Need to Know

• Women have traditionally been relegated to office work or other less strenuous roles in restoration, but they can also succeed in the field.
• Both men and women have strengths that they bring to restoration field work. A balanced team utilizes the strengths of every person on the staff and offsets their weaknesses so that customers get the service they deserve.
• Women in general excel at multitasking, connecting with customers and executing jobs carefully.

My mother never had a callback on a fire job, EVER! She had one broken glass out of every move-out project we did (and we did A LOT). She became the most amazing technician I have ever come across in my 30+ years in the industry.

If I learned one thing quickly, it was that women didn’t just belong in the office or filling candy jars in insurance agent offices (the restoration equivalent of barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen).

I have many conversations with owners at various companies who think about hiring a guy who can move heavy items and do the hard work that so many of us do on a regular basis, but they forget some of the most critical skills they may gain by hiring women for technician roles.

Men Suck at Multitasking

My father would love to get on a project and tackle a difficult task. He would get bored as he started thinking of other things and move on to another task. This left me to clean half a fire-damaged brick hearth, paint half the cabinets, or set up the Injectidry after he drilled the holes.

In my experience, this doesn’t happen as often with the women I’ve worked alongside. They tend to be very detail-oriented and methodical in their approach.

Men, when we are somewhere between two and three years old, have a testosterone bath that washes across our brain. This eliminates the bonds between the right and left hemispheres of the brain. We become binary beings. We are either analytical or creative, but not at the same time.

My wife can balance the checkbook while considering what she needs to do for one of her coworkers after that coworker has had a difficult day. If I accomplished these two feats at the same time, it would be a Herculean accomplishment. For my wife, it would just be Thursday.

She can utilize emotion and logic, while this is an either/or endeavor for yours truly. People who can think about multiple elements of the project are just as important as people who can fixate on one solution.

Customer Experience is Critical

Whenever I show up at a home during the day, I am far more likely to meet the lady of the house than the man. Whether I am there for a water loss or a carpet cleaning job, I find that I must work extra hard to establish trust.

I am 6’4”, 310 lbs., not exactly a little guy. I have noticed that when women show up to do the job, trust is easier to establish. I must work extra hard to build trust so I can earn the right to make recommendations to the customer.

In my experience, women often connect differently with these customers and may establish that trust more quickly. Why would we continually hire man after man just because the work is physical? The physical element of the job is just one component. There are other needs we must acknowledge that are critical to the success of the project.

How does the customer feel when the job is complete?

Men, being task-oriented, are satisfied when the building is dry and the structure has been returned to pre-loss condition. Women, in my experience, are concerned about whether the customer will call us again because they feel confident that the customer experience was good.

That’s not to say either sex cannot derive satisfaction from the other side of the job. I realize I’m painting with a broad brush here, but in my experience, this holds true more often than not.

Schwarzenegger be Darned

Three of my guys got on one end of a coin-operated pool table. I got on the other.

Once we moved it out of the customer’s home, I went to the doctor to discuss how to repair an obvious hernia injury. When I explained the injury to my mother and wife, they both responded with the same word: “moron.”

Not every guy is this stupid.

This guy WAS this stupid.

Women tend to understand their limitations. In doing so, they are less likely to have downtime from injuries, insurance claims for broken items, and workers’ compensation claims.

My list of restoration injuries is longer than the injuries sustained by most NFL teams last season. My mother and wife have a combined zero.

Perhaps I have just been extraordinarily careless (I have), but there is something to be said about not just trying “to get the job done.”

A good job requires understanding your own limitations and recognizing that success goes far beyond simply completing the work. Often, guys pride themselves on the amount of work they can endure, whereas women tend to be more concerned with how well they can get the job done.

Having balance on our teams and jobsites is an incredible advantage that helps ensure our customers get the service they deserve, whether we’re performing an air duct cleaning service or a mold remediation project.

Building Better Teams

As I mentioned earlier, I have painted with a broad brush, but I think it is important that we do not pigeonhole people based on gender, race, or any other group.

We can build teams that augment our weaknesses with their strengths. Maintaining an open mind and putting people of all backgrounds in positions where they can best support our teams can propel all of us forward.

Men are not just meathead technicians, and women are not just admin support.

If we can keep an open mind and provide the right support, we just might be able to change our organizations for the better.