I agree Winseer, a “grafter” is not a species found anywhere in abundance. You can be down the mines, in the gulags, the sweatshops, or the workhouses, and you’ll find few if any of these “grafters”.
If people work 8 hours a day as the norm, the grafter works 9. Where people work 12 hours, the grafter works 13. If people make do with 8 hours sleep a night, the grafter makes do with 7. If it’s the norm to keel over with a heart attack at 50, the grafter keels over at 40.
As you say, the only consistent thing about a grafter is how much more than the norm he does, for how much less. For this reason he’s the darling of the employing classes, but always in short supply.
It’s not about working yourself into an early grave or being the boss’s ■■■■■. You just don’t do a half arsed job, if it can’t be done it can’t be done but you do your best. It’s called having personal standards and being professional.
If the TM, planner, company, kit, &or pay is ■■■■ then put your petted lip away and move. Life’s too short to put up with crap, if fewer drivers were prepared to bend over then T&Cs would have to rise but nooo far too many will moan and ■■■■■ on here, canteens and RDCs but do f’kall about it.
chicane:
It’s not about working yourself into an early grave or being the boss’s ■■■■■. You just don’t do a half arsed job, if it can’t be done it can’t be done but you do your best. It’s called having personal standards and being professional.
If the TM, planner, company, kit, &or pay is [zb] then put your petted lip away and move. Life’s too short to put up with crap, if fewer drivers were prepared to bend over then T&Cs would have to rise but nooo far too many will moan and ■■■■■ on here, canteens and RDCs but do f’kall about it.
Can’t argue with any of that ^^^^^. If any aspect(s) of your job don’t suit then attempt to change them. If that doesn’t work then simply walk away. Life is way too short to be made miserable by a job.
chicane:
It’s not about working yourself into an early grave or being the boss’s ■■■■■. You just don’t do a half arsed job, if it can’t be done it can’t be done but you do your best. It’s called having personal standards and being professional.
If the TM, planner, company, kit, &or pay is [zb] then put your petted lip away and move. Life’s too short to put up with crap, if fewer drivers were prepared to bend over then T&Cs would have to rise but nooo far too many will moan and ■■■■■ on here, canteens and RDCs but do f’kall about it.
Yep, most ‘grafters’ aint moaning endlessly about the job nor constantly looking for work nor are they being shafted money wise, ok they might get taken advantage of (no not in the knicker dept ) when they first started out like most of us did, but sooner or later they get spotted and offered better, employers if they have an ounce of sense make sure grafters stay.
hmmmm
lets have a quick look at the old job center plus website…
I see pages and pages of jobs. Not one of them is a genuine job offering; however many recruitment agencies promising the world to the unsuspecting.
Now how do they get away with it i hear you ask?
Simple - the government love to show that the jobs are there BUT they are not; these jobs are created in advance in the hope that they will materialise thus proving the government correct.
Call these agencies and register and then watch the job offers roll in… for anything but hgv work.
Mr. Cameron - wake up and grow up son, your problems lie at Calais Sir…
When I think about it all bar one of our work opportunities have come through contacts and I would reckon most positions are filled before it gets to the interview stage. Thinking back even further I can’t think of anyone we took on that we didn’t already know about. So I reckon the knocking on doors with a CV and work gear isn’t a bad way to look for work, it’s making that initial breakthrough that’s the hard thing, then once you’ve got a foot in the door develop and protect your reputation.
chicane:
When I think about it all bar one of our work opportunities have come through contacts and I would reckon most positions are filled before it gets to the interview stage. Thinking back even further I can’t think of anyone we took on that we didn’t already know about.
So not exactly a good advert for the industry as a good provider of job opportunities for new drivers.
chicane:
When I think about it all bar one of our work opportunities have come through contacts and I would reckon most positions are filled before it gets to the interview stage. Thinking back even further I can’t think of anyone we took on that we didn’t already know about.
So not exactly a good advert for the industry as a good provider of job opportunities for new drivers.
