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Welcome to the second quarter of 2020 Ladies and Gentlemen and to another episode of warehouse and operations as a career! I’m Marty and I for one am excited to be here, not just for bring you another episode of WAOC but I was ready for the first quarter to be over with. It was a rough quarter for a lot of us with all the layoffs, reduced hours, staying in place orders and learning about social distancing and what an essential employee really was. As economically disastrous as it was, it will pass, and I’m certain we’ll all be stronger for it. Well, let’s talk a little Op’s today and forget about all that for a few minutes.
I investigated an incident this week, one of those accidents that never should have happened. If you know me at all you know I’m not a big believe in the word accident. I firmly believe accidents occur because someone did something, they knew was wrong, they didn’t follow a procedure or process, or another person did the same and it just happened to us. In all my years I’ve only heard of one incident I could honestly call an accident. A team member was operating a tugger and the front drive wheel came off bring the machine to an abrupt stop sent him flying out of the driver’s compartment and he landed face first on the concrete. He was alright, banged up pretty good, but not lasting injuries. After the investigation was complete it was confirmed that the last quarterly PM or preventive maintenance was performed and documented, and every operator had correctly filled out a pre shift and post shift equipment report on the unit. The mechanics stated that the shaft bolt had simply loosened enough to back out of the screw housing on its own. The report stated that the machine had logged an increased number of hours for the quarter, it was one of the favorites by everyone on the crew, so it was always being used. The result was a new procedure where the mechanics we’re placing a lock tight type of adhesive to all the bolts going forward. That’s the only actual accident I’ve ever heard of. Everyone did their jobs well and as written, but it still happened.
Anyway, so back to this week’s investigation. So, an unloader was using a dock stocker to unload pallets from a trailer. A dock stocker or pacer is a smaller masked standup forklift that kind of looks like a mini counterbalance lift. I’ve seen a couple of sit-down models too but the majority of units I run across in my travels are of the stand-up variety. There shorter mask makes them the perfect powered tool for unloading trailers and moving pallets across large docks. I gotta quit wandering or we’re never going to get through this story. So, it was a really humid day and the dock plate was forming a little condensation from the cold air coming from the trailer, the driver had left to refrigeration unit running after docking the trailer. It was a ribbed floor and of course was damp from the load which was produce. The operator was simply entering and exiting the trailer at too high a speed. The driver commented that he had started to get out of his cab a couple of times and go tell him to slow down. He could feel the lift entering and exiting his trailer on more than one occasion. The operator entered the trailer to retrieve one of the last 5 pallets and upon coming off of the dock plate his front wheels lost traction when they made contact with the ribbed floor and the lift turned sideways to the right and the right fork tore through the trailer wall and ripped a 18 inch gash in the trailer wall. This was no accident. The operator had been driving too fast. 5 other unloaders we’re working in the area and a leadman and a supervisor had been on the dock all morning. I’m not pointing fingers or calling anybody out but come on, this was not an accident. This one was a nobody did anything. It’s hard to stay focused and do what’s right, I know that, I’m far from perfect and I catch myself slipping with a rule every day. But let’s not say damaging a trailer to the tune of 2700.00 was an accident. The employee received a coaching card, was suspended for 3 days without pay and ended up with 4 of 6 safety points as an equipment operator. And you can bet that he will be watched closely by his management team and their customer now. The gentleman is a good guy, I know him, he is a safe operator and respects the equipment. He just made a bad decision, and his team and management didn’t do any better. Sounds like I’m mad or upset, not at all. What we do can be dangerous and I just hate someone losing any pay or hurting anyone else!
And on to another point, and honestly, I’m not on a soap box today, dang it sounds like it though! Over the last 3 weeks I’ve been certifying a lot of essential positions, grocery order selectors and replenishment fork drivers. I’m running just over 50% placements or graduates though. I know we’re all in a difficult situation right now. Many of us in the light industrial world are working reduced hours or we’ve been laid off, some of us have been told it could be long term or permanent. When we’re talking to a recruiter please don’t exaggerate our skill levels. I don’t agree with how companies are only looking for skilled and experienced labor right now but that’s how it is. I’ve had people sit through the class, participate in all the discussions and listen to me about how productivity driven their company or assignment is and when it’s time to get on the rider jacks or forklift it comes out that they’ve only been on the rider jack a couple of times or just driven the reach lift moving product on the docks. I know that given a couple of weeks they’d make a great long-term employee but putting themselves in a high productivity environment is dangerous for you and others. Please be honest with your hiring agents. It seems all those advertisements of high paying jobs, since there the only ones being posted right now, are attracting everyone out of work right now. Please remember, experience is what gives us skill. Even if we get hired for a high productivity position, we may not be able to keep it. When working outside or above our skill set best case is, we’ll lose our new job. Worse case is we’ll hurt ourselves or injure someone else. We’re not winning either way. I’m just urging you to be careful, but it’s rough on all of us right now, I understand. But It is going to get better, I’m certain of it!
And on an up note, through working with several agency recruiters, I can say all of them we’re able to get placed. A couple at a lower wage but hey, their getting equipment experience now and in 3 or 4 months, who knows, they could transfer into productivity positions!
I’m excited to see so many new Manufacturing positions opening up too. Many of our production factories have added 2nd or 3rd shifts. As we’ve learned, we just need to think strategically, we can land those jobs. A little planning will help us out. Last week I talked a little about how just replying to a Facebook ad with a interested or info wasn’t going to do us any good. Earlier this week I had an opportunity to sit in with a recruiter while she was doing a little sourcing. I was there to do a 2nd interview for a couple of productivity order selectors that she was interested in running through a class and I noticed her frustration answering all the messages through Facebook. On one post she had 19 replies, 9 gave no information, 7 just replied with interested and 3 wrote about coming in for an interview or stated that they were going to give her a call. When you say it out loud it has to make you think, or I hope it does right? We’ve had a couple of episodes on how to look for work, several recruiters and hiring agents have given us some pretty good tips. You might go back and check out a few of them. Things are going to open up for us soon, be one of those that jumps quick and grabs a great position.
Well, I could ramble on for an hour. I actually had a couple of topics to discuss for today but, well, just got to talking I guess. We’ll get to’em next week!
Until then, plan ahead, think strategically, and above all practice safety, we all want to return home each day!