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Respect (Pecking Order) in a Shop

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luv2wrench

Member
What is going on with todays new job force?? I work as a GM mechanic in a shop in the Midwest And have been doing so for 12 years as I just turned 30. I m not old by anymeans, but these new guys in the shop don"t respect tools, time or older (experienced) mechanics. When I was starting out, I busted my butt around older techs learning as much as i could. I always brought back tools i barrowed cleaner than when i barrowed them and made a point to buy that tool. When a older tech yelled at me, I took it constructively and tryed to learn from it, and I did. These new guys don"t know how to work. Are we babying our youthful work force too much?? I think so. I learned my work ethic from my grandpa. "Show up early, stay if needed, and if your gonna take the time to do it, do it right and with pride, your name is on that repair when your finished."
 
The workforce is going straight to hell and quickly.

short story told to me by my cousin.

He's a plant mgr in a food blending plant. A blender (person who operates a machine) was out and my cous. asked a young new guy who had shown some intelligence to fill and work the machine. My cous went out to check on the guy and he was standing around talking and not working. New guy was told he wasn't hired to talk and to get on the machine and get to work.

Bout 15 minutes later the new guy was in my cousin's office literally crying and complaining that he wasn't used to being "talked to that way" and wasn't gonna take it and quit.

This is what happens when these modern parents treat each and every child like they are the newborn Prince and never ever tell them no or correct anything they do wrong.

I am all for bringing back American manufacturing but our workforce is woefully untrained and hasn't been raised to receive training.
 
It's not just in the shop...it's pretty much the entire workforce in every job field. I'm 33 and virtually no one I work with takes pride in their work. And I mean no one.
 
My parents were older than most people my age, my dad will be 83 in November and mom just turned 76. In some ways, it's like we missed a generation. My dad started working like a man young...real young(he's been paying for it physically for the last few years now), and always took pride in anything he did. It's sonmething I learned from him early on. Even though I don't consider myself half the man my father is, I hope to pass on to my 2 year old son the work ethic my father taught me.
 
that is very true and is the reason that we quit raising tobacco on our farm awhile back.

Back in the day all the kids from the area went out to cut and hang tobacco, they were even allowed to be out of school to do it, not considered truant. Every boy and a great deal of girls did it, the pay was bad but that was how every family earned their money in Kentucky, selling tobacco, not cutting/hanging. Our kids will come help you and your kids come help us. Once your kids were grown the neighborhood kids went around and earned money in the tobacco barn.

Eventually the kids all starting wanting more money and started working slower, now no american kids work tobacco at all around here, all immigrant workers. and its been that way for awhile. It would be impossible to have any chance at profit if you had to pay american kids to cut/hang tobacco. We decided we didn't want to get into the hiring of seasonal labor and stopped growing tobacco.

Kids just won't work anymore
 
I just thank God that our grandfathers had the drive and strong will they did, or we would all be speaking German right now. THAT IS A GENERATION THAT WORDS JUST CAN'T DECRIBE. I miss ya grandpa.
 
Work culture varies. Locally the Mex workers are worried about the Asian immigrants taking "their" jobs that the "Americans" won"t do. Some of local "Blacks" upset that "Somalis" will do "Field N*gg*r" work that is beneath them. Local comunity garden group that had a little pick what you want weekend with transportation to field and bags got that response from some food pantry/welfare "blacks"-- who wanted a share of crop delivered to them. Local Hmong groug got some extra pickers out there to glean, some Bahama, Haitian and Somalis came out also. Hmong and Chinese had some good garden patchs in areas close to bus routes, this garden was 5 miles into country with no bus. Monahan was right about welfare entitlements destroying some communities. Shop work attitudes among military vets much better, the reason some shops will give a bonus for a wounded vet as supervisor and back him on discipline cases, firing some reluctant workers sent by state to work that complain about conditions. Veteran one legged supervisor tells them to consider no ventilation and somebody shooting at them before complaining again. Shuts up most of the ones that stay- about 1/3. RN
 

you should see the oilfield---I have run young ones out after 10 minutes. Had a mennonite crew one time, they outworked 90 percent of every other crew that I had. You can thank our public education system as well as parents raising their kids on television. maybe we should push for a mandatory boot camp for work ethics before people can apply for a job.
 
luv2wrench, Like you I been in a Ford garage for
30+ years, I find now not even the olded techs
take care of the tools the dealerships
purchases or has to purchase to keep up with
warranty standards, it' makes me sick.. I find
tools like a very expensive battery booster in
the trash, the shop buys a new one, cause the
cord or plug in is broke on the old one.

