Complying with federal, state, local or industry-specific safety regulations is important, and ensuring your jobsite meets all minimum requirements can help prevent tragedies. However, basic compliance does not guarantee worker safety. Companies must constantly be at the cutting-edge of technology and industry consensus in order to provide their workers with the best chance of avoiding injury or fatality from falls.

Some recent updates to the OSHA Fall Protection code and ANSI Z359 Fall Protection standards have taken effect and will impact many construction companies. Hopefully, these updates will help employers provide more robust fall protection for their workers and encourage safer work practices in the field. This article will briefly overview basic fall protection requirements and then discuss these recent updates, their potential impact on employers and how construction companies can remain proactive to prevent falls and ultimately save lives.

Basic OSHA Fall Protection Requirements

According to federal OSHA 1926, construction companies are required to provide some form of fall protection to any worker exposed to a fall hazard of six feet or greater. OSHA deems guardrail, safety netting and personal fall protection systems as equally acceptable forms of fall protection, so it is up to the employer to decide the most effective, applicable or appropriate fall protection method for the specific fall hazard.

Fall Protection User Training Requirements

Each company must also designate a competent person who holds a current certification from an ANSI-accredited training program. The competent person will be responsible for authorizing and training employees, routinely inspecting the site for new fall hazards to mitigate and maintaining the entire fall protection program. As long as employees receive official certification from a third-party trainer like Diversified Fall Protection or another fall protection manufacturer, the employer can designate as many employees as they would prefer. Since it requires a competent person to make any changes or additions to the fall protection equipment being provided to employees, companies with multiple jobsites are recommended to have multiple competent persons within their organization.

Additionally, employees are not permitted to use fall protection equipment until their employer conducts authorized user training and the competent person officially authorizes the worker to utilize the provided fall protection equipment. Even if an individual was authorized by a former employer to use fall protection equipment, their new employer must still provide basic fall protection training to authorize the worker for at-height work.

Fixed Ladder Update

As of 2018, OSHA requires all permanent, fixed ladders 24 feet or greater to include ladder safety systems. There are many compliant options available on the market, but the most common systems provide a cable or rail channel that has a shuttle connected to the chest D-ring of the climber’s body harness. This shuttle can help arrest falls right when they happen, so users who slip from their ladder don’t fall all the way to the ground below.

For ladders installed before 2018, OSHA currently has a deadline set for November 2036 for all affected ladders to be retrofitted with a ladder safety system. In fact, this retrofit is required for any eligible ladder at the moment of repair, maintenance or replacement.

However, in recent months, OSHA has floated the idea of lifting the 2036 deadline for businesses, so ladders would only have to be retrofit at the end of their service life. Some businesses are grateful for the extra time to become compliant, but many people in the safety community fear this will only further delay the installation of life-saving equipment on ladders. There is no safe height to fall from a ladder—the majority of ladder deaths occur under 10 feet. The longer we wait to make fixed ladders safer, the more workers will be injured (or worse) in the meantime.

ANSI Z359.14-2021 Update for Self-Retracting Lifelines

One of the most recent updates affecting fall protection users concerns self-retracting lifelines (SRLs). In August 2023, ANSI Z359.14-2021 took effect which made fall protection manufacturers reclassify SRL devices. Historically, they were differentiated into Class A and Class B. Class A devices were rated for a stopping distance of approximately 24 inches and kept fall forces under 1,350 lbs, while Class B devices were rated for a stopping distance of approximately 52 inches and kept fall forces under 900 lbs. But when it came to foot-level anchors or working around sharp edges, determining which devices were compliant was more difficult.

The recent update now reclassifies SRLs as either Class 1 or Class 2. Stopping distance and fall force rates are still relevant, but are no longer being used to differentiate the two types of devices. Class 1 SRLs are designed to connect to an anchorage at or above the user’s dorsal D-ring. Class 2 SRLs are designed to connect to those anchorage points, as well as anchors installed up to five feet below the user’s dorsal D-ring (AKA foot-level anchors). This differentiation was necessary because leading-edge falls were causing equipment failures, resulting in worker injury or fatality in many cases. Class 2 SRLs are rated to withstand the additional fall forces a worker experiences during a fall while connected to a foot-level anchor, thanks to the additional shock pack integrated into the system.

Some people find it helpful to remember that Class 1 SRLs have one option for tie-off (anything at or above the dorsal D-ring), and Class 2 SRLs have two options for tie-off (at or above the dorsal D-ring, and also anything at or above foot-level). Many construction sites have opted for caution and begun assigning Class 2 SRLs to field workers so they will be protected regardless of where their provided anchor is located.

Fall protection requirements have led OSHA’s Top 10 Most Cited Violations list for the past 15 years. Furthermore, ladder, scaffold and fall protection training requirements take up three other spots on the Top 10 list. When businesses and construction companies nationwide struggle to meet basic OSHA safety requirements, worker safety is compromised. In the current state, falls are one of the most common workplace injuries, and numbers have only increased in recent years.

Often, construction workers face limited options for installing anchors on jobsites, and that can significantly affect the range of options available to provide certain fall protection systems to workers. Collaboration among general contractors, fall protection providers and their end users can help advance efforts to create safer construction sites and integrate this equipment from the beginning of the build. The sooner fall protection is provided to workers, the better chance we have at preventing falls. The more falls are prevented, the more tragedies are avoided.

SEE ALSO: HOW TO GUARD YOUR CONSTRUCTION WORKFORCE AGAINST FALLS

The post Fall Protection Equipment Updates and How They Might Affect Your Construction Company first appeared on Construction Executive.

But beyond recognizing exceptional work, the data behind these projects may also offer a roadmap for delivering better outcomes across the broader construction industry.

Can the performance metrics from award-winning projects help owners, designers and contractors make decisions that lead to safer jobsites, stronger budget performance and more predictable schedules? According to ABC’s growing EIC data set, the answer appears to be yes.

Over the past several years, ABC has enhanced and automated the EIC application process, enabling the organization to capture and analyze detailed project-performance data across hundreds of projects nationwide. The findings reveal several clear trends among top-performing projects: value-based procurement dominated over low bid selection; preconstruction services consistently improved schedule reliability; and contractors investing in technology and early collaboration often delivered stronger safety and budget outcomes.

The 2025 EIC portfolio—recognized at ABC Convention 2026 in Salt Lake City—provides one of the clearest pictures yet of what project excellence looks like in practice.

The portfolio includes 341 national-level projects totaling $15.09 billion in construction value, representing 38 million work hours, 48 million square feet of construction and 3.6 million acres of developed land. The projects span every major market sector, including data centers, healthcare, multifamily, petrochemical, institutional, renewable energy and aviation.

