// Careers
CHANGING THE MINDSET
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Helen Gawor explains how valuing different skills to encourage diversity not only benefits businesses but helps increase profitability
’ve always struggled with the ‘women in construction’ movement because if not handled properly it puts us in a ‘subset’ of the workforce rather than addressing the diversity of skills, capabilities and experience women bring as equals. Attracting women into the industry starts with attracting these diverse capabilities, not just targeting by gender. When this experience comes from other industries, we should organically attract more women into our businesses. I started working with GKR over four years ago as a management consultant. Scaffolding businesses were not a category of client I would typically work with as my background and therefore my client base was digital media businesses and tech start-ups. In fact, I originally said I couldn’t help them. However, when I met MD Lee Rowswell, I realised that the challenges and aspirations of GKR were not too far removed from the other businesses I worked with. Having a very entrepreneurial mindset similar to the tech founders I worked with, he wanted to strengthen their market positioning, structure GKR for growth and build a culture that drives innovation. So, when I later joined the business permanently as Strategy Director, I felt very much at home despite my original belief that scaffolding was not an industry I could add value to. I got to enjoy the challenge of an industry that needed change and GKR got an instant injection of experience from a faster-moving industry. When a business is open to bringing in people from different backgrounds or with different skills, you will create a more diverse workforce. HOW DOES THIS WORK FOR FEMALE SCAFFOLDERS?
I must caveat my comments here with the fact that I have never worked as a scaffolder nor have the skills to become one. But I do want to find ways of attracting people of both genders into scaffolding roles because we are currently not finding enough new entrants into the industry.
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