Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.: Part Four

CIUT 89.5 Show: Career Buzz Canada, Wednesday, 11-12 pm
Be inspired by ordinary people with extraordinary stories
who share the secret twists and turns in their own careers and lives.
Screenshot credit: ciut.fm/career-buzz

This is the last part of a transcript of Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc. (Click here for part three.)

Martina Ernst interview on Career Buzz Canada with Mark Swartz



Part 4:
What were the biggest challenge you had to overcome when starting up your business?
How do you continue to integrate your social mission with your for profit objectives?
What triumphs have you experienced as an entrepreneur?
What advice would you give to a start-up entrepreneur?

Mark: Now, Martina, when you started up what would be the biggest challenge that you had to overcome? You have talked about two different messages that might be at odd - design/build and you have to bring women into the trades. What other challenge you have had to overcome because you have been in this business now for 5 years and most new businesses go belly up within a year or two, so did it past that critical stage?

Martina: Well, we are very lucky, in a sense that we were able to sustain it for that long. But we do have all the issues that any other start-up has, we have a cash flow issues, we have issues of how we get our message out there, how do we get clients, and because of what kind of projects we do. Our projects, the additions and extensions, start ranging from $100.000 and upwards, so it’s a big chunk of money you have to dedicate towards us and that is one of the challenges actually. You are a new start up and you are asking people pay all this money and there is a trust factor. Of course, with longevity, being in business for five years is helping a little bit. So, that all sorts of issues we had as a start-up company.

Mark: OK, today you are an ongoing and you are a thriving small business. How do you continue to integrate your social mission with your for profit objectives?

Martina: It has not changed – what we do as we grow our social mission grows with us. The idea is when we make a commitment to the social mission you don’t minimize it after you getting some traction on your business. You grow your social mission with you. You actually expend it, you make it bigger, and you change direction into another social mission which is possibly more in line with what you do as your profit sector.

Mark: Could you give us a quick example of how you have grown that social mission along with your for profit site?

Martina: Well, we are on a building site and on women in construction site, the more sites we have that can sustain women the more women we hire from the colleges.

Mark: Excellent. You do get your word out with the colleges as well? Do you liaise with them? Do you have some sort of arrangements at all or it just on informal basis?

Martina: Well, the colleges know about us, some of them do, and George Brown certainly does. We have a liaison with them on ongoing basis and when we do have the sites we contact to them. Yes, we are in contact with them.

Mark: OK, great. Now, in terms of being ongoing you must have been experienced a couple of triumphs in addition to your challenges. So, maybe you can share some of the good stories or good sites of what’s going on in terms of getting clients, bringing people in from to help mentor them. What can you think of?

Martina: For me, personally, because my background is architecture I just love to see things built. So, I always get a huge buzz when I actually see a product finished. But one of the most heartfelt things which happen was when somebody we mentored really expressed the gratitude to us and it was very heartwarming that we made of a little bit of difference in that woman’s live.

Mark: So, it is intrinsically rewarding as well as profitable for you.

Martina: Well, it has to be because being a social entrepreneur is the way of life. It is really comes from your heart off what you are doing. So you are sacrificing some profits towards that social mission. You are making choices.

Mark: Hopefully, not always so. I am sure that in some cases when the mission melt with the for profit site as you say it can grow in tandem in conjunction with each other and over time you get bigger slices of both.

Martina: Yes, that is true. All of this goes in conjunction with each other but you still make choices. You get bigger, you have bigger profit margin. How much of that do you dedicate towards your social mission? It is always a choice of what you do and you have to have a real commitment to that other site of your business.

Mark: OK, Martina, you are a veteran now of social entrepreneurship having lasted five difficult years. What advice would you give to a start-up entrepreneur; who want to be able to bring some sort of social goodness, some sort of cause into their business?

Martina: The most important thing is that your message, your social mission is in line with your business. Then you can push both things forward in the same way. One of hypothetical example of that would be, for example a panel manufacturer who wants to alleviate asthma in kids which might be cause through mould. This manufacturer can manufacture mould resistant panels. So, those two things are inline then. The mission of alleviating asthma though mould with what they manufacture. If anybody wants to start a company like this you have to really look into what are your messages, who is your target market, and are these things actually inline.

Mark: OK, that’s great information. You are listening a Career Buzz radio, Canada’s unique radio conversation which empowers lives and energizes organizations on CIUT 89.5 FM.

Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.
Part 1: What Wo-Built Is about?
Part 2: Challenges of Running a Business;
Part 3: What Peapod Life Is about?
Part 4: Social Entrepreneurship Is a Way of Life.

About Mark Swartz
Mark Swartz, MBA, M.Ed., is a leading Canadian speaker, Monster.ca National Career Coach and Columnist; author of best-seller Get Wired, You're Hired!, and CareerActivist. He may be reached by visiting careeractivist.com.

Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.: Part Three

CIUT 89.5 Show: Career Buzz Canada, Wednesday, 11-12 pm
Be inspired by ordinary people with extraordinary stories
who share the secret twists and turns in their own careers and lives.
Screenshot credit: ciut.fm/career-buzz

This is part three of a transcript of Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc. (Click here for part two.)

Martina Ernst interview on Career Buzz Canada with Mark Swartz



Part 3:
What Peapod Life is about?

Mark: All right, in terms of your current business and you have mentioned that you are beginning to moving into this whole green sphere: the eco-building or building and design what is going to be an environmentally-friendly in sound. So, you have an initiative that you are working on right at this moment. I have gone to trade shows to visit you and I’ve seen you at your booth and you were whipping up a storm and chatting it, chatting it away. What about this initiative?

Martina: Well, we call it Peapod Life. And it a glass enclosure that is for both living and working and growing plants on a larger scale. So, you can do both live in it, you can work in it, and you can grow plants, and, we actually growing food plants in it, as well.
What we did over the last couple of years was to identify that there were other issues in society that needed help. One of them is food. We are always concerned about food. Yesterday, I was at an event which was hosted by FoodForward Toronto and people were talking about food shortages in Toronto, so that people cannot actually get fresh foods in some areas and so on. It just emphasizes that there is need out there for people to supplement their food sources.
We came up with the product that allows both living and growing off plants. We have solar cells to produce the energy to help run it, we have rain water recovery to help watering the plants, so it is more than just having an energy-neutral building. We are looking at having an energy-gaining and energy-producing building.

Mark: This is not simply adding a green house to your backyard. You are talking about building a living space – an extension to your existing home that allows you to be like a living room with plants and stuff growing in it. Is that essentially it?

Martina: Yes, that is exactly what it is. Because you cannot really live in your green house: it is not insulated enough, it has not the right ventilation, and you don’t have humidity control, so we have to integrate all these elements in it. And our social mission in that sense is a) to provide a different way of looking at buildings and b) to provide possibility of people having an alternative to their food sources.

Mark: That’s great. Just to remind to our listeners that I am speaking on Career Buzz Radio and I am chatting with Martina Ernst, a founder of Wo-Built, a women's build social entrepreneurial company for profit that not only designs and builds in this case some green space, additions to homes that their newest product but also helps to bring young women into the workforce within a construction trades, so - social mission and for profit.

Please click here for part four: Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.

Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.: Part Two

CIUT 89.5 Show: Career Buzz Canada, Wednesday, 11-12 pm
Be inspired by ordinary people with extraordinary stories
who share the secret twists and turns in their own careers and lives.
Screenshot credit: ciut.fm/career-buzz

This is part two of a transcript of Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc. (Click here for part one.)

Martina Ernst interview on Career Buzz Canada with Mark Swartz



Part 2:
What are the challenges of running a business that also has a social mission?
How to get media exposure for your startup?
How to support your social mission?

Mark: Great. You say some of your people you have mentored have gone on to larger different experiences; do you think that you have infused into them the spirit of mission that they may carry on as well?

Martina: I think to a certain extent, maybe. I cannot talk for them but I am hoping that we have, because we think that social entrepreneurship, if you are talking to a smaller company like ours, is that our influence maybe like a pebble in the water when you throw it in, and maybe the ripple effect will actually bring a wider and wider and wider influence sphere.

Mark: It’s nice analogy. Now, you are running a business that also has a social mission that must be somewhat complicated because from time to time there, I am assuming, could have been some inconsistencies or challenges: you want to do right; you want to do the best thing for your people but at the same time you gotta make a buck. So, tell me a little bit about that.

Martina: We actually had many challenges over the last five years. One of them was that the economy was not very good so, what happen also was, because we actually had a training mission which was coupled with a construction company which is a building company, so we had two different messages. We had our training and mentoring message and we also had our building message. And to push both of them forward to the same extend was quite challenging because the two messages are not that much inline. We found that over time because our social mission of women in construction took off, it actually got a lot of PR and we had a lot of success with it in terms of that. Now we feel that it just runs on its own and we are getting more and more involved in green building. So now we have a new product which is an integrated green building mission in many ways, you can say.

