September 18, 2024 • 55 mins
What if the pressure to be perfect is silently harming our best workers? Join us to uncover the hidden mental health crisis within the construction industry as we sit down with Thomas LeMay and Brian Winningham. Thomas, the child of a Navy veteran, and Brian, a former Ranger, bring their expert perspectives to a crucial conversation on leadership and mental health. They introduce their collaborative project—a book aimed at equipping foremen with essential leadership tools, filling a vital gap in support and training for those on the front lines.
We delve into the story of Emilio Stevens, a veteran who transitioned into a foreman role, and his harrowing experience of losing a colleague to suicide. This emotional narrative brings to light the systemic issues plaguing the industry, from relentless demands to inadequate mental health support. We explore the devastating impact of bad leadership on team morale and mental well-being, emphasizing the need for a cultural shift to prioritize mental health and work-life balance.
Ending on a note of hope and practical advice, we discuss the importance of self-care and seeking help. Drawing from personal experiences, we share actionable steps for setting boundaries and managing stress effectively. Highlighting the analogy of the hidden roof leak, we stress the importance of recognizing and addressing mental health issues before they lead to irreversible consequences. Join us in this vital discussion to better understand the intersection of leadership, mental health, and the construction industry.
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This episode is brought to you by Memorial Ranch; A place where for our veterans and first responders to find rest and relaxation while they prepare for their next mission: LIFE
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If you're a military veteran in the construction industry, or you're in the construction industry and support our military vets, and you'd like to be a guest on the podcast you can find me at constructionvetpodcast@gmail.com , or send me a message on LinkedIn. You can find me there at Scott Friend. Let's share the stories and motivate others!
- TCV Email: constructionvetpodcast@gmail.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
but also protect your body from your own mind, and
that your mind is very powerful.
It's like a supercomputer.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
It'll trick your own body this is the construction
veteran podcast, connecting andcelebrating veterans in
construction now.
Now, here's your host, scottFriend.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Welcome back to a special episode of the
Construction Veteran, where Italk with Thomas LeMay and Brian
Winningham about a very sombersubject, but one that needs to
be discussed in the constructionindustry mental health and
taking of one's own life.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Thomas, and Brian.
How are you guys Doing?
Fantastic Doing great.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Very good.
Well, this is a unique episode.
This is not going to air on mytypical Mondays because I want
to get this out as soon aspossible.
We are in the midst of SuicidePrevention Month, very now well
talked about within the industryNot well as in a positive light
, but it's become a lot morenoticed by a lot of people
(01:17):
throughout the industry, andespecially veterans within the
construction industry.
So I've got Brian and Thomas onwith me.
Brian is a returning guest, myfirst.
I feel like I should send you atrophy.
Yeah, very good.
So I'm going to ask Brian andThomas to introduce themselves
real quick.
Just a quick background on yourservice and what you do in the
(01:38):
construction industry, brian.
We'll start with you.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Sure, I was a long time ago, back 1988 to 92.
I was a member of the 3rdRanger Battalion, 75th Regiment,
so I spent my time as a ranger.
After I got out, I went toschool for a little while and
ended up back in construction,where I'd been most of my life
(02:03):
before the service anyway inconstruction, where I'd been
most of my life before theservice anyway.
And then a few years ago well,back in the early 2000s I became
a project manager and did thatfor almost 20 years.
And now I'm a consultant.
I help companies and teams andprojects have better outcomes
than they might normally have.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Very good, well said.
How about you, thomas?
I am Thomas LeMay.
I work at DPR.
My path's a little different.
I am a child of a veteran andof a career Navy guy and I would
like, uh, I would, I would liketo say that, uh, the GI bill,
definitely, uh, was the reasonwhy I'm here, because, uh, in
(02:53):
through that, through theprocess of that, uh, my father
met my mother and andimmediately went into the United
States Naval Reserve.
Uh, and then I was brought intothis world shortly thereafter.
So that's my part.
But Brian and I crossed pathson many, many.
(03:13):
Actually, we actually workedfor the same company for a good
while and didn't even know eachother.
But we crossed paths on theconstruction kind of the lean,
lean and continuous improvementgroups kind of online, and then
(03:33):
we just go from there.
So I'm happy you guys are.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
you're located in different spots, right?
So Brian you're down in SanAntonio, thomas you're in South
Carolina, is that correct?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
That's right, that's right yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Well, it's very neat how we can all get together and
do this and have a chat.
So reason I have these guys onis Brian had reached out to me.
He and Thomas are working on avery unique project.
He's kind of given a little bitof snippets here and there on
social media, but I want to letyou guys lead the charge here
and tell me about what we'rehere to talk about and what is
(04:09):
it you guys are working on.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
So we're working on a book aimed at foreman trade
foreman basically giving themsome tools and leadership tools
that they can use.
We feel like that there's ahuge gap there.
We both spent time in the field, like a lot of folks do, and we
(04:36):
feel like there's a huge gapthere.
You know that there's reallysomething missing.
So we've been working on thatfor a while and I don't know.
Go ahead and tell a little bitmore, thomas, and then I'll jump
in about how we got started, onwhy we're here today.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
I didn't even know you, Brian, and I was introduced
to some of your work.
And then Brian here he's awarrior poet, if no one knows
and go to rangerwinniecom andthat's what I did.
That's actually how I wasinitially introduced to Brian
(05:18):
here and there's some heavystuff in there and our chapter,
which we just recently posted,is right there alongside of it.
But what we're trying to do andwhat kind of maybe I encourage
Brian, I pulled on hisheartstrings, I go, I want to
write a book about small unitleadership and he's like oh yes,
(05:41):
it speaks to the ranger in him.
Yes, oh yeah, oh you know, itspeaks to the ranger in him.
Yes, oh yeah, oh, you know itright, the ranger in CO with
that, yeah.
And I'm like, and I was likeit's not about a lot and a lot
of the publications and booksand there's consultants out
(06:01):
there and they're all great.
And there's consultants outthere and they're all great.
They talk a lot about like, hey, we need to do process
improvement on a big scale, likewe need to get out GoPros and
we got to change entireoperations, or we have to change
our contracts or we have to buyreally expensive like pieces of
(06:25):
equipment, and those are allgood and I'm a big part of that.
But what I'm interested in nowis leaders who may not even like
think of themselves as a leader, but you work in a group of
maybe five to seven people.
But if you think about theworkers who work in groups in a
(06:50):
crew of like five to sevenpeople, think of like a foreman,
and our main character in thischapter and in the rest of this
book is he works in a framingand drywall crew.
So if you think about framingand drywall crew, you have
layout, you have detailers whodo you know, like the trim and
(07:13):
the backing, and then you havethe kind of production workers
who do work at height, and soyou have a lot of various jobs
and there's a lot of things thatneed to happen.
You have material moving andthen you have the flow of
information, and then you alsohave like change and then you
also have the element of danger.
(07:35):
And I was like I finally got tomeet Brian in person we were in
New Orleans and I was like, haveyou ever like seen one of these
kits?
And I was like showing him oneof these kits.
I think you take them to rangerschool, or probably it's for
officers that take them toranger school.
I think you were telling methis, but like it's string and
(07:57):
it's like um little magnets andand little things and you build
and you were like that's a sandtable.
And I was like no, this is likea logistic thing.
I'm like what I am reallyinterested in is that kind of
stuff.
It's you work in a small groupof people.
(08:19):
You don't have to have reallyexpensive things to do massive
change.
What I mean by that is like ifyou wanted to do better
organization of your workspace,you could just pick up trash off
the floor or rearrange thethings that are in your buggy or
(08:44):
in your scissor lift and makeit more efficient.
And then, once you do that it'slike, okay, now I can somehow
see that, I see that this islabeled here, this is here, and
I say like I need this and allof a sudden you say, okay, I
need this and I link thattogether.
And if you link that together,you suddenly need more people,
(09:08):
right?
So you start to work in a smallunit and this is like where I'm
like I have to think about this, but also think about this,
perhaps with more of an expertwho's been expertly trained in
this and and and and probablythe the world's most difficult
(09:29):
crucible both, both in theregimen and and in all your cool
guy schools that you've gone to, and and in activity.
But um, um.
So I just started to ask Brianthese questions and, and, and
he's been teaching me about thekind of things that that I've
listened and, and, being a childof a veteran, and maybe this is
(09:54):
this is something to talk abouthere just for a second.
But you've partitioned off yourlife.
So my father, vietnam, hepartitions that off.
I'm like pantomiming apartition and that's not even
talked about.
There might be.
His uniform is hung up in acloset, that's like in the guest
(10:16):
room and there might, and hisshadow box is like down in the
basement, like way in the corner, and that's it.
There's there's no othermention of it and both my
grandfather's ones, world War II, the other one's Korea, same
way, same way, um, so I like,and even if you tried to bring
it up, they changed the subject,but for whatever reason, brian
(10:39):
finally, like was willing totalk about it and I said it's
like you open the floodgates andthat's where we really went
into.
So we've started to combine theideas.
It's like, if you take smallunit leadership, small unit
tactics, these ways you move,the way you organize, even the
(11:01):
way you talk, like plansignaling, we talk, you talk
like plan plan signaling.
We talk about signaling likeusing your hands or the way you
mark studs.
It's similar to, perhaps, theway you would use smoke or talk
on the radio.
So we definitely like, reallyget into that and we break it
(11:24):
down and we use the and it's allfiction, but we use the stories
in there to teach some lessonsthat you can like immediately
take away, um, even in yoursmall unit and in your own
personal life.
And so we started this book andit starts in a heavy way and you
(11:46):
talked about that this week is,you know, construction
prevention week, constructionsuicide prevention week, and
then this month is suicideawareness week in the United
States overall, and we go rightat it and you have to have it be
a ranger to have violence ofaction.
(12:07):
And maybe I'll let Brian kind ofreflect a little more, but I
think that's the way, and thischapter is the genesis of the
rest of the book and it lurchesour character and his small unit
into change because of thissituation, a death, and it's
(12:28):
unexpected, and when you dealwith suicide you deal with
unexpected death.
Um, a lot of things suddenlythat were unseen suddenly become
incredibly seen, and a lot offacts that were once hidden,
(12:49):
like drug abuse or depression ornot feeling well or problems at
home, suddenly becomeincredibly clear once they're
gone, because that person whohas been hiding that can't do it
anymore because they're notthere.
And so what we want to say inthis chapter is you have to be
able to recognize when somebodyis hiding, you have to recognize
(13:11):
the signs.
And Uh, yeah, maybe I was, I'mgetting a little hung up here on
my words, but uh, you have to.
You have to recognize thosesigns.
So we, we, we started thischapter off and it's heavy right
off the front of the gate, butit's heavy for that reason that
it kind of pulls you into thisto the story.
