Operating Engineers and Other Construction Equipment Operators Onet SOC Code 47-2073.00 Career Description: Operate one or several types of power construction equipment, such as motor graders, bulldozers, scrapers, compressors, pumps, derricks, shovels, tractors, or front-end loaders to excavate, move, and grade earth, erect structures, or pour concrete or other hard surface pavement. May repair and maintain equipment in addition to other duties. Related Clusters:

Career Summary:

• Learn and follow safety regulations.
• Take actions to avoid potential hazards and obstructions such as utility lines, other equipment, other workers, and falling objects.
• Adjust handwheels and depress pedals to control attachments such as blades, buckets, scrapers, and swing booms.
• Start engines, move throttles, switches, and levers, and depress pedals to operate machines such as bulldozers, trench excavators, road graders, and backhoes.
• Locate underground services, such as pipes and wires, prior to beginning work.
• Monitor operations to ensure that health and safety standards are met.
• Align machines, cutterheads, or depth gauge makers with reference stakes and guidelines or ground, or position equipment following hand signals of other workers.
• Load and move dirt, rocks, equipment, and materials, using trucks, crawler tractors, power cranes, shovels, graders, and related equipment.
• Drive and maneuver equipment equipped with blades in successive passes over working areas to remove topsoil, vegetation, and rocks, and to distribute and level earth or terrain.
• Coordinate machine actions with other activities, positioning or moving loads in response to hand or audio signals from crew members.
• Operate tractors and bulldozers to perform such tasks as clearing land, mixing sludge, trimming backfills, and building roadways and parking lots.
• Repair and maintain equipment, making emergency adjustments or assisting with major repairs as necessary.
• Check fuel supplies at sites to ensure adequate availability.
• Connect hydraulic hoses, belts, mechanical linkages, or power takeoff shafts to tractors.
• Operate loaders to pull out stumps, rip asphalt or concrete, rough-grade properties, bury refuse, or perform general cleanup.
• Select and fasten bulldozer blades or other attachments to tractors, using hitches.
• Test atmosphere for adequate oxygen and explosive conditions when working in confined spaces.
• Operate compactors, scrapers, and rollers to level, compact, and cover refuse at disposal grounds.
• Talk to clients, and study instructions, plans, and diagrams, in order to establish work requirements.
• Signal operators to guide movement of tractor-drawn machines.
• Operate road watering, oiling, and rolling equipment, and street sealing equipment such as chip spreaders.
• Perform specialized work, using equipment such as pile drivers, dredging rigs, drillers, and concrete pumpers.
• Push other equipment when extra traction or assistance is required.
• Keep records of material and equipment usage, and problems encountered.
• Drive tractor-trailer trucks to move equipment from site to site.
• Turn valves to control air and water output of compressors and pumps.
• Operate equipment to demolish and remove debris, and to remove snow from streets, roads, and parking lots.
• Operate conveyors to remove grit and debris from digesters.
• Compile cost estimates for jobs.

• Building and Construction - Knowledge of materials, methods, and the tools involved in the construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads.
• Mechanical - Knowledge of machines and tools, including their designs, uses, repair, and maintenance.
• Building and Construction - Knowledge of materials, methods, and the tools involved in the construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads.
• Mechanical - Knowledge of machines and tools, including their designs, uses, repair, and maintenance.
• Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
• Public Safety and Security - Knowledge of relevant equipment, policies, procedures, and strategies to promote effective local, state, or national security operations for the protection of people, data, property, and institutions.

• Heavy equipment operators usually learn the skill on the job. Operators should have a good sense of balance, the ability to judge distance, and good eye-hand-foot coordination. Employers prefer hiring high school graduates. Some construction equipment operators train in formal 3-year operating engineer apprenticeship programs administered by union-management committees of the International Union of Operating Engineers and the Associated General Contractors of America. Because apprentices learn to operate a wider variety of machines than do other beginners, they usually have better job opportunities. Apprenticeship programs consist of at least 3 years, or 6,000 hours, of on-the-job training and 144 hours a year of related classroom instruction. For more general information on this topic, contact the National Center for Construction Education and Research online.

  Military job training consists of between 4 and 12 weeks of classroom instruction including practice operating construction equipment. Course content typically includes operation of different types of construction equipment; and the maintenance and repair of equipment. Further training occurs on the job and through advanced courses. The Army and Navy offer certified apprenticeship programs for one specialty in this occupation.

• Equipment Maintenance - Performing routine maintenance on equipment and determining when and what kind of maintenance is needed.

• Operating Vehicles, Mechanized Devices, or Equipment - Running, maneuvering, navigating, or driving vehicles or mechanized equipment, such as forklifts, passenger vehicles, aircraft, or water craft.
• Handling and Moving Objects - Using hands and arms in handling, installing, positioning, and moving materials, and manipulating things.

• Realistic - Realistic occupations frequently involve work activities that include practical, hands-on problems and solutions. They often deal with plants, animals, and real-world materials like wood, tools, and machinery. Many of the occupations require working outside, and do not involve a lot of paperwork or working closely with others.
• Second Interest High-Point - Secondary-Cutoff/Rank Descriptiveness

• Dependability - Job requires being reliable, responsible, and dependable, and fulfilling obligations.
• Attention to Detail - Job requires being careful about detail and thorough in completing work tasks.
• Cooperation - Job requires being pleasant with others on the job and displaying a good-natured, cooperative attitude.
• Integrity - Job requires being honest and ethical.
• Initiative - Job requires a willingness to take on responsibilities and challenges.
• Achievement/Effort - Job requires establishing and maintaining personally challenging achievement goals and exerting effort toward mastering tasks.
• Persistence - Job requires persistence in the face of obstacles.
• Independence - Job requires developing one's own ways of doing things, guiding oneself with little or no supervision, and depending on oneself to get things done.
• Analytical Thinking - Job requires analyzing information and using logic to address work-related issues and problems.
• Adaptability/Flexibility - Job requires being open to change (positive or negative) and to considerable variety in the workplace.
• Concern for Others - Job requires being sensitive to others' needs and feelings and being understanding and helpful on the job.
• Leadership - Job requires a willingness to lead, take charge, and offer opinions and direction.
• Self Control - Job requires maintaining composure, keeping emotions in check, controlling anger, and avoiding aggressive behavior, even in very difficult situations.

• Moral Values - Workers on this job are never pressured to do things that go against their sense of right and wrong.
• Independence - Workers on this job do their work alone.
• Support-Mean Extent - Occupations that satisfy this work value offer supportive management that stands behind employees. Corresponding needs are Company Policies, Supervision: Human Relations and Supervision: Technical.
• Company Policies and Practices - Workers on this job are treated fairly by the company.
• Supervision, Human Relations - Workers on this job have supervisors who back up their workers with management.
• Supervision, Technical - Workers on this job have supervisors who train their workers well.

Wage and salary data provided by:

• Bureau of Labor Statistics, Tennessee Department of Labor website
• TN Department of Labor & Workforce Development website
• Bureau of Economic Analysis website