So what makes you want to become an electrician? A lot of people become electricians, because there may be following in their grandfather's or their father's footsteps and take over the business from there. Or a lot of people want to become electricians, because they think they're gonna run good money for not actually doing much. But then there are some people to start the journey, think, yes, I'm going to become an electrician, a fully qualified, qualified electrician and run my own business. But then they quit. Because it goes and gets tough. Maybe that they didn't realise that you had to do all these qualifications, you had to do quite a few exams. And you had to jump through these hoops to be part P registered with maybe Napier, or the NIC. And then you've got our challenge up against the upgrades the upgrades of maybe from when it was 16th to 17th to 18th. And now there's going to be another one soon, I think which will more likely be 18.2, where they bring out the AfD DS, I think you need to be a certain type of person to become an electrician, to hack it sort of thing to have a job as an electrician. But then there's another type of person you need to be to run your own business. In this podcast, I'm going to go into detail on what type of person you need to be to be a successful electrician, and then to be a successful electrician. But in your own business. Tool Box Talks for electricians where we help electricians reduce stress, gain back time, and earn loads of money. Welcome back. Once again. My name is Ben Poulter, your host of tool box talks for electricians, if you don't know my name just yet. Well, there it is Ben Poulter. And I'm an electrician who's been in the trade, or in the game, should I say, for over 20 years? And I do say game, because that's what it may be feels like sometimes you're in the game of being electrician. Well, for me, being electrician was never considered when I was at school, or when I was young. I wanted to be a mechanic. I was interested in cars, bikes, Anything With An Engine basically that interested me. I tried to go into the army, but the army wouldn't let me do mechanics because my GCSE grades weren't good enough. So got an apprenticeship as a mechanic. Well, for the reasons of me being young, dumb and stupid, I suppose, only lasted a year of being an apprentice mechanic. I first started out as electricians mate, and I eventually got offered an apprenticeship to become an electrician. And when I was younger, I don't think I was as ambitious as maybe I am today. I never had any ambition to sort of be an electrician or let alone run my own business. So when I did eventually think right, yaka, run my own business, I'm gonna start up on my own. I didn't think about I didn't make a plan. So I made all the mistakes possible. However, they did turn into good mistakes, because what's the point in having in doing a mistake, if you're not going to learn by it, and I learned a lot from all the mistakes that are made back in the day. And I do think that loads mistakes is what led me on to have a successful electrical business. But without a doubt, if I didn't have to learn them mistakes, things would have been so much easier. But everything happens for a reason. And I'm pretty glad I did become an electrician, for many reasons, which I'm going to detail right here.

Let's be honest, electricians are always going to have work. Since I was apprentices have been qualified. Since I've been doing my own business, I still get offered jobs for electrical companies all the time, they may ring you up saying I got a contract on Ben, are you interested in subbing to us? Or there's you're never far from a job as electrician? You'll never be? unemployable. Maybe, especially if you're running your own business. If you sometimes I know a lot of some self employed electricians, that maybe run their own business and thought, yeah, I want a bit more of an easy life now. And they've easily found a job as electrician within a company.

And even more so with the massive boom of electric cars and solar power. Or maybe wind turbines. There's always a job for electrician, wherever you are.

A number two, yeah, I'll admit it electrician, they do earn good money. The JRB right rates for electrician at the moment is around 20 pound an hour. Which Yeah, that'll be like if you're on site or you're subbing or if you're employed. But if you're self employed, I've heard of to tune two and a half grand in one day. And then opportunities come along, when you're self employed, you're able you're in the position to go for you're able to do that work. So, being self employed for me over the last 20 years, has been a massive benefit.