Collectively, the projects achieved a total recordable incident rate of 0.68—70% below the 2025 industry average TRIR of 2.3. Ninety-eight percent finished within the final contract budget despite collectively overcoming 2,647 days of delays. Across the portfolio, contractors deployed a wide range of technologies, including robotics, telematics, drones, virtual reality and artificial intelligence.

The data also challenges several longstanding assumptions about high-performing construction projects. While many EIC projects exceed $100 million in value, nearly 200 are valued below $20 million, suggesting the practices driving excellence are not limited by project size. The portfolio also demonstrates that merit shop contractors are successfully delivering large-scale, technically complex projects while achieving industry-leading safety performance.

Taken together, the portfolio significantly outperformed broader industry benchmarks in safety, budget reliability and schedule management—raising an important question: What were these projects doing differently?

The data points to several leading indicators that consistently show up in award-winning construction.

THE VALUE OF EARLY ENGAGEMENT

Project success begins with procurement strategy and the services purchased during project development.

All procurement methods were represented across both general and specialty contracting. However, 60% of projects were procured primarily on value- or qualification-based selection, while 40% were procured primarily on price. Of the price-based projects, half were awarded through select bidding processes involving prequalified contractors.

While much of the broader construction market still relies heavily on price-driven procurement, EIC projects skewed strongly toward qualification- and value-based selection (encompassing both the “value-based” and “solely negotiated” designations in the preceding and above infographics).

Every market sector selected contractors primarily on qualification at least 50% of the time. The high-tech/data center sector and renewable energy sector relied most heavily on qualification-based procurement, at 74% and 75%, respectively.

“Owners are increasingly seeing that selecting a construction partner based on best value, not just low price, leads to savings overall,” says Buddy Henley, president of Gaithersburg, Maryland-based Henley Construction. “Having a trusted partner engaged during design allows risks to be identified earlier and problems to be solved before they become costly. That early collaboration improves cost certainty, supports smoother schedules and significantly reduces surprises in the field.”

Government projects relied most heavily on open hard bid or price-based procurement, using that method 27% of the time. By contrast, the high-tech/data center market procured just 15% of projects through open hard bid.

Among general contractors, 74% were selected primarily on a qualification basis. Nearly one-quarter of those projects were solely negotiated, and those projects represented the highest average contract value at approximately $101 million.

“The most successful projects are the ones that bring the design team and construction manager together at the very beginning. Early collaboration improves constructability, clarifies scopes for the trades, and reduces gaps that create risk,” Henley says. “That early alignment leads to better budget predictability and stronger trade relationships, which directly supports safer and more successful projects.

When owners focus on value-based procurement instead of low bid alone, the outcomes are consistently stronger. Choosing teams based on experience, collaboration and the value they bring creates real partnership across the project. We see better cost control, higher-quality results and safer jobsites when the right team is selected from the start.”

Lorri Grayson, partner and founder of Rehoboth, Delaware-based GGA Construction, echoes Henley’s sentiments. “Early involvement creates an atmosphere of strong collaboration among project stakeholders. It enables the project team to define the scope of work, identify long lead items and, most importantly, control costs from the earliest stages,” she says.

“It also helps develop a bid strategy that responds to current market conditions. For example, early involvement on our current project, The Continental, located at the University of Delaware, saved the owner over $5 million on a $90-million project,” Grayson says. “Early coordination allowed us to identify critical procurement needs and minimize budget risks, resulting in a more efficient and cost-effective process.”

That emphasis on early collaboration and value-driven procurement was reflected throughout the EIC portfolio data. Just 18% of general contractor projects were procured through open hard bid, and those projects represented the lowest average contract value at approximately $15 million.

The owner perspective also supports early contractor involvement.

“Successful projects are built on strong partnerships rooted in trust, transparency and psychological safety—where titles are set aside and teams feel comfortable speaking openly to solve problems together,” says Spencer Moore, vice president and chief facilities officer for globally renowned cancer center UT MD Anderson. “Early collaboration creates that foundation, allowing teams to address challenges with humility and ownership before moving toward solutions.”

That same emphasis on qualifications, collaboration and long-term value also appeared in how specialty contractors were selected across the EIC portfolio. Specialty contractors were procured primarily on qualification 46% of the time, while 31% were selected through select bid and 24% through open hard bid. Contract value did not appear to significantly influence procurement methodology for specialty trades.

One of the more surprising findings in the data was that procurement strategy did not necessarily dictate contract structure. Regardless of how projects were awarded—whether through qualification-based selection, negotiated work or open bid—top-performing projects utilized virtually every form of contracting across the portfolio.

One notable distinction emerged between general and specialty contractors: Lump-sum contracting overwhelmingly dominated among specialty contractors regardless of procurement method.

THE PRECON ADVANTAGE

Across all market sectors, preconstruction services were provided on 74% of projects—well above what many contractors would consider typical across the broader marketplace. General contractors delivered preconstruction services on 73% of projects, while specialty contractors did so on 75%.

“Early involvement allows specialty contractors to contribute practical, experience-based insight before key decisions are locked in. When we’re engaged during preconstruction, we can identify coordination challenges early, help refine scope and sequencing, and offer practical yet innovative solutions to tough problems–reducing rework,” says Matt Terry, president of Dallas-based mechanical contractor TDIndustries. “That upfront collaboration directly improves schedule reliability, cost certainty and overall project performance.”

Steve Grauer, executive vice president for Hensel Phelps, agrees. “In my experience, the best outcomes to project success on complex projects are rooted in project teams that exemplify a high level of trust, practice transparency, have accountability, truly collaborate, and have a high level of executive commitment and engagement in the project and where there is open communication by all the stakeholders,” he says. “These traits are best embedded when project teams have some type of early engagement, giving them an opportunity to work collaboratively to resolve early challenges and work to build personal relationships prior to the start of construction.”

Notably, no preconstruction services were provided on 51% of projects procured through open hard bid.

While preconstruction services were utilized across all procurement methods and contract structures, the combination of open hard bid procurement and lump-sum contracting most frequently resulted in projects without preconstruction involvement.

Twenty-six percent of all EIC projects did not utilize preconstruction services, and 75% of those projects followed the open hard bid/lump-sum model.

FROM PLANNING TO PERFORMANCE

At a time when the construction industry continues to battle cost escalation, labor shortages and schedule disruption, EIC projects significantly outperformed broader industry benchmarks in safety, budget reliability and schedule management. The EIC portfolio overcame more than seven years of cumulative delays, delivering 98% of projects within budget and achieving a TRIR of 0.68.

