Reason #55: Being Needed Means Being Used (Until You’re Fired)

For a while, you will believe the place cannot run without you. You are the one who “makes it happen.” You translate vague leadership wishes into hardware that ships, you unstick the build when the pilot line stalls, you answer the questions nobody else can even parse. Then you remember the part they never say out loud. You are still replaceable. The market is still crowded. Your indispensableness does not make you unfirable. See Reason #34

Mechanical engineering is unusually good at turning you into a catch basin. Broadness gets sold as freedom, but in practice it makes you the default owner of anything that touches atoms. Demand modeling, supplier chasing, fixture triage, packaging drop test drama, “just run the numbers,” “just update the model,” “just make a quick drawing,” “just lead the meeting.” That is not leadership noticing your talent. That is the organization exploiting a job description with soft edges. See Reason #8

And because you are a cost code, not a revenue line, the gratitude is always temporary. Every new productivity hack comes with a new dashboard, a new cadence, and a new expectation that you can do two roles with one headcount. When the quarter tightens, your “range” is not rewarded. It is treated as proof you can absorb more. See Reason #23

Here is the darker part. Being the catch basin means you also become the blame basin. The more hats you wear, the more ways you can be “responsible” for something slipping. A supplier is late, a test slot is unavailable, a requirement changes, a VP wants it by Tuesday anyway. You write the memo, you own the action items, you stand in front of the slide with your name on it. In ME, visible impact is shared, but accountability sticks. See Reason #33

Those little dings add up. Missed dates you did not control. “Communication issues” when you refuse to promise miracles. “Not strategic” when you tell them physics has a schedule. Meanwhile your calendar is eaten alive by check-ins and “alignment,” which guarantees the work never gets a clean flow anyway. See Reason #42

Even your peers quietly benefit from it. If you are the fixer, everyone else gets to stay in their lane. Then review season comes and the lane-keepers look stable while you look messy. And in a field where everyone is competing for a small number of good seats, stability wins. See Reason #6

You will be proud to be depended on right up until the day they depend on you as the explanation.