FIFO career insights from Mike who is a mechanical fitter from New Zealand: – Different rosters available in FIFO. – Maintaining a positive attitude. – Tips for leaving FIFO. – Family acceptance. – Hard realities of being away from family.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:
– In the time that I’ve worked with you I’ve noticed like, you’re always very like positive and stuff and never really seem down or have a bad attitude towards anything, like a lot of other guys I suppose you work around that have had down days and they can be really negative for a whole day or a few days in a row. What would you attribute that to, having a positive attitude how do you keep that, maintain it?
– Probably the main thing for me is that I believe that…
– Good day and welcome back to Fit for Fifo and part two of Mike the Mechy’s interview. Where this week he shares with us how he maintains his positive attitude even on his darker days. He also talks about his concerns of Fifo work drying up. However this interview was done done a while back when some major projects had just finished, and it appears that Fifo work’s about to start ramping up again as resource prices are beginning to change. Though as in all industries I think this is an important reality to remember. So let’s get into it, here’s part two with Mike.
– And what other rosters do you know that are available?
– Common one in Western Australia when I was over there was eight days on six days off,
– [Jason] Okay and that’s considered to be a family friendly roster.
– [Jason] Right.
– I’ve been away for a bit over a week and then home for almost a week so I think that’s quite a good roster although a lot of time traveling, traveling pretty frequently doing that. But the guys that I’ve worked with who were doing that roster and I did it for a short time myself, yeah they like it.
– All around Australia what would you say, a lot of guys are talking about, like a bit of a pull back in Fifo industry, Queensland especially I suppose. But what are you thoughts on that?
– I don’t think anyone could deny that that’s happening. The mining side has been hit quite hard with the resource prices coming down as they have in the last little while. And the oil and gas, well sooner the gas industry here has been hit quite hard as well with the gas prices being tied to international oil prices.
– [Jason] Yeah.
– The more prices fell, gas prices went with it. And I know when I was working at the upstream projects the inland gas field projects there was a lot of people who were in permanent jobs for the gas companies who were let go, there was a lot of them. So there’s no doubt that things have tightened up significantly.
– [Jason] Yeah.
– What do you, so do you sort of have any indicators on where you’re sort of gonna be going next, like obviously you said before you’re chasing work over in mining in West Australia and then you came to gas, how did you hear about these jobs?
– Mainly through looking at, at job websites, doing, doing searches on, on the job search websites, and using search terms such as key words, like expressions of interest, that’s a good one, that’ll bring up future work that’s coming up, that might not be getting ready to go now, but it’s on its way and so that’s a good one. Networking is really important, that’s one of the things I’ve learned from working in this industry that’s really important to get to know the people you’re working with and connect with them through Linkedin or just personally and stay in touch because that can pay dividens, the fact that I’m here now is actually down to yourself because you told me about a role that was available here.
– I suppose in the time that I’ve worked with you I’ve noticed like you’re always very positive and stuff you never really seem down or have a bad attitude towards anything like a lot of other guys I suppose you work around that have had down days and they can be really negative for a whole day or a few days in a row, what would you attribute that to like having a positive attitude like how do you keep that, maintain it.
– Probably the main thing for me is that I believe that just being busy on the job and being focused on the job, the time will pass. And before long you’ll be away home again. I think without that attitude, if you were stuck here on an island and you’re not happy doing what you’re doing the time will drag and would be a real pain. So now I just try and keep myself busy, and through being busy the time passes.
– Have you got any advice for guys that have been in the industry for a long time, maybe looking to get out, or not happy in the industry?
– Yeah hard to say I suppose because I’m in it and I haven’t faced going out of it yet, it’s a bit of a hard one,
– [Jason] Yeah.
– But yeah just plan ahead I guess, if you if you’re thinking that you are gonna get out then start looking around, put the feelers out and try to get something organized before you actually leave, the work situation at the moment is tight all around the place. So yeah, you really need to be prepared for that I think and just try and prepare in advance, maybe try and get a role lined up before you actually leave. Don’t leave and think that you’re gonna walk into something next week cause it may not happen and you can lose a lot of the benefit that you’ve worked so hard for here in saving your money. That will disappear while you’re looking for your next job.