And then number three, industrial, commercial or being what's classed as a house basher? That is obviously my preferred way of earning a living being a domestic electrician. You can work in all different types of environments, and from being in a lovely old lady's house in the loft where you get tea and biscuits fit in a light or you could be 100 foot

Vigneron a wind turbine wiring up a new wind turbine, to be honest, I've never done it. So I'm not sure the terminology of what they call these wind turbines stuff. But we'll be interested do to do, I think one day, I might just go on the course, just to see what they're all about, because I'm quite interested in this renewable energy, even in solar panel installations, or maybe don't want to get involved in doing it. But as electrician, you sort of geek out on the new technology and stuff like that, what's advancing around the world, because in my early years, as an apprentice, I was travelling all around the world, getting paid to stay in hotels, and work nights, discharging batteries. Always remember, if I say to the guys that I was working with 2.2 2.2, we got excited when we got to 2.3. Because we're testing these,

the backup cells for UPS and for telephone communication systems for a company called Amazon, it was a great job back in the day, and yeah, we travelled all over the world, we had a good time.

And number four, being electrician, it is it is physical work. And you may not think too much of it, maybe if your electrician or you think it's easy, twisting a screwdriver and connecting a few cables. But it's physical work, you actually got to do something, maybe use your mind. Because you think you've ever worked in an office, and you sit in front of a computer all day typing, it's not actually hands on. So if you're a hands on person who enjoys a challenge, then yeah, solving problems as electrician, it is a trade for you. Because we've got builders, who enjoy basically hard labour, they're lifting and shifting bricks all day. And if they've got to be quite tough, I think the builders, and there's carpenters who thrive on perfection, because if they get that cut just wrong than the sadhaka travel, that doorframe is going to look a right mess. And then there's plumbers, or assume just like to get wet. And then there's electricians, us who fix everything. And then number five, I think being an electrician, it keeps your mind active, it keeps your brain ticking, it keeps you challenged every day. Because there's rarely a problem that's identical from the last or some look a little bit differently, you've got to figure out you've got to figure out why that's called loose, or maybe why that doesn't work. So electricians are constantly using their brains to figure out what's gone wrong. And I don't know if you've ever maybe worked on site with myself, if I'm trying to figure out a problem. I go quiet. I try to concentrate, right. It's my process of elimination. But I've done this, I've got find that fall. I'm like a dog with a bone. Sometimes I think electricians will be the same. If they want to find the fault. They've got process that they're working to. And you need to shut off from the outside noise and just concentrate every step where you're done. Because then once you find it, you get better satisfaction. Well, to be honest with you think thank God for that. I didn't think I was going to find it. You don't know where that fault is. But when you do find it if I guess I'm the man. But then in number six, in 1882 Nope, not the year I was born. But yet a long time ago, that was the first time that I regs was issued a over in the UK anyway. And that was obviously 140 years ago. And then later down the line, we've had upgrades and upgrades and upgrades. And today, we've got the 18th edition.

And sign the 18th from 140 years. I suppose that doesn't sound a lot. But with the warrior royal glow, the wiring regulations that have changed so much, that are constantly basically evolving with new technology, you've got to keep doing these upgrades. With all the different technology that's evolving all around the world. There's new devices that keep customers and domestic premises basically safe from catching fire. And as electricians, we have to learn something new every time. When I first started my apprenticeship, it was MC B's, and then we went on to our SeaBIOS or we did our CDs. But then it's a lot more better. It's better now to instal these are SeaBIOS for every circuit. And then now we're moving on to a fdds it keeps you on your toes with these wiring regulations and upgrades all the time for it's forever changing. And let alone the technology of Smartline that we've got to evolve and installed in a lot of domestic premises will even in commercial premises as well. We've got the LED lighted the trailing edge the leading leading edge dimmers, we've got to figure out how these work and basically upgrade ourselves all the time, keep us challenges. And that's what sort of person you've got to be interested in doing. You got to be interested in technology, because if you're just an electrician, that's going to be Camorra sell for socket. But then then the customer come along and say yeah, but I want a Wi Fi socket with USB. And you've got to work out right Okay, how's this gonna work? How's the work properly and how's it got to be installed properly, basically. So yeah, you've got to keep yourself out.

