Latest / The Electrical Show / Thomas Nagy and Paul Meenan talk about entitlement

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Thomas Nagy and Paul Meenan talk about entitlement · The Electrical Show

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The Electrical Show with Thomas Najie. Welcome to The Electrical Show with Bosch Professional
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here on Fixed Radio. I am Thomas Nagie and joined me once again.
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It's Paul Mean and the fountain of knowledge that here is now on today's show,
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we are both going to be covering a topic which I personally experienced and
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I'm sure, in fact, I know you've also experienced it. Paul entitlement
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in our industry. Couple that with a lack of knowledge and lack of skills
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and you've got you've got poor quality staff. So we're going to be talking
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about who these culprits are. And I guess what this means for our industry
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moving forwards, because I think we're think we both agree we're at a time
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in this industry where it's moving. It's moving at such a pace it's actually
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hard to keep up with it. So yeah, it's that is going to
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be today's topic The Electrical Show with Thomas Najie on Fixed Radio. The Builders.
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This is the Electrical Shy and Thomas Najie and today we've got Paul Mean
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in here and we're going to talk about the knowledge and skills gap in our
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industry that is to be getting bigger and bigger, which I think both of
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us have observed on site. And that doesn't mean that, I please believe
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there doesn't mean I know everything. I've got a long way to go.
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My train has only just pulled out the station. I've got a lot of
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stops ahead of me. But Paul, let's start with what's your experience in
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this, because you have seen this, I'm sure many times where you work.
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I have employed thousands and thousands of subcontract electricians over the last ten fifteen
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years of my career. So yes, it's getting worse. It's getting harder
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to find competent people, skilled people, people who are knowledgeable, people who
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have got the you know they got the yeah, I'm trying to think of
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the right words about using naughty words. The desire to learn, desire to
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learn and level up, and ever be complacent in what they're doing. I
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have met some horrendous If I can give you one story of a little job.
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I came across on two electricians sitting on a scaffold. You couldn't make
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this up, and they were literally talking about how they were going to get
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Christmas out of the job, and me being me wearing T shirt, boots
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and jeans and a high fire gain. You're all right, boys, what's
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going on? Neil Gain? Yeah? What Christmas? Do you think we'll
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drag out this one? It was my job, so I literally had to
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sit and go no, sorry, mate, do you want to just come
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with me? And where we're going? You're going home. You're going home
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unfortune because I can't. I can't have that approach on the job. You
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lose money, you put all your other fellow workers at risk, and it's
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it's a horrible thing to admit because I've never enjoyed it. But yeah,
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it's it's really hardstanding of people. Really, we've burned through Actually I can't
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give specifics, but we've burned through numerous people, and I think a lot
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of it, without getting too controversial, is it goes back to this this
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mentality of getting qualified super quick and going out there. Of course it is.
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We've had two of them in the last I don't know, eighteen months,
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two years, I'd say I've had two of them, and they just
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it's absolutely unfathomable. They'll just rock up and yeah, yeah, all the
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qualifications, got my test inspection and going from a gold card. And I'm
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like, mate, what is this thing with a gold card as well?
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This like this, it's like this this fantasy that we've all got to abspire
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to getting a gold card. I just don't understand it. But everybody turns
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up with the same thing. They all want this. This got to have
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the gold card in the absence of nothing, You've got to have something.
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And the gold card has always been that standard, and many many years ago
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it was a good standard. And then society got a little bit corrupted.
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And then it turns out you could go to a cabin in Essex and pay
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someone two hundred quid for a plastic card and which you literally can instagram doing
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it. Yeah you can watchap. I've got a bloke watchapp in me at
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the moment, not now, but over the last couple of weeks, seven
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hundred pound for a JAB gold card, all included, and they promised to
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get you on the easiest register and you're like absolutely, yeah, that's going
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on now. So this is why when people say, oh, you're a
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job be bash up. No. I was really proud when I got my
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gold card. I was really proud when I was an inn ICQS and all
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the rest of it. But when you get to the other side of that
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learning journey and that development of your own cognitive abilities, your own conscious competence,
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you then start to realize, actually, it's just a bit of plastic
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this My behavior is my conduct, my willingness to learn, my ability to
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be safe and not kill anybody is what makes me a good tradesman. I
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think it's a lacking thing though, because, like I say, we've had
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multiple guys turn up and they just they'll give it this thing. I've all
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got my qualifications and stuff, and honestly some of them have got They've done
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the test and inspection and stuff, and like you get them out on site
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and you can just see like the wheels spinning, but the hamsters dead.
