It Wasn't Her Career Choice: Why Construction Wives Are Holding the Industry Together (Unpaid)

It wasn't her career choice. In this solo episode, I tackle a topic that doesn't get talked about enough in construction: the unpaid labor crisis affecting wives and partners of builders and tradies. I share my own story of how my wife Camille went from a successful corporate career to working unpaid in my building business, the toll it took on our relationship, and the turning point that changed everything. 

If your partner helps with admin, bookkeeping, or any part of your business without proper compensation, this episode is a must-listen. It's time we stop expecting free labor and start valuing the women who are literally holding our industry together.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It wasn't a career choice. This one is all about our wives and partners. Not our wives or partners career choice to work in our businesses. Like I firmly do believe that the construction industry would completely fall over if all wives and partners were to go on strike. We are loving this new podcast studio. It is uh pumping along, and um, yeah, really looking forward to getting the new site signage in here. But as always, we've got another cracking podcast for you today, and this one I'm doing a solo one, but this is a topic that I believe doesn't get talked about enough. And the uh the topic for today's podcast is it wasn't her career choice. And uh look, this one is all about our wives and partners. You would have heard me say it a million times, I'll bang about it, bang on about it a lot, but look, it's uh it's not our wives or partners' career choice to work in our businesses, and yet like I I firmly do believe that the construction industry would completely fall over if all wives and partners were to go on strike. And that's because they're propping it up. They're the ones that well,

Setting The Stage: Partners And Work

SPEAKER_00 1:22

a lot of them are going out, doing their day job, um, having their own careers, and then coming home, dealing with family, dealing with kids, putting food on the table, getting the kids into bed or doing homework, whatever, sort of depending on the family situation, but then jumping in and helping us blokes out with our admin. Um look, my business definitely isn't that way anymore, but I know back in the day that's how it worked, and it's not the right thing to do. And um, I feel that there's a lot of relationship breakdowns, a lot of marriage separations because of the the extra additional stress and anxiety that is put on wives and partners to help keep the I

Why Unpaid Partner Labour Props Up Building

SPEAKER_00 2:08

guess the family business or the the trade or the building business operating, and it shouldn't be that way. So many females that work in the building industry, um, it's it's not their first choice. They didn't choose a career in the building industry, and they've ended up in the building industry simply because their husband, us blokes, um, had a trade job or a building job, and we're good at the on-site stuff, but we're fucking useless at the office stuff, and we rely so heavily on our or we expect a lot of the time our wives and partners to uh get involved and help us out. And look, it's just not right. I know it's something that I'm constantly working on. I uh I'll put my hand up. Like, I I'm not getting in the office, I don't like being in the office. I'm not good at tech, I'm not good at computers. Um but that's like I've structured my businesses now where I have VAs or I have personal assistance to help me with that stuff, and I still do lean on um Camille, my wife, probably more than I should. Um, and I'll probably still put some pressure on her, but it's something that I'm constantly aware of and trying to um improve. Hey guys, we have got a huge announcement to make if you're a builder or more importantly, the wife or partner of a builder in the construction industry. We are having a huge seminar on the 12th, 13th, and 14th of March, and you do not want to miss this. Live Life Build has events every single year, but we are making this one bigger and better than ever before. It's going to an event across three days, and we have got an incredible lineup of guest speakers, mentors, and coaches to cover everything from drone, building your confidence, estimating, uh, building software, analytic health, leadership, tools and protests. You name it. This seminar is all about better businesses, better projects, and better life. So stay tuned, go to the Live Life Build website or go to the Live Life Build Instagram page or even my personal Instagram page, stay tuned for the ads, click the links, and I look forward to seeing you at this event. You do not want to miss this one. There's a lot of parts of this what I wanted to talk about today. Like, number one, if you're a bloke out there that it expects your wife or your partner to jump in uh after hours or whenever it may be, and pull you out of the shit and do your admin work, do your accounting, um

