[00:00:00] Ben Poulter:

[00:00:01] Okay, so you don't need to be a rocket scientist, although some of us are pretty clever electricians, especially when we turn it to a fault finding job and we find it in 10 minutes on a badge every time that happens. I probably have at least two by now. And the skills you need to be a good electrician, they don't happen overnight.

[00:00:22] They're learnt over. And in this podcast, I'm gonna explain to you seven skills you'll need to work on, not just to become a good electrician, but to get better and better Every day toolbox talks for electricians, the podcast loading electricians with the tools and the skills they need to reduce stress, gain back time, and earn more money.

[00:00:46] Hey, everyone, backwards again. Ben Polter here. And are you a thicko? Have you started to train to become an electrician and feel completely lost with everything that's going on? What everyone's saying, you're being asked to go grab a drummer, that 1.53 Core Twin and Earth, or go on mate. We need to go get some Ssy cable, or Glen the SWA off.

[00:01:09] Another thing where they say, right, make sure you lock the MCB off. What the flipping out of all these things you, they don't even know. Don't worry. , it's something that happened with me at the beginning as well. It's completely normal. You haven't got a clue of all these terminologies. I remember to this day, I was sitting in this estate, Moneo, dunno why I remember the car and I was apprentice and the guy called Gary, the, uh, electrician that was training me, he kept speeding off all these BS numbers.

[00:01:37] I didn't got a clue. What's the, what's 2, 3 91? What's, uh, 2 3 91 x. What's an m c cb? What's swa What, what are all these things? What the hell are you talking about? Singles, doubles. Twin Earth. Ssy. Yeah. I, I was. Flabbergasted. I thought, I ain't got a clue what you're talking about mate. But the only way to learn is ask questions.

[00:01:58] And that's exactly what I did. Cuz when I first started out being an electrician, we used to travel two or three hours to the job to start with. And yeah, I, I admit a lot of the times I just got into passion chi or got in the back and fell asleep. But sometimes you could have a conversation with the guy, say, look, what is this?

[00:02:12] Tell me what the hell are you talking about? Cause I haven't got a. But along with the electrician torque, you're gonna have to develop some other skills too. And seven of these skills you'll find here and one of the first skills is an obvious one, is knowing , what the hell the electricians is actually on about and how dangerous they can actually be cuz with electricity.

[00:02:34] It isn't obviously visible. You can't see it, so sometimes one wrong move and yes, it's gonna be a last, it's gonna be a bit of a shock to say the least. And not any cable is suitable for every environment. To this day, I still see the people that are run to an earth on the side of their house. I dunno why people do that.

[00:02:55] There's special cable, there's even rubber flex run down side of your house. It does a better job. It's gonna last a lot longer. But they've got a clip to the side of the house, and yet obviously it works. It works for the time being. It works till they've got in the van and they've drove away. But after a while, that cable's gonna be open to the elements and it's gonna get the weather on it where the rain gets to it, the cold gets to it, the heat gets to it, and it's gonna deteriorate.

[00:03:17] It's gonna perish and cause a fault over time. So using the right tools for the job is another skill that you'll learn over. As I know with some electricians, , they love to use an impact driver for everything. Well, that's another huge mistake, an impact driver. It doesn't talk it up to a certain setting.

[00:03:37] It can easily cross Fred that terminal and it'll leave it useless if you've got a switch. Well, more than likely, what I've seen a lot of the time is mtbs, where they put it in a consume unit. They put all their breakers. and the impact driver from up bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, nice and tight all the way along.

[00:03:52] Well, you don't really know if any M terminals have been threaded until it's too late, cuz over time if that terminals is a little bit loose, cuz it's been threaded, it is not tightened up against that busbar. It's gonna start to arc. And what does arc cause that causes heat. So that's a fire waiting to happen.

[00:04:11] Another thing that you'll learn over time is when you go to a job. It's not necessarily that electrician that's been there before was better than you, or even if you'd done a good job. That's the thing. A lot of the time I've been to places and , I've ripped it. The bits say, look, I'm just gonna start fresh cuz I can't work out.

[00:04:28] Why the hell this electrician has done it like this. There's a simpler way there. There's a proper way to do it. And what I can say, never assume it's just a repair. When you go to a property, when someone calls you up saying, yep, I've got a little fault, or Can you come and sort it out? It's gone wrong for a reason and more than likely DIY day's been in there, done a big job, and this is where it started to fail.

[00:04:51] You gotta think, why didn't they call D O I, Dave? Because half the time you go there sometimes and hang about this ain't that old, this job. You can tell if the cables have not been there long or there's no cobwebs in there. You think, right, someone's been here like last month and now it's gone wrong. So look a bit deeper and you'll always find out that someone's Billy Bodged it.

