Building Talent Foundation Extends Social Impact Partnership with Resideo Technologies

Two Leading Organizations Collaborate to Create New Career Opportunities for Young People

Joint Efforts Reflect Strong Focus of ESG Efforts by Both Organizations

(Washington, DC) July 26, 2022 — Building Talent Foundation (BTF) announced the renewal of its annual $300,000 strategic social impact partnership with Resideo Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: REZI). Through their multi-year partnership and collaboration, both BTF and Resideo are creating new opportunities for students to pursue careers in the HVAC and security and smart home industries, while also helping to address the talent shortage in residential construction.

“Together, we’re making a real impact,” said Branka Minic, CEO of BTF. “Our initiatives are helping students get into rewarding careers, giving educational institutions relevant curriculum resources and cutting-edge technologies to train them, and providing a well-trained workforce for employers.”

BTF and its partners are focused on engaging 1 million youth and career changers to explore careers in construction by 2030 and have set a goal to bring 100,000 new skilled workers into the sector with a strong focus on women and people of color. Together with its partners, BTF is well on its way to achieving these diversity goals. Through its JobsToBuild career exploration and job placement tool, it helped more than 500 students find good paying trades jobs in 2021. Among those placements, the percentage of female workers placed was more than double the industry average, and nearly 70 percent were people of color.

“Resideo’s leadership on our Board and Advisory Council has been vital in helping us promote rewarding careers in HVAC to more young people,” said Minic. “With their help, we’re impacting the lives of thousands of students.”

“Resideo is honored to renew our commitment to BTF and its partners. We’ve accomplished a lot in one year, but we know much more needs to be done to solve the ongoing shortage of talented tradespeople in the homebuilding industry,” said Phil Theodore, Products & Solutions President, Resideo.

Resideo is committed to creating alignment between the skills employers need, and the skills entry-level installers and technicians are taught in trade schools. Resideo built upon BTF’s relationships with education partners across the country and formed a new HVAC-Industry Council. It also donated the latest HVAC equipment for their training labs and educational resources for those technologies. On the Jobs to Build site, Resideo also provides information about Smart Home and Security Systems to promote these careers to young people and career changers.

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About Building Talent Foundation

Building Talent Foundation (BTF) is a non-profit organization founded by the Leading Builders of America, 20 of the largest residential construction companies in the United States. BTF's mission is to advance the education, training, and career progression of young people and people from underrepresented groups, helping them develop into skilled technical workers and business owners in residential construction. For more information, visit www.BuildingTF.org.

About Resideo

Resideo is a leading global manufacturer and distributor of technology-driven products and solutions that provide comfort, security, energy efficiency and control to customers worldwide. Building on a 130-year heritage, Resideo has a presence in more than 150 million homes, with 15 million systems installed in homes each year. We continue to serve more than 110,000 professionals through leading distributors, including our ADI Global Distribution business, which exports to more than 100 countries from nearly 200 stocking locations around the world. For more information about Resideo, please visit www.resideo.com.

Prioritizing Employee Engagement Will Help Homebuilding Industry Fill the Talent Gap

WASHINGTON, D.C. (June 29, 2022) – To address the acute and persistent talent shortage in residential construction, employers in the industry should prioritize employee engagement to retain the people they already have. That was the central conclusion of the 2021 Homebuilding Workforce Engagement Study, which was released this week by the Building Talent Foundation (BTF). 

Sponsored by the Leading Builders of America, and led by the expert team at Oxford Center for Employee Engagement (OCEE), the study was conducted with the goal of understanding the engagement of frontline workers in the homebuilding industry, the factors that affect it, and the role it plays in employee retention.  

“BTF's strategy is to bring a pipeline of new talented tradespeople into homebuilding, connect them to growth-oriented employers, and retain them in the sector for years to come,” said Branka Minic, CEO of BTF. “By conducting this study, we aimed to establish a clear retention baseline, and understand what it would take to improve it.”

 Employee turnover is also expensive to employers, with costs as high as $15,000 per employee for expenses relating to separation, replacement, training, and lost productivity. Considering that it’s concentrated among early- or mid-career employees, turnover is also a long-term problem, potentially widening the skills gap in the homebuilding industry.

 The study found that employee engagement was one of the keys to employers being able to keep their people. The top reasons people identified for leaving their jobs, the survey found, had to do with opportunities for career advancement and skill development, as well as the effectiveness of their immediate supervisors.

Those engagement metrics even outweighed compensation, although pay and benefits were still important. “This shows that prioritizing engagement, and providing upskilling, career pathways, and well-trained supervisors, will help companies keep good people,” Minic said. “Engaged employees are also more productive, dedicated and happier. Put simply, companies with an engaged workforce are more successful.”

What Employers Can Do

As a result of this survey, BTF is actively developing several initiatives aimed at helping employers improve employee engagement. These initiatives include raising awareness of this study’s results, providing greater access to training resources, facilitating best practice sharing and peer-to-peer learning, and offering career coaching.

In the immediate term, employers can take steps to improve their employee engagement. These include allowing and encouraging employees to pursue professional and skill development, fostering supportive, team-centric work environments, and training supervisors in effective leadership. A variety of resources and training modules are available online at low or even no cost.

The Time to Invest is Now

Focusing on employee engagement will benefit employers in the short term, and will help the industry as a whole in the long term. As more people are happy and growing in their careers, the building industry will gradually develop a reputation for offering rewarding, viable careers, which will in turn help recruitment of new talent into the sector.