Mark: OK, great. Let’s come back to the green portion of it in just a moment because it’s very topical and it is mission oriented. But you mentioned something earlier I think our listeners might want to hear especially if they are thinking about starting a business, social mission. You talked about getting PR, public relations, media exposure for the training of women in construction, and you said that got some traction. So, how that came about?

Martina: Well, actually, sometimes we approached people and told them about what we were doing and they got excited about it and they started writing about us or we, actually, got approach by them because they have heard of us and wanted to interview us. That is how we got the PR.

Mark: Tell me what kind of media exposure did you get at this point?

Martina: We were written up by The Toronto Star, at one stage; and we were mentioned in a couple of other articles, as well.

Mark: OK, great. At that point, did you push on it or really it was what’s coming in, and this is nice, but you were satisfied with the level of exposure?

Martina: That is an interesting question because hindsight is always 20/20, and I think we probably should have pushed a lot more then that what we did. We were just very, very pleased that people were writing about us and they wanted hear about us but, I think we did not actually push it enough.

Mark: OK, but for businesses that just starting out there are so many different aspects that you need to focus on, so, it’s understandable that once momentum begins in one area, likely, you are getting some publicity, you are taking your eye for a bit, you move on to the next thing, like you know, make me a few bucks.

Martina: Well, it was also coupled with the fact that the two messages were intertwined, so we also had to get our building message out because that’s really what makes us money and that is what actually supports our social mission. So we had to push on that a lot more than the social mission and somehow it got turn around.

Mark: As these things sometimes do.

Please click here for part three: Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.

Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.

CIUT 89.5 Show: Career Buzz Canada, Wednesday, 11-12 pm
Be inspired by ordinary people with extraordinary stories
who share the secret twists and turns in their own careers and lives.
Screenshot credit: ciut.fm/career-buzz

Recently, a good friend of mine, Mark Swartz, asked me to take part in his radio show Career Buzz as he wanted to do a segment on Social Entrepreneurship.

Mark has been a Career advisor for many years and his show provides information about possible career directions and choices.

I was very touched that he thought that I could contribute to the subject, but albeit a bit nervous as I usually don't call myself a social entrepreneur. But Mark managed to get some useful information out of me and I hope you will enjoy listening to the interview.

Many thanks to Mark Swartz for making this interview a success.

~ Martina Ernst

Martina Ernst interview on Career Buzz Canada with Mark Swartz




The following is the transcript of a recent Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc., one of few female-led design and build companies in Toronto.

Part 1:
What Wo-Built is about?
How the company has a social entrepreneurship bend?
What kind of successes had Wo-Built had?

Mark: Welcome to Career Buzz - Canada’s unique radio conversation that empowers lives, riches careers and energizes organizations.

Hi, I am Mark Swartz, founder of Career Activist dot com, Canada’s free career website. Social entrepreneurship - what is it? Well, it’s basically entrepreneurship with a social mission: making money, while making a difference. Maybe you will start your own business but you want to inject the measure of social goodness still make a profit.

I have two fascinating young ladies with me this afternoon and they are going to talk about their experiences with social entrepreneurship. Coming up with the second half of this show I have Elisa Birnbaum. She has started a nationwide online magazine called seechangemagazine dot ca, and she features social entrepreneurship and small businesses, medium sized businesses from coast to coast who have been able to put together a viable business plan and an ongoing business while also injecting social mission.

But right now with us in the studio I have a wonderful individual and friend, her name Martina Ernst. Now, Martina started off a company called Wo-Built, and what is the designation at the end to the web-site?

Martina: It is dot com.

Mark: Martina has a background in design/build construction building and also she looks at the green side of the equation. So, welcome this morning, Martina.

Martina: Thanks Mark.

Mark: It’s great to have you here.

Martina: Thanks for inviting me.

Mark: Now, you have got some interesting things going on at your company and it’s called Wo-Built. But maybe you can tell me a little bit about what the company is about and how it has social entrepreneurship bend?

Martina: We are design and build contractor for residential market and also for small commercial projects. We specialize for residential market for additions, extensions, new build and on the commercial side we like to be involved with the alternative medical community and build offices for them.

Mark: OK, you say you build offices. What is that in tell?

Martina: Usually, it is interior renovations because these offices are in larger commercial buildings and we do fit-outs for them.

