VIDEO: Working Session Forum Event Begins Diverse Workforce System Change Work

Date Posted: March 29, 2022

Posted In: Discussion, Ideas, Regionalism, Workforce,

The morning of March 16 was very full but very rewarding for 111 stakeholders in the St. Louis built environment.

A Construction Forum working session on that morning focused on “small win” projects in five key barriers to workforce inclusion and equity that had been identified at the Forum’s December program. It was third in Construction Forum’s series of programs on “Building Tomorrow’s Construction Workforce – Steps to Inclusive Employment.”

The series is a deep dive exploration into the systems change that the St. Louis construction industry will need to build the diverse, inclusive, and equitable construction team of tomorrow.

Tom Finan, Forum executive director/co-founder keynoted the event. He began his presentation with two quotes from the philosopher George Santayana:

“Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it,” and “The Difficult is that which can be done immediately; the Impossible is that which takes a little longer.”

“Today our work of systems change to build tomorrow’s inclusive construction workforce begins,” Finan told those assembled.

“We cannot begin this seemingly impossible work without first examining over a century of economic exclusion in our industry for Black, Brown and women workers. Construction Forum was envisioned over a decade ago as a room without walls that anyone could enter. This room would be a place where the entire industry could participate in building relationships and working on issues, both large and small.”

He recalled that on August 14, 2014,  the Forum announced a panel discussion program at the Moto Museum titled, “Boots on the Ground: What Will It Take?”.  It was to be an examination of the changes needed to create St. Louis construction workforce diversity.

Five days earlier, on August 9, 2014, Michael Brown had been killed in Ferguson. At the time the Forum program was planned, Michael Brown was still alive. When the Forum announced the program, the implications of that moment in the history of the St. Louis Region and the nation were not fully clear, Finan said.

“Frankly, continuing with our plan to hold a candid conversation about diversity, inclusion, and equity in our industry during that volatile inflection point for St. Louis and the nation seemed an iffy proposition, at best. At the time we wrote, ‘We don’t believe for a minute that a single program can bring about change in a situation that decades of effort by dedicated, smart members of our industry has been unable to resolve’,” Finan said.

In the weeks leading up to that program, tensions in the St. Louis Region and across the nation continued to escalate.

“When 463 people had registered by event day, we hoped against hope that parking would be our biggest issue,” Finan observed.

“But the Forum program on September 9, 2014, was a shining moment. That day we were proud of our decision to form Construction Forum. That day we were thankful for the people who were there, some of whom are in this room today. They had decided to look the elephant in the room squarely in the eye.

“That elephant is the history of the systemic exclusion of Black, Brown and women workers from meaningful participation in our industry.

“It is the resulting lack of family stability, generational wealth building, and participation in our region’s economic growth. It is the history of a system that successfully saw our region and our industry endure two world wars and a recession and emerge surviving and thriving. But during those periods of crisis and triumph, that same system kept a substantial number of our region’s citizens on the outside looking in,” he said.

This video includes the keynote address and footage of the interaction in the five group sessions. 

Barriers to Inclusion

Finan reminded those attending that at the Forum’s Dec. 2 event, diverse facilitated focus groups identified and unpacked the top five barriers to workforce entry for diverse populations.

He said that the March 16 program would be a two-hour working session, during which the work groups would  turn that work into actionable tasks on those barriers:

• • Transportation:  How do workers get to their jobs?
  • The “Old Boy” Network:  How do we change or eliminate “It’s who you know” as a determinant in hiring and retaining?
  • Career Pathways:  How do we create awareness and accessibility regarding construction career paths in a centralized fashion?
  • Racism in Hiring:  How do we circumvent or prevent race from being a deterrent to being hired?
  • Education Inequity:  How do we ensure that all students have the educational basics needed to enter the field?

As background for the March 16 effort, the Forum premiered a teaser video of a documentary that the Forum is producing with Solstice Productions. The documentary is intended to impact the historical precedents that created today’s workforce system.

Their task in the working sessions was to identify who is doing what well, what success might look like in creating a more diverse equitable system, and gaps in the current systems.

The goal of each working group on March 16 was to identify one “small win” project that could be a seed for beginning quantum systems change. They did a SWOT analysis of each project and identified the assets and support that the project would require. Finan told them that when the projects were completed at year-end, “success” would be measured by how well the project teams had collaborated, not whether or not the project achieved its anticipated outcome.

At the conclusion of the work session each group reported out its project. The projects will unfold over the next nine months and outcomes will be presented at the Forum’s December program.