The next question? Whether procurement methods, contract structures or preconstruction services contributed to those outcomes.

When comparing planned project duration to actual construction duration—including delay recovery—projects utilizing preconstruction services demonstrated stronger performance.

Projects with preconstruction services showed slightly better schedule outcomes overall. Fifty-two percent achieved shorter actual durations compared to projects without preconstruction services.

More importantly, projects with contractor involvement during preconstruction overcame more delay days and exhibited lower schedule variation.

Projects without preconstruction services experienced a 14% variance between planned and actual construction duration, including delays.

The same trend appeared across contract structures. Lump-sum contracts—which included preconstruction services on only 47% of projects—experienced an 11% variance between planned and actual duration. Construction manager-at-risk projects, where preconstruction services were included on 96% of projects, experienced only a 1% variance.

The trend became even more pronounced among general contractors. Design-build and CMAR delivery methods significantly reduced schedule duration variance compared to lump-sum and time-and-materials contracts. This aligns with the fact that design-build and CMAR projects incorporated preconstruction services on 90% and 96% of projects, respectively.

“The biggest gains we see come under the construction-manager-at-risk approach. Early cost validation during design helps identify savings without sacrificing quality,” explains Henley. “Clarifying scopes and resolving issues early reduces financial risk and improves safety across all trade partners.”

Among specialty contractors, preconstruction services also reduced schedule variation regardless of procurement method or contract type. Projects without preconstruction services experienced a 25% schedule variance. When specialty contractors participated in preconstruction, that variance was reduced by at least half.

Although 98% of EIC projects finished within the customer’s final approved budget, variation still existed between original and final contract values through approved change orders.

Projects utilizing CMAR and design-build delivery methods experienced lower budget variation than lump-sum and time-and-materials contracts, suggesting fewer scope changes and change orders over the course of construction.

No significant correlation emerged between procurement method, contract type and safety performance, with one exception: time-and-materials projects recorded an exceptionally low TRIR of 0.04.

Time-and-materials contracting was most common in industrial, infrastructure and renewable energy markets.

CONSTRUCTION TECHNOLOGY

Technology adoption continues to expand across the construction industry.

• The four most commonly used technologies during the past three years remained consistent:
• Project-management platforms
• Safety workflow technologies
• Drones
• Jobsite security technologies

TECHNOLOGY MOVES TO THE CENTER

Just three years ago, artificial intelligence was virtually absent from EIC projects. Today, 18% of projects report using AI technologies.

Importantly, no major technology category has declined in usage over the past three years, suggesting contractors continue to realize measurable return on investment.

Technology deployment also spanned all contract types and project sizes.

Construction technologies were utilized across projects of every size category. Data indicates that technology deployment frequency remains consistent regardless of project dollar value.

“During the past three years, we have experienced unprecedented growth which we attribute to two key factors,” says Rob Griffith, chief operating officer of Gaylor Electric. “First, we are collaborating with our customers earlier in the precon process. The second—related—factor is our commitment to utilizing innovations that increase efficiency and safety for our workforce and the speed at which we deliver reliable outcomes on projects.”

Projects utilizing safety technologies consistently reported lower TRIR rates than projects without those technologies.

The trend suggests that investments in safety-focused technology are contributing to improved jobsite performance.

“Technologies like BIM, VDC, field-management platforms and real-time reporting help teams communicate more effectively and make informed decisions faster,” Terry says. “Our longstanding investments in these tools give our teams a distinct advantage when delivering high-quality results. This amounts to better productivity, safer jobsites and more predictable outcomes for owners.”

WHAT THE INDUSTRY CAN LEARN

Companies qualifying for EIC awards should take pride in their performance. The data confirms that ABC’s EIC-awarded projects significantly outperform industry averages across safety, budget and schedule metrics.

• The analysis also reinforces several broader conclusions:
• Preconstruction services deliver measurable value
• Technology adoption is accelerating and becoming a key differentiator
• Safety leadership remains foundational to project excellence
• High-performing contractors consistently deliver quality projects regardless of procurement method or contract structure

The data also provides insights worth sharing broadly across the industry. Regardless of project size, market sector or delivery method, the conditions for excellence can be created through intentional planning, collaboration, innovation and leadership.

SEE ALSO: ABC UNVEILS AWARD-WINNING CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS, NATIONAL CONTRACTOR OF THE YEAR, SAFETY AND DIVERSITY EXCELLENCE IN THE INDUSTRY

The post Inside Construction’s Highest-Performing Projects first appeared on Construction Executive.

Most construction organizations cannot answer that question. Not because the data does not exist—it does. Every active project generates daily inspection findings, labor records, near-miss reports and audit results. The problem is that standard safety systems collect this data and then report it in ways that make it operationally useless for prevention. They describe the past. They predict nothing.

The predictive safety analytics framework (PSAF) is a practical, deployable system developed from years of applying data science to large-scale construction portfolio operations that takes the safety data construction organizations already collect and transforms it into a forward-looking risk signal. The result? A single weekly score that tells executives where risk is concentrating across their portfolio before anyone gets hurt.

WHY YOUR CURRENT SAFETY DATA IS FAILING YOU

The construction industry’s reliance on lagging indicators—TRIR, DART rates, OSHA logs—is still valid. These metrics are essential for compliance, benchmarking and insurance. But they share one structural limitation that no amount of refinement can fix: They only tell you what has already happened.

A zero-incident month is not a green light. It may mean your projects are genuinely safe. It may equally mean your teams are under-inspecting and your hazards are going unrecorded. Without an analytics layer on top of your existing data, you cannot tell the difference—and that gap is where serious injuries occur.

Leading safety researchers have demonstrated that integrating proactive safety controls alongside lagging measures measurably reduces incident rates. Yet most contractors still lack a practical system that delivers this at portfolio scale. PSAF fills that gap.

HOW PSAF WORKS: THREE PRACTICAL STEPS

PSAF builds on three ideas—each straightforward on its own, and exponentially more powerful in combination.

Step 1: Compare Projects Fairly

Raw safety numbers are misleading without context. A project recording 50 findings during a slow month with 5,000 labor hours looks identical on paper to a project recording 50 findings during an intensive month with 100,000 labor hours. They are not the same. One is under-inspected. The other is highly active and well-monitored.

PSAF adjusts every metric for actual labor intensity—so executives can compare risk accurately across projects of any size, phase or duration. This single adjustment eliminates the most common source of misleading safety reporting in construction portfolio management.

