Has anyone got an apprentice

[littlespark]

This is what gets me;

You get a 17/18 y.o school leaver. They get a job, they’re expected to get up in the morning, work an 8 hour shift, get paid at the end of the week and be sober for 100% of the time….

The other ones… the so called intellectuals that have gone to uni are half cut most of the time… get up at 11 most days and have a Wednesday off….

Talk about lazy.




Tongue in cheek guys…. I’ve done both… my kids are going through it now.

 

[7029 dave]

Not all kids are lazy. I can only go on my own personal experience, was 15 when started out on my journey to become an electrician. It was 44 years ago so yes times have changed no bloody mobile phones thank god.
If you want to learn and are enthusiastic and enjoy the work you do, it will show in your work ethic, performance etc.
The majority of kids dont want to get their hands dirty these days. Mr Blair did not encourage trade skills just all go to university lol.
Now we have lack of skilled tradesman in this country.

 

[nicebutdim]

Not all kids are lazy. I can only go on my own personal experience, was 15 when started out on my journey to become an electrician. It was 44 years ago so yes times have changed no bloody mobile phones thank god.
If you want to learn and are enthusiastic and enjoy the work you do, it will show in your work ethic, performance etc.
The majority of kids dont want to get their hands dirty these days. Mr Blair did not encourage trade skills just all go to university lol.
Now we have lack of skilled tradesman in this country.

I sit in a class of kids and there's real pride in the work turned out by most as well as a surprising keenness about theory and mathematics. The real enthusiasm is about earning more money, which is always a good motivator.

 

[freddo]

The other thing thats annoying is, one he just takes your tools without telling you or asking you, so you spend 10 minutes looking high and low for your hammer that you know you just put down near you, and when he is finished with a certain tool he just leaves it on the ground where he was working, obviously expecting mummy to tidy up after him. Crazy.

I hate that, so much. The rule was always you can borrow a tool but next time you buy your own. borrowing the same tool over and over is not on. No where in my contract does it say I have to provide tools for other employees.

 

[littlespark]

I heard a story this morning in the wholesalers that reminded me of this thread, so I thought I’d share.


Basically, one man band like me had taken on an apprentice… great worker, not a phone addict, and was in their second year.
The lad came in one day and asked for a pay rise- out of the blue.
Was told he was getting £3 more an hour than jib rates for his level… and still training.

That turned the lad from a conscientious worker to someone that didn’t give a flying you-know-what.
Turned up late, didn’t turn up at all, just being a bit of a pain.

A matter of days later he had jumped ship and moved to a bigger company that had offered another £2 an hour on top.

The guy is obviously annoyed as he’s taken the initial risk of getting an apprentice… teaching them the basics of both the trade and being in a job in the first place… along with having to reorganise jobs that he expected having two workers on instead of just one.

 

[7029 dave]

I heard a story this morning in the wholesalers that reminded me of this thread, so I thought I’d share.


Basically, one man band like me had taken on an apprentice… great worker, not a phone addict, and was in their second year.
The lad came in one day and asked for a pay rise- out of the blue.
Was told he was getting £3 more an hour than jib rates for his level… and still training.

That turned the lad from a conscientious worker to someone that didn’t give a flying you-know-what.
Turned up late, didn’t turn up at all, just being a bit of a pain.

A matter of days later he had jumped ship and moved to a bigger company that had offered another £2 an hour on top.

The guy is obviously annoyed as he’s taken the initial risk of getting an apprentice… teaching them the basics of both the trade and being in a job in the first place… along with having to reorganise jobs that he expected having two workers on instead of just one.

That's the risk the guy took, if he was that good and valuable to him he should of payed him. No good crying about it.

 

[DPG]

That's the risk the guy took, if he was that good and valuable to him he should of payed him. No good crying about it.

To be fair we don't know what he was paying him!

Perhaps we should 'of'

 

[littlespark]

As I said in the OP, the lad was already getting more than what the JIB says he should get.
Just some other company offered him more.

I know there’s no real reason for him to be loyal to the guy that gave him a job in the first place… but it has left him hesitant of taking on anyone else.

 

[7029 dave]

JIB rates have always been shocking, the whole pay scale across all grades.

 

[oscar21]

I cant seem to make any headway with ours, its not that he is lazy or has attitude in any way, its just that he hasn't got a practical bone in his body, he would be much better suited to sitting in an office all day, probably on a bean bag moderating twitter posts or something like that.

Take the other day, I got him to measure a couple of downlights out as per the plan I'd drawn. The light was 800mm from the wall, all nice and simple, except it was in a loft conversion so the ceiling was sloping before it went horizontal. Imagine a vertical wall, then a 45 deg sloping ceiling then the flat ceiling.

