Masonry Magazine September 2005 Page. 48
News
Local, State & Regional
# Michigan
The Michigan Mason Contractors' Association's (MMCA) annual fall meeting and board of directors election will be held at the beautiful Bay Harbor Resort, September 16-18. Family activities including golf, horseback riding, a water park adventure, member and guest reception, and a banquet on the shores of Lake Michigan are scheduled.
For more information about future activities, please visit the MMCA website at www.mmca-mi.com.
# New York
Reported by Occupational Hazards, "Scaffolding Fall Prevention Top the List of Construction Violations in New York, Study Finds," July 8, 2005:
A review of more than 2,500 OSHA construction site inspection records in New York from 2003 found that nearly one-third of all OSHA construction violations in the state were of OSHA's scaffolding or fall protection requirements- more than for any other standard.
The organizations involved in the analysis also said the results of this study as well as a separate review reveal troubling data about the plight of immigrant workers in the construction industry.
Their analysis, titled "Lives in the Balance-Immigrants and Workers at Elevated Heights at Greatest Risk in Construction," was prepared by the New York State Trial Lawyers Association (NYSTLA) and issued by NYSTLA, the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health (NYCOSH), the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now NY (ACORN), Make the Road by Walking and the New York Immigration Coalition. It reviewed all construction site inspections conducted in the state during 2003.
NYSTLA President Shoshana Book-son says the study points to the need to keep Section 240 of the state's Labor Law - which governs scaffolding safety - on the books.
In addition to retaining the scaffold law, "Lives in the Balance" recommends more rigorous OSHA construction safety rule enforcement; hiring of more OSHA compliance officers who speak the same languages as immigrant workers, and more extensive construction worker safety training, especially in English, Cantonese and other languages spoken by immigrant workers.
# North Carolina
Dallas Caudle and Josh Morrison, both of Central Cabarrus High School and McGee Brothers, won the championship in their respective divisions in the 2005 National Masonry Skills USA Contests recently in Kansas City. Caudle finished first in the high school division, and Morrison finished first in the post-secondary division of the competition.
Both Caudle and Morrison learned basic masonry skills under Todd Hartsell at Central Cabarrus High
Merit Pay Verses Entitlements
MASONRY NEWS CONTRACTOR TIP
Are we running businesses or charities? Do you pay your people solely by the hour regardless of their effort? We've all done it. And, if so, have you ever wondered who came up with the idea of paying employees by the hour? What was this person thinking when designing this system? What does hourly pay have to do with the effort being put into the work being performed? In my opinion, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.
Think about the basic premise of the hourly system. When paying by the hour, an employee's focus becomes "How many hours can I put in on the job?" rather than "How efficient can I do the work?" However, an employer gets paid based on profit, which is a direct result of how efficient the employee works. As the number of hours put in on the job increases, pay for the employee increases, but pay for the company decreases. The hourly system is setup to pull employees and management in two different directions.
Paying wages without basing them on measurements and/or expected outcomes, such as company goals, will eventually lead to substantial decreased results. Why? Hourly pay becomes entitlement pay. With any entitlement pay, even the very best will become weak. This is going on all over the world. In some areas, business owners and employees haven't realized it yet.
Even in union companies, at the end of the contract the union negotiates to get higher wages for its members for a period of time. Do the owners of the companies get to negotiate for higher productivity from the employees to justify these increases in pay? Maybe I am missing something, but giving more without receiving more will end up in certain corporate failure sooner or later. When that happens, both companies and workers lose, union or not.
Here's an example of how entitlements work: My wife loves animals, so when we travel, we often stop at North Bend State Park in Cairo, W. Va, where plenty of deer roam. Upon entering the park, a sign reads: "Please do not feed the deer." I often wondered why they didn't want tourists feeding deer. It seemed like a wonderful thing to do for the deer.
Passing through the same park one winter, it became very apparent what was happening. Despite the postings, visitors were still feeding the deer. And since very few tourists came to feed them in the winter, the deer were starving to death. It was very sad sight. You could see virtually every bone in some of the deer's bodies.
Because the tourists had been giving them handouts, they had become weak and could no longer hunt for themselves. If there hadn't been entitlements for the deer, they would have healthily survived on their own. They would have been rewarded based on their efforts (knowing how to find food on their own) instead of expecting entitlements (having the tourists feed them)
All companies should set up systems that encourage employees to work toward the company goals while also working for themselves. In order to do this, mutually agreed upon goals for employees and management must be set.
Remember: People work for themselves. If the company does well, the employees should also do well and want to help the company survive. The right systems can teach them how to do it, and it's the responsibility of the company owner to set up systems that encourage efficient behavior.
At my seminars and in my book, "Rewarding and Challenging Employees." I show mason contractors how to design these systems. For information, call Kemi Huck at (800) 417-9272