How To Find Great Trade Workers: Part 3 of 3
January 5, 2016 Part 3 of tips for employers This article continues a review of best practices for recruiting, hiring and retaining top-notch trade workers. Don’t over-value experience. As a grizzled veteran with more than four decades of experience in my chosen field, I’m not
How To Find Great Trade Workers: Part 2 of 3
December 22, 2015 Part 2 of tips for employers This article continues a review of best practices for recruiting, hiring and retaining top-notch trade workers. Look outside your local area. The smaller your market area the more likely it is that you’ll have to find
How To Find Great Trade Workers: Part 1 of 3
December 10, 2015 Part 1 of tips for employers So far this blog has been devoted to advice for aspiring trade workers. I’m going to switch gears for a while and speak to their employers, many of whom also follow this blog. I know most
A Front Door Into The Trades
November 20, 2015 Just knock for a rewarding career. In my last blog I discussed apprenticeship programs and vocational/technical schools as paths into the skilled trades. A third path exists that may be the most accessible of all for talented and ambitious people. Do a
How Do You Enter a Trade?
November 10, 2015 Apprenticeship has changed from the old days. Following in your father’s footsteps has a long tradition in the skilled trades. Many if not most of today’s trade workers entered the field because that’s what their father or some other family member did
College Is Not Worth the Cost!
October 27, 2015 So say recent college grads A consistent theme of this blog has been that debunking the myth that you have to go to college to achieve financial success. I’ve written about the lack of jobs for most college graduates in the fields
Living Independently
October 13, 2015 Hard to do with big debts to pay Many, many years ago as a young man in my early 20s and recently discharged from the U.S. Army, I moved into my own apartment for the first time. While serving in the military
Computers In The Trades
September 14, 2015 Your computer skills will come in handy A lot of young people look at the manual trades as a lot of wrench turning and grunt labor. Maybe that was true a century ago but the jobs of today’s skilled trade workers are
Labor Come Alive!
August 14, 2015 It’s a thrill to see the results of your work I spent more than three decades covering the skilled trades as a trade journalist. Now that I’m retired I look back with immense satisfaction at the friendships made and life lessons learned.