You are totally missing my points ih100. What you said is extremely true as well. I in no way implied that I personally am better than anyone else, as you inferred that I did.
I think what makes a really good operator is someone that has a great attitude and thinks about all the pieces of machinery or phases of construction that come behind them and thinks about little things, takes care of them, and most importantly, knows their role in an operation.
Some examples that I can think of right off hand:
The hoe operator that digs the bell hole for RCP without having to wait to be told by the groundman to mark out where it's going to be.
The hoe operator that honks his horn to tell the truck he's loading to go just as he starts to dump into the box on his last pass because he knows it takes a few seconds for the truck to begin to move.
The hoe and loader operators that don't sit there and wait for trucks when there is a lull in the cycle. They are always moving, building a pile close to the loadout so that in the event he gets slammed with several trucks in a row, he's got a really short cycle to get them out of there in a hurry if he has to, and doesn't have to work the entire face.
The loader operator that doesn't wait with his bucket in the air for a truck to pull up and when they don't spot right, has to back up and readjust.
The loader operator that dumps a small pile of dirt in the haul road next to pile to keep trucks from crowding too close to him.
The blade operator that gets out of the way when laying gravel to allow the trucks to keep dumping, knowing that there are two seperate operations involved with gravel, the laydown & finish.
The dozer hand when dumping a string of trucks leaves the last few dumps in a ribbon for a later time if he wants them to start another, backs up and catches the trucks instead of letting them come all the way down to the end of the fill with their load.
There are more little things than that, just what I could come up with quickly.
I may not have been operating since 1975, but I have been in this business long enough to see operators that do the things I mentioned above and I have seen operators that don't do the things above, and I tell you what, it wasn't always age or years operating the separated the two.
And I have also seen and heard operators that when shown or told the things I mentioned above, (not necessarily by me either) nod and say "yeah, that makes sense" then two hours later go back to what they were doing before.