From Free Labour To Proper Overheads

SPEAKER_00 4:41

manage the books, do the bookkeeping, help you out with contracts, help you out send emails and all that type of stuff, then you need to have a good hard look at yourself because your wife shouldn't have additional stress put on her and additional anxiety and all these types of things just because we don't have the skills to do that. Um it's this is this is so important to me that in my live life build business where we train and mentor, um, well, we've just hit last week actually we hit our 1000th member. Um we are actually we actually work with um VA. So we are we uh have a collaboration with the doing co and we train VAs to do tasks in building business and trades-based businesses that helps give you the time back. So all the all the mundane tasks, emailing, scheduling, um could it well it can be anything, it could be quoting, estimating, and all those types of things, but we work with our members to establish what it is they want help doing, and then we can get VAs involved to help them do those things so that they can be more focused on things that they are good at and they are efficient at and they are they do like doing. So um VAs, I believe, moving forward in the construction industry will play a massive role in um getting things more efficient, helping people get their time back, and definitely helping out with um with our relationship, our family relationships by um giving us a bit of freedom because they'll take some of the tasks off our plate. A big problem in our building industry is and I'll tell you the story about um how Camille ended up in my business, but the problem is that a lot of why or most wives and partners are not getting paid, and look, people just keep focusing and banging on about how expensive the building industry is and how expensive it is to build and renovate, but they don't understand that a lot of administration work in our industry is is unpaid. Um, I'd love to I'd love to get some feedback from wives and partners that are working in trades-based or building businesses that aren't on the payroll or are simply just the accounts just moving money around so that their husband can reduce their tax bill and all those types of things because it's it's just so wrong. And to tell you the story about Camille and I um we're just talking about this the other day, actually, and I think we figured out that it has been um about 12 years. Camille's been working in the building business for around 12 years. So, what happened is um Camille was on maternity leave with our second um child, and Camille had done incredible things. Uh, one of the big things that really attracted me to Camille was up until I met Camille, I'd I don't know, I seemed to be attracted to just bloody drop kicks. That's uh yeah, hopefully none of my old girlfriends will listen to this, but uh they just yeah, weren't really motivated, didn't have good careers, and yeah, just it wasn't a good fit. And Camille was actually very different to uh previous relationships that I had, and one of the things that, like I said, really attracted me to her was she was just so driven, she was so motivated. She had worked her way up. She had when I met her, she actually had worked her way up in corporate, she had a great career um at Suncorp Insurance, and she actually did she was really, really good at um nails for females. So she would you do huge hours doing a corporate gig, and then um after hours and weekends, she would be booking nail clients in and um making quite a good income doing people's nails, and it was it was quite a bit of a struggle when we first met because I I was working flat out, she was working flat out, and we didn't really get to see each other that much, but just the work ethic she had and um her commitment and all that type of stuff was really um it meant a lot to me. So

