25K - 180K+

Hey again, Marty here with Warehouse and Operations as a Career. We work, that's how the world works. I’ve had the fortune of working in the light industrial industry or the warehouse and transportation fields for my entire career, over 45 years. I’ve errored, messed up, been irresponsible, negative at times and I consider myself more than lucky for making it through it all, and having the many mentors with their guidance that's been shared to me.

If I had to pick one individual that made the largest impact on my career, I’m not sure I could. But if I was asked who made the largest financial impact and setting goals impact on me it’d be my first corporate president.

I had started with the company as an outbound loader on nights. I was fortunate to be moved to the hi-rise order selection department my first week. I was 6’ 3in tall and loading the many bobtail trucks of the time was, well, we’ll say quite difficult. Had I not been moved to selection I don’t believe I’d of made it the 24 years I did. I had moved into the warehouse side of inventory control about 2 years later on the day shift, then to the freezer side lead, next as the freezer supervisor.

The operations part of the company, day warehouse departments, as a side note, we had the same fish fry party for the night crews that same night. Anyway, so at the fish fry, my company president at the time called me over to his table, where he was sitting alone. Now, our relationship was a rough one. He had fired me 3 times up to this time. Luckly, he always sent someone to get me before I left the building. I learned something from him every time I spoke with him! So, I went over and sat down, not sure what direction this was going to go! He said something to the effect of Marty, you are doing an alright job, you’ve got to grow up quicker though. Tomorrow you’ll be the director of warehouse and I’m going to add $100/wk to your pay. I of course said something like sure and I can do the job and thanked him. He then asked me what I wanted to be making in 5 years and what did I want to be doing. I told him I wanted the V.P. of Operations and earning more than he was making. I can remember he literally spit out a little of the tea he was drinking. He then said I needed to get back to working. We talked about my goals several times after that, over the next 5 years and a couple of other promotions.

So, where I’m heading today is, how much money are you wanting to earn and what do you want to be doing? If you don’t answer those two questions you are delaying setting or meeting your goals. And that's on you.

If you’re a long-time listener you’ve heard me talk about the many different positions and career paths in our industry. From general labor, the many different positions in the production industries, line workers, assembly, research and development, and then in the manufacturing industries, analysis, Engerineering, electrical, even chemist educations, and the distribution world, where many of the standard warehouse positions intertwine themselves in all three of the industries. Oh, and then you have all the supply chain jobs, even global shipping careers, and the transportation worlds of trailers, chassis, rail or railroad, and shipping on the seas. Your earning potential is unlimited in our industries. Want to go earn many millions a year. Go do it!

So how do you get started? I received no less that 10 messages or phone calls last month from individuals asking about forklift training. I figured we’d start with that question today.

I want to share this one in particular. A young lady called and asked if we had a forklift training class where she could get her forklift license. I explained how we have worked with organizations and companies, instructing safety on equipment. I asked if she had forklift experience. She said no, she was looking at job ads and the forklift pays more. We discussed how having that card or license wasn't going to help her get the forklift position, and how companies needed to hire, from the street anyway, experienced operators. I shared that the quickest way to get trained on a forklift was by doing a little research, locating a company that uses the type of equipment you’d like to operate and that you can commit to being on time, for every shift too. Getting your foot in the door, maybe with sanitation, or loading, maybe unloading or general labor. After being THAT employee, you know, on-time, positive, and always wanting to learn more for maybe 3 or 4 months, then approach your supervisor or manager and let them know you want to be a forklift operator, and ask them what's the next step. Theres just not a short cut. Your management team will start working with you. Maybe in like 6 more months you can be that operator. Such a promotion and increase in under a year is awesome.

I enjoyed speaking with her and was impressed that she knew what she wanted to do and why she wanted to do it. She’s doing her target research now and we’ll be staying in touch.

All you need to know is what would you like your next step to be, do your research, and get started with it. Our industry is an industry where experience is key. You’ve heard me speak about knowing the position before ours and the position after ours. That can be your first step.

OK, let's briefly look at a few of the positions. We’ll start with a few of my favorites; those get a foot in the door job that applies to most all light industrial industries.

You’ll see a lot of advertisements for general labor. This is sometimes referred to as utility work. It can be anything from an e-commerce associate picking and packing apparel, or small electronic parts, to positioning smallware's on conveyors. Almost any unskilled position in the warehouse. One of the great things about these jobs is that they are readily available for us career minded individuals because a lot of people work them for a while and leave. We’re going to use the position as a steppingstone though, right?

Two other easy starts are loading and unloading. Not quite as unskilled, in my eyes anyways, but great entry level positions. As an unloader we could be working from a purchase order or breakdown sheet. These will tell us what ti and hi or the stacking configrations we’ll use to place the cases on the pallet for storage. In many instances we’ll be applying a barcoded label to the front lower right corner of the pallet. This will be used by the pallet runner or putaway forklift operator and the receiver to identify what aisle to drop the pallet for the forklift operator and telling them what slot or reserve location to place it after the receiver has scanned the product into the inventory.

Once we secure that Get In The Door position the sky’s the limit for us. Where we can go from here you may ask:

Let’s see, where to start, the Sanitation department, another good entry position that can take us in several career directions. I've heard of one gentleman that started his career many years ago cleaning aisles and today is a chemist for a manufacturing plant.

Like I mentioned a bit ago, the pallet runner, a putaway forklift operator, the product receiver, and a few other positions in the industry, the replenishment forklift operator, a dock hauler position, stacker, pallet sorter, picker, packer, being an order selector, truck driver, truck spotter, lets see what else, Inventory Control, Assembler, Machine Operator, material handler, building maintenance, Welder, Grinder, Line Operator, Batch Mixer / Compounder, Quality Inspector and quality control, Production Helper, Die Cast Operator.

And then those positions can take us into the Administrative, Technical, or Supervisory positions, like: Production Supervisor, Manufacturing Engineer, Industrial Engineer, Plant Manager, Continuous Improvement Manager, Lean Coordinator / Six Sigma Black Belt, Production Scheduler / Planner, Maintenance Manager, Process Engineer, Quality Assurance Technician Quality Control Analyst, Compliance Specialist, Environmental Health & Safety (EHS) Coordinator, Safety Manager, Regulatory Affairs Specialist.

And we havent even gotten to the many Supply Chain and Global Shipping careers or all the technical and support roles or administrative positions. Oh, and I almost forgot about the many levels of management and executive jobs yet.

Todays point being, in our field, the earning potential is ours to set. I’ve shared many times a friends decision to be a forklift operator, turning down every other position in the warehouse and management offerings. He loves being a forklift operator, and he's been doing it for over 40 years now. He had a plan and stuck with it.

If you’re happy earning an hourly wage with the increases it’ll bring, that's great, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. And if you’d like more responsibilities, learning every day, reaching for more every year, that can happen in our industry. I think the most important thing to keep in mind though is, you must love what you're doing. If you hit a wall in a task that you don't enjoy, change it. We just named a few other things you can do!

Remember that you control your destiny in this industry.

Over the next few weeks, I’ll do a deeper dive into many of the positions we talked about today. What task they entail, how to get to them, and where each can take you from there. Maybe we can even do a few interviews with associates performing them and making a career in them.

No matter what job we hold or task we’re doing, our first priority is, and always will be, safety. Let's all go home after each shift just like we arrived, our families will appreciate that!