Workforce Development

Labor Losses Open the Door for New Materials & Services

  • A quarter of a million people left the housing construction industry from 2002-2012, and many of them have found employment elsewhere.
  • Framers are feeling the effects of this exodus more acutely than most, prompting them to look for creative ways to do more with fewer people.
  • CMs can play a pivotal role in switching framers from sticks to components by offering installation training and expertise to new framing employees.

Preserving & Growing Market Share

  • By conducting its own ASTM E119 floor assembly fire testing, SBCA has the data it needs to effectively fight the controversial IRC Section R501.3 code provision and help preserve CMs’ market share.
  • SBCA has drafted template best practice language CMs should consider using in their TDDs, customer contracts and submittal documents to counter the efforts of the lumber industry to shift liability onto end users.
  • Through Framing the American Dream and WorkForce Development efforts, SBCA is actively engaged in helping CMs successfully navigate today’s labor challenges and grow their businesses.

Top 10 Employee Training Tools: Designer Training

Best practices for training and mentoring designers.

Implementing What You Learned at BCMC: Build an Effective Truss Design Department

  • Before a new truss designer designs their first truss, it’s a good idea to have technicians work as a helper on a truss production team.
  • Understand the personal characteristics, education and knowledge of your plant personnel because often talent is there that is unexplored and unrealized.
  • Training a new designer is an ongoing process that takes time. When you have good designers trained, you will want to do everything you can to keep them employed with you.

Implementing What You Learned at BCMC: Get the Right People & Keep Them

  • The focus should be on developing a system each company can continuously evolve in order to avoid becoming stagnant as the market improves. 
  • In order to bring in qualified people, initially, companies need to define, write out and fine-tune a recruitment process.
  • You need to develop a pipeline of candidates and not wait for the need to arise.  

Unifying the Framing Industry Through Safety

  • When it comes to jobsite safety, fragmentation within the construction industry creates obstacles that shouldn’t be there (and don’t have to be).  
  • It’s very difficult for framing companies to develop a consistent culture of safety when the jobsite-specific safety plan changes from jobsite to jobsite.
  • FrameSAFE provides a standardized approach to safety communication and shares universal best practices when it comes to safe behavior and jobsite hazard mitigation.

Top 10 Employee Training Tools

In upcoming issues of SBC Magazine, we are going to look at the top ten training needs for component manufacturers, walk through the issues associated with each of those training needs, and provide guidance on industry best practices for offering basic through advanced training.

Grooming a New Generation of Leaders

  • We need to focus on our younger employees now and groom them to become the next generation of leaders in our companies and in our industry.
  • Just like raising kids, building leaders is accomplished through a million small conversations, learning moments, completed tasks and informal evaluations with feedback.
  • There has to be a commitment on your part to ensure the employees you mentor learn everything they can about their jobs and the business.

Our Imminent Labor Shortage

From BCMC 2012 Educational Session: “Preparing for the Future of Hiring”

What Do You Love About This Industry?

  • WorkForce Development will need to be a corporate focus as the economy continues to improve.
  • Showcasing the world of components, its unique characteristics and many career opportunities can be a powerful way to entice fresh faces into our industry.
  • SBCA’s WorkForce Development website, wfd.sbcindustry.com, is a great tool for posting jobs and reviewing resumes, with new site enhancements coming soon.