KIND WORDS...BLUNT , HONEST , BUT KIND NONETHELESS-

Bear with me on this one. Bonuses were suppose to go out today - I've gotten one every year I've been with this contractor.Paychecks were handed out today and no bonus. No big deal , I look at a bonus as a bonus - you get one when times are fat, you don't when times are lean. Times are lean.But when another IJ got one and asked me if I got mine , I had to wonder - did they forget about me ? Had I done something wrong ?
We had our Christmas BBQ thing at the shop this afternoon and I pulled my foreman aside and asked "Is there a problem with my performance"? Here's where it gets interesting...
What followed was a 30 minute discussion of my plans to take my license exam in the spring , and that plan was in his estimation a bad one. Here are some highlights...
...At your current rate you are more than worth the money...
...I have X amount of journeymen and a bunch of grunts that do what I tell them..."I need a red wire from here to here and they do it...that's not electrical work".Why do you think you are off in some corner away from them doing other things?...
...I trust you and you do good work, but you make it harder than it has to be , I see you struggle with things you shouldn't have to struggle with if you just thought ahead more than you do...
...I wouldn't trust you in a live switchgear (me neither!)...
...Can you read prints?...(yes)
...Could I give you a set of prints and could you plan and execute the job,find the specs for lighting types,plug heights etc?...(no)
And it went on and on. The bottom line is I'm not ready to be the kind of journeyman I want to be, so I will wait and learn.
And then there is the financial reality...
...If I had you at your current skill level making journeyman's wages and another journeyman with better skills and I had to cut someone, who do you think I would pick?...
And finally...
...I think you'd be cutting your own throat if you got your license now...
Ouch.
But true.
I can wait.
And I thank him for his honesty.these issues (though not so well defined) have been nagging at me in the back of my mind, but I wrote them off as "fear of success" (see how being a social worker fucks your mind up?) when in reality it's a simple case of I'm not ready yet.
Time for some goal setting.
Oh...it turns out only supervisory level folks got a bonus and this IJ made some foreman very happy and they made an exception,they just forgot to tell everyone to keep mum.