Once you top out… we stop checking you. Here’s what we don’t say out loud… In this trade, topping out is treated like a lifetime clearance. Once you’re a Journeyman, the questions stop. The verification stops. The friction stops. Not because it’s smart… Because it’s uncomfortable. We don’t want to offend experience... We don’t want to challenge confidence... We don’t want to be “that guy” who slows things down. So we assume... We assume the hand still has it. We assume fatigue hasn’t crept in. We assume repetition hasn’t dulled judgment. We assume confidence still equals competence. And assumptions are cheap. They don’t cost anything… until they cost everything... We say we respect experience. But real respect would be holding experienced hands to a higher standard… not a lower one. Instead, we do the opposite... Apprentices get watched. Apprentices get checked. Apprentices get corrected. Journeymen get left alone… Even when their body language says something’s off. Even when the job feels rushed. Even when the plan is thin, and the pressure is thick. And when it finally goes bad… When a seasoned hand makes a “rookie mistake”… Everyone acts shocked. But nobody wants to talk about how long it had been since anyone actually verified the work. Nobody wants to talk about how many times we let “he’s good” replace “prove it.” Nobody wants to talk about how many close calls got brushed off because calling them out would’ve been awkward as hell. That’s not trust... That’s laziness wrapped in tradition. Judgment isn’t permanent. Skill isn’t static. And confidence, left unchecked, turns into arrogance real damn fast. If the only people being evaluated are the least experienced ones… Then, the most dangerous assumptions in this trade are wearing Journeyman tickets. That’s not Brotherhood... That’s abandonment... And every time leadership chooses silence over verification… They’re not respecting their people. They’re rolling the dice with them... BETTER... NEVER RESTS...

This one is for my peers, my Brothers. For the Journeymen. This is also a warning shot across the bow for: The safety and training professionals who claim stewardship of the next generation. I’m passionate about teaching and training because I was in their boots. And because whether we like it or not… every Journeyman is already teaching. We don’t get to opt out of that responsibility. The moment you topped out… the moment you were trusted to work without supervision… You became an instructor. Not by title… but by example. Every decision you make in the field teaches something. Every shortcut teaches something. Every time you slow down… speak up… or stay silent… it teaches something. We teach behaviors… We teach patterns… We teach techniques… And we do it whether we intend to or not. That’s the weight of being a Journeyman. I remember being a young hand sitting in rooms where the person at the front couldn’t explain their way out of a paper bag. They had the title. They had the credentials. They had the authority. What they didn’t have was understanding… You’d ask a real question… not to challenge… but to survive. And instead of clarity, you got buzzwords. Instead of an explanation, you got irritation. Instead of teaching, you got shut down. That damage doesn’t stay in the classroom. It follows people into the field… It teaches young hands to stop asking questions. To hide uncertainty. To accept confusion as normal. That’s how dangerous habits get passed down quietly. And too many of us have watched it get worse. I’ve worked with instructors who had no passion. No drive. No ambition to sharpen themselves. They weren’t there to build people. They were there to coast. To cruise. To draw a paycheck. Training became a parking spot instead of a responsibility. I’ve known training “professionals” whose depth of understanding rivaled “Simple Jack”. If you’ve seen Tropic Thunder, you understand the reference. Blank stares. Broken explanations. Zero ability to connect cause and effect.