(13:32):
I mean, I'll let Brian talk alittle more.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
It's the reason that we have changed Scott, you know,
for the for the rest of thebook have changed Scott, you
know for the for the rest of thebook.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Yeah, Brian, before you kind of get after it, um, I
will say so.
You guys released a sneak, asneak peek, of the book.
Um, I've seen it.
Uh, you shared on LinkedIn.
I plan on sharing it as well.
Um, it's like Thomas said, it'son Brian's website where he
writes some wonderful poetrythat's rangerwinniecom.
(14:02):
But you guys have done atremendous job of getting that
hook and it's it's it's heavy,Um, and it speaks to those of us
who, you know, served in thefield, um, who have lost people,
you know, in the field or or atwar, Uh, but I like that, the,
the turn you guys have reallyfocused on our industry,
specifically um, in the field oror at war, Um, but I like the,
the, the turn you guys havereally focused on our industry,
(14:23):
specifically um, and thestressors of that, and I'm just
like waiting to hear more.
I'm like, okay, give me thenext chapter.
So you guys have done atremendous job on getting that
hook in there right off the bat.
Um, so I appreciate that.
So, Brian, um, what do you wantto speak to about the book?
Speaker 2 (14:39):
well, let me, let me first say it's probably first
part, you know, first first partof next year, before the book
is done.
So just just, uh, uh, not goingto say there won't be any more
releases between now and then,we may, may, release a chapter
come on man now and then.
But uh, uh, for sure, uh, firstpart of next year, the whole
first taste is free.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Good you book will be done.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
First taste is free.
Good, you get them hooked right.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
First taste is free, I like it.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah, you know, I mean it's just let me read
something to you that I wrotevery early in this process with
Thomas, because it just kind oftells you why that we're doing
what we're doing.
As we look at a constructioncrew and a fire team side by
side, we can begin to see someways in which the structures and
the work itself are verysimilar.
(15:28):
A major similarity and much ofwhat drives people to do this
work, is that in bothprofessions, value is created by
the smallest units, who areclosest to the work.
The greatest impact we can haveon the work is at this level.
This is where transformationhappens.
That being the case, we mustfigure out how we can impact
these folks' lives in positiveways, as well as increase their
(15:51):
capacity for leadership.
Bad leadership at the executivelevel costs companies an
estimated $550 billion annually.
Bad leadership is alsopervasive in that bad leaders
tend to surround themselves withother bad leaders.
It becomes a compoundingproblem and ruins company
culture and, ultimately,people's lives, and that's what
(16:13):
we want to fight.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
But yeah, yeah, that's really good.
And, Brian, since we had ourepisode together on the
construction veteran, I'vegotten a chance to speak to a
lot of people.
And you're right, it's neatwhen I get to hear from folks
that have served at the tip ofthe spear, other special
operations folks and everybodyin between, how there's such a
(16:38):
similarity between the serviceand this industry.
But it boils down to it beingall about the people, and I mean
I hate to use the word resource, but they are the most
important resource, if you will,in this industry.
We can't do this without thepeople.
Um, so if people want to seethat um, uh, initial chapter of
(16:58):
the book, they can go torangerwinniecom.
And can you guys give us, justlike maybe, a snippet real quick
to hook them in there?
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Sure, yeah.
So the whole scene opens up, orthe chapter opens up on a
Sunday evening and EmilioStevens is our, our, our foreman
, and he was also an 82ndveteran.
I don't think we say where hewas a veteran, but we say he was
(17:28):
a veteran, he was.
He was also a veteran, servedin the, the, the global war on
terror, the GWAT wars, and youknow.
So he gets a notification on aSunday evening.
He's in his backyard and he'sjust sitting there.
(17:49):
You know we opened with himjust sitting there staring at
his phone, going, oh my God,he's just gotten notified that
(18:10):
one of his journeyman drywallpeople has just lost their life
to suicide and he's trying tofigure out what to do.
Right, and you know, firstthought goes out to his, the
guy's wife and kids.
And then, all of a sudden, youknow, because of what's, what's
happened in his life previously,he's in the middle of a
flashback, uh, you know, goingback to a time when he lost a
friend in in, uh war, in afirefight, and uh, you know he
(18:31):
wasn't there, so he didn't seeit happen, just like he didn't
see this happen.
And uh, you know it, just it,it it impacted him and uh, you
know it just it impacted him,and you know.
But what we see is he's he'sgot tools to use now.
So he starts, he goes and hesits down on his back patio when
he, you know, as soon as herecognized what's happening, and
(18:52):
he opens his meditation app andhe starts breathing.
He starts four, seven, eightbreathing, you know, four
seconds in, seven seconds ofholding, and then eight seconds
out, slowly, and he just startsdoing that, you know, until he
can get on top of it.
And then, you know, from there,the next scene we see is the
next morning when he's got toinform the crew and there we
(19:15):
start to see some of the signsthat were apparent that we
didn't really nobody looked at.
Because why, you know?
Why would they?
And you know.
And then from there we go tothe funeral and you know he has
a conversation with Alberto, isthe person who died.
He has a conversation with herwife, you know.
(19:36):
And then we go a little furtheralong and he's gone and taken a
class on how to approach thisand how to talk to people who
may be in distress, and he'skind of on a not a great project
, you can kind of tell.
We start to get ideas aboutthis here, that his project
(19:57):
isn't all that great because thesuperintendent that's that's
there is kind of he's like whenare you replacing him?
When are you replacing Alberto?
When are we getting thatreplacement in?
You know what I mean.
Just like the day after, uh,you know, and then and then was
like pretty angry that they allmissed because of the funeral.
You know that his whole crewmissed because of funeral and
stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
So he's a villain.
I don't like that.
Guy already have to read he'snot.
He's not, seems like it atfirst.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
It's, it's the industry that's the villain.
To be honest with you, you knowit really is.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Let's talk about that .
I want to.
Um, thomas, I'm gonna kick itover to you real quick.
So we both work for ratherlarge companies.
Um, what do you think we'redoing wrong and what can we do
better?
I mean, I have my own ideas,but we're just driving people
into the ground literally.
Um, and that's what we'refocusing on here.
What's your take?
Speaker 1 (20:47):
it's systematic.
What I mean by that and I saythis a lot um, there are some
roles, roles in our industrythat the the.
Even if you're working superhard and you're the only thing
that you can do is work hard,like come in early and stay late
(21:12):
and get after it and really getinto drawings and this is the
only thing that you can do, andthat thing that you're doing is
making everything worse becauseyou're getting tired, you're
getting stressed and you'remaking mistakes.
But the demand, meaning thesystem, is you need to be here.
(21:34):
You need to be here super early, you need to be here late.
You need to disappear whenreally important people show up.
You also need to be here late.
You need to disappear when youknow really important people
show up.
You also need to do these wackyhours because we can't disrupt.
You know something else that isseemingly more important
because it costs money orwhatever things.
(21:56):
So a lot of the things that weput people into into our system
are terribly designed for humanbeings, and I'll give you one
example, and that's drillingoverhead and electricians and
plumbers, mechanical workersthey do this a lot.
(22:17):
You have your arm above yourheart and they do this a lot
where they, you know you haveyour arm above your heart and
you're, and they do this all daylong, and usually you're on, uh
, some kind of elevated devicelike a scissor lift or baker
scaffold or, worse, a ladder,and so you're, it's, it's just,
it's very injurious to your body.
So if you do that all day andthat's you know, that's what you
(22:39):
were lined out to do, even ifyou did a really good job like
you're a super accurate andyou're super highly productive
like you you've wiped yourselfout.
All of your energy is wiped out, and so when you go home, one,
you're probably covered insilica dust and two, you're
tired, and so you go home toyour family and there's almost
(23:04):
nothing left of you.
And not to mention, um, a lotof our workers almost half of
them, and probably that'sprobably more than half nowadays
commute more than two hourseach way, and that's it's.
It's really hard, like, how dowe fix that?
Speaker 2 (23:24):
like geez, we talk about that in the story too yes,
we talk about the energy drinksyeah, I mean go to go to go to
any convenience store at 5 30 inthe morning.
Who do you see there and whatare they buying?
Speaker 1 (23:37):
yeah, yeah so we actually yeah, so that's in like
the fourth section, so likepart of the system that.
So one thing-.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Drink those all day.
Then you got to drink a sixpack of beer to go to sleep.
Right, we take yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
So if you work 10 hours and you commute for four
hours and you're, by the way,you're supposed to, like you
know, have a life, so, like,where do you sleep in this, like
you, don't you?
Actually our workers will takea part of their, you know,
required sleep out, and all ofthe studies have shown if you
don't get that, last, and it'sthe in those last two hours of
(24:15):
sleep is the most beneficial tohuman health, and if you don't
get it, you get really poorquality sleep.
So to feel better is to reachfor, you know, substances.
The easiest one is when you'refilling up gas on the way into
work.
Energy drinks are right thereand they just it's false.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
And since it's a two-hour drive home, you've got
to get gas on the way home.
So you start that 12-pack rightthere.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Yeah, you're in reverse and we wanted to talk
about that in this chapterbecause it feeds into you and
it's in this chapter.
If you've ever dealt withsomeone who's passed, especially
an unexpected death, it'sreally, it's really unsettling
(25:03):
and you live.
You live your life in kind ofscenes and especially this
happened to me you live yourlife in scenes.
So we wanted to have these kindof quick, hitting, uh kind of
sections in this chapter, kindof sections in this chapter and
they start with a.
It starts with kind of like aschedule.
(25:24):
It's like two and a half weekson a Wednesday afternoon and it
builds and then they get alittle longer and they get a
little longer.
There's more time in between,but you live your life in
between the scenes.
What you don't see in thischapter you still need to go
(25:45):
call in that in-wall inspection.
We still got to pour concreteon friday, like that never ends
right, we got it.
You know we have a majordelivery that's got to get
hooked up to the tower crane andmove to the roof and that's we
got a, we got a window, we haveapproval by the city.
We really have one chance.
So, like you have to kind oftake life I was talking about my
(26:05):
father partitioning off it'sthe same thing with construction
.
You take that your life andjust put it on hold while this
thing has to happen.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
And I would be willing to bet that most
construction dudes probablydon't talk about how shitty
their day was with their wifeeither most of the time, oh yeah
you know, I mean I bring thatcrap home with you, right?
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (26:30):
I'm ashamed to tell you how many energy drinks I had
today, to be quite honest and II do say that tongue in cheek,
but in all seriousness when Ireached for my second energy
drink today, I went man, Ireally shouldn't be doing this
because it was because of thebook and I'm like man, I really.
I got to do something different, get better quality sleep.
And you know, thomas, to yourpoint it's, you're always on,
(26:52):
but I think there's always thisunspoken expectation for
perfection.
That's another very difficultpart of our, our industry.
