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David Ewing plans to use Generation Next as a recruitment tool for his company.
David Ewing plans to use Generation Next as a recruitment tool for his company.

Generation Next seeks to develop industry leadership

Posted online
Brain drain and the retirement gap – for the Springfield Contractors Association, they’re different names for the same thing.

The SCA, which promotes the local construction industry, is working to ensure the future of the 325-member organization by building interest with the next wave of young professionals. Enter Generation Next, an SCA networking group established in 2014 and designed to engage the under 40 demographic, grooming willing members for future leadership roles.

“You sit around at a lot of our meetings and you see that most of the participants are folks who have been in the industry for years,” said Travis DeLong, Generation Next’s current vice president and an estimator for Prestressed Casting Co. “The same people who are volunteering keep volunteering, but eventually those people retire. This is a way we can get the younger generation involved so there isn’t that gap.”

DeLong said there are no rules or required membership dues for joining Generation Next. Those interested don’t even have to be SCA members, and college students, he said, are always welcome to attend.

The growing industry gap is evident in Missouri State University’s construction management program. Richard Gebken, an associate professor and program coordinator for the department, said construction management enrollment peaked at around 225 students in the 2008-09 academic year, before plummeting during the recession. In the last four years, enrollment has steadily increased with attendance between fall 2013 and fall 2014 at approximately 160 students, up 15 percent from the previous year.

“We’ve got students who are technology-driven but who don’t have a lot of industry experience trying to fill a gap for people who had been in the industry 20 to 30 years,” he said. “Our placement and salary have always been high; it’s just a matter of convincing people construction is still a viable career option.”

Pitching to college students an industry that took deep cuts during the recession is a tough sell.

“We can’t get these 20-year-olds interested in our industry because it’s dirty, doesn’t pay well and is seasonal,” said Rick Quint, president of Q & Co. LLC, during Springfield Business Journal’s recent CEO Roundtable discussion on construction. “We have a tough road ahead.”

Starts and shifts
Dave Ewing, owner of Ewing Signal Construction LLC and Generation Next’s inaugural president, said the so-called retirement gap began forming when the recession prompted a number of SCA members to retire and meeting attendance numbers dropped.

“We were coming out of a really bad recession that took the construction industry off at the knees, and the first thing you do is you quit spending money and socializing,” Ewing said. “That combination really opened their eyes that they needed to get some fresh blood in there.”

Dave Robertson, an SCA board member and vice president of sales with Prestressed Casting Co., said discussions about forming a group to boost involvement from young professionals arose during a board retreat about three years ago. He said the board recognized SCA’s leadership was primarily made up of business owners and upper management, but young professionals were underrepresented. To that end, the SCA held a roundtable discussion with about 30 construction industry professionals to discuss establishing the group.

“It was a very raw conversation, not only about doing something new but some of the exclusivity that they felt,” Robertson said. “When you walk into a room with 100 people and you’re the youngest one there, that can be kind of intimidating.”

The result, he said, was not a structured, board-driven version of the SCA for 30-somethings, but instead a wholly different group that represents the younger generation’s preference for connecting via social media and networking functions.

“The board recognized the culture shifted, and this was an opportunity to shift with it rather than try to force them into our mold,” Robertson said.

Ewing said he sees the difference in methods as an advantage for attracting the younger audience Generation Next is after.

“There’s no rigidness there, and you can jump into something pretty quick,” he said, adding Generation Next’s core group comes up with ideas and then seeks outside input from its Facebook followers. “A board would have to take an idea under advisement, vote on it among their members, and schedule it with a committee. We just do it.”

Although the group still is in its infancy, Robertson said Generation Next already is fostering interaction between Springfield’s construction and design communities, and its events are among the SCA’s best-attended functions in years, averaging 50 people.

“The biggest thing you will see are the guys who get involved in Generation Next, then they get involved on an SCA committee and then the next thing you know they’re our board members,” Robertson said. “They’ll perpetuate the organization.”

Sheryl Letterman, SCA’s director since 1986, retired Jan. 19 of this year. SCA’s employment services director, Kathy Baer, currently is serving as interim director.

Funding the future
Continuing the legacy of the SCA also means giving back, including growing the SCA Scholarship Endowment Fund. Currently, the SCA gifts roughly $3,500 annually from its general fund. Thanks to Generation Next, the decade-old endowment recently crossed the $40,000 mark with a goal of $80,000.

Quint, who has been involved with the MSU department for the past 27 years, said getting students involved in construction early is key, adding the MSU the program was charting a path to be one of the best prior to the recession.

“As the jobs dried up, our enrollment started dropping,” he said. “Now, these major, large companies who realized the assets we had come here and hire everything we’ve got. While the enrollment is headed back up, it’s getting tougher and tougher. You can get all the interns you want, but once they have three years experience, they get scooped up.”

This spring, Generation Next launched a mentorship program with MSU’s Construction Management department. Under the program, four Generation Next members mentored eight senior students of MSU’s Sigma Lambda Chi chapter, a construction honors society. Those students in turn each mentored eight freshmen within the program.

“This whole thing is ultimately to identify and develop good talent in Springfield,” said David Joswick, a senior department instructor. “Retaining that talent really comes down to getting to know who is working here with local companies to help students realize there are a lot of opportunities here.”

Ewing said he sees Generation Next’s involvement with MSU as encouraging the younger generation of students to remain part of southwest Missouri’s construction industry.

“I’m using it as a recruitment tool,” Ewing said. “We can very possibly find students actively going to these events that we can recruit, keep them here and grow our own workforce.”[[In-content Ad]]

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