By Anna DeBattiste

I’ve said it many times before, and I’ll say it again; it’s time for us to stop looking for experienced operators and start making them. Unemployed experienced operators are just not out there, at least not for more than five minutes. We’re here to help, and we’ve been stepping up our schedule of “rookie classes” to get you started.

Crane Hotline Magazine recently published my article about women in the crane industry, which you can READ HERE. This is a great place to start looking for untapped potential; do you have women in the office who have shown an interest in field operations? Do you have women in field positions you might try using as signalpersons and riggers on a potential path to training as operators? Some of the women I interviewed for the article made great points about the value of women as crane operators and other field workers. Women often tend to be smoother, more controlled; they tend to take time to think things through more thoroughly; they’re less likely to feel pressure to work fast at the expense of safety. The problem, as Hilary Renaud of Valley Crane Service points out, is that it often doesn’t even occur to women to explore field positions in the construction industry unless they have family connections or get explicit encouragement from someone within the organization. Company owners, managers, supers, foreman and other crane operators can make a difference here. Keep your eyes open for potential talent, even in the office, and encourage interest where you see it. Start thinking outside the box when it comes to where your next operator trainee might come from.

Here at New England Crane School we’ve been wondering if hosting a woman-only rookie class might be doable sometime next winter, and we’d like your feedback on that. Why limit a class to women, you might ask? Sometimes that can provide a safer environment, one that might encourage more women to sign up, and by “safer” I don’t mean physically safer but psychologically safer. I can speak to this issue personally. I volunteer for a mountain rescue team, and occasionally our training director will offer a snowmobile, ATV or other training session just for women. It feels more comfortable to me because I know I’ll be dealing with less performance pressure, and the other members of the group will be supportive rather than competitive. That’s not a criticism of the way either gender tends to operate in a training environment; it’s just an observation of trends. Groups of men and women tend to interact in different ways, and sometimes it’s more effective for me to learn in groups of women.

Send us your feedback! If we held a woman-only class this winter, would you be interested? Do you have a candidate in mind? I would love to hear back from you, even if you just want to tell me I’ve got it all wrong.