Sunday, March 5 kicked off the first day of 2023's Women in Construction Week--a week dedicated to celebrating women as indispensable members of the construction industry. Monday through Friday, we'll be highlighting the experiences, challenges, and accomplishments of five outstanding women from various Webcor teams.

When you talk to Field Administration Manager Jan Yi about her personal and professional background, it doesn't take long to notice that her most significant life choices have consistently been driven by a desire to support those around her-from her family to her community to her colleagues.

Upon her high school graduation, Jan made the selfless decision to put her college plans on hold so she could support the family businesses, which her parents had launched after immigrating to the United States (without any knowledge of English) before she was born. After several years spent working as the businesses' accountant/auditor/bookkeeper while her brother pursued his degree at UC Berkeley, she transitioned to the role of stay-at-home-mom for 15 years to support her own growing family. When she returned to the workforce in 2011, she jumped at the opportunity to oversee a six-year beautification and modernization bond program designed to enrich the learning experience of students within San Jose's Berryessa Union School District.

"The bond program created flexible learning spaces, much-needed site improvements, and safer campuses throughout the district's 13 schools," Jan says. "Directly supporting the students by working with the bond oversight committee and community members on the construction has been the highlight of my career."

It's no wonder Jan's thrived in her current role as field administration manager, a career pivot that catapulted her into an entirely new world while positioning her to continue doing what she does best: support others in doing their best work.

"That first year at Webcor, I could not wait for Monday to come around so I could return to the job site," she says. "Seven years later, I still look forward to the start of a new work week. Being part of this company in a role that allows me to support employee growth and improve lives is incredibly rewarding."

It's a unique role that demands a tireless commitment to championing the success of team members across all Webcor projects and ensuring the work and services they provide Webcor's internal teams, external stakeholders, and trade partners align with the company's core values. Ultimately, she's responsible for supporting the company as a whole and understanding how company processes and procedures impact project teams and day-to-day operations.

"Construction's rapid pace and focus on problem-solving has always drawn me to the industry," she says. "Working with architects, engineers, various trade partners, and developers to build landmarks in major California cities is pretty amazing-and what better company to work with than Webcor, which has proven to prioritize their people first? The overall company ethos, projects, and people are incredible. Supporting our amazing project coordinators/assistants and project teams is the best part of this job-guiding, learning, and improving processes together."

Like most gratifying but time-consuming careers, however, Jan's has come with challenges-notably, balancing the demands of her role with those of life outside the project site.

"It's taken some time, but I've learned to find balance," she says. "I experienced some health challenges recently that reminded me how vulnerable we can be. We need to learn to be kind to ourselves and others and seek balance in life, work, and family."

In the spirit of finding balance, Jan's prioritized the pursuit of a long-held personal and professional goal. This fall, she'll be returning to school to finish the BA program she'd put on the back burner years earlier to support her family. "I look forward to fulfilling those final 55 units!"

Sunday, March 5 kicked off the first day of 2023's Women in Construction Week--a week dedicated to celebrating women as indispensable members of the construction industry. Monday through Friday, we'll be highlighting the experiences, challenges, and accomplishments of five outstanding women from various Webcor teams.

When Regional Safety Manager Clara de Lara joined Webcor nearly a decade ago, she wasn't sure what she was getting herself into-just that she needed to work after being laid off by her former employer. She'd discovered Webcor, where one of her friends happened to work at the time, months earlier while researching jobs online and decided to apply for the open project assistant (now referred to as a project coordinator) position as her friend's referral. On March 22, 2014, Clara began her first day with Webcor Concrete in the Bay Area.

Over the last nine years, Clara's grown from a construction novice in a project support role to a highly knowledgeable safety leader managing safety initiatives and processes on one of our largest, most complex projects-UCSF New Hospital Parnassus Heights (NHPH)-and UCSF HSIR Seismic.

"I love the opportunity my role in Safety provides to not only build relationships with our office and field staff, but bridge the gap between the two," Clara says. "I love being able to work with both sides of the team and earn their trust to perform my job effectively."

Clara's transition to the Safety world began about a year after she'd joined Webcor. She decided to take advantage of a unique opportunity to move to LA for a new project-a move that would be a major turning point in her career. Upon her arrival to her new project site, she was assigned to a shared office with Sr. Safety Manager Mike Hernandez, who took her on a site tour while explaining his roles and responsibilities on the project as a safety leader. It was her first exposure to a career path in construction she'd never before considered. Immediately, she was intrigued.

Clara wasted no time demonstrating her passion and initiative for transitioning to Safety-she asked all the questions she could, enrolled in classes, and earned relevant certifications, determined to prove to Vice President Jack Harrington (her director at the time) that she'd found her niche. Sure enough, Jack agreed to work with her on mapping out a transition plan, and she was transferred to Safety shortly afterward.

While Clara was thrilled to know her efforts had paid off, she knew she'd continue to face certain challenges inherent with being a woman in construction, regardless of switching departments.

