CCA Announces Director of Workforce Strategies

Conversations among industry folks at all levels these days are dominated by workforce concerns and availability of labour. This issue is shaping up to be a long-term challenge and its complexity makes it extremely difficult to define and tackle – especially when there is a business to run.

CCA has been engaging in many conversations throughout 2023 as we have sought to understand this better. Last week, we sponsored the Workforce Solutions area at Buildex and Bill Black also moderated a panel discussing workforce of the future. All these conversations continued to build on our understanding of on this critical topic.

So far we have made some key observations -

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• Unlike historic labour crunches familiar to our industry this is not due to “booming” levels of volume and activity. Neither is it due to fallout from the Pandemic – This is the result of several decades of construction careers being progressively considered a second-rate career track in favour of four year academic degrees. The resulting stigma has led to an erosion of interest in our industry by youth and their parents.

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• Traditional practices of job fairs, expos and visits to high schools did not prevent this happening and so they will be unlikely to solve it in the future – especially considering the retirement levels projected over the next 5 - 10 years.
• As an employer our industry, across the board, needs to be willing to rethink our approach to diversity & inclusion, employee experience, mental wellness, investment in training & personal development and long-term career paths in ways we may not all have done in the past. These are not buzzwords, nor are they new boxes to check – they are the practices of other industries and organizations who have become the employers of choice that we will need to be able to compete against for new employees.

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• With immigration challenges, government at all levels, schools, post-secondary institutions, apprenticeship and numerous other not for profits all as influencers and stakeholders in this realm it is extremely difficult to define, never mind deciding where to start.

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The vision of CCA is to engage our community to build better and, growing the industry talent pool and developing people are two of our five strategic objectives. With this in mind, we are investing in the next level of dedicated effort to support our members on this complex issue.

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Therefore, I am truly delighted to announce that as of November 1st 2023 Tammy Amstutz will be joining your CCA team as Director of Workforce Strategies.

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Tammy is no stranger to CCA or our community and has over a decade of experience.

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As the Chief People Officer at a local software provider, she played a pivotal role in the company's rapid expansion over the last year. She has spearheaded the optimization of the talent acquisition program, and effectively implemented core HR programs, all while aligning these initiatives with the company’s fast-paced growth strategy.

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Prior to this Tammy offered her skills in a fractional strategic HR role, serving the small business community across Western Canada. She has developed a deep-rooted expertise in project management, workplace safety, and results-oriented HR programs. She has a broad experience spanning multiple sectors, including commercial and residential construction, oil & gas, professional services, legal, technology, retail, and not-for-profit organizations.?

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Now as Director of Workforce Strategies she will lend her experience, her energy and unique personality to the challenge of defining and tackling this critical component of our future success as an industry on behalf of our members.

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Please welcome Tammy to the CCA community