In 1990, the Berlin Wall crumbled, Margaret Thatcher resigned as British Prime Minister, Martina Navratilova won Wimbledon and 16-year-old Martin Round started his career at JELD-WEN. Today, Martin is a product engineer for JELD-WEN at our Sheffield, England plant where he recently reflected on his more than 30-year career with JELD-WEN. Martin revealed what he loves about JELD-WEN, how his career has grown over the decades and even shares a celebrity sighting on the job – spoiler alert, it involves a British Royal.
09/25/2023
From youth trainee to product engineer
Q: How did you get started working at JELD-WEN and what is your role today?
A: I first started when I was 16 years old on a Youth Training Scheme (YTS). I made £27.50 a week for the first year. Then I moved on to an apprenticeship for three years as a wood machinist. During that time, I became the youngest team leader.
Today, I’m a product engineer at the Sheffield, England plant where I focus on design, implementation and optimization processes for JELD-WEN. I’ve been in this role for about six years.
Q: What do you like about working for JELD-WEN?
Working with so many different people over the years has been a pleasure and I have developed some great friendships.
JELD-WEN talks about having the right talent and the right people making the decisions. I can honestly say that today’s management team is great. They are approachable and helpful and they communicate well.
Q: What are some experiences you’ve had that really stick out over your 30+ years with the company?
A: I have had some wonderful experiences over the past 33 years. I met Prince Edward on his official visit to South Yorkshire when he toured our JELD-WEN manufacturing plant! He visited our plant because a new factory opened and it produced 2,500 boarded and hemlock doors every week and produced 40,000 other internal doors. The new factory brought a lot of jobs to the area.
I have also been fortunate enough to visit some of JELD-WEN’s other plants in North America, Finland and Denmark. My current position has also allowed me to develop my skills through numerous training and development courses.
On my visit to North America, I received training on how to set up, program, run and maintain the Progressive Trim-line. The Trim-line is a computer numerical control (CNC) type trimline that trims a door to its correct size. I believe, the Progressive Trim-line, with its unrivaled capacity, was and remains the heartbeat of the factory and has helped improve our output, quality and profitability.
Q: What does the future at JELD-WEN look like to you?
A: In the future, I see the company investing in more advanced technology and machinery so that we can stay up-to-date and remain competitive.
Personally, I have no regrets, whatsoever of staying with this company for 30 years. I would like to keep progressing within my current role as a process engineer, which I had no experience in before. I feel JELD-WEN has invested in me personally by allowing me to learn 3D printing and design, Excel levels 1, 2 and 3, CNC programming and much more.
I’ve been approached many times to work somewhere else and I’ve been asked by former coworkers if I wanted to work with them at other companies. I feel my loyalty is with JELD-WEN because of the skills they taught me over the past three decades.
Q: What would you say to young people starting out who are searching for meaningful work experiences?
A: Starting out on a YTS, then moving on to an apprenticeship which gave me four years of training was hard at first. But it pays to just stick with it and work hard. The reward will come later.