Step 2: Weight Findings by What Actually Matters

Standard audit systems count every inspection finding the same way—a housekeeping note and a life-threatening fall hazard are recorded as two equal data points. That equivalence is the single largest analytical error in conventional construction safety reporting. It buries the most dangerous signals under mountains of minor ones.

PSAF assigns escalating weights to findings based on their potential to cause harm:

The resulting score divides positive, proactive findings against severity-weighted negative findings. A month where one life-threatening condition is buried among routine citations looks dramatically different under PSAF than under a raw count—and that difference is what prevents serious injuries.

A declining score month over month is the earliest warning signal available before any recordable incident occurs.

Step 3: Track Warning Signs Before Injuries Happen

Every serious construction fatality is preceded by recognizable conditions—unprotected edges, unsupported excavations, uncontrolled energy sources or suspended loads over occupied areas. The serious injury and fatality potential (SIF-P) rate quantifies these exposures as operational data before any injury occurs.

PSAF’s specific contribution is integrating SIF-P tracking with the weighted audit score into a single combined signal. When SIF-P observations are rising at the same time the weighted audit score is declining, the combined signal identifies deteriorating site conditions weeks before they produce a recordable event—weeks that no lagging metric can provide.

In a portfolio application of PSAF, the composite model detected a correlated adverse trend—rising SIF-P observations alongside a declining Weighted Audit Score—across a six-week window. Every standard lagging metric showed satisfactory performance throughout. No incidents had occurred. Yet the integrated signal was unambiguous: Risk was concentrating in a specific area at a specific phase of construction. Targeted supervision and coaching followed. The project moved through its highest-risk period without a single recordable event. The lagging metrics confirmed safety after the fact. PSAF enabled it before.

ONE SCORE, EVERY WEEK

All three components integrate into a single composite safety analytics score—one number, updated weekly, that tells executives the safety status of every active project at a glance:

For executives managing five, 10 or 20 active projects simultaneously, this weekly composite signal replaces hours of report-reading with one clear answer: where do I need to focus right now?

When executives have this signal updated weekly, safety management changes character entirely. Teams stop asking, “What went wrong last month?” and start asking, “Where is risk building this week?” That question—asked weekly, answered with data—is the structural difference between a compliance program and a prevention program.

WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOUR ORGANIZATION

Implementing PSAF does not require new software or additional staff. Every metric is calculable from data most mid-to-large contractors already collect through their existing inspection platforms, labor tracking systems and safety reporting tools. Four principles make the difference:

• Compare by labor intensity, not raw numbers—A busy project and a slow one cannot be evaluated the same way.
• Weight hazards by severity—Focus attention on what could cause serious harm, not what is easiest to count.
• Track warning signs before incidents—The conditions that precede serious injuries are visible in your data if you know how to look.
• Review the composite score weekly—Monthly safety reviews are compliance exercises; weekly reviews are prevention.

THE BIGGER PICTURE

PSAF demonstrates something that extends well beyond safety: Construction analytics methods—normalization, severity weighting, composite integration, threshold classification—can transform any operational data stream into portfolio-level intelligence. The same architecture applies to schedule execution reliability, quality backlog management and financial risk tracking.

The construction industry has now spent two decades investing in data-collection tools. The organizations that pull ahead in the next decade will be those that build the analytics layer on top—converting collected data into decisions, not just reports.

The data your projects generate every day already contains the warning signs you need. PSAF ensures it prevents the future instead of recording the past.

SEE ALSO: PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS AND FORECASTING IN CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS

The post Predict Risk, Not Incidents: A New Analytics Framework for Your Construction Safety Data first appeared on Construction Executive.

Workforce safety should be viewed as more than a regulatory obligation. Protecting employees is critical to operational stability, workforce retention and long-term business success. For construction leaders, work zone safety is not simply about avoiding incidents. It is about creating environments where workers can perform safely and return home at the end of the day.

Construction and roadway crews routinely work only feet away from moving traffic, heavy machinery and constantly shifting conditions. Even with proper planning and controls in place, work zones remain unpredictable environments where a single moment of distraction can result in serious consequences.

According to the National Construction Work Zone Safety report, there were an estimated 101,000 work zone crashes in 2023, the latest year statistics were available. In addition, data compiled by the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics shows that an average of 776 people die annually in work zone-related incidents, including more than 100 roadway workers each year.

The Business Impact of Work Zone Incidents

Every work zone incident can have lasting effects on workers, their families and communities. They also have business implications. For contractors and business leaders, those incidents carry consequences far beyond the immediate scene of an accident. Workplace injuries can disrupt project timelines, impact productivity, increase operational costs and place additional strain on workforce stability.

Beyond the immediate costs associated with an incident, work zone accidents can create ripple effects across an organization. Delays caused by investigations, equipment damage, staffing shortages or project shutdowns can impact timelines and client relationships. In competitive industries where margins and schedules are closely monitored, even a single incident can create operational setbacks that extend far beyond the jobsite.

Companies that prioritize proactive safety planning are often better positioned to maintain productivity, strengthen workforce trust and reduce long-term exposure to costly claims and disruptions. These realities reinforce the importance of approaching work zone safety as an ongoing leadership responsibility rather than a checklist item. Strong safety cultures are built through proactive communication, consistent training and a visible commitment to protecting workers in dynamic environments.

Construction leaders play a major role in creating environments where safety remains the priority, even when conditions change quickly. Maintaining that focus requires consistent communication, planning and accountability across every phase of a project.

Building a Stronger Safety Culture

One of the most effective ways construction leaders can strengthen work zone safety is by building consistent safety practices into every phase of a project. Key areas of focus include:

Consistent Communication

Daily safety meetings help reinforce expectations, address changing site conditions and keep workers focused on situational awareness before entering active work areas. These conversations also create opportunities for crews to identify potential hazards and discuss concerns before incidents occur.

Tailored Training

Work zones present unique challenges that require workers to remain alert and adaptable throughout the day. Preparing employees to recognize changing traffic patterns, anticipate distracted drivers and respond to unexpected conditions can significantly reduce exposure to risk. Safety training should extend beyond regulatory requirements and focus on real-world conditions workers are likely to encounter on active roadways.

Pre-work Coordination

Pre-task planning, traffic control reviews and clear communication between contractors, supervisors and crews help reduce confusion in active work environments. When workers understand site-specific risks and expectations before entering a work zone, teams are better prepared to respond to changing conditions safely and efficiently.

Near-Miss Reporting

Near-miss reporting and ongoing safety evaluations can provide valuable insight into patterns or hazards that may otherwise go unnoticed. Creating an environment where workers feel comfortable speaking up about safety concerns helps organizations identify risks early and continuously improve jobsite practices.

