MUSC’s ‘Train in Maine’ has left the station

With temperatures so mild this winter they’ve rarely dipped below the 40-degree mark, Charlestonians are elated not to have had to dig out scarves, gloves or parkas – that is, if they even own them. But for one young woman and five Charleston men who decided to go north and brave Maine’s sub-zero freezes, it’s all for a good cause: learning trades that will equip them to make a difference for some of the Lowcountry’s most vulnerable patients – children at the MUSC’s Shawn Jenkins Children’s Hospital. 

The opportunity for them to train in Maine came as a result of an innovative partnership between MUSC and New England Tech Air, a successful sheet metal engineering and manufacturing company located in Scarborough, Maine. Over the last year, the company has added to its workforce with trainees from the Charleston area who have moved temporarily to Maine to learn the business. When the training is complete, they will return to Charleston to work on the MUSC project. 

NETA specializes in designing and building heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems and manufacturing and installing exhaust and ventilation systems. And while the company conducts business predominantly in the Northeast region of the U.S., it has also branched out to handle specific projects in other areas of the U.S., like the new children’s hospital, where it is playing a major role. 

According to Whit Jackson, lead project engineer, hospital projects are its specialty. So much so that 80 percent of the company’s volume over the last five years has been in the health care sector. NETA was awarded the bid to design and install the HVAC system and fabricate and install all the duct work. Jackson characterized the project as huge. “Essentially, we are in charge of all the air in the hospital,” he said. 

In reality, that is no small undertaking. Hospitals require specialized attention so the quality of the air patients and staff are exposed to in operating rooms, laboratories, isolation areas and clean rooms is healthy and pure and not involved in spreading infections. 

Infections in hospitals, in fact, are a very big problem throughout the U.S., and poor ventilation, lack of proper air filtration and inadequate HVAC systems can often be the culprits. Without the appropriate system, bacteria can flourish and airborne contaminants can spread and infect, possibly even kill, patients. 

Airborne microbes are spread by moisture and can cling to ducts and vents and spread throughout the hospital via the HVAC system. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly three quarters of a million people in the U.S. will develop a hospital-acquired infection each year: 75,000 of them will die.

NETA’s substantial hospital experience allows its engineers to design, and its work force to properly build and install a highly-customized system to address challenges that could arise when a hospital is caring for the most complicated of pregnancies and neonatal cases.

To do so will take a significant number of skilled laborers. Due to the high business volume NETA currently has in the Northeast, its existing workforce was already committed to other projects. Last year, leadership brainstormed ways to expand their workforce. 

Jackson’s colleague, Kevin Robinson, NETA’s general manager, explained the challenge they faced. “We talked a lot about the MUSC project, knowing the schedule was going to be crazy beginning in spring 2017. We wondered how we were ever going to find 60 guys to come onto this project because everyone involved in hiring would be looking for people during our same time frame,” he said. 

Jackson nodded. “About a year ago, we were at an oyster roast. Kevin and I were talking." They wanted to come up with a way to solve the timing issue. "What would be the chance of finding guys down here if we said to them, ‘We’d love to hire you, but we’re going to have to hire you next June?’ Probably not good. But what if we hired guys from Charleston, brought them to Maine and trained them in our program? We could use help in the Northeast, and they would be part of the workforce while they trained.”

There was also another consideration. In keeping with its commitment to diversity and inclusion, MUSC required the construction management team to submit a comprehensive diversity and local participation plan for the project. The plan calls for a 30 percent spend goal targeting small-, minority- and women-owned business enterprises (SMWBE) and 65 to 70 percent participation of a local workforce comprised exclusively of South Carolina residents. 

Jackson said that although they were under a contractual obligation to work with these numbers, that didn’t impact how they conduct business. “We’re not bringing on locals or minorities because of contract obligations, we’re doing it because that’s our company’s philosophy – to give people a chance to succeed and grow in our corporate culture.”

So they devised a plan to offer an intensive training program to people from the Lowcountry and take them to Maine to train them, with the understanding they would return to Charleston as an integral part of the children’s hospital project. It’s called Train in Maine.

“When we first floated it, we thought it would be pie in the sky,” Jackson said. We didn’t think it would ever catch on, considering Maine is so far away, and they would be working through the freezing winter months.” Robinson nodded, “But we also knew that if we came down to Charleston and hired 30 guys at a time, it would be an overwhelming training process. By taking teams up to Maine and training them in our corporate culture, safety and lift training and fall protection and learning our processes in the field, we could bring them back down, and not only will they be experienced and valued members of the team, they could also help us train the next group that will already be in place."

Both men were surprised the project got legs as quickly as it did. Jackson said, “I don’t think we thought people involved would be quite as excited as they are. The people here at MUSC, Bobby Teachey and Jean Marc Villain, are supportive and helpful, as is the mayor’s office.”

