8 minute read
Reaching Out
SMART MAP peer mentoring program provides on the ground help and resources for employees and members struggling with mental health and addiction.
By / Jessica Kirby
When Bryan Johnson, business agent at Local 66 in Washington, received a call from a member late at night saying a loved one was in trouble, he knew just what to do. Within minutes, Johnson was able provide step-by-step direction on how the member could approach the situation safely, and he was able to pull up the exact resources the member’s loved one needed with two clicks of a mouse.
“In all my years as representative, the absolute best days have been those when I was able to assist in something like that,” Johnson says. “There isn’t a person out there who wouldn’t feel good about having the training and resources to save or better a life in a time of crisis.”
Johnson is just one of more than 100 Local members, contractors, and JATC instructors who have participated in the SMART MAP peer mentoring program, an outreach-based program that delivers practical and effective tools for assisting individuals struggling with suicidal ideations, mental health, and addiction issues.
The peer training program launched in 2019 as a result of the ground work laid by the SMART MAP Awareness trainings, which have taken place since 2013. SMART MAP conducted four training sessions in the fall of 2019, delivering approximately 21 hours of training on communication, confidentiality, and resource navigation to Local 66 in Seattle, Local 9 in Denver, Local 36 in St. Louis, and Locals 22, 25, and 27 in New Jersey.
“This is awareness training skill building that enable the peer mentors to be front line advocates and resource providers for anyone needing mental health assistance,” says Chris Carlough, educational director for SMART and co-founder of the SMART MAP program. “The training includes strong communication skills and the ability to have difficult conversations. This isn’t a link to a 1-800 EAP type of program.”
Mentors are also taught how to identify potential signs of addiction or mental health challenges, things like an alwayson-time employee suddenly experiencing chronic lateness, or changes in coordination or energy levels. The training closes with a segment on self-care, because compassion fatigue is real and peer mentoring is taxing and sometimes frustrating work.
SMART MAP engaged not only business managers and organizers to complete the training, but also rank and file members. “We identified individuals who had certain traits in common—people who were interested in peer mentoring, who the rest trusted and respected, and who wanted to help and had some empathy for the issues,” Carlough says.
Nearly 100 people were trained in the 2019 group, including some contractor members, and then COVID slammed the door on the program. Although certain components of the training were already online, taking the entire course online is a difficult endeavor because of the critical role breakouts, role playing, and storytelling play in the training. do pieces online but words account for only seven percent of the equation. Everything else is body language and tone.”
An essential component of the program’s roll-out has been having contractors and representatives from SMACNA national participate in the program because it is an encouraging step towards eliminating some of the stigma the workforce feels about approaching an employer to discuss these issues.
“There is that piece of people not wanting to ask for help in general,” Carlough says. “It’s not that they don’t have instructors and contractors who care and have empathy. They do. They just don’t want to let anyone know they are struggling, and they are thinking about protection of job and status.”
As SMACNA’s Director of Market Sectors and Safety, Mike McCullion became acutely aware of SMART MAP’s importance when statistics reported the country’s highest suicide rates in the construction industry.
“That was a real eye-opener,” he said. “When the SMART MAP program expanded and became available, I attended to understand what it was all about, and I was absolutely blown away.”
McCullion says some of the most surprising and impactful elements of the course included learning about the complexity of mental health and addiction problems and the willingness of participants to share the ways these issues have affected them personally.
“It was a very personal course,” he says. “I learned so much about mental health and addiction, and I felt truly obliged to Chris because up to that point, few contractors had been involved, so I felt privileged to represent SMACNA and contractors. I got a great deal out of it. It really gave me an enlightened perspective on the depth of addiction and how difficult it can be to get out.”
“In the training, we learn to ask open-ended questions, practice motivational interviewing, and have some tough conversations,” Carlough says. “These are skills it takes most of us our whole lives to learn, if we learn them at all. You can
Another mental health training being developed and delivered by the Construction Industry Alliance for Suicide Prevention, along with SMART and SMOHIT, is a one-hour suicide prevention training.
“Every year, suicide impacts construction workers heavily, taking nine times as many lives as the “fatal four” (e.g. falls, caught between objects, electrocutions, and struck by objects) take on the job,” Carlough says. “That makes construction one of the industries most affected by suicide.”
Carlough’s team is in the process of reaching out to all who have attended the three-day SMART MAP Awareness Mental Health Champions course to complete a six-hour Train the Trainer session and, in turn, bring that education back to their business, chapter, or Local.
“Our goal is that each trainer will facilitate 10 trainings of 25 people each,” Carlough says. “That would affect 10%, or 20,000 people, in our membership.”
SMACNA is working with Carlough to prepare awareness training to be delivered through SMACNA’s chapter education programs, beginning with two webinars—one on mental health, addiction, and wellness and a second on suicide prevention— and rolling into 2022, SMACNA will be working to offer chapters in-person training on the same subjects.
“I think the workplace culture is shifting,” McCullion says. “As more and more contractors receive education on these issues, they are understanding how to respond in a positive way and work with employees to help them get the help they need.”
Bryan Johnson has actually attended several SMART MAP trainings and says he learns something new every time. “It really changes your perspective on things and it really grabs you because there are people who have gone through some very serious issues and survived,” he says.
Several Local 66 representatives have taken the training, but recognizing the need for on the ground members, the union also identified rank and file members to attend.
“When someone is in need, they don’t necessarily look for a person who might be in the know,” Johnson says. “They turn to the people who are nearby and who they feel they can trust. We knew we had to get the resources into the hands of the people nearest them.”
Carlough and his team are still working out the best way to identify potential mentors, noting it takes a certain kind of person to relate to others who are struggling. “I have been in recovery for most of my adult life, so I know what the lies sound like,” Carlough says. “If you ask a local to identify peer mentors, many of those volunteers will be in recovery so they know the experience and have lived it, and they can be there for their co-workers.”
SMART MAP is developing hard hat stickers to subtly identify peer mentors and, so far, the idea has been enthusiastically received.
McCullion says contractors can be at the forefront of moving this kind of program forward because they realize this is a safety issue and that the health and safety of the workforce is so important.
“We all want to move toward that goal of taking the shame and stigma away from this,” he says. “Employees shouldn’t have a negative perception of how they will be received by their employer. We all have our challenges—2020 tested that, for sure. What needs to be understood is that people are different and handle things in different ways. But we all have things that need handling.”
Collectively, SMACNA and SMART are well positioned to change the culture and stigma around these issues by connecting on common ground.
“The important thing to remember about labor and management is that there is no person on either side who would deny that these issues are a real concern,” Johnson says. “Of course, this relates to work and work benefits from people getting help, but we would all agree it is so much more than that.”
To learn more about SMART MAP or becoming a peer mentor, contact your business manager or email Chris Carlough at ccarlough@smart-union.org.
Carlough and Ben Cort, marijuana education expert, presented a seminar on SMART MAP for SMOHIT’s Safety Champions Conference in March 2021. Those interested can contact Mike McCullion or Randy Krocka at SMOHIT for recordings of that session or any session presented at the conference. ▪
Jessica Kirby is a freelance editor and writer covering construction, architecture, mining, travel, and sustainable living for myriad publications across Canada and the United States.