"Constantly having to prove myself in this industry has always been a challenge," she says. "I learned early on that people were treating me differently-maybe because I'm a woman, maybe because I lacked a background in the trades, maybe because I haven't been in the construction industry long enough… I really don't have the answer. However, I've learned to take the challenges at face value and simply allow my performance to speak for itself. You can't please everyone; someone will always have something to say. If someone has a critique to share, you just have to take it into consideration and move on. I've learned to combat any self-doubt fueled by others' criticism by trusting in my skills and developing expertise."

That expertise has grown substantially since joining the Safety team in 2015. In addition to her rapid career growth within the department over the last eight years, Clara has earned a Construction Health and Safety Technician certificate (CHST) and expects to graduate with her master's in environmental health and safety in June. After that, she plans to work toward her Certified Safety Professional (CSP) certificate. She's made exemplary progress, but her proudest accomplishment is the genuine confidence she's built after years spent shadowed by uncertainty.

"Overcoming the initial insecurities that emerged after transitioning to the Safety department was no easy feat," Clara says. "I was timid and unsure of what lay ahead. However, I decided to treat it as if I were starting a whole new career… which I technically was. With the experience and knowledge that I've acquired over the years, I've developed an unwavering level of self-confidence regarding my role and tackle challenges by utilizing all my available resources and communicating with my team."

Her teammates and colleagues have continued to be one of the most rewarding parts of her Webcor experience-especially the women, including those she's met at external industry events.

"I've shared countless insightful conversations with women in construction regarding their career paths and the slow but steady changes they're seeing in the industry for "us,'" Clara says. "They always point out that "we' can do this, as women in a male-dominated industry."

That message was powerfully delivered in the "Dream Crazier" Nike video played during last year's Groundbreaking Women in Construction conference, she shares. The video, narrated by tennis champion Serena Williams, features several highly accomplished female athletes and coaches breaking barriers in sports-another world commanded by men.

"Since the conference, I've saved this video and find myself watching when I need some extra motivation," she says. "The message applies not just to female athletes, but to anyone who's faced the challenge of breaking barriers in their industry."

Sunday, March 5 kicked off the first day of 2023's Women in Construction Week--a week dedicated to celebrating women as indispensable members of the construction industry. Monday through Friday, we'll be highlighting the experiences, challenges, and accomplishments of five outstanding women from various Webcor teams.

After nearly two decades of steady career advancement within the commercial construction industry, Sr. Project Director Monica Ashley is thrilled to say her perspective on being a female leader in construction has dramatically shifted. Following years of feeling intimidated and weary of being a woman in construction, she says, she's reached a point where she can confidently say she feels empowered and supported "to blaze my own path in this industry."

"At the beginning of my career, I was determined to prove the nay-sayers wrong about being a female field supervisor," Monica says. "Today, I no longer feel I have something to prove-instead, I know I have much to offer."

With a hefty resume that boasts a BS in Construction Management from CSU Chico, LEED AP and Safety Trained Supervisor (STS) accreditations, and over 17 years of demonstrated career growth at Hensel Phelps (one of the country's largest general contractors), Monica knows she has plenty of expertise and experience to offer any construction team. Prior to joining Webcor, Monica was a project manager at Hensel Phelps, where she spent the majority of her career as a project engineer and superintendent before transitioning to the project management side. In October of last year, she made the move to Webcor as a senior project director and now leads the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center project, which broke ground in late February.

"I am relatively new to the Webcor family, but even so, I feel blessed to be surrounded by such a great group of talented people," she says. "At each turn, I have been introduced to amazing individuals who give so much to our teams. The overall sense of pride and fulfillment that I see from our team members just reinforces that we are doing something right.

"It's interesting to me that the construction industry has a reputation for being crass and abrasive. Over the course of my career, I have only come across a handful of folks who truly represent those traits. In general, I think this industry is full of kind-hearted, salt-of-the-earth people who are willing to bend over backwards to help when needed."

As a project leader, Monica's passionate about fostering a work environment that compels Webcorians to support and trust one another, just as she says she's experienced with teammates on past projects.

"I love championing team evolution," she says. "At the start of a project, everyone is usually timid and reserved. Throughout the life of a project, however, each team eventually becomes a family. It's extremely rewarding to build these relationships-which often continue far beyond project completion- and watch my teammates achieve their goals. I take great pride in my leadership abilities and love when I can celebrate the successes of others."

Although Monica fully embraces her role as team leader of one of Webcor's largest active projects, it's far from the only one she plays. Working mother, wife, daughter, friend, community leader (she's currently the president of Women in Construction Operations', aka WiOPS, Northern California chapter), and volunteer are other vital parts of her identity, each of which comes with its own unique set of challenges, commitments, and responsibilities. In the end, she says, accepting that there's a limit to what she can realistically offer is key to finding peace.

"Accepting that I have to say "no' sometimes is difficult, but necessary," she says. "It's challenging to keep up with all the chaos and juggle the many roles I currently hold-managing everything is still a struggle at times. The truth is, no one person can do it all."

It's a philosophy that extends to the workplace as well, she says. "The single most valuable lesson I've learned in my career thus far is that we can't do this job alone. Each of us needs to bring our own expertise to the table and be prepared to support one another when needed to ensure project success. Because of that, treating everyone with the level of respect and kindness that they deserve is paramount."