On your toes about the wire and Regulation A number seven are things to consider. If you're considering or wanting to become an electrician, or an older age, maybe when you've had enough of being on the tools and you want to be on your knees anymore, you don't want to climb around people's lofts, you can easily get a job working in an office for an electrical company. Or if you've built up a network of customers, you can just be the orchestra, who basically dictates to say, electrician goes here, and you sort of organise the jobs for Electrician, you've run your own business, it depends what you've done in your experience as being an electrician over the years. But there's quite a few options of where you can go, you don't necessarily have to retire and go work in a garden centre, there's always something else you can do. And then number eight, would be being your own boss, I would say that about 80%, of electricians that I know work for themselves, running their own business. And there's a number of advantages of being your own boss, as an electrician, I think being your own boss is something that we should want to achieve in our life anyway, I think it's something good to be your own boss. Because when you're your own boss, you can dictate when you work, how long you work for how much you get paid. There's so many benefits to being your own boss. And yeah, it's hard work. But it pays off in the end. And the massive thing what I found over the time of being my own boss, is the time I can have off when you want you can go and do something for the day. Maybe have a day off in the week, where if you work for someone, and possibly there is no work at that factory or that I've worked for electrician before when this it is there's no work today, Ben clear the yard. I don't want to be sweeping the yard all day I did it. Obviously I was a young lad and I was an apprentice and you have to do these things. But being your own boss, you can just say Yeah, well, I'm just won't go in today, I'll just stay at home, I'll do something else. I'll take the dog for a walk or watch a film on Netflix.

Number nine, is the satisfaction you get when you've actually potentially basically save someone's life. Because a lot of installations what I've turned up to over my career as electrician, you think, oh my god, what could potentially happen there someone could have died. Or basically, if they got a massive shock, and that was an earth property or wasn't fused properly, then yeah, that person would have died. So when you walk up into an instal somewhere, and you fix that instal to say you can walk away and sleep at night thinking, yeah, that's gonna be great, no one's gonna get hurt in that maybe that factory, or that domestic premises or that building site, no one's gonna die at that place anymore. Because you fixed it. That's a massive satisfaction that I get a lot of the time. And number 10, I think this is quite a good one, that life is full of problems, that he was gonna get a problem here or there. And some people, they get angry or they get frustrated. But being electrician, you face a new problem every day. And as always saying life, every problem has a solution. And if you deal with problems every day, and you figure it out how to overcome that problem, it only makes your problem solving skills 10 times better. So not just the electrical problems that you get good at solving problems with is other things in life. A lot of it is that I've learned a massive lead lesson is don't bother trying to fix your own van if you're not qualified. Get someone qualified to fix your van for you. The amount of times I've spent all night all evening trying to fix a little problem on the van, where I could have just took it to a garage and they plug it in their machine to 30 quid there we go. That's Little. That's that little since you need to replace. If I just done that in the first place and not been so tight and stubborn, then it would have been easy would have saved a lot of hassle in my life. To that's one of the problem solvers. I have learned over my life as well to maybe ask someone that knows their stuff, or someone that knows in their professional in their skill. A number 11 is another advantage of being an electrician or not just an electrician being inside the trade. As a trade person. You get to meet a network of trades with every job. It's not always just the electrics needs doing. It'll be maybe a plaster that patches the worker, and then a painter that comes along and makes it look good. But the bonus with working with other trades is that you get to see their work like the the amount of times maybe you've been on site and you've seen Yeah, man, I wouldn't have that guy working him out is rubbish. And he's a messy girl. He's done a bloody nightmare of a job, I wouldn't have him work in anywhere or my jobs or in my house again, we're obviously not going to take his number. But a lot of the time, this may be a plumber, a carpenter or a builder who's done a fantastic lovely, neat job. So you'll take their number one you keep that number to save and I will recommend maybe a builder because you're going to need a decent builder one day or a decent plumber or a decent carpenter. So you keep that number. But remember, it works both ways you

You give them that your number, and they'll recommend you as well. You become friends and have a bigger network of basically trades people that recommend each other. And then there's number 12. And the thing is with electricity, everybody needs it. If someone needs to cook their dinner, and eat the oven to work, if someone wants to be in their house for the evening, they obviously want their house nice and warm, then yes, it might be a gas boiler. But it's the electrical that controls the switching of the heating, so they need electrician. And then there's plenty of other people with businesses, which they can't function without electrics. Yep, it's great to have the internet. But you need to plug that in somewhere to get electricity to make that Internet work.

