CLF 2023 D1E1 | Change, Innovation and Resilience in Construction with David McFarlane (EllisDon) & Sarah Clark (FRPD) | EP82 (Part 1)

Day 1 Episode 1 | In this episode, from the conference floor at the VRCA Construction Leadership Forum 2023, James and Christian are joined by David McFarlane, Senior Vice President of Western Canada at EllisDon and Sarah Clark, President & CEO at Fraser River Pile and Dredge.


EPISODE LINKS:
Dave McFarlane LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-mcfarlane-33092214a/
EllisDon Website: https://www.ellisdon.com/
Sarah Clark LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-clark-a2876650/
FRPD Website: https://frpd.com/

PODCAST INFO:
the Site Visit Website: https://www.sitemaxsystems.com/podcast
the Site Visit on Buzzsprout: https://thesitevisit.buzzsprout.com/269424
the Site Visit on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-site-visit/id1456494446
the Site Visit on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5cp4qJE5ExZmO3EwldN1HH

FOLLOW ALONG:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/thesitevisit
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thesitevisit

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:18

They do this one every year.

SPEAKER_01 1:28

Heavy hitters like that are super fun to talk to. It's interesting for us to be interviewing those people who don't know what to expect. And I thought the outcome was really fun.

SPEAKER_02 1:39

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. Alright, so here we go. Day one, five episodes. Enjoy.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

Welcome to the Site Visit Podcast. Leadership and Perspective from Construction. With your hosts, James Balkner and Christian Hammond.

SPEAKER_06 2:41

Let's get down to it.

SPEAKER_02 2:48

Well, that was a fantastic first session here with some legends. We've got David McFarland from Elliston and Sarah Clark from Fraser River, Pal and Dredge joining us. Did I get it? You did very well.

SPEAKER_04 3:01

You call us FRPD.

SPEAKER_02 3:02

Yeah. I know. I know. Just wanted to make sure everybody got that. And I was practicing the whole time. So good. You nailed it. Why don't you guys just really quick polls notes? A little bit about your background, what you're currently doing, and then we'll get into a little bit of a debrief from the session you just had. Sarah, go ahead.

SPEAKER_04 3:19

I'm a civil engineer by training. Went to Queen's University. And uh throughout my career, I've been involved in almost every type of infrastructure. I started in road construction with the Ministry of Transportation in Ontario on their EIT program. Then I moved to uh mass transit with Bombardier, which gave me the opportunity to do some traveling around the world. I then switched back to a government uh owned company, which was Partnerships BC, that had been put in place to bring uh, as the province was bringing in larger projects, uh, the business cases procurement methods around those projects. And then I went back to private industry nine years ago when I went to uh FRPD, and that is marine construction. So that was my my third type of uh uh uh construction.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Well, that's very cool. And currently serving as president and CEO.

SPEAKER_04 4:10

I'm currently the president and CEO of been uh the been just reaching my six-year anniversary of that role.

SPEAKER_03 4:16

Very cool, very cool. David, background, a little bit better. Way more exciting to hear from Sarah. I'm uh I'm born and raised Ellis Dawn. I've been with Ellis Don since '94, but full-time employment '96. Uh construction management uh engineering um kind of went around the world, not around the world, around Canada, between uh Toronto and Winnipeg and Calgary, and then over to Vancouver in 2020 to open up an office, re-establish it. About four years ago, I turned that over, and I now represent our construction and civil operations for Western Canada. So we've got a fight over the Ontario-Manitoba border.

SPEAKER_02 4:58

Very cool. Thank you. Awesome. Well, we were chatting a little bit as you guys were up there. I think, James, you were talking about the challenges.

SPEAKER_01 5:05

Yeah. I'm, you know, just listening to this, we took a lot of notes. I mean, you guys had said a lot of really interesting things, a lot of sort of uh uh I would say topics that are uh the answers had a lot of conflicting things. We talked about profitability, we talked about caring for people on mental health, we talked about there's also the geopolitical um forces that we have to deal with to be competitive as a country. Um and whether or not this all squares for us, people working hard, pushing through, going through difficult times, being harder humans as opposed to softer humans. Um these are just some of the themes we were talking about and thinking about, but listening up there, going, okay, well, how do you both feel, and you can go one at a time here, about tomorrow? Are you worried about where we're going as a culture, where we're going as a work culture, where we have things like AI coming down the road here? Um, we have an economy, especially on the commercial side with a lot of commercial debt there. You know, we see buildings, huge discounts in San Francisco being sold or trying to be sold. Um, there's a lot of impending things. So, what are your thoughts on? Are you kind of nervous? Well, uh you said a lot there. I know that was at this point of it.

