Seeking Heavy Equip Techs - Where to look?

I have made a dozen or so youngsters aware of the upsides of air twaffic corntrol . 6 figure pay, insurance, pension, four oh one k plan. Early retirement… Not one of them could pass or wanted to be drug or alcohol tested. I’m not much of a recruiter.

Seems like most people are smoking the reefer these days. Personally I could give a damn if someone smokes a joint Friday or Saturday night, just don't show up to work high.

Then they whine cannot make enough money.

Not hiring those that smoke, tends to eliminate a whole class of trouble from the work place. However I am sure a few good ones get caught in that net too. Oh well. I would rather not have it in my employees' system for some investigator to find after an incident.

The big money is going to be whoever makes a fool-proof test for on the spot THC intoxication. I've met plenty of folks that save it for after work or on the weekends, and even more nowadays that just want to eat a mint or gummy to take the edge off after work. Would probably help to relieve some of the rampant alcoholism in the trades. To the OP; I can't add anything that hasn't already been said. Offer more than the next shop and treat people well. Some folks are sitting still because of the constant economic talk, some are jumping ship when the company caps raises at 3%, some are just moving into other positions or trades altogether.

Years ago when I was a "garbologist" WM was paying $15 an hour to start with bennies for someone to ride on the back of a truck and throw garbage in the big green hole in the back. Couldn't believe how many people who pissed and moaned about couldn't find a decent paying gig as soon as heard about preemployment whiz quiz immediately lost interest. Only have to quit tokin" for a couple weeks to get clean enough to pass test. Also lost a bunch of hard working garbage throwing "machines" because WM wouldn't hire convicted felons. A few good guys came to us through the temp agency and couldn't be hired full time because of that rule so they beat feet. We weren't guarding the crown jewels, we were picking up garbage, never understood that one.

Worked on and IN as well drove and shagged Garbage, somebody got to do it. Shoulders cannot handle any longer so begged off at current employ. That stated, Second Left Shoulder Steroid coming Friday.

stinky64 said: Years ago when I was a "garbologist" WM was paying $15 an hour to start with bennies for someone to ride on the back of a truck and throw garbage in the big green hole in the back. Couldn't believe how many people who pissed and moaned about couldn't find a decent paying gig as soon as heard about preemployment whiz quiz immediately lost interest. Only have to quit tokin" for a couple weeks to get clean enough to pass test. Also lost a bunch of hard working garbage throwing "machines" because WM wouldn't hire convicted felons. A few good guys came to us through the temp agency and couldn't be hired full time because of that rule so they beat feet. We weren't guarding the crown jewels, we were picking up garbage, never understood that one. Click to expand... Because once a felon, always a felon. They come in to work mad, you get tossed in the truck for dead.

Not true at all, know several guys over the years who did something dumb when young and stupid then pulled their heads from their asses and went on to lead a pretty productive and successful lives.

stinky64 said: Not true at all, know several guys over the years who did something dumb when young and stupid then pulled their heads from their asses and went on to lead a pretty productive and successful lives. Click to expand... with today's lax sentencing, murder's are only getting 20 years, and are sent out in much less time.

I’m seeing companies changing their policies on felonies and allowing certain convictions.

I briefly met with the shop manager of a large trucking outfit today. First or second largest in the state. They are bumping their top Tech pay to $57@hr and their new recruitment strategy is “We’ll just throw as much money as it takes”. Well, there you go. It’s too late to grow your own or be strategic about it.

Can still remember “Earning” $5.50/hr or later in life expecting at least $10.20/hr or as was low level supervision starting at $13,500/yr Or as was ‘Contractor’ worked at client’s sites for $30/hr Just born wrong generation I suppose.

Another funny thread--reread from start to finish--and think about the currant state of affairs nationally, this second page especially.

