Celebrating women in construction: How breaking barriers is changing the industry

Charley Burtwistle:

What is up, everybody? I’m Charley Burtwistle. We are back in the virtual studio once again. Zach, joining us live from Arizona. Zach, how’s the weather down there?

Zach Wojtowicz:

Hey. Not bad, not bad. It’s going pretty great. It’s always awesome to get out of Omaha in the wintertime. And next time, I’m just going to recommend about February, we always do “The Building Code” in the desert, just make it a whole thing.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah. Well, speaking of the desert, we are about one week removed now from the greatest week of my life. Not something normally used to describe IBS, but the International Builders’ Show, IBS, was quite honestly, I don’t know if I’d go greatest, but top three weeks of my life for sure. It was everything I’d ever hoped it was and more, but maybe as an IBS vet, Zach, how would you break down this year’s performance?

Zach Wojtowicz:

Well, first off, we finally delivered on a trip for one Charley Burtwistle, to get him out of the office, to get him out there to see our customers. He was rocking it in the greatest booth of all time. The marketing team deserves the biggest shout out. I heard constantly rave reviews from our customers, from our internal teams, how much time and effort it took, but customers consistently were telling us this is just dominating the rest of the competition.

So, if you’re ever at IBS, I always recommend come and talk with us because we get to talk to you about what’s happening with your Buildertrend account and what we’re bringing to you guys out in the field. And it’s always just so rejuvenating to really talk to everybody and just really double down on what makes Buildertrend so great, which is our relationships. And you and I see that all the time on “The Building Code.” We get to talk to some of the most incredible people and that’s no different. So yeah, I’m still riding the wave of the IBS experience in the booth. It’s really great. And we also, I had people tell me, even our “Building Code” episode, they’re like, “Yeah, just the energy was different,” being on stage, and it was a ton of fun.

Charley Burtwistle:

Well, yeah, I think it’s just good to zoom out from time to time. You and I are constantly working and deep in the details. It’s tough to zoom out oftentimes and appreciate everything that Buildertrend’s done and the industry has done and everything that our customers are doing. And it’s cool to see some of the people that we’ve talked virtually in person, including one of our favorite people and the guest of today’s podcast. Zach, who do we have?

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s right, our very own “Building Code” alum, Piper Stromatt. And we actually saw her down at IBS, and I actually at the time didn’t realize she was going to be on for the episode or on an episode again, so I’m super excited. I walked in to work this morning to shoot the episode. I was like, “Oh, Piper’s going to be on? Here we go.” She’s a director of interior design at Boutique Living by Curate at Chattanooga, Tennessee. So, we’re here to talk about a really special week in construction, which is the Women in Construction Week. So, we thought no better person than the host of “The Building Blonde” herself, which is to talk a little bit about her experience as being a woman in the construction industry.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, Piper’s fantastic, absolutely perfect guest for the week, and seeing her at IBS was definitely a highlight of the trip as well. So, without further ado, let’s get Piper in here.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Piper, welcome back to “The Building Code.” We’re so excited to have you on today. How are you?

Piper Stromatt:

I’m great. How are you all?

Charley Burtwistle:

Doing well.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Fantastic.

Charley Burtwistle:

Zach is not in Omaha, so it’s been a Zach-free day for me, which is always good ones to have.

Piper Stromatt:

What is that like? Oh, my gosh.

Charley Burtwistle:

But yeah, Piper, back on “The Building Code.” You were on episode 155, which was a great episode. But for our new listeners that maybe haven’t had a chance to hear you before, can you give a little recap about yourself, your background, how you got into your current role?

Piper Stromatt:

Yeah, absolutely. So, thank you again for having me on. I’m super excited to be here. Of course, love working with you all, so makes it even better that we get to sit down and chat again.

So, a little bit about me, I started design, gosh, I joked with you all about on my episode that dirt was in my blood, so I was on job sites before I think I could even walk basically. My grandfather, heavy civil construction, so my grandparents got into hospitality at one point in life. And so, my true aspiring moment was when we started installing basically a new hotel up in the Smokey Mountains, and I was like, “This is amazing.” I love space planning, getting stuff out of boxes, seeing how just vision comes to life. My mom said I always started rearranging my bedroom as a child and started hanging pictures on the wall, which my grandmother still has hung up, which is adorable, hung little draperies on the wall.

