As part of Women’s History Month, the construction industry celebrates Women in Construction Week from March 5th-11th. To celebrate, we wanted to highlight women who are making a difference in construction: who they are, what they bring to the industry, and how they are making the future brighter for everyone.
Who They Are
Women make up 14% of the construction industry and only about 3.4% of actual trade workers. Considering women make up 47% of the national workforce, this number is low, but it’s growing.
Studies have shown that diversity increases employee engagement, improves productivity, and fosters innovation, so it’s no surprise that 59% of employers are actively working to bring a wider variety of people to their teams. This includes hiring more women, providing them with ongoing training and professional development opportunities, and promoting them into positions of leadership.
Bringing Growth to the Industry
Women are drawn to construction for many of the same reasons men are: a plethora of available jobs, great wages, and the ability to build a long, rewarding career. Yet there are even more reasons why a woman in particular would want to work in construction: For one, the pay gap in construction is small, with women earning 99.1% of what their male counterparts earn. This is substantially better than the national average of 81.1%.
Beyond being a very physical job, construction requires intelligence and problem solving skills. Whether it’s making a bid for a job, creating a budget, drawing a blueprint, or solving a difficult puzzle on a job site, women inhabit the world differently and therefore can bring a different perspective to these tasks that often improve efficiency and save companies money.
Workers of the Future
Opportunities for women in construction continue to grow. As the industry looks for ways to recruit young workers, scholarships and training programs are becoming more widely available. For example, just this month the Department of Labor entered into a $20 million agreement with TradesFutures to create pathways for women and minorities into the industry through registered apprenticeship programs. TradesFutures, a Washington, DC-based nonprofit, plans to enroll 13,000 applicants into these programs, with over half of them being placed into registered apprenticeship programs across the country over the next four years.
To make sure that women, veterans, people of color, Native Americans and other underrepresented groups are getting access to the program, TradesFutures will be partnering with the National Urban League and North America’s Building Trade Unions. The initial apprenticeship programs will be in Tennessee, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Missouri, but will expand to other states as programming becomes available.
Want to be part of this great change? Check out our last Women in Construction blog post for tips to help you diversify your labor.
At Steadfast, LLC, we believe that diversity is a strength, and it will only improve the future of construction! We hope to see more women and other underrepresented groups given equal pay, equal access to learning opportunities, and an equal chance to build a thriving career in construction.