And we're human, you know wemake mistakes, and I think
personally me as a leader.
When somebody makes a mistake,I try to be human and hey man,
it just don't do it again.
It happens.
(27:13):
You screwed up big deal, youlearned to understand how it
happened.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Can we make?
Sure that it doesn't happenagain.
Speaker 3 (27:19):
If you make it 10 more times, then we're going to
have a completely differentconversation.
But you know, I think that that, to me, is what really stands
out and it really ruins yourmental health.
There's this expectation thateverything is going to go right,
and it never goes right on anyproject.
I mean it would.
It sounds great, but drawingswill have some issues.
It's going to happen.
(27:40):
You're going to have peoplethat don't show up to work.
There's going to be somequality issues, no matter how
hard you try.
But what I appreciate about thefirst chapter of the book that
you guys release is how he'staking that turn as a leader and
really enforcing hey, I'm goingto make sure my guys are
healthy and whole.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
So I'm really excited to see what's next for his
journey.
I guess my contribution to whatThomas said would be go talk to
any group of people who work inconstruction and find out
anybody that you talk to whoworks less than 50 hours a week.
And that's from the top all theway down, and it's it's almost
non-existent.
(28:24):
Uh, and they've done all thesestudies that say that working
all these hours is really reallybad for you, you know, bad for
your health, and we don't do itfor short periods of time, we do
it for whole careers and it'scrazy.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
I, you know that has been the mentality for so long
and I think maybe it's crazy.
I, you know that has been thementality for so long and I
think maybe it's changing.
I don't know.
I hope it is.
I hope it is.
I definitely, yeah, Iabsolutely hope it is.
But one thing that I can do is Ican take care of myself and I'm
not going to, I'm not going towork myself to death, and if
that causes me to not make thenext promotion, so be it.
I want my family life healthy,you know.
(29:00):
I want my kids to know who I am, because I know way too many
people and I'm sure you guys dotoo that they'll do these crazy
70, 80 hour weeks, like do youhate your family or what are you
?
What are you doing?
Man, nobody's asking you towork these hours.
Um, and I it took me a littlewhile to finally put my foot
down as a superintendent to sayno, you're not, you're not
working four hours extra tonightI got to go home, just like you
(29:23):
do.
It's not my fault, you know,and I was letting people take
advantage of me, and I think wedo that a lot in leadership.
Um, yeah, it's no big deal Worktwo extra hours here, four
extra hours there Cause you gotto get the job done.
I don't think we're leading thejob very well If that's the
case, if we're working thesecrazy hours.
And what's unique that I'vefound is when I started holding
(29:46):
people to those hours like guys.
We're not going to work anymorein 10 hours period.
Eight hours is the goal.
We're not going to work anymorein 10 hours a day.
And you start to see this shiftin people that you know guys
like OT I get that, but it's notall about the money.
Guys and you start gettingbetter production out of them.
They have a better family life.
Um, there's all kinds of thingswe can go into.
(30:08):
I got a question about the book.
Was there something specificthat really like?
What was the impetus to writethis specific story about this
individual?
Speaker 2 (30:18):
I don't, I'm trying to think, I think so this was
like one of the last chaptersthat we've even started on.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
This one got backed into.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Yeah, we sort of backed into this, you know.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
I mean, I knew.
So I knew I wanted to dosomething for construction
suicide prevention week, becauseI've done something for the
last three years, just you know,done whatever.
(30:54):
And it just came to me.
I just started having thesethoughts.
It's like because we, you know,emilio's the guy and we talk
about him like he's a person allthe time between Thomas and I,
like he's someone we know.
But you know, it's like what isthe impetus for them to change?
What is driving them to want,you know, to even need to change
?
Because you know, usually ittakes a shovel to the head to
(31:17):
kind of get people to want tochange, because change sucks and
change is hard and you know youhave to practice at it.
It's, you know, like it's notsomething that we're just really
naturally do, because we runaway from change often, as often
as we can.
I mean I can't tell you howmany times that I worked with
people on construction sitesthat as soon as something
(31:37):
changed on the construction site, it blew them away because they
couldn't figure out how tochange gears in their mind.
You know the plan needs tochange and you know, and that's
really where it came from and itjust, it was something that
started sitting on my heart.
You know that this is what Iwanted us to do.
So I approached Thomas about itand I said, thomas, well, no, I
(31:59):
think I actually wrote it first,didn't I?
And then said, yeah, so I wrotelike some of it out, like the
first two parts of it orsomething like that, and gave it
to Thomas, and Thomas was like,yeah, this is it like that.
And gave it to Thomas andThomas was like, yeah, this is
it.
And then, you know, we started,you know, going back and forth
and and you know and it'ssomething that both of us have
kind of remarked on it's like Ican't tell you what parts I
(32:23):
wrote and what parts Thomaswrote.
It's just it's been that kind ofpartnership and it's taken us a
while to get there.
Don't get me wrong, but it's I.
There isn't.
There isn't a division.
I mean, it's just we both wroteit, and other people have asked
me about that too.
You know how do you do thatwith a co-writer?
I don't think I could, and it'slike I didn't think I could
(32:43):
either, but it's just, Icouldn't tell you what I wrote
and what Thomas wrote, to behonest.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Yeah, it's.
I really enjoyed that, thatfirst chapter you guys release,
and I'll say, if the rest of thebook is anything like that,
then I hope every C-suiteexecutive on down reads this
thing, because I think it could.
It could cause some majorchanges.
But my question, thomas, I'llkick it to you.
Um, if people are listening tothis and they're going, yeah,
(33:09):
this sounds all good and well,what can I do, regardless of
their, their rank, if you will,in the structure, what, what,
what can somebody physically dotomorrow to make a difference?
Speaker 1 (33:20):
at the bottom, the, the last section, it's.
It's really fleeting, but, um,if you had the opportunity, go
down.
It's like the show notes,author's notes, author's notes.
And it starts off with thethird stanza of the Ranger Creed
(33:41):
.
As a civilian, that stanzagives me chills Gives me chills
too, so that's okay.
I probably didn't have to dopush-ups while saying it, but
it's like never shall I fail mycomrades.
Like never, never.
There's not like.
(34:05):
Those guys over there areassholes, right, If you have
that true mindset that I willnever fail those guys.
I might struggle and I mighthave issues.
They're still going to beassholes, yes, oh, no doubt.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
But you still don't fail them either.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Yeah, I struggled and I say this publicly now, but I
struggled with mental illness,with panic disorder and anxiety,
and I would go, I would used tohave panic attacks and this
happened through all geez,probably the first 15 years of
(34:44):
my career before I finally gothelp.
And the only reason I got helpwas somebody finally caught me
passed out.
Only reason I got help wassomebody finally caught me
passed out.
I wasn't able to hide because Iwas on the floor unconscious,
and if you don't know what apanic attack is, it's an
imbalance and for me anyways,it's different for many people,
(35:06):
but it's a chemical imbalance.
Is what happened to your body?
Your body is feeling attackedand so your fight or flight
mechanisms in your, in yourbrain and in your hormone system
and in your nervous system kickin and your, your, your body
goes into protection mode andone of the ways it does it, and
does it for me, is it's like Ijust hold my breath and I will
(35:29):
pass out.
I'm like a possum, I guess, butI don't know how that's being
very protective, but there'spanic attacks, there's anxiety
attacks.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
Anxiety attacks are very different and they're more
what I suffer in my mentalillness.
They're more like a ramp up toget there, like that building,
building, building, and that'ssort of like how the anxiety is
a little bit different.
But go up, go on, thomas.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
Yeah.
So I want people to know thatbecause and you have to if
people are struggling mentally,they're not going to do it in
the middle of the OAC meeting.
Okay, you might break down andhave a mental breakdown and cry
or something, but you're notgoing to.
Typically it's not going tohappen in a social setting, but
(36:21):
it will most definitely happenin a hidden aspect.
In our job sites.
There's a lot of hiding spotsand on the website and maybe you
can include this as thethumbnail but we show a Connex
box and you look into it andit's sturdy and it's messy and
(36:49):
there's some moldy cardboardthat's on the floor.
Um, don't forget the coffee cup.
And I'll get to the coffee cupand and so the coffee cup sets
me off.
So there's a coffee cup justset right on the the edge and
you would, you would set thatand the reason why that coffee
(37:12):
cup.
And then this isn't my picture,but I I just it.
It triggers me because thiswould be something I would do
and I want to share this withpeople that you would set your
coffee cup there on the edgebecause you didn't want to spill
it when you're about to passout, nor did you want any of the
mold and dust and, you know, inthe death zone inside that
(37:32):
thing to get into your coffee,because that's gross.
This is what a person whosuffers mentally like seriously
goes through, and that's thatplace is where people suffer on
job sites.
I would also do it instairwells, and the reason why I
would do it in a stairwell isbecause you could hear people
(37:53):
coming up or down so you couldjust shoot out the door.
If you were at least on yourfeet, if you were sitting down,
you could be like oh, I was justwalking up 10 flights of stairs
, I'm just resting.
Checking messages on my phone.
Yeah, in the after actionreview, aar.
(38:13):
I thought that was cool, thatwas a good ad, brian.
We talk about it.
We said it's often hidden and Iwant people to know.
The thing that you can takeaway and do tomorrow, scott, is
look for it, because it's theworst thing.
It's hidden.
Number one and two we don'tlook for it.
(38:36):
So if one thing is hidden andtwo, we don't look for it, then
it'll never be found until itemerges.
And a suicide is an emergentthing.
It's just like a roof leakright, like you don't think
(38:58):
about a really poorly executedroofing detail around a roof
drain until it rains threeinches in one day.
And then, all of a sudden, it'slike why didn't we do the
inspection on the roofing Right?
It suddenly becomes so clear,but it's too late.
All of your insulation on yourroof is ruined and you have to
(39:21):
do all kinds of crazy rework.
The problem with suicide isforever.
There's no going back, there'sno rework, there's no rework,
it's forever.
There's no rework, there's norework, it's forever.
So in the next bullet afterthat, that impulsive decision,
that decision that I choosedeath over any other outcome
(39:43):
that can kill me.
And so if it's a hidden issueand no one's looking for it, or
like we go out of our way, notlike like we, we go our way to
ignore it, then that that's justas bad as as the act of suicide
in, in my opinion.
(40:04):
So like we have to like.
This week is so importantbecause it raises awareness of
it, but since this is towardsthe end of the week, what's
really important is that nextweek we don't stop or we don't
forget.
We take action.
And it's free.
You don't need anything, anyother thing aside from reading
this website, but you can gothere.
(40:27):
There's no paywall.
Speaker 3 (40:30):
Well, what I do appreciate too that you guys
talked about in that firstchapter and I'm not giving
anything away, cause it's outthere in the ether, if you will
but how he?
