My name is Rebecca McDiarmid. I'm here representing the Canadian Construction Women. The Canadian Construction Women is an organization dedicated to supporting women in or wishing to become part of the construction industry, particularly in the Lower Mainland.
I believe there are benefits both to women and to the industry by increasing the number of women in construction. Unfortunately there are also a number of barriers preventing more women from entering this field. Specific reasons why more women should join construction include lucrative wages, particularly when compared to more traditional fields; opportunities for advancement based on skill—in construction I've found that the cream certainly rises to the top; long-term employment security; university education is not necessarily required; and people working in construction will always have that satisfaction of producing a product that's going to be there and evident for decades to come.
Benefits to the industry include women bringing a different set of strengths to the job site. We tend to be more detail oriented, better at multi-tasking, and gentler with equipment. This has real cash advantages for businesses when it comes to maintenance costs and replacement costs, particularly in heavy equipment.
There's anecdotal evidence that there are fewer confrontations on site, fewer incidences of fighting, that people seem to be more productive, looking towards resolution-based problem solving as opposed to trying to win. Women tend to have a better safety ethic. A woman is more likely to ask for help when trying to move something heavy, which translates into the men also feeling that they are not obligated to try to push themselves to the limit. Obviously the fewer injuries you have on any site, the better off everybody is.
Increasing the number of women in an organization will broaden the perspective when it does come to problem solving, just in the different ways that men and women think. They are able to come up with better solutions to deal with their problem. Also, by being more open to having women in the organization, companies are able to broaden the talent pool they're drawing their employees from.
Unfortunately there are some barriers to increasing the number of women in construction. There's a lack of information about available opportunities. Most high school girls are not presented with construction being a viable career option. There are misconceptions about the industry by individual women, their parents, and their teachers that it's man's work, that it's always dirty, it's always heavy, and it's too technical. That is certainly not the case. A lot of teachers and career counsellors will focus on the importance of attending university as opposed to presenting the options of apprenticeship training or trades training or technical school as an alternative to university after high school.
Employers don't always recognize the benefits of having women in their organization. This is a matter of a lack of experience with women who are able to help them out. Other barriers include job site hours. It can be difficult to arrange for child care with the hours of construction sites in general. We tend to start earlier: 7:30 in the morning to 4 o'clock in the afternoon is standard for us, and it's tricky to find child care that's going to accommodate those hours. In addition, when you have a woman working on a site, the only woman there with 60 other guys, you do get the sense that you're alone, and that can be hard on a lot of women who aren't prepared for that.
To overcome these barriers, the best way of doing that is to provide positive role models, women who have made successes of themselves, showing the next generation that it is possible. They can do it. It's going to take a lot of work, but they can be successful.
Educating the public about opportunities available in construction: it is a good paying job. It's possible to advance and advance quickly, particularly in comparison to other, more traditional careers.
Educating employers about the benefits of increasing the number of women on their site: again, this is mostly anecdotal information from employers who got their first woman on site and were amazed at the difference it made in their crews or their maintenance costs or the productivity of the work in general.
There are also supporting organizations to provide a venue for women to get together who don't have the opportunity to interact with a lot of other women during the course of the day, to compare notes and exchange stories and find some inspiration to get through the harder times.
One of the things I would like to bring up, which has been discussed in previous conversations on introducing quotas, mandates, or initiatives that specifically target women and increase the number of women in non-traditional fields, is that it can create a backlash when everyone is not judged by the same criteria. Even women who are well qualified and who are doing a good job are judged against this standard. This has been seen before. Law enforcement agencies and the military have tried to increase the number of female members. You can end up with nicknames such as the “powder puff patrol” or the “pink list”, which refers to women who are working on site. It creates nothing but antagonism between the women and their male counterparts.
In summary, I'd like to say that both women and the construction industry would profit by increasing the number of women in the field. Current barriers to increasing the number of women employed in building trades and on-site management can be removed through education and through increasing the profile of positive role models. Having said that, programs put in place to merely increase the number of women on construction sites would not be productive and would create a hostile environment for other women who are going to be entering that field.
Thank you.