Warehouse And Operations As A Career

In warehousing and operations, none of us begin our shifts planning to create risk or endanger someone. Most of us show up, jump on the forklift, our rider pallet jacks, or another piece of powered industrial equipment, to put away pallets, run freight across the dock, build loads, and try to hit our numbers. We hear the safety rules during orientation, we sign the training sheets, we watch the videos. And then we get comfortable. We convince ourselves that “just this once,” or “just for a few minutes” won’t hurt anything. Until it does. I’m Marty and today here at Warehouse and Operations as a Career I want to talk about a real scenario. A young forklift operator lost her job because she placed a stack of pallets in front of an egress doorway. She felt wronged. Her reasoning? It was only going to be there for a few minutes. I was going to move a few things around and would have come right back. She had been trained not to block doorways, exits, electrical panels, and fire extinguishers. She understood it in

Welcome back to another episode of Warehouse and Operations as a Career. I’m Marty, and today I want to talk about something a listener asked a few weeks ago. How does one choose a career, and more specifically, how do they end up in the light industrial, warehousing, and transportation fields.  One of the things I’ve learned over the decades is that very few people wake up at 18 years old and say, I’m going to be a forklift operator, or I’m going to build a career in a distribution center.  In my opinion most careers aren’t chosen, they’re found. They’re shaped by our experiences, opportunities, influences, and sometimes just plain necessity.  But once people get here, once they get that first real taste of what this work is like, the stability, the opportunity, the teamwork, a lot of them stay. And that’s what I’d like to talk about today.  Let’s start with a simple truth: most people don’t choose a career the way a high school guidance counselor might describe it. It’s not a straight line.   It’s often a

When we think about goals and planning, most of us picture big dreams, buying a house, raising a family, finding stability, […]

Few things disrupt operations more quickly than a No Call, No Show (NCNS). Whether it’s a missed interview, a new-hire training, an equipment […]

Marty here with Warehouse and Operations as a Career. Today we’re talking about staffing agencies, what they are, why they […]

Welcome back to Warehouse and Operations as a Career! I’m Marty, and today we’re diving into something that quietly runs the show in almost every modern […]

I heard of three individuals, in 3 different states, losing their positions this week, and that bothered me a bit. Two of […]

Hello everyone, and welcome back to Warehouse and Operations as a Career. I’m Marty, and today we’re talking about something […]

What do you think of when you think of forklifts? I’m sure a lot of us picture those forks sliding […]

Hello everyone, and welcome back to Warehouse and Operations as a Career. Today, I want to talk about turnover.  I’m […]

Hello all! Welcome back to Warehouse and Operations as a Career. I’m Marty, and I’m glad you’ve chosen to spend […]

Marty here with Warehouse and Operations as a Career. I want to start off by saying a huge “thank you” […]

Here we are in week 37, about to end the 3rd quarter of 2025. I’ve always found this time of […]

Warehouse and Operations as a Career the podcast. Marty T Hawkins here. We need to get to a lot of […]

Hey everyone, Marty here with Warehouse and Operations as a Career. As we continue our series on job descriptions, task, […]

When we talk about logistics, warehousing, and distribution, transportation is the vital link that keeps everything moving. Without trucks on […]

Here we are in the middle of the 3rd Quarter already. Schools are starting back up here in the states, […]

Welcome back to another episode of Warehouse and Operations as a Career. I’m Marty, and today we’re going to shine […]

It’s week 31 of 2025. Welcome back to Warehouse and Operations as a Career, I’m Marty, and today we’re diving […]

Hey all, Marty T Hawkins here, and welcome back to another episode of Warehouse and Operations as a Career! We’ve […]