HELP !!!

[ingham21]

Hello people,
new to this site as you can see, just need some advice from you professionals out there. Im 21 coming up 22 and am in need off an apprenticeship or on the job training, the trades i feel confident at are mainly Joinery & Decorating. i have good DIY skills and would like to turn it into a career. There are 2 problems, the main one being finding an employer, its so difficult i have been trying for a good year now even with my experience off working as a CAD technician for a shopfitting company and actually being hands on onsite. the other problem being the money side off things, my money will drop and im prepared for that even with me having 2 young children.

What i'd like to know is the best way to tackle my problem!!! is it to go night college and study there, take the drop in money and go for an apprenticeship, or study via these fast-track 2-4 weeks joinery & decorating courses!!!!

Please advise.

p.s if any tradesmen out there need a reliable, hard working and bright trainee give me a shout. Im prepared to go to great lengths to become a quality tradesman.

Thanks Lee (manchester)

[freddymercurystwin]

ingham21 wrote:

Im prepared to go to great lengths to become a quality tradesman.

Except take a wage cut, skimp on everything, get an additional evening/weekend job for a year or 2 to finance a career move?

[ingham21]

Freddymercurystwin.

are you a tradesman urself!!!

[freddymercurystwin]

Haha, Christ No! Click on my profile. Whats your point?

[ingham21]

nothing just asking.

thanks for advice

[freddymercurystwin]

Alright you young whippersnapper; I'll resist the easy quips about contraceptives and the youth of today etc! (well maybe just one or two). Heyho, a quick search on Google reveals the usual route to becoming a joiner etc is indeed an apprenticeship as you're already well aware. Just what other choices do you think are out there? As is the norm for most careers you have to start at the bottom. As you know no one's going to waive a magic wand and match the wage of an apprentice to that of your current salary are they? There's tons of stuff out there on the web, careers advisors you could talk to etc.

I’m sure you'll have seen most of these links too?
http://www.bconstructive.co.uk/careers/jobs.asp?sub_section=3&sub_section2=39&sub_section3=305
http://www.bconstructive.co.uk/careers/jobs.asp?sub_section=3&sub_section2=5&sub_section3=10
http://www.learndirect-advice.co.uk/helpandadvice/helpwithfunding/
https://www.apprenticeships.org.uk/youngpeople/whatnext/formpage1.htm

Assuming you are indeed prepared to take on board everything in my first post, if you've applied to 50 or so companies and they've all rejected you then there must something fundamentally wrong with your expectations, approach, attitude, CV, appearance etc and you need to address these issues at this stage. Talk to independent people who'll be more direct/realistic in terms of your current approach etc than maybe friends/family may be such as: http://www.learndirect-advice.co.uk/featured/cag/

To sum up if you've tried everything suggested in all the links above and still get nowhere well there's not much hope and you'll have to think of another career.

Any one else out there wants to contribute - Go for it!

Of course I could be completely and utterly wrong as I'm not a tradesman, maybe apprenticships are simply a thing of the past?

By the way you may well have got a better response in one of the other sections such as Trade Talk, wheres a mod when you need one?

[Moderator 4]

your wish is my command!
 

[freddymercurystwin]

Come on ingham21, cat got your tongue?

[ingham21]

thanks for posting this to the correct forum, thanks for the advice and suggestions.
I have got names off 8 companies that are currently after an apprentice and will be phoning them this week hopefully i will succeed in landing an apprenticeship.

Any more suggestions from you experts wouldnt go a miss.