So, I think it started very young, but officially started when I was 16 years old, a freshman in high school. I was able to take a home ec class that was interior design. So, I took design 1 and 2, loved every bit of it. Decided to take it my senior year again and then declared my major right out of school at UTC and declared my major of interior design, so that’s how I got started. There’s a lot, along the way a lot of support that were women actually, so that’s something that I hold very dear to my heart and definitely starting at a young age I think really helped form my career.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Well, and that’s why we brought you on today. You obviously host your own podcast, “The Building Blonde.” You’re a woman in construction. Obviously, the industry is predominantly male. So, we wanted to get your perspective during Women in Construction Week – what’s your experience like and to talk a little bit more about those mentors who maybe showed you the ropes.

Piper Stromatt:

Absolutely. So, like I mentioned, I started taking these home ec classes when I was 16 years old, and I had a teacher, her name was Jenny Sharp. Her daughter-in-law was actually in school at UTK, which is UTK Knoxville. I was born and raised in Knoxville. So, she was really one person that really shaped having freedom and liberty of design and freedom of knowledge and just really supported me all the way even through college, just my cheerleader.

My mom is a huge impact of, I think she was always visual. She was always redecorating and working with designers. My grandmother was absolutely incredible when it came into this, just really stood behind me in all aspects of life when it came into really what do you want to do, who is the person that you want to be, how do you need to go forward to be able to take those steps to get there? And she’s also one of the top 400 business women in the U.S. for civil construction. So, construction is in our blood as well as massively run through our family. So, I think those were the key leaders in my life that were all women fortunately. And then I had my partner, Paul, who was a big leader today at giving me a chance at being a woman in construction, very young, ripe age of 22. So, those are some of the people that really just really formed who I am today.

Charley Burtwistle:

That’s awesome. I love the more and more we talk to you, we’ve met a few different times now, I feel like every time you have another story of another family member who is just incredible at construction. You just kind of keep pulling them out of the hat there so that’s really cool to hear. And I agree, the posters or decorations still hanging on the wall at your grandma’s house is one of the cutest things I’ve heard.

Piper Stromatt:

I literally cried. She goes, “Let me show you what I have.” And it was Christmas, I walked upstairs and I literally just went like this, and just tears started coming down. I was like, “Oh, my gosh. This was from when I was six?” So, it’s been that long, which is just support is amazing.

Charley Burtwistle:

Well, that was another reason that we were pretty excited to have you on after talking to you the last time is the fact that you have just been around in construction for so long. Obviously, the topic here is women in construction, and you’ve had an opportunity to see a few different phases from learning about it in college to being around it with your parents to being in the industry now. How do you feel that I guess the percentage or the number of women joining the industry are? Is it being more normalized, breaking down the barriers that some people may have thought were there before? And I guess what do you see for the future of women in construction?

Piper Stromatt:

Yeah, absolutely. And I love this question, and I get this, I’ve had it once before, and I love answering it because being … Y’all keep on saying you get tidbits every time that we talk, and one thing is I’m trying to break down the barrier of designers collaborating with each other across all aspects of design and construction because it can be very competitive, and it can be very knockdown, drag out sometimes when it comes into projects and taking design. And that’s something that is very important to me is just very incorporating of all the women in Chattanooga to really work together, to be friends, to keep moving forward and to really bounce ideas off of each other whenever we need help, too. So, I started a small business building group that’s basically all women. It’s called Women in Building Chattanooga. And that’s something that I’ve really tried to encourage and I’ve tried to break down the barriers and I think it’s becoming even more popular.

