Ousman Deenmahomed: always plugged into change
At the age of 10, Ousman Deenmahomed discovers electricity in a way no textbook would recommend: he sticks a fork into a socket. An immediate electric shock follows. Fortunately, he escapes without serious injury. But rather than simply learning his lesson, he wants to understand. What is electric current? How does it work?
What follows is more cautious, but just as curious. While other children play football, Ousman takes apart and repairs the fans, radios and blenders at home. After school, he often stops by the family welding workshop to watch and lend a hand. His parents realise this is more than a passing interest and enrol him in part-time electronics and mechanics courses. He later trains in refrigeration.
The fork, meanwhile, can finally resume a normal career in the kitchen.
Now aged 30, Ousman has reached another milestone at Avipro Processing: he has been promoted to Team Leader. His journey with the company began on 24 April 2018, when he was 22. With a diploma in Electrical Engineering, he joined the refrigeration maintenance team. A year later, he became a Senior Technician.
His work is primarily hands-on. It involves diagnosing faults, testing, adjusting, repairing and sometimes modifying equipment. When he first joined Avipro, Ousman did much of his own learning to master the machinery. Just two months after arriving, he was already working on technical projects, including modifications to the condenser and spiral freezer.
Today, he supervises three people and oversees the processing facility’s refrigeration system.
His expertise is all the more valuable given the shortage of workers in industrial maintenance. And demand is set to grow. Avipro’s future processing facility, expected in late 2027, will be larger, more automated and more technologically advanced. It will incorporate a new generation of equipment.
Ousman does not see these developments as a cause for concern. He considers them part of the job. “I’ve grown used to change. In our field, there is always something evolving,” he explains. “Change is part of my job.” He is even considering taking artificial intelligence courses at his own expense to better understand the technologies that will be introduced at the new facility.
This is perhaps where his story speaks most strongly to young people. Industrial maintenance is about much more than repairing a broken machine. It spans electricity, mechanics, refrigeration, automation and plumbing. You work with your hands, but also with your head. Above all, you never really stop learning.
Ousman already has his next goal in sight: becoming a Maintenance Manager. His advice to anyone considering this path? “You have to persevere if you want to succeed in this field,” he says.
Since that first eventful encounter with an electrical socket, Ousman’s spark has never faded.