Diversifying Your Construction Company's Trade Skills to Meet Growing Demand
By Anne Lackey
October 22, 2024
An experienced tradesperson who steps onto a property to address one problem will probably spot three more issues the owner should address, so there's always entrepreneurial value in learning multiple skills.
Consider the landscaper who can offer lighting services to enhance the...
Passing It Down: Transferring Knowledge From One Generation to the Next
By Kyle Potts
September 25, 2024
According to recent U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics findings, over 2.5 million construction workers are over the age of 55. Associated Builders and Contractors reports that one in five workers will exit the industry in the next few years. With that projected loss of industry expe...
Construction Students Jam Out With Ty Pennington at National Skilled-Trades Competition
By Grace Calengor
September 19, 2024
"We’ve got to turn this into a T.V. show.” That is what John Montgomery, co-executive director of the Skilled Careers Coalition, said when he attended SkillsUSA, a national skilled-trades competition for teens, in 2021. But well before television, the first federal law in the Uni...
Innovative Ways to Lessen Your Labor Challenges and Improve on Delivery
By Sean R. Nacey
May 10, 2024
Contractors have been contending with labor shortages for several years. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like this will materially improve any time soon. Two trends indicate that contractors and their supply-chain partners will need to get even more creative to successfully naviga...
A Wellbeing Culture for U.K. Construction Workers
By Bagnalls
May 7, 2024
As of 2024, more than one in seven adults in the United Kingdom say their mental health is either poor or the worst it has ever been. The U.K.'s National Health Service spends more than £300 billion a year dealing with the consequences of poor mental health, and the crisis isn’t ...
Properly Preparing Your First-Year Employees for Success on the Jobsite
By Randy Dombrowski
April 16, 2024
To keep pace with demand, contractors may need to hire 500,000 more workers this year above their normal pace of hiring, according to Associated Builders and Contractors. This at a time when many businesses still struggle to hire skilled workers.
The data shows there’s a tight l...
Out Is In: Outsourcing Strategies for Small Construction Businesses
By Brad Werner
March 21, 2024
Construction companies of all sizes are facing a common challenge: the need to optimize their operations and drive sustainable growth in an increasingly competitive and less predictable market. One solution that has emerged is a greater reliance on outsourcing—hiring external pro...
Increasing Support for the Increasing Number of Women in Construction
By Shanthi Rajan
March 19, 2024
The construction industry has long been male-dominated, but the tide is turning as more women are making their mark in this traditionally challenging field. It’s invigorating to witness the increasing presence of women in various roles within the industry, and the importance of t...
Investing in Interns Always Yields ROI
By Alexzondra Fleetwood
February 20, 2024
As demand grows for construction projects, finding and retaining qualified workers has become—and remained—increasingly difficult. To help overcome the labor shortage, BELL Construction—a leading construction company in the Southeast providing general contracting, design-build an...
Building TeamBuilder
By Patrick Hennessy
February 14, 2024
In an industry where people are the primary assets of the organizations that perform the work, one of the toughest and most important challenges is effective workforce planning. For Harkins, a general contractor headquartered in Columbia, Maryland, with offices throughout the mid...
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The Case for Skills-Based Hiring
By Fraser Patterson
Forget ‘education,’ ‘experience’ or ‘past employment.’ Filling the trades gap will mean identifying the specific skills you need for the projects you have—and hiring people with those skills.