SPEAKER_03 6:36

Now worry if I'm the right uh person to actually continue to navigate it. But it it's interesting, all those things, you know, profitability. We are we are a profitable first. Our intent is to make money. Yeah, we're in the business to make build buildings, to do marine work, to do all those things to turn a prop. Yep. But you have to balance everything you described there. The big the the snippet that I took out of that that scares the crap out of me is the construction industry has not changed. It's been the slowest sector and industry to move. So we at Ellis Dawn are very mindful of what the Silicone Valley is looking at. They want to bring us for, like they are our biggest threat today. Traditional pour your footings, build a building, to go in and operate it. We're worried about that changing because they are focused on us right now. So all the other things that keep us up at night, people's mental health, profitability, politics you talked about, Silicon Valley is paying more attention to construction than they ever have. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 7:49

Yeah, I mean, there's yeah, I mean, there there are some parts, I think, of technology that are going to help, obviously. Absolutely. Um but uh yeah, I mean, you know, just uh before we get Sarah's take on this, um, you can pick any of those things, by the way, or just the group of them. Um but you know, in technology, you know, our company, Sitemax, we you know, we we're in that. We are trying to use everything to make get that profitability gap so that it's not actually a human impact. There's there's a gap there where people can have efficiency themselves so you can have that profitability um without a negative impact on humans. So they can continue to use things but better, so they're not wasting their time. So there's a gap there between some conversation.

SPEAKER_02 8:38

I'll tidy this up for you, Sarah. Thank you. Okay. One of the things that James was saying and that you guys were talking about was the challenges we all dealt with through COVID. Construction adapted pretty well, you know, in terms of you were saying, David, generally pretty slow. I think a lot of companies handled COVID and adjusted fairly well. Knowing that we as an industry went through that and looking at the challenges ahead could be economy, could be whatever, any of these things that you're saying. How are we better suited now to approach those things and handle them?

SPEAKER_04 9:13

That's a good question. And like Dave said, I Dave wondered if he was the best person to lead. And I always ask myself that am I the best person to lead in this role? And uh if I don't think that on any given day, I say why, and then I try to fix that. So when it yes, it does. The it get it when you're prevented with presented with challenges such as COVID, where you have to act quickly, um, you find the the industry is very innovative and committed to finding the way. Dave said this AI outside, that is that's big. A lot of people in construction don't really think that way. They're very we're very hands-on. Um, so the more we can learn and see how we can adapt um the better. Now, I did read an article recently, Dave, that may make you feel better that had construction on the end of the uh curve that would be the least impacted by AI. But you can't be sitting around hope, you know, just oh that's okay, good, I don't have to do anything. Um so do we have an answer? Neither one of us has an answer to that. We're just trying to figure it out.

SPEAKER_02 10:21

No, that's good. I mean, it's a point to talk about, right?

SPEAKER_03 10:23

It's the conversation. But but but I think you know, listening to Sarah's answer, then reflecting on what you said. Like we are innovative, we are moving forward. I can I can cite from when we start digging the holes to finishing the envelope, there is innovation being brought, brought to all those elements of a building or to a marine project or to a road project. Yeah, so we are innovating. It's just it's interesting, and maybe it's just because we live in it, we don't see it happening as fast enough, but you know, in reflecting on this conversation, we we are doing smart, innovative things on so many different fronts, right? And we're taking these initiatives, we're doing these pilot projects, you know, even you know the use of AI in a positive way is amazing in our industry, right? You know, building the better mousetrap, right? So yeah, it's exciting. So I feel a little bit better now after five years. Good myself.

SPEAKER_04 11:22

No, of course.

SPEAKER_02 11:23

Yeah, that's definitely, yeah. One thing, David, that you said um kind of partway through your chat was just talking to the resilience, I think, of people in the industry, but also in in one's career in construction. And it was the not giving up so quick. Yeah, that's the patient. I believe that's what you were talking about. That resonates so much with me because a lot of the panel legends, you know. We're changing the name.

SPEAKER_03 11:45

We don't like Sarah and I don't like the name. We're gonna go with cool kids of consultant. Love it. Legends make us look old.

