The way to build confidence is through competence. You know, every day I'm taking on new projects I didn't see yesterday, which means I have to try, and I might fail a few times before I'm successful. But when I'm successful, I feel great and it just builds a little bit of confidence and a little bit more knowledge that I didn't have before.

This is Take Stock presented by Commusoft, the podcast where we bring together diverse experts and leaders to discuss the top trends, ideas, and strategies used in the field service industry and beyond - let's dive in.

Hello listeners. And welcome to Take Stock - the show where we interview top professionals and share the best ideas from the field service industry and beyond. Today, I have the pleasure of speaking with a professional who is taking the skilled trades by storm. Currently based in Ontario, Canada. She's a third-year electrical apprentice, motivational speaker, and advocate for young people and women in the skilled trades.

It's my pleasure to welcome Shannon Tymosko. Hello. Well, thank you for having me, Charles. It's such a pleasure to be here and to chat with you. Discover a little bit more about why we both love the trade. 

Absolutely. Absolutely. Glad to have you here. I'm gonna jump right in. I'm aware that you have a pretty eclectic career path so far. Can you tell me more about your path, your journey, and how did you become interested in the skilled trades? 

Well, it's a question I get asked often, and you know, it's not my first career choice. It's not my second. Probably, you start counting up to the fourth and fifth. It sounds like it wasn't something that, you know, skill trades were not something highly encouraged in my high school. So there was a tech class, there were grades nine and 10, but I had a new high school, and they hadn't really established a good department. 

Skilled trades was not something that was on my horizon as a young person. So I did the typical school route. I went to school, picked something - accounting, found out within a year, disliked it, switched to something else, you know, career choice, number two there.

So now I went to school for child and youth work and I finished that. It was a three-year program.  Worked in the field for a bit, but sadly, it's not one of those jobs that pay well. So, you know, like I say, thriving was not an option. I was just surviving, going into debt. I was working at a shelter for homeless youth and still to this day, one of my favorite jobs, I loved that job.

But you know, sadly again, it doesn't pay well. So I had to maintain my college job. My college job was just working at a financial institution. And this evolved into like a decade-long career. I started as a customer service rep, moved my way up to a management position, at head office, and it was never something that was completely rewarding for me.

Never something that I really enjoyed. You know, I went home, I took the job home with me. It didn't pay well after a decade of working in one industry. I only made $40,000. So you know, that's an entry-level income that I'd worked 10 years for. Slowly going into debt.

I needed change. I wanted to have wants.  

Was there a moment that you recognized - like a light bulb moment where you recognized you needed that change? 

I don't know if it was a light bulb moment, but you slowly just find that your job is not for you and it's not paying the bills.

I think maybe the light bulb moment wasn't necessarily at that time, there was, I think a light bulb moment, but it wasn't then yet it was, fast forward a little bit, and I was career searching. Didn't know what to do, but my friend purchased a home. My best friend, Matt. When neither of us were tradespeople.

He wanted to rip out the kitchen on day two. I was like, you're nuts, but we did. So, it's turned into a kitchen, we finished a basement, two bathrooms, and with the help of Google and any friend we might have that actually was a tradesperson - we figured out how to do these things. It was during that I had that, “aha moment.”

Maybe this is what I could do? I knew tradespeople make reasonable money, but I never thought it would be something for me. So I went, maybe this is my thrive job, you know? 

Because I had a child youth background, I started researching programs and how can I transition. Because I knew that was gonna be hard.

I found a pre-apprenticeship program and it was through the YWCA. It was to help transition women into the skilled trades. So I took that, it was good for my resume. There was a good co-op opportunity afterward and helped me get something so I could establish myself and find a start to my new journey.

Absolutely. Absolutely. So it just began as helping a friend out in redoing a household project and it led to an entire career. That's pretty incredible. 

The funny thing now is though, that friend, he was in a labor kind of job. He was a bus driver and I was in business.

Now he's VP of business and I'm labor job. We're both doing better than what we were doing before. We've switched positions, but yeah, both doing better. 

It's so funny that you all switched, but also are thriving in each of your respective positions. In the past few years, regardless, if folks have stayed on their same career path, or ventured out into another career, we've all had to pivot in some way in the past few years.

Say there was a young person that you had to give advice to that was struggling with their career. As you were earlier on and needed to make a change and needed to make that pivot, what advice would you give a young person who needs to make that career pivot?