When I first started … our company has always been primarily women, which is amazing. But I think that since I’ve started, it has just flourished in so many different ways. You’re seeing twice as many women project managers in the field, reps, plumbing, civil, electricians. I walked on the job and I was like, heck, yeah, I’m super excited to see this. I think it’s just really flourishing in a lot of ways because people now think it’s not just some male dominated world and that you can be respected, you can do big things and you can walk on a job site and somebody come to you for help rather than you always having to ask for help or not being taken seriously on site. I have fortunately been taken more seriously on site since I’ve started, so that’s not one thing that I’ve ran into, but I know a lot of women do.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah, it’s really interesting. In my own experience working with builders or with customers, I would go, when I first started, it didn’t feel like I talked to that many women. This was about five, six years ago. And as my career’s gone on, almost every business I have gone to or talked to, they almost have a few core pieces that run the business that are women. And so, it’s not even just the performance of the labor, but it’s also even the backend administration. I’ve worked with all women-owned construction companies now, and so, you’re seeing this influx of opportunity on a lot of awesome pieces of the construction industry, not even just people think building homes, but actually the business operations side.

Piper Stromatt:

Absolutely. And that’s something that I find great value in because primarily, women can multitask a little bit easier sometimes.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah. I wanted to say nothing like talking about women in construction with two dudes who probably are black and white, follow the question. Sorry to cut you off, but yeah, that was initially I was like, oh, here we go.

Charley Burtwistle:

That’s the first thing I thought, too. Yeah.

Piper Stromatt:

Yes. So, that’s one thing is we have to juggle a lot of balls in life no matter what it is, whether it be kids, family, schedules. We’re typically, women are a little bit more adaptable to the go with the flow, kind of what needs to happen now. So, that’s why I think that, at least in our company, it works really well for our estimating team to be primarily women, our purchasing team, backend to design admin, design, of customer support, everything, anybody being in design, anybody being in those positions. But primarily to celebrate women in construction, it does take a lot of those attributes that women do bring to the project. So, it works well for us, and I’m going to keep on letting it work well as long as we can.

Charley Burtwistle:

Absolutely. And I think the coolest thing that you’ve said up to this point is the fact that you started or you’re a part of the Women in Chattanooga Construction. What do you call it, meetup, group meetup …

Piper Stromatt:

Yeah, it’s a Facebook group we started in 2020. Schedules are hard. People have kids. After work is never easy and during the day is mayhem. So, we’ve not been really able to get it together, but we’re trying to get an all-women build going on one of the sites where it’s an all-women team from lending all the way down to closing, it’d just be women to work on the project. So, that’s one thing that’s going to be coming here soon. Y’all are the first ones to really hear about it.

Charley Burtwistle:

Wow.

Piper Stromatt:

So, hopefully, this group will come in strong for me.

Charley Burtwistle:

Absolutely. Well, I appreciate you giving us the exclusive. I think that’s the first one we’ve ever got on “The Building Code.” Breaking.

Zach Wojtowicz:

We just got the scoop?

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, we got the scoop.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Get bigger and bigger …

Piper Stromatt:

This is not public, but our teams know about it, so we’re doing good.

Charley Burtwistle:

That’s awesome. I feel like that’s the biggest thing, at least from my perspective, that you’re doing is just making the awareness of like, hey, this is even a career option, right? It’s crazy how the construction industry is portrayed and a lot of people just don’t even consider it as an option. And that’s not just women, but minorities. We’ve had other people on here talking about just the labor shortage of as a whole. And so, I think raising the awareness of like, hey, we can do hard things. We can build a house. This is an option, and you can succeed, yeah, not just be in construction, but thrive in it and run businesses, and being that role model for a lot of other 16-year-olds in home ec classes of like, oh, this is an actual career, I think is really, really powerful.

Piper Stromatt:

Yes. And just to bounce off of that just really quick, and I think this is something that people going through education right now, when I went through school, residential design and construction was cool. It was okay. It was not pushed. Commercial’s pushed, and being a true and high end interior designer’s pushed. They don’t talk about the real world. They don’t talk about construction sites and getting your feet dirty, getting your feet wet, getting in there, seeing the problems that arise. They usually teach you all the technical skills to sit behind the computer and really pick out colors and present well.

And that’s one thing I want, like you said, you want people to know this is a career option. Not many people know that. I sure didn’t until I just grew from my family to really know that that was an aspect. I want kids that are going through, like you said, high school, I want you to know that the option … And anybody can reach out to me at any time if they’re younger. My younger cousins actually just came on my podcast, and I’ll be releasing it next week, and I interviewed three 13-year-olds in their view in building a house so …

Charley Burtwistle:

That’s incredible.

