Technician training

[podczaski]

I agree with Mr. Fogle's comments, and am pretty sure I was a student of his at least once. I still stand behind my opinion about the training however, and it is not the fault of the trainer, but the program. I have been told that that the Gilbarco training has been revamped, so will withhold an opinion until our first trainee in the new program comes back......FYI....we make our guys ride with experienced techs first, if for no other reason to see how they handle all of the crap thrown their way, and help us determine if they are even worth the investment.

[cantdrive55]

Podczaski - Just curious - where are you finding your new techs? Craigslist, Indeed, signs on the vans, etc? It seems when I start looking for help I have to weed through 99% junk and interview 1% and hire 1/10th of that. It so friggin time consuming.

[fogle622]

I received an e-mail that mentioned some training the state of Georgia provides. I deleted the email by accident so hopefully the writer will see this and email me again. I'd love to know more.

I've always thought HVAC students make good new service technician candidates. The two fields have more similarities than differences. Many instructors are glad to recommend students that have the desire to learn but are having difficulty meeting living expenses. If you can devise a way to let a student intern with your company to make some money while continuing school it typically turns into a win / win for everyone. Take a continual interest in the HVAC courses in your area and develop a friendly and professional relationship with all the instructors. One shop even donated some dispensing system equipment to a vocational high school. Additionally students installed, programmed and maintain a tank monitor system in a back up generator fuel storage tank.

[podczaski]

New hires have been word of mouth for us. Everybody so far is homegrown so to speak. Any experienced guys we have hired have been mercenary. Craigslist has been an absolute waste of time. I think the biggest problem is the number of disciplines required. At least in our company, we have no prima donna specialists, and we train that way. One of the questions we ask any potential hire is "If your car breaks down on the side of the road, what do you do?". More that one has actually said they would need help changing a tire. At 22 years old..... . The answer goes a long way towards determining attitude and potential. It is definitely a hard road to travel. I think part of it literally, and this might get me in trouble, is the emasculation of our young men in today's society. Hard work for a lot, not all, is a four letter word.

The trouble with the way we do things, is the amount of time it takes to train someone to be more than a hanging hardware and filter changer. Admittedly, the job has grown more complicated through the years. TV screens in pumps, IP addresses for card readers, three levels of security to change a price, just to pump some friggin' gas......smdh !

[cantdrive55]

I'm glad I'm not the only one having these same issues. It's getting harder and harder to find someone that can "do-it-all" the computer guys don't want to get dirty and the mechanics have a hard time with the IT part of the job. It's getting to the point where I need to split service into two seperate sections, mechanical and POS guys. Hard to do that because it makes scheduling impossible.

[fogle622]

I think it is next to impossible to divide most calls into just a mechanical, electronic, software or electrical issue. Many tasks require both mechanical aptitude as well as knowledge of IT, electronics and electricity. Plus there is the "oh while you're here, can you ... ?" syndrome. Worst of all on many calls the problem description is either misleading, not accurate or not enough information is available. A knowledgeable person answering the call and digging deeper for more information and clarification is a blessing but there's only so much you can figure out before a tech arrives onsite.

When I use to ride with techs we would play "what if" while riding to the site and walk through what we knew, what we suspected, what steps we'd take to identify the root cause and how we'd address the issue. All of this based strictly on dispatch information. More often than not our imagined root cause was wrong. If we added the tech's background knowledge of the site's equipment installation, personnel and customers the percentage of correct imagined root causes jumped a lot higher.

Even way back then though it was easy to spot bias. Techs gravitate to their mechanical, electronic, electrical or software strengths. Service managers know that and dispatch accordingly.