Wholesalers Help Find New Employer
Who are the best contractors to work for in your town? How do you know? If you’ve been employed in this town as a technician for a few years, you know by word of mouth. If you just moved to town or graduated from a vo-tech school you could use some help. Start with the wholesalers who deal in your trade. Depending on who you ask at the wholesaler however, you’ll probably get a different answer. If you ask the wholesaler’s manager, you might be given the names of their best customers. While this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, you’ll need information that will specifically help you. You might find this from the wholesaler’s counter guys.
The counter guy usually deals with the contractor’s employees. They know the employees who have it going on and they know the slacker-deadbeats. You want to work with sharp coworkers. You want to stay away from contractor employees who look like they just rolled out of bed (or picked themselves up from the floor), are on a three-day bender, hang out at the wholesaler shooting the bull and eating all their donuts (the counter guys have excellent intel on everyone who fits this description), drive beat up trucks, cannot speak intelligently about their trade, are not well groomed and who in general, lack respect.
Here’s a good question to ask a counter guy (or an insides sales guy): do the folks in this contractor’s office treat them with respect? Or, tell me which contracting companies treat you with respect. If contractors do not treat the counter guys with respect, there’s a good chance they are not treating their employees and even customers with respect.
Another good thing to know about contractors is if they pay their bills on time. This is simply a sign of good business. You want to work with good business people.
Check out what this smart company is doing. HVAC Agent helps technicians find jobs and helps employers find technicians. On their front page they have a link titled Suppliers. Click on it and you are taken to a list of the fifty United States. Click on a state and you have a list of that state’s wholesalers.
Now go find a counter guy and ask him some questions!
Landing a New Technician Job
If you’ve read along here over the last year, you’ll notice that I have no tolerance for careless and thoughtless management. I’ve tried to show you what to look for in good management and how good management will help you, your family and career. Good management can be your best ally or it can be your worst enemy. When you finally discover that management is not acting in your best interest and you’ve tried through persistent communication to voice your concerns and effect change – and nothing happens – it’s time to find a new owner/manager.
With today’s post I’ll be starting a new category titled: Landing a New Job. I hope to provide tidbits of useful information and advice in order to market yourself in an appealing way to prospective employers. After sitting in the technician hiring chair for over twenty years, I have seen folks present themselves in all types of manners and have a pretty good idea of what works and doesn’t. I’ve had people sit in front of me while applying for a job wearing more metal that pierced their skin than goes into some ductwork systems. I’ve had two different people bring their translators to the interview. And I’ve had more people than you could imagine who should have brought their translators to the interview – and they spoke English.
I am not interested in you just landing a new job. Instead, I would like you to connect with a manager who cares about his coworker’s personal development, education, career and family. There are companies out there that are worth working for. We’ll help you find them. And if you work for one, please don’t hesitate to let us know about them.