Nothing new and affects all industries to a greater or lesser extent. til I stopped farming I hadn’t realised just how important ‘networking’ is in securing work. Firing out hundreds of CVs might get you making up the numbers at interviews but I don’t think it’s the best way into most companies unless you’re a graduate going for an office job.
“Could it be that employers and their representatives who are pushing for a solution to the ‘skills gap’ are in fact lobbying to keep their wage costs down?”
Juddian:
Yep, most ‘grafters’ aint moaning endlessly about the job nor constantly looking for work nor are they being shafted money wise, ok they might get taken advantage of (no not in the knicker dept ) when they first started out like most of us did, but sooner or later they get spotted and offered better, employers if they have an ounce of sense make sure grafters stay.
I think it depends on whether you’re working for Mr Fezziwig or Mr Scrooge - and remembering that the latter was able to put the former out of business under Victorian market conditions.
I personally find the “grafting” mindset to be a very interesting one. It incorporates a willingness to work harder than the norm (however hard that norm is).
But it often involves more than working hard: it’s almost invariably a willingness to work hard when badly treated, or poorly rewarded relative to the effort. There’s a strong implication of subservience and compliance in being called a “grafter”.
It’s not entirely a bad thing when deployed appropriately, but what I think a lot of “grafters” don’t acknowledge is that (like farm animals, battery hens, or perhaps more flatteringly, SAS soldiers) they rely on other people to limit their effort and prevent their inherent weaknesses being grossly exploited.
If we leave PAY out of the entire argument for the moment…
If all pay was equal across the driving speculum, then employers would still I fear try and get drivers that are experienced enough that they don’t need training, self-insured if they can possibly get away with it, and with those two planks in place - it doesn’t matter if the guy has 9 points, and has just been released from jail for a non-driving related offence such as GBH.
What we need is not so much “apprenticeships” - but the kind of induction that agency drivers are expected to do unpaid in some yards - given out as some kind of intense course to be carried out during a probationary period - with a tie-in should that course be “passed” and the full-time job nailed down.
That’s the route I saw myself taking years ago, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it.
I trained at a proper HGV driving school (Kent Metro) in 1991, having spent the previous two years at my employer’s driving other vehicles, including and upto 7.5tonners.
“Training” and “Experienced” should be gleaned at the same time - in a job that will give you both and NOT expect you to “know it all to get the job, but strangely have something wrong with you that you don’t expect decent pay for doing that job”…
Rjan:
I personally find the “grafting” mindset to be a very interesting one. It incorporates a willingness to work harder than the norm (however hard that norm is).
It also implies the contradiction of the double standards applied to the labour market v other commercial sectors.IE the aim of a successful commercial operation is to get as much return/profit as possible for as little outlay/effort as possible.
Rjan:
I personally find the “grafting” mindset to be a very interesting one. It incorporates a willingness to work harder than the norm (however hard that norm is).
It also implies the contradiction of the double standards applied to the labour market v other commercial sectors.IE the aim of a successful commercial operation is to get as much return/profit as possible for as little outlay/effort as possible.
I couldn’t quite make sense, but do you mean grafting is the opposite of trying to get as much as possible for as little as possible? If so that is probably true: grafting is giving as much as possible for as little in return.
But when you’re giving your arm to a crocodile, or feeding your children into a grinder feet-first, you want your behaviour to be in the former category, not the latter, and that’s the weakness of grafters that they frequently can’t form appropriate judgments about risk and reward, or the prudence of obedience or persistence. That’s why SAS men run themselves to death on orders.
But unlike the SAS case which was caused by incompetence and had repercussions on those responsible, with employers the grafter’s folly is always encouraged and manipulated, because the grafter’s folly is their profit (and grafters frequently work against attempts to bring repercussions to bear on a poor employer).
We can see this in the pride of Chicane about his sons being grafters. He doesn’t conceive of them as being the cheapest labour on the market, or as regrettably selling themselves shorter than anyone else because of high rates of unemployment.