I think the most important thing is - because I talk to a lot of youth - and I always end it with the same message. I'm here to talk to you about the skilled trades, but that might not be your passion, but that might not be your love. Go find what you love. And you can only do that through trying.

You can't experience it through cell phones and other people telling you - you can't experience it through that. I think we stop trying at some point, we just stop going out and trying new things and I, myself am guilty of this. I go back to that friend, that friend had a canoe.

I loved canoeing. The next season, he bought a kayak and he's like, you wanna try it? I'm like, no, I love canoeing way too much. I love canoeing. I'm not gonna die for the whole season. I refused. I did the canoe by myself while he was in the kayak. 

Right, right, right. 

Next season I tried the kayak. I don't wanna go back to the canoe. I love the kayak.

It was a game changer. 

Right. I robbed myself of a year of love because I was confident I wouldn't enjoy that more. It’s the same thing with your job. You don't know what you'd like. I didn’t know I was going to be an electrical person and find this as something I enjoy.

So if you need to pivot, I suggest - and don't pivot big yet - go try little things, go out, and do little experiences. Work with your whoever, you know, work at home on something a little task. See if you enjoy working with tools - if you have a friend who, whatever, does busing, for example, maybe go spend the day on the bus with them and see if this is something you could do.

It’s the only way that you're gonna know if you like it. Since you spend way more time at work than you do at home. It's so, so, so, so important that you like what you do. 

Absolutely, we're spending at least 40 hours a week, so many of our waking hours on the job it's important to yeah, maybe not even love it, ideally, of course, love it, but at least like what you do.

I think that was really wonderful what you said. A career pivot can be a daunting thing, but just taking that little step, you know, going on the bus with a friend, doing this, doing that. It starts with a small step, a big change starts with a small step. So I think that's an important thing to hear because I think for all of us, a huge change, a career pivot can be extremely daunting and it's all about taking that first step. 

Yeah and for the skilled trades, I know it can be hard, to get to the skilled trades. I think it's one of, for me, I think the hardest part of the skilled trades was getting that sponsorship. Like you need an employer to commit to and say, we're going to take you on as an apprentice.

Well, employers don't want to take on first and second years. If you go take a look at job banks, you see all these job postings, they're like third, fourth, fifth year, you know, we need our employers to kind of start taking on those new entry green people.

I know it takes a little bit more effort to train them. So for the people that are pivoting, be persistent. Don't give up. It could be very discouraging when you hear no, no, no, no, no. Someone will say yes. And for the employers out there, start opening the doors for, and giving those first and second years a chance because we need to start transferring knowledge from our older guys to our younger guys.

Absolutely. Yeah. Like you said, it's twofold as a young person. You're starting out and rejection is just a fact of life. You're going to hear the no’s in all parts of life, all along the way. You have to have that stomach to be able to take rejection and push on and keep going. But I like what you said.

Companies - it would pay off for these larger companies to come in and give that training to a younger person in the hope that in the long run that would help their retention moving forward. If I could transition here, I would love to hear more about your experience as a woman in the trades and in field service.

Recently the United States Department of Labor held a survey that found roughly 10% of the skilled trades workforce are women. Obviously, that's something that needs to be addressed and a challenge that you're taking head-on. What do you think are some strategies and concepts that trades and service companies could implement to recruit more women and help women feel comfortable and more introduced into trades companies?

Great question. I think it's interesting because it kind of goes back to the last thing I said about employers being open to taking on new hires. They say there's a shortage of skilled trades workers. I'm not really sure if that's a hundred percent the case. I think there's a demand for cheap labor.

So we need to be more open to again, taking on new hires of any minority because, you know, truth be told construction is a very white male-dominated situation. So we need to be more open to everybody and that's the employer's end. Then on the other side, I think we need to talk to women and men or children, women, and men, boys, and girls a little bit more about the stereotypes.

It's funny because I have, in my family, a couple of nephews. I'm the only registered tradesperson. There are a couple of handy guys, but I'm the only one that's working 40 hours a week. He still loves auntie Shannon's tools. Like he gets his own tools because of me. 

He knows I do construction. But he still goes to the guys when he needs something fixed. Business people. Then they look at me and say Shannon, do you know how to do this? So there's that conditioning that is still current. It's still happening through books, through school, and through the other kids that are running around.