So it come home with me, & I'm in the parts dept.
 
It's a screwed up world out there. Ability to do a job in quality and quantity is a low priority out there. The first job I had after college there was a co-worker built like a football player and while he was decent enough he was far from proficient at his job. He sold a residential electrical package to a contractor that was completely non-relevant to code that wound up being a 10,000 dollar blunder. Worse was this error was not discovered till after the installation. You would have thought this co-worker had just landed a 50, 000 dollar deal the way the boss had acted. Meanwhile another co-worker who was fairly good at his job but not great was constantly hounded by the same boss. Of course the second co-worker did not compare to the first in terms of physical appearance. The boss was more interested in paling around with the jock than having a first rate employee.
The point is these idiots don't hire themselves and there is usually a superficial aspect as to why they got hired. If bosses only were worried about hiring the most qualified people then the rest of the population would get the message that poor work habits and inabilities means no job.
 

I place the blame with the parents and schools! The schools have been teaching the kids they deserve respect above all esle. The parents haven't been teaching em any different. When my youngest whils in HS told me "you have to respecte me" I told her right there that respect is earned not granted.

Rick
 
It is likely getting worse , but there were/are several older people who don't respect others things either.
 
I've seen it extreme both ways and the reality often resides in about the middle.
#1 when the young snot comes into the shop and doesn't mind his place, know his place, understand his lack of knowledge, his lack of abilities or have respect.
#2 the grouchy old pharts in the shop are jealous or feel threatened by the young whipper snapper. That is showing signs of eventually having more more drive and ability than they will ever have.
 
I partially agree with that. However, when a person enters the work world should be the day that they realize foolishness is no longer tolerated. If the message was coming through loud and clear via these clowns being shown the door then I think you would see far less clowns in the labor force.
 
Boils down to lack of respect and pure selfishness. This applies to much of our country today. It comes from both sides too. Meaning management and workers.
 
Just want to say that most teachers don't add to this problem, at least not the ones who have been around for a while. The whole self-esteem thing came from college professors who haven't been in a classroom in 30 years if at all. Most of us veterans feel the same as you. We see no work ethic in the classroom and are told that we have to "convince" the kids to work and learn, even though most could care less about education. I wont point fingers at anyone because its not that simple. There are many contributors to the loss of work ethic and we are reaping the consequences in the jobsites and classrooms all over. Around here, the first warm day of spring causes almost all the young employees to get sick. Go figure.
 
That type of attitude is everywhere.
I work in a shop, specialty machine building company, a very nice place too I might add.
A few young ones are there. Under 25.
All of these guys are on their phone with their buddies, outside smoking, poor-medium work ethic at best. I am suprised that the owner allows it.
This country is in bad shape when people at work waste 15 minutes out of every hour. And we wonder why the Chinese and Mexicans get the jobs.
I worked in a couple of schitt holes that were so bad that if you even talked to anyone for 1 minute the shop foreman was in your face. I learned at a young age to work, not talk.
Kids today dont understand the fact that in a shop it costs $50 an hour to run the place, salaries/benefits/overhead/indirect labor etc.
What needs to be done at your shop is to fire a few of these young punks and let the rest of the young ones get the message. Work ethic and responsiblity should be taught in school, cause the parents may not know what it is.
 
It's like that everywhere.. I am only 25, but I also have been told I have an extraordinary work ethic. Currently my pet peeve is in class at school. People always want some credit for wrong answers they give on exams, especially when they are obviously wrong-then they ridicule the professor. I will never forget my Police and Community professors motto he wrote on the board the first day of class last semester. RTFB/RTFQ. It is a bit profane, but is straight to the point. Read The F Book, Read The F Questions. Pretty simple on what the outline for the course is. Do your work, and do the best you can do, just like life.
 