Piper Stromatt:

It’s quite interesting.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That sounds awesome. I can only imagine. Well, give us a little preview. What did they say?

Piper Stromatt:

Oh, it was adorable. So, I had them start out, I’m like, “What are your questions for me?” And they were kind of like, “What are your… ” They used all these lingo terms, which I realized how old I was, and I just … I’m turning 30 this year and I was like, “What does that mean?” She was like, “What is your ick with your husband?” And I was like, “My ick? I don’t even know what that is.” So, they had to explain some stuff to me, which was quite comical. But we went through a lot of what’s your favorite design? What’s your favorite aspect of design? I got to ask them, what is yours? What’s your first thing that you like to pick out in a bedroom? Or what’s your favorite thing to do when you come in, and you start thinking about a project?

I’m happy to say since then, my little cousin who’s 13 is going to maybe taking online classes for design, and we’re going to do a little course this summer. And so, I gave her all my old books. We’ve got our computer set up for this summer, and we’re going to be doing some design projects. So, it was really comical to say the least, 45 minutes of just teenage girls hammering me questions about design.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Man, I just want to … Yeah.

Charley Burtwistle:

Well, the …

Zach Wojtowicz:

I’m definitely going to listen for sure. That sounds awesome.

Charley Burtwistle:

Right. By the time that this episode right here comes out, that episode you just mentioned will already be out, so we can link that in the show notes. Everyone can go and listen to it. And yeah, I think I may be tuning in as well.

Something that you just said there about favorite parts about design, not to just continue to plug podcasts, but the first episode of “The Building Code” that you were on, we talked a lot about your process and the way you work in your company. And I think the thing that stood out to me the most from that first interview was how closely you work with the client to ensure that they’re getting their needs and making the experience as impactful and powerful as possible. I don’t want to just completely copy and paste the entire first episode, but for the people that didn’t get a chance to listen to that, could you talk a little bit about the ability that you have to work with clients and tailor that experience for them?

Piper Stromatt:

Absolutely. So, my favorite question, and I don’t know if I even said this during the first episode, I may have, but my first question whenever we’re starting off with a floor plan, are you right-handed or left-handed? Because that is going to literally control the entire space when it comes to electrical, to doorways, to space planning in general. I really like to know how they live. I sat down with a couple recently, and I was just first question, what’s your life like? Where do you work? What do you do? What are your kids like? How old are they? What are your pets like? Are you right-handed? Are you left-handed? What light levels do you like? Because all of this really starts to be drivers when it comes into creating that perfect home for somebody because people like different things. You all may like two separate things, whether it’s the actual design of the house or the function of the house.

I personally like my master bedroom to be like a cave. And so, some people want it the lightest and brightest thing. Some people want it nice and cozy, and warm and fuzzy. So, that’s something that I really get to really dig down deep into with people. And then I also take into consideration your height. Are you going to grow in the house? Are you going to grow a family in the house? Are you going to age in place? So, there’s a lot of guided questions that I personally like to delve into basically on a much deeper level than I think a lot of designers go or a lot of builders go. It’s kind of just, well, what do you want? A lot of people don’t really know what they want until you specifically ask them what their needs, what their wants, what their likes are. So, I hope that answers it.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s incredible. I would’ve never even … Again, total guy over here. Does it look good? I don’t know. So, I’m interested, you’re a director of interior design, your partner at Boutique Living by Curate. You were probably involved in the business strategy side and the planning. I mean, do you guys actively look for women and find ways to bring women into your business? I mean, talk to me about that process.

Piper Stromatt:

Yes. We naturally, I think, attract women, which is amazing. My ladies that work with us, the talent is absolutely incredible. I’m at a loss for words sometimes. I’m like, how in the heck did I end up with all of this amazing talent that we have that we attracted? Of course, the project management side is very heavily dominant in male still. I love that aspect because a lot of women aren’t great with controversy in the field or going up to a male figure and saying, I need you to do this. So, I think naturally, it comes to us just because we portray that we support women, that we really love them in the industry. We support everybody, but I think that’s definitely one key is just that we constantly hype up everybody in our business to where we attract people who want to be a part of our business, not only for what we create, not because of the locations that we build or the price points we build. It’s mainly because of the people that we decide to involve ourselves with.