So we really need to talk to the younger generation. If we introduce it to them younger, then by the time they're eight, nine years of age, then it's a little bit more common. But we reread them books that are Bob, the builder and like boys. 

That's so funny. I was just thinking of that. When you were making that comment, I thought of how important representation is in media in our lives. I had thought of there's Bob, the builder - where's Barb, the builder?

Well, it even transfers into sports, because I was sitting there with that nephew who he's very smart, even only five. Because he watches sports with grandpa. I said, do you ever watch girl sports? He stopped and thought, cause he had to think, cause he watches hockey, he watches baseball, and then he's like, yeah, yeah.

I'm like what sport? Tennis. It's like the only girl sport you watch because women don't like it. So you're even underrepresented in sports. It does something to a child's brain. I don't know exactly the psychology, but it does something to them to start that conditioning to kind of go left or right.

I really empower those. I was just talking to a father today through my hall and he takes his daughter out. She does stuff with him, he's like, oh, she's gonna be the next Sparky, whether or not she is gonna do it. But I bring her out with me. You're building her confidence when you do that as a young girl, cause you're giving her basic skills to go out into the world and be able to fix things herself.

Maybe she doesn't know how to fix that problem, but she's troubleshot a different one that she's confident enough to take that one on. So, we need to start talking to our little girls and letting them know it's an option for them too. 

Absolutely. I don't think I could have said it better myself - representation and life experiences. That's what helps us grow, that sets the vision for the future. I really appreciate your point of view on that. 

I actually just had this woman. So there are women everywhere, just trying to change that. We were talking about Bob, the builder. Here is a book I just got from a wonderful woman, Valerie.

She wrote a book that says that the construction worker is my mom. There are women out there writing books everywhere. I'm trying to work on a little book myself. 

Yes, I was going to ask, I saw that you mentioned that. Can you tell me more about your upcoming book? 

Yeah, so I'm working on it, everybody's got different ideas, but it kind of started with just a silly post I made online.

You know nursery rhymes. Nursery rhymes are one of those things that we read over and over again. We don't really think about it, and a lot of them, we don't know what they really instill. We know they're kind of all dated. Let's just say, I've taken a couple and I've played with a few and I thought it would be kind of cute to put a book together of them.

For example, I've taken one of my favorites. I took I'm a little Teapot, right? We all know that so I changed it to I'm a little female, brave and bold. Here's my hammer. Here's my drill. When I hear the men doubt, hear me, shout, look out, boys. I'll figure it out. And so it changes that again, it just starts telling that little girl, oh, I can do it.

It’s important to start building these ideas, these conceptions in the brain early on to set that example and tell your kids you can do anything. Here's a real-life example in literature, in a film, of a woman being a construction worker and a woman being an electrical apprentice.

How cool is that? I can imagine in that same vein, there are probably some misconceptions about being a woman and working in the trades, and maintaining a sense of femininity.  What are your thoughts and your opinion on this?

I kind of have two opinions. I have the, I think it's really important that you still embrace yourself, who you are, your femininity. If you wanna change your nails, you wanna do your hair. You know, those things are who you are. Just like, you wanna grow your beard out, you know, that's kind of comparable. 

But for me, femininity is those kinds of things. But there are some women and I try very hard to be careful of what I wear because I wanna be remembered for my words, not what I look like.

So for me, there's femininity and then there's drawing attention, I guess. I'm not really sure. I try to limit that as much as possible because I think my brain is what should hold value.

Right, right. 

But I still paint my nails. I wear it because truthfully, it keeps them stronger. They don't break through the week, so I have to do them on the weekends. So that by Monday they stay strong. 

Absolutely. Absolutely. So it's interesting. On one hand, of course, you're here representing yourself, empowering yourself in the way that feels right to you, but there's still a thought you have to consider that in the work environment. Interesting. 

It's still a man's world and I'm still very aware of that because I've worked in a different environment. I do feel there's a different culture. So I know I am often the only person and you have to be very careful.

You are always seen. So for example, working on my last site, where I have to work at heights. So my foreman came up to me and he said, Shannon, I've been watching you for 15 minutes and you haven't done anything wrong, but that girl behind you has also been watching you for 15 minutes.

So I need you to not break any rules because if she decides to say something, it's easier to say, oh, it's the girl. You can say it's the boy. Well, which one? I don't know, they're all boys, but there's only one girl. So I have to be very careful and remember that I'm easily seen, and easily remembered just because I am the minority.