Visibility Measures

Properly positioned barriers, signage and traffic control devices help create safer environments for both workers and motorists. High-visibility apparel and well-maintained traffic control measures become especially important during adverse weather conditions, nighttime operations, and periods of reduced visibility.

Preparing for External Risks

In addition to internal safety practices, construction leaders should recognize the growing impact distracted driving continues to have on roadway work zones. Mobile devices, speeding and driver inattention remain leading contributors to work zone incidents across the country. While contractors cannot control driver behavior, they can prepare crews for the reality of those risks through planning, communication and defensive safety strategies.

Building a strong work zone safety culture requires consistency from leadership. Employees are more likely to prioritize safe practices when company leaders visibly support and reinforce them. When safety conversations happen regularly and expectations remain clear across all levels of an organization, workers are empowered to make safer decisions in high-risk situations.

Construction leaders should also recognize the importance of reinforcing safe driving awareness beyond the jobsite. Employees operating company vehicles, transporting equipment or traveling between project sites face many of the same roadway risks as motorists passing through active work zones. Extending safety conversations to include defensive driving practices and situational awareness can help further reduce exposure both on and off the jobsite.

A Shared Commitment

For motorists, driving through a work zone may feel like a temporary inconvenience caused by lower speed limits, lane shifts or traffic delays. For construction crews, however, those environments represent active jobsites where focus and caution are essential. Encouraging drivers to slow down, remain alert and follow traffic signage remains an important part of protecting the workforce operating nearby.

Preventing work zone incidents ultimately requires a shared commitment between construction teams, business leaders and the public. While workers follow strict safety procedures to reduce risk, drivers also play a critical role in maintaining safe roadway environments.

As infrastructure investment and roadway improvement projects continue nationwide, construction leaders have an opportunity to reinforce safety not only as a compliance requirement, but as a core organizational value.

Companies that maintain strong safety cultures are better equipped to protect their workforce, support operational continuity and build long-term resilience in an increasingly demanding environment.

Supporting businesses and workers is directly tied to supporting thriving communities. As roadway construction activity continues nationwide, maintaining a proactive approach to work zone safety can help organizations protect their workforce, strengthen operations and create safer outcomes for everyone on the road.

SEE ALSO: TRANSFORMING WORK ZONE SAFETY THROUGH AUTOMATION

The post Adopting a Leadership-Based Approach to Work Zone Safety first appeared on Construction Executive.

When used to achieve general safety goals, such as real-time monitoring with video-based AI to detect risks, it can be a valuable tool if there are frontline supervisors available to respond to alerts. The inconsistent nature of a construction jobsite, where new problems and dangers can happen at any time, and workers often make split-second decisions to save themselves and their colleagues from injury or in some cases take unnecessary risks, makes relying on video-based AI highly impractical, and due to often very complex work conditions, prone to inaccuracies.

Here are five reasons why video-based AI has limitations in construction safety:

1. The Full Time Power That is Needed to Support Video-Based AI Isn’t Available in 90% of the Highest Hazard Construction Settings

AI is very energy consuming and in order to process video-based AI, full time power is required. Given that 90% of the work areas that are associated with the highest hazard construction work do not have full time dedicated power available, the battery-powered fixed-point camera systems that are needed in the highest risk work zones would require changing batteries frequently, which isn’t practical or even viable in some work areas.

2. Environmental Erraticism and Data Quality and Consistency

High-performing video-based AI depends on large volumes of consistent, high-quality data. Manufacturing naturally produces uniform datasets, improving model performance. In healthcare, hybrid-AI and human-intelligence approaches help ensure accuracy in complex situations.

Construction video data is often fragmented and inconsistent: Camera angles change regularly and are often far away from work activities; different weather patterns and lighting can impact clarity; obstructions are common; and high hazard work behaviors are unpredictable. These factors reduce data quality and increase the likelihood of missed or inaccurate video-based AI detections.

3. Roaming Video-Based AI Systems Such as Robots or Helmet Cams Miss 90% of the Story and Cannot Access the Highest Hazard Work Zones

As with almost any work environment, worker behaviors are heavily influenced when a manager is present. Roaming video-based AI systems inherently change worker behaviors when they are present but are unable to evaluate or impact 90% of the work activities when such roaming systems aren’t present. Fixed-point camera systems that record 100% of the work activities and which are then “smart sampled” by expert human video annotation construction specialists are much more impactful. Robotic camera systems are also unable to access the highest hazard work areas especially on the top floors of buildings as they are being constructed, and helmet-fixed camera systems are mostly worn by staff who aren’t permitted to access these highest risk work areas.

4. Unsafe Worker Behaviors Often Occur in a Just a Few Seconds Making Video-Based AI “Real-Time” Alerts Ineffective and Can Overwhelm Frontline Supervisors With Too Many Alerts, a Subset of Which Will Be Inaccurate

Many of the extremely dangerous worker behaviors in construction take place in 1-5 seconds, making real-time video-based AI alerts extremely impractical. Overwhelming a single safety professional on a construction project who oversees safety for 100+ workers with a barrage of real-time video-based AI alerts will almost never result in a worker being notified in real time of the high-risk action they just took.  Without human video annotation specialists being used to ensure that all videos sent to frontline supervisors are accurate, there are going to be many inaccurate videos sent which will quickly erode the confidence in the video data integrity.  Furthermore, “smart sampling” and sending a small subset of the overall coaching clips can drive safety performance to extremely high levels without overburdening safety professionals with too many alerts.

5. Video-Based AI Solutions Do Not Provide Construction Clients With the Consultative Video Coaching Services Needed to Truly and Significantly Impact the Safety Culture on Projects

There are countless examples over the last 50 years of frontline supervisors in many industries being overloaded with automated data streams that are often underutilized and wind up not materially improving safety, quality or productivity. Building a safety culture that can drive the 97%-100% compliance levels needed to significantly reduce the risk of workplace injuries requires a highly consultative coaching approach, which video-based AI alone cannot accomplish.

Over time, video‑based AI can contribute meaningfully to construction, but it should complement versus replace time-tested, human‑led consultative video coaching methods. Its greatest value lies in supporting human teams by:

• Providing additional visibility across sites in the small number of work areas where there is full-time power available
• Capturing rare, but potentially high-risk video-based AI events with fully powered cameras that can be reviewed first by human video annotation specialists before the video events are sent to frontline supervisors

A balanced approach of combining AI capabilities with experienced human oversight offers the most practical path forward.

