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WAOC is always talking about Advancement, Planning and Careers, but aren’t their warehouse and operations positions for us seeking part time positions or maybe just seasonal work? Hello all, I’m Marty with Warehouse and Operations as a Career and the answer to that question is Certainly, and some great ones actually. I started to say and some great opportunities just then but let’s talk today about a few of the positions for maybe the parent with children in school during the day, or the person that just wants to pick up some extra pay before or during the holidays. There’s lots of seasonal positions available throughout the year even.
I’m familiar with one such facility, a global organization, that does everything under one roof. They import and receive units that have to be assembled for their client’s retail stores, once their assembled they store them or inventory them and then ship them to individual locations as needed. They offer not only short-term assignments, usually 2 to 3 week projects but ones that last between 2 and 4 months as well. Because they try and source that type of worker for their assembly department they try and work within peoples schedules, maybe like a 9 a.m to 3 p.m. shift so parents can drop of the children at school and are out in time to pick them up each week day. It’s a win win for the employee and the employer! And since their employee is seeking this kind of schedule, they call them first every time a new project is ramping up. They’ve worked for them before, know the task at hand and eliminates so much training, and that cost associated with it is greatly reduced! They regularly get those projects so even the receiving and shipping departments can utilize this type of workforce and be just as flexible with the hours as these extra hands will assist the full time associates during their crunch periods.
Another production facility that produces disposable paper and plastic goods runs 6 shifts a week, a 1st, 2nd & 3rd Monday thru Fri and then three more on Sat & Sun. The weekend shifts are filled by those only wanting part time work or maybe a second income. I love this model; it helps reduce required overtime and creates work for a whole other segment of us in the workforce!
Both of these examples are in the production or manufacturing aspects of the business and although there are probably fewer part time positions in distribution, at least the larger DC’s there’s plenty of warehousing or dock work positions in the retail environments too. All that product in our grocery stores, big box stores and the shopping malls comes in across a loading dock. It has to be unloaded, received and those shelves stocked so the end user or consumer can purchase it! A lot of those jobs are late evening or night positions, and typically will not require a full 40 hours a week. Maybe our deliveries only come in 2 or 3 times a week, and we’ll only need to come in on those days, or we can come in for only like 4 hours each evening. An being more on the retail side, maybe it can be much more flexible with days worked and hours both!
And even in transportation and logistics, I know several people that work part time with cartage freight or cross dock facilities. These are great jobs too, set hours, maybe 4 or 6 hours shifts 3 or 4 days a week. A few of them I’m aware of work with that fri, sat sun shifts. These can be both day and night shifts. Oh, and dispatchers can be part time as well. As a dispatcher we may have additional duties, maybe working with bill of laden, billing and working closely with the fleet maintenance people. Working so closely with the drivers can teach us a lot about the movement of freight, their side of it at least.
Now part time positions shouldn’t be confused with casual work, casual positions or casual labor. In my experience these positions are held by people wanting to eventually be hired on full time somewhere. Many of our well-known parcel services utilize casual labor as fill in’s during peak times or peak seasons. Typically, we’ll be on call or have a schedule with only 20 or 25 hours a week and that schedule can change from week from week. Like I said, I think casual work is great as a get our foot in the door kind of a position, these are great companies to work for but getting hired permanently can take a little time. Now that I’m thinking about it, I do know one individual that’s worked casual for a couple of years now. He likes to travel, a lot. He’ll work a few months, save up for a trip, take off for a while and come back and apply again with the same company. He does a great job; they know he’ll be in every day so they hire him back and work him as long as he’s in town.
We all don’t want the stress, challenges or responsibility that comes along with advancement or growth within a company, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. Just like I’ve shared before. I know forklift drivers that’s been operating the same lift for 30 years, their jobs have been good to them! One of my best friends has been working in warehouse sanitation over 33 years, he’s never wanted to do anything else. Just a few months ago we spoke with an order selector that’s been offered a management role on 5 different occasions and turned them down each time. He loves his job! These are all people that enjoy what they’re doing, they have a 40 plus hour a week job, probably more like a 48 to 50 hour a week job. They want full time employment, a position that pays well and they get to go home after the shift, and they don’t have to think about work again until the next shift! I feel we’ve got to enjoy what we’re doing in order to be the best at it and I think having a job as a position is perfectly fine!
Part time jobs are a little different, we don’t want that 40 hours plus position. We want to earn a good pay rate of course but we may have other responsibilities. Children, other jobs, maybe parents or family members we need to take care of. A part time position can provide us with earnings, keep us fit and productive while allowing us to take care of our other responsibilities.
Again, what an industry right. Warehousing, transportation and operations has it all! There’s a position for all of us!
I wanted to say something about planning and goals today too. You know, many times as a part time and casual worker we are master planners, keeping track of not only a work schedule and responsibilities but our out of work responsibilities as well. How are we all coming along with our Goals and plans? I’ll be honest, I’m behind on one of mine. With only 12 more weeks to achieve one in particular I may have to make an adjustment, and that’s nothing bad. The point is that I’m still working on it, and it’s perfectly fine to extend that timeline a bit. How are each of you coming along? You know it’s been a while since we had a giveaway, I think our last one was a WAOC t-shirt. Let’s all send in a little paragraph on how we are or are not on track to meet our goals for 2019. You don’t have to share what your goal is if you’d rather not but talk about what got in the way of you achieving it or what you felt you did that helped you reach it! I’ll start, I am not going to reach my goal because I think I overreached a bit. I took on a few more projects than I should have and did not dedicate or commit enough time to accomplish this particular project. But I’ve re-committed myself and I will have it completed by February 1st! Email your story to host@warehouseandoperationsasacareer.com by next Monday and we’ll draw the winner on Tuesday and announce the winner on next week’s show. Oh, the prize, let’s see, we’ll give away any two items from our Store Front at https://www.teepublic.com/user/waoc , shoot, let’s go for broke, we’ll give away any 3 items the winner choses! Get those entries in my midnight CDT next Monday, we’ll chose the winner and then just send me your choice of 3 items, and I’ll get them ordered and delivered to ya!
We’ll, there’s a little on part time and casual positions, I hope I answered a few questions and maybe gave you some ideas about a few great positions that you may not have thought of yet! Remember, even with part time jobs, our first priority is Safety!