Most Important Things You Should Know Once Qualifying as a Professional Electrician

Whether you have been working for a larger electrical company for some time now and have recently successfully qualified to be able to strike out on your own or else are still training, there are many considerations before you even begin to plan to launch your own business.

So, with this in mind, continue reading to learn about the three most important things you absolutely should know once qualifying as a professional electrician.

1.    Your Own Health & Safety Must Factor into Everything

As an electrician, as is the case with other tradesmen, you are automatically placing yourself at high risk of incident and injury in your professional vocation, so it is crucial not to cut any corners when it comes to your own health and the safety and, of course, your client’s.

At the very minimum, full compliance with HSE policies and procedures is mandatory, and before you commence every single job, you should carry out a full and thorough risk assessment.

The assessment should comprehensively cover the following four main aspects:

1. Physical hazards, such as moving heavy machinery and furniture or working on top of a ladder
2. Hazardous substances, such as toxic substances and harsh chemicals
3. Social hazards, such as long and unsociable hours, overworking, infrequent breaks and stress relating to your work
4. Environmental hazards, such as uneven surfaces, second-hand smoke, sun exposure and poor lighting

2.    Concentrate on Cash Flow

Even though this next point seems, at first, somewhat obvious, cash flow is vital, especially when first starting out as a professional electrician, and you need to focus on striking the right balance between your hourly rate for a call out and your overheads.

Start by ensuring you have good quality and durable tools for the job from a reliable wholesale electric supply company that will stand the test of time and ensure every task is completed with the highest levels of accuracy. Additionally, create call-out charges to fit the minimum expected, yet cover all of your material costs before you invoice your customer.

3.    Work on Your Problem-Solving Skills 

The third most vital thing to remember as a newly-qualified electrician is that you and you alone will be thrown into plenty of situations that are not ‘cut and dry’ in the context of finding a solution.

It is for this reason that you need to focus your efforts on improving your problem-solving skills, as well as your ability to quickly and accurately diagnose an electrical issue and then troubleshoot your way to fixing it.

Luckily, there are numerous ways to improve your skills at solving problems, including breaking the electrical issue down and eliminating variables that are either impossible to change or else are working perfectly, in order to find a solution.

Naturally, the more experience you gain in working with different kinds of electrical problems and the greater your repertoire of successfully completed jobs, the quicker you will become at diagnosing and solving problems.