I also don’t agree with Juddian who refers to being exploited as if it were a rite of passage. Young workers a few decades ago tended to be paid less as part of a pay structure in which older workers were paid more (and certainly more than their bare needs), and younger workers had reasonable expectations of progressing onto the higher rates of pay. Today, those structures are no longer in place - older workers are not generally being paid more by virtue of seniority, aren’t being paid generously (except perhaps in remaining unionised workplaces), and conditions are deteriorating so that when younger workers become older, they will have none of the paybacks for earlier sacrifices now.
Rjan:
I personally find the “grafting” mindset to be a very interesting one. It incorporates a willingness to work harder than the norm (however hard that norm is).
It also implies the contradiction of the double standards applied to the labour market v other commercial sectors.IE the aim of a successful commercial operation is to get as much return/profit as possible for as little outlay/effort as possible.
I couldn’t quite make sense, but do you mean grafting is the opposite of trying to get as much as possible for as little as possible? If so that is probably true: grafting is giving as much as possible for as little in return
That’s what I meant.Which is basically what the employers’ side is calling for in most cases v union negotiations.In which case the obvious answer should be why would/should the unions be expected to go against all the usually accepted conventions of commercial logic,re the question of ‘more productivety for more pay’.
Rjan:
I personally find the “grafting” mindset to be a very interesting one. It incorporates a willingness to work harder than the norm (however hard that norm is).
It also implies the contradiction of the double standards applied to the labour market v other commercial sectors.IE the aim of a successful commercial operation is to get as much return/profit as possible for as little outlay/effort as possible.
I couldn’t quite make sense, but do you mean grafting is the opposite of trying to get as much as possible for as little as possible? If so that is probably true: grafting is giving as much as possible for as little in return
That’s what I meant.Which is basically what the employers’ side is calling for in most cases v union negotiations.In which case the obvious answer should be why would/should the unions be expected to go against all the usually accepted conventions of commercial logic,re the question of ‘more productivety for more pay’.
Agreed. There’s plenty of mileage in commercial logic for routine disputes.
The problem is that this only goes so far until the unions have to overturn commercial logic altogether (or else founder on it just like the capitalist economy does every few decades).
Unions spectacularly failed to do this in the 1970s - they had won every concession that could be made commercially and the bosses were dry, but members were still asking for more when the bosses had nothing more to give within the domain of commercial logic.
It’s like drawing blood back from Dracula, whilst giving him increasingly little of yours to drink - eventually, Draculean logic itself means you either have to vanquish him completely, or else he has to fight back for his own life. There’s no middle ground where Dracula can be tapped for his blood indefinitely, without him drinking even more of yours.
Rjan:
It’s like drawing blood back from Dracula, whilst giving him increasingly little of yours to drink - eventually, Draculean logic itself means you either have to vanquish him completely, or else he has to fight back for his own life. There’s no middle ground where Dracula can be tapped for his blood indefinitely, without him drinking even more of yours.
I think Fordism is actually based on the idea that the more blood Dracula gives the more he’ll get back by creating lots more Vampires to feed from.
On that note Unions can never be ‘too strong’ and wages can never be too high.Inflation is price led while higher wages in real terms just create economic growth.Hence the difference between 1960’s America and early 1970’s UK v late 1970’s on UK etc.Drac cuts the blood supply so the Vampire population reduces.
To put that into perspective why make one worker work 10 + hours per day to afford 1 car if he’s lucky.When you can pay two workers enough per hour to work 8 hours each for four days per week so they can afford to buy two cars each.One for commuting and one for leisure during their longer time off.
Rjan:
We can see this in the pride of Chicane about his sons being grafters. He doesn’t conceive of them as being the cheapest labour on the market, or as regrettably selling themselves shorter than anyone else because of high rates of unemployment.
That’s the thing though, one lad has left another line of work to drive because it pays better. My son because he can earn throughout the winter as well rather than relying on earning a year’s wage from contracting in the summer months. They also benefit from experience of both sides of the office/management table. Cheap? no not compared to many of the rates I’ve seen mentioned on here.
) when they first started out like most of us did, but sooner or later they get spotted and offered better, employers if they have an ounce of sense make sure grafters stay.
