ReAudio: ReAssess Your Workers Comp Toolbox
ReAudio goes beyond policies and regulations to explore the real impact of workers’ compensation. We break down key industry trends, workplace injury data, and best practices while diving into the human side of recovery. Through expert conversations and powerful stories, we uncover the challenges, emotions, and perspectives that shape the experience for employees and employers alike.
Whether you’re an industry professional or just curious about the system behind workplace injuries, this podcast brings you the facts you need and the stories that matter—because workers’ comp isn’t just about processes, it’s about people.
The award-winning ReAudio podcast is presented by your partners at ReEmployAbility. Thanks for listening!
ReAudio: ReAssess Your Workers Comp Toolbox
Building Second Chances with Factory OS
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Are you ready to be inspired? Factory OS does a lot of things differently in the construction world, but the biggest might be their hiring practices. Geared at giving people the training they need to succeed, they are improving people’s self-worth, one employee at a time. We sit down with Factory OS EHS Manager Trevor Bach and HR Payroll & Benefits Specialist Jeanne Roberts to learn how Factory OS is making a significant impact in the Vallejo community. Reaching individuals who've been overlooked by the traditional job market, and offering them more than just a job - but a renewed purpose.
Reemployability and Building Second Chances
Speaker 1R E A R E A R E A R E A audio.
Speaker 2R E A audio.
Speaker 3R E A audio. R E A audio. R E A audio. R E A audio Reemployability Reemployability.
Speaker 2Season 3.
Speaker 3Surprises come in many forms. When Trevor Bach and I agreed to talk about his company's experience with Reemployability for R E A audio, I thought we'd be talking mainly about Factory OS' approach to injured workers, their phenomenal communication and the care that they have for their employees. What I didn't realize was the vast majority of their employees were considered second chance. What Factory OS is doing in the construction industry is pretty cool, but what they're doing internally is even more impressive. I'm going to let Trevor and Jeanie explain more. Tell us a little bit about what it is that Factory OS does. It's kind of unique in what you're doing and helping the housing market and building the homes the way that you do. So tell us about that first, and then I want to learn more about senior management and their vision and how you all kind of got to being so employee-driven and directed.
Speaker 2So what do you all do first, Well, we manufacture our homes in a controlled environment.
Speaker 1All the building is done inside of a factory.
Speaker 2Most of the yeah, they shift out about 80% complete. It's at 85. So once it gets to site, it takes days to set, instead of weeks to a month to set up an apartment complex, for example, and most of what we're sending out of here is affordable housing. The people building this affordable housing are people that would qualify for what they're building and, again, we just take a whole lot of pride in that and about 40%, I believe, of the people. When we first opened up here, about 40% of our workforce had zero construction experience.
Speaker 3Really.
Speaker 2And so we're massive on training, and now we're helping them build a resume. Obviously, we want everyone to stay with us, but we take a lot of pride in building their skills that could help them throughout their entire life.
Speaker 1Yeah, and given them a second chance to rebuild their lives at all.
Speaker 2We have employees that are homeless. We have employees with all types of backgrounds and I think that we've helped people mentally. They look forward to coming to work and that's a really good feeling and they know that they're helping communities out there by building what we're building.
Speaker 3And that can't be an easy decision from a management standpoint when you're trying to build a business Like who sits down and says, hey, let's hire homeless people, right, I mean, that's just, it seems. I don't want to say counterintuitive, but it really is. In the corporate mindset of the world that we're in right now, there's the competition to get the highest level of abilities and trustworthiness and I think sometimes there's this stigma about people who are getting second chances, about people who are homeless, that they don't necessarily have those skill sets and they may not at the outset, but you're reaching out to try to give these people an opportunity and give people a chance, and so many times just giving somebody the chance is all that they are looking for. Right, Just give me a chance. Where did that, where did that mentality come from? Tell me a little bit about the management there, and what is it that drives you to reach out to those types of folks?
Speaker 2Well, I think that really goes to Larry Pace. He's our founder. He's always been driven to give people second chances and we happen to be in the city of Vallejo, which, statistically, vallejo, is a melting pot of culture and backgrounds, and we happen to be in a pretty poverty city. If you were to look at Vallejo, they're struggling a lot and most of our employees are from this area, and Larry believed it was a really good fit to help the communities and give people a second chance.
Speaker 1There's a lot of homelessness in this city.
Speaker 2Yeah, absolutely. We have a project that's down with me from here that we've dealt with to help the city of LAO specifically.
Speaker 3So in the roles that you're both in you know you're in HR and in risk and those things do you have a lot of interaction with the employees, not only when they're hurt but like throughout the course of their training and onboarding and daily life 100%.
Speaker 1Yes, we're in the HR office. So, like Trevor said, we kind of all do everything. So you know he does just do. I mean we all do HR. At any point Somebody will come in and if somebody's out or somebody stepped out, we all just jump in and help and we wear many hats.
Speaker 2Yeah, we do. We're like Swiss Army, nizies.
Speaker 3Yeah, like everybody is these days right, everybody does multiple things, so having that interaction with the employees, it's got to be satisfying, knowing that you're doing good things. Can you tell us any stories about some of the people that you've met? I think one of your favorite stories about folks that work there that you feel like you've really been able to make a difference. So do you have anything in the back of your mind for that?
Speaker 2There's a lot, I mean, there's so many.
Speaker 1To mine I would say one of our employees, john, he's really intelligent, he's