Why is that? What is it about these trades people that makes them so valuable? And what are other people worth their weight in?
Well, I've worked with plenty of "professionals" and I can tell you I would weigh all of them with different substances. Many with precious metals, enriched uranium, and perhaps the more colorful ones, saffron.
Everyone has their own skills and talents and thrive in certain situations. That is because of many different reasons. Within a team environment everyone can bring something to the table, Youth and a strong back or organisation. A keen eye on safety, or maybe job planning is your forte. Every good team needs the veteran presence, and knowledge to steer the group away from previous mistakes. All these skills and abilities are valuable, some more than others in certain situations. So ya......All of these people are great, we need more of them.
These people are NOT who this post is about.........
This post is about the people worth their weight in other things, and what I am trying to do about it. Things like sand. Steel too maybe, but not the type of steel used to make a building or something useful (I'm thinking more like the springs in an old mattress found in the back alley or the antique watering can full of rusted holes grandma used until she got tired of getting her shoes wet and turned it into a planter for her hydrangeas). In certain circumstances they can be used for something useful, but often the effort to get any benefit isn't worth the trouble.
Our country developed the red seal trade certification to ensure the people being trained in the various trades were meeting a certain standard. To make them more transferable between employers and to just plain make our economy better. Check this site for more info on the red seal program.
You don't need a red seal to be a millwright, unlike power engineers or pressure welders, which fall under legislated certification. Companies choose to employ certain red seal trades. If we are letting the standards slip and just handing out the trade tickets to anyone who shows up, it hurts the value of each and every trades person that holds that trade ticket.
In my opinion the province of BC has done some great things to address the training and advancement of training. Initiatives such as the Provincial Instructor Program, to give us instructors a better understanding of the ways in which we train. My role as an adult educator is to help everyone who comes through my doors to become the best trades person they can be. To have a solid understanding and pride in everything that they do, not to rely on fancy equipment and lasers but to rely and grow their individual skills and knowledge. I would like all of my students to become lifelong learners, leaning into the more difficult challenges with the ability to think through situations and to find out the answers. It is paramount that we maintain the core skills of tradespeople moving forward into this technological age where things can be easy. It is my role not to weed out the rusted watering cans, but instead to plug the holes and develop them into the best damn watering can they can be. The knowledge they sprinkle can then help the future grow their roots and help our industry become solidly planted in the richness of skills and abilities we once had. Being a trades person is an honorable difficult profession to be proud of. Just keep in mind as we move forward in the digital age to let technology add value to what we do as tradespeople, and not to let our value be measured by the technology we use.
