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Podcast highlighting women in construction gains traction

Molly Hulsey //June 27, 2022//

Podcast highlighting women in construction gains traction

Molly Hulsey //June 27, 2022//

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Chrisit Powell (left), of 84 Lumber and Angela Gardner of Hill Electric interview both men and women in the construction industry for the Women Talk Construction podcast, as well as women in nontraditional roles. The podcast, which currently has 14 episodes, has listeners in 17 countries and 207 cities. (Photo/Provided)

For years, 84 Lumber’s Christi Powell didn’t work with other women.

A former fire and rescue team lead and chemist, Powell turned her talents toward business development at Lowe’s and Builders FirstSource’s commercial sales departments in 2000.

Fellow women in construction were just nonexistent — or at least appeared to be.

“I didn’t even know there were female builders,” she told SC Biz News. “You just don’t run into them often.”

Then she joined 84 Lumber, a Pennsylvania building materials company led by Maggie Hardy Knox, and met Hill Electric’s business development and marketing director Angela Gardner.

Since then, has run into so many women in the field and companies seeking out women to join the industry that she was promoted to 84 Lumber’s Women Business Enterprise Lead and now cohosts the Women Talk Construction podcast with Gardner.

“I’m now in the world of general contractors now that are high-end, doing 400 units at a time, and very involved with government agencies that are buying,” she said. “So, it’s still kind of the same, but now I work with a different set of customers. Now I work with a lot of women where I never worked with women at all before.”

Building from the ground up

The strongest impetus for the increasing number of women in construction has been minority and women-owned business quotas required of federal contractors for material procurement and onsite work, she said.

But few companies understand the full breadth of funding available for such businesses, or how to certify themselves for such incentives, she said. Fewer have the resources available to put together a Women and Minority Business program like 84 Lumber.

“Even though I was new in July of 2020, just from doing a little bit of homework for 30 days prior to me taking the role on, I knew more than 90% of the people I talk to who are in it,” she said of the construction industry’s women and diversity hiring leads. “So, we’ve got people out there making laws and making rules and putting together programs that don’t work because they don’t understand it.”

Most businesses she dealt with in South Carolina didn’t even know what it meant to be certified as a women-owned business, she said.

Meanwhile, she said, general contractors were finding it challenging to find the certified suppliers or employees needed to fulfill federal or internal requirements.

Longtime customers and strangers alike have come to Powell in droves saying: “We love having female product managers. What can I do to get more women to work for me?”

Powell knew she had her work cut out for her. Instead of having 1,000 mentorship sessions over coffee, she and Gardner began to interview women and men in the construction industry – as well as women in other non-traditional roles such as aviation – across the nation. After the release of 14 episodes, the podcast now has listeners in 17 countries and 207 cities.

“When I meet amazing people — it doesn’t matter if they’re in New York or Maine or Arizona — if it’s an amazing story and we want to share it, we just ask them if they’d like to be on the podcast,” she said.

Podcasts, released each Monday, focuses on the wins and challenges overcome for women in construction, not the airing of complaints. Both men and women are featured on the podcast, because both have been key to creating a more egalitarian workforce that doesn’t skip out on 48% of available talent, Powell said.

“When you only have one or the other, you aren’t bringing everything to the table that that particular customer or that particular client needs to have,” Powell said. “It’s not fair to them, right? We’re better together, so we want to learn how to work better together.”

The podcast website also serves as a forum for industry players to discuss scholarships, workforce development opportunities and business support.

Better together

Powell’s Build the Way initiative has been another method that 84 Lumber uses to connect contractors and women or minority-owned businesses. The company offers free blueprints to small businesses able to demonstrate a need. It’s also compiling a database of minority and women-owned businesses across the country under Powell’s leadership for contractors in need.

Paired with the podcast and Powell’s efforts, a Greenville happy hour has grown into a quarterly luncheon called Women Confidence Builders for working women across sectors. The first sessions were held at the Commerce Club; Powell invited 20 people, but 48 showed up.

An upcoming Aug. 30 event, sponsored by BMW, is expected to draw 450 people to the Greenville Convention Center. Other business leaders want to emulate the event in Charlotte, Atlanta and Charleston.

“It’s just so exciting,” Powell said. “Just to see what God is doing in my obedience to just be good to people and be kind and try to lift other people up.”

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