Mark: OK, now, Wo-Built is short for … what exactly?

Martina: It is short for ‘women build’ because the company is 100 percent women-owned. So, roughly about 6 years ago I met my business partner Elida Huignard and we actually met at a CAWIC, which is the Canadian Association of Women in Construction, it was their inauguration party. So, we got chatting and we were both pretty much taken by the number of women in construction we actually saw there. It’s still a rarity to see women in construction.

Mark: Certainly, in Canada, it is.

Martina: So, we identified that there is an opportunity there to actually help women in construction, and one of the things we said when we got chatting was why don’t we open up a construction company that helps mentor women. It was our social mission. We started Wo-Built with a social mission at its heart which was mentoring women in construction. We see ourselves as a little bit a stepping stone for them. We hire young women out of colleges. They want to go into the construction industry as trade’s women and we offer them a stepping stone on our sites to start off their careers there. So they have their first site experience and afterwards we hope they actually find a contractor which can give them an apprenticeship because we are not set up for that.

Mark: Great. Wo-Built is a social entrepreneurial business in design/build and you help young women get their feet into the whole area of construction building. What kind of successes had you had over because you have been in business for how long, Martina?

Martina: Just, over five years.

Mark: OK, what kinds of successes have come up over that time?

Martina: Well, we actually had a couple of women which we helped in our sites and since then they moved onto what we believed to a better thing – in construction. They actually started big careers and we were very happy to be able to be helpful to them to start off their careers. We felt that women actually had more difficulties to start careers as tradeswomen in construction because there might be a perceived disadvantage maybe in terms of strengths or skills, or so. We are helping them by giving them their first experience on site.

Please click here for part two: Career Buzz interview with Martina Ernst, President & CEO, Wo-Built Inc.

Our Business Model Innovation

Photo: Wo-Built's Business Model Sketch
2011 @ wobuilt.com
Credit: businessmodelgeneration.com

"Business model innovation is about new ways of creating, delivering and capturing value"
Alexander Osterwalder
Author, Speaker and Advisor on Business Model Innovation

Our business model in review based on Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder

Recently I came across a great YouTube video about Business Model Design by Alexander Osterwalder. A different way of looking at Business Models based on their bestselling book Business Model Generation. It’s a language that is more tangible and visible and based on 9 building blocks, segments with different value propositions and relationships. The nine blocks are Customer segments, Customer relationships, Channels, The offer, Key activities, Key resources, Key partners, Cost structure and Revenue stream. What I liked about it was the apparent simplicity to show a business model in one picture, to be able to change and add components without having to start from scratch each time.

So we immediately started to put our Business Model together showing all our offers. It’s a work in progress, but the interim is shown above. I am not going into detail, but it showed us where we need to build up resources, partners and distribution and marketing channels. It showed where we need to concentrate our efforts and clearly showed the relationships between our offers and how we can leverage overlaps.

On further review we started to use the same model for each of the segments to develop them in more depths. This time we use it as a project management tool. But we found that we need to rename some of the segments to give a coherent picture. For example the Channels segment, which communicates and announces the offer to the customer segment, has now on the right side of the model success measurements, success implementation and key interactions. Success measurements ensures that the performance of the channels are monitored and tracked, success implementation shows the end results (number of contract signed for example) and key interactions shows the overlap and leverage between channels (for example sales meetings and Speaking engagements, both can be educational and sales).

Why are we on the look out for new ideas for business models and try to use them for us? The answer is simple: even though we are a construction company in a very traditional field we want to be on the cutting edge of business practices, technology and social thinking to build and grow a company that is fit for the 21st century. Many of the old paradigms are changing and we need to find the tools to work within our changing environment.

Martina Ernst
President/CEO
Wo-Built Inc. - Innovative Design and Build

+ feedback on the Web:

wobuilt
Our #Business Model in review thanks to #bmgen http://bit.ly/oFQ3DY - building and growing our #construction company in 21st century
Tweeted by @wobuilt 19 Jul

Retweeted by TantienHime

Alex Osterwalder
@wobuilt great!
@business_design in reply to @wobuilt19 Jul via TweetDeck
Mentioned in this Tweet

Our Anime PR Avatar WoBinna First Anniversary

Collage: Our Anime WoBinna Is Turning One
2011 @ wobuilt.com

WoBinna and Friends – Happy Birthday - Our anime is turning one.

