Electrician: Job Profile and Role

Thinking on your feet, strong problem-solving skills and attention to detail are but three of the skills you should have if you want to start your career in the job we will explore in this blog: the job of an electrician. Naturally, there are more requirements it takes to become an electrician. These we will also explore in the following sections.

To help you decide whether the electrician job is the right fit for you, you will also find out all about the expected annual salaries, the typical working hours, and where to find employment. We follow these “hard facts” with insights into a day in the life of an electrician and three tips for thriving in this interesting and exciting profession.

Short Summary

• As an electrician, you are responsible for ensuring that your electrical installations comply with the national electrical safety measures and standards at all times.
• As an electrician, you need to be able to both plan and read blueprints and technical diagrams which are the basis for your electrical systems.
• As an electrician, you are asked to identify and fix electrical problems and do electrical maintenance.

Job description

If the electrician job is the right fit for you, you will perform a myriad of daily and regular tasks that are way more than fixing electrical disruptions. You will be in charge of planning electrical systems for both private homes and businesses. This includes your knowledge of the electrical wiring layout and all safety measures connected to your electrical installations. Besides, you will also be responsible for doing electrical maintenance, which requires that you know how to identify electrical problems and how to fix them.ile at the same time ensuring your customers’ satisfaction.

Responsibilities

• Installation
• Specialisations
• Customer Service
• Safety Procedures
• Testing and Inspection
• Maintenance and Repair
• Home/Business Rewiring
• Tools/Equipment Knowledge
• Compliance with Regulations
• Blueprints/Technical Diagrams

Different types of Electricians

• Journeyman Electrician
• Commercial Electrician
• Installation Electrician
• Solar Panel Installer
• Electrical Contractor

Salary

When you are a full-time employed electrician in the UK, you can expect a starting annual salary of ￡29,000. With work experience, this can increase to ￡39,000 or slightly less. Note that the location of your electrician job will likely affect your annual wages. Typically, you can expect higher salaries in and around London, whereas you should expect lower salaries in the rest of the United Kingdom. Besides, your employer and the company size will also influence what you earn each year.

Working hours

Typically, you will work between 30 and 40 hours a week which may be conducted from 9 to 5 but you can also digress from these classic working times. As an electrician, you need to take on board that you may work evenings and weekends, depending on your contract. You may also be asked to be on call, meaning that you will have to factor in emergency jobs which can be outside your usual working hours.

Employers

If you want to work in this job, you can decide whether you want to be an employee or start your own business. We recommend that you go self-employed with a few years of work experience since that gives you both valuable insights and contacts. Till you go that step, you can find employment with local electrical contractors, facilities management companies, such as National Grid and Scottish Power, or manufacturing companies. You can also look for jobs with small-scale electrical companies. Another option is to work with the Armed Forces where you can also complete electrician-related apprenticeships.

Qualifications

To enter an appropriate education, you will need GCSEs with varying pass grades. If you want to become an electrician by doing a college course, you either need pass grades at 9 to 4 (A* to C) or 9 to 3 (A* to D). Higher pass grades also qualify you to do an apprenticeship. Moreover, you should invest time in electrical software, such as Revit MEP, Dialux, EPLAN Electric P8, and AutoCAD Electrical.

Skills

We have already let you in on three skills you should have when you want to be an electrician. Naturally, your future employer may value different competencies, which is why you must always check which skills are required. Nevertheless, we are quite sure that the following three competencies will also benefit you when working with and planning electrical systems.

Technical Knowledge

Your job will entail a lot of technical planning, for example, when it comes to drafting blueprints and reading electrical diagrams. Therefore, technical knowledge is a must if you want to strive in your electrician career. Besides knowing how to plan, draft, and execute blueprints, you also need an in-depth understanding of the workings of electricity. Lastly, you should also have basic IT skills that enable you to work with electrical and admin software.

Showing Initiative

Showing initiative can be another useful skill in your job. Theoretically, most employers are more impressed by employees who come up with ideas that can improve workflows which results in more efficient work. Showing initiative also proves that you are willing to take responsibility for your decisions and actions which goes a long way towards advancing in your career.