Charley Burtwistle:

So, I think that I mean, that’s incredible, having the ability to attract a diverse workforce and fit people in areas where they can succeed, I think is great for, and I don’t want to toss an umbrella across the entire industry, but maybe if somebody is listening to this episode or there are people that are curious of like, hey, we don’t have any women at our company and all male, how do I go out and promote? Maybe that’s not an environment that’s as attractive and women are actively going out, trying to apply for it. How do they break into hiring a more diverse workforce? And what are some things that you’d recommend for someone wanting to potentially better their business in that way?

Piper Stromatt:

Oh, my gosh, what a great question. I love that. There’s quite a few builders that I’ve seen and like, ah, we can do it better. We’ve been doing this for 30 years, and we don’t need anybody’s help. And it’s like the moment that you do help them, they’re like, oh, wow, okay. Can you do this other thing for me and this other thing and this other thing?

So, I’m going to tell a story really quick, I’ll make it brief, but when my partner, Paul, who owns GreenTech, and he’s majority owner of Curate, when he first started hiring more and more women on the project management side and the different aspects of the company, he doesn’t look at what construction knowledge they have. It’s all about the assessments that we do. It’s called a DiSC assessment. It’s what are your personality traits? What are your traits as an individual? And what can you bring to the team as a whole?

So, Laura Brown, who’s one of my favorite human beings on this planet, she is one of our best project managers. She’s director of field operations. She can control any situation, any project like the back of her hand. And she started in banking. We call her Sushi Laura because she was in banking. My partner, Paul, named her Sushi Laura because he would go to the bank and beg her to come work for him because he’s like, “You are headstrong. You can do this job. You can do this, you can manage all these things and your attention to detail’s incredible. Would you want to come work for us?” They went out for sushi, and he put her in as Sushi Laura, and they decided to come work for us. And I remember to a T, she walked into the office and she said, “Paul, what’s a footer?” And I remember just looking, and I was like, “What?”

Charley Burtwistle:

Wait a second.

Piper Stromatt:

“Hold on. Is this going to work?” And I’m telling you, she’s the most incredible human being that I know. She just beat breast cancer’s butt to a T, worked all the way through, and I don’t know if you can cuss on this, but I was about to say the A word, but she literally couldn’t do a better job while battling breast cancer at the same time, and I can’t brag on her enough. S.

He’s brought her best friend, Cyndi, who is in banking, too. She is our CFO, and she brought her to the team. She’s brought numerous other trades to the team, which are incredible, so I can’t thank her enough. And then Kim Cobb, who is on our sister company, GreenTech, she’s been in the industry for over 30 years, and she leads about 18 project managers and is impeccable as well. So, I think no matter what you do, you can always have a background in it, if you have the opportunity, and you have the drive to learn and the drive to succeed in something. So, I think that’s my take on it …

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s awesome. I love talking to builders about their hiring strategy. It comes up a lot when we’re interviewing people, and you said it perfectly, which is construction takes a variety of skills to do well. And even if you have been doing something the same way 30 years, you can always improve and find new ways to always grow as a business. And you have all these other people outside of construction coming in like women who are bringing these new sets of skills and perspectives and experience and background. And it’s funny, I’m actually at my mom’s house right now who is in banking, and so, your story really resonates with me. She’s very similar like banking is also not really a female heavy industry, and she’s done really well with a lot of those same kind of almost a chip on her shoulder like I’m going to prove these guys wrong.

Piper Stromatt:

Right.

Zach Wojtowicz:

It serves them so well. And I think we’ll continue to see that happen in the construction industry as more and more people continue to see the opportunities there.