While video‑based AI is often presented as a compelling solution for construction safety, its effectiveness is limited by the dynamic and unpredictable nature of jobsites. Unlike industries such as manufacturing and healthcare, construction lacks the consistency and stable power infrastructure needed for AI to perform reliably. As a result, the greatest impact will come from selectively combining video‑based AI with human video annotation specialists and proven consultative video coaching programs.

SEE ALSO: THE NEWEST MEMBER OF YOUR FACILITIES TEAM? YOUR BUILDING.

The post Five Reasons Why Total Reliance on Video-Based AI for Construction Jobsite Safety Isn’t the Answer first appeared on Construction Executive.

Worker fatigue isn’t just feeling tired. It’s the physical and mental strain often caused by long shifts, overtime, heat, repetitive tasks and inadequate recovery time that can raise injury risks due to:

• Slower reaction times 
• Decreased situational awareness 
• Impaired judgment

National safety and health agencies have conducted studies highlighting the urgency of this topic. One report found that nearly one in four construction workers regularly exceeds 40 work hours per week. Another revealed how physical fatigue can impair construction workers’ situational awareness. Wearable sensor data indicated a 12% drop in their hazard recognition and a 28% decline in safety risk assessment.

For an industry that employs one of the nation’s largest workforce segments and routinely delivers complex, high-cost, long-term projects, these statistics reveal a clear and persistent vulnerability. Fatigue is not simply an individual worker issue; it is an organizational risk that can drive OSHA recordable incidents, undermine project outcomes and diminish competitive standing.

Fatigued workers may overlook critical safety protocols or misjudge distances and loads, leading to accidents that could affect both their personal safety and that of their coworkers. Efficiency can also take a hit, as mistakes made by tired workers can drive costly rework, wasted labor and materials, schedule delays and budget overruns. And when contractors bid for work, their safety records are under the microscope; injuries tied to fatigue could cost job opportunities.

Managing Fatigue Proactively

Fatigue doesn’t happen by accident and it shouldn’t be managed reactively. It requires a proactive approach that involves implementing preemptive measures, such as robust worksite preventive health programming, into daily operations. This may require examining external factors that can contribute to worker fatigue, such as commute times, environmental conditions (e.g., extreme heat) and work schedules.

But fatigue isn’t just about long hours or extreme weather conditions. It’s also about physical capacity versus job demand. It’s hard to manage unknown fatigue risks. A pre-employment physical can help identify health factors that may contribute to fatigue. Often called a preplacement physical, this exam can help determine whether a candidate can safely perform the physical functions of a given role. This assessment isn’t designed to rule out candidates. It focuses on alignment—not exclusion—to confirm that the role matches the candidate’s capabilities.

Applying Worksite Intervention

Structured injury prevention programs can make a real difference at busy worksites. A firm managing a high-profile construction project might employ onsite occupational health professionals, such as athletic trainers, to help manage fatigue before injuries occur. Their duties may include:

• Conducting ergonomic assessments to remove inefficiencies and boost productivity 
• Coaching proper body mechanics and safe material handling to reduce strain 
• Leading preshift warmups to improve flexibility and comfort

An onsite occupational health model could feature other medical professionals (e.g., physicians, registered nurses) for first aid and routine health services, enabling workers to be treated for minor conditions and return to work promptly—helping projects remain on track and preventing further injury.

Delivering Targeted Care

Episodic health services provide flexible, targeted support for organizations that don’t need a permanent onsite health staff but want expert coverage for seasonal or project-specific risks. These health services can be offered at worksites on a one-time or recurring basis to address specific occupational illnesses and injuries. For example, organizing worksite flu vaccinations is a simple way contractors can curb the spread of a respiratory illness that can drive absenteeism and disrupt daily operations. Employers that take steps to limit flu spread have a better chance at maintaining stable staffing and reducing the need for overtime, which can ease workload pressures and prevent fatigue.

Measuring Impact and Demonstrating Value

An effective fatigue management strategy can drive meaningful gains in safety, performance, and employee wellbeing. Avoiding a single fatigue-related incident can easily justify the investment. Measurable outcomes can include:

• Injury Rates: Track recordable injuries and near-misses before and after plan implementation.
• Cost and Duration of Cases: Assess the speed and expense of work injury resolutions in specialized versus general care.
• Lost Workdays: Monitor reductions in days off and modified duty through improved prevention and quicker recoveries.
• Productivity: Analyze schedule adherence and rework rates to identify reductions in fatigue-related errors.
• Bid Competitiveness: Evaluate win rates on safety-sensitive projects linked to enhanced safety metrics.

Turning Insights Into Action 

A good first step in managing worker fatigue would be partnering with an occupational health provider. These medical professionals offer more than injury care. Occupational health experts can turn everyday injury data and real working conditions into a focused fatigue management strategy. By looking beyond individual cases to the patterns behind them, they can pinpoint where fatigue is increasing risk and recommend strategies that include:

• Analyzing injury and near-miss data for fatigue‑related patterns 
• Reviewing schedules and overtime to flag high‑risk rotations 
• Surveying workers and screening for sleep and fatigue issues 
• Evaluating high‑demand jobs where fatigue most threatens safety 
• Adding fatigue-related questions to injury evaluations to sharpen prevention

Reframing Fatigue Management as a Strategic Advantage

Fatigue management should be a core element of a risk mitigation strategy, not a sideline wellness initiative. Worker fatigue can impact safety performance, operational efficiency and financial outcomes. In an industry where safety records are scrutinized and margins hinge on precision, contractors that integrate a fatigue management strategy into their daily operations and workplace safety program are better positioned to protect their crews, strengthen their industry reputation and remain competitive.

SEE ALSO: A HEAD OF THE GAME: NAVIGATING TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURIES IN CONSTRUCTION

The post Worker Fatigue: The Overlooked Hazard Driving Injuries and Rework first appeared on Construction Executive.

When people are apprehensive about speaking up, little mistakes can go unaddressed. Workers who are stressed out, overloaded and over-tired don’t have the capacity to spend the energy and time to do what they know would be right to fix—or prevent—those little mistakes.

Equipment, technology and OSHA rules abound to foster safety. Yet, these tools only work if workers can engage them. To do so, requires a down-regulated nervous system and emotional safety. Humans in general are much more aware, capable and present when rested, well-trained and supported.

TRAIN THE BRAIN

Nervous system and emotional regulation is a skill that starts with internal regulation. Somatic (physiological) awareness, is identifying what your body is experiencing and learning what to do with that feeling; not control it, not deny it, not suppress it, but work with it, allowing your capacity for information, stimuli and action to remain uncompromised.

