While trade schools have taken something of a bad rap among university scholars, the truth of the matter is that trade careers are plentiful, lucrative, and rewarding. If you’re interested in trade work rather than a desk job, here’s where you can find high demand for trade workers.
Hairdresser
Cosmetologists render far more value unto their clientele than fashionable hairstyles and stylish personal reinvention. These hard-working professionals advise men, women and children from all walks of life on hair conditioning, styling and maintenance at beauty salons, day spas, hotels and resorts across the country. Getting a foot into the industry’s door requires ample training and licensing on a commitment to health and safety standards. As hair care options increase, so does the demand for hairdressers that can perform them.
Cosmetologists spend long hours standing and working with diverse chemicals, but there is a meaningful payoff: their work plays a critical role in each customer’s personal hygiene and individual dignity. The mark a cosmetologist’s careful work leaves on someone’s confidence through clear communication, savvy time management and well-honed creativity and dexterity may outlast any dye, leave-in conditioner or permanent wave.
Welder
Wielding an ARC, TIG or MIG welder is as much art as science. Whether employed in shipbuilding, automotive, construction or manufacturing positions, the most trusted welders have undergone intensive on-the-job training and voluntarily pursue professional certified welder qualifications. Their considerable learning processes qualify them to maintain and operate machines designed to repair and fabricate equipment, machinery and metal structures in countless settings.
Even unskilled welders can find work on assembly lines performing repetitive work requiring little or no special skill. Above all, there’s the simple thrill of knowing you harnessed heat to permanently join once-separate metal pieces. In either case, the best welders are experts in determining operations, ideal materials and project time-frames by reading and interpreting sketches, diagrams and blueprints.
Mechanic
Gifted mechanics are nothing less than the automobile industry’s heroic diagnosticians and surgeons. When they aren’t repairing and inspecting cars and trucks, they master such basic-but-essential maintenance tasks as changing oil and rotating tyres.
Although not mandatory, professional certification is common, mostly because these programmes require valuable experience and the passage of comprehensive technological exams. Most engines, electrical systems, brakes, belts and fuel systems are already dauntingly complex. More and more automotive systems each year are also primarily controlled by varying electronic components and computers. Hence, continuing education and training in modern electronic technology will become perpetual themes in a veteran mechanic’s career.
Electrician
Electricians typically work alone, but the most sought-after tradesmen frequently collaborate with architects and building engineers to design expansive, intricate electrical systems for renovated structures and new buildings under construction. Installing electrical power, communications, control and lighting infrastructure during construction is far less complicated than maintaining these systems afterwards, simply because the wiring is far more accessible. Nevertheless, both needs are essential to making the lives of any building’s inhabitants easier and consistently comfortable.
Identifying problems and repairing malfunctioning or broken equipment can include replacing parts, swapping out light fixtures and examining motors, control systems and other equipment types in awkward, hard-to-reach places. Under these and many other conditions, reading complex blueprints and technical diagrams to narrow down circuit and outlet locations becomes essential. Once you find your destination, you can expect to employ both basic hand tools such as wire strippers, drills and saws alongside voltmeters, ammeters, cable testers and thermal scanners to ensure everything is in order.
No matter the economic outlook, people will always have certain needs. If a three-year university education isn’t for you, trade careers are more than just an alternative option. They are an avenue made for talented, driven individuals who are ready to make money doing what they love.
Where else is there a high demand for trade workers? Let us know in the comments below.
Meghan Belnap is a freelance writer who enjoys spending time with her family. She also enjoys being in the outdoors and exploring new opportunities whenever they arise as well as researching new topics to expand her horizons. You can often find her buried in a good book or out looking for an adventure.
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