Whats happening with youngsters

[GMES]

Firstly hello guys, it's been a while since I posted or did any staffing but work is crazy which is leaving very little time for anything else, which leads nicely into the reason for this thread.
What's happening with the young electricians of today. They either seem to want the earth and its mother or seem really uninterested, I've been trying to get someone to help us out and its bloody hard work . I've been in talks with a young spark who 7 days ago all but said he wanted to come to us and wasn't happy where he was, I know the lad and offered him an immediate start but he's proving hard work to sort a start date.
Then another lad two weeks ago rang me asking for work to essentially finish his nvq portfolio so I offered him some work immediately only for me to chase him 2 days later where he said I've got a job so no thanks.
I'm not going to paint all youngsters the same but the ones I'm encountering lately leave a lot to be desired, the first question seems to be , how much will I earn, what other perks are there, do I get a van etc etc surely the 1st question should be asking about their duties

 

[westward10]

I was a youth in the 70s and look back on it with happy memories, would I like to live that era now no way.

 

[SparkySy]

Don't get me wrong we had a great childhood but looking back on it as a parent you can now see why it was good, as my parents didn't want us to go without just as their parents before did. I think technology has a lot to do with it too, when I was growing up we only had 3 channels and no mobile devices or internet! But we had real aspersions of a career that would last a lifetime and now have one, most jobs now are temporary or 0hrs, a lot of kids these days wanna be YouTube stars or famous. Ffs

 

[Andy78]

The problem is that most of our memories are happy ones as those are the memories that stay. The ones full of positive emotion are easier to retain whereas other memories such as details without emotional attachment are more difficult to recall, and intense negative memories may get erased or suppressed.
It's proven that rose tinted memories are a psychological reality.

It's easy to forget there was plenty to moan about society in every era.
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But we had real aspersions of a career that would last a lifetime and now have one, most jobs now are temporary or 0hrs, a lot of kids these days wanna be YouTube stars or famous. Ffs

Of course no child ever aspired to be like George Best, Mick Jagger, Evel Knievel, Douglas Bader, etc

 

[HappyHippyDad]

Firstly hello guys, it's been a while since I posted or did any staffing but work is crazy which is leaving very little time for anything else, which leads nicely into the reason for this thread.
What's happening with the young electricians of today. They either seem to want the earth and its mother or seem really uninterested, I've been trying to get someone to help us out and its bloody hard work . I've been in talks with a young spark who 7 days ago all but said he wanted to come to us and wasn't happy where he was, I know the lad and offered him an immediate start but he's proving hard work to sort a start date.
Then another lad two weeks ago rang me asking for work to essentially finish his nvq portfolio so I offered him some work immediately only for me to chase him 2 days later where he said I've got a job so no thanks.
I'm not going to paint all youngsters the same but the ones I'm encountering lately leave a lot to be desired, the first question seems to be , how much will I earn, what other perks are there, do I get a van etc etc surely the 1st question should be asking about their duties

Good to see you back Glen. I was only looking at your profile yesterday thinking it had been a long time since you last wrote.

 

[Darkwood]

Maybe it's you they don't like @GMES

 

[SparkySy]

@Andy78
I'm not saying that there arent exceptions to that and to be fair they all had jobs for life!

 

[Outtaluck]

Wow. My mind is blown.

Okay, so we have a new generation of people, aka Millennials, that ate useless. Generally, everyone here agrees. The ideas stated about this undoubtedly lean to the upbringing of these indivuals. I see complaints about can't punish them… those are the results of laws/ordinances passed, which I am pretty sure didn't happen by the generation being degraded while still in their mother's womb.

Secondly, I see discussion about job loyalty, keeping promises, ethics/morals. I see it being, again, the generation is just poor. Okay, so let's take the simple guy going for a job, while he knows that applying for one at a time is a bad idea, he applies for many at once, categorized in his head in most to least wanted. For some strange reason, he probably already knows about job description, thanks to facebook, glassdoor, twitter, etc. So, when the calls come in, he's going to ask for the information pertinent to him to aid in that decision. Probably because he was taught and had it ingrained in him, "Go to school, get an education, so you don't have to live this hard life. Live a life of luxury and have your choice of jobs by going to school."

As far as no call backs after multiple job offers? Does anyone here who is in charge of hiring call back each and every job applicant who isn't a candidate? Absolutely not. But, everyone expects this new generation to at least treat the people handing out jobs as god's simply by offering a job that pays more than the person hiring could make at the applicants age. Nevermind that typically, wages for blue collars don't keep up with inflation. It used to be 25% (1 week)'s check would cover expenses. Now it's 75%. So then people wonder why. This young generation sees nothing more than people getting fired arbitrarily for whatever reason, most probable lack of education, but absolutely no one in the professional fields they work in offer mentorship that means anything… unless, of course, they're getting paid for it. When something dumb/stupid happens, this younger generation hears about how much money they cost the company and then they're told they're out of a job, surmising that money, not people is the most important thing. So, they'll change to be loyal to money.

