Category: Construction Company

Why Are Women Important in Construction?

Why Are Women Important in Construction?

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. The Construction Labor Shortage The current labor pool for construction jobs is too small to meet the demand for construction workers. With nearly twice as many job openings as people seeking employment in the construction industry, recruiting more women to meet that demand makes good sense simply from a numerical standpoint. It will take about 590,000 new construction workers to meet the demand anticipated for 2023. Women can certainly help to make up for the shortfall. Benefits of Increasing Gender Diversity in Construction The current labor shortage is only one of the reasons why it’s important to have more women in construction. There are other significant benefits. Creativity and Innovation Gender diversity adds another point of view to any discussion, which in turn increases creativity and innovation. Research has shown that groups that include women are better at collaborating and innovating than male-only groups. Effective Communication Nature has given women an advantage when it comes to communicating. Research reported...

Read more
What You need to Know—2023 Women in Construction Conference

What You need to Know—2023 Women in Construction Conference

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. When and Where Will the 2023 Conference Be Held? The 2023 annual conference of the National Association of Women in Construction (NAWIC) is scheduled for August 9-12 in Portland, Oregon. This will be NAWIC’s 68th annual conference. NAWIC’s stated purpose is to strengthen and amplify the success of women in the construction industry, and its annual conference plays an important role in carrying out that mission. NAWIC Membership To join NAWIC, you must be a woman working in some capacity in the construction industry for 20 or more hours per week. That includes project management, administrative, legal, insurance, or financial work or employment in any of the construction trades. The only other requirement to join as a voting member is to hold membership in one of NAWIC’s chapters. Currently, there are more than 115 chapters spread across 47 states, divided into eight regions: Northeast, South Atlantic, Southeast, North Central, Midwest, South Central, Pacific Northwest, and Pacific Southwest. Women who...

Read more
What Percentage of Construction Workers Are Female?

What Percentage of Construction Workers Are Female?

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. What Percentage of Construction Workers Are Female?: 2022 Statistics In September 2022, approximately 7.7 million people were employed in the U.S. construction industry. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately 14% of construction workers in October 2022 were female. Both the number of women working in the construction industry and the number of construction-related companies owned by women have increased since 2014, despite some disruptions due to the Covid-19 pandemic. As of 2020, Hispanic women outnumber White women working in construction in the United States. This segment of the construction workforce grew by 117% between 2016 and 2020. Most Hispanic women entering the construction workforce do so in job site positions, not office jobs. States with the Most and the Least Women in Construction Though not technically a state, Washington, D.C. has the most women employed in construction (17.6%). In order, the remaining states in the top five are Arizona, Florida, Washington, and Oregon. This can be useful...

Read more
What is the National Association of Women in Construction?

What is the National Association of Women in Construction?

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. Origin of the National Association of Women in Construction Historically, construction has been male-dominated. In 1953, the relatively small number of women working in construction in the Fort Worth, Texas area felt a need to support and be supported by their female peers. That need for networking and support resulted in the formation of Women in Construction. It soon became apparent that all over the country, women trying to make a place for themselves in the construction industry would benefit greatly from an organization like Women in Construction. And in May 1955, Women in Construction revised its charter to add chapters throughout the U.S., changing the organization’s name to The National Association of Women in Construction (NAWIC). There are now more than 115 NAWIC chapters located in 47 states, organized into eight regions: Northeast, South Atlantic, Southeast, North Central, Midwest, South Central, Pacific Northwest, and Pacific Southwest. NAWIC is affiliated with NAWIC organizations in other countries, including Australia, New...

Read more

Remote Construction Management Trends

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your bonding needs. Continue reading to learn more about remote construction management trends. For a very long time, construction management meant spending all day on a single job site or traveling from one site to another to check on progress and stomp out small fires before they could become big ones—not exactly an efficient approach to project management. In an industry slow to embrace digital technologies, it only became widely apparent that the physical presence of a project manager onsite might not be necessary when the pandemic turned the way Americans work upside down. Increasingly, digital technologies used to improve construction processes are being deployed as project management tools, and many construction project managers spend far less time onsite than previously was thought necessary. Top Remote Construction Management Trends Digital Time Tracking At the most basic level, construction project management is about making sure that people show up to work when and where they’re supposed to and remain as long as they are...