Right. It's a wonderful sense of empowerment. You're encouraging young women, but there's pressure. There's pressure there for sure. Awesome. Well, switching gears a little bit. You're clearly a social media whiz and I see your posts. I see videos and they're engaging. They're entertaining.

It's really cool to see. How can business owners and entrepreneurs use social media to their advantage? In field service, an electrical company, an HVAC company. How can these field service companies use social media to gain more business? I think you're already seeing that a little bit, you know, with COVID a lot of things have gone online.

You're seeing a lot of companies working with individuals, actual trades people. You know, and making influencers. You're seeing a lot more podcasts. You're seeing a lot more different online kind of things.  I think employers are seeing that. They're starting to do apps, they're starting to do these different kinds of things.

I think employers can definitely take advantage of finding skilled trades people this way. Again, you're gonna be able to see their passion, you know, a lot of times I think it's the hardest thing to train are the character parts. Dedication, hard work, all those things that you say on your interview.

But you can train most people. So you can really see that. I think sometimes through social media, if you take the time to look, you could probably find some really good candidates and nurture them to become your next journeyman. Right. We wanna develop leaders. We wanna develop the next generation and, you know, using social media can help you find them.

You know, it's, it's an interesting trope, I think, but it's true that we hear in the business world. You can train some skills, but you can't train character. You can't train hard work. That is something that is just within a person and something they've learned and is part of their lived experience. But you can truly train a skill. You can learn to be a marketer, a musician,  an electrical apprentice. Yeah, but character.

Well, it's interesting. I used to do hiring and the head office would provided us the interview questions and there would be like, you know, we had actually several interviews before you got hired and we'd always ask the same question.

Like, why am I asking the same question? It's to see the consistency of the person, if they're answering the same way, because of course someone can kind of just it the first time, but do they really have that hard work and dedication that they, they were, oh, they're ready with those few words, you know? Well, here's another question, but a different way. And so you can kind, you know, see those people and, and that's how the other side does it.

All right, Shannon. That sound means it's time for our rapid fire segment. The part of our show where we get to know you, our featured guest on a more personal level. The stakes are high, the time is short and we need to get to know you fast. Are you ready?

Yes.

Okay. Here we go. Shannon what is a tool you cannot live without?

My linesman.

Great answer. What is a must have food when you're visiting Canada?

Poutine.

What is your favorite fish to catch when you're fishing?

I haven't caught enough. What is the one I'd like to catch a pike? A pike, a Northern pike? Yeah.

Okay, great. Great. And what is the best way to keep warm when ice fishing?

Hut, definitely an ice hut.

 We got to the end. Well, that was great. Excellent work. I'm glad we could hop on that adventure. I do want to follow up poutine now tell me what is the best way to make poutine? What, what are the, what are the true poutine ingredients?

I really think the cheese makes a difference. Yeah. I think like if I think it's gotta be like this special kind of melty mozzarella because like cheddar, you can, you can try to make that work, but it's just not the same. You gotta, you gotta use that. It's like a spy type of cheese. It's so good. It's gotta be that mozzarella. And then it's just gravy and French fries. Like the rest is easy. Right.

Absolutely. In the same vein of social media, I'm gonna throw you a question here. If, if you were to judge a company only based on social media, never having heard of them before no prior experience, let's say an electrical company or an HVAC company. What about their social media media presence would convince you as a customer to hire?

I think it's, I think employee, you know, employee morale is a super important culture. You know, often when I'm as in person looking for a job, I look at those like top hundred employers and, you know, when you look at them, there's all those kind of different criteria.

And one of them is how they take care of their employees. Can they retain their employees because that's gonna show work ethics as well as a company. And if you can establish long term good employees, you're also gonna have that knowledge to be able to carry on your business.

And so it's really important that we take a look at how they treat their employees cuz their employees are, you know, who does the job. It always starts at top and trickles on down and leadership is, you know what? Start it's at the very.  You know, I talk about sometimes that boss that is in, in construction, there's still that guy that's not nice. And they think that sending in the toughest guy is the best. Like, you know, go and you yell at your employees. They're gonna go work harder. When you walk away, your employees proceed to talk about what just happened and they waste the next hour because they wanna waste your time, two hours. And if you're really have a bad teammate or a bad seed that one's gonna look how to sabotage.