I’m gonna say this one time because this is supposed to be a place where we cut the bullshit. So I am about to throw a HUGE bullshit flag because nothing changes unless we are willing to be honest, honest with our industry and honest with ourselves. Hell this may just be another lesson I learn to just shut my big mouth and go along to get along. My first hard lesson came just recently, and it wasn’t a risk or hazard that most would think of our recognize. It’s a risk that is hiding beneath the surface of this trade - it is the risk of not passing along knowledge. I have always known the physical and mental dangers of this trade, Im good with danger and risk management. I had always been comfortable with the uncomfortable. I have just completed my apprenticeship making me one of the many “new generation” JLs you all speak of. Even I can see the lack of effort put into the “new generation” of journeyman lineman. But I’m going to ask - whose fault is it really. What I am about to say is not said because of the fact that I spent years learning this new trade I am currently committed to. It is said because I spent years dedicating myself to something larger than myself before. I am quite certain that I will challenge a lot of egos here (yes believe it or not I still see a lot of egos on this site) and I will ruffle a lot of feathers and challenge the status quo with what I am about to say, but I bears saying it anyway. I am a retired Army Ranger who spent 24 years training, practicing, learning, and quite frankly failing to become a consummate professional of my craft. I know what it means to survive in a profession where the margin of error is slim and cost of failure is high. Success comes from humbling yourself to a process that takes years for some and decades for others, there is no one clear path and having a student mindset is key. I know what it takes to become a true professional of your craft and trade. The one thing I hear over and over again is constant complaining, bitching, and moaning about this “new generation” of lineman and linewomen. I hear many of the same comments and concerns and see many of the same pitfalls I’ve seen before for many years in the Army.

This was gonna be next week, but with the potential for winter storms later on this week, I'm posting it today. Storm Response … The Mythology We Hide Behind Storms have mythology. We tell the same stories every time … the hero crew, the iron stomachs, the men who don’t sleep, don’t complain, don’t stop. We turn exhaustion into honor and recklessness into resolve. We frame suffering as proof of commitment. That mythology doesn’t come from the field. It’s built above it. Storm culture loves the image of sacrifice … as long as someone else pays the cost. It glorifies endurance while quietly ignoring judgment. It praises toughness while punishing restraint. It rewards those who stay moving … not those who keep people alive. We call it grit. It’s not. It’s narrative control. The mythology says real linemen push through. Real leaders don’t slow things down. Real crews don’t need rest … they need heart. And anyone who questions the pace just doesn’t want it bad enough. So people learn the role. They hide fatigue. They bury doubt. They keep going long after their decision-making is compromised … because the story says stopping is failure. From the outside, it looks legendary. Social posts. Photos in the rain. Smiles through exhaustion. Leadership reposting bravery as if it were part of the plan. In the field, it’s something else entirely. Adrenaline covering cracks. Luck carrying weight it was never meant to hold. Close calls are reframed as proof that the system works. That mythology collapses the moment something goes wrong. Then we rewrite the story. We say it was unforeseeable. We say the storm was extreme. We say no one could have known. But the field always knows. The margin was gone. The people were spent. The pace was reckless. The mythology didn’t fail. It succeeded. It kept people quiet. It kept trucks rolling. It kept leadership insulated. Storm mythology doesn’t exist to honor workers. It exists to make their sacrifice feel inevitable.

Ya'll have seen the Safety Sundays, and I love the conversations they spark. Those will continue, but we can do better. Starting today, a new weekly post will be added to the mix. It will call out... What We Don't Say Out Loud. Let me know what you think... What We Don’t Say Out Loud … Week 1 Here’s something we don’t say out loud… This trade accepts casualties … it just doesn’t admit it. We don’t use those words. We soften it. We dress it up with words like "inherent risk" and "part of the job". We pretend every death is an anomaly instead of a receipt. We hold the funeral. We make the post. We say his name. Then we go right back to rewarding the same behaviors that put him there. Speed over judgment. Silence over friction. Completion over condition. We teach people how to endure pressure, not how to resist it. We train them to keep moving when their gut is screaming to slow down. We condition them to ignore fatigue, doubt, and fear … because those things interfere with production. And it works. Until it kills someone. From the outside, the job looks successful. The lights are on. The storm is cleared. The outage numbers drop. Leadership moves on to the next win. In the field, everyone knows how close it came to falling apart … how many corners were cut, how many chances were taken, how much luck was spent to make it look clean. That’s the blood on our hands we don’t measure. And when someone finally does die, we act surprised. We investigate the last decision instead of the years of pressure that shaped it. We blame the hand closest to the wire and protect everything upstream of it. That’s not tragedy. That’s design. And until the trade is willing to face that … not memorialize it, not spiritualize it, not sanitize it … it will keep feeding good people into a system that already knows the cost… …and has decided it’s acceptable. ~Kevin | Lineman Bull$hit™ Academy