“The time to invest in engagement is now,” Minic concluded. “Our industry is already investing heavily in recruiting and training new talent, and those efforts will be twice as effective once the sector is better at engaging and retaining its workers.”

The 2021 Homebuilding Workforce Engagement Study, was sponsored by the Leading Builders of America and supported by the Home Builders Institute, Harbor Freight Tools for Schools, and many other organizations. To see the results of the study, download the full report here.

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About Building Talent Foundation

Building Talent Foundation (BTF) is a non-profit organization founded by the Leading Builders of America, 20 of the largest residential construction companies in the United States. BTF's mission is to advance the education, training, and career progression of young people and people from underrepresented groups, helping them develop into skilled technical workers and business owners in residential construction. For more information, visit https://www.BuildingTF.org.

Building Talent Foundation Partners with NextWave Safety Solutions

Partnership will enhance safety training opportunities for job seekers in the building trades

WASHINGTON, D.C. (May 3, 2022) – To mark Construction Safety Week, Building Talent Foundation (BTF) and NextWave Safety Solutions, Inc., (NextWave) have announced a partnership that will make safety training resources available to job seekers in the homebuilding trades.

The proprietary NextWave Learning Management System (LMS) incorporates Virtual Reality technology to provide an immersive learning experience. The partnership will enable BTF to build a library of training resources through its Education Partners on the JobsToBuild platform, helping job seekers advance their skills and career opportunities.

“Jobsite safety is a critical component to our mission of creating a sustainable workforce of skilled, well-trained, and happy employees in the home-building industry,” said Branka Minic, CEO of BTF. “NextWave’s LMS is a foundational piece of technology infrastructure that will enable BTF to provide access to structured training tracks to our candidates. This training will enable our candidates to learn about different opportunities in the homebuilding trades and build the necessary skills to compete for highly sought-after opportunities and advance their careers.”

“We’re proud to be working with BTF to help them achieve their goal of expanding the homebuilding workforce,” said Lorenzo Gallo, Founder and CEO of NextWave Safety. “By engaging with the LMS on the Jobs to Build platform, job-seekers can obtain critical safety skills and certifications, which makes them more attractive to employers.”

The in-kind donation from NextWave is valued at $200,000.

To learn more about the NextWave LMS and to explore available courses, visit https://NextWaveSafety.com/https://jobstobuild.nextwavesafety.org.

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 About Building Talent Foundation

Building Talent Foundation (BTF) is a non-profit organization founded by the Leading Builders of America, 20 of the largest residential construction companies in the United States. BTF's mission is to advance the education, training, and career progression of young people and people from underrepresented groups, helping them develop into skilled technical workers and business owners in residential construction. For more information, visit https://www.BuildingTF.org.

 About NextWave Safety Solutions, Inc.

NextWave Safety Solutions Inc. is an integrated safety solutions company innovating risk management, workforce training, and analytics through technology. NextWave is on a mission to build the future of safety training and workplace safety by developing cutting-edge technology to mitigate project risk, reduce workplace incidents, and drive productivity. The company’s core foundation in professional safety services saves lives and generates material cost savings for our clients. For more information, find us at https://NextWaveSafety.com. 

International Code Council and Building Talent Foundation Announce New Collaboration

The two organizations will promote careers in construction and reinforce education and training opportunities for future construction professionals

Washington, D.C. – The International Code Council and the Building Talent Foundation (BTF) announced that they will be combining efforts to support and strengthen the residential construction and building safety workforce. The two organizations will promote careers in construction and better align education and training for emerging professionals with the changing needs of the industry.

Under the new memorandum of understanding, both parties will collaborate to assist jobseekers in connecting to potential job opportunities in the building and construction field, support youth who are exploring careers in construction, provide access to pertinent resources, and promote building safety skills training programs.

“The Code Council is committed to supporting building and construction professionals with the resources they need to succeed in their careers,” said Dominic Sims, CBO, Chief Executive Officer, International Code Council. “Our work with BTF will help welcome new entrants to the field and support them with job portals, education and other resources.”

BTF strives to rebuild and create a sustainable residential construction workforce by bringing together the creative energy, resources and efforts of builders, trade partners, suppliers, manufacturers, and educational partners throughout the industry. BTF’s mission is to advance the education, training and career progress of young people and those from underrepresented groups, as skilled professionals in residential construction.

“Engaging with the Code Council will be an incredible resource, allowing us to connect job seekers with employers, mentors and advisors in residential construction,” said Branka Minic, Chief Executive Officer, Building Talent Foundation. “It will also give our employers, job seekers and educational partners access to the Code Council’s safety training programs. The result will ultimately be a stronger, well-trained workforce.”

For more information about the Code Council’s Safety 2.0 Programs click here.

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About the International Code Council   
The International Code Council is the leading global source of model codes and standards and building safety solutions. Code Council codes, standards and solutions are used to ensure safe, affordable and sustainable communities and buildings worldwide.

About Building Talent Foundation

Building Talent Foundation (BTF) is a non-profit organization founded by the Leading Builders of America, 20 of the largest residential construction companies in the United States. BTF’s mission is to advance the education, training, and career progression of young people and people from underrepresented groups, helping them develop into skilled technical workers and business owners in residential construction.