It has been a year since WoBinna and her friends came onto the scene and helped us to promote Wo-Built’s mission of encouraging young women to consider the building trades as a career. We had great fun bringing you stories where WoBinna shares her design and building experiences and her love for the building trades.

WoBinna is based on the collective experiences of the Wo-Built team, our experiences on site and life, even our aspirations when we were children.

My own personal favourites are: “A fabulous doll house” and the follow-up “A star is built”, “A summer job project like no other” , and "Class assignment" with a petroleum pelican getting the green message out.

Enjoy!!!! For more stories: wobinna.blogspot.com and wobuilt.blogspot.com

We wanted WoBinna’s stories to be humorous and interesting to encourage debate about the trades amongst young people and hopefully plant a seed to consider the building trades an alternative career. The building trades face a crisis in the next few years as more and more qualified trades people will retire. The industry has not managed to inspire a lot of interest in young people to do apprenticeships and WoBinna is our attempt to engage them in discussions.

I grew up with sophisticated comics, such as Asterix and Obelix by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo; and I have always liked animation. When I first envisaged WoBinna three years ago I had an Archibald "Archie" Andrews’ look and feel in mind, created by Vic Bloom and Bob Montana; mainly because this comic deals with teenagers. But recently I have been intrigued by the Japanese based manga style and I believe WoBinna would do well in this genre. Much more hip and fun, more contemporary. So look out for a change in WoBinna again - another make over is on the way.

We want to spread the news about WoBinna much more than we have and we need your help!!! We invite everyone to share WoBinna’s stories with their friends, schools and anyone who would like to start career discussions with young people. Or just share the stories, because you love them.

Martina Ernst
Wo-Built Inc. - Innovative Design and Build

Young Blond Female Anime Avatar
Credit: MS Office Clipart - MC900440373

Links to some other WoBinna & Friends comic strips:
Wobinna and Friends: Built a Fabulous Lemonade Stand
Wobinna and Friends: The Joys of Shop Class!
A Home Reno: Inspired by Piet Mondrian
A Home Reno: Finishing Touches

Celebrating International Women’s Day - Encouraging Women in Construction

Collage: Happy International Women's Day 2011
Celebrating 100 years of Women's Achievements
#IWD2011 + #internationalwomensday
2011 @ wobuilt.com

It doesn’t happen often, but sometimes it does. Recently I answered a call and the gentleman on the other end politely asked if he could talk to my boss or partner. I was so taken back that I momentarily was lost for words. Finally, I politely counseled the gentleman that I was the boss and that the company is 100% female owned. He tried to apologize by saying that he thought I was the blond young fluffy thing at reception. Some people do not know when to stop.

As amusing the episode is, it shows that we in our society still fight certain stereotyping, especially in a more male dominated industry such as construction. We started Wo-Built to help women to have a career in the construction industry especially in the building trades. We felt that women were at a disadvantage due to prevailing perceptions. So we wanted Wo-Built to be a stepping stone in their career.

Today is the 100th anniversary of the International Women’s Day celebrating women’s achievements and accomplishments. We have made immense strides over the last 100 years in gaining equality, visibility and status in business, but further progress has to be made. And in the developed world it has often very little to do with external influences.

We are looking for one important aspect in the women we help, the right attitude. The attitude is to be the best you can be and not because you want to impress others. You want to be the best for yourself. This is the attitude that will also help every woman to make it in business. It often is the woman’s own prejudices, preconceived ideas and self-esteem issues that help to provide the ‘glass ceiling’.

We have met many competent and professional women in the construction industry, all of them are equal to their male counterparts. These are women who love what they are doing and through this become experts in their fields. They demand respect, a very important attribute in business.

The International Women’s Day theme this year is: Equal access to education, training and science and technology: Pathway to decent work for women. Even though this is a right in Canada, women still have to claim this right in higher numbers. We will encourage any woman who wants to.

Martina Ernst
CEO
Wo-Built Inc. - Innovative Design and Build

Using LinkedIn as Our Social Media Tool

Collage: LinkedIn Answers
Ask a Question - Answer Questions: wobuilt q&a
Credit: LinkedIn

Martina Ernst @ LinkedIn
CEO - Design & Build General Contractor - Renovations with a Woman's Touch
Toronto, Canada Area
Connections - 122 connections
Industry - Construction
Websites - Company Website + Blog

Everyone in the business world knows that LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network with over 80 million professionals using this social networking platform to exchange information, ideas and opportunities. LinkedIn Answers is a great place to connect with other professionals to share business knowledge and expertise. Here are a few of my latest answers to the questions on the LinkedIn Answers:

