Month 7 – February 2013

February was a pretty exciting month. As I mentioned at the end of January’s post, I spent a week at the Charlotte Pipe and Foundry Company. All of the other management trainees from Hajoca were in attendance as well. There were many familiar faces that I had met at the Managers’ Seminar back in September and there were plenty of new ones too. The new people I hadn’t met yet were the trainees from the Texas and Louisiana region. It was great to finally get to know them.

The trainers at Charlotte had so much to offer. Not only did we learn about Charlotte products specifically, but we were also taught a lot of general industry history and knowledge as well. In addition to facility tours and classroom training, we also spent plenty of time doing hands on work as well. We cut cast iron pipe and built a DWV (drain-waste-vent) system in a mock house using no-hub couplings. We also worked with CPVC plastic pipe and solvents to build a water supply system. Having done this type of work under the supervision of experts, I feel more confident and qualified in being able to help our customers select the right products. It’s one thing to know what something does, but it’s a totally different experience to actually get hands-on training.

Of course I won’t forget to mention that we were provided some very delicious meals and had fun times going out in the city at night.

Coming back to Lansdale was a bit tough because I missed hanging out with the other trainees and the warm North Carolina weather. But things were really picking up at the branch, so I kept pretty busy. A week later, I attended the region’s Counters Plus meeting. This was a day-long meeting organized by the regional manager. Many of the counter salesmen and purchasers were there. The main topic of the meeting was… counter sales! Specifically, the two focuses were increasing sales volume and gross profit margins. We all shared our goals for 2013 and stories about what worked and what didn’t in 2012. There were a couple of vendor representatives there to present and suggest some new items for us to stock and display at our counters.

Jeff says that I will be starting my operations phase of my training next month. This will involve a lot of different things including purchasing, inventory management, accounts payables/receivables (billing), employee records, verifying paperwork, and any other logistics pertaining to running a profit center. Sounds like a whole lot of work, but I’m ready for it. This is what I signed up for when I accepted the opportunity to become a manager!