Matt Rhoades has been selected as Brookville Equipment Corporation’s Employee of the Month for November.
Matt has been employed at Brookville Equipment Corporation for the past 13 years. Matt has worked in final assembly throughout his entirety at BROOKVILLE. For about half of his career here, he worked as a Mechanical Assembler and an Electrical Assembler. After January of 2019, he moved to Crew Leader for Mining, Mechanical – Final Assembly, and he was later promoted to Supervisor for the same department in 2022.
As a Supervisor of the Mining, Mechanical Assembly group, Matt’s main duties are to meet deadlines to ensure delivery schedules, assign employees to projects or tasks, ensure parts availability, and meet internal deadlines.
Matt’s favorite type of equipment to work on is mining equipment, specifically 30 ton locomotives. He says, “30 ton locomotives are like the semi-trucks of the underground mining world. They are huge, massive vehicles which are incredibly powerful machines.” Matt has learned a lot since starting his career at Brookville Equipment. He originally went to college to be a secondary education teacher, but after a couple years of sub teaching, he wanted to find something more reliable. He stumbled onto Brookville Equipment Corporation and never looked back on his teaching career. During his time at BROOKVILLE, he has been taught countless on the job skills. He did not have prior experience before his employment about electrical systems, it was all taught in house. He also has learned a lot of his managerial skills from on the job experience. Matt says, “In my supervisor role, I get to teach a lot of the new hires who come in. I get to train them and watch them grow, while implement the skills I have taught them into their careers. In a way, I still get to use my teaching degree, which I really love.” Matt expressed, he already had a working knowledge of the mechanical side of his job, as he grew up on his family farm. Matt is the 6th generation to own his family’s farm, which has been around since 1847. At the farm, Matt focuses on raising beef cattle, as well as corn and soy bean crops.
Although Matt has always excelled at his career, it doesn’t mean it didn’t come with its own set of challenges. Matt shared when he first started, he had only every worked on his family farm and as a substitute teacher, therefore, he didn’t have much knowledge about how the company’s equipment actually worked. Luckily, BROOKVILLE is willing to train people on the job, and that is where Matt learned all he knows. Some other challenges he faced was in the electrical department. For about three years, he worked in Electrical Assembly, where he started with zero knowledge. This was all new for him – through on the job training, he was able to learn how to read a blueprint and apply it to the unit. He also had a helping hand in working on the streetcars during that time, which also created a challenge for him.
When Matt was asked, “How do you keep yourself motivated at work?,” he said “I am always trying to find ways to improve the different processes with have in Mining – Final Assembly. I want to make my team as efficient as possible and it is my job to figure out how to make that happen. He says, “I love being able to teach someone about our equipment. They may come in with zero experience about what we do here or how to work on our equipment and I am able to teach and guide them. It is really incredible watching people go from little to zero knowledge about our equipment to turning it into a vast amount of knowledge.” Matt expressed one of the things he loves most about his job is he loves to see a project from start to finish. He loves being able to see the units go from a bare frame to a fully operational unit. Matt also said, “I love the people I get to work with. There is a really great group of people who work at BROOKVILLE and I enjoy all the time I get to spend with them.” Matt truly enjoys what he gets to do every day, and does a great job at his duties.
One of the most important lessons Matt has learned through his career is to always work hard, while trying to do your best each and every day. Being diligent with your work ethic will pay off later down the road. If you continue to work hard each and every day, it can lead to bigger and better things throughout your career.
During his free time, he enjoys farming, hunting, fishing, as well as spending time with his wife and their son.