Building a Safe, Healthy, and Respectful Workplace for Tradeswomen: A Total Worker Health Approach.

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PROJECT SUMMARY Employees in the skilled trades industries (e.g., construction) are at high risk for injuries and fatalities because the work is physical and machinery-related hazards are close at hand. Tradeswomen are at even higher risk for adverse outcomes due to the complex and unique challenges they face, including discrimination and harassment, poor personal protective equipment fit, and lack of access to safe bathroom facilities. The objectives of this study fill three major knowledge gaps about women in skilled trade jobs: (1) identify the unique workplace experiences (both problematic and beneficial) tradeswomen face; (2) quantify the impact these factors have on tradeswomen; and (3) identify workplace strategies that can improve their safety, health, and well-being. Our central hypothesis is that multiple factors affect tradeswomen’s Total Worker Health® (TWH) and can be addressed by strategies based on a systems approach. The long-term goal of this work is to improve tradeswomen’s safety, health, and well-being by identifying experiences specific to tradeswomen, and using that knowledge to develop strategies for ensuring a better work life for women workers. Our approach is based on the Sociotechnical Systems (STS) theoretical framework that will help us to identify key risk and protective factors typically encountered by tradeswomen by incorporating interactions between people, the environment, and technology. We will also include factors that influence the overall well-being of tradeswomen from a TWH perspective. We will identify these key factors and develop organization- and individual-level strategies for minimizing or promoting them, respectively, in order to support increased safety, equity, and inclusion in the skilled trades. This project will produce (1) a survey tool that companies can use to identify key factors that affect tradeswomen’s safety, health, and well-being; (2) a set of strategies, solutions, and guidelines designed to mitigate key stressors for both tradeswomen (on navigating their unique environment) and supervisors/organizations (on organizational supports for tradeswomen); and (3) new materials (e.g., pamphlets, short videos, one-pagers) for research translation and dissemination of this information/knowledge. We will employ a mixed methods approach by combining qualitative (interviews and focus groups) and quantitative (survey) data to identify the key factors affecting the safety, health, and well- being of tradeswomen, and generate strategies for solutions. Project aims are threefold: 1) Identify the unique safety and health experiences tradeswomen face and quantify the identified factors that influence tradeswomen’s safety, health, and well-being; 2) Assess the feasibility, benefits, barriers, and facilitators of various individual- and organization-level strategies that can be applied to improve safety, health, and well- being for tradeswomen; and 3) Disseminate the knowledge and findings generated in the study (Aims 1 and 2) to stakeholders and the public.