[00:05:10] So the second skill that is a must, I think is be a team player. Electricians. Yep. They often work alone, going from job to job only being that, that one trade on site. And I like jobs like that. I like doing jobs on my own. It's a lot easier sometimes, but it's not the case all the time. You're more than likely gonna be.

[00:05:34] Builders, plumbers, carpenters, all on site that you need to be a team player to get that job done. After all, you've all got a job to do and you gotta keep that customer happy. So you need to be patient with good communication skills and be friendly to others. It'll pay off in the long run too because if you do make friends with other trades, If you think about it, they're always on site.

[00:05:57] They're always on job. So you give them a card, maybe you give them your name, you give 'em your number, and they're gonna pass your number on. So it's gonna work out a lot better for you in the future. Now, the third skill is that you've gotta be a good problem solver. Electricians never get called up because it's working.

[00:06:15] They'll never say, Hey, I've got a fantastic amount of lights in the garden. Can you just come take a look? They'll never call you for that. If it's working, you don't get a. So when you do get a problem, have a little bit of patience. Don't go there when you're rushed. I've done it before. I'm gonna pop in on the way home.

[00:06:30] It, yeah, it doesn't work like that. , you sometimes think it, hopefully it'll be a slightly loose cable or something you can fix quickly, but it's not normally the case. If it's a problem, there's. A big problem for a reason. I've even known some electricians who they've been around to someone's house and they've give up and said, yeah, I can't find the problem.

[00:06:48] See you later. I'm gone. I give up. They give up too easy. If there's not a quick job, it's not a quick fix. They're in and out, not interested. Don't be one of those. I'm one of these people that I'm like a needle in haystack. If I've got a problem right, it's down to me now to find it. I gotta fix it. I fuck it.

[00:07:03] It doesn't matter how long it takes. I need to find it. It's one of the things you gotta put right in your head before you go to sleep at night. If you've got a visit back the next day, that's fine. Obviously if it's a big job, but sometimes you've gotta find that fault and you wanna find out why it's not working and why it was Billy Bodge store, why it was done wrong.

[00:07:21] You wanna fix it. And understanding how electricity works and how these rrc D works, R CBOs, and how the cable sizes run, that's gonna come with experience as well. And with that skill, you'll naturally understand it a lot more and be able to find them false. There was a job I did, uh, a good, good 10 year ago, I think now wide, a block of flats for an old people's retirement home.

[00:07:47] And it was all tested, done and dusted, signed off. Um, but of course you are still waiting for payment. This is the only reason, obviously why I went back. Cause I thought to home it was wrong, but it was a day that everyone moved in. There was a problem. It had been fine all. , but when someone moved in, I got a call, but I was more than happy to go.

[00:08:06] But it turned out that one of the ladies that had moved in, uh, that one of their grandsons has been very helpful and put some pictures up for her. So when she told me that straight away, cause obviously you have a little conversation with these elderly ladies that when you walk in, they wanna talk to you anyway, so you might as well have a cup of tea in a conversation.

[00:08:23] She said, yeah, my grandson come around, he put these pictures up for me, spot on straight away. Stuck her now straight through the cable. That's why the bathroom light didn't. And then I always remember that one cuz the lady was so happy that I fixed it and efficiently and nicely that she just moved into a new apartment that she grabbed my hand and she goes, she put a pound coin in my hand as a tip, which I thought was lovely in a way.

[00:08:45] You gotta think it's only a pound. You could have put a tenor, but it was a pound coin. I was very happy with that. I said, nice. You made a new friend there. . But moving on to number four, and this one's a bit more about physical fitness than essential skill. I suppose a skill is to keep fit because sometimes as an electrician you need to be a bleeding acrobat.

[00:09:05] It's when you go across these loft spaces and they've got the, the tresses or the, the. The beams all in the way. You've gotta maneuver through them and you've gotta be careful cuz there's insulation up there. You can't put your foot through the ceiling if there's no walkway. It's a bloody nightmare sometimes.

[00:09:22] And what amazes me when I meet other electricians and well, they're big lads, you think, oh my God, how the hell do you climb around doing these jobs? Sometimes I've got a bit of a belly on them, like the old boys. And you think you must be very strong and agile to get across these beams or into these small spaces.

[00:09:41] because obviously that's another thing you gotta be, you've gotta be quite strong sometimes to be able to pull these long run of cables in and nimble enough to get yourself into these positions where you are. Maybe feed the cable through, especially if you're doing it off a cherry pick or on a steel wire arm pulling it across a factory.

[00:09:57] Sometimes that's hard work. You gotta hold that cable above your head. Cause if you drop. , it's gonna break someone's back. So you've gotta hold that cable into place with all your slings to maneuver it along that cable tray, maybe at a height. So being strong is a skill that you need to keep up with.

[00:10:14] But another thing would be if you colorblind yet, forget it. You're never gonna get on as electrician if you colorblind. You need to be able to see what color the cable goes where in order for things to work properly, especially when you've now got , brown, black, gray, ah, they're all similar. So when you, at least when you have the ?

