Meet Michael McCartney of Prescott Valley

Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael McCartney.

Hi Michael, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I didn’t always make the best decisions and found myself looking at a 5 year prison sentence with no idea what i was gonna do, thinking my life was pretty much over. I was 34 never having a Carrere and only working entry level jobs, and getting out at 40 there was no hope for my future. About a year into my sentence I had had enough and decided to put the drugs and alcohol down, and got sober in an alcohol and drug program with fellow inmates and volunteers that came in once a month. my life got dramatically better very fast. I found myself the happiest id ever been while in prison. A friend we called sarge had owned an electrical contracting company kept telling me how great it was and he sold me on it. I was already the TA for the first semester of a course called construction tech which was the first semester of the electrical apprenticeship. As soon as i was released from prison I registered with IECA, Independent Electrical Contractors of Arizona, which is a recognized apprenticeship program and started working as an apprentice shortly there after. I quickly realized how much i enjoyed it and fell in love with what would soon be a great and rewarding career. shortly there after I met and started dating my wife and she saw how much I enjoyed learning and working in the electrical industry and had only encouragement for me. we bought our first home in January 2019 were married in April of 2019 and our first son was born in August that year. I progressed fairly quickly in the company that gave me a shot right out of prison and will be forever grateful to them. By my third year I was put in charge of some small projects ranging from 250k to 700k, and assisted in large projects over 5,000,000 Near the end of my fourth year I had been working in Prescott for a few months with another year left on my current project we sold our home in Tempe and moved to Prescott where my wife grew up. In December of 2020 our second son was born, and in 2021 I completed the apprenticeship which consisted of 8000hrs of on the job training and 800 classroom hrs. In 2022 When the Prescott project ended a subcontractor offered me a project manager position at a very large controls company and it seemed like a great idea. After talking about it with my wife I decided to take the offer. I only lasted 18 months at a desk and needed to get back in the field. I started working a smaller contractor in Prescott that had a couple large projects. about that time my wife had our third son. I was there for 11 months before they laid off most of their electricians. having never been laid off before it hit me harder then id like to admit. I had really enjoyed doing side work but had never wanted to start my own company until then. I registered our LLC Metalclad Electrical, signed up for and took the trade exam, and passed my test. we decided on that name because when we are trying to get our boys separated from the group when leaving somewhere we will call out mc boys lets go. Mc being the trade term, it only seemed right. In the year that we have been in business, we have gotten to work with many wonderful contractors, my wife Mikki is expecting our fourth boy next month and I have the ability to be home when she needs me and get to spend the time with my family that I couldn’t when I worked for other people, and I can make sure that future employees have that benefit, as it was one of the main reasons I started Metalclad Electrical. Family and my community is extremely valuable to me and my hope is that with Metalclad Electrical we can give back to the area that we are raising our boys in.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I think the biggest struggle was that Mikki and I made so many big changes in such a short time. a few months before we started the company we decided she would stay home and start homeschooling the boys, and shortly after we started the business we found she was pregnant. So many major life changes and there is a lot of fear that comes with all three, it’s hard to remember sometimes that God has gotten us this far and He will get us the rest of the way.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Here at Metalclad we are licensed and specialize in commercial and residential electrical, new builds and remodel. Our favorite and what we are locally known for is ranch and farm work, as we run a small hobby ranch ourselves, I love going to a new ranch that needs an upgrade or is in the process of expanding and making there work easier or there dreams coming true.

We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
If you would have asked me that question 10 years ago I would have said I was surrounded with only bad luck. Today I don’t look at it as bad luck but what I had to do and go through to shape who I am today. As for good luck I choose to call that god working in my life. How I landed on the prison yard that Sarge was on, or how I met my wife when we lived two and half hour apart, and still managed to be in the same room that night. She likes to say that we only got this life by seconds and inches and I tend to believe it.

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