Vanessa Hernandez is a process engineer for the General Assembly department for the Hyundai Motorgroup Metaplant America. She’s one of the many professionals that make sure every vehicle rolling off the line is up to Hyundai standards, from the paint job to the welding.
“We’re not only focusing on the quality of the vehicle, but also the process for the workers,” explained Hernandez.
But her journey to the line began years ago as a high school student. She was a part of the engineering program at Herschel V. Jenkins High School in Savannah, which brought her to Georgia Southern University to pursue a degree in electrical engineering.
“I started at the Armstrong campus in Savannah, where I took a few of my initial classes for engineering,” she said. “Then I transferred over to the Statesboro campus to finish up.”
But she didn’t know what her future career would look like.
“I knew I wanted to be a part of something innovative, something new, something different,” she explained. “Some of my previous engineering jobs were engineering-related, but there was nothing new that made me want to keep pursuing that specific career.”
That was when the Hyundai plant arrived, opening up a new world of job opportunities to the region. The Georgia Southern Eagle could see the future she was dreaming of materializing right in front of her.
“I had the opportunity very early on to start here at Hyundai,” she said. “I became one of the first engineers within the General Assembly Department.”
But she was ready for the challenge.
“As somebody who’s starting a new job, and even outside of college, you don’t ever feel that you are 100% prepared for the job that you’re going into on the first day,” she said. “I think what helps is if you can reference things that you learned.”
And she learned a lot during her time at Georgia Southern.
“There are different systems and different areas in the electrical engineering field at Hyundai,” she explained. “But because I came from that engineering background at Georgia Southern, it was really easy for me to hit the ground rolling on day one.”
But she’s still learning something new every day, and her time at Hyundai has taught her to embrace whatever challenges come her way.
“They’ve taught me,” she said. “They’ve pushed me to different limits. They’ve taught me not to be scared of challenges. I think before, with something new or a change, it was very terrifying not knowing if you were going to be able to handle it. I think the fascinating thing is that with good leadership, they know how much you can handle. They push you, but they work with you to make sure you excel.”