"new years resolutions" Are annual goals too long of a timeframe? would having semi-annual resolutions be a better idea?
Asked by Issamar G. The Entrepreneur's Best Friend at Monetized Intellect Consulting
in Business Development, Career Management

Martina E. @ wobuilt answer:
Actually I have found that you need five year resolutions/goals or longer as well to steer your company in an overall direction. Sometimes ideas and initiatives will take a couple of years to come to fruition. A long-term goal needs to be divided into smaller time frame goals and strategies, which might be yearly or semi-annual goals, or even monthly ones. They have to be reviewed and evaluated on a predetermined frequency to make sure that they are still on track or need to adjusted. We get so wrapped up in day to day activities that we loose focus of the bigger picture.

Does a pop up make you more likely to sign up for a newsletter when you visit a website or does it irritate you? I am curious as to what your habits tend to be...
Asked by Lisa L.: Social Media Specialist - Teaching you how to grow your business via online connections and engagement
in Lead Generation

Martina E. @ wobuilt answer:
I find pop-ups very irritating and they have never enticed me to sign up for or buy anything. Generally I do not sign up for newsletters, mailing lists etc since I am inundated with e-mails I do not want in the first place. I hardly read the newsletters from people i know due to lack of time. Therefore what would entice me to give out my contact info? Usually only if there is something I need right at that moment and I usually only want a one time answer, not a longstanding flow of information. Maybe active social media campaigns would be better lead generators than mailing lists.

I'm doing a little survey for a bunch of my friends. If you're self employed and sell a service - what are your PROVEN tips for getting gigs?
Asked by Isabella M.: Co-Organizer at MentalHealthCamp
in Business Development

Martina E. @ wobuilt answer:
It depends on what your service is, what your client profile is, if your service local or covers a wider area. However, regardless of the above it is important to have a web presence. A website more static, general information, a blog, tweets, facebook etc for more dynamic timely information are a minimum nowadays. However maintaining a successful web presence will require persistence.

What's the worth of a "Like" for your business?
Asked by Hanan G.: Managing Director, 2creativ - a Digital Marketing Agency
in Business Development

Martina E. @ wobuilt answer:
Hi Hanan, I generally agree with Erica's answer and her blog since I believe that clicking the "like" button takes the least effort and that at this point one does not have a relationship with the reader. I also agree that the quantity of likes are meaningless and give a faulty sense of popularity.

However, I consider likes a start to a relationship as they are first points of contact. The content of a post stood out enough that the person reading it noticed it and thought enough of it to press the like button. It is up to me then to develop the relationship by answering the "like" and start a conversation, after all there seem to be some common ground for a conversation. Similar to other forms of contact they need to be acknowledged and maybe something unexpected might be the outcome.

Please Vote for Architect Barbie!!!

Screenshot: wobuilt's tweet: Select Barbie's 125th career!
Please vote for Architect Barbie!
http://www.barbie.com/vote/

News Flash

Global Online Campaign to Select Barbie's 125th Career:

• Polls will be open from mid-January through February 10th, and the winning career will be unveiled at a special event at New York Toy Fair on February 12th, 2010.
• The new career doll will be on shelves in Fall 2010.
• Please vote often - there is no limit to the number of votes one person can make.
• Here’s the site: http://www.barbie.com/vote/

links:
taubmancollege.umich.edu: Dimensions Twenty-One (PDF)
"Architect Barbie was chosen as the theme for the Sanders Fellowship exhibition. Students and faculty of Taubman College’s T-Square Society developed prototypes of Architect Barbie based on their own experiences, fantasies and perhaps frustrations... "

barbiemedia.com: Barbie Celebrates 125th Career with Global Initiative to Inspire Girls
Global Events: Canada - Canada will launch the Barbie “I Can Be™…” academy, which will invite girls and moms to physically try on different roles and learn first-hand about a variety of careers. The event will also celebrate Barbie's past careers for moms and girls to see where Barbie has been and is headed...

online.wsj.com: Barbie(R) Celebrates 125th Career with Global Initiative to Inspire Girls
JANUARY 21, 2010

follow Barbie on Twitter

Tales from the Renovation Track: One Woman’s Experiences of Being a Renovator: Part 7

Collage: construction, carpenters, hammers, nails, women, chopsticks
Credit: MS Office ClipArt - j0338018.wmf + j0228945.wmf

Part 7 - Door Hell

I must get more calls to repair doors that stick than for almost anything else. Nine times out of ten, this common situation is caused by loose screws in the hinges, either in the door or in the doorjamb.