Emotional and psychological safety on site is a performance variable, not a soft quality. Typically, people on a construction site are trained to be strong and self-reliant. Unfortunately, that often gets interpreted as pushing through stress and holding back emotions rather than speaking up. Constant holding back creates chronic physiological stress (allostatic load), which only continues to decrease the body’s window of tolerance.

If workers are uncertain about a job change, a deadline or a personal issue, they’re less likely to voice concerns when they see a hazard. Even if only unconsciously, much of their resources are focused—often in solitude—on personal issues. Holding onto old stress prompts a decrease in the capacity to handle new stress, like a jobsite safety issue.

Under the pressure of background stress combined with presenting stress, a good worker collapses into the default survival or coping mechanism. Extraneous behaviors and responsibilities fall by the wayside.

The strongest safety tool people have is the ability to speak up, and they’re more likely to do that when they feel psychologically safe and physiologically resourced. Being psychologically safe means being in an environment where workers feel trusted, not judged and generally heard. Being physiologically resourced means having the capacity to handle more stimuli without being overloaded or stressed.

SURVIVE AND ADVANCE

The stress state, at least on a physiological level, is the same as a survival state. In a survival state, the body orients toward threat, real or imagined, because the brain is hardwired to survive before anything else. This means less awareness and less concern about what subjectively feels unimportant. Yet that may just be what is objectively important on a jobsite: a particularly part, for example, vulnerable to falling off and prompting a serious safety issue.

If a worker feels either physiologically or emotionally unsafe, they are less likely to speak up or take proper action. A safety culture must explicitly protect honest signals, not just outcomes. Construction culture must allow the person in question to take the risk of saying something that might not be correct or culturally accepted, such as pointing out that an activity is not safe.

To shift this part of safety culture means shifting the appreciation toward taking emotional risks to pursue safety behavior and speaking up. It means modeling and rewarding actions that would traditionally not be honored, and having the community not only verbally agree but really feel the value of these risks.

Often, that value is felt when people start to share the feelings they’ve held and show how much they really care about others: They care about their own and others’ safety, and they recognize how difficult it can be to speak up, to slow something down or to take a different course of action.

Traditional safety programs assume people will consistently signal risk. In reality, it’s the capacity of each person and the collective emotional safety of the space that determines the success of any safety program. Buying more safety equipment and establishing more rules will often not improve your safety record, whereas changing the culture and the physiological capacity will.

SEE ALSO:  FIVE WAYS TO INTEGRATE MENTAL HEALTH INTO CONSTRUCTION SAFETY PROTOCOLS

The post Improve Somatic Awareness to Increase Construction Workforce Safety first appeared on Construction Executive.

Testifying at the hearing, “Building a Safer Future: Private-Sector Strategies for Emerging Safety Issues,” Sughrue explained that ABC’s annual report demonstrates how private-sector safety systems, including the use of leading indicators, are already helping contractors identify hazards, reduce risk and improve outcomes before incidents occur. The report shows that top-performing ABC members participating in ABC’s STEP® Health and Safety Management System achieved incident rates 686% safer than the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics construction industry average, reducing total recordable incident rates by 85%.

“The lesson is clear: Proactive, measurable safety systems work,” said Sughrue. “At Cianbro, we know that safety challenges cannot be solved by looking only at what went wrong after an injury occurs. It requires committed and engaged leadership, clear communication, team member involvement and a culture of trust. In addition, it requires a proactive approach, focused on the holistic person, which is why we utilize leading indicators to help us prevent illness and injuries. Construction professionals need to be at their best at all times as the construction industry is full of risks.”

Sughrue explained that multiple layers of accountability exist when injuries occur on a project. While those include OSHA, workers’ compensation, civil risks, contractual/owner accountabilities and insurance companies, just as powerful are the consequences for damaged client relationships, workforce morale, public perceptions and reduced ability to attract talent.

“Enforcement alone cannot build an industry-leading health and safety culture,” said Sughrue. “To address emerging safety challenges, OSHA should also emphasize compliance assistance, cooperative programs, education and practical tools that help employers prevent incidents before they happen. Relying on TRIR as a primary safety metric is increasingly ineffective and counterproductive.

“In contrast, leading indicators measure the inputs and processes that prevent injuries before they occur and directly assess how well a safety system is functioning in real time,” said Sughrue. “These indicators are actionable: They tell leaders what to improve, where risk exists and who needs support—long before someone is hurt. OSHA policy should reward prevention, encourage innovation and help more employers adopt proven best practices.”

Sughrue further testified that ABC’s 2026 Health and Safety Performance Report is a blueprint for doing exactly that. It shows that, when contractors measure safety, engage workers, hold leaders accountable and commit to continuous improvement, injury rates go down.

“People are the heart and souls of the construction industry,” said Sughrue. “The purpose of every safety program should be to protect them using leading indicators.”

Watch the hearing and read Sughrue’s testimony.

Established 37 years ago, STEP is a proven system that provides contractors and suppliers with a robust, no-cost framework for measuring health and safety data and benchmarking with peers in the industry. This self-assessment tool helps participants become an employer of choice in a competitive labor market. Any construction contractor can be a STEP participant. Visit abc.org/step to learn more.

SEE ALSO: FIVE WAYS TO INTEGRATE MENTAL HEALTH INTO CONSTRUCTION SAFETY PROTOCOLS

The post Proactive, Measurable Construction Safety Systems Work: ABC Testifies to Congress on Workforce Protections first appeared on Construction Executive.

Originally passed in mid-2024 and proposed to go into effect in July 2025, the law’s requirements were postponed until January 2026, giving ABC Minnesota/North Dakota—in partnership with NCCER and the Minnesota Cable Communications Association—time to roll out their Safety Qualified Underground Telecommunications Installer training program, which would ensure the workforce of their contractor members were certified.

When ABC MN/ND first caught wind of this law, it quickly set to work on designing this program from scratch. It would need to encapsulate enough classes to satisfy the 40-hour requirement, with both hands-on (in the field) and hands-off (digital classroom) training portions. It would need to include a training addendum for those looking to become program instructors. It would need to be flexible enough to accommodate the demands of sometimes unpredictable and often odd construction hours. It would need to be offered in both English and Spanish. And it would need to be designed in one year.

This law being the first of its kind in the country, there was no precedent for similar programs which the chapter could reference. So, it did not shock the chapter when it was approached by Minnesota Cable in late 2024 once this legislation had passed. With a relatively small staff, Minnesota Cable was conscious of the cap on its abilities to build out a bulky safety program like the one this law would require—but just as with ABC, their members needed it. “Minnesota Cable asked if ABC was interested in partnering,” says Adam Hanson, president of ABC MN/ND. “So, we went through a few meetings and agreed to take it on.”