SPEAKER_01 11:52

I guess I have to come on with a pair of vans on. Uh if we have to wear vans.

SPEAKER_03 11:56

I'm gonna go up to my hotel room, get on.

SPEAKER_04 11:57

I could have worn jeans today. That's one reason I'm in construction, is because I get to wear jeans.

SPEAKER_01 12:02

I know exactly.

SPEAKER_02 12:03

But speaking to that and and building a career, you know, maybe that compounds on itself, or the years you've spent at Elliston, or the years that you've spent in an industry that's kind of stacked on top of each other to where it's come to today. Maybe let's talk just really quickly to the resilience of men and women in construction and how important it is to building a career in construction.

SPEAKER_03 12:24

I think construction is so cool because you know, you look at what we what we're able to do, you know, we come together at the start of a project, you know, someone's got a vision, someone's got a need. And they come to us to assemble a team, you know, to design it, to engineer it, then to execute on it, and in a lot of cases, operate. And then we all disband and we go on to another one. So there's the resiliency of what we're able to do. So we come together, it's like you go to the space program, they're together for decades and decades. Right. We come together for a two-year project, six-month project, or or an eight-year project. You know, we're redeveloping the Oak Ridge Mall, redevelopment 28-acre site.

SPEAKER_05 13:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:07

Come together, bring bring the industry together, like-minded, but you know, we have to support that. It was like my reference to the conductor of an orchestra. Come together, deliver something, because we're a means to an end. No one likes what we do, they like the product that we produce at the end. So that's that's the exciting part and the resiliency of what we're able to do. We bob and we no, there's no cookie cutter. Yeah, you know, it every even if you had a uh the an example of something that's repeatable, there's always going to be nuances to it, ground conditions, some tweaks here and there. I just think we're uh we're best suited to to provide that resilience resiliency, like we always say inside LSD, fast, fluid, and flexible, and we have to be because every everything that we do is different.

SPEAKER_01 13:53

Totally. Um the uh so on with resiliency, there's a couple of things of themes that were going on uh on the panel there of now. We always talk about you know with our staff. Um luckily we have a lot on the higher echelon of this, but you have A, B, and C players, and sometimes D players in companies, and it's just an unfortunate spectrum of people's engagement with their job. So we we had a podcast, uh we've had a number of them where we've talked about mental health, like the work, the term mental health, and how you separate that and bifurcate that from just life is hard. You know, um, because you know, mental, let's let's say you're you're clinically, you have a like, let's say you're you have a clinical bipolar, like that, you know, you've been to, you've had your psychological profile done, and and that's the deal. And you actually have something that says that. And then there's somebody that's like married the wrong partner, um, had kids they didn't plan on getting, had made a few financial mistakes, and now they're just can barely have their head above water. Is that mental health? Is that or is that and the reason I say that is because how do you bifurcate pushing through to get to the word profit? Because profit, I don't know where profit exists. Does it exist in pulling up the people who who, for instance, I can let's say somebody can't buy a home because it's too expensive in Lorman. Like, do you see all these factors that make this mental health sort of a panacea of a term very complicated?

SPEAKER_04 15:37

Certainly not being an expert in anything you just said. Uh there is a push. You in construction, there is a certain type of person that excels. And I think we're all we're probably all crazy. We love it. So when people, there are ways. You talk Dave talked about resilience, and whether it be like figuring out how to build something you didn't know or a new spec that you didn't understand, or working out in the rain for six months out of the year and loving your job still, there is a you know, you gotta love it to do it. Yeah and there are ways. Um there are people, yes, they go through life. And when you back to the stick to it that Dave and I were talking about and get with a place where you really like, yeah, the people you're surrounded with that you work with are gonna help you get through those hard times. They're gonna be your rock. You're moving around, you're never gonna have that backup and stability, you know, stability. Yeah, the support structure is huge for people.

SPEAKER_01 16:37

Yeah. Yeah. I the uh, I mean, we've seen corporations, so let's just say, you know, your two companies, for instance, and how you support your employees and how you you know move them through their career. And then you see the you know, Silicon Valley model where they've got like uh you know the best steak chef making lunches for them, and they see this stuff. They see this. Well, how do those people have that? And then I'm going to Tim Hortons every morning. Like, what did I do something wrong in my life? Like, what happened here?

SPEAKER_04 17:05

People like Tim Hortons.

