Colonist jobs (particularly early colonisation)

[Tisifoni12]

Here I'm particularly thinking of the early stages of colonisation

Some jobs clearly have a specific role; geologists, botanists, medics, scientists
But what do 'officers' do; admin, command, security (health and safety) ?
And engineers, as the droids do the building and repairs, do they do research ?
Engineers and officers just seem to end up filling gaps
If you've only got an initial colony of 12 people, maybe 24, do you really need to staff for example the grocer; surely that could be 'open access' with maybe a rota for staff doing necessary stocking, cleaning, etc. Or would droids do the menial stuff ?

 

[abbayarra]

You can check the wiki, it is helpful.
Engineers do the building of stuff such as machine parts and electronics.
Security officers seem to be used for security stations. Only really helpful when you have a storm or cold wave as those minimize the sanity(Morale?) loss.

 

[YertyL]

Every building has "best workers" in its info, so it depends on what you want to build. Security outposts are IMO not worth it unfortunately, but you can use officers for covert ops if you have the "space race" DLC.
You also do not need an early grocer or other staffed comfort buildings in most cases. High comfort helps with getting martianborn colonists, but before you can set up schools and universities it is generally best to fly in colonists from earth instead.
So you generally only want to prevent colonists from falling into red comfort so they do not get a morale penalty or become earthsick. To achieve this, decent housing comfort (living complexes, not apartments) and satisfying 2 out of the 4 colonist wants is enough: Every colonist wants food and has 3 interests depending on their specialization, see here. As you can see, social+relaxation via a gym, park and/or amphitheater do that job for everyone but engineers and geologists. If you use a gym, colonist with the social interest, including geologists, will visit, become fit, and gain the exercise interest which the gym also satisfies, so really you need grocers/diners only for engineers.