Human Side of Construction

Nearly 200,000 US construction workers quit in September 2026, the most in more than three years, while layoffs sat near record lows. In this solo episode, Angelo separates what the number can tell us from what it can’t, looks at the research on why construction workers actually stay and leave, and makes the case that a resignation is a near miss the industry never investigates. He closes with three moves any leader can start on Monday, none of which need a budget line.Key topics• What the September JOLTS data shows, and what it can’t explain• Why a hot market removes reasons to stay rather than creating reasons to leave• Growth and supervisor treatment over pay: what construction workers say keeps them• Why workers with one to five years in are the most likely to want out• Toxic culture as a predictor of attrition (MIT Sloan)• The exit interview as an autopsy, and the near miss we never investigate• Spotting the decision before the notice• Investigating the quit, stay conversations, and making the path visibleAbout the hostAngelo Suntres, P.Eng., PMP, GSC, is a construction leader with more than 20 years in ICI and institutional construction, author of The Human Side of Construction (Wiley, 2024) and Rebuild Construction (Amazon, 2025), and host of The Human Side of Construction podcast. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

David MacDonald, Division Manager at Dewar Industrial Services, joins Angelo to talk about the one trait he hires for above everything else: telling the truth. From a Red Seal carpenter who nearly went bankrupt in 2008 to building a new ICI division inside a nuclear contractor, David shares why honesty gets you help, why schedule lies are really trust failures, and why the people on the tools are the most important people on any project. The conversation closes on mentorship, mental wellness, his daughter’s electrical apprenticeship, and what it will take to get more women onto Canadian job sites.Key topics• Why “we’re on schedule” so often turns into “we’re not hitting it” the week before• Pay now or pay later: difficult conversations versus nuclear explosions• How accountability rolls downhill until it reaches the trades, who can’t push risk anywhere• David’s sweatpants interview and the leader who hired him to build teams, not to know HVAC• Hiring for honesty, respect for the customer and being a good human• Mentorship as letting people fail with calculated risk• Process-heavy nuclear work versus ICI, and why sector experience isn’t interchangeable• Shielding your people’s time off and sitting with them when things are hard• Women in the trades: the image problem, the messaging problem, and what actually moves the number• Why promoting your best installer to foreman can backfireGuestDavid MacDonald is Division Manager at Dewar Industrial Services, building the company’s ICI division. A Red Seal carpenter and former owner of The Alcon Group, he spent nearly nine years at Black & MacDonald as a project manager and operations manager. He is in his fourth discipline within construction and plans to keep learning. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

ENR’s 2026 Top 600 Specialty Contractors report shows $275 billion in revenue driven by the AI data centre boom, and a craft worker shortage that keeps getting worse. In this solo episode, Angelo argues the boom isn’t a recruiting problem. It’s a stress test of whether construction leaders can develop people, carry risk and protect basic dignity at speed. He closes with one thing every leader can do on site this week.Key topics• Why the boom is sorting firms rather than lifting all of them• The shift from finding workers to developing them, and why foremen are the real bottleneck• How risk pushed down the contract chain lands on crews and erodes psychological safety• The “bathroom clause”: meals, clean washrooms and paved walkways as recruiting strategy• The Canadian picture: BuildForce hiring needs and data centres in the GTA and Alberta• A one-week site walk and the one question to ask your foremanMentioned in this episode• ENR, “ENR Top 600: AI Boom Tests Talent Pipelines” (Oct 21, 2026): https://www.enr.com/articles/64024-enr-top-600-ai-boom-tests-talent-pipelines• BuildForce Canada, Construction and Maintenance Looking Forward 2026–2035• Associated Builders and Contractors, 2026 workforce shortage model: https://www.abc.org/wfshortage• HSOC Episode 10, Health & Safety 2.0 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

