A Brief Discussion on Measures to Improve the Quality of Construction Workers

In the new qualification level standards promulgated by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, construction enterprises are required to equip corresponding intermediate technical workers according to their qualification levels. Therefore, accelerating the construction of the construction worker team and improving the ideological and professional quality of construction workers is an important issue facing construction enterprises and a need for the sustainable and healthy development of the industry.

Adjusting the Structure of the Construction Worker Team

In recent years, with the disappearance of the demographic dividend, the labor-intensive construction industry has faced a labor shortage. The instability of the workforce and the decline in employees' skills have posed new challenges to enterprise operations.

Modernization drive requires strong human resource support. It not only needs scientists, engineers and management talents, but also requires a sufficient number of highly skilled professionals and high-quality workers. Funds and a few cutting-edge talents can be introduced, but high-quality operators and skilled professionals at the construction frontline can only be cultivated. To explore changing the structure of the construction worker team, an incentive mechanism should be established. In addition to encouraging rural youth to engage in the construction industry, students who have graduated from school or on-the-job personnel should also be encouraged to obtain corresponding technical grade certificates for workers. Project managers and technical personnel who have mastered operational skills have higher basic qualities than ordinary workers and can play a greater role in improving project quality and reducing costs in practice. The diversification of the composition structure of the worker team helps to change the incorrect view that construction workers are migrant workers and helps to change the concept that young people are unwilling to be construction workers.

Examining the Setting of Work Types Based on Development Reality

According to the relevant regulations of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, worker grades are divided into primary workers (national vocational qualification level 5), intermediate workers (national vocational qualification level 4), senior workers (national vocational qualification level 3), technicians (national vocational qualification level 2), and senior technicians (national vocational qualification level 1). However, in reality, there are two versions of worker grade certificates in the construction industry, one from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and the other from the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development. With the rapid development of the construction industry, especially the continuous emergence of new technologies, the role of some original work types in the construction industry is weakening, the scope of responsibilities involved in some work types has expanded, and new work types are constantly emerging.

Faced with the new situation, government departments in charge and industry experts need to conduct special investigations on the setting of work types in the construction industry, and re-determine the names, definitions and grades of work types in the industry according to professional needs and the number of employees. The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security should coordinate with the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development to study the current setting and management of work types in the construction industry and issue unified certificates. In addition, the construction industry should continue the division between general workers and skilled workers. At present, the starting income of general workers is relatively high, while skilled workers need a learning process (as apprentices or students) and are engaged in technical work, so their income should be higher than that of general workers. The provision of minimum wage income ignores the method of determining the minimum wage income by category and skill level, so that enterprises have not reduced labor costs, but have not played a role in encouraging workers to improve their technical level.

Having a Sound System and Appropriate Methods

According to the needs of the development of the construction industry, the required work type sequence in the construction industry should be clarified, and the training of workers' technical grades should be resumed. This is a long-term process. Only in this way can a complete team of construction workers be established.

Systematic professional work type training is equivalent to technical title training, which is also a gradual process and cannot be compared with simple certificate-based training. The training of construction workers has its own industry characteristics, mainly reflected in the mobility of engineering projects and the instability of personnel. Therefore, guided by the demand of the construction labor market and in accordance with the principle of \"training before employment; training before taking up posts\", we can improve the technical quality of the staff team through training, and cultivate a team of construction workers with good ideology, excellent skills and complete work types, with technicians as the leader, senior workers as the backbone and intermediate workers as the main body.

With the rapid development of Internet technology, online education has expanded to training and education in various industries and is becoming increasingly mature. The mode of online learning + pre-exam tutoring and examination is a relatively advanced training method.

Focusing on Various Forms of Education and Training Models

To improve the quality of the construction worker team, it is not enough to expect them to obtain technical grade certificates. It requires the continuous joint efforts of government departments in charge, industry associations, enterprises and other parties.

It is necessary to expand the social cognition so that the whole society can establish the concept that 

"good modern workers are also social elites. The government should study the project construction management model, explore the method of joint bidding between the project management layer and the construction operation layer, and give the operation layer team an equal status. Attach importance to the professional ethics education of construction workers. Determine their treatment through the dual standard assessment of professional skills and professional ethics and form a system. Inherit the traditional mentorship  so that new workers can earnestly master safety protection and labor skills through osmosis. Organize labor skills competitions in a timely manner to form a learning atmosphere of emulating others, learning from others, catching up with others and surpassing others. 

In addition, the role of industry associations should be brought into play. Beijing Construction Industry Association has purchased the purchase service project of Beijing Federation of Trade Unions and is making great efforts to build a network platform for policies and regulations, public welfare education, skill education, on-the-job training and continuing education for the construction industry to provide services for the majority of industry personnel.