Then, everyone complains about how weak, no work ethics, uneducated the "youngsters" are today, and we start into the next, "ya know, back in my day I had to walk 10 miles uphill both ways in 6 feet of snow barefoot, and you's think you gonna get off that easy?" I believe the answer to what is going on is the previous generation has made it all about themselves, then expects the impossible from the next, then blaming that younger generation for their own shortcomings.

 

[Darkwood]

We used to have a lengthy thread that addressed the dumbing down of education, I went through college back in the eighties and it was not easy with a pretty high comparable failure rate, since then we have had successive government lowering the educational standards to give good political figures on education, consequently the trades have also had to dumb down the qualifying criteria, we now see apprentices through no fault of their own passing electrical courses with limited maths and physics knowledge and skills, such is the problem across the educational board we have seen companies, universities, colleges been forced to lower the criteria for access and pass rates of the exams, this unfortunately is where we are now so when seasoned sparky reflects on the newer generation it isn't an attack at them directly, it is an attack at the whole education system in general, if one is one of those young ones leaving school then you know no comparison to judge your education, those of us that are now in our 40 + have seen the changes over the decades, I personally have had about 15 apprentices under my wing and the last 15ys has really lost my hope for the industry when we see supposed GCSE passed apprentices that cannot do the basic maths of a 10yr old in my day... this is an industry where that matters and can risk life so in reflection these comments have solid basis that can be shown in government standards and world educational league tables.
Ps - there are always exception to the rules but finding those kids nowadays is harder than ever, so much so I have changed my business model.

 

[westward10]

Another problem being the teachers in the education system are none too bright themselves. It is a flawed system.

 

[Megawatt]

Another problem being the teachers in the education system are none too bright themselves. It is a flawed system.

Another problem being the teachers in the education system are none too bright themselves. It is a flawed system.

Dark you are so right now in North Carolina where I live since no one seems to be able to pass the test in 6 hours and make a minimum of 75, now they have altered the questions, you have 8 hours to complete your test and lowered the passing grade to 70

 

[littlespark]

Billy Joel said it best
“We didn’t start the fire.....”

people are mentioning the dumbing down of today’s education? Have you tried any schoolwork your kids are doing now??

back in the 80’s, computing was a new subject. the school had a room with a dozen bbc acorns. Learning BASIC, and getting a headache of a green monochrome screen.....

now my kids are learning html, coding,.. video editing etc. I can’t keep up.

 

[telectrix]

one of the problems is down to the parents mollycoddling their offspring.... don't get dirty, climbing trees is dangerous, your immune system is useless because we scrub everything with dettol, the world is an evil place, so we won;t prepare you for adult life, but for the time being everything you want will given to you with no effort on your part. it's not all the kids' fault.

 

[Baddegg]

The education system hasn’t kept up with progress either.....exams as a concept are outdated as people no longer need to retain information in the same way anymore they can find out the answer to anything instantly on they phones.......personally I still enjoy reading and learning and testing myself on my ability to recall that info but my older kids both of who are in the top 10 students in a school of nearly 2000 call me a dinosaur ?.....it’s all progress I suppose and the previous generation aren’t supposed to keep up or understand, leave em to it I say they’ll work it out

 

[Mike Johnson]

I was still faster on my slide rule than the majority of young engineers I worked with on their calculators, which they seemed to use the whole time, very few mobile phones around in those days, but I do agree on the dumbing down of the education standards, where did the ONC and HNC go?

 

[KennyKen]

I think it depends on upbringing and Personal situation. I’m 34. Grew up in a rubbish rough east London estate. A place where you grew up quick. We got up to mischief but then you soon realise and see the other side of the
Coin. A time when we found a smack head injecting Nescafé coffee on a stairwell of the local council estate. Times like that which make you think “Geez, The only way out of this mess is to work and grind it out to get out of the area”

As soon as I finished school. My old man threw me out at 5.30am when he was off to work. “If I’m going to work, So are you” couple of days hanging around shopping centres soon got boring. I then went through the yellow pages. Rang a company and spoke to the proprietor. I made my way the the office. Dressed smartly and spoke to him about starting an apprenticeship.

I completed my apprenticeship at 21. The blokes I worked with were old skool.
I remember forgetting pepper for a lunch order was lynching time.
I also remember being spoken to
And treated like rubbish was “ Character Building” but it made me stronger and appreciate the fact, I had a job and it was going to get me out of the mess. I bought
My first house at 24. I had my first child at 21. I took my family to the other side of the world at 28.