He went up to that gentlemanand just, uh, the the other
tradesmen, and said, hey, what'sgoing on, like you could tell
something's different.
And we, we, I think we seethose signs, but a lot of us
(40:51):
aren't humble enough to go upand say something.
And so you know, we're all inthis together and I try to talk
to our tradesmen about that too.
Hey, I know you guys can allcollectively hate me and that's
the general contractor, and wesay that tongue in cheek, but
it's we're, we really are inthis together and we're one team
.
And I'm looking out for you andI see you guys more than I do
(41:12):
my own family.
So I can tell when you're in abad mood, uh, way better than I
can tell if my own wife is in abad mood, but that's a whole
other story.
But you know, you can tell whensomebody comes in and they're
either overly chipper or they'rejust down in the dumps.
And so I think and Brian, I, Ithink you might agree with this
(41:32):
You've got a couple more grayhairs than Thomas and I pepper
Um, but you've seen the industrychange.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
No, no, this is, this is all.
You bleach it.
Speaker 3 (41:43):
Um, but I think, even in the last decade I'd say
maybe even five years thatthings have changed where
talking about your mental healthhas become a lot more
acceptable Um, taking mentalhealth days, or companies
offering things like freetherapy sessions, things like
(42:04):
that Um, so I, I, I think we'redoing a good job talking about
it more, but talking about itisn't preventing it, I think
talking to the individual isreally what's going to help.
Speaker 1 (42:16):
There's so much good that's happened now.
We have employee resourcesgroups, we have mental health
professionals that come to likeat DPR, many of our job sites,
DPR, like many of our job sites,we've had people like Brian who
are certified and to teachingpeople to recognize a sign
happen.
(42:36):
And we're not the only ones.
It's happening all over Likethat's all great.
That got us to now theawareness, the websites, the
LinkedIn posts it hasn't changedthe number at all.
People like yes, yes.
People like yes, yes, we needto find those.
What is it?
53 people out of every hundredthousand.
(42:56):
We have to talk directly tothem, so like to find them.
We have to get in so many moremediums.
We've got to get into huddles,get on walls, get in books, get
in websites, be on the radio,get in movies.
Like we just can't stop you.
Just all of the stuff thatwe've gotten to got us to today
(43:18):
and that was really amazing,amazing work.
But now we can't stop untilthat thing is that's zero.
And then, once it's zero, let'smove on to another industry.
Speaker 3 (43:28):
Yeah, yeah, brian, I think it might've been the
episode you and I did togetherwhere we were talking about
people traveling and justespecially the travelers.
Man, I really feel for them andI've traveled a few times in my
career and it just, it'll eatyou alive.
And I've had my own mentalhealth struggles, especially
during travel.
Um, I've been very open aboutmy alcoholism and it came to a
(43:50):
head the last job I traveled forand it just, it got worse and
worse and I'm thinking, oh, it'sno big deal, but that could
have led me down a really muchdarker path.
Who knows what could havehappened.
But I'm not ashamed to talkabout this stuff because I want
people out there to hear hey,you're not alone, you really
aren't.
I mean, we say that and itsounds super cliche, but we're
(44:11):
all going through this craptogether.
Speaker 2 (44:14):
Thomas is traveling right now.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
Oh, no, poor Thomas.
Speaker 2 (44:20):
That's why there's nothing on the walls behind him.
Speaker 3 (44:23):
Oh nice.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
But we were actually we were talking about that just
a little bit ago.
Um, like I am away from homeduring the week, um, but uh,
like I have many, many comfortsthat uh, a lot of people, um, do
not, do not even though.
Speaker 3 (44:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (44:46):
Yeah, when you're the guy who's traveling yeah, yeah,
I mean, if you're the new guy20 year old, you know, labor or
whatnot and traveling for justabove minimum wage and making
that per diem, that's all welland good.
But, like you guys said, you'regoing out, you're drinking all
these energy drinks and you'regetting drunk, feeling like crap
the next day, and that's atough life.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
And the sad fact is, sleeping in a hotel with
probably two, three other guysYep.
Speaker 3 (45:13):
And it happens a lot more than people want to admit.
I mean that that is very commonin our industry and it's, it's
sad, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (45:22):
And also it's hidden also and we don't look for it,
we don't talk about it.
It's one of those hidden things.
Everybody just knows that ithappens and nobody says anything
, or you know it's.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
It's one of those hidden things.
Everybody just knows that ithappens and nobody says anything
, or you know it's.
It's, um, yeah, like one onething that we really can use
more awareness and and you justmentioned it like the travelers,
but it's not the people withthe, the the easy street.
Uh, you know that I'm the shinyboots now guy, even though I do
(45:52):
take a construction selfie onthe job site once in a while,
but um but uh yeah, it's thepipe crews.
Put me in pipe crews.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
They get after it.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
Um, but they're in the heat.
I mean I'm here in SouthCarolina and I mean you're, it's
a hundred degrees, you're downin a ditch or no breeze.
I mean it's 100 degrees, you'redown in a ditch, there's no
breeze, and the thing that theyhave to go back to to rest is
like a hotel room that theyshare with the same dudes that
they're in the ditch with allday, probably Not a healthy
(46:23):
environment.
Yeah, and probably a 30 rack ofkeystones between them.
Speaker 3 (46:30):
You happen to get just a fight on the job site
with that same guy.
Now you got to deal with himand you talk about stress going
through the roof.
Speaker 1 (46:37):
Yeah, it's uh, yeah, it's, it's, it's difficult and
that it all, it all kind ofcombines, um, and you don't see
that because it's not on,there's no place for that once
you leave the gate right.
Um, we expect, I mean I expectthat same pipe crew I was
(46:58):
talking to this afternoon,tomorrow morning 6 am be be, you
know, sober, alert and readyfor the safety briefing, because
we're going to get back aftertomorrow and probably again on
Saturday.
Definitely get back on Saturdayif it's dry, and that's just
the way.
That's just how we work in ourindustry.
(47:19):
I'm sure it's the same waywhere you work.
I'm sure it's the same way inTexas where Brian is.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
Scott's in Texas also .
He's just up in the Dallas-FortWorth area.
Speaker 3 (47:29):
Yeah, the ritzy part, I guess of Texas.
I don't claim Dallas, thoughI'm far enough south.
Even though I live near Dallas.
Speaker 1 (47:36):
But it was the same way in San Francisco, california
, where I used to work, and it'sno different here in the great
state of Georgia or SouthCarolina, I don't care who's
telling you what on the internetor TV.
There is good people everywherewe go.
Yeah, yeah absolutely.
Speaker 3 (47:59):
Well, gentlemen, I really appreciate your time.
I'm going to wrap it up here.
One final question for both ofyou.
So where can people get moreinvolved and get behind this
message and support you guys?
Can people get?
Speaker 1 (48:12):
more involved and get behind this message and support
you guys.
You got to say it.
It was Brian's idea.
He just dropped it on Monday,but but drop it again.
Speaker 2 (48:20):
It's at rangerwinniecom.
You can find it.
You can find the link on mywebsite.
You can.
You can talk to us there.
You know, to be honest, I got acall today from a guy in
distress and it's heartbreaking.
(48:42):
You know this industry and itgoes from one end to the other.
This suicide issue we have.
It's from the labor to the CEO.
It's not just affecting oneportion of our workforce, it's
affecting everybody.
The stress and the stuff thatwe have on our jobs is just so,
so high.
Self-care, self-care, self-careso important.
(49:04):
Please do it, take care ofyourselves.
And yeah, you can find me onLinkedIn.
My company's name is FieldDriven Lean.
You can look me up there.
Brian Winningham, I'll give youall the links.
Speaker 3 (49:20):
I'll share everything if you guys hadn't heard Brian
and I chatting last year.
It's crazy.
It's already been over a yearprobably, but if you hadn't
heard that episode, I'dencourage everybody to go listen
to that.
Thomas, I know we're connectedon LinkedIn.
I'll be sure to share yourprofile there as well.
I wouldn't be surprised if youguys have some people reaching
(49:40):
out, and same with me.
If anybody ever wants to talk,I'm open man.
It's whatever you want to sayto me behind closed doors or
over the phone, let's discuss.
Speaker 2 (49:51):
Well, I became this year, because this means so much
to me.
I became a mental health firstaid instructor.
Speaker 1 (49:57):
Oh cool.
Speaker 2 (49:57):
So I'm yeah, I'm like , I said like a friend of mine
that meant well, and you know weposted it on LinkedIn and he
came on and said something aboutyou know, thank you for raising
awareness, and I said you knowI I appreciate your support, but
this isn't awareness, this isaction.
We're taking action now becausewe can't just continually just
(50:20):
raise awareness.
We have to take action, amen.
Speaker 3 (50:24):
Good stuff.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
That's um, that's the .
The.
Why I went to Brian and I waslike I want to talk to you about
smaller unit leadership,because I knew I was like he
would do it.
He's like, yeah, I would do itand be encouraged to do it.
I am so incredibly grateful foris for those people who have
(50:52):
dedicated all of their lives andsome of them the ultimate
sacrifice, into the military.
That's why I'm honored to be onyour podcast, scott.
But it's important to also knowthat you have to take action and
that's why we put in the in the, at the towards the end.
(51:12):
It's like it's the same reasonwhy airlines want you to put
your oxygen mask on first.
If you pass out, if you'repassed out in the hallway or in
the in the connex, you can'thelp anybody else.
So if you're struggling, ifyou're, if you're even just
feeling just a little bit uneasy, you got to take action and use
(51:36):
those techniques that you'velearned, those breathing
exercises, those resources, yourbattle buddy, those kind of
things.
Call a friend, call me or Brian, hit up Scott, hit us in the
DMs and we'll write you back.
Yeah, call me or Brian, hit upScott, hit us in the DMs.
Speaker 3 (51:51):
Slide in the DMs.
Speaker 1 (51:53):
And we'll write you back.
Speaker 3 (51:54):
Yeah, no, that's really well said, man.
Take care of yourself.
Make sure you're good first,yeah.
Speaker 1 (52:00):
Take care of yourself first, 100%.
And that way and I've said thisbefore if you think about the
things that a human being needsto survive, and that's water,
that's food, that's sleep, ifyou, if you're, if you're
missing those things at work,like if you're, if you're not
(52:23):
getting clean water, you can'teven breathe, like you're,
you're breathing in dust andit's okay.
Like, why don't you man up likeit's a little drywall, dust,
leave immediately.
There is no place for that.
Or if, like, if you're workingat a place where it's like you
can't get clean access to water,somebody asks you there's no
(52:44):
place for that.
It's not protected any of thatjust don't do it not, there is
no place for that right.
And then so also be aware andthat's that's, from a safety
standpoint, your health like,protect your body there, but
also protect your body from yourown mind, and that your mind is
very powerful.