Piper Stromatt:

Absolutely. And just to bounce back on if they’re gentlemen that don’t have women in the industry, and they’re trying to gain some females in the office, I think starting out with somebody younger that’s moldable, that is willing to learn their process because that’s not something that is easy for a woman to come into is creating a process for somebody. It doesn’t usually work that way. If they’ve been in building for 30 plus years and this is the way that their dad did it, their brother’s done it and they do it, I think the best thing is if you’re wanting to delve into that, I think you should definitely start at somewhere that’s small and really start to think about how you could help those individuals, but really learn from them and then take what you could bring to the table to help them not control the situation or dominate the situation. It’s probably not going to go so well if somebody does that.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, I love that advice. And I think that the thing that sticks out to me, and we keep hearing it on episodes, it’s just everyone’s background is so different. And construction’s just such a cool industry and such a cool space where you can be a banker or you can be … We have people that got their MBAs. We just talked to someone who’s in the Air Force, and there’s just so many different backgrounds that make the industry and the community such a cool space to be a part of, at least on the edge. Like Zach and I are, we just get to talk to cool people all the time. So yeah, that’s fantastic, and huge shout out Laura, for sure.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Well, Piper, I think we’re coming up on our time, unfortunately. I always tell people at the end of the episode, you’re always welcome to come back, and I’m saying it publicly on the recording just to force our team to actually commit to it. They can’t edit this part out, won’t let them. Before we let you go, we just want a thousand dollar question, why should other women consider careers in construction?

Piper Stromatt:

It will give you so much in return that you will never even be able to even fathom. I look back to where I started when I was 22, and it literally brings tears to my eyes of how much support, how much I’ve grown individually, how much I’ve grown as a designer, how much I’ve grown in my knowledge of just basic construction and I’m still learning just extreme amounts every single day. And so I think that’s reason enough right there. And to change lives, change communities, change your cityscape, change the areas around you, and to really just do good, I think is a way to do it. So, that’d be my take as well on it.

Charley Burtwistle:

Love it.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Well, we certainly can’t speak for it. So, thank you so much for coming on for us today. You’re a friend of “The Building Code.” Please, please, please come back, and you’re an inspiration …

Piper Stromatt:

Absolutely.

Zach Wojtowicz:

… to women everywhere, and it’s an honor to get to speak with you, so thank you.

Piper Stromatt:

Thank you all again, and I will always come on whenever anybody reaches out.

Charley Burtwistle:

Fantastic. Thanks, Piper.

Piper Stromatt:

Thanks. Have a great night.

Zach Wojtowicz:

We just had Piper on “The Building Code,” always a pleasure. It’s hard not to feel just completely inadequate talking to someone as accomplished and incredible of a woman as she is. Charley, how are you feeling?

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, Piper is one that I can almost guarantee that we are going to have back on the podcast because I mean, her first episode was so great, and I just thought going into this one is like, oh, we’re going to talk about a lot of the same things again. But every story that she told, every anecdote that she had, every piece of advice she gave was completely different than the first time. So, I think that we just are going to have to keep having her on here until maybe never, but she inevitably runs out of fantastic content to give us.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Let’s be honest. She’ll probably replace one of us.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, true.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Takeover as a true industry veteran.

Charley Burtwistle:

Well …

Zach Wojtowicz:

Not making any recommendations, but I wouldn’t even blink and be like, yeah, that makes sense.

Charley Burtwistle:

No. I’d give up my seat immediately and bend the knee so the …

Zach Wojtowicz:

Bend the knee.

Charley Burtwistle:

Well, sorry, I’m really into Game of Thrones right now, but no. Yeah, the episode is great, having Piper on. I feel like every time we talk to her, we learn something a little bit more about not just the industry and women in construction and design, and the comments she made about the first question she asked is, you’re right or left-handed, little things like that. But also, things about her and her personal life and growing up and how she got into it, just overall a fantastic interview.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Absolutely. Yeah, you just never know where these conversations are going to go, and it’s just so great to always continue to really get into those details. So, hopefully, you guys enjoyed it. Thank you so much for listening to “The Building Code.” As always, we’re here for you. Remember to like, comment, subscribe. Check us out where all podcasts are available. If you want to see the virtual series, see what it looks like in Arizona, it’s an office in my mom’s house, so pretty exciting. So, always, always never know where we’re going to be. Thank you for listening to “The Building Code.”

Charley Burtwistle:

Absolutely. And the last thing, real quick before we sign off, I feel like I dropped a ton of shownotes references here. So, definitely go out to buildertrend.com/podcast and check those out as well. See you next time. I’m Charley Burtwistle.

Zach Wojtowicz:

And I’m Zach Wojtowicz.