I just hired a new mechanic a couple weeks ago. He's early 60's. He came to me with a resume of 20 years experience in cranes, and 6 of it as managing a shop. He didn't quit the company, so much as he quit the new manager they hired. It was a lot bigger company than I am, and so we have a little less pressure, and just fewer pieces of equipment. His old company had a big push to get stuff out the door, if it was actually finished or not. A new move for a lot of the managers is a metric of uptime and filling out the forms for PM's. He had a lot of push from upstairs to the tune of "if you guys just did the PM's " nothing would break. When equipment did go down- get it out the door and on the next job- and when it goes down fix it there. (so some other crane company, doesn't get the job). As we've seen in Vtech's thread, managers that come straight from school or a different industry, want to have corporate measuring points for their raises/ bonus etc. They just want uptime. Personally, I don't care about the total percentages of uptime, as much as actually getting the equipment fixed when its broken. Because I know its going to break. And I realize that some things are harder to fix than others. I've sent one young guy through a diesel tech school, and I've hired other (older and younger) guys with experience. The young guys, you just have to realize that they are young, and are going to make 20 year old young guy mistakes. It's part of it. With older guys, you get the years of experience, but most of the time, they have physical limits. So I try to make it a mix, have the young guys learning from the old guys, and the young guys doing the brute work. I've really enjoyed Coaldust's info on the alaska side. Its a lot of remote work in not great weather environments, so while the pay scale sounds high, I bet its not cheap to live in alaska. As far as the drug testing- I pre employment drug test, and everyone is in a random pool. Both drug and alcohol. And I can select for testing also. As far as the felons, I had a guy apply to work with a great resume, but he forgot to mention the child molestation incident a couple years back (he didn't get a job). I won't hire a thief. I will hire someone who got in a bar fight.

digger doug said: with today's lax sentencing, murder's are only getting 20 years, and are sent out in much less time. Click to expand... Not everyone who has a felony is a murderer or kid toucher, 2 dudes I knew just made the mistake of accepting public defenders who were basically taking up space and didn't give a ***** about their client, got railroaded because they trusted the court appointed flunky and didn't know any better. As stated earlier they got their ***** straight and prospered. How about all the white collar pole smokers who don't even get prosecuted for destroying peoples lives because they have enough ill gotten loot to keep their asses out of jail?

stinky64 said: Not everyone who has a felony is a murderer or kid toucher, 2 dudes I knew just made the mistake of accepting public defenders who were basically taking up space and didn't give a ***** about their client, got railroaded because they trusted the court appointed flunky and didn't know any better. As stated earlier they got their ***** straight and prospered. How about all the white collar pole smokers who don't even get prosecuted for destroying peoples lives because they have enough ill gotten loot to keep their asses out of jail? Click to expand... The ones they hired in a local shop as "Welders" had 5 felony drug dealer convictions each. and couldn't weld either.

Certainly. The gold mines around here are hiring anyone with a pulse and an inkling of welding or wrench turning ability. How they keep running is a miracle. The deferred maintenance and shoddy emergency repairs are eventually going to catch up. It’s not sustainable. Even though, some of our HEF members are pretty good at that preventative maintenance philosophy. It doesn’t work for large companies very long.

Coaldust said: Even though, some of our HEF members are pretty good at that preventative maintenance philosophy. It doesn’t work for large companies very long. Click to expand... Your very correct---Look at the millions saved in service expense in all large companies like Penske. It's penciled to a fine point--then dump the vehicle, the good was gotten. It's all about the hour glass--with employees and vehicles.

DMiller said: Can still remember “Earning” $5.50/hr or later in life expecting at least $10.20/hr or as was low level supervision starting at $13,500/yr Or as was ‘Contractor’ worked at client’s sites for $30/hr Just born wrong generation I suppose. Click to expand... It's all kind of relative, just the times. Howard Hughes was worth 2.5 billion in 1976 when he died, Jeff Bezos 195.5 billion in 2023. At that time we wondered making $5.50 what 2.5 billion would be like. Hughes was a big shot then, he's small taters now in comparison. And there were roughly 180,000 people with a net worth of 1 million or more in the 70's. Today there are 23.7 million with a net worth of 1 million or more. Today there are 2,640 with a worth of 10 figures or more. 813 billionaires as of April 2024. * You and I were just working for pocket change at that time compared to today. Can you imagine how much we could have afforded then if we were making $50 bucks an hour. A real good attorney at that time was charging $45 an hour, today $400 and up. It's all relative--then and now. But people went to work for maybe two or three companies in a life time. Now if you haven't job hopped four times by the age of 22 your just not classified as ambitious enough. The world we live in 2024.