Camille’s Story: Cost Of “Free” Work

SPEAKER_00 8:49

like I said, we we um we obviously um yeah, had a relationship and then had started having kids, and Camille was on maternity leave with our second child, and we had a really I had a really good admin um lady at the time, Julie, and it had made a massive improvement in my business. And her husband got transferred down to Adelaide, and she they obviously moved, and I'm like, holy shit, what am I gonna do? And Camille and I had some conversations back in the day, and where she's like, Well, I yeah, it's probably like best that I uh move into the business and we make it a family business. And at the time and the the headspace I was in and running like running a shit show, like I could as like I've said before, like I had no issues getting the work, I had no problems doing the work, but when it came to the administration, the quoting, the estimating, all that stuff, it was a managing clients, doing contracts, it was just a shit fight, and yeah, there was so many room, so much room for improvement. And uh being in that shitty mindset that I was in, the first thing I thought was unreal. Like, we'll be ahead of the game, like we we struggle to win work as it is. Um, free labor. Like, this is gonna be awesome. Like, we'll have all these all this administration work getting done, and we'll be able to be cheaper than other builders. And when I think about it now, like I cannot I cannot believe that I was actually one of those people that was in that mindset. But the other thing that I'm really um disappointed at myself about is to even think of Camille like that, to think that she could do all these hours and do all this work in my business and not get paid for it. And at the end of the day, it ended up creating a lot of problems, a lot of stress, and a lot of issues. And Camille ended up working her ass off in our building business. It's a it's a she is a massive reason why we had such a big turnaround. Um, and she's a huge reason why we have everything we have now. It's uh all the documents, the templates, everything that we have in Live Life Build. Um so much of that stuff is stuff that was created because of the influence that she bought to my building business. And that's why I say, like, we've got systems and processes that the building industry has never seen before because of her experience in the corporate world and being at like seeing how I was struggling and seeing where I needed help, uh, and being able to use her skill set to develop systems, processes, procedures, documents, templates has been absolutely life-changing. So, but there were some very stressful moments there because uh Camille was putting in huge hours as well as bringing up two well, a baby and a toddler, supporting the family, groceries, shopping, house cleaning, like all the stuff that goes with having kids and a family, and yet wasn't getting uh like we actually went backwards. Like Camille went from earning a very good salary, doing her nails and working a corporate job, to getting literally paid nothing to work in our building business. Uh, and it really took a toll on us as a family, it definitely took a toll on her as a just a human being, I guess. Like she felt very undervalued. Um, she felt a bit oh um, I can only assume a little bit not um worthy and stuff, and it took a massive toll on our relationship, and a big part of the turning point in uh I guess my life and all my businesses was I've all like I've constantly over the years always asked questions and been interested in numbers, and sometimes things are sitting right in front of me, and I I just don't get it, I don't take it in, I don't understand it, and then all of a sudden it just clicks and I take off with it. And overheads is one of those things. And look, I'd been to seminars, I'd been to courses, I'd spoken to people. We had we've got a full-time um accountant that has worked with us for this is uh coming up to 20 years, but it just wasn't sinking in with me, and um, probably a uh two years after Camille had been working in the business, I really, really started to understand overheads and really got my head around it, and so a part of that overhead was obviously Camille's time in our business and making sure that she started to get paid the appropriate salary, but where all that actually came from. So I was starting to get my head around overheads, I was really getting a good handle on it. Um, like these days, I'm all over it. Like, I I would definitely put my hand up to say that I am probably one of the best people in the construction industry to understand overheads. Um, but it hasn't always been like that, and part of what tied into that back in the day, figuring out overheads out, was something that Camille brought to the business was having very clear um KPIs, roles and task descriptions, um, employee contracts, all those types of things, and so establishing a very clear list of roles and tasks for myself, for Camille, and the role that she played in the administration, um, our accounts person, like and all those types of things, allowed us to actually put an accurate salary on those roles. All right, guys, I want to introduce you to a really exciting new product that I believe is going to play a massive role in Australia building healthier homes. As you all know, I am extremely passionate about healthy homes, and I'm doing a lot of research and putting a lot of time and effort into making sure my construction business is leading the way when it comes to building healthy homes here in Australia. We've teamed up with the guys from Highwood Timber. Highwood Timber are pioneering condensation management with their high flow ventilated LVL batten system. High flow battons give builders a stronger, straighter, and smarter way to create a ventilated cavity behind cladding and underneath roofs without compromising on structural performance. While tackling condensation to improve building health and ease of insulation, highwood battons are built to perform. When it comes to dealing with condensation and ventilation, high flow battons will help you create continuous ventilated cavities behind all your cladding and underneath your roof sheeting. They reduce condensation risk and support healthier, longer lasting buildings. Highwood timber battons are also in alignment with the proposed NCC condensation management requirements as well as passive house ventilation requirements. Being an engineered LVL product, they are stronger, straighter, and more dimensionally stable than a