So even if, God forbid, there's a massive pandemic, that pandemic that happens all over the world,

electric electricians will still be getting phone calls, to get the work done. And obviously, this was proved a couple of years ago, when it actually did happen. We had a massive pandemic across the world and some electricians, they say to me, that has never been so busy. Because everyone was at home doing their DIY. And while they're doing their dry, they thought I'm gonna get this repaired was in my home because we were told to stay home. We were stuck at home. They had nothing to do. But electricians were classed as

was it the emergency source service in a way where we had to go and fix things. But a lot of people took advantage a second you fit this outside socket, but I'm not allowed in your house. But yeah, you can do it from outside. Yep, you need to get a foosball mate, this is the thing. So it's a bit tough to explain to people sometimes. But yeah, we get called all the time still whatever happens. Because obviously, it wasn't just a domestic households that got got told to stay at home. Obviously, people with businesses that were running, they thought, well, if I'm closed, a marshal get that refurb done, they did a lot of refurbs or schools that were closed down. Therefore, right, this is a great time to get some work done. We'll get people in there tradesmen in there to do the work was we're forced to close. So there was no end of work about when that lockdown happened in the UK a little while ago, but not just in the UK. To be honest, it's all over the world. I'm not sure about electricians all over the world. But I'm assuming it was the same all trades that were allowed to go out on work, they have plenty of work to do. Now, I suppose you could look at it as a good thing, or a bad thing, because you don't get time to rest. But there always be a need for electricians. And a lot of people will always call you up and always ask for the job to be done.

A number 13 Understanding how electricity works, I think is a skill itself. And around the world. There's all different recognised qualifications to be an electrician, and different regulations, you have to follow obviously over the US, you've got different voltage to us. So we've got to 4040 over here, you've got one on 110 Over there. But knowing and respecting that electrical items can kill in the shocks that you get from electrics. That's one of the things I think electricians are trained in. Because I myself have had the opportunity to work all over the world with my UK qualification. But I think to be a permanent resident may be in Australia or over the US, you'll need to do an upgrade course or something just to make sure that you understand the electrical requirements within that country. But I think you might find it a lot easier than if you were starting fresh. Because you've got knowledge of maybe your electrician maybe in Australia, and you're coming to the UK, you've got the fundamentals of how electricity works. And yet I understand that it's not just a live neutral Earth is not like that you might have three phase, you might have different voltages, there's a lot of different things to take into consideration is not electricians not being as easy as maybe what some guys assume.

It's the knowledge that you gain as electrician. You know why it's important for that connection to be tight because you don't want things to arc and you know why that cable should be connected and protected by the right size fuse. I think if you've got this knowledge as electrician, then you're 90% of the way there but also when I was working in Hong Kong, there was some wiring hanging over the streets in their back alleys that are just you wouldn't believe sometimes some of the wiring is over there. You will have thought that they haven't got any standards which 90% Were they have because some of the stuff that I've seen out there, you wouldn't have put your name to I don't think they've got part pay I can guarantee that. So there are 13 points. Why is probably a good idea to become an electrician and if you enjoy some of them points made and you think yeah, I enjoy challenge I enjoy problem solving, then I think you'll enjoy being electrician too. But being a good spark who is employed is one

One thing, I think one of the massive things have helped my business grow over the years is social skills. I think I can literally I can, I can talk to anybody and everybody. And I really do get the impression that customers, they'd like that too. I can explain what I'm doing why I'm doing I may be going into too much detail sometimes. But I think the customer appreciates that. I don't try and bamboozle people, I just try and make them understand why I'm going to do this chase Harold word Awara 2.5 cabled to carry on the ring circuit of why it was installed originally. Or if I'm going to put a new socket in why I'm going to do on a 16 amp fuse or my might need to upgrade the fuse box. There's nobody ways, I just give them as much information as possible, as I think they'd need to know because they want to know what's going on is their house, their pride and joy, they're more likely paid a lot of money for it. And a lot of the time.

