I don’t meet to open an old wound here, but I wanted to touch on this thread a little, especially as it seems to be a common thread in many of the different boards I am a member of.
In one capacity or another I have been in broadband, communications and telecommunications since 1991. Everything from copper to the cell sites, the cell sites themselves, broadcast towers, celestial and terrestrial satellites, cable, phone and data centers. It is a gypsy lifestyle; we travel to where the work is located. It is hard to find people that will travel like this, my tower guys go out for 6 weeks and come back home for a week off. The a few my lineman go out for months at a time; the others want to stay local and I do my best to accommodate that, yea maintenance contracts and squirrels.
Once you are able to find people that can live the gypsy lifestyle the next challenge comes. It is hard to find a guy that can climb poles all day longs, much less someone to climb a 1000’+ tower. It makes the pool of applicants smaller.
Before the days where everyone in the industry was being subjected to background checks, I honestly think that 75% of our work force had some type of felony conviction, and DUIs where a little higher than that. Most DUIs came from crews while they were on the road; work hard, play harder. The union power and telephone guys were in the same boat, they just had better PR people in the halls. With all that being said most of the guys were not the degenerates people have made us out to be. As with all things in life it only takes a few bad apples.
The Cable Lineman has always been one of the most technically challenged fields out there. Telephone Lineman for the most part have always just needed to follow the colors. Don’t get me wrong it’s not super easy to be a Telephone Lineman, there is a good degree of technical knowledge that needs to be mastered. It is just that the Cable Lineman has always needed to know more, with the amps, balancing the line, testing forwards/backwards, knowing how a splitter nine spans down is the cause of your problem (even though you have never seen it, the reading just tells you that it is there).
The industry is changing, drastically and quickly changing. I am not sure if it all for the better though. Fiber has caused massive changes for all aspects of the communications industry. I used to employee “tower dawgs” or riggers, on the wireless side of the house. I needed people that could lift heavy steel, run 1 5/8” coax and hold 90 pound antennas in the air while someone else bolted them to the tower mounts. That was just the cell guys, the broadcast guys had to deal with 20’sections of ridged conduit weighing in around 120 pounds apiece, with antennas picks up to 12,000 pounds. These were good craftsman, with little to no “computer training”. Now with fiber to the cell I have tower climbers that have graduated from places like ITT.
On the Cable Lineman side of the house, fiber is starting to cause a major issue. That issue is a loss of qualified workforce. It is getting harder and harder to find good quality Cable Lineman, real cable not fiber. We are always looking for cable splicers and most of the responses we get are from fiber splicers. Sorry guys if you have just hung, spliced and installed drops for fiber you are not a Cable Lineman. I am not saying that anyone can do fiber, it is a different skill set. The skills need to do production are the same, where to route the cable, how to hang the strand, lashing, etc. It is just that if all you have ever touched is fiber you are not qualified to deal with coax. With Cable Lineman retiring faster than cable plant being decommissioned and large skill gap is being created in the work force. Cable Lineman are in higher demand, yet the MSOs are not paying for the demand.
So once again both good and bad things for fiber. Change is inevitable, there is nothing we can do about that. Though as an industry it is up to us, the ones that do the work, to ensure that the change goes smoothly.
Retirement is another thing all together. To the younger guys that want to stay 1099, you are responsible for your own retirement. You need to find a financial advisor that can help set this up for you. Don’t try to do it yourself, the tax laws are too complicated, the fed needs to find some way to give you money to people that do not want jobs. A long time ago we implemented a 401k program here for my guys, as well as benefits (even before the feds forced everybody). We offer it to our employees and encourage them to participate in it. We do have 1099 folks and after 90 days we offer some the chance to convert to full time employees. Some take it some do not, but I feel as a company owner I have to try to leave a better foot print for others to follow in the generations to come.
Well I will get off my soap box, figured I would just prattle on for a bit, I am old it is what I do.
Live Safe, Don’t Forget To Not Let Go, Don’t Touch The Shiny Lines Above You And You Will Get To Hug Your Loved Ones Again
x