Bruce Sychuk: MY JOURNEY Executive Director, SMACNA-BC
SMACNA-SMART Best Practices Market Expansion Task Force I started in the sheet metal industry right out of high school as a production worker at Tacey / Coast Metal Products. Coast Metal was the production side and Tacey Sheet Metal was the craft side. After a couple of years sitting on a punch press, I decided the craft side offered more of an opportunity for advancement. I ended up apprenticing through Tacey and becoming a journeyman in 1978. I worked on the tools for a few years at Tacey Sheet Metal and United Metal Fabricators Ltd. and held a number of foreman and supervisory roles at different shops over the next 26 years, with my final 12 years in the trade at Apollo Sheet Metal in Coquitlam, BC. I loved the trade, first because of the security of it—it isn’t like other trades where you have to wait for the building to be nearly finished before you come in to do your work. Our work starts at the beginning, and we are there until the end, so there is longevity involved. The pre-planning and the amount of thought it takes to put a piece of ducting into the space allotted is a feat. And the diversity—I worked in pulp mills and coal mines, on boats, and in shopping malls. I worked on BC Children’s Hospital, the library in downtown Vancouver, the first expansion at YVR airport, and on GM Place before it was called Rogers Arena. There were also multiple office buildings, hospitals, high-rise multi-use buildings, schools, and the list goes on. We were doing duct that was 6 or 8 feet in diameter and 100 feet in the air and on 8-foot ducting underground. We see it through from fabrication to assembly to installation, and each piece could weight 10 lb or 1,000 lb. In 1998, I was asked to be a chapter executive for SMACNA-BC, and I accepted. It gives me an edge to have
both a contractor’s view and to have been a union member for 26 years. I don’t have to refer back to National to answer most technical questions, and I can speak to contractors in their language. Also, every contractor I ever worked for provided management and supervisory training, so I have learned to be well-rounded in the trade. I am proud of and firm on being transparent and honest. I found out it is better to come clean with everything and just get it out there and handle things. Being from the union and also riding the fence all those years as management, I played by all the rules and did everything in a professional manner. I have realized contractors and the union have a different view of each other that doesn’t actually reflect reality. I have been able to help put things into perspective. I have nothing but accolades for my contractors and union members—they are so professional and have participated wholeheartedly in our partnership program, where we have emphasized trust, honesty, and accountability. I have enjoyed bringing both sides to the table as part of the Best Practices Market Expansion Task Force, because this is where we most need to be transparent and put the politics aside. The people on the Task Force are wide open for frank, honest discussion, and if something isn’t right, we hold each other accountable. Everyone there is speaking the same language, and it isn’t about money. It is about giving our people and our trade autonomy and promotion as an industry and making sure our trade is distinguished. ▪
Partners in Progress » August 2020 » 7
