How do you become an electrician?

Through a registered apprenticeship: paid on-the-job hours under a licensed mentor plus classroom instruction through a community college or training school. Those documented hours lead to a journeyman licence and then, with more hours and an exam, a master licence that lets you pull permits and run your own company.

How many electricians are Black women?

Very few. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures put Black workers at roughly 6.7 percent of electricians and women at about 2.9 percent, so the overlap is small enough that a Black woman holding a master licence and owning a company is genuinely rare.

Is the trades a good career right now?

The grid is being rebuilt and solar installation is projected to grow about 42 percent, and all of that work needs licensed electricians. The work cannot be outsourced or done remotely, and an apprenticeship pays you while you train instead of charging tuition.

VOL. 26·SATURDAY, OCTOBER 10

← ARTISTS

§ THE PORTRAIT

Phyllis Poole

§ ARTIST · BUSINESS

Phyllis Poole

Master Electrician · Owner, Lady Electrical Company

ERA: 2020s
KNOWN FOR: Master Electrician · Owner, Lady Electrical Company

§ THE SHORT VERSION

Phyllis Poole is a master electrician and the owner of Lady Electrical Company. A Black woman running a licensed electrical company is genuinely rare in the United States, where roughly 6.7 percent of electricians are Black and about 2.9 percent are women, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics figures.

Highlights.

Master electrician, the top licensed rank in the trade

Owner of Lady Electrical Company

One of very few Black women running a licensed electrical company in the United States

The portraits.

EVERY ARTIST →

The only name in this room so far.

§ QUESTIONS PEOPLE ASK

How do you become an electrician?: Through a registered apprenticeship: paid on-the-job hours under a licensed mentor plus classroom instruction through a community college or training school. Those documented hours lead to a journeyman licence and then, with more hours and an exam, a master licence that lets you pull permits and run your own company.
How many electricians are Black women?: Very few. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures put Black workers at roughly 6.7 percent of electricians and women at about 2.9 percent, so the overlap is small enough that a Black woman holding a master licence and owning a company is genuinely rare.
Is the trades a good career right now?: The grid is being rebuilt and solar installation is projected to grow about 42 percent, and all of that work needs licensed electricians. The work cannot be outsourced or done remotely, and an apprenticeship pays you while you train instead of charging tuition.

Here is a career nobody puts on a poster, and it pays better than most of the ones they do.

WHAT A MASTER ELECTRICIAN IS

It is the top licensed rank in the trade. It takes years of documented hours as an apprentice, then a journeyman licence, then an exam, and it authorises you to pull permits, sign off on work and run your own company. It is a credential, in the same sense a degree is, and almost nobody describes it that way to a seventeen-year-old.

Phyllis Poole holds it, and she owns Lady Electrical Company.

THE NUMBERS AROUND HER

About 6.7 percent of American electricians are Black. About 2.9 percent are women. Sit with the overlap of those two figures and you understand why a Black woman with a master licence and her own electrical company is described, accurately, as rare.

Rare is not the same as unreachable. That is the entire reason to print this page.

WHY THIS IS A FUTURE STORY

The grid is being rebuilt. Solar installation is projected to grow around 42 percent, every one of those jobs needs licensed electrical work, and an electrician cannot be outsourced or automated out of a building. A trade licence is one of the few credentials getting more valuable as the economy gets stranger.

And the path costs the opposite of a degree. An apprenticeship pays you while you learn: on-the-job hours under a mentor plus classroom instruction through a community college or training school. You finish with a licence, no tuition debt, and a skill that transfers to any state.

HOW TO ACTUALLY START

1. Find a registered apprenticeship rather than a paid trade school. Registered means the hours count toward your licence and somebody is paying you for them. 2. Ask the local electrical union hall and the community college in the same week. They run different doors to the same licence. 3. Locally, the Compton Workforce Apprenticeship in solar installation is exactly this, and it is open. 4. If the ground floor is the obstacle, free GED and exam prep runs locally too.

The woman who owns the company started as the apprentice holding the light.