I have a few different methods of repair that I would like to share with you, because everyone seems to have to deal with this problem sooner or later. Basically, the screws back out of the hinges or pull out from the wood altogether from the motion of the door either opening, closing or banging shut.

At first, I tried to take square shafted wooden matches, cut the flammable end off, glue as many as I could into the holes in the wood, flush cut the protruding pieces off when it was dry and then drive the screw back into the new wood in the hole. This works okay, but square does not work all that well in a round hole. Also, it is hazardous to throw match heads into the garbage. I decided to substitute the match heads for wood tooth picks, but they splintered when I flush cut them, and it took a lot of toothpicks sometimes to fill the hole. On top of that they were messy with all that glue on those tiny little pieces of wood.

Now as luck would have it, a Japanese gal hired me to do some dump runs for her as she was moving back to Japan from Canada and was sorting, packing and discarding possessions. She asked me if I wanted a pile of chopsticks, some plastic, some wood, some plain and some very decorative. I took them off her hands (just trying to be helpful), but I knew chopsticks and I did not exactly have a good relationship. I tell you, if I had to eat with chopsticks for real, I would be in the anorexic category, or conversely be accused of playing with my food. For all of my manual dexterity, the secret of feeding oneself with those devices purely escapes me.

Well, I was thinking about what the heck I was going to do with all of these chopsticks, when I had quite the inspiration. The next door with loosened screws became my guinea pig. I took a wood drill bit and compared it to the hole in question and chose one about the same diameter of the hole. Then I compared that drill bit diameter with all of the wooden chopsticks until I found one that was slightly smaller than the drill bit diameter. It has to be smaller and not the same size in order to make room for the glue.

I cleaned the hole out with the drill bit, slathered up the end of the chopstick with good carpenter glue and stuck it into the hole. I then immediately cut it flush. In my possession of tools, I own a flush cut saw, which only has teeth that cut on one side of the saw blade. The purpose for this is so the surface you are cutting against does not get ruined.

I fixed every hole like this in turn, then went back to the first hole, even though the glue had not set yet and started to drive all of the screws back in. Oh yes, I did pre-drill a "pilot" hole in the middle of each chopstick first. The pilot hole I drilled was about half as small in diameter as the screw. I do this to prevent the chopstick wood from splitting. In an ideal world, one would have waited until morning for the glue to set, but no one wants to have their exterior doors off all night long, so I had to make that compromise. This repair works like a charm. You could use doweling as well, but the chopsticks were cheaper at the time.

In some cases, a faster repair is to just use longer screws.

There are also, small pieces of metal you can purchase at Home Depot which one is supposed to stick in the screw holes and then drive the screw back in. I have tried these, but am not overly impressed with these.

If you have a door installed in a brick wall, you can still fix these as well, although a different approach is needed. I have tried many different ways to get screws to stay in brick. It is easier with the newer brick as it is harder, but the older brick is softer. I have tried everything to get the screws to stay in the brick ... tapcon screws, plastic plugged screws and metal plugged screws. I have even tried to glue the wood to the brick first, but the glue was stronger than the brick and pulled the face of the brick off.

Then my wonderful buddy Steve, a bricklayer came to the rescue and told me exactly what to do. He showed me that if I used the copper out of ordinary house wire, 14/2 for example, stripped the insulation off and put at least 2 pieces of the entire length of the hole in the brick, the screws would stay put. And by gosh, he was right! I am renovating my own double brick cavity wall house from the 1870's, so I was tickled pink to learn this! This method works well because the copper is malleable enough to let the screw threads cut into it. I tried rebar tie wire as a substitute because it was less time consuming as no insulation had to be removed first such as the electrical wire. But this type of wire was too hard, and the brick just crushed around the edges of the hole and the screw popped out. So copper it is!

Now if only I could figure out a use for all of those leftover plastic chopsticks!

Happy Renovating!

Janice Bell
Bell Renovating

2009 © Janice Bell

Tales from the Renovation Track: One Woman’s Experiences of Being a Renovator
Part 1: All in All
Part 2: Weld on Fire
Part 3: They Were Nailed
Part 4: It Pays to Be Honest
Part 5: Rural Renos
Part 6: Messy Is Costly
Part 7: Door Hell
Part 8: Just Where Do I Stop?
Part 9: Dressing for the Trades

Wo-Built Mentors George Brown Students

Screenshot: The Student Bid Competition's Website
Credit: tcicbidcomp.com

Wo-Built was ecstatic when we were asked to mentor students for a construction bid competition!

