Blake Fitzgerald
By Blake Fitzgerald on June 27, 2017

Move In Day: New Job Site, New Challenges

Starting out at a new job site almost feels like the first day of your freshman year of college again. You don’t really know anyone and you just want to be able to find your role in it all. Now this is my second summer at New England Construction, but changing the job site that you’re working on is a big move for someone.

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Last summer I worked on the Ferrari of New England dealership, but now that their showrooms are all set it was time to find a new job for me. I returned to the company and was sent to the Rhode Island mall to work on a Dick’s Sporting Goods installation. This job and Ferrari were like two different planets because of their size difference. Ferrari was a small redevelopment of the showrooms and reception area of the building, but Dick’s was building an entire new store from scratch.

Being here and seeing all these new facets of construction has helped me to learn more in depth about how the business works. Watching the steel go up is always interesting here at Dick’s because it takes a lot of preparation and safety. We always have to have a fire detail here when they are welding the beams into place for precautionary reasons. We also need multiple people to help crank the beam up because of how heavy it is.

One thing that I missed because I was covering at Ferrari one day was the 40+ foot steel towers we had installed at the storefront. We had a large crane come in and drop the towers into place because they were already prefabricated. I was sent pictures by Mike (My Superintendent), but it would have been cooler to see them go up in person.

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I do miss some things about Ferrari, such as the air conditioned indoors rather than the humid open building we work in. I watch these subs pour concrete and move sheetrock and it makes me sweat even thinking about having to move such heavy stuff.

Speaking of the subs that is probably the biggest difference between the two jobs. It went from having about 12 to 15 guys on site to 30 to 40. It makes being here a lot more interesting because of all the work going on. I can watch and learn more with so many more people working.

Now, that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t get too hectic sometimes. We have had our problems and conflicts on site but at New England Construction we always work through them. Just like a freshman in college, you may hit some hard times, but you got to fight through them to become better at what you’re doing.

 

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Published by Blake Fitzgerald June 27, 2017
Blake Fitzgerald