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Like I will walk up to an electrician, mate, Hey, you doing
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la quick quick buzz check, and I go, what's that? What's the
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difference between resistance and impedance? Fundamental question there, And you can you can
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see the horror in their eyes. You can literally see their eyes just what
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anything is. It's not a trick question. It's for me to gauge how
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can I help these guys be the best they can be? Because if they're
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the best they can be. They'll do the best work, they'll be proud
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of it, they'll learn more, they'll learn more. But I consistently see
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where if I ask a simple question like type a RCDs, for instance,
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and when I go to trade shows or if we do talks or whatever,
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you'll everyone will go type a RCD. There's a different type of RCD.
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Yeah, oh when did that come out? And everyone goes, oh,
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yeah, it's in the eighty tradition. No, it was in nineteen ninety
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four. The first ones are available. They've been available for nearly what thirty
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odd plus years, and we're only just kind of realizing that what they do
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now. And one of the challenges I find is is the industry, the
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short call stuff has absolutely created a big problem. But we've also created a
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do what you're told, worship the badge, don't think for yourself. And
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years ago sparks or electricians thought for themselves. Now it's no, no,
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no, you paish your money, will give you the advice, We'll support
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you. They're they're there. It's really complex. Yeah, this is,
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of all the trades, the most complex, the one that when you join
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you'll never stopped learning. If you are stopped to learn, you're doing staning
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wrong. You don't even know you're doing it wrong. The Electrical Show on
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Fixed Radio. I'm Thomas Nagie with Paul Meenan, and we are continuing our
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discussion about the frankly vast knowledge and skilled gap in our trade. So if
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you just tuned in, don't panic. We are just getting going now.
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Paul, where do you think this issue is coming from. We've spoken a
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bit about the introduction of short courses and people using that as sort of a
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fast track way of getting into the industry. But any other thoughts, club
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tribalism. Yeah, it's it's the badge and logo sellers. When when we
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first started, me and my group of friends started our wonderful E five Journey,
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which was about going around for free, helping people share our knowledge and
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all that. With the very first years of it, we got absolutely slated
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and threatened, Yeah on Twitter, thankful on that anymore by anybody who was
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proud to be a member of one of the schemes. And I'm sitting there
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and I'm literally going they're called schemes. Schemes are inherently divisive in nature.
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Hello that in nature. They want your money. They work for you,
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you don't work for them. They'll tell you what they want you to know,
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so you keep paying your money. How about we awaken and think I'm
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trying I'm not trying to beat Russell brand here, but just wake up and
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think about how the industry actually works. Because if you know how the industry
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works, you you you sit above it and you realize that, yes,
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they have their place, but it's about you going on that journey where you're
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you are consciously comfortable in what you're doing so you won't hurt your customers.
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Yeah, let me ask you the question you've been recruiting like, Yeah,
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I was actually just thinking, how do you find recruiting industrial commercial electricians Because
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you started off as a domestic installer and now you're in the commercial industrial world.
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How do you find it? It is tough, and I find a
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lot of the time it's easier. We just pick up I'll pick some I'd
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rather take somebody with no qualifications and you mold them the way you want them
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to be than take somebody who says they've got what they what they have and
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actually they have a complete lack of we're actually getting onto this is unconscious competent
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that we're getting into that later on. But I find that's the easier way
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personally, just to take somebody who's young and keen and actually just wants to
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do a good job, but they haven't got any qualifications, and you just
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mold them the way you want them. Yeah, I think for me,
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the number one thing in anyone I employ is passion drive. Actually they're awake.
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I think there's a huge difference between sparks because of the amount of roots
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into the industry. Now, as I said in a previous show, it
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used to be domestic commercial. Industrial. Yeah, industrial electricians are phenomenal,
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but sometimes they could be quite When you turn around them and go right now
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we're going to do a full set of inspection and testing, they'll absolutely panic
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because they've been metal munching for five years. And that's not a bad thing.
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That's not a detriment to him. But when you're doing bigger, bigger,
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bigger stuff, you develop a very limited skill set and the opportunity to
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be more diverse as an electrician is less, Whereas in a domestic world it's
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far more complex, far more customer facing, lots of different technologies and everything
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else. But yeah, if you took a domestic guy put them in commercial
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industrial, he'd fail. But the one person needs to tell him that is
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himself. And if he can't think for himself, he's putting himself at danger
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and everyone else around him. And that's where employers have to be able to
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measure the ability or the consciousness of the individual that they're trying to employ.
