I Pity future of Industry

[Deleted member 72666]

Early last year my neighbour tells me his son is looking for work experience and is at college and wants an apprenticeship , I told him to tell his son to come and see me , I spoke to the lad and made arrangements for him to join me on a rewire , he did 2 days and then he had 2 days at college , the following week the same , I told him all the final testing and certs will be done next week but would be on a day that he is at college , he was disappointed he would miss it , so I delayed it and sent him a message , I got a text message early in the morning saying he is sick and can't make it , He lives 5 doors from me , I popped round to see him , his father said he's not here , he's round his girlfriends and went to a party last night ,
WTF , I lost 2 days for him , all for him to give me crap , ,,,,

That's a bummer!
Btw where are you sat in your avatar? It looks very much like the promenade in Larnaca.

 

[telectrix]

treat 'em mean. keep 'em keen....... oh no, that's women.

 

[Deleted member 72666]

I bet you are a joy to work with!!

You've got to establish the rules at the outset then hopefully everything falls into place.

 

[R G]

That's a bummer!
Btw where are you sat in your avatar? It looks very much like the promenade in Larnaca.

That was in Cannes , about 6 years ago on my 50th mate , BTW Im on the right lol

 

[Deleted member 72666]

That was in Cannes , about 6 years ago on my 50th mate , BTW Im on the right lol

Who's the redhead?

 

[R G]

Thats not the misses , just another old dog ..

 

[guest119]

Tallow on the scroat, not that Trefol green stuff.

Boydy

 

[2na]

Cotty I'm not there to be a friend, I'm trying to teach him. Out of work we are good friends, but at work, it's business as usual.

Another thing I do is that if a tool is lost, they replace it. After the first week, they never put floorboards down without getting the torch out to have a look......

 

[ferg]

To be absolutely honest I was a terrible apprentice.
Cheeky, knew everything, terrible timekeeping but never used my phone at work......... mainly because there were no mobiles then

I think my only saving grace was that I wasn't lazy.

I went through several mentors till I eventually ( and very, very fortunately for me.) got one with the patience to work out how to get the best out of me and get me to realise I was acting like a fanny.

If I had my time over I would do it differently

Youth is completely wasted on the young. BUT they are just kids really and being a mentor is much more than just telling someone what to do.

 

[trev]

Ferg to some extent you're right but when I had apprentices I was there to teach them 1) How to do the job and 2) How to go on at work

 

[Brightspark2]

They need guidance, so get him told.

One of the first few days my apprentice started to get his phone out all the time, so I told him straight. Now he only gets it out on his dinner.

Tell him to get his hands out his pocket and to ask you what you want him to do next. Tell him he should be watching you and knowing what tools you want next. I remember having to be told things when I first started.

IMO this all part of the training for them in the first few days/weeks. My apprentice is now very good to the point that other tradesmen on site will notice and compliment him, he's only been with me 9 months.

You need to be teaching him, I take it as part of my job to teach him and develop him to be a good electrician. There not just cheap labour as some companies like to think.

 

[7029 dave]

Get rid then!!!

 

[Knobhead]

From what I’ve read so far I wouldn’t let an apprentice near any of you.
Once you take on the role of instructor you take on responsibilities as does the apprentice. I was a company approved instructor before I came out of my time, as an apprentice I would have a younger apprentice with me. You learn a damn site quicker with someone asking questions.

The company was one of the biggest multinationals and had a good outlook on training and apprenticeships. If you put the effort in they would bend over backwards to help.
It was drummed in to tradesmen that the apprentice is there to learn, its part of their job to teach.
Years later with another company I went for formal qualifications to teach tradesmen to teach apprentices.

The apprentice isn’t the gofor, teaboy, etc

One tested my patience with using his phone, I banned him from using it. He thought he’d got me sussed, vanish to the bogs. A fire hose over the door sorted that out! He should have turned the keypad tones off.

 

[Des 56]

Leaving aside for the moment the attitude of the apprentice on the job,lets look at the attractions of the trade

It was (past tense)a respected trade
It was well paid
It was a trade (unlike most others) that required the practitioner to have a few polished marbles in his upstairs
It was taught and mentored by others who came before that beneited from all those positives

Wind on to the present and the attractions of this trade

It is diluted
It is practised by a percentage who may not have enough polished marbles up top,because
It does not require the same skill level to practice as it once required
It is a add on only(domestic) to other manual trades
It is but one of the skills of the multi trade industrial tech operative
It can be a physical and dirty job
It still requires more paper based admin than all others

It is competing against many other occupations that require the polished marbles in this IT age
The IT jobs are better paid
The IT jobs don't mean getting dirty fingernails and taking your work everywhere you go after your daytime hours are done

These are some of the reasons many would not even consider this occupation
It follows that where there is take up amongst whats left of the apprentice electrican candidates,the pot is skimming the lower reaches

Some may be failed wanna be IT operatives and this trade ends up as a reluctant "have to take some sort of job"


Interest or lack of it,its understandable if not excusable

 

[Dcf]

I've watched over the years the decline of apprentice standards all of which have been well documented in previous posts.
as des said it was respected trade with wide and interesting scope of work.
not so much now due to things like off site manufacturing , putting bits of the trade into the "specialist" categories and the like.

my old gaffer always had at least 1 x first year, second year, third year and fourth year apprentice at any time.
he was quite clever in the way he played you by putting you up against the older apprentices on a job and getting you to out perform the older lads.
built up your confidence and ability without you even knowing it and was getting you ready to deal with life as a time served man.
i found if you kept a laddie interested it was half the battle and to make him part of your team
so instilling a work ethic and a mutual respect in them.

when all these muppets leave school these days they get told they can be anything they want to be
couple that with todays i want it all and want it now with no effort on my part attitude and its no wonder old men like me are grumpy