It's like a supercomputer.
(53:05):
It'll trick your own body.
So, um, you have to seek helpbecause you can't even overcome
it.
I'm standing here today to havetestimony that seeking help you
can't even sometimes do ityourself.
You've got to be thrust into it.
But be open to it, and it's avery manly thing to do, is what
(53:26):
I want to say, because beingaround for your family, uh, down
, you know, down at later on inlife is what it's all about
really, is what it's truly aboutthat, that, that 3am poor that
we got in like three and a halfyears ago, I don't even remember
it barely Like I remember beingpissed off and that was it.
(53:49):
So it was not an achievement.
So, um, take care of yourself.
That's all I got.
Thank you so much, scott, andthank thanks everybody.
Speaker 3 (53:57):
Thanks, scott, thank you guys.
but also protect your body from your own mind, and
that your mind is very powerful.
It's like a supercomputer.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
It'll trick your own body this is the construction
veteran podcast, connecting andcelebrating veterans in
construction now.
Now, here's your host, scottFriend.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Welcome back to a special episode of the
Construction Veteran, where Italk with Thomas LeMay and Brian
Winningham about a very sombersubject, but one that needs to
be discussed in the constructionindustry mental health and
taking of one's own life.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Thomas, and Brian.
How are you guys Doing?
Fantastic Doing great.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Very good.
Well, this is a unique episode.
This is not going to air on mytypical Mondays because I want
to get this out as soon aspossible.
We are in the midst of SuicidePrevention Month, very now well
talked about within the industryNot well as in a positive light
, but it's become a lot morenoticed by a lot of people
(01:17):
throughout the industry, andespecially veterans within the
construction industry.
So I've got Brian and Thomas onwith me.
Brian is a returning guest, myfirst.
I feel like I should send you atrophy.
Yeah, very good.
So I'm going to ask Brian andThomas to introduce themselves
real quick.
Just a quick background on yourservice and what you do in the
(01:38):
construction industry, brian.
We'll start with you.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Sure, I was a long time ago, back 1988 to 92.
I was a member of the 3rdRanger Battalion, 75th Regiment,
so I spent my time as a ranger.
After I got out, I went toschool for a little while and
ended up back in construction,where I'd been most of my life
(02:03):
before the service anyway inconstruction, where I'd been
most of my life before theservice anyway.
And then a few years ago well,back in the early 2000s I became
a project manager and did thatfor almost 20 years.
And now I'm a consultant.
I help companies and teams andprojects have better outcomes
than they might normally have.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Very good, well said.
How about you, thomas?
I am Thomas LeMay.
I work at DPR.
My path's a little different.
I am a child of a veteran andof a career Navy guy and I would
like, uh, I would, I would liketo say that, uh, the GI bill,
definitely, uh, was the reasonwhy I'm here, because, uh, in
(02:53):
through that, through theprocess of that, uh, my father
met my mother and andimmediately went into the United
States Naval Reserve.
Uh, and then I was brought intothis world shortly thereafter.
So that's my part.
But Brian and I crossed pathson many, many.
(03:13):
Actually, we actually workedfor the same company for a good
while and didn't even know eachother.
But we crossed paths on theconstruction kind of the lean,
lean and continuous improvementgroups kind of online, and then
(03:33):
we just go from there.
So I'm happy you guys are.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
you're located in different spots, right?
So Brian you're down in SanAntonio, thomas you're in South
Carolina, is that correct?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
That's right, that's right yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Well, it's very neat how we can all get together and
do this and have a chat.
So reason I have these guys onis Brian had reached out to me.
He and Thomas are working on avery unique project.
He's kind of given a little bitof snippets here and there on
social media, but I want to letyou guys lead the charge here
and tell me about what we'rehere to talk about and what is
(04:09):
it you guys are working on.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
So we're working on a book aimed at foreman trade
foreman basically giving themsome tools and leadership tools
that they can use.
We feel like that there's ahuge gap there.
We both spent time in the field, like a lot of folks do, and we
(04:36):
feel like there's a huge gapthere.
You know that there's reallysomething missing.
So we've been working on thatfor a while and I don't know.
Go ahead and tell a little bitmore, thomas, and then I'll jump
in about how we got started, onwhy we're here today.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
I didn't even know you, Brian, and I was introduced
to some of your work.
And then Brian here he's awarrior poet, if no one knows
and go to rangerwinniecom andthat's what I did.
That's actually how I wasinitially introduced to Brian
(05:18):
here and there's some heavystuff in there and our chapter,
which we just recently posted,is right there alongside of it.
But what we're trying to do andwhat kind of maybe I encourage
Brian, I pulled on hisheartstrings, I go, I want to
write a book about small unitleadership and he's like oh yes,
(05:41):
it speaks to the ranger in him.
Yes, oh yeah, oh you know, itspeaks to the ranger in him.
Yes, oh yeah, oh, you know itright, the ranger in CO with
that, yeah.
And I'm like, and I was likeit's not about a lot and a lot
of the publications and booksand there's consultants out
(06:01):
there and they're all great.
And there's consultants outthere and they're all great.
They talk a lot about like, hey, we need to do process
improvement on a big scale, likewe need to get out GoPros and
we got to change entireoperations, or we have to change
our contracts or we have to buyreally expensive like pieces of
(06:25):
equipment, and those are allgood and I'm a big part of that.
But what I'm interested in nowis leaders who may not even like
think of themselves as a leader, but you work in a group of
maybe five to seven people.
But if you think about theworkers who work in groups in a
(06:50):
crew of like five to sevenpeople, think of like a foreman,
and our main character in thischapter and in the rest of this
book is he works in a framingand drywall crew.
So if you think about framingand drywall crew, you have
layout, you have detailers whodo you know, like the trim and
(07:13):
the backing, and then you havethe kind of production workers
who do work at height, and soyou have a lot of various jobs
and there's a lot of things thatneed to happen.
You have material moving andthen you have the flow of
information, and then you alsohave like change and then you
also have the element of danger.
(07:35):
And I was like I finally got tomeet Brian in person we were in
New Orleans and I was like, haveyou ever like seen one of these
kits?
And I was like showing him oneof these kits.
I think you take them to rangerschool, or probably it's for
officers that take them toranger school.
I think you were telling methis, but like it's string and
(07:57):
it's like um little magnets andand little things and you build
and you were like that's a sandtable.
And I was like no, this is likea logistic thing.
I'm like what I am reallyinterested in is that kind of
stuff.
It's you work in a small groupof people.
(08:19):
You don't have to have reallyexpensive things to do massive
change.
What I mean by that is like ifyou wanted to do better
organization of your workspace,you could just pick up trash off
the floor or rearrange thethings that are in your buggy or
(08:44):
in your scissor lift and makeit more efficient.
And then, once you do that it'slike, okay, now I can somehow
see that, I see that this islabeled here, this is here, and
I say like I need this and allof a sudden you say, okay, I
need this and I link thattogether.
And if you link that together,you suddenly need more people,
(09:08):
right?
So you start to work in a smallunit and this is like where I'm
like I have to think about this, but also think about this,
perhaps with more of an expertwho's been expertly trained in
this and and and and probablythe the world's most difficult
(09:29):
crucible both, both in theregimen and and in all your cool
guy schools that you've gone to, and and in activity.
But um, um.
So I just started to ask Brianthese questions and, and, and
he's been teaching me about thekind of things that that I've
listened and, and, being a childof a veteran, and maybe this is
(09:54):
this is something to talk abouthere just for a second.
But you've partitioned off yourlife.
So my father, vietnam, hepartitions that off.
I'm like pantomiming apartition and that's not even
talked about.
There might be.
His uniform is hung up in acloset, that's like in the guest
(10:16):
room and there might, and hisshadow box is like down in the
basement, like way in the corner, and that's it.
There's there's no othermention of it and both my
grandfather's ones, world War II, the other one's Korea, same
way, same way, um, so I like,and even if you tried to bring
it up, they changed the subject,but for whatever reason, brian
(10:39):
finally, like was willing totalk about it and I said it's
like you open the floodgates andthat's where we really went
into.
So we've started to combine theideas.
It's like, if you take smallunit leadership, small unit
tactics, these ways you move,the way you organize, even the
(11:01):
way you talk, like plansignaling, we talk, you talk
like plan plan signaling.
We talk about signaling likeusing your hands or the way you
mark studs.
It's similar to, perhaps, theway you would use smoke or talk
on the radio.
So we definitely like, reallyget into that and we break it
(11:24):
down and we use the and it's allfiction, but we use the stories
in there to teach some lessonsthat you can like immediately
take away, um, even in yoursmall unit and in your own
personal life.
And so we started this book andit starts in a heavy way and you
(11:46):
talked about that this week is,you know, construction
prevention week, constructionsuicide prevention week, and
then this month is suicideawareness week in the United
States overall, and we go rightat it and you have to have it be
a ranger to have violence ofaction.
(12:07):
And maybe I'll let Brian kind ofreflect a little more, but I
think that's the way, and thischapter is the genesis of the
rest of the book and it lurchesour character and his small unit
into change because of thissituation, a death, and it's
(12:28):
unexpected, and when you dealwith suicide you deal with
unexpected death.
Um, a lot of things suddenlythat were unseen suddenly become
incredibly seen, and a lot offacts that were once hidden,
(12:49):
like drug abuse or depression ornot feeling well or problems at
home, suddenly becomeincredibly clear once they're
gone, because that person whohas been hiding that can't do it
anymore because they're notthere.
And so what we want to say inthis chapter is you have to be
able to recognize when somebodyis hiding, you have to recognize
(13:11):
the signs.
And Uh, yeah, maybe I was, I'mgetting a little hung up here on
my words, but uh, you have to.
You have to recognize thosesigns.
So we, we, we started thischapter off and it's heavy right
off the front of the gate, butit's heavy for that reason that
it kind of pulls you into thisto the story.
(13:32):
I mean, I'll let Brian talk alittle more.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
It's the reason that we have changed Scott, you know,
for the for the rest of thebook have changed Scott, you
know for the for the rest of thebook.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Yeah, Brian, before you kind of get after it, um, I
will say so.
You guys released a sneak, asneak peek, of the book.
Um, I've seen it.
Uh, you shared on LinkedIn.
I plan on sharing it as well.
Um, it's like Thomas said, it'son Brian's website where he
writes some wonderful poetrythat's rangerwinniecom.
(14:02):
But you guys have done atremendous job of getting that
hook and it's it's it's heavy,Um, and it speaks to those of us
who, you know, served in thefield, um, who have lost people,
you know, in the field or or atwar, Uh, but I like that, the,
the turn you guys have reallyfocused on our industry,
specifically um, in the field oror at war, Um, but I like the,
the, the turn you guys havereally focused on our industry,
(14:23):
specifically um, and thestressors of that, and I'm just
like waiting to hear more.