Villain, MUSC’s director of Supplier Diversity, sees great merit in the program. “The Train in Maine concept is a win-win initiative for all parties involved in the project. By investing in these young men and women’s futures, NETA ensures that its local workforce will be armed with the skills and high standards that the company is known for while being compliant with its contractual obligations. MUSC benefits from having an able pool of professionals that it can call on for future projects. The trainees acquire a set of high-demand skills in a health care sector poised for more infrastructure growth going forward, and it means more taxes for the State of South Carolina as they ramp up the salary scale.”

Teachey, a lead project manager with the construction management team, was equally complimentary. “The Robins & Morton, Cumming and Brownstone team recognizes and commends the outreach of New England Tech Air to search out minority sheet metal companies and work toward filling that void with their Train in Maine program. While they work also toward the construction project’s small-, women-, minority-owned business goals, hopefully their program continues to offer new opportunities for the minority community in Charleston and the state of South Carolina.”

Identifying potential workers

Jackson said they didn’t do any advertising to find interested workers. Instead, they went knocking on doors. It was actually the Charleston SMWBE list that led them to a local entrepreneur, Frank Ancrum of Hard Hat Transportation, who ultimately introduced them to people he knew. Between Ancrum’s contacts and a recommendation from a faculty member at Trident Tech, they hired the initial cadre of six people – five African-American men who would be trained as sheet metal workers, and one woman, a recent college grad who was interested in a career in drafting – and flew them to Maine to begin their training. 

The NETA team worked hand-in-hand with the group in the manufacturing facility for the first four to five weeks. Some, Jackson said, had pretty good previous experience; others were fairly green. “We were surprised at how enthusiastic they were and how they picked it up fairly quickly and fit in wonderfully. It’s worked out really well, and they have adapted to the culture. They even attended our daily meetings. They really had a voice.” 

Providing tickets to fly home to visit their families every four weeks was just one of the benefits NETA provided to the team. When Hurricane Matthew made landfall in the Charleston area in October, Jackson and Robinson flew them home to take care of business, as some had damage to their homes. Not only did the NETA team make it a priority to get them back to their families, they also made arrangements to help them get through the aftermath of the storm. 

Team members worked first as apprentices and now work as sheet metal installers without the need for supervision, Robinson said. He attributes their rapid growth to the intensity of the training. 

“They definitely get a huge experience in working on a construction site,” he continued. The sites they were on had 300 to 400 workers, and they were exposed to multiple trades. Trainees get safety training. They hang duct work, measure duct work, test duct work – they will get a lot of experience in those five months. It allows them to market themselves as experienced sheet metal workers.” 

Jackson and Robinson will be back in Charleston this month to hire another cadre of people. Then again in April, they will concentrate on another group of 10 to 15. Numbers will continue to grow until they reach between 60 and 70, feeding the pipeline of experienced workers who will aid them in the future, as they are opening a NETA branch in Charleston. 

“This helps our company be able to better service our clients, like the MUSCs of the world, by having crews outside of New England, Jackson explained. We, companywide, have a commitment to taking people with various levels of experience and raising them up in the company, so people can grow their careers with us.” 

Robinson said there is no better feeling than when they work on a children’s hospital, and by hiring locally, there is more buy-in. “When you finish it,” he said, “you see the children and families going into it. “You feel you were a special part of it. I had the experience of doing that in Maine. One of the greatest things about hiring local people is that it’s their home, their kids, their families and grandparents. It’s their friends’ kids, and nieces and nephews using this facility. Their passion to be a part of it is greatly enhanced. They are going to be that much more proud of it. It’s just a different level when it’s is in your home town. And when we complete it, it’s a great feeling to have been a part of it. There will be a lot of pride and respect that will be put in that building.”

Partners, not competitors

At the same time NETA is involved in Train in Maine, the team also is involved in another novel program it launched to mentor South Carolina businesses that fall under the SMWBE category that subcontract under them – companies that do what they do on a much smaller scale. These programs, Villain said, are setting the standard for collaborative business practices and greatly benefit MUSC and the Charleston community.

Robinson explained the philosophy. “The goal is to help every company that works with us improve the processes of their company. In the end, it will help them gain work on their own,” he said. “Contractors tend to stay in their own little silos, and historically, they don’t share secrets," he added. “Our owners went the opposite direction – they wanted to share secrets and help others learn.” 

Five years ago, they initiated corporatewide a Lean journey, which is a system that aims to improve processes, quality and value for the customer. One of the principles they adopted was sharing trade secrets. “With that,” Jackson said, "if you have partnerships with others, that’s much different than being a competitor with everyone. If seven years from now we’ve helped three small companies, we can call them and rely on them for help, so, if we need assistance, we can provide better service for our customers. We make them partners, not competitors.”

Robinson agreed. “Look, we all know there’s not enough young people loving the construction world – they all want to be in computers. Not a lot of people are entering it. As companies, and with respect to our commitment to our customers, we have to have the ability to perform – by networking with other companies, this has been a huge step for us.”