So the way he measured it was held the tape measure in the corner, followed the slope and then across the ceiling, all in one go so the tape measure was bent to the shape of the ceiling. Obviously the light ended up too close to the wall and the wires weren't anywhere to be seen. Now I know I didn't show him specifically how to measure it out but I just find it so perplexing that young people, not just him but all of them have absolutely zero experience in anything even slightly hands on. all the experienced people I work with were all on building sites up scaffolding from about 12 years old with their dads, or other friends all had mopeds or crossers in bits when they were kids, they built go carts and tree houses, today's youngsters can't even boil and egg. They really aren't suited to manual labour at all. The way I see it is they all need to make sure they get mega well paid jobs to afford the few tradesmen left that they will inevitably need in the future.

 

[littlespark]

Useless apprentices are down to people not taught the practical skills at school like they used to, and it’s down to health and safety, and insurance rates.

Don’t get me wrong…. I’ve always advocated for safety. As soon as an accident happens, however unlikely, safeguards should be put in place so it can’t happen again.

However, it means kids nowadays don’t get to use sharp objects at school. Cooking, sewing, woodwork… anything that can hurt if not used properly…. And it’s all for fear of the school being sued by a parent.

Then we expect a 17 year old apprentice to know the difference between the sharp end of a screwdriver and the other.


I wonder when sports will catch up?
Ban darts because of the sharp bit… ban snooker because someone choked on a chalk….
And just wait until some footballer loses a lucrative skincare contract just because of a broken nose.

 

[nicebutdim]

Times change. There are still kids out there doing the stuff you describe, but probably many fewer than in the past.

I wouldn't assume anything about an apprentice I was charged with training and would explain everything to ensue they learn the trade in a manner I deem acceptable. Some will get most things first time and others will require repetition before they stick.

I'd much rather an apprentice coming as a blank slate, than with the assumption they already know everything as the later will cost considerable amounts of wasted time, energy and money.

Also try not to be that person you hated when learning the ropes. I wouldn't suggest treating them with kid gloves, but days go better when there's no resentment from either side.

 

[oscar21]

That may well be true, but I'm willing to take time out of my day to train him in electrics, I don't see why I should have to potty train him as well. I agree about the school bit, when I was at secondary school in the 80's we had a woodwork class with sharp chisels, razor sharp planers, big drill bits etc etc. As for the metal work class we had big old lathes, a milling machine, powered hacksaws, open brazing hearths (the teacher blew himself up one day) even an oxy-acetylene set up which could have easily taken out half the school if it was mistreated.

In fact I remember one day the acetylene torch started burning and the lad using it dropped the torch and ran for his life down the corridor as we'd all been briefed about how dangerous it was. Luckily the set up had flash-back arrestors on it so it all went out of its own accord but when the lad nervously came back into the classroom about 10 minutes later the teacher said "look lad, it wouldn't have mattered how fast you could run, it would still have got you". Happy times and you learned so much more back then.

 

[oscar21]

Times change. There are still kids out there doing the stuff you describe, but probably many fewer than in the past.

I wouldn't assume anything about an apprentice I was charged with training and would explain everything to ensue they learn the trade in a manner I deem acceptable. Some will get most things first time and others will require repetition before they stick.

I'd much rather an apprentice coming as a blank slate, than with the assumption they already know everything as the later will cost considerable amounts of wasted time, energy and money.

Also try not to be that person you hated when learning the ropes. I wouldn't suggest treating them with kid gloves, but days go better when there's no resentment from either side.

The problem is as well as teach him, I've still got a job to do, I still need to install lights and sockets as the bills still need paying, if I was a teacher in a school it would be easy as there wouldn't be anything else to do but when I have to keep getting up and down a scaffold to show him how to get a piece of conduit straight it can be frustrating to say the least.

 

[nicebutdim]

How long has he been with you?

 

[oscar21]

How long has he been with you?

I'm not entirely sure, he is a relative of my partner so he actually did a bit with us a while ago even before he did his college course, he started with us for a couple of days officially as he needed employment to do the course which was for a year or more and he has just turned 19 and he finished the course when he was 18, so full time about a year and even longer on and off. Its not like I just get him to clear the rubbish up I actually try and explain things to him. I just don't think he is suited to physical type work, not everyone is.

Edit: with the risk of sounding like an old fart the thing that really got my goat today was this - The job we are on is having a grid ceiling fitted but only 90% of our conduit work was finished. The perimeter wooden batten for the ceiling was being installed and they way they did it was to cut it either side of our conduit so they can run the metal grid carrier over the top of the conduit.

When we came to fit the last couple of pieces of conduit I told our apprentice to get the multi tool and cut a 20mm slot out of the wood where the conduit was going up, 10 minutes later I heard the sound of a hammer and chisel. I walked in and he was hitting a chisel (not even a wood chisel but a cold chisel) against the batten damaging the newly painted plasterwork next to it. I said WTF and he replied "there's still a bit of wood left in the slot, even though all he needed to do was run the multi tool through it again until it cut all the way through it.

I'm not sure what went on in his mind, it was almost as though he was totally normal and then got possesed by some zombie gene that turned him into Terry F**kwit.