I'm like, okay, give me thenext chapter.
So you guys have done atremendous job on getting that
hook in there right off the bat.
Um, so I appreciate that.
So, Brian, um, what do you wantto speak to about the book?
Speaker 2 (14:39):
well, let me, let me first say it's probably first
part, you know, first first partof next year, before the book
is done.
So just just, uh, uh, not goingto say there won't be any more
releases between now and then,we may, may, release a chapter
come on man now and then.
But uh, uh, for sure, uh, firstpart of next year, the whole
first taste is free.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Good you book will be done.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
First taste is free.
Good, you get them hooked right.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
First taste is free, I like it.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah, you know, I mean it's just let me read
something to you that I wrotevery early in this process with
Thomas, because it just kind oftells you why that we're doing
what we're doing.
As we look at a constructioncrew and a fire team side by
side, we can begin to see someways in which the structures and
the work itself are verysimilar.
(15:28):
A major similarity and much ofwhat drives people to do this
work, is that in bothprofessions, value is created by
the smallest units, who areclosest to the work.
The greatest impact we can haveon the work is at this level.
This is where transformationhappens.
That being the case, we mustfigure out how we can impact
these folks' lives in positiveways, as well as increase their
(15:51):
capacity for leadership.
Bad leadership at the executivelevel costs companies an
estimated $550 billion annually.
Bad leadership is alsopervasive in that bad leaders
tend to surround themselves withother bad leaders.
It becomes a compoundingproblem and ruins company
culture and, ultimately,people's lives, and that's what
(16:13):
we want to fight.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
But yeah, yeah, that's really good.
And, Brian, since we had ourepisode together on the
construction veteran, I'vegotten a chance to speak to a
lot of people.
And you're right, it's neatwhen I get to hear from folks
that have served at the tip ofthe spear, other special
operations folks and everybodyin between, how there's such a
(16:38):
similarity between the serviceand this industry.
But it boils down to it beingall about the people, and I mean
I hate to use the word resource, but they are the most
important resource, if you will,in this industry.
We can't do this without thepeople.
Um, so if people want to seethat um, uh, initial chapter of
(16:58):
the book, they can go torangerwinniecom.
And can you guys give us, justlike maybe, a snippet real quick
to hook them in there?
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Sure, yeah.
So the whole scene opens up, orthe chapter opens up on a
Sunday evening and EmilioStevens is our, our, our foreman
, and he was also an 82ndveteran.
I don't think we say where hewas a veteran, but we say he was
(17:28):
a veteran, he was.
He was also a veteran, servedin the, the, the global war on
terror, the GWAT wars, and youknow.
So he gets a notification on aSunday evening.
He's in his backyard and he'sjust sitting there.
(17:49):
You know we opened with himjust sitting there staring at
his phone, going, oh my God,he's just gotten notified that
(18:10):
one of his journeyman drywallpeople has just lost their life
to suicide and he's trying tofigure out what to do.
Right, and you know, firstthought goes out to his, the
guy's wife and kids.
And then, all of a sudden, youknow, because of what's, what's
happened in his life previously,he's in the middle of a
flashback, uh, you know, goingback to a time when he lost a
friend in in, uh war, in afirefight, and uh, you know he
(18:31):
wasn't there, so he didn't seeit happen, just like he didn't
see this happen.
And uh, you know it, just it,it it impacted him and uh, you
know it just it impacted him,and you know.
But what we see is he's he'sgot tools to use now.
So he starts, he goes and hesits down on his back patio when
he, you know, as soon as herecognized what's happening, and
(18:52):
he opens his meditation app andhe starts breathing.
He starts four, seven, eightbreathing, you know, four
seconds in, seven seconds ofholding, and then eight seconds
out, slowly, and he just startsdoing that, you know, until he
can get on top of it.
And then, you know, from there,the next scene we see is the
next morning when he's got toinform the crew and there we
(19:15):
start to see some of the signsthat were apparent that we
didn't really nobody looked at.
Because why, you know?
Why would they?
And you know.
And then from there we go tothe funeral and you know he has
a conversation with Alberto, isthe person who died.
He has a conversation with herwife, you know.
(19:36):
And then we go a little furtheralong and he's gone and taken a
class on how to approach thisand how to talk to people who
may be in distress, and he'skind of on a not a great project
, you can kind of tell.
We start to get ideas aboutthis here, that his project
(19:57):
isn't all that great because thesuperintendent that's that's
there is kind of he's like whenare you replacing him?
When are you replacing Alberto?
When are we getting thatreplacement in?
You know what I mean.
Just like the day after, uh,you know, and then and then was
like pretty angry that they allmissed because of the funeral.
You know that his whole crewmissed because of funeral and
stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
So he's a villain.
I don't like that.
Guy already have to read he'snot.
He's not, seems like it atfirst.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
It's, it's the industry that's the villain.
To be honest with you, you knowit really is.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Let's talk about that .
I want to.
Um, thomas, I'm gonna kick itover to you real quick.
So we both work for ratherlarge companies.
Um, what do you think we'redoing wrong and what can we do
better?
I mean, I have my own ideas,but we're just driving people
into the ground literally.
Um, and that's what we'refocusing on here.
What's your take?
Speaker 1 (20:47):
it's systematic.
What I mean by that and I saythis a lot um, there are some
roles, roles in our industrythat the the.
Even if you're working superhard and you're the only thing
that you can do is work hard,like come in early and stay late
(21:12):
and get after it and really getinto drawings and this is the
only thing that you can do, andthat thing that you're doing is
making everything worse becauseyou're getting tired, you're
getting stressed and you'remaking mistakes.
But the demand, meaning thesystem, is you need to be here.
(21:34):
You need to be here super early, you need to be here late.
You need to disappear whenreally important people show up.
You also need to be here late.
You need to disappear when youknow really important people
show up.
You also need to do these wackyhours because we can't disrupt.
You know something else that isseemingly more important
because it costs money orwhatever things.
(21:56):
So a lot of the things that weput people into into our system
are terribly designed for humanbeings, and I'll give you one
example, and that's drillingoverhead and electricians and
plumbers, mechanical workersthey do this a lot.
(22:17):
You have your arm above yourheart and they do this a lot
where they, you know you haveyour arm above your heart and
you're, and they do this all daylong, and usually you're on, uh
, some kind of elevated devicelike a scissor lift or baker
scaffold or, worse, a ladder,and so you're, it's, it's just,
it's very injurious to your body.
So if you do that all day andthat's you know, that's what you
(22:39):
were lined out to do, even ifyou did a really good job like
you're a super accurate andyou're super highly productive
like you you've wiped yourselfout.
All of your energy is wiped out, and so when you go home, one,
you're probably covered insilica dust and two, you're
tired, and so you go home toyour family and there's almost
(23:04):
nothing left of you.
And not to mention, um, a lotof our workers almost half of
them, and probably that'sprobably more than half nowadays
commute more than two hourseach way, and that's it's.
It's really hard, like, how dowe fix that?
Speaker 2 (23:24):
like geez, we talk about that in the story too yes,
we talk about the energy drinksyeah, I mean go to go to go to
any convenience store at 5 30 inthe morning.
Who do you see there and whatare they buying?
Speaker 1 (23:37):
yeah, yeah so we actually yeah, so that's in like
the fourth section, so likepart of the system that.
So one thing-.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Drink those all day.
Then you got to drink a sixpack of beer to go to sleep.
Right, we take yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
So if you work 10 hours and you commute for four
hours and you're, by the way,you're supposed to, like you
know, have a life, so, like,where do you sleep in this, like
you, don't you?
Actually our workers will takea part of their, you know,
required sleep out, and all ofthe studies have shown if you
don't get that, last, and it'sthe in those last two hours of
(24:15):
sleep is the most beneficial tohuman health, and if you don't
get it, you get really poorquality sleep.
So to feel better is to reachfor, you know, substances.
The easiest one is when you'refilling up gas on the way into
work.
Energy drinks are right thereand they just it's false.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
And since it's a two-hour drive home, you've got
to get gas on the way home.
So you start that 12-pack rightthere.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Yeah, you're in reverse and we wanted to talk
about that in this chapterbecause it feeds into you and
it's in this chapter.
If you've ever dealt withsomeone who's passed, especially
an unexpected death, it'sreally, it's really unsettling
(25:03):
and you live.
You live your life in kind ofscenes and especially this
happened to me you live yourlife in scenes.
So we wanted to have these kindof quick, hitting, uh kind of
sections in this chapter, kindof sections in this chapter and
they start with a.
It starts with kind of like aschedule.
(25:24):
It's like two and a half weekson a Wednesday afternoon and it
builds and then they get alittle longer and they get a
little longer.
There's more time in between,but you live your life in
between the scenes.
What you don't see in thischapter you still need to go
(25:45):
call in that in-wall inspection.
We still got to pour concreteon friday, like that never ends
right, we got it.
You know we have a majordelivery that's got to get
hooked up to the tower crane andmove to the roof and that's we
got a, we got a window, we haveapproval by the city.
We really have one chance.
So, like you have to kind oftake life I was talking about my
(26:05):
father partitioning off it'sthe same thing with construction
.
You take that your life andjust put it on hold while this
thing has to happen.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
And I would be willing to bet that most
construction dudes probablydon't talk about how shitty
their day was with their wifeeither most of the time, oh yeah
you know, I mean I bring thatcrap home with you, right?
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (26:30):
I'm ashamed to tell you how many energy drinks I had
today, to be quite honest and II do say that tongue in cheek,
but in all seriousness when Ireached for my second energy
drink today, I went man, Ireally shouldn't be doing this
because it was because of thebook and I'm like man, I really.
I got to do something different, get better quality sleep.
And you know, thomas, to yourpoint it's, you're always on,
(26:52):
but I think there's always thisunspoken expectation for
perfection.
That's another very difficultpart of our, our industry.
And we're human, you know wemake mistakes, and I think
personally me as a leader.
When somebody makes a mistake,I try to be human and hey man,
it just don't do it again.
It happens.
(27:13):
You screwed up big deal, youlearned to understand how it
happened.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Can we make?
Sure that it doesn't happenagain.
Speaker 3 (27:19):
If you make it 10 more times, then we're going to
have a completely differentconversation.
But you know, I think that that, to me, is what really stands
out and it really ruins yourmental health.
There's this expectation thateverything is going to go right,
and it never goes right on anyproject.
I mean it would.
It sounds great, but drawingswill have some issues.
It's going to happen.
(27:40):
You're going to have peoplethat don't show up to work.
There's going to be somequality issues, no matter how
hard you try.