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It's a good point. Yeah, I mean, what if the future of
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these people professionally, what's going to happen if this sort of kind of behavior
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goes not necessarily unchecked, but um, I don't know, unmonitored. Unfortunately,
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what'll end up happening is there will be more and I hate to say
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this, and I really don't ever want this to happen, but there will
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be kind where you're going with, yeah, more public instance of electrocution,
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not electric shock electrocution because that kills someone. There is a difference that Harvey
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Tarel, the young boy who died in Romford and when he was on the
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pub fence, and that's now generating a want to license and make sure that
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an operating license has any ICR electrical testificate. I think them things are only
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a good thing. I am sick to death of the fact that someone has
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to die part p the sure case. Please google it. Someone has to
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die for any sort of changes to happen. It shouldn't be that way.
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But just remember saying our industry has no regulator. They have competent person schemes,
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the IET or an independent organization who write the wire and riggs in association
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with a British stands Institute. Nobody overlooks this industry, which is why the
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only time you'll find it's regulated is when you're staring at a judge. It
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is true. I still I'm in full favor of the idea of like a
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driving license style. I fully submit the protecting of the title. I fully
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support the protecting the title that they're doing in Scotland. I hope it comes
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down and to be perfect, Frank, I would rather have one organization run
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the entire industry fairly and impartially. But I think I hope it's happening up
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there. It's only a matter of time before it comes here though. Yeah,
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but knowing it will probably take The trouble is is you create the gray
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economy, so there will be blokes will go well, why would I pay
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five six hundred pounds a scheme operator, and I can just go on next
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door and just go and get jobs like that and do it cash an and
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so it will only have a desired effect unless something is there to regulate and
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enforce the regulations, which I think one of the things that Building Safety Regulator,
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which is a new division and HC is going to start trying to do.
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How much broad powers they have is yet to be determined. All right,
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well, look let's look at the four stages of competity, because this
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is I find it absolutely is fascinating, the interesting four stages of competency.
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Next, and we're going to apply it to this discussion fixed radio. You're
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listening to the course and Thomas Nagie with Paul Meanan here, and we are
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talking about dealing with electricians in our trade that are confident but not necessarily competent.
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Now, last week we mentioned in passing very briefly the four stages of
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competency. Now, I thought it'd be good to go through these now.
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So Paul, this is you actually taught me this, because I was completely
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unaware of this until you, right, you bought it up to me a
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few years ago. So it wasn't this the first time we first met at
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Tresham. It may well have been. You were doing wiring and I was
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doing my life story, and as part of this, I was saying about
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the journey that you go on in life. So for those apprentices or young
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electricians and even them older people, there are four stages of competency. The
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first one is unconscious in competence, so you're ignorant to what you don't know.
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You don't know that you don't know stuff, and why would you know
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if you don't know anything, And that's part of growing. The next stage
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is conscious in competence. So as an electrician, I am aware that there
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is technology coming out ev charging solar PV. I may not have trained in
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it, but I am aware that I need to grow my knowledge in it
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and I will interface in it. The next stage is conscious competence, so
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I'm learning. Those who are in college or doing a two three in r
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mine or doing battery storage courses, you are consciously learning and developing. Your
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competence doesn't mean you're excellent. It means you're learning and applying. And then
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you've got unconscious competence where you're really, really good at stuff. Now.
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The irony in those four stages is you will sit in all four at every
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single moment in your life, but about a different subject. So for me
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conscious incompetence, I am aware that I suck at conjut work because I haven't
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done it in ten years. I'm terrible at it. There'd be an elephant's
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graveyard if I was putting a pipe ender. It would just be a disaster
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and it would bankrupt whoever I worked for. There is always stuff that I
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am unaware within this industry, and it scares me when I learn new stuff
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because I think, is it only me? Why do we not know more
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about conscious confidence? For me, I always try and put myself on at
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least one training course a year just to try and keep my pencil sharp,
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even if not theoretically mastery. I think if it come to like knowledge of
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Reg's hierarchy of standards and railways, I think I'm pretty good at that.
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Apparently I'm deemed an industry expert in that field. But don't ever think you
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know everything about everythink is my message on the whole four stages of constance.
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Or definitely you don't, and there'll always be someone clever than you. Trust
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me. I know people who are clever than me. There's always a bigger
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there. Yeah. Yeah, it is an interesting thing though, and a
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lot of people will question where they sit in there, but I think you're
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right. At some point we sit in all four of those somewhere, at
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some point doing whatever it is that we do. Self awareness is God.