SPEAKER_01 17:06

No, I'm just saying, I know, but it isn't it isn't the best steak guy from Las Vegas. So the point, the point I'm getting at is that we because of the way the internet has all provided these uh purviews into all these different lives of everybody, we're always comparing to a point where of a uh uh a sense of like I'm probably never going to be that person at you know that's a head of Uber or uh you know a high super high-paid engineer at you know Netflix or something like that. It's getting paid you know eight, nine hundred thousand dollars US a year and having that stake. So like what responsibility and what's the sort of cutoff for companies in construction to be able to provide these sort of extra perks?

SPEAKER_03 17:58

Well, we should have we should have mandated these questions to be uh pre-shared because my gosh, you uh unload a lot and expect us to respond to it. Well, I mean I I just put a little out there, a lot of things. Those companies that you're you make reference to are certainly disabling, they certainly cause a lot of stress because exactly to the examples of why not us. Yeah. Now, can you go on inside the more of a construction traditional model and get to those levels, etc.? That's not in our DNA. We're not gonna have that. No, do we go for nice meals? Do we reward our teams with different things? But if someone is seeking a goal seeking that type of situation, the industry's not there. Can you go on to have a very successful career and make high six and seven figures? Absolutely. Yeah, so I can cite many examples inside our organization and across the industry where you've gone on to have very successful rewarding careers. But those those disablers are can't even talk anymore. Disablers, yeah. Um no, like the the they're they're just they're just shaking things up.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

They they enable entitlement is what's what they do. They do.

SPEAKER_03 19:11

But it's it's a fizzle, right? In the pan.

SPEAKER_01 19:14

But interesting, like what what has happened now is is that all of these companies now, like for instance, Facebook doubled their their shares double because they laid off all these people. And they were like, okay, well, there's no stake now, and now you know you're getting kebabs or whatever. I don't know. But that's that's my reference to Flash in the Pan.

SPEAKER_03 19:30

They're gonna create that excitement, they create that hole in the market. It's not gonna last.

unknown 19:33

Right.

SPEAKER_02 19:34

No, and we're just not sustainable. No, and I think we saw that in the last 12 months, right? And now things are moving back to you know, run your business like a traditional business should, right? Actually have pay attention to how you make money. Yeah, metrics, you know, some basic metrics that make sense.

SPEAKER_03 19:47

But I'd love to get Sarah's perspective on it. Maybe I'm wrong because I just I've only been at L'Dog. Is you know, are there examples of the flash? I think I think we're very conservative just in general. Like we don't want those environments or we don't live in those environments, right? Or the people that go for that.

SPEAKER_04 20:09

And I mean, it's one thing, there's always gaming around. And you remember in the the EA was here and that it worked and you had the chef and you had the gym. And some people come to us and say, when are we gonna have the chef in the gym? And like, I don't know where I'm gonna put the gym in this 1974 building. But it's more of what you want out of your career and what the way you're wired. And if you look at a lot of people that are wired in construction, they like the balance of uh using their head and using their hands, and construction offers that, and they uh it offers you the capability, and so do things in programming and other uh other vocations, but you get to apply yourself and someone who, you know, someone who maybe didn't go to post-secondary school, didn't become a programmer, came through the ranks as a welder, all of a sudden they realize wow, I can be a leader, I can do some more training, I can get to a you know a place I never thought I was gonna get to.

SPEAKER_03 21:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 21:03

And construction offers many different paths for people.

SPEAKER_03 21:07

And and and and now more than ever, that's required. We're losing the craft trades.

SPEAKER_01 21:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:13

So if you're not academically inclined and you don't want to go to college or you don't want to go to university, you can still have a very rewarding, successful career with a craft. I can I can cite six different crafts that are falling away. The demographics gone up, and uh you know, we're we're not gonna be able to put Tarazzo floors down anymore because those craftsmen are gone. Yeah. So a kid that doesn't know what he wants to be, wants to go out to be a heavy equipment operator, six figure salary is not a bad place to start off. Um, so I think we we can we can add a lot of opportunities that in a different sector like the Silicon Valley, yeah, yeah. To be the best of the best. You know, these people are not I'm not at any way suggesting they're not the best of the best, but they're just wired different. Totally. So I think I think we're we're a lot more robust than what offering.

