The future interns for Kingsbury Companies. Courtesy photo.
by Olga Peters, Vermont Business Magazine Vermont’s construction professionals are retiring faster than new workers are joining the industry, according to many experts in the field.
“Last year, I think we added 2,500 new people to the construction industry,” said Richard Wobby Jr., executive vice president and director of safety training and member services for the Associated General Contractors of Vermont. “The problem was we lost 2,000.”
Demographics are part of the issue, he said. The outgoing age cohort is bigger than the ones replacing it.
For the past two years, AGC/VT has partnered with career centers to attract more young people to the industry. The organization is also helping other companies develop internal training programs, Wobby said.
Kingsbury Companies, a general contractor in Middlesex, for example, is four years into an in-house internship program.
Jordan Newquist, a civil engineering junior at the University of Vermont, spent the summer in Kingsbury’s project manager internship program.
Photo: Jordan Newquist interns with Kingsbury Companies. Courtesy photo.
“I’m really appreciating that I’m getting to take a bit of what I’ve started covering in my classes and expand on it a whole bunch in a very hands-on way,” she said. “The people I work with have been great. When I don’t understand something, they step in and explain it or teach me something new.”
Newquist said she applied for the internship to acquire construction management skills, which she hasn’t had much exposure to at school. She found the experience challenging, she added, because it was so much different than the classroom environment.
“Because I’m a junior, I’m getting into specialty classes this semester,” she said. “I feel like this (internship) served as really good preparation those classes. I’m going in with some real-world experience.”
Kingsbury Companies President TJ Kingsbury said the four-year old intership program “may still be in the infancy stages, but we are full speed ahead.”
He said workers must continue to evolve and grow as professionals. If people stop learning, they stagnate.
“We recognize that our industry is in dire need across the country for skilled workers, whether they be project managers, superintendents, foremen, general laborers, pipe layers, truck drivers or heavy equipment operators,” Kingsbury said. “We’re trying to give our interns an opportunity to create a path to success in the trades.”
The company has a strong program targeting college students and recent graduates to train people as project managers and foreman. The company is also training for other positions such as heavy equipment operator although those efforts are less defined.
Project manager Power Donnelly, who mentored Newquist throughout the summer, said interns usually start by shadowing a mentor and slowly take on more independent tasks.
This might include calling vendors, ordering supplies, checking on material lead times, or confirming delivery times.
At the start of the program, Donnelly invests a lot of time in the intern. The investment is worth it, he said, because as the intern develops skills, they take over more tasks from the full-time employees freeing them up for other project work.
“It is a large time commitment in the beginning,” Donnelly said. “But you have to think about it as if you’re investing. You’re investing an extra hour a day now to save yourself weeks down the road.”
Last year, the company launched a truck driver program, Donnelly said.
“We had a couple of people who were laborers for us who signed up and were interested in that program,” he said.
Three workers successfully completed the program. Two stayed with Kingsbury. The third took a driving job with another company.
Jim Halavonich is the vice-president of corporate resources.
In a nutshell, the corporate resource person oversees the company’s staffing and equipment. Halavonich is in charge of on-boarding new employees as well as buying and selling equipment.
The internship curriculum was developed over the past four years with input from the interns, he said.
In conjunction with their school schedule — think during summer vacations — interns work a five-day, 40-hour work week and earn an hourly wage of $20.
They are paired with an experienced Superintendent and work on assigned projects.
Some of the skills interns learn are in project safety, survey and layout, site development, utility installation such as water, drainage, and sewer lines, and concrete work.
Interns will be exposed to field work, contract administration, estimating, and construction safety.
At the end of the internship, participants receive feedback on areas of strength and areas for improvement.
Halavonich said he prefers working with interns rather than hiring a workforce recruiter.
Recruiters might find 100 candidates, but the internship finds the right candidates, he said.
“So for us, what we have found is it’s more important for us to find the right person, than just a person,” he said.
“The right person gets our core values, believes in our mission statement, and has the same characteristics that we have which are integrity adaptability and efficiently,” he added.
Halavonich’s favorite part of overseeing the internship program is witnessing the interns’ growth.
“Watching them grow and learn, and get excited, and get angry, and get dirty, and fail at something, and then succeed because they kept going at it,” he said. “It gives you hope in the future.”
Training the next generation of trades professionals must start early, said Kingsbury. For example, this summer the company hosted a group of children from the local child care center, Neck of the Woods, based in Waitsfield.
Approximately 21 5- and 6-year-olds joined workers at one of Kingsbury’s shops. They climbed on the heavy equipment and spent a few hours with the equipment operators, said Kingsbury.
“We’re trying to change the idea that the trades are not a good profession and trying to appeal to the younger generation as well,” he said. “I think we’ve got a long ways to go in our country at changing the mindset of what a career in the trades can look like.”
For Newquist, the internship has helped her understand the direction she wants to take her career and channel her energies more efficiently. She has learned that she enjoys variety, with a mixture of office and field work.
“I think it’s really informing the way I think about engineering generally,” she said. “It’s gonig to be pretty cool to go into that (water quality) class and be like, ’OK, I just worked on an improvement project for a wastewater treatment plant.”’
Her positive experience expanded beyond tasks. She feels more well-rounded and confident.
“I definitely had some phone call anxiety,” she said. “Now I just call people or pick up the phone.”
On Aug. 21, the company hired a talent acquisition and development administrator to oversee the program. This employee will take over all training, recruitment and expand the internships program.
Olga Peters is a freelance writer from Southern Vermont.