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I'm really starting sound like Russell branding this apologies. Self awareness really is important
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in this trade as to where your position is, your knowledge is, your
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practical skills. You don't need to go on to a website for a competent
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person scheme and have them tell you. You'll know yourself, especially if you
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care, like when you have your nic assessments. If you if you're sitting
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there nervous, it means you're consciously competent. You know you want to do
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a good job, you know you've got stuff to learn. You're speaking to
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appear and if you impress him, then great, you're registered for another year.
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It's it's just knowing what you're good at. For me, I've always
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had this weird sick problem where anything I'm scared of or I don't know,
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I just dive into it because I want to know everything about it. It's
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a disease. I mean, it's a good disease to have. I'm not
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going to say that it's a good thing to think. You're really really sad,
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which actually is technically true. You're really clever. Even I can call
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myself that. My brother certainly does. All right, Well, look,
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let's let's wrap this topic up after some more music. You're listening to Fix
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Radio the Builder's Station, the Electrical Show with Thomas Najie sponsored by Boss Professional
15:54
Powerful power Tools sort of measuring tools and experts accessories. I'm Thomas Najie and
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wrapping up another show with Paul Mean and here and we've been we've been discussing
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knowing it all and knowing nothing and the damage that that can cause professionally for
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people who sometimes muddy the water between those two algorithms. So how can we
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knock this chip off the shoulder? I guess I think the only way you
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can do it is because I'm a firm believer that if you don't know something,
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just pick it up and start learning it just but unfortunate by doing that
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you make a lot of mistakes along the way. But I absolutely firm believer
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that is one of the best ways to learn. If you don't know how
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to do something, just pick it up. And if it's pipe bending,
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if it's fuse ball fit, whatever, just pick it up and just start
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learning. Yeah. Not everybody agrees with that, I'm afraid. No,
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Yeah, no, I can see that point. And he ended. I've
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said before, everybody's got an entitlement to feed the family and start somewhere.
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For me, I've got a different approach. So if I get someone who's
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got a really bad attitude, doesn't want to learn, and they don't have
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to necessarily have the same level of enthusiasm and passion I do. But if
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they don't want to learn and they want to deliberately sabotage others around them and
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be that bad apple, then unfortunately, if they won't be willing to be
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retrained, then they have to get I'll use the term pumped is a phrase
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that we use to ourselves. But yeah, what about CPD. What part
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does CPD playing all of this? Again? CBDs not logo, It's it's
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part of what you do. Every time you pick up a fan from a
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wholesale and you read the instructions and you go, oh, it needs a
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fuge in the switch. Well, I didn't know that. Thought. That's
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CPD. You're learning something new every single time you're picking up the REGs book,
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you're asking questions. So you're going online and watching a sparking Injura webinar
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an E five one or whatever, watching an IET or reading an article or
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pro electrician magazine, whatever you are learning. All you've got to do is
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be able to reflect. I always took the view of when I was learning
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as an apprentice. I used to go, in a year's time, I
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want to be able to install a fuse board by myself competently. I want
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to be able to do a fire alarm in five years. And then when
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you start looking back, you then go, oh my god, I've learned
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so much. So reflection is something the electricians do on cruise control a lot
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of them. A lot of them will go, now, my odd,
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don't do that. The only thing that is different from what we think of
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modern cpds you write it down to evidence it and the IET you've been leading
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that for years. The NIC and others are now starting play catch up and
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say do thirty hours a year. Last year I did eight hundred and seventy
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six recorded hours a CPD, So it's that is sad actually, But in
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the trades you do it by default. The trouble is most trades and won't
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actually have the time to be filled. Ink. You'd probably spend a couple
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of hours a week just doing a CPD log book. You don't have to.
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It's just a retrospective look back. I learned from that. I learned
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from that plaster, I learned from that plumber. I've acquired a new skill.
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Yeah, I've definitely learned. It's one of them. If there was
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one message I think I could drive home to anybody listening, is it is
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absolutely true the more you learn, the more you earn. It's just that
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is absolute truth. And if you don't just learn it, if you don't
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know how to do it. I've learned that definitely in the last I would
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say eighteen months. I think it was you that had a large effect on
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me for learning that, because it is just the more you learn, the
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more you are eat. I beat it into him. It so is true.
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It really is this the best bit of advice I was given. The
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more you learn them, more you earn. Yeah, I think both of
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us can agree on that one hundred percent. If there's one thing anybody to
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take away from this, it is that in it. I don't know about
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other trades carpentry and stuff, but definitely in electrics. My brother's a carpenter
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I can attest now n Sorry Sean, but all right. Well look you
19:42
can hear this show again from ten pm with more great music right here on
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Fixed Radio. This and all of the previous shows are available to download wherever
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