How they treat their employees is, is really important. And you can see that, like, you know, sometimes they've got these social media apps and they're always getting their employees to send in pictures of comradery and having good experiences, ones that kind of do company events.

Those are, you know, really trying to build morale. Those are things that you wanna look for.

Right? Even as the customer, like I know as a customer and consumer, if a company or an organization. If they're treating their employees, their, their family, their people, their own people, right. It's gonna reflect on how they treat me as a customer.

That's the values of their organization. It shows in that employee, employer relationship I'm with you on that.

And it would show the quality at the end of the day. You wanna find quality, it trickles all the way down through.

Absolutely. Transitioning to your own career. What is a mistake that you've made that along the way. Cause we've all made plenty of them. Boy, I've made a lot. But what's a mistake that you've made that you wish you could have avoided.

I don't, that's a see I'm a very much, everything happens for a reason person. In the moment of foresight, in those moments that are really stressful, of course, like you're you wish things were different.  Everything has for me, always kind of worked out. It's been for a greater reason. So there's some lessons I've learned. You wanna be careful with social media these days of what you post online. Especially if you're working with a specific employer. Learnt that the wrong way. Would I change it? No, I don't think so. Cuz you know, I learned a bunch of other things.   Everything's happened for me for a reason. I went to school to be a child, youth worker. Then I did business and not electrical.

And I feel like all of that's made me kind of this package to be this ambassador, have the knowledge or abilities to kind of take this on. But I might not have had that if I didn't have all those experiences.

Yeah,  regardless if at surface level we may or may not think it relates or it's connected. Everything happens for a reason and contributes to our overall lived experience. You know, whether it's a career change, a career pivot, a mistake, we've made something we've done great. It all contributes to who we are and who we become in our career. And otherwise.

I gotta ask. What is your favorite part of being in the skilled trades?

That's a really hard question cause I feel, well, I guess maybe I can combine it into one it's that confidence I talked about cuz it kind of gives you that ability to take on at home projects and you know, those do it yourself skills. And so I started taking on car repairs and as somebody, I will be very honest, has struggled with her own mental health and at times depression, it's really important to maintain and take care of yourself. The skill trades helps me do that for my mental health, by keeping me on a routine, keeping me physically fit.

This actually contributes to your mental health, but it also helps build my confidence. And so how do you build confidence? Like what is, what is the form? Where do I find that? And so the way to build confidence is through competence. It's when you're that little kid, you take the sippy cup and you spill it and you spill it 10 times. Finally you're successful. And guess what? You just build a little bit of confidence. And so this is why it goes back. I talked about trying, we stopped trying, we stopped building confidence. And so I think it's really important to go out and try. And the skilled trades, you know, every day I'm taking on new projects, I didn't see yesterday, which means I have to try.

I might fail a few times before I'm successful, but when I successful, I feel like I feel great and just built a little bit of confidence and a little bit more knowledge I didn't have before.

Right. I love what you said. Confidence is competence and, and that's so true. You need to get up and try again every day and in something like field service and the skilled trades, every day is a new challenge. Everything is a new experience, a new lesson to learn. How many filaments did Edison go through to make the light bulb like thousands? It takes  it lots and lots of attempts to get to the result.

And I think we stopped celebrating our successes, you know, like we used to, you know, to clap for that first walk. And so when did we stop clapping for our little successes and we need to take a moment and go, I just did that. Yeah. And reward ourself and remind ourself that we can do these things. And maybe sometimes clap for ourselves if nobody else is listen.

Right, right. And that, that goes back to, to, to mental health and keeping a routine patting yourself on the back, celebrating your success, not just at these huge life markers, but along the way.

At the end of the day, at the end of the week, I made it through that week. I made it through that tough day. In terms of mental health in the workplace and in field service. You know, I think that's something that has fortunately gotten more attention over the past few years. As far as your routine and your practices, how do you keep your mental health and what do you think field service and trades companies could do to prioritize mental health?

I think you made a good point that a lot of, and, you know, over the last few years, I think there's been a lot of attention brought to. Mental health and just other kind of challenges that people might be having with families and children and these kinds of things. And so I think understanding is the first step employers understanding that we're human and respecting that as well.

So employers really need to take time to understand. Their, their staff listen to their staff. And I, and I think it's really important for the skill trade specifically that we start to see a culture change. You know, I think there has been more focus made to mental health, but not enough in the skill trades.