What you say is very true. It is hard to walk into a store and get waited on...all employees are either on the phone or surfing the net. Try calling..the person answering the phone knows nothing. I once called Gus's Concrete and asked for Gus. Phone Gal said I don't think there is anybody here by that name.
He was there...in the next room...he owned the place.

I think the parents and the teachers shoulder some blame for the problem. But shame on the manager that lets these jackasses destroy the business or organization or company from the inside. Apparently there is no training program in most businesses, no rules of conduct that will get you fired and no manager with the guts to say...you failed...hit the road.

Somewhere the myth got started in America that good managers have a daily love-in with their employees and SUPPORT their employees regardless how wrong, lazy, stupid or inept they are. Management is not doing these young folks any favors. They will never learn to be responsible until someone in management sets down the rules of life and work...play by them or else. The best love you can give your employees is a stable job at a decent pay rate....and that comes about by being competent at what you do.

Any fool that owns a business ...like the ice cream shop I was in recently, and turns it over to two, 16 year old high school kids to run, deserves to lose his investment while the kids laugh and play video games on their phones.
 
Have the same problem traing aprenticeses you tell them to bring in a bearing. They tell you to get it yourself and watch you install it. Then go and tell the boss they aren't being trained and cry hostial work envoirment.
 
A lot of it is our eduction system (and parents) and the single skill (computers) workforce we are developing. Young people just out of school arve very good at computers, after all they have been working/playing with computers since 5th or 6th grade. They should be better than us "older" people that had to learn computers mid-career. This gives young people the impression they are better than us.

Once you get these computer wizzes away from their primary area of exprttise they are lost. This is one reason so many things are being moved offshore, lack of a skilled (many different skills) workforce.

I have been there and seen it.
 
Well said.

When I was an Assistant Service Manager in a GM store, we had a kid who was on a work share program with our local community college. One day, two of our techs had a car on a hoist and were removing the gas tank to replace the fuel pump. They were right at the point where one had the tank on his shoulders while the other was disconnecting the wiring, fuel lines, etc.

This bone-headed kid walked up put a cigarette in his mouth, and teasingly acted like he was going to light up. I happened to walk past and told him, "Don't even think about it. I've fired people for less than that".

One of the techs, Tom, told me later that after I'd left this kid said, "Gene was just kidding about firing me, wasn't he?"

Tom said he told the kid, "No, I think he was dead serious".
 
I work in a shop with 8 techs, one is 60, I'm 44 and the rest are in their 20's, they are all very nice to work with, while I might be able to show them a trick or two they can teach me things on new technology, I realize this and have no problem getting along with them and do not play the old rooster/young rooster game.
 
Maybe I'm just lucky, but I've seen a number of promising young people with pride in their work, it helps if they have a smart adult take interest in teaching them.

On the flip side, we hired some teenagers this summer haying that were beyond useless. 15,16 and 19 years old. The women outworked them 2 to 1. The young fellows didn't have half a brain, not a bit of drive, and no physical strength. I'm in poorish shape, but 2 off them at the bottom of the conveyor in the breeze couldn't keep bales fed to me fast enough alone up in the mow. I'd go down, throw the wagon to the base of the conveyor and then go up and stack them. They were whining about the heat and how heavy the 45 lb bales were.

My mother made the mistake of hiring them to move firewood, she's in her 60's with a bad back, and she was outworking them 2 to 1. Took the three boys 14 hours to stack 3.5 cord of firewood. 14 hours! With an old lady helping!

I came and did the last 1/2 cord in 25 minutes.
 
why is everyone blaming teachers and parents? what were they supposed to do tell kid to do something either he does it or dont back when we were kids if we didnt do as told we got whiped cant do that nowadays really. i do my kids but not like was done to me now as they are getting older everyone comments on how helpfull my kids are and polite all that stuff that used to be common i dont blame parents or teachers i blame govornment officials for making it a crime to discipline your kids
 
I've found that managing people is like renters. When you have several renters all you have to do is evict one for late payment and the rest straighten up. The same with workers, fire one and the rest get the message.
 