I'm the highest quote, they come back to me and say, Ben, you are sort of a three 400 pound out of the five quotes we got. But I still get the call. And they say

can you still do the work? Can you beat the price? And I say well, no, like, why don't you go with the other electrician that gave you a 200 pound cheaper? Oh, because you sounded like you knew what you were talking about? Well, I do know what I'm talking about. And but I'm assuming that the other electricians if they're qualified, that they also know what they're talking about. But because I'm a chatterbox and I talked to the customers, and I explained to them, maybe made them feel comfortable, I think to understand that, yeah, it's fine. He knows what he's doing, I'm going to be safe. That is God's done the job. So that is a lot of time, I think why customers want me to do the job for them. And this is the whole reason that I created that email nails for the customers to keep in contact to let them know that I'm still in business, because I have had phone calls before where people say, are you still electrician, I think once your electrician, it's tough to sort of let it go, you can't forget how to do it, you might have to do the upgrades. But once you're electrician, you're always going to be an electrician, this is the thing. And then number two, is to let them know that there's new technology on the market. A lot of people don't know that they can have maybe the smart heating controls or the USB sockets, or PIR lighting on the back. So it basically lights up their walkway when they put their bins out anything like that or love light and amount of offline people like because there may be once a knows more storage space. And I don't use a lot of den grew up there because they're spiders, but whether you had a lovely light in that loft, where you could see exactly what you're doing. And then put your boxes of stuff that you won't touch for the next 10 years exactly the same as I do. Cool, nice and tidy in your life. But then if you need to find if you've got a nice light up there, this is what I think that customers enjoy. And then also number three, the of the theme, the point of the email nails, is I let them that I can instal it cost to keep my business running. And I think is fantastic. And I've been using this over? Well, I think it's maybe a designed or thought about it maybe 1012 years ago. And I've been using it ever since keeping in contact with customers.

And I have had some feedback from a lot of customers that do say yeah, they appreciate it. They're interested in reading what new technology is about, they've read the emails, and not necessarily call me up all the time to have to have any of the work done. But they also listen to the podcast. And they say, Well, it's interesting, but you're not electrician, how come you listen to it? And they say but it's interesting to find out what's going on in the world with electricians and the technology and how electricians work. Maybe how electrician think I'm not even sure I'd love to find out next time we'll come around your house, if you will, my customers listed explained to me why you listen was who interested about finding out about electricians.

So if you're in business for yourself, and you're not sending these emails out, like, basically newsletters in a way to your customers to keep you you basically your company at the forefront of their mind, not only for when they want electrician, but maybe they're working in an office and there are a London on their lunch break and talk it around and someone goes, Oh, I'm having a kitchen fitted, I need an electrician. Well, then they remember hang about I got an email from Ben. He's good electrician, I'll recommend that guy for this kitchen to be refitted and it will get your name out there so much more. And what does it cost to send an email? Absolutely nothing. You can just send them an email, and it will just keep them interested in your company. I think a lot of customers like to know that you're doing well as well. Or you're what you're doing that you're still running your business. Because interesting to say over the years of all the customers. I did something a little while ago, I checked all the customers that I'd worked for over I think it was like a 10 year span. There's not many, there's not many customers that I work for not many new customers anyway, there's the same customers that keep popping up. And I've done work for them over the years constantly and they've kept my business running

So I do recommend checking out these email now as to maybe sending a few emails to your customers, let them know about technology, just letting you know that you're still about. But the only thing I want from yourself is to let me know how you get on, start sending these emails out maybe once a month, and then let me know what if you get any jobs out of it if you get any feedback from your customers, because I've had some great feedback for some electricians already. They say yes, I've put six jobs in after sending out these emails and keeping up at the forefront of people's minds. So it's working for not just me, it's working for a lot of others as well. So for now, have a fantastic week, and I'll be back here 6am Bright and early next Monday. Till then I'll see you again.

PS, I nearly forgot to mention, if you want to check out the email nails, check the link in the description, and there'll be a link straight to the 10 email nails that you can check out. If you'd like to start using them to send your customers to build your business to help your business. Reduce Stress gain back time.

Again,