Paying Fairly: Roles, KPIs, Salaries

SPEAKER_00 15:48

solid material such as pine. This helps resist warping, twisting, and shrinkage, ensuring more consistent installs less prone to splitting than solid timber. Howwood timber battons are precisely manufactured, meaning that your installation will be faster and easier than other products on the market. The part that I like the most about these battons are they are H3 treated for long-term protection against decay and turmoiles. They use a waterborne H3 treatment which reduces reactivity with membranes and adhesives when compared to LOSP. These are the exact battens that you want to be using on your homes and your builds if you are considering building healthier homes or passive homes. Check them out, Highwood Timber Products. And so it didn't take very long, and it was an incredible turnaround to see um just the the culture in the business, um, Camille's like our relationship improved. Um because at the end of the day, like everybody, everybody that goes and works their ass off every day deserves to get paid appropriately for that. And yeah, it made such a big difference. And um for me, like I said before, it's something that I'm it's a point in my life and I'm that I'm pretty disappointed about because I should not have been taking advantage of Camille. I should I shouldn't have um expected her to work in the business for free. Um, like I was all I was completely on board when she chose to come into the business, but there should have always been payment around it. At the time and the headspace I was in, I just couldn't figure out how we would afford it. Like we were struggling to win work as it was. Uh, even the jobs that we won, we weren't making money on, we had no cash flow. So it was a massive battle for me to figure out how to get my head around how I could pay her accurately. And um, it's a huge thing. Like, it's funny actually, just sitting here recording this and reflecting on those

Sponsor: Healthy Homes And Ventilation

SPEAKER_00 17:47

moments in our life and in our business, um, to think where I'm at now and the help that I give hundreds of builders in helping them figure out their roles and tasks and their overheads. And one of the most important things um when people sign up to our elevate program now is I work with them to establish their overheads. And one of the first questions I asked is, does your wife or partner work in the business? And it's unbelievable how many of them say yes, and it's unbelievable how many of them aren't getting paid. And so this year, 2026, it's really become a key focus

Culture Shift After Paying Properly

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of mine as a whole, like across this podcast, across the building industry, um, to really support females in the industry a lot more. But in my live life build business, and especially in our elevate program, we've actually designed programs and even seminars and events specifically for wives and partners of tradies and builders. So um we're we've got some incredible stuff coming out this year. Um, we've got some key keynote speakers and some mentors and coaches that are coming into Live Life Build to help us work with wives and partners to work on things like imposter syndrome, um, having confidence in the building industry, um, leadership, culture, all those types of things. And I'm I'm just so excited about the future and how we can help more females um feel more comfortable working in our building industry,