When I was electrician apprentice in 1969, My job was to bring coffee to journeyman. When and if he thought you were good enough, he would give you some training. Proud to say when I retired in 2011, they called me KILLER, as in job killer. Dave
 
I think that every 17 /18 should have to serve in the military at least 1 hitch to learn to respect & learn how to treat each other, Maybe the slow learners twice . That will make them them grow up & pull their own weight. Retired M/Sgt 20 1/2 years in the Mil.
The American people coddle the kids too much.
 
Years ago my father hired a neighbor boy (16 years old and big framed) to help with hay. My father was busy with something and wanted me to bale so I did. My sister (5' 4" 105 pounds) volunteered to put hay on the elevator to send up to the kid. She buried him several times (not intentionally) during the day. Anyways Friday comes along and dad asks if the boy had shown up during the day for his pay while we were sitting down for dinner. Monday comes along and still no kid so dad goes over to see the boys parents to let them know he has the boys pay. Long story made short is the boy avoided coming over for his pay because he was embarrassed by being outworked by a girl.
 
Heck - we (partner & I) stacked 3 cords yesterday in 1 hour 15 minutes! No excuse for those "young bucks", but lazy!!
 
why is everyone blaming teachers and parents? ................ i blame govornment officials for making it a crime to discipline your kids
Click to expand...

With all do respect..... [i:71803cf474]WE[/i:71803cf474] are the Government. People listened to stories about not using discipline until it became the norm. Teachers taught children they were each a precious snowflake.

Well, the snowflakes have multiplied and we have a mess. We still have good hard working kids in our neighborhood, and I'll bet they were whacked a time or two when they were younger.
 
We had a good system in VietNam. Put the smart azzes and losers on point in the jungle, sorted them out real quick. Nothing like an NVA firefight to get their attention.
 
(quoted from post at 16:00:38 09/27/11)
I place the blame with the parents and schools! The schools have been teaching the kids they deserve respect above all esle. The parents haven't been teaching em any different. When my youngest whils in HS told me "you have to respecte me" I told her right there that respect is earned not granted.

Rick
Click to expand...

Agree 100%.

My kids are adults but we brought them up to work hard, respect their elders and don't expect life to be fair. We were working against the school system, it seems. They put the stress on "self-esteem". Always worrying about hurting a student's "self-esteem" to the point they coddled these kids into expecting to have things ALWAYS work out in their favor, NEVER get yelled at. And a lot of parents were no better. If Johnny messed up, the parents were in the school office defending him. I remember that when I messed up in school, the nuns gave me a knuckle-rap with a ruler or a trip to the cloak-room for a paddling. Then I got a spanking when I got home from my dad. There is no fear in kids today. They take no responsibility for their actions.
 
i have five grandaughters,and thats all i hear.you are disrespecting me,you are not giving me my space ,and the one i hate most of all,i cant do that!quite honestly i think they get it from television as much as anything else.those kids shows on tv nowdays are a joke,and its my belief they are sort of brainwashing most kids.somehow they get the idea they are equals,and no one should have to be starting at the bottom.those jobs are for old used up guys who cant do anything else.its like that old saying,"i'm not young enough to know everything".
 
(quoted from post at 06:06:13 09/28/11) i have five grandaughters,and thats all i hear.you are disrespecting me,you are not giving me my space ,and the one i hate most of all,i cant do that!quite honestly i think they get it from television as much as anything else.those kids shows on tv nowdays are a joke,and its my belief they are sort of brainwashing most kids.somehow they get the idea they are equals,and no one should have to be starting at the bottom.those jobs are for old used up guys who cant do anything else.its like that old saying,"i'm not young enough to know everything".
Click to expand...
hey get it from TV? I hear young moms saying it all the time. "I can't" when what they really mean is "I am too good to put time or effort into that." Because they learned it well from their mothers.
 
i keep forgeting there a generation between kids now days and my own,and your sure right.nothing makes me madder faster than to here a kid say "I CANT" without even trying. Ive gotton to where i dont ask them to do anything anymore,hate to hear the whining.
 
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