Occupation

Reliability engineer

Reliability engineers work out why equipment fails and change the design, maintenance strategy, or operating practice so it fails less. The role depends on patient data work: failure histories, condition monitoring, and honest investigation of what actually went wrong.

Also known as: Maintenance and reliability engineer · Asset reliability engineer

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Occupation content

Part of Engineering and technical design

A visual day in the work

What the work involves

  1. Analyse failure history and downtime records to find bad actors and recurring modes.

  2. Lead root-cause investigations after significant equipment failures.

  3. Develop maintenance strategies and criticality rankings for plant and assets.

  4. Interpret vibration, thermography, oil analysis, and other condition-monitoring data.

  5. Specify design or spares changes that remove a known failure mode.

  6. Track reliability measures over time and report on whether interventions worked.

Entry-route stepper

How people commonly enter

  1. A bachelor's degree in mechanical, electrical, or industrial engineering.

  2. An engineering technology diploma plus significant maintenance experience.

  3. Progression from a maintenance technician or planner role into reliability engineering.

  4. Recognised maintenance and reliability certification taken alongside technical experience.

Typical training: Bachelor's degree

Licensing: Certification common, not usually required

Work-context map

Typical work context

  • Team based
  • Lab or workshop
  • Desk based
  • Client sites
  • Varied work

Team based · Lab or workshop · Desk based · Client sites · Varied work

Related interests

  • Investigative (analytical)
  • Realistic (hands-on)
  • Conventional (organizing)

Investigative (analytical) · Realistic (hands-on) · Conventional (organizing)

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