I had a boss once say to me coworker say to me, when I was telling him I was upset and he said to me, I probably would feel the same way. Can't say anything about it, like you can't because you don't know how you can't, because it wouldn't be cool. Like, why can't you? There's still not that openness to talk about our struggles on a construction site.

You know, there is no mental health days there, you know, suck it up. Princess gets to work. So I think we still need to make a change on construction site level. Cause I think at head office, oh, there thought great cultures up there, but like it does not trickle it down to the construction. You know, you know, that 10% number you talked about with women being in the skilled trades.

I, I definitely think that's a little higher than necessarily, like, I think that number might include some of those jobs that are like project management kind of jobs. They're still kind of in the realm of skilled trades, but I think women in electrical is only like 4%. Right. It's much lower. So like that, that was a generous statistic.

Yeah. So I think we, we need to be more open, I think with more women also coming onto the construction site that will just naturally change. Sadly. I think they need to come the same time. Women come onto the skill on the construction site. We naturally bring a little bit more understanding to mental health and feelings and the men naturally open up a little bit, cuz you know, I'll be the first one on a construction site to know some guys had a baby I'm the only one who probably cares, you know?  He wants to be a little bit more excited about his newborn, but he knows the rest of the guys don't waste your time. So if we got more women, then we could naturally just kind of change the culture. It would just change it to be a little bit more accepting of feelings.

Absolutely. I value your perspective on that. And also, I love what you said.  It can't just be at the highest levels that culture, that priority of, of mental health. It has to be throughout the entire organization top to bottom left to right. All over the place.

So as we get to our the close of our episode here, I wanna know what's next for you. What is next on the agenda for Shannon?

I think people always ask me, you know, where do you see yourself in five years in electrical? And  I don't know if I necessarily picture myself chasing a specific avenue like solar or whatever. I as a previous manager and someone was in training. I think I'm gonna chase the I wanna be a good leader.

I wanna be that good journeyman. I wanna be that good teacher. I loved teaching when I was at my previous job. And so I'm eager for that day to take on that role and be able to teach the next apprentices. And you know, sometimes again, I was at the hall today, our, local hall and had some training and there is a position there- training coordinator.

And so they facilitate and oversee. The different kind of things that are local block Otago working at Heights. They're doing welding programs right now. Like, I would love that job. That's like maybe a retirement job. So teaching and just being that good leader and  trying to create culture.

Absolutely. I always feel like many times really regardless of field, teaching and the practice of the profession are often seeming like they're separate and often shown as a separate thing, but I consider them all one and the same. I think if you're really devoted to a craft and devoted to a profession, it is part of your obligation. I would even go as far to say, to pass that craft and pass your knowledge onto the next generation. So that's really exciting to hear that that's a priority for you.

And even more importantly I talk about knowledge all the time. People say there's gonna be a skilled trade shortage of people. And I'm like, well, what about the knowledge. What about, the 60 year olds, 65 year olds that know about like I've heard of knob and tube, I've never seen it. So what about the older guys that have that experience? And so unless we're passing down that knowledge, because technology's changed too much that's what we're gonna lose out on.

And I've heard of like organizations retiring their, their senior guys and. Shutdowns happen. And none of their current staff know how to fix them. They bring in their retirees to do the job. And they're now collecting CPP, you know, their retirement and getting paid again because they did not make sure they passed on the knowledge.

Right. It's not only a great thing to do. As a career person to pass that on. It benefits everybody. It benefits those folks who are at the age of retirement. It benefits the younger folks and it benefits the organization. It's a overall, mutually beneficial thing.

And that's the whole process about the journeyman process. And I think respecting the process and each individual needs to respect the process. The apprentice needs to understand they're there to learn. So, you know, think about it. You're in school, ask questions, be eager, be there every day. This isn't just you're collecting a paycheck and the journeyman needs to be respectful of the process that you are the teacher without you, this person's lost. So step up to the plate,  pass down that knowledge. And ultimately it makes you smarter when you teach other people. And because that person's going to ask you questions and now you gotta think more and the employer needs to respect the process cuz they need to start hiring people.

So each process needs to respect where they are and you step up to the plate to kind of make it the whole system.

Absolutely. I couldn't have said it better myself. Well, there you have it. We've reached the end of our time together today, but in closing, I wanted to give a big thank you to our featured guest electrical apprentice and skilled trades advocate, Shannon Tymosko. Shannon, thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you so much for having me. It's great to chat.

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