– And what would you say maybe to, any advice you would give to a family member or family at home who are on the other side of Fifo I suppose like how to prepare for their a partner or some member of their family going away to do Fifo.
– Yeah, yeah, I think both sides have to be committed to the idea, I think if someone’s going into this industry and home is not accepting of it then I think it’s going to be really tough. Yeah, I think that’s really important, you have to be aware of what you’re going into and the other thing that we’ve done is we’ve got a, an agreement that if one or the other is not coping then we pull the pin,
– [Jason] That’s good.
– Yeah no work is more important that home. So yeah, both sides need to have an escape clause.
– [Jason] Yeah, right, that’s a really good tip.
– Yeah, if it’s getting too tough then the agreement has to be there that okay this is not working, we’ve gotta do something else.
– Yeah, right, that’s a good eh, I suppose it keeps you both a bit I suppose semi-accountable for each other, keep each other’s happiness at the same time.
– Yeah, yeah, and another way to do it too is to put time frames around it, when you do that you say well okay we’re gonna do it for the next three months and at the end of that three months we’re gonna review it and are we happy to do another three months, yes we are okay, then on we go. And that way again, there’s some light at the end of the tunnel, if you are faced with doing this and thinking it’s just gonna roll on year after year after year, that could be pretty hard.
– Entering Fifo is quite, or when you’re in Fifo it is you’re not the only to think about I suppose, you’ve got to really have a good think about your family.
– Yeah, yeah absolutely because you’re part of a team back there and when you’re not there now you’re gonna struggle through various reasons, there’s things that you do and a role that you play there, that’s missing, so it’s hard for them. I feel for the people who go home with small children, that must be hard for them and hard for the kids as well. So, yeah, you’ve really gotta be aware of what you’re going into.
– Yeah, that’s about it really I think, is there anything else you can think of that you’d like to add?
– Yeah just one thing that, that was a factor for me when I first got into it was, I was unprepared in terms of communication with Heim. I went out to a site, out in Country Queensland and I had checked in advance to find out what cell phone coverage was available and I was told yeah, there’s a Telstra Tower at the camp so there’s no problem, everything’s really great except that the phone I had at that time was an older phone and it wouldn’t work off that cell phone tower. It was, I think it was a 3G tower and my phone was an older phone. So I get to site and hello no communication, no text messaging no phoning, and you know, that was, that was a bit tough, I got around it, they did have a phone room at that camp so I found that out and was able to go make a call every night doing that. And one more was, sometimes in the camps the internet service can be not that flash, and I got to this camp and found that the wifi, my computer worked off wifi, and there was no wifi in the camp, you had to plug into a cable to get access. Well my computer didn’t have a plug to plug into. So I had to go and buy a router
– [Jason] Yeah, right.
– to make it work. So just things like that if you can check those in advance, so that you can roll up there fully prepared, just eases the way, there’s enough to deal with as it is without having to have those glitches.
– Yeah so some of the questions that you really need to be asking, yeah,
– Find out as much as you can.
– Yeah. Any other questions that you can think about that you should to be asking potential employers?
– No, just all the usual stuff that you would ask. Yeah just try to gather as much information as you can about it, when they give you a contract to read, a job offer, actually read it.
– [Jason] Yeah, okay. It pays just to be fully aware of what’s in there.
– Yeah.
– Yeah.
– On next week’s episode we’re taking you for another tour, this time over Fifo camp, so you can see what facilities are on offer. Don’t forget to subscribe to our Youtube channel and follow us on Facebook and Instagram to keep up date with Brad the Plumber on his very first Fifo job with his daily updates. Finally if you any questions, feedback, or comments for Mike or myself please it in the comments box below. And we’ll see you on next week’s episode.
– Yeah that’s what it’s all about!