Associate Customer Support Engineer

Your primary responsibility as an Associate Technical Support Engineer will be to provide remote support of Cognex designed systems and solutions to system integrators or direct end user customers. This role has a high degree of customer interface and is expected to provide a high level of customer service and satisfaction. Typical Industry applications include: parcel and pallet conveyors, sorters, interfacing with in-motion scales, dimensioners, label printer/applicators, scanners and sensors and PLC controls software. Our TSE’s are often the first call that our customers make when they need support. Our TSE’s can solve technical issues remotely, exhibit a Customer First attitude, and Persevere until the job gets done correctly. TSE’s are based in a Cognex Office in different locations globally.

Essential Functions

• Learning to provide front-line product technical support submitted through web or phone call for the most common problems by asking meaningful troubleshooting questions, providing clarification on customer questions, directing customer to useful resources, etc.
• Maintain high customer satisfaction level through timely, attentive, and polite interactions
• Maintain open communication and provide consistent case updates to customer.
• Learns common troubleshooting steps to reproduce customer reported issues. Works with another team member to resolve or provide suitable workarounds.
• Create, update, and close cases in CRM.
• Maintain complete and coherent case notes, and ensure all relevant data is captured.
• Contributes to technical bulletins and knowledge base articles that are easy to understand for non-technical and technical audience both internal and external.
• Contributes to the creation of internal FAQs that are shared with the Technical Support Team.
• Escalate product issues to more senior Technical Support team members.
• Works with Technical Support team to respond timely to requests from engineering for additional information or troubleshooting on customer setup.
• Participate in required technical trainings to keep skills up to date with current technology, new products and industry standards or trends
• Works within existing technical support processes and begins to provide input on improvement based on employee and customer feedback.

Knowledge, Skills & Abilities

• Developing ability to guide customers in how to use Cognex products and explain the cause of trouble in an easy-to-understand manner.
• Understand when and how to react and maintain composure and professionalism when handling different types of customers.
• Understand different types of communication and when to apply them.
• Active listening skills and the ability to gain a full and accurate understanding of the customer point of view.
• Ability to demonstrate empathy and establish a good customer relationship
• Developing ability to de-escalate customer frustrations and maintain focus on the issue at hand.
• Learning how to set realistic customer expectations.
• Basic knowledge of image processing, analysis, and deep learning techniques.
• Basic knowledge of machine vision concepts, optics, or lighting techniques for machine vision applications.
• Gaining familiarity with all relevant Cognex products/ technology (DataMan barcode reading, In-Sight platforms, VisionPro, Deep Learning, etc.)
• Basic knowledge of networking or industrial communication protocols such as TCP, FTP, EIP, Devicenet, Profinet, SLMP, Modbus, etc.
• Learning to replicate setups, reproduce issues, and resolve problems efficiently.
• Understanding when you need more information from the customer and learning how to ask questions to get appropriate information.
• Basic knowledge of factory automation process, industrial controls, industrial robotic controls, and PLC ladder logic programming.
• Basic understanding of software programming and debugging of both script-based and object-oriented applications.
• Basic ability to read and interpret wire and engineering diagrams.
• Basic ability to read programming documentation.
• Basic knowledge of specific programming languages in use by Cognex (Javascript, C#, C++, VB)
• Basic knowledge of electronics, electrical circuits, hardware, and wiring.
• Developing the ability to discern when to escalate a case and what information is relevant to include when escalating to other team members.
• Ability to prioritize, multitask and work under pressure
• Strong note taking and organization skills and the ability to effectively hand-off cases

Minimum Requirements

• Bachelor’s or Master’s Degree in technical field or equivalent work experience.
• 0-2 years related experience in technical support in the electronics, robotics, manufacturing, automation, or IT industries.
• Prior customer service experience preferred.
• Ability to travel internationally as required.
• English language proficiency (spoken and written)
• Ability to speak on the phone for extended periods of time
• Ability to use computer equipment or work in office environment
• Strong attention to detail and communication skills and ability to work within a team