But what I appreciate about thefirst chapter of the book that
you guys release is how he'staking that turn as a leader and
really enforcing hey, I'm goingto make sure my guys are
healthy and whole.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
So I'm really excited to see what's next for his
journey.
I guess my contribution to whatThomas said would be go talk to
any group of people who work inconstruction and find out
anybody that you talk to whoworks less than 50 hours a week.
And that's from the top all theway down, and it's it's almost
non-existent.
(28:24):
Uh, and they've done all thesestudies that say that working
all these hours is really reallybad for you, you know, bad for
your health, and we don't do itfor short periods of time, we do
it for whole careers and it'scrazy.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
I, you know that has been the mentality for so long
and I think maybe it's crazy.
I, you know that has been thementality for so long and I
think maybe it's changing.
I don't know.
I hope it is.
I hope it is.
I definitely, yeah, Iabsolutely hope it is.
But one thing that I can do is Ican take care of myself and I'm
not going to, I'm not going towork myself to death, and if
that causes me to not make thenext promotion, so be it.
I want my family life healthy,you know.
(29:00):
I want my kids to know who I am, because I know way too many
people and I'm sure you guys dotoo that they'll do these crazy
70, 80 hour weeks, like do youhate your family or what are you
?
What are you doing?
Man, nobody's asking you towork these hours.
Um, and I it took me a littlewhile to finally put my foot
down as a superintendent to sayno, you're not, you're not
working four hours extra tonightI got to go home, just like you
(29:23):
do.
It's not my fault, you know,and I was letting people take
advantage of me, and I think wedo that a lot in leadership.
Um, yeah, it's no big deal Worktwo extra hours here, four
extra hours there Cause you gotto get the job done.
I don't think we're leading thejob very well If that's the
case, if we're working thesecrazy hours.
And what's unique that I'vefound is when I started holding
(29:46):
people to those hours like guys.
We're not going to work anymorein 10 hours period.
Eight hours is the goal.
We're not going to work anymorein 10 hours a day.
And you start to see this shiftin people that you know guys
like OT I get that, but it's notall about the money.
Guys and you start gettingbetter production out of them.
They have a better family life.
Um, there's all kinds of thingswe can go into.
(30:08):
I got a question about the book.
Was there something specificthat really like?
What was the impetus to writethis specific story about this
individual?
Speaker 2 (30:18):
I don't, I'm trying to think, I think so this was
like one of the last chaptersthat we've even started on.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
This one got backed into.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Yeah, we sort of backed into this, you know.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
I mean, I knew.
So I knew I wanted to dosomething for construction
suicide prevention week, becauseI've done something for the
last three years, just you know,done whatever.
(30:54):
And it just came to me.
I just started having thesethoughts.
It's like because we, you know,emilio's the guy and we talk
about him like he's a person allthe time between Thomas and I,
like he's someone we know.
But you know, it's like what isthe impetus for them to change?
What is driving them to want,you know, to even need to change
?
Because you know, usually ittakes a shovel to the head to
(31:17):
kind of get people to want tochange, because change sucks and
change is hard and you know youhave to practice at it.
It's, you know, like it's notsomething that we're just really
naturally do, because we runaway from change often, as often
as we can.
I mean I can't tell you howmany times that I worked with
people on construction sitesthat as soon as something
(31:37):
changed on the construction site, it blew them away because they
couldn't figure out how tochange gears in their mind.
You know the plan needs tochange and you know, and that's
really where it came from and itjust, it was something that
started sitting on my heart.
You know that this is what Iwanted us to do.
So I approached Thomas about itand I said, thomas, well, no, I
(31:59):
think I actually wrote it first,didn't I?
And then said, yeah, so I wrotelike some of it out, like the
first two parts of it orsomething like that, and gave it
to Thomas, and Thomas was like,yeah, this is it like that.
And gave it to Thomas andThomas was like, yeah, this is
it.
And then, you know, we started,you know, going back and forth
and and you know and it'ssomething that both of us have
kind of remarked on it's like Ican't tell you what parts I
(32:23):
wrote and what parts Thomaswrote.
It's just it's been that kind ofpartnership and it's taken us a
while to get there.
Don't get me wrong, but it's I.
There isn't.
There isn't a division.
I mean, it's just we both wroteit, and other people have asked
me about that too.
You know how do you do thatwith a co-writer?
I don't think I could, and it'slike I didn't think I could
(32:43):
either, but it's just, Icouldn't tell you what I wrote
and what Thomas wrote, to behonest.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Yeah, it's.
I really enjoyed that, thatfirst chapter you guys release,
and I'll say, if the rest of thebook is anything like that,
then I hope every C-suiteexecutive on down reads this
thing, because I think it could.
It could cause some majorchanges.
But my question, thomas, I'llkick it to you.
Um, if people are listening tothis and they're going, yeah,
(33:09):
this sounds all good and well,what can I do, regardless of
their, their rank, if you will,in the structure, what, what,
what can somebody physically dotomorrow to make a difference?
Speaker 1 (33:20):
at the bottom, the, the last section, it's.
It's really fleeting, but, um,if you had the opportunity, go
down.
It's like the show notes,author's notes, author's notes.
And it starts off with thethird stanza of the Ranger Creed
(33:41):
.
As a civilian, that stanzagives me chills Gives me chills
too, so that's okay.
I probably didn't have to dopush-ups while saying it, but
it's like never shall I fail mycomrades.
Like never, never.
There's not like.
(34:05):
Those guys over there areassholes, right, If you have
that true mindset that I willnever fail those guys.
I might struggle and I mighthave issues.
They're still going to beassholes, yes, oh, no doubt.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
But you still don't fail them either.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Yeah, I struggled and I say this publicly now, but I
struggled with mental illness,with panic disorder and anxiety,
and I would go, I would used tohave panic attacks and this
happened through all geez,probably the first 15 years of
(34:44):
my career before I finally gothelp.
And the only reason I got helpwas somebody finally caught me
passed out.
Only reason I got help wassomebody finally caught me
passed out.
I wasn't able to hide because Iwas on the floor unconscious,
and if you don't know what apanic attack is, it's an
imbalance and for me anyways,it's different for many people,
(35:06):
but it's a chemical imbalance.
Is what happened to your body?
Your body is feeling attackedand so your fight or flight
mechanisms in your, in yourbrain and in your hormone system
and in your nervous system kickin and your, your, your body
goes into protection mode andone of the ways it does it, and
does it for me, is it's like Ijust hold my breath and I will
(35:29):
pass out.
I'm like a possum, I guess, butI don't know how that's being
very protective, but there'spanic attacks, there's anxiety
attacks.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
Anxiety attacks are very different and they're more
what I suffer in my mentalillness.
They're more like a ramp up toget there, like that building,
building, building, and that'ssort of like how the anxiety is
a little bit different.
But go up, go on, thomas.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
Yeah.
So I want people to know thatbecause and you have to if
people are struggling mentally,they're not going to do it in
the middle of the OAC meeting.
Okay, you might break down andhave a mental breakdown and cry
or something, but you're notgoing to.
Typically it's not going tohappen in a social setting, but
(36:21):
it will most definitely happenin a hidden aspect.
In our job sites.
There's a lot of hiding spotsand on the website and maybe you
can include this as thethumbnail but we show a Connex
box and you look into it andit's sturdy and it's messy and
(36:49):
there's some moldy cardboardthat's on the floor.
Um, don't forget the coffee cup.
And I'll get to the coffee cupand and so the coffee cup sets
me off.
So there's a coffee cup justset right on the the edge and
you would, you would set thatand the reason why that coffee
(37:12):
cup.
And then this isn't my picture,but I I just it.
It triggers me because thiswould be something I would do
and I want to share this withpeople that you would set your
coffee cup there on the edgebecause you didn't want to spill
it when you're about to passout, nor did you want any of the
mold and dust and, you know, inthe death zone inside that
(37:32):
thing to get into your coffee,because that's gross.
This is what a person whosuffers mentally like seriously
goes through, and that's thatplace is where people suffer on
job sites.
I would also do it instairwells, and the reason why I
would do it in a stairwell isbecause you could hear people
(37:53):
coming up or down so you couldjust shoot out the door.
If you were at least on yourfeet, if you were sitting down,
you could be like oh, I was justwalking up 10 flights of stairs
, I'm just resting.
Checking messages on my phone.
Yeah, in the after actionreview, aar.
(38:13):
I thought that was cool, thatwas a good ad, brian.
We talk about it.
We said it's often hidden and Iwant people to know.
The thing that you can takeaway and do tomorrow, scott, is
look for it, because it's theworst thing.
It's hidden.
Number one and two we don'tlook for it.
(38:36):
So if one thing is hidden andtwo, we don't look for it, then
it'll never be found until itemerges.
And a suicide is an emergentthing.
It's just like a roof leakright, like you don't think
(38:58):
about a really poorly executedroofing detail around a roof
drain until it rains threeinches in one day.
And then, all of a sudden, it'slike why didn't we do the
inspection on the roofing Right?
It suddenly becomes so clear,but it's too late.
All of your insulation on yourroof is ruined and you have to
(39:21):
do all kinds of crazy rework.
The problem with suicide isforever.
There's no going back, there'sno rework, there's no rework,
it's forever.
There's no rework, there's norework, it's forever.
So in the next bullet afterthat, that impulsive decision,
that decision that I choosedeath over any other outcome
(39:43):
that can kill me.
And so if it's a hidden issueand no one's looking for it, or
like we go out of our way, notlike like we, we go our way to
ignore it, then that that's justas bad as as the act of suicide
in, in my opinion.
(40:04):
So like we have to like.
This week is so importantbecause it raises awareness of
it, but since this is towardsthe end of the week, what's
really important is that nextweek we don't stop or we don't
forget.
We take action.
And it's free.
You don't need anything, anyother thing aside from reading
this website, but you can gothere.
(40:27):
There's no paywall.
Speaker 3 (40:30):
Well, what I do appreciate too that you guys
talked about in that firstchapter and I'm not giving
anything away, cause it's outthere in the ether, if you will
but how he?
He went up to that gentlemanand just, uh, the the other
tradesmen, and said, hey, what'sgoing on, like you could tell
something's different.
And we, we, I think we seethose signs, but a lot of us
(40:51):
aren't humble enough to go upand say something.
And so you know, we're all inthis together and I try to talk
to our tradesmen about that too.
Hey, I know you guys can allcollectively hate me and that's
the general contractor, and wesay that tongue in cheek, but
it's we're, we really are inthis together and we're one team
.
And I'm looking out for you andI see you guys more than I do
(41:12):
my own family.
So I can tell when you're in abad mood, uh, way better than I
can tell if my own wife is in abad mood, but that's a whole
other story.
But you know, you can tell whensomebody comes in and they're
either overly chipper or they'rejust down in the dumps.