SPEAKER_04 22:12

I think we can offer people that don't know how to go through po that don't know, they're maybe not thinking they can go to post-secondary, but they don't know what they're gonna do, so they get stuck. And I'm thinking of women, especially. I like my friend, my daughter's graduating grade 12, so she's going to university. One of her friends is doesn't know what she wants to do. She's working at Safeway. She could do a trade for five years and make good money and have doors open for her. They don't know about it. And you know, I know there's been a lot of effort to get into high schools. There needs to be more, and there needs to be the respect around the positions.

SPEAKER_02 22:45

And this this is a great place to tidy up our conversation. This is kind of where a bit of the panel ended as well, talking about uh what we can do for certain groups, what we can do for mentorship, really what we can do for advocacy for an industry that we love and that we know people can build great careers in. So this we and this topic has been coming up a lot as we've been recording our latest podcast. We have a great industry, and I want to finish this just a question. It's the same question for each of you, and it's just a quick response from both. But we're here at the construction leaders forum for the VRCA. We've got awesome men and women here that build this industry. David and Sarah, what is one thing that we could do to be better advocates for the construction industry? Just whatever comes.

SPEAKER_03 23:35

But like we being who?

SPEAKER_02 23:37

You ourselves? You, you you and your what you're doing in Celeston. Okay, or that's it.

SPEAKER_03 23:42

Okay, I got it. Yeah. So, and you touched upon it. You know, we have not done a good job making the schools, like high school, or college and universities, okay. High school, we're getting there. Why not down to the public school? We are not showing or advocating for our industry to say you can have a viable career inside our industry, right? Look at Sarah, what a perfect example. A Queens graduate that has done like everything. Yep. Um, or to Sarah's example of her friend's daughter working in Safeway, why couldn't she come on and become a journeyman electrician? Whatever else. So I think we haven't been more purposeful enough in getting out there and saying, hey, construction's over here. If you're interested, come and talk to us.

SPEAKER_02 24:32

No, it's a great point. What about from you, Sarah? Anything uh different or kind of on the same topic you were talking about before?

SPEAKER_04 24:39

I think it's the same topic. We know we in grade nine day, we took out all the grade eight, grade nine, where they go out with their parents. So we took a group out and they went down to our project on Centurm and they got to go out on the rigs, out on the water. And it's a great time to educate people whether they're gonna go into construction or just show the breadth of construction to kids so they talk about it even with their friends, you know, and that it's a it's a good career. And um, I think we all in my mind, we respect trades people, the respect tradespe get is not enough. And that's a culture thing in in Canada for sure.

SPEAKER_03 25:15

Uh that's a great example. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:17

I mean, these people can do things most people can't, right? And that's not recognized or respected.

SPEAKER_02 25:24

Well, there's definitely a lot that we need to do. I think through these conversations, through panels with the cool kids that we just had. It might stick, right? It might get a good shit. It could. I think that we are able to um uncover some some pretty great practical uh ways to be better advocates for industry. Um we want to thank you guys for taking the time to do something. Maybe it's the first time you've done this, but you guys were great. And uh we we uh we wish you guys the best moving forward with your respective businesses and uh here for the rest of the weekend for this conference.

SPEAKER_01 25:55

Yeah, and also one other thing is that to invite you onto the site visit for a longer conversation. Oh, yeah, of course. Because we do these um um, we have a studio um in Yale town with all the video and all the stuff, it's like a dedicated one there. Um we could tell like some of the questions we asked, you're like, well, there's a lot of stuff like drinking from a fire hose. Um, but to unpack that stuff and to have individual conversations with you on on separate podcasts, because we really do think that the perspective that you both have, uh when you just said the the the culture of trades doesn't get the respect it needs, that is a massive topic that can be fixed. And we just I think the best minds need to come together to uncover those things. So yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:42

Yeah, very cool. Thank you for having us.

SPEAKER_04 26:44

Yeah, really, it was really provocative. Made me think a lot your questions, and we didn't have them ahead, but it was good to have to. The first things that come to mind are usually, you know, what's the right answer or what are the biggest challenges? So thank you.

SPEAKER_01 26:57

Definitely very good, thank you. Well, that does it for another episode of the SiteFit. Thank you for listening. Be sure to stay connected with us by following our social accounts on Instagram and YouTube. You can also sign up for our multiple app.com, where you'll get industry and sites protests and everything you need to know about the site podcast and construction management tool of choice. Thousands of contractors in North America and the US. All right, let's get back to the