May 20, 2026
Provided by Kit Ozburn, President
As Mental Health Awareness Month comes to a close, feelings of admiration and care for skilled labor in the construction industry rise within me. But strange as it might sound, I’m first reminded of concepts that I learned from a world-class restauranteur: knowing and perspective.
In his wonderful book “Unreasonable Hospitality” Will Guidara shares the remarkable ways that he and his staff at a renowned New York City restaurant treated guests with hospitality that exceeded any norm within his cutthroat industry. Not only was the menu impeccably designed and the food perfectly executed, greeters, servers, and all staff engaged with guests in ways far beyond the customary “hey, how you doing?” Instead, staff at 11 Madison Park excelled at knowing their guests. 11 Madison Park achieved a world-wide reputation for knowing its guests through elaborate spontaneous gifts for guests like on-site oil paintings to capture the event or even building an impromptu beachside setting for a couple whose Caribbean vacation had been cancelled due to a hurricane.
The stories of hospitality at 11 Madison Park cause me to wonder how the construction industry could really know the people, the individuals, the families in its care. We could easily imagine extending unreasonable hospitality to clients, current or prospective. After all, customers help pay the bills and keep revenue moving. But how about the skilled individuals installing the work? I worry their work of skill and dignity occurs otherwise invisibly.
Guidara’s father, a restaurant industry veteran, would warn Will about losing touch with every member of the staff, front of house and back of house. This dichotomy similarly echoes into the construction industry with different populations of teams in the office and in the field. Too often, office staff – affectionately known as “do-nothing-carpet-walkers” by counterparts in the field – forget the realities of the jobsite, where everything is hard. Everything. In fact, Guidara’s father captures this reality well:
“Perspective has an expiration date, no matter how hard you try to hold on to it.”
For years, experts have warned of the coming shortage of skilled trades in the construction industry. That time is now, with various estimates indicating the industry operating at a deficit of 350,000 – 500,000 skilled workers. With lazy regularity, the blame has been placed on the over-emphasis on college and the dismantling of vocational training. No one will argue that these are not critical factors in the shrinking population of craft trades, but I fear this position is myopic and lacks perspective. When considering the perspective from the jobsite, perhaps the diminishing appeal of the trades can be better understood by a multitude of compounding variables: Long hours, physical demands, days of rain wiping out a paycheck, inconsistent crew mates, travel to faraway jobsites, second-class benefits, unrealistic expectations and illogical schedules imposed by clients and – dare I say – industry leaders.
What if we applied these concepts of unreasonable hospitality to those laboring in the trenches, to those delivering the materials, to those unseen behind the tool belts, to those logging long miles and meeting the sunrise every morning pulling into the jobsite? What if we employed perspective and challenged ourselves to know the amazing individuals in the craft teams and really listened to the real needs?
As Mental Health Awareness month comes to a close, I question my own perspective. How am I engaging with everyone at every jobsite? Am I knowing them better? Do I ask “how are you really doing? What would really help?” These questions strike at the root of many mental health issues: isolation and loneliness. Being known pushes back that darkness and invites all of us into the light.
Too often I fear, leaders in our industry ignore the warning signs and cave to the intoxicating temptation of cutting costs to win the next project (costs too often related to the necessary functioning of the project). I’m no different; I’ve caved more times than I’d like to admit. But this absolutely cannot continue.
The statistics of mental health and suicide in construction are staggering. Representing only 7% of the American workforce, construction accounts for 18% of all suicides, with over 5,000 lives taken each year. Industry leaders herald forward-thinking safety programs at the jobsite with countless protocols and thoughtful equipment to prevent jobsite injuries, but what about what’s happening under the hard hat? Of all the trades workers who reported anxiety or depression, 84% do not seek help from a professional. How can we disarm the stigma of talking about mental health?
Recently, at T.W. Frierson, leadership has taken concrete measures to open communication pathways and facilitate opportunities for restoration within the company, including all craft team members. Chaplains routinely engage with all individuals at the project site offering a listening ear and a compassionate voice. Many times, these conversations are the gateway to connecting people with needed resources.
In addition, leadership noticed a subtle but tragic reality of our industry. For hourly craft team members, a rainout day means a day without pay. The bills don’t take a rain day. The baby still needs diapers. So, many times in the past, individuals would elect to take a PTO day, if available. Consequently, their PTO days ordinarily imagined for vacation and restoration are repurposed toward financial survival and treading water. With these actions, leaders signal an absence of compassion toward the very people who represent the foundation of this beautiful industry. Instead, T.W. Frierson has enacted weather-banks of PTO hours to supplement weather days and preserve precious PTO so team members are able to gain the restoration they need and have earned.
Leaders must regain their perspective and seek to really know the teams in their care. Construction is a beautiful and noble field. The skills, creativity, and resilience of those members of the craft population are second to none. There is no day better than walking a jobsite and engaging with the men and women whose labor is on display, the grit and the passion. Knowing teams means asking uncomfortable questions and being determined to act with whatever feedback you receive. Hearing without acting destroys trust and slashes perspective.