2026 Focus: Supporting Women In Building

SPEAKER_00 19:22

but more importantly than that, help females get paid what they're worth to work in our building industry. I think it's so important. Um, and as I've said at the at the beginning of this podcast, I've said it a lot of times, I do believe the building industry would fall over. So, look, if you're one of my regular listeners and you're listening to this podcast, and you're you you have a wife or partner that helps you out in the business, um, and they're not on the on the books, they don't get paid for their time, then look, happy for you to reach out, um shoot us a message on social media, send us a um reach out to Live Life Build, or um if you go to the links on the website at Live Life Build, you can actually book a 15-minute phone conversation with me. I would love to have a conversation with you. Even if you look, even if you're not um wanting to sign up to one of our programs, more than happy to have a conversation with you about how to figure out your overheads and how to make sure that your wives and your partners are getting paid for the roles that they play in your business. Because it won't just help your business, it'll help your relationship, it'll help your family life. Um, and like I said, it's it's it just should be done. Like they deserve to get paid. For us blokes, um look, it's it's there's a few things that we do that are very old fashioned and times need to change. We as I said in the beginning, like these days, I'm all for females having careers, and I I think they add so much value to any business. Like in my building business, well, actually, I shouldn't even say my building business, so um across all of our businesses, like today as I'm recording this podcast, I currently have ten females, and they range from obviously Camille, administration, VAs, finances, uh, marketing. So they're they're direct, like they're full-time um employees at work for our business, and they bring so many different skill sets, um different opinions, different values, different attitudes, and it's just it like we it's it's value, like probably value is the biggest one. Like um, something I've really seen with having Camille in the business for the last 12 years, um Sharon, my accounts and um my accounts and contracts manager um this year is. Her 20th year working for us. We have Cherie and Kerry in Live Life Build. We have multiple VAs. We've got Kathy, our marketing lady. Like there's so many females that I interact with on a daily basis, and it is it's just so good to see and hear and let them have input. Because one thing especially that makes a big difference is us blokes tend to respond to things very differently. Um, even if we're not trying to be, generally we're we're more aggressive. Um, we can be more aggressive in our responses and the way that we handle things, whereas females bring a lot karma approach, and sometimes those karma approaches can be the difference between calming a client down and just everything figuring like panning out and getting a good result to us blokes saying something or putting our foot in our mouth and turning a small um I guess calm situation into a situation that can maybe get quite difficult and possibly turn a client um on the wrong side. So like that's just one example. Um, like having a female to bounce ideas off and to um get their response on and to get do like females communicate at very different levels to us, and we actually had a very really good example um of this today, like literally before we started recording this podcast. Um in the last couple of weeks, Camille and I have settled on another big business venture. Um, this one's for Camille. Camille's supported me unbelievably over the last 20 years. So um it's Camille's turn now. She's um we've invested, she we've bought a big property, a wedding venue, um, with a whole heap of accommodation, and it's it's a big deal, and that's that's going to be Camille's baby. But the property needs some maintenance work and some things finished, and um I uh we're our own building business is too busy and it's um three hours away, so we've coordinated with a another um one of our it's actually one of my live life build elevate builders from uh from Warwick and he's doing the work for us, and part of that work is doing some um fixing up some linings and finishing some work off inside the barn. And Camille and I had had conversations about it. Um I had communicated with uh Ryan, the builder, and Ryan sent me through a photo of the work they've done today, and I was stoked. I was like, fuck yeah, like that's looking unreal. And but just I literally showed Camille as I was walking out of the office to come and do this podcast, and she's burst into tears, and she's like, That's not what I wanted, that that's not what I was thinking. Like, you've literally just turned a beautiful timber barn into a tin shed, and and I was just I was really taken back, even just sitting here now talking

Communication Gaps When Couples Work Together

SPEAKER_00 25:03

about it. I'm quite emotional about it because I thought I'd communicated to her, and I thought with the conversations that we'd had that we're on the same page, but um, yeah, it turns out we weren't, and that's that's a big thing, and again, it's something that I'm constantly working on. Like that situation today will make me reflect on things and um just dig deep and figure out what what went wrong there, what what could I have communicated better? And straight off the top of my head with things like that is my terminology, and I think this is something that builders need to be aware of in our building businesses because this situation, like Camille works in our building business, but she's not on site all day, every day. And when we're down at the property and walking through the barn, there's things that I've repeated to her this afternoon that she's said, Well, yeah, I I really didn't understand what you meant by that. And so, yeah, it's when husbands and wife work together in the building industry, uh, especially if your wife's got their own career and they're only coming into your business every now and then to help you out with some admin work, terminology can make a big difference. And um look, Camille and I are gonna sort that out. I've said to her, we're going down there on the weekend, I've said, look, babe, it's it's that's on me. If um if we go down there and you don't like it, then I don't care that it's cost us money, we'll I'll quite happily um pull it back out. But you've got to be aware of all these situations, and when things like this do come up, especially when you're working with your wife or partner, you need to take ownership of it and reflect on it and come up with results because working together every day with each other is is incredibly stressful. Um, well, it can be, it doesn't have to be, but it's another reason why this year, 2026, like Live Life Builders supported and I've supported females in the building industry for a long time. Um, but this year I really want to get serious about it. It's why we're going to have um we're actually calling it build her. So um these events, we've had a few members reach out and say, What's going on? Like it says wives and partners. Does that mean that I can come along to this? And we're like, no, it's it's females only. Like we're not discriminating, but um, this is purely to support females in the building industry, give them a safe space, uh, put experts in front of them on topics that they need help with to continue their growth and development and reach their goals and be able to run incredible businesses in the building industry. So, yeah, look, there's a lot of parts to this, but ultimately at the end of the day, this podcast, like I said at the beginning, the topic is uh it's not her career choice. So if your wife or partner helps you out occasionally, or even if they work in your building business or trades business full-time, or even if you have you employ, like you've got a building business and you employ females, there's