But each association still took pause with just where and how to begin designing the program. So, NCCER was not shocked either when it received a call to action. 

Robert Jones, digital director of learning at NCCER, says, “It just made perfect sense for us to be able to support ABC. To make sure that this chapter is a leader in the state in training people how to work safely, and not just in broadband.”

Jones says they also saw the bigger picture—a national one—which influenced the type of program that they would build. “We built the program modularly,” he says. Of the seven courses, the first focuses specifically on Minnesota regulations; the other six focus on digging-safety and equipment skills. “We designed it so that if another ABC chapter came to us under similar circumstances, we are able to readily respond.”

Having worked closely with NCCER over the past several years, Hanson was confident in this next venture. “I knew that there was great opportunity there,” he says. He was also confident about the national influence a program like this could have on construction safety. “We were not only building this for Minnesota contractors.”

Perhaps the SQUTI program was built for something bigger than Minnesota, but—as it originated there—what did the contractors in Minnesota think of this program?

Director of Government Affairs for ABC MN/ND Joel Hanson says, “A lot of the feedback I got from contractors included ensuring that we weren’t just covering the bare minimum. If they’re going to have to put people through 40 hours of training, it should be worthwhile.” Hanson collected information on preexisting training that contractors were already applying, as well as supplemental activities to include. “We wanted to make this a good value for the contractors.”

Having been enacted for almost half a year now, the program is already increasing overall telecommunications safety awareness and implementation, and the more contractors who enroll and pass, the more feel and see the safety benefits. “ABC MN/ND is proud to help lead the rollout out of SQUTI”, says Janet Artmann, ABC MN/ND’s safety programs manager, “SQUTI strengthens our industry by elevating training expectations and reinforcing a culture of safety on every jobsite.”

At the time of this publication, there were 214 participants and 51 instructors enrolled; 171 of whom have already earned their orange cards—which will need to be renewed every three years.

This SQUTI certification program is already proving successful—and historical. Artmann says, “We’re always advocates for the safest, best way to do anything. Being the first program of this kind out there and already having nearly 200 orange cards, if we can keep that consistency going and keep in the forefront of people’s minds, I feel like its success will be organic and lasting.”

SEE ALSO: INFRASTRUCTURE: GOING AFTER IIJA-FUNDED WORK TWO YEARS LATER

The post New Law Prompts ABC Minnesota/North Dakota to Design New Telecommunications Safety Training Program first appeared on Construction Executive.

Mental health, however, remains largely outside of the safety system. 

This poses a safety risk because mental health conditions are associated with measurable impacts on attention, judgment, communication and risk tolerance. Fatigue, distraction and elevated stress increase the likelihood of safety-related incidents—especially in construction, where work is performed in dynamic, high-risk environments that rely on sustained attention, clear communication and sound judgment. 

Here are five practical ways construction leaders can incorporate mental health into existing safety protocols without creating parallel programs or adding unnecessary complexity. 

1. Treat Mental Health as a Job Hazard, Not a Personal Matter 

Construction safety already accounts for conditions that increase risk: weather, fatigue, congestion and schedule pressure. Mental strain belongs in that same category. Long hours, constant remobilization, rework pressure and unresolved conflict all affect how safely work gets done. Rather than framing mental health as something workers must manage on their own, leaders should recognize that jobsite conditions and culture shape it. Including mental health considerations in job hazard analyses—particularly for high-risk or high-pressure tasks—shifts the conversation away from stigma to shared responsibility. 

2. Build Awareness Into Daily Safety Routines 

Toolbox talks, pre‑task plans and daily huddles are some of the most effective safety mechanisms in construction because they are short, consistent and site led. Mental health support fits naturally into these routines. That doesn’t mean turning safety meetings into therapy sessions. It means briefly acknowledging factors that affect focus and decision-making: stress, exhaustion, workload or changes in routine. Even simple check-ins reinforce the idea that safety includes how people are doing, not only what they’re doing. When these conversations are consistent and matter-of-fact, these conversations normalize awareness and reduce the hesitancy to speak up before risk escalates

3. Train Supervisors to Recognize Behavioral Safety Signals 

Construction supervisors are already trained to identify unsafe behaviors such as bypassing controls, rushing tasks or ignoring procedures. Mental health shows up through similar signals. 

Changes in behavior—withdrawal, irritability, missed details and uncharacteristic risk-taking—can indicate increased safety risks. Training field leaders to recognize these patterns, without diagnosing or labeling them, strengthens situational awareness on jobsites. The focus should be on response, not judgment: slowing work, reallocating tasks, checking in privately and connecting workers to support when needed. Early recognition is one of the most effective forms of risk prevention. 

4. Make Support Resources Part of the Safety System 

Safety systems work when tools are visible, accessible and trusted. Mental health resources should be no different. When employees don’t know where to turn or worry about the consequences of asking for help, they won’t use available support. Leaders can reduce that barrier by clearly communicating mental health resources as part of the safety program, not as a remedial measure. Posting information alongside safety signage, referencing resources during onboarding and reinforcing confidentiality all help position support as another protective control, like PPE or  SWA, rather than a last resort. 

5. Reinforce That Speaking Up Is a Safety Action 

One of the strongest predictors of safe jobsites is whether people feel comfortable raising concerns. That applies equally to physical conditions and mental strain. When leaders consistently reinforce that speaking up is expected, and then respond constructively, workers learn that raising concerns is part of safe work—not a disruption. This matters, especially when silence is often mistaken for resilience. 

The message should be clear: asking for help, flagging overload or requesting a pause is not a failure to perform. Those are proactive safety decisions. 

The Next Step in Safety Leadership 

The construction industry didn’t significantly improve physical safety through slogans. Progress came when leaders acknowledged risk, embedded controls into daily work and modeled the behaviors they expected from others. Mental health deserves the same treatment. Integrating it into safety protocols doesn’t lower standards or distract from performance—it strengthens it. The question isn’t whether mental health affects safety. It’s whether our safety systems are designed to reflect the reality that safety is shaped as much by human factors as physical ones.  

Resources

Here are a few resources for getting started or refreshing existing programs:

• ACI Mental Health and Wellness resource page
• Skanska’s Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) program
• Strong Minds, Safe Sites by Wellness Workdays
• American Foundation for Suicide Prevention: Hard Hat Courage

SEE ALSO: SO YOU WANT TO BUILD A SAFETY PLAN

The post Five Ways to Integrate Mental Health Into Construction Safety Protocols  first appeared on Construction Executive.