EMPLOYEE SPOTLIGHT
EMPLOYEE SPOTLIGHT
JARED HALLETT
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Jared Hallett is a carpenter at West Head Boatbuilders Ltd . His dad is also a carpenter , so as Jared grew up , he watched and learned until he decided to head off to university . He “ tongue-in-cheek ” recalls thinking that attending university would be cool , but he now affirms that , “ No , it wasn ’ t . It was a terrible idea , so I just moved home from university and started working in a boat shop . I caught on very quickly , and I really liked it .”
A couple of years later , Jared moved to Ontario and spent some time doing home renovations , and then he got into framing houses but found that it was extremely boring . In his words , Jared asserts that , “ everything is really square . It ’ s not ‘ boatlike ’ at all , so I came home to build boats again because I just enjoy that more than anything .”
When asked what he actually does in the run of a day , Jared answered in his typical fun-loving manner , that he mostly writes lists and takes naps ! He did , however , on a more serious note , clarify that he does the carpentry on the boat : “ Any carpentry related things , I do that , and then we build the wheelhouse . Then I do all kinds of finish work and cabinets and all that type of thing . Also , I like making pretty things , but no one else does .” Once again , Jared leaves a person wondering if he ’ s serious or just joking around !
There are probably six or seven carpenters between the two shops at West Head . Usually , two boats are being built at a time , so two different teams are working on them . “ We can mix it up a little bit because most everything is different on each boat ,” Jared says . “ The basic structure of the boat is usually the same , but most of the custom stuff like the cuddy and the wheelhouse gives us a chance to be a little creative . Every boat I do , I try to make something weird and add a little special something to each project . I like putting little secret things in cabinets .”
Jared has been at West Head for almost four years , and in that time , he has shown himself to be a bit of a jokester . But he does admit that it can be a stressful job at times because they are usually very busy . They are always trying to meet deadlines and give the customers what they want , but they do have fun . Listening to Jared being interviewed for this article , we have no trouble believing that !
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