Language, Terminology, And Taking Ownership

SPEAKER_00 28:05

a lot of stuff that us blokes need to learn. And the only way we're going to learn on that about these things is by asking questions, taking ownership, reflecting on situations that come up. Um, and I guess taking this sort of stuff seriously, and to wrap this podcast up, the last thing I'll touch on is obviously females and males are very different. Um, females have to deal with their monthly cycles and all those types of things. And I've probably just had a heap of listeners that are just switched off and pressed the pause button and running away. But it this is serious, guys. Like, um, it's not it's not to be like I guess I'm a bit different with this sort of stuff. Like, like I said, I've we've got 10 odd females in our business. Uh I have an incredible wife, Camille, and I've also got two incredible daughters. And um, it's probably two years, it's probably getting close to two years ago now. Um I listened to a lot of Audible and I listened to a book, it's by I can't remember the author, she's an Aussie um lady, uh, called Period Queen. And it just really opened my eyes up to um what they have to deal with, how they feel, how it affects their emotions. And I think as as a business owner that works with my partner, um, has I have two beautiful girls, I have multiple females around me um every day. Um, we've just employed our first um female apprentice. A lot of our trades have um females in their team now. I believe it's my responsibility that I have to understand more about their monthly cycles and how it affects them because I can't treat oh, I don't I treats the wrong word, I guess. I'm not sure how to um how to put it, but our s we need to be thinking more about our job sites, like

Female-Only “Build Her” Events

SPEAKER_00 30:04

our our toilets need to be cleaner. Like they females have these monthly cycles that they have to deal with, and um us blokes need to stop getting all funny talking about this shit and knowing about this shit because it's real, it's reality, it's it's life. I recommend every single bloke out there that listens to this podcast um look it up on Audible. Lucy Peach, uh the book's called The Life Hack Your Cycle and Know Your Cycle All Month, Own Your Cycle All Month Long. Own your power, own your power all month long, all month long. So um look, I guess there's gonna be a lot of listeners that never thought we'd be talking about periods on the uh level up podcast, but you never know what you're going to have coming your way when you listen to this podcast. And look, that's it's all part of my mission to create a new building industry. Like having more females in the building industry will just make such an incredible difference. It will um will get better outcomes, we'll get better projects, we'll get better relationships. Like, there's just so many benefits to it. Um, yeah, and just like every single one of us blokes all has different talents and different beliefs and opinions and all that things, like females do as well, and yeah, we need to take advantage of that. So I'm gonna stop banging on about this. Um, I'd love to get your feedback, know your comments um on this topic, but please, I really encourage all the blokes that listen to this podcast. If you have a wife or a partner that works in your business, please put some time into considering that it's not her career choice. And it just seems to be the way that it pans out that us blokes are able to have our career choice and to follow our dreams, but a lot of times our wives and partners are sucked into

Respecting Cycles, Sites, And Inclusion

SPEAKER_00 31:59

or choose to um thinking that it's the right thing for the family business or for the relationship or whatever it is to work in our businesses. And yeah, all of us blokes, like if you're a bloke out there and you you get the shits because your wife won't help you out, like please don't. Like you shouldn't have you shouldn't expect them to uh get you out of the shit just because you're running a business that you don't understand how to run, or you don't understand how do the admin or you don't understand how to do the accounts or the contracts and those types of things because at the end of the day they don't either. So, as always, make sure you like, subscribe, tell all your friends, and help us continue to make this one of Australia's number one construction podcasts. As I said before, you never know what you're gonna hear on this podcast. This podcast is nothing off limits,

Wrap Up: Create A Fairer Industry

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there's no agenda. We are simply here to help create a new building industry. Um, go to the DuanePears.com website, grab your merch and help continue our mission. Uh and yeah, look forward to seeing you on the next one. Cheers, guys.