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Special career section
From food to fences: A late career change By Elisabeth Curry Special Correspondent Tom Mell, owner of Southern Pride Stain in Evans, spent 40 years in food service, both in the military and in the private sector. He and his wife, both now retired Army, moved to Evans in 2004. While searching in 2012 for someone to
Businessperson of the Month Tom Mell, Southern Pride Stain, Evans fix his fence, Mell found that none of the area businesses provided staining. He noticed innumerable gray, weathered fences all over the Augusta area and realized he had discovered an untapped market. He did some research, traveled to Texas for coursework and certification in outdoor staining, and started staining fences and decks part time.
The business venture quickly gained momentum. Mell decided to leave the food service industry and made an activity he already enjoyed his full-time career in 2013. What’s most important to you in your work? Enjoying my work is the most important thing for me. I got tired of food service in the end. It isn’t an easy career and there aren’t many people in their mid-50s doing it. Catering especially – there’s no end to the work there. One of the best parts of this job is when I have a customer who thinks they need a new fence and I tell them “No, I can make your old, gray fence look better than new.” There’s an instant gratification in getting to see a finished product that looks better than someone could have ever hoped, without the additional cost of a brand-new fence or deck. What did you learn from your career as a chef in the Army that helps you now? No one ever believes me when I tell them this, but everything I know about customer service I learned from the Army. It taught me focus and dedication, and I think I’m pretty good at it. Everybody wants a good value. Everybody wants to be treated fairly.
I traveled around the world when I was in the Army and learned that different cultures have different views on customer
service. Thailand, for example – they’re just See FOOD TO FENCES, page 34
Changes in attitudes
Long-term careers are no longer the norm By Gary Kauffman, Editor For two summers while I was in college in the late 1970s, I worked in a factory that manufactured doors and windows for the building industry. One of my co-workers had been employed by that company for 50 years (he started at age 15). Another had been there 45 years, and almost everyone had worked for that company for at least 25 years. It wasn’t unusual back then for someone to start a career with a company right out of high school or college and stay with that business for the rest of their lives. That isn’t the case these days when the U.S. Department of Labor says the average person stays in a job just 4.4 years. In the course of a normal working life, that means at least 10 jobs changes – in fact, the average these days is 11 job changes. For those born after 1977, job tenure can be even shorter. Many expect to stay in a given job less than three years. Many times these job changes are in the same career path – a banker stays a banker, but works for several different financial institutions. Increasingly, though, people’s career paths can veer sharply from where they started. Several months ago I met a man in his late 40s who was in school to become a nurse after years of running a successful construction-related company. As you might expect, human resource managers become wary if a resume shows too many career changes in a short time. A survey of HR managers by the staffing firm Robert Half found that they consider workers who have had five jobs in a 10-year span to be “job hoppers.” While companies no longer expect an employee to spend a lifetime with them, they also are hesitant to invest time and money in training someone who may only be around a year or two. Someone who has voluntarily changed jobs
several times in a short span may be seen as someone unreliable, easily dissatisfied, lacking skills or even in the wrong career. Why the change in attitude? Part of it is due to the way the generations born in the
The average person stays in a job just 4.4 years, with 11 job changes past 30 years view jobs. It is no longer strictly about salary or job security. A 2012 survey by Net Impact found that college students ranked a job with a social impact as one of their highest priorities, and 58 percent said that they would be willing to take a 15 percent pay cut in order to work for a company with values like their own. Views have also changed on job security. In the past workers often hesitated about changing jobs because of losing the security they’d built up over the years. But following the Recession of 2008-9, when many saw their parents let go from long-term jobs, younger generations take a more cynical view toward job security. They perceived that as companies’ lack of loyalty toward their workers, and now feel less beholden to extend long-term loyalty of their own. The Internet and social media have also made workers more aware of other jobs, often within their living area, that sound interesting. The wealth of information on the web also makes it easier to obtain knowledge about a potential job before making the switch. Job hopping also has some perks. A job change often
means career advancement Punching the and a salary increase. Or, if Time Clock the move is a lateral one at the same pay, it could mean better working conditions or working for a more progressive thinking CEO. Or it could mean more flexible hours and the ability 51% to work from home part of the time, two important considerations for those under 40. These days more companies, 1980 and more HR managers, are taking these views and desires into consideration. They are creating more flexible working conditions, and they are seeing 39% job hoppers as people who are versatile for their unique work experiences. Many are also incorporating ways to have a social impact, 2005 either locally or abroad, that satisfies the workers’ needs to Percentage of feel like they’re making a difworkers ages ference beyond the building’s 35-64 who have walls. been at the Employees with 50 years at one company are almost unsame job 10 or heard of these days, and those more years with even 10 years at one company are becoming increasingly rare. Short job tenures seem to be the new normal, and probably will be for years to come.
February 2014 Buzz on Biz
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