And so I think and Brian, I, Ithink you might agree with this
(41:32):
You've got a couple more grayhairs than Thomas and I pepper
Um, but you've seen the industrychange.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
No, no, this is, this is all.
You bleach it.
Speaker 3 (41:43):
Um, but I think, even in the last decade I'd say
maybe even five years thatthings have changed where
talking about your mental healthhas become a lot more
acceptable Um, taking mentalhealth days, or companies
offering things like freetherapy sessions, things like
(42:04):
that Um, so I, I, I think we'redoing a good job talking about
it more, but talking about itisn't preventing it, I think
talking to the individual isreally what's going to help.
Speaker 1 (42:16):
There's so much good that's happened now.
We have employee resourcesgroups, we have mental health
professionals that come to likeat DPR, many of our job sites,
DPR, like many of our job sites,we've had people like Brian who
are certified and to teachingpeople to recognize a sign
happen.
(42:36):
And we're not the only ones.
It's happening all over Likethat's all great.
That got us to now theawareness, the websites, the
LinkedIn posts it hasn't changedthe number at all.
People like yes, yes.
People like yes, yes, we needto find those.
What is it?
53 people out of every hundredthousand.
(42:56):
We have to talk directly tothem, so like to find them.
We have to get in so many moremediums.
We've got to get into huddles,get on walls, get in books, get
in websites, be on the radio,get in movies.
Like we just can't stop you.
Just all of the stuff thatwe've gotten to got us to today
(43:18):
and that was really amazing,amazing work.
But now we can't stop untilthat thing is that's zero.
And then, once it's zero, let'smove on to another industry.
Speaker 3 (43:28):
Yeah, yeah, brian, I think it might've been the
episode you and I did togetherwhere we were talking about
people traveling and justespecially the travelers.
Man, I really feel for them andI've traveled a few times in my
career and it just, it'll eatyou alive.
And I've had my own mentalhealth struggles, especially
during travel.
Um, I've been very open aboutmy alcoholism and it came to a
(43:50):
head the last job I traveled forand it just, it got worse and
worse and I'm thinking, oh, it'sno big deal, but that could
have led me down a really muchdarker path.
Who knows what could havehappened.
But I'm not ashamed to talkabout this stuff because I want
people out there to hear hey,you're not alone, you really
aren't.
I mean, we say that and itsounds super cliche, but we're
(44:11):
all going through this craptogether.
Speaker 2 (44:14):
Thomas is traveling right now.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
Oh, no, poor Thomas.
Speaker 2 (44:20):
That's why there's nothing on the walls behind him.
Speaker 3 (44:23):
Oh nice.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
But we were actually we were talking about that just
a little bit ago.
Um, like I am away from homeduring the week, um, but uh,
like I have many, many comfortsthat uh, a lot of people, um, do
not, do not even though.
Speaker 3 (44:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (44:46):
Yeah, when you're the guy who's traveling yeah, yeah,
I mean, if you're the new guy20 year old, you know, labor or
whatnot and traveling for justabove minimum wage and making
that per diem, that's all welland good.
But, like you guys said, you'regoing out, you're drinking all
these energy drinks and you'regetting drunk, feeling like crap
the next day, and that's atough life.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
And the sad fact is, sleeping in a hotel with
probably two, three other guysYep.
Speaker 3 (45:13):
And it happens a lot more than people want to admit.
I mean that that is very commonin our industry and it's, it's
sad, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (45:22):
And also it's hidden also and we don't look for it,
we don't talk about it.
It's one of those hidden things.
Everybody just knows that ithappens and nobody says anything
, or you know it's.
Speaker 1 (45:32):
It's one of those hidden things.
Everybody just knows that ithappens and nobody says anything
, or you know it's.
It's, um, yeah, like one onething that we really can use
more awareness and and you justmentioned it like the travelers,
but it's not the people withthe, the the easy street.
Uh, you know that I'm the shinyboots now guy, even though I do
(45:52):
take a construction selfie onthe job site once in a while,
but um but uh yeah, it's thepipe crews.
Put me in pipe crews.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
They get after it.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
Um, but they're in the heat.
I mean I'm here in SouthCarolina and I mean you're, it's
a hundred degrees, you're downin a ditch or no breeze.
I mean it's 100 degrees, you'redown in a ditch, there's no
breeze, and the thing that theyhave to go back to to rest is
like a hotel room that theyshare with the same dudes that
they're in the ditch with allday, probably Not a healthy
(46:23):
environment.
Yeah, and probably a 30 rack ofkeystones between them.
Speaker 3 (46:30):
You happen to get just a fight on the job site
with that same guy.
Now you got to deal with himand you talk about stress going
through the roof.
Speaker 1 (46:37):
Yeah, it's uh, yeah, it's, it's, it's difficult and
that it all, it all kind ofcombines, um, and you don't see
that because it's not on,there's no place for that once
you leave the gate right.
Um, we expect, I mean I expectthat same pipe crew I was
(46:58):
talking to this afternoon,tomorrow morning 6 am be be, you
know, sober, alert and readyfor the safety briefing, because
we're going to get back aftertomorrow and probably again on
Saturday.
Definitely get back on Saturdayif it's dry, and that's just
the way.
That's just how we work in ourindustry.
(47:19):
I'm sure it's the same waywhere you work.
I'm sure it's the same way inTexas where Brian is.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
Scott's in Texas also .
He's just up in the Dallas-FortWorth area.
Speaker 3 (47:29):
Yeah, the ritzy part, I guess of Texas.
I don't claim Dallas, thoughI'm far enough south.
Even though I live near Dallas.
Speaker 1 (47:36):
But it was the same way in San Francisco, california
, where I used to work, and it'sno different here in the great
state of Georgia or SouthCarolina, I don't care who's
telling you what on the internetor TV.
There is good people everywherewe go.
Yeah, yeah absolutely.
Speaker 3 (47:59):
Well, gentlemen, I really appreciate your time.
I'm going to wrap it up here.
One final question for both ofyou.
So where can people get moreinvolved and get behind this
message and support you guys?
Can people get?
Speaker 1 (48:12):
more involved and get behind this message and support
you guys.
You got to say it.
It was Brian's idea.
He just dropped it on Monday,but but drop it again.
Speaker 2 (48:20):
It's at rangerwinniecom.
You can find it.
You can find the link on mywebsite.
You can.
You can talk to us there.
You know, to be honest, I got acall today from a guy in
distress and it's heartbreaking.
(48:42):
You know this industry and itgoes from one end to the other.
This suicide issue we have.
It's from the labor to the CEO.
It's not just affecting oneportion of our workforce, it's
affecting everybody.
The stress and the stuff thatwe have on our jobs is just so,
so high.
Self-care, self-care, self-careso important.
(49:04):
Please do it, take care ofyourselves.
And yeah, you can find me onLinkedIn.
My company's name is FieldDriven Lean.
You can look me up there.
Brian Winningham, I'll give youall the links.
Speaker 3 (49:20):
I'll share everything if you guys hadn't heard Brian
and I chatting last year.
It's crazy.
It's already been over a yearprobably, but if you hadn't
heard that episode, I'dencourage everybody to go listen
to that.
Thomas, I know we're connectedon LinkedIn.
I'll be sure to share yourprofile there as well.
I wouldn't be surprised if youguys have some people reaching
(49:40):
out, and same with me.
If anybody ever wants to talk,I'm open man.
It's whatever you want to sayto me behind closed doors or
over the phone, let's discuss.
Speaker 2 (49:51):
Well, I became this year, because this means so much
to me.
I became a mental health firstaid instructor.
Speaker 1 (49:57):
Oh cool.
Speaker 2 (49:57):
So I'm yeah, I'm like , I said like a friend of mine
that meant well, and you know weposted it on LinkedIn and he
came on and said something aboutyou know, thank you for raising
awareness, and I said you knowI I appreciate your support, but
this isn't awareness, this isaction.
We're taking action now becausewe can't just continually just
(50:20):
raise awareness.
We have to take action, amen.
Speaker 3 (50:24):
Good stuff.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
That's um, that's the .
The.
Why I went to Brian and I waslike I want to talk to you about
smaller unit leadership,because I knew I was like he
would do it.
He's like, yeah, I would do itand be encouraged to do it.
I am so incredibly grateful foris for those people who have
(50:52):
dedicated all of their lives andsome of them the ultimate
sacrifice, into the military.
That's why I'm honored to be onyour podcast, scott.
But it's important to also knowthat you have to take action and
that's why we put in the in the, at the towards the end.
(51:12):
It's like it's the same reasonwhy airlines want you to put
your oxygen mask on first.
If you pass out, if you'repassed out in the hallway or in
the in the connex, you can'thelp anybody else.
So if you're struggling, ifyou're, if you're even just
feeling just a little bit uneasy, you got to take action and use
(51:36):
those techniques that you'velearned, those breathing
exercises, those resources, yourbattle buddy, those kind of
things.
Call a friend, call me or Brian, hit up Scott, hit us in the
DMs and we'll write you back.
Yeah, call me or Brian, hit upScott, hit us in the DMs.
Speaker 3 (51:51):
Slide in the DMs.
Speaker 1 (51:53):
And we'll write you back.
Speaker 3 (51:54):
Yeah, no, that's really well said, man.
Take care of yourself.
Make sure you're good first,yeah.
Speaker 1 (52:00):
Take care of yourself first, 100%.
And that way and I've said thisbefore if you think about the
things that a human being needsto survive, and that's water,
that's food, that's sleep, ifyou, if you're, if you're
missing those things at work,like if you're, if you're not
(52:23):
getting clean water, you can'teven breathe, like you're,
you're breathing in dust andit's okay.
Like, why don't you man up likeit's a little drywall, dust,
leave immediately.
There is no place for that.
Or if, like, if you're workingat a place where it's like you
can't get clean access to water,somebody asks you there's no
(52:44):
place for that.
It's not protected any of thatjust don't do it not, there is
no place for that right.
And then so also be aware andthat's that's, from a safety
standpoint, your health like,protect your body there, but
also protect your body from yourown mind, and that your mind is
very powerful.
It's like a supercomputer.
(53:05):
It'll trick your own body.
So, um, you have to seek helpbecause you can't even overcome
it.
I'm standing here today to havetestimony that seeking help you
can't even sometimes do ityourself.
You've got to be thrust into it.
But be open to it, and it's avery manly thing to do, is what
(53:26):
I want to say, because beingaround for your family, uh, down
, you know, down at later on inlife is what it's all about
really, is what it's truly aboutthat, that, that 3am poor that
we got in like three and a halfyears ago, I don't even remember
it barely Like I remember beingpissed off and that was it.
(53:49):
So it was not an achievement.
So, um, take care of yourself.
That's all I got.
Thank you so much, scott, andthank thanks everybody.
Speaker 3 (53:57):
Thanks, scott, thank you guys.
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