Read more

Protective Gear: Construction Trends

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your bonding needs. Continue reading to learn more about protective gear construction trends. The range of protective gear (personal protective equipment, or PPE) available for use in the construction industry continues to expand with new developments in PPE technology and enhanced safety requirements imposed by government entities, employers, project owners, and insurance companies. The COVID-19 pandemic has contributed to the need for additional PPE (for example, N95 masks) to help in disease prevention when infection rates are high. Top Protective Gear Construction Trends Fit and Comfort Proper fit plays a big part in the effectiveness of construction protective gear. There is a direct correlation between the comfort of PPE and compliance with rules and regulations regarding the use of PPE. Comfort goes hand-in-hand with fit as PPE design criteria because workers may not wear PPE properly or adjust the fit properly if the item is uncomfortable. So, there is ongoing research and development to come up with PPE that can be adjusted for...

Read more

Construction Recruitment Trends

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your bonding needs. Continue to read to find out more about construction recruitment trends. The Current Labor Shortage The demand for new workers in the construction industry has been greater than the potential supply for years, and that trend continues in the COVID-19 era. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Construction activity was stagnant through most of 2021 but is likely to pick up with government-funded infrastructure spending. To be competitive moving forward, construction companies need to acquire and/or develop talent that has the right combination of skills for the work to be done. They also need to have a diverse workforce that is in line with what both private and public project owners are looking for. And they need to be able to attract and retain workers in a highly competitive hiring environment. The Right Mix of Skills Generations of construction workers were hired for their technical skills and experience. But there is a growing recognition of the need for...

Read more

Changes for OSHA Construction Requirements in 2022

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your bonding needs. Continue reading to learn more about changes for OSHA in construction requirements for 2022. The Biden administration has been working in multiple industries to reinstate rules and regulations revoked during the Trump administration. There also are ongoing efforts to implement some regulations and enforcement strategies originally proposed during the Obama administration, as well as some that previously had not made it past the discussion stage. Many of these developments directly impact the construction industry and OSHA’s safety regulations. Rebuilding OSHA During the Trump administration, many OSHA positions, especially for inspectors and senior administrators, were eliminated or went unfilled. With the goal of increasing safety inspections and enforcement, one key move is to reinstate the Site-Specific Targeting Inspection Program that subjects high-risk worksites and businesses that have not complied with existing reporting requirements to more frequent inspections. Enhancing Recordkeeping Requirements In early 2022, OSHA proposed amending certain recordkeeping regulations to match more closely what was initially envisioned by the Obama administration....

Read more

Building Information Modeling (BIM) Trends

Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your bonding needs. Continue reading to learn more about building information modeling BIM trends. What Is Building Information Modeling? Autodesk defines Building Information Modeling (BIM) as “a process of creating and managing information for a built asset throughout its lifecycle—from planning and design to construction and operations.” It brings together real estate developers, architects, engineers, construction contractors, suppliers, and others in a collaborative process of planning, designing, and building a single 3-dimensional model that all parties use as the basis for work at every stage before, during, and after construction. Among the most impactful trends in BIM today are the use of 3-D printing, 3-D laser scanning, prefabrication, energy modeling, and cloud computing. 3-D Printing Using BIM data and 3-D printing eliminates the need for multiple drawings, plans, and models of a building to be constructed. The three most common 3-D printing technologies used in BIM—Stereolithography, Selective Laser Sintering or melting, and Fused Deposition Modeling—differ primarily in the type of material or the technique...

Read more

How Smart City Construction Has Changed the Industry

What is Smart City Construction? What was once envisioned only in works of science fiction is becoming reality in the form of smart city construction. Broadly speaking, a smart city is an urban environment in which community development priorities and government policies converge with information and communications technology (ICT) and innovative design and construction processes to seamlessly connect people, places, and things.  Smart cities rely on ICT infrastructure. This is similar to the concept of an Internet of Things (IoT)—a network of physical objects equipped with sensors, processing capability, software, and other technologies exchanging data between and among themselves and connected systems over the internet and other communications channels.  Some cities are implementing “smart” infrastructure elements, most notably in their airports, energy projects, and traffic control systems. However, with the exception of some demonstration projects, smart city construction is still a thing of the future, though nearer than one might think. Surety Bond Professionals is a family owned and operated bonding agency with over 30 years of experience. With access to a broad range of surety markets, our expert agents are ready to assist with all of your construction bond needs. A Model Smart City (Woven City) There soon...

Read more