We were approached by a student from George Brown College’s Construction Management Program to mentor his group in a construction bid competition. Of course, we jumped at the chance to work with students and guide them through the construction and estimating bid process.

This event is held every year at Ryerson University. Students from across Canada are invited to complete bids based on a set of contract documents. It was started in order to help students understand the challenges that occur in the bidding process for construction projects. These bids must contain quality takeoffs for own forces work, a sub-trade analysis and selection, as well as the overhead and pricing summary.

The bids are judged based on the following three criteria:

• Most Outstanding Professional Conduct;
• Most Accurate and Complete Bid Package;
• Nearest Bid to the Budget Price.

Screenshot: The Winners of the Student Bid Competition
Credit: tcicbidcomp.com

Our group was in the top 50! Great job and we are very proud of you!

It was interesting to note that the winner of Most Accurate and Complete Bid Package and Most Outstanding Professional Conduct was an all female team. This is also a great sign for our industry.

Wo-Built Inc. is grateful for this opportunity to be involved in this mentorship, and would like to thank the students at George Brown College for the chance to give back to our community and participate in this amazing educational event.

Deborah McKenna
Senior Construction Project Management / Interior Designer
Wo-Built Inc.

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How many paint colours?!

Image:HSLSphere.svg Author: Mike Horvath
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This image is licensed under the Creative Commons

Wonder why a trip to the paint store to choose colour can be overwhelming? Should be simple....right? You don’t have to study colour theory or colour meanings to make a decision. After all you know what you like...right? Once you’re faced with a wall of thousands of paint colour chips it’s easy to become trapped in indecision because there’s actually too much choice!

A consumer living in an urban centre and looking for interior or exterior paint colour has an estimated 20 to 30,000 options. Benjamin Moore has over 2500 colours, Parapaint a couple of thousand, Pittsburgh another couple of thousand...and on it goes. But Glidden? Well, Glidden has 6000 colours they can formulate. Glidden is the grandmother of paint colour offering.

As a colour consultant, I’ve noticed that each paint company has it’s own ‘personality’ in the colour palette it offers. For example Benjamin Moore and Pratt & Lambert have a lot to offer in the ‘historic’ look... murky and aged-looking colours that change a lot during the day and into the evening. Sico, Para and Pittsburgh are known for clear colour and strong pigment. Para and Pittsburgh have some fantastic ‘almost blacks’. Glidden has a lot to offer in more interesting pale tones (probably due to their 6000 colours!).

So, how to narrow it down? Determine which paint company’s palette you generally like the look of and try to keep within that company’s offering. Test the colours you think you’ll like (some of the companies mentioned have test pots you can buy... if not buy the smallest can to test the colour). Whether you’re selecting interior paint colour or exterior paint colour, this testing is a valuable step.

It’s amazing what happens to colour when you start to spread it around!

_______________________________________________________
This article was contributed by Sylvia O’Brien, creative director of Colour Theory, a colour consulting firm in Toronto, Canada.
Colour Theory helps clients pick colour for interior and exterior paint, flooring, cabinetry, tiles, countertop, roofing, siding, aluminum, vinyl and hard landscaping.
To contact Colour Theory call 416-766-6789 or visit the web site at www.colourtheory.net

links:
Wo-Built Inc.: Paint Colour Trends 2008... Are you making the most of your investment?
by Sylvia O'Brien

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Welcome to Wobuilt's blog

Hello,

I would like to welcome you to Wo-Built Inc’s information and discussion forum where women in the building industry are invited to tell their stories, to give mentoring advice, to inform about construction and building issues and to let the world know about their experiences.

Wo-Built Inc helps women enter and thrive in the building and construction industry. We are especially interested in helping women enter the skilled trades. This forum is established to showcase women’s achievements, tell about Wo-Built’s progress and initiatives and to encourage participation in our vision of having more women actively participating in the construction industry.

Women have a lot to offer to the building industry and the building industry can offer great career opportunities to women. This forum is a vehicle for encouragement and progress to connect these two sides of the same coin.

Though the emphasis is on women, we love to hear the male perspective as well. We believe this forum could also act as a place to share information for better understanding and working in construction environments.

Our president Elida Huignard and I look forward to a great dialogue with you.

Martina Ernst
CEO

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