Mike Phillips
Executive director, Ontario Structural Wood Association
According to information from the Ontario Building Officials Association (OBOA), the average building official is getting older, and in many cases, is soon to retire. When the Ontario Structural Wood Association (OSWA) has a meeting, I see lots of grey hair and more than the occasional bald head. What is happening to the building industry and how are we going to save the future?
Technology and innovations will help. We can build more of our buildings as components and merely assemble them on site. This should require fewer people doing construction work. And factory quality should also reduce the need for site inspections. Yes, it will reduce the numbers but it won’t eliminate people entirely! We will need younger, brighter, enthusiastic employees to replace the existing population.
Increasingly, we find those replacements are found in the college programs across Ontario. Be it in engineering or architectural technology or construction management type programs, these kids are needed. And we need to do a better job of telling them that, the structural wood component industry and municipal building departments, we exist and need their skills! Of course, the programs themselves can always be improved but if we take the time to get involved to join things like advisory programs for each course the curriculum can be amended and improved to meet our real-world requirements.
And we can provide summer jobs and intern opportunities to show them that real jobs with decent salaries exist. Not every student will be a superstar and you will have to invest time training them so they can contribute. It is a long-term play that can achieve results and provide each of us quality people ready and willing to work and contribute to your organization.
OSWA has also taken a further step to recognize the superstars within this new group of college students. For close to a decade now we have been awarding bursaries each year to the best of the best at Ontario collages. The Gary LaLonde Memorial Bursary Program awards $500 bursaries to a handful of winners each year. The recipients are nominated by members of our association and are generally the star intern from this past year. Many of them return to work fulltime with our member upon graduation. The circle of life does exist!
OSWA has a membership of over 100 companies spread primarily across Ontario representing the wood structural component industry. Our members fabricate and distribute roof & floor trusses, engineer wood products (EWP), wall panels, connectors plus related engineering and design services. We are committed to promoting the growth of sustainable, renewable, structural wood products for all applications to all construction stakeholders. To contact OSWA and to learn more about our association please visit www.oswa.ca.
A longtime friend now retired but spent 50 years in automotive industry had the same problem.
On his own time he tried to get students in high school& community to go into truck mechanics.He basically got nowhere.
He was in contact with transport companies that were desperate for people.