[00:10:32] Red, yellow, blue. They were a bit different. You could determine 'em a bit better. I'd assume I'm not colorblind, but yeah, you're screwed now with a brown, black, gray, you cannot tell the difference. Different shades of gray. It's not gonna work. So the number five is being flexible. And I'm not all about being flexible with yourself.

[00:10:51] Like I was saying before, being nimble to get in these little spaces, it's, you gotta be flexible with your time. Cause , it's not like you can put time on a. All the time. It's maybe fine if you can go to an, uh, a job, an estimate and give 'em a quote and , you know roughly how long that's gonna take.

[00:11:07] But a lot of time, if you're fault, fine, you know, I got called out and the customer will say to you like, how much is it gonna be? And. How long is the electric gonna be off for? Um, sorry mate. How long's a bit of string? Sometimes you can't tell someone how long it's gonna be off for. You don't know. It might be that a rat's got in.

[00:11:25] I've been to a property before in Milton Keens. A rat went in, it chewed the whole lighting circuit and I got it fixed out the rodents in there. The thing is, it happened about a month later. She didn't clean up the, the rats went back and just started eating the cable again. So I said the only best thing you can do is rip the ceiling down and do it in metal conduit.

[00:11:44] But to be honest with you, you wanna spend a bit of money getting rid of these rats. It was crazy. Some of the places I've worked in air. Disgusting. I'll hear that. , but when a customer says to you like, how long is it gonna take? Or How long are you gonna be you, you can't answer these things, especially when they ring you up and ask you the question.

[00:12:02] I've got a light out. How long's it gonna take to fix? I haven't got a clue, mate. I've gotta get there first. I've gotta have a look and gotta see all up against, I don't know whether that's a street lamp that's like 20 foot up in the air or something you don't know. So be flexible with your time. Give yourself plenty of time because most properties with.

[00:12:20] Being protected by an RC d these days, it's a lot more difficult to find. I remember they used to go right. I knew where it come from cause I had a bang and you see cuz the light's been banged or smashed off where it's got water in it on the back. You don't get that anymore. The Rrc D it will just trip and there's no bang or nothing.

[00:12:37] You just gotta find that fault. Obviously that's 10 times better for the customer, but a little harder to find for the electrician to find where there's a fault. So then number six, I'm gonna say you gotta have maths. You gotta have some skills in maths, in, uh, I'd say basic maths, I suppose. But when you're taught at college, if you've heard of OS law, but if you haven't, you soon will.

[00:13:02] Every electrician knows, owns law. V equals voltage, I equals current, or amps and r equals resistance. . And to be honest, these days, there's an app you can do your cable calculations on. There is a lot quicker to work things out. I use it all the time, but knowing how to do it, if you didn't have the app, you didn't have modern technology to help you out doing these calculations of the OS law, then , it would be advantage for sure.

[00:13:30] Cause then you know exactly why you are using it. It's not just the. I'm just gonna run a 16 mill feed into this outside outdoor light. Yet why? Why are you running the 16 mill feed into an outside light? What's that pulling? What? What's the volt drop? To be able to calculate that if you ever needed to, is gonna be a massive advantage.

[00:13:48] And the last one, the seventh skill you really need to be a good electrician is that I find it's dying out among a younger generation. and it's social skills. Social skills is gonna help you communicate with customers. Cause if a customer doesn't trust you or even like you, they're not gonna remember to call you again.

[00:14:11] They're not gonna remember to recommend you to their friends or their family. I think I've said it before in a previous podcast, that you can be the best electrician in the world, but if you can't talk to a customer and make them feel confident that. Good at what you do, it's not really gonna leave a good impression.

[00:14:29] Even if you go over the top when explaining like, I'm gonna use SWA to an outside light, buried in the ground, protected by A six Sam type B R C B O, well they, they might look at your gun out and totally confused and think, what are you telling me this for? Don't even care. But being able to explain why you are doing the job the way that you are doing it, I think , in my experience, it helps the customer.

[00:14:51] With the confidence that you're a good electrician for the job and they obviously let you get on with it and let you put in the materials that you've bought with you to do the job. , I've been rewiring a house before and the lady said to me like, do, do you need all them cables? Do you actually have to have all them cables in there?

[00:15:08] Well, yes you do. I wouldn't pull them in for no reason. And officer started to explain to her what the lighting cables and the switching cables and the sockets. , she obviously walked off. She wasn't interested. But yeah, uh, like knowing why you've got to do the job is gonna be a massive advantage. And all these skills, you will more than develop over time, and many of these skills will help you not just grow your electrical business, but have fun with it and be better in your electrical business.

[00:15:36] Along with some other steps mentioned in a previous podcast and that podcast called How these Simple Steps will fill your Diary with high paying customers all year. And that's episode two on Toolbox Talks for electricians. So go check that one out and I'll see you next time.