VIDEO: “Mind-Set” Explores Unions’ Key Role in Groundbreaking Worker Wellness Research

Date Posted: December 14, 2023

Posted In: Discussion, Ideas, Workforce,

Before he came to his current position, Dr. John Gaal had decades of experience in collaborating with educational institutions and non-profit organizations on worker wellness.

After leaving the Carpenters where he was director of workforce and training in 2019, he helped Washington University with a worker opioid research project and University of Missouri Extension with a pilot program to develop a recovery-friendly workplace program statewide.

At that time he was approached to become the inaugural director of the worker wellness component for the MO AFL-CIO’s Missouri Works Initiative’s newly-formed Worker Wellness Program.

A far-ranging video with Dr. Gaal was edited by the Construction Forum team into short segments for use on the Forum website and social media. We call these mini-programs, “Mind-Set: Focusing on Building Worker Mental Health”.

St. Louis unions have  a history of collaboration with universities and others in ground-breaking research into worker wellness. Over decades, the unions have contributed data and other resources to explore such issues as opioid use, repetitive motion injuries, the need for fall prevention training, and the effect of the construction culture on an an outsized incidence of smoking, drinking and other health-risk behaviors.