Poor Work Ethics Hinder Business

Whether the poor ethics we are experiencing in today's society is a result of the family breakdown, a society where it is acceptable to do your own thing, or it's okay to do it as long as you don't get caught, poor work ethics are becoming a major problem in today's workforce. Recently a report shows that 84 percent of all employers feel they cannot hire good employees because the applicants have poor work ethics.

The study was complied by John Kooti, dean of the School of Business at Georgia Southwestern State University, and it shows that all businesses are suffering. It is not easy to identify what is the main contributing factor to this dilemma, but there is no easy solution.

Everyone has been in a place of business, such as a fast food restaurant or a department store, where there are more people in line waiting to get checked out than there are store personnel to serve. The part that really frustrates me is most of these employees are oblivious to what's going on around them. They don't bother to look around to see that the line is growing and their customers are growing impatient. And when they do look around and see the growing line, they don't bother to change their pace at all to help the line move....their body language sends off signals to say to everyone, who cares?

Great Opportunity for the People Who Care

The marine industry is no different. It's just hard to find good people. However, in any field of business, the person who cares about providing the proper service will stand out heads and shoulders above the rest. This is an excellent opportunity if you'll just apply yourself. Recently I was visiting the Marine Mechanic Institute in Orlando as one of their Education Training Advisory Council (ETAC) members. While attending the three day meeting, which is allows the industry to evaluate the school and make recommendations for improvement, we were touring the classrooms to observe the students in action. Skip Burdon of the ABYC and I approached one student and asked him how he liked the school. He informed us that he was very pleased and was eagerly awaiting graduation which was coming by the end of the month. Skip then asked him if he had a part time job to help him while in school, to which he replied, "oh no, sir, I saved my money prior to coming to school so I could concentrate on my studies"....Wow! We were blown away by his attitude and professionalism. Right there on the spot we passed this students name on to one of the ETAC members who represented a marine dealership and he was offered a position upon graduation. This is exactly how the customer, as well as prospective employers, will respond to professionalism in today's society. Think about it, how do you feel when you run across someone who shows enthusiasm on the job? Personally, I want to do the best job possible

regardless of what the job is. If flipping hamburgers is the best I can do and I accept the job, then I want to be the best hamburger flipper in town.

Keeping Your Word

Another problem I've experienced over the years is many people don't bother to keep their word. I guess I'm from the old school when your word meant something. I was raised that when you gave your word to someone you honored your commitment, no questions asked. If for some reason you couldn't keep your commitment, then you told the person that you couldn't do it. At least you honored your word and told them something. Many people just ignore it and go about their business like there's nothing wrong. Once again, being a person of integrity, who honors their word, will be a person who is respected in today's society.

The AMTECH association is dedicated to not only improving service in the marine industry, but we hope to provide a good example for our members by being an organization that is committed to improving ethics and doing the right thing. I want to thank those of you who are providing these honorable traits as a representative of AMTECH. And I hope those of you who haven't given much thought to some of these issues will start thinking about them and make a conscience effort to improve them in the future. It's never too late to start. Let's all get together and start doing the right thing!

Joseph J. De Marco

AMTECH

President