canada management agreement to even out wages and benefits for workers across all contractors to avoid personnel-based delays . The project management agreement helped to ensure that there were no strikes and no lockouts during the project which helped to keep the project on time .
In order to meet the labor shortage head on , the Floodway Authority utilized creative hiring and people management practices . Notably , the Manitoba Floodway Authority required contractors to have 20 percent employment equity on contract tenders – a requirement that both addressed the Alberta oilsands-related labor shortage and gave opportunities to workers in groups that were often underrepresented in the construction industry including women , first nations and aboriginals , and people with disabilities .
“ We also employed an aboriginal set-aside initiative where aboriginal companies could actually bid on certain aspects of the work ,” said Ronuk Modha , Communications Manager for the Manitoba Floodway Authority . “ One component of our project , the West Dike – only aboriginal-owned construction companies could actually bid on this work . What this did is it identified a whole segment of the construction industry that traditionally had not been involved in large-scale projects such as this , and gave them the opportunity to bid on work and all of these kinds of things benefitted our project .”
In particular , this initiative has had significant effects and benefits outside of the Floodway Expansion project itself . “ Before we set up the set-aside program , we had some discussions with aboriginal contractors – one of the things they continually indicated to us was that they had a challenge getting contract bonding to work on largescale projects ,” says Modha . “ With our initiative , rather than having these companies go out and get bonding from a private bonding company , we took on the role of the bonding company and managed the work that they were doing . As a result they were able to get a lot of experience and , subsequent to their involvement with our project ; they
www . floodwayauthority . mb . ca / home . html 75