Red Seal master electrician Anna Lary joins Angelo to answer the question she asked at a panel that left the room silent: how does the way we resource a job site affect the mental health of the people working on it? They cover silica behind caution tape, washrooms that drift out of reach, why fewer than half of apprentices in Canada’s largest trades finish, why generic EDI training backfires, and what owners, contractors and foremen can do about it. Anna also shares how the ConnectHER Hub at BCIT grew from one message into a funded program that has connected more than 2,000 people.Key topics• Site logistics as a message about worth: dust, washrooms, access, debris• Apprenticeship completion in Canada: 47% of men, 34% of women in the 15 largest Red Seal trades (2021)• Why apprentices leave: starting wages, the first employer, apprentice EI, training backlogs, condensed technical training• Generational change in how apprentices are trained and spoken to• Why foremen need training to intervene, and the social-connection problem• EDI training built for construction, and calling men into it• Bystander intervention and calling people in rather than out• Owner and policy levers, minimum standards and ‘where practicable’• Invested workers speak up; resentful workers stay silent• The ConnectHER Hub, Equity in Electrical and Equity in ContractingGuestAnna Lary, Red Seal and BC master electrician, M.Ed. Former BCIT electrical apprenticeship instructor. Project Lead, ConnectHER Hub at BCIT.Mentioned in this episode• ConnectHER Hub, BCIT: https://www.bcit.ca/construction-environment/welcome-to-the-connectherhub/• Equity in Electrical and Equity in Contracting events (Anna Lary)• Leaders in Trades training, BC Centre for Women in Trades• Future of Work panel, Pitt Meadows Plumbing, April 2026• Canadian Apprenticeship Forum, apprenticeship completion analysis (2023 and 2024 reports)• Anna Lary on LinkedInSupport resourcesThis episode discusses workplace harassment and sexual assault. If any of it is your story: Ending Violence Canada directory at endingviolencecanada.org; RAINN at 1-800-656-4673 (US); Assaulted Women’s Helpline at 1-866-863-0511 (Ontario, 24/7); call or text 988 in a crisis (Canada and US).Work with Angelo: [email protected] This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

Content noteThis episode discusses sexual harassment and assault. If that is heavy for you right now, take care of yourself. Support resources are below.Episode summaryA woman who built a career she loves in construction wrote to Angelo and a few other men with industry platforms with one request: tell the men to check whether the women they work with feel safe. In this solo episode Angelo reads her letter, with her permission and with identifying details removed. He then speaks to the men in the industry about the hidden hazard assessment women run every day, why so many reporting processes end in the woman leaving, and five concrete things men and leaders can do starting this week.Key topics• The field-level risk assessment women run on top of the actual job• Why news like the Cornell case reopens old experiences for women on job sites• A listener’s letter on harassment, close calls and leaving the industry• Survey data from Ontario, Nova Scotia and the US on harassment, reporting and retention• Reporting systems versus exit systems• Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act and workplace sexual harassment• Why “as a father of daughters” misses the point• Psychological safety for everyone, not a team with an asterisk• Five ways to check in and act without making it worseSupport resources• US: RAINN National Sexual Assault Hotline, 1-800-656-4673, 24/7 (rainn.org)• Ontario: Assaulted Women’s Helpline, 1-866-863-0511, 24/7 (GTA 416-863-0511, #SAFE (#7233) on Bell, Rogers, Fido and Telus mobiles)• Canada: directory of sexual assault centres and crisis lines, endingviolencecanada.org• In crisis anywhere in the US or Canada: call or text 988Sources and links mentioned• Ontario Building and Construction Tradeswomen (OBCT), survey of 342 women, released at the 2025 Ontario Building Trades convention• YWCA Halifax, survey of 101 women and gender-diverse skilled tradespeople, released March 2024• Institute for Women’s Policy Research, A Future Worth Building: What Tradeswomen Say (2021 survey, 2,635 respondents)• Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act, workplace harassment provisions (Bill 132, in force 2016) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

