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Hot Seat
April 2009
Volume 19, Number 3
ISSN 1499-5271
Essential skills
Those of us who grew up in Canada
tend to take for granted basic life
skills such as reading, writing, practical
math and spoken communication.
Anybody at a management level uses
these “essential skills” every day and
couldn’t function without them.
But it’s not unusual to have an
employee that isn’t terribly proficient at
those skills despite being a master
craftsman on the technical side. If anyone
has seen the movie The Reader, for
which Kate Winslet won an Oscar, it
involves a woman who is intelligent and
functional in most respects but illiterate.
There’s a scene where her shame
causes her to abandon her job and her
apartment after she receives a promotion
to an office job that would have
exposed her illiteracy. People lacking
basic skills often spend their whole lives
trying to hide the fact.
We often see that in the trades too
where an experienced tradesman who –
one would think – would be an excellent
leader for the young technicians just
doesn’t want “the hassle” of management.
In many cases, they may just be covering
up a lack of basic life skills. They may
have dropped out of school early or have
just forgotten many of the things they
used to know. The result is often a lack of
self-confidence that prevents them from
advancing in their profession.
The Construction Sector Council
along with a number of trade organizations
is working to address this issue
through surveying members and developing
tools and training to update these
fundamental skills.
But, it’s a sensitive subject, as the
Mechanical Contractors Association of
Canada learned when they started
polling member contractors to determine
how the required skills have
changed over the years and where the
gaps are. At least one reaction was
something like: “What are you saying –
that my guys are stupid?”
It’s not easy an easy subject to broach
with individual employees. It certainly
needs to be done one-on-one and kept
confidential.
New immigrants actually have a
much easier time with this. For someone
for whom English is not their first
language, there’s no shame in taking
basic English and math classes. The
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opposite is true if you have you lived
your entire life in Canada.
I think most contractors would agree
that when they bring someone into
management it tends to be more successful
if the person has been a longterm
employee. They know the way the
company operates and are familiar with
the customers and their needs.
But moving these employees into
leadership roles may take upgrading in
areas unrelated to the trade. The
Construction Sector Council and the
trade organizations that it is working
with are to be applauded for their
efforts to come up with the tools and
training to do this.
However, I don’t remember sensitivity
being a major concern when I
worked in the trades. When it comes
time to talk to an employee about basic
life skills, it pays to tread carefully.
Editor
Simon Blake
(416) 614-5820
sblake@newcom.ca
Contributors
Ron Coleman
Roy Collver
Barry Cunningham
Ed Gravelle
Arthur Irwin
Bruce Nagy
Design and Production
Tim Norton
production@nytek.ca
Publisher
Mark Vreugdenhil
(416) 614-5819
mark@plumbingandhvac.ca
Account Manager
Jordan Chong
(416) 614-5832
jordan@plumbingandhvac.ca
Production Manager
Lilianna Kantor
(416) 614-5815
lkantor@newcom.ca
Circulation Manager
Pat Glionna
Corporate Services
Anthony Evangelista
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