Customer Service

Even though you are in charge of electrical installations and maintenance, you also still need to liaise with your customers. Needless to say, excellent customer skills should be part of your competencies portfolio. Since dealing with customers involves various communication, you should furthermore have strong verbal, non-verbal, and written communication skills.

Career Path

After you have completed your education, you start with your first job. With several years of work experience, you can look into progressing to more senior roles or taking different career directions, for example, by specialising as an electrical design engineer. Alternatively, you can get promoted to the job of a site or project manager. As we have already mentioned, you can also set up your own business.

Educational Background

Typically, you need to complete either a college course or an apprenticeship if you want to become an electrician. Appropriate apprenticeships are an installation and maintenance electrician advanced apprenticeship or a domestic electrician advanced apprenticeship. If you want to look into college courses, you can do the following: a Level 2 Diploma in Access to Building Services Engineering (Electrical), a Level 2 and Level 3 Diploma in Electrical Installation, or a T Level in Building Services Engineering for Construction.

Entry Level

While you learn the practical side of being an electrician during an apprenticeship, your first real job will nevertheless be your entry-level position, for example, as a trainee electrician. Usually, you stay in this job for about a year before you can advance to a slightly more senior position. 

Continuous Learning

To get to this position, you not only need to have an excellent work record. Furthermore, you need to look into ways to continuously learn and improve. For the job of an electrician, there are the following options: obtaining your ECS card (Electrical Certification Scheme), doing your PAT (Portable Appliance Testing) certification, and being on top of the latest wiring regulations. If you want to specialise as an electrical design engineer, you need to look into obtaining a university degree, such as a Bachelor’s degree in applied physics or electromechanical engineering.

Becoming an Electrician as a Career Jumper

You can also become an electrician as a career jumper, for example, if you have already worked in electrical engineering or building services. Keep in mind that you need the relevant qualifications to swap to working as an electrician. 

A Day in the Life of an Electrician

Having all the facts about a job is all well and good when it comes to deciding on your future career. But it is always easier to get to the right decision when you know what your typical working day will actually look like. This is why we will now explore three typical tasks that you will perform when working as an electrician.

On-Site Inspection

After you have checked your schedule, assembled the needed tools, and arrived at your first job, you need to inspect the site. This can range from checking electrical disruptions like circuit breaks to installing a new electrical system and rewiring a property. It can also extend to discussing a brand-new electrical circuit for a new building by planning and drafting the first blueprints.

Wiring and Installation

Let’s assume that you have already progressed beyond the planning stage. In the next step, you start with the wiring of a place. Besides installing wires, you are in charge of installing outlets, switches, circuit breakers, and fuse boxes. The latter then needs to be labelled so that the property owners know which fuse to use in emergencies or during blackouts.

Quality Checks

Before an electrical installation can be used, you need to ensure that everything is safe and in working order. Therefore, quality checks are another task you will perform. This task can also occur while doing maintenance on an existing system which should work flawlessly but for some reason doesn’t. This way, you can identify potential disruptions that need fixing.

Tips for Thriving as an Electrician

Your continuous learning is one way to ensure that you thrive in your chosen career. Besides, there are further ways that can help you improve both professionally and personally. In this section, we will look at three tips for thriving as an electrician:

• Feedback and improvement
• Quality work
• Business knowledge

Feedback and Improvement

Your customers are pretty much the paramount factor that ensures that you have a job. Therefore, you need to always pay close attention to their feedback – funnily enough, especially their criticism. This kind of feedback is a sure way to improve your work performance since it shows you where you might not have paid enough attention. If you want to thrive as an electrician, you should always improve by taking your customers’ (and colleagues’) feedback on board.

Quality Work

This feedback can help you to improve the quality of the work you offer. Being top of your field is another way to thrive in your job. The higher the quality you offer, the more in demand you will be. Quality workmanship is not limited to your work, it also extends to the tools and electrical systems you work with.

Business Knowledge

This competency will come in handy if you want to start your own company. You may have all the technical knowledge you need to be a brilliant electrician. But running your own business is another kettle of fish entirely. Therefore, you should invest time in learning everything about the financial side of a business and how to attract customers and employees.

Frequently Asked Questions