Hammad Chaudhry, VP of Innovation and Digital Construction at Pomerleau, joins Angelo to talk about the human side of construction technology. Hammad explains why AI adoption stalls when companies don’t understand their own business processes, why field “resistance” is usually a rational response to risk, and why the most valuable tools rarely look revolutionary. The conversation turns to the workforce gap, procurement incentives, and why investing in mental health and change management is part of any serious technology strategy.Key topics• From architecture and BIM coordination to leading innovation at Canada’s largest builders• Why tech companies misread construction as one monolithic industry• There’s no holy grail: understanding your business process before you buy AI• Data strategy as table stakes, and clients asking contractors for their AI strategy• The timing problem: investing too early vs waiting until your back is against the wall• Resistance as risk management, and changing a tire on the Gardiner• Conway’s Law, silos, and a workforce with no time left to learn• Startups vs contractors: hero syndrome and the unflashy wins• Will AI replace people? The labour gap and growing demand• Incentives, procurement and contracts as the real barrier to tech’s potential• Pomerleau’s investment in mental health and change management• ROI, insurance, and why the human case is the business case• The doorman lesson: what you lose when you optimize for ROI alone• Hammad’s advice to executives: start with the business objectiveGuest bioHammad Chaudhry is VP of Innovation and Digital Construction at Pomerleau and Vice Chair of Building Transformations, a non-profit built for the industry, by the industry. He started on the architecture side in Alberta, moved into construction as a project coordinator and BIM coordinator, and worked through estimating, preconstruction, proposals and special projects (including the conservatory renovation at the Banff Springs Hotel) before leading innovation and technology teams at some of the largest general contractors in Canada. He has also worked directly in the construction tech startup space, including time at Cupix, and is a Top 40 Under 40 in Canadian construction. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

Every construction estimate makes assumptions about people: how rested they are, how long they’ll stay, and who’s actually running the job. Nobody writes those assumptions down, so nobody prices them, and ops wears the variance when they don’t hold. Drawing on his years as a Chief Estimator and P&L leader, Angelo breaks down the overtime tax, the churn tax and the trust gap between estimating and operations. He closes with three practical moves any contractor can make on the next bid, no software required.Key topics• How a labour number really gets built, and why every factor describes the building, not the people• Why historical productivity data hides the human variables instead of capturing them• The overtime tax: MCAA factors for 50- and 60-hour weeks, and the “61 cents” reality• Fatigue data from the National Safety Council (2018)• The churn tax: absenteeism, turnover and the value of craft training• The month-six cost review, and why psychological safety is a margin issue• Three moves: write down the human assumptions, price acceleration honestly, close the loop This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

Anthony Foley went from National Guard infantryman to master electrician to owner of his own veteran-owned shop, and he volunteered five years as an apprenticeship instructor along the way. In this conversation he is unusually honest about what large-scale construction does to people over time, including himself.We get into the day there was no drinking water on a hot job site and what that silence communicated, the leadership test he gives every apprentice, why he believes teaching is the highest form of mastery, and the moment a former student told him over lunch that he still seemed bitter. He agreed.Key topics covered• Why a foundation in standards made the transition from the military to construction easier, and where that turns into rigidity• The jump from a small shop to a national contractor, and the day he had to admit he might just be a number• Getting thrown onto large-scale new construction with no mentorship and being told to ask as few questions as possible• The water story, and what leadership communicates when it brushes something small off• Take the money off the table: his test for whether a leader is worth following• Why he gave five years of his own time to teaching apprentices for free• Teaching as the way men in this trade actually show they care• Phones, gambling and what he reads as a hope problem in younger apprentices• The gap between the six figure trades marketing and a first year apprentice’s actual paycheque• The superintendent who kept working through heat stroke, and what that models for everyone watching• How harshness gets inherited from one generation of tradespeople to the next• Why he thinks building steadier men is the precondition for the diversity the industry says it wants• Becoming the thing you were trying to avoid, and catching it in yourself• What construction could learn from law enforcement about peer support and stress• What he would tell an eighteen year old, and the one reason for joining the trades he will not acceptGuestAnthony Foley, owner and master electrician, AKF Energy Electrical, Dumfries, Virginia. Former National Guard infantryman. Five years as a volunteer apprenticeship instructor.Mentioned in this episode• AKF Energy Electrical: akfenergy.com• Anthony Foley: [email protected]• Kennesaw State University (where Anthony studied graphic design before enlisting)• Lightcast, Defining the Skilled Trades: A Data-Driven Blueprint for the Future, August 25, 2026 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

A guy breaks his arm on your site and ninety seconds later three people are moving, there is a form, and there is an incident review by Thursday. A guy tells your foreman he has a plan to end his life, and nothing happens at all. In this solo episode, Angelo takes the mental health and crisis response program Shannon Truax-Wardell built at Preferred Materials, following the loss of a colleague to suicide, and turns it into a five-phase build sequence any construction company can follow. This is not an awareness episode. It is the operator manual: what you do, in what order, and what it costs you when you skip a step.Topics covered• Why mental health programs start with a trigger and a person, not a strategy, and why they die when handed to someone without authority• The ready-mix truck campaign, and the driver education that had to happen before it launched• Awareness without capability as an exposure, not a kindness• The eighty percent of your workforce who want to help and do not know how• Mental health first aid versus crisis response training, and why they are not interchangeable• Volunteer-based responder rosters, and why letting people quit is the system working• Why operational leaders, not HR, end up carrying the program• Roster composition, and who people in trouble actually approach• The legal line: no diagnosing, no treating, no prescribing, and why training is the protection• Why terminology matters: died by suicide, not committed suicide• Retention as the real return, and why promising an ROI number gets your program cancelled• Attention failure as an under-counted driver of site incidents• The one sentence from a leader that destroys the whole investment• What a site lead and an office lead can each do on Monday morningLinksEpisode 026 with Shannon Truax-WardellCrisis support: in Canada and the United States, call or text 988 at any time. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com

Shannon Truax-Wardell led a program that put a suicide crisis line on the side of ready-mix drums and drove it through every community her company works in. It won a national award, and a stranger in crisis called the number and later called back to say thank you. In this episode, sponsored by Grand Valley Construction Association and Mark’s Commercial, she walks Angelo through what came after the campaign: crisis response and mental health first aid training built into an operating company since 2021, who volunteered and why, where the legal line sits, and what to say to the executive who wants the ROI first. Angelo shares the story of the manager who asked him the same question five days running until he broke down at his desk. The through line is simple. We train every crew in first aid for the body and almost none of them for the mind, and that is a training gap, not a values problem.Key topics covered• How the ready-mix drum crisis line campaign came together in January 2021, and why the drivers were trained before a single truck went out• Crisis response versus mental health first aid: what each one covers and how long each takes• Why operational leaders, not just safety and HR, are the right people to train• Keeping the program voluntary, and why some volunteers backing out was the right outcome• The legal line between offering a safe place to speak and treating someone• Language that matters: died by suicide, not committed suicide• The 80 percent in the middle who want to help and freeze because they do not know what to say• Why relating your own story back to someone in crisis can push them further away• Angelo on Tim Peters, five days of the same question, and what a relief valve feels like• Shannon on losing an hour of her drive while carrying her father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis• The operational case: supported people produce, and stressed people are a risk to themselves and the crew• Answering the ROI question, and Cal Beyer’s line that the human case is the business case• The Loyal Crew: where the name came from, the hard hat sticker, and check in on your crew https://theloyalcrew.justadd10.com/• What a leader can actually do on Monday morning, on site and in the office• Where mental health programs fall flat, and what associations could be doing insteadAbout the guestShannon Truax-Wardell, CRSP, is Vice President of Safety, Health and Environment at Preferred Materials, and the founder of The Loyal Crew. She started in construction in 2005 in mining and aggregates after a co-op term paving roads for the County of Simcoe, and studied environmental engineering technology. She led the award winning ready-mix drum suicide prevention campaign and built crisis response and mental health first aid training across her organization. She speaks on mental health and psychological safety in construction both on behalf of her company and independently.About the SponsorsThe Grand Valley Construction Association’s mission is Building Better Community. While their work is rooted in building the spaces and infrastructure that shape our communities, GVCA recognizes that nothing gets built without the people behind it. That’s why they’re committed to raising awareness, education and support around mental health and suicide prevention in construction, because building better community starts with taking care of the people who build it.Learn more at: https://www.gvca.org/Mark’s Commercial’s commitment to helping people get home safely extends beyond physical safety to mental health and well-being. That’s why they’re proud to support this podcast and the important conversations that help create safer, healthier workplaces. Because getting home safely means taking care of both body and mind.Check them out at: https://www.markscommercial.com/en-ca/If you are struggling, you are not the only one. In Canada and the US, call or text 988 for the Suicide Crisis Helpline. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit humansideofconstruction.substack.com