Ranks and Positions
Engineering Officer
| The Chief engineers of Starfleet must be fast thinking, adaptable and, perhaps most importantly, innovative. |
Chief engineers have always played a vital role aboard Starfleet vessels as their role includes total responsibility for the operation and maintenance of the ship’s key systems. The status of the warp and impulse engines are particularly important, and the Chief engineer often has to improvise solutions under tremendous amounts of pressure if systems break down or are damaged. |
| The career path a future Chief engineer may follow can be quite varied; Chief engineer Montgomery Scott of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 accumulated many years of experience before his promotion, while Chief engineer Geordi La Forge of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D had a much more varied career before being promoted to Lieutenant, and was assigned the role despite reservations over his inexperience by Chief engineer Logan in 2364. | |
| Chief engineers are primarily appointed for their engineering skills and they are expected to have a wide knowledge of non-Starfleet technologies, as they will often find themselves having to develop some form of effective link between incompatible systems. | |
| The role includes a significant amount of personnel management as well as practical work. | |
| Impromptu inventors | One of the primary roles of the Chief engineer is to liaise with the assistant Chief engineer and assign duties on a daily or weekly basis, often working out the duty rosters and logs in advance to cover engineering systems that may be needed for mission-specific requirements. |
| Regardless of past experiences, the role and duties of the Chief engineer remain the same on all Starfleet vessels, with even Lt B’Elanna Torres embracing Starfleet protocols when she was appointed Chief engineer of the USS Voyager NCC-74656 by captain Kathryn Janeway after they arrived in the Delta Quadrant. | |
| The majority of the Chief engineer’s time is spent in main engineering overseeing a team of duty engineers who carry out many of the routine tasks required in the running of a starship’s energy production and engines. | |
| The Chief engineer will usually miss no opportunity to work on the engineering systems within their vessel, and must have a practical working knowledge of all the tools that are employed within engineering to repair, recalibrate, and scan the myriad components installed within a starship |