Quality Products Fabrications Manager Don Bartlett Becomes Compass Precision Employee of the Month
Social media has become so ingrained in our culture during the 21st Century, it’s difficult to measure its vast impact. For Don Bartlett, social media helped him land a job at Quality Products & Machine, LLC.
Now a little more than four years after his hire date, Compass Precision has named Don its Employee of the Month for August.
Don worked nine years as a Class 6 production welder and assistant crew lead at Jacobsen, but when the company relocated to Augusta, GA in 2017, he elected to pass on moving his family more than 150 miles to a new state. So Don’s wife, Lesa, posted his resume on Facebook.
Quality Products Operations Manager and Facebook aficionado Greg Donaldson, who was Employee of the Month at Compass Precision in March, saw it. Greg was connected to Lesa on Facebook because they were in the same class at Olympic High School in Charlotte. That led to Don landing an interview at Quality Products, and he was eventually hired in July 2017.
In his first two years, Don worked on the press brakes as a fabricator and performed MIG welding. Then, he transitioned out of the welding department to become the Working Crew Lead. In that role, Don was responsible for organizing the flow of production.
Then in June, Quality Products announced Don received another promotion to Fabrication Manager.
“Don was the obvious choice for filling our Fab Manager opening at Quality,” explained Gary Holcomb, CEO of Quality Products’ parent company Compass Precision, LLC. “He is an equally obvious choice for Employee of the Month. Give me a few guys like Don and our organization can do nearly anything.”
Don pointed to his co-workers, especially Greg and the other managers, as his favorite part about working at Quality Products.
“I’ve found that the managers and bosses are easy to work with. They have the same kind of goals that I have, which are to keep the company running,” Don said. “Make a good product so that your customers are happy and people will keep coming back to you.”
Don has been in welding and fabrication since the mid-1980s. Like several of his co-workers, he attended Central Piedmont Community College, taking MIG and TIG courses. That was after enrolling in every shop class imaginable — wood, metal, industrial design and graphic arts — in high school.
“I’ve always been a hands-on type of guy,” Don said. “I took all the industrial type classes.”
Don and Lesa have two daughters and two sons — Sierra (26), Matthew (19), Jenny (14) and Ryan (9). The couple also has two grandchildren, two mixed-breed dogs and a cat. Don joked that he was thankful that not all those people and pets live in his house.
At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, Don’s twin brother convinced him to try disc golf, which has the same concept of golf but is played with a frisbee. Don and his youngest son absolutely love it. They try to play every weekend.
“Charlotte is well known for its disc courses. They have like 18 disc courses in the Charlotte area,” Don said. “Fort Mill has a lot of courses, and then whenever I go on vacation, I play, so I’ve played at a lot of different courses.”
Don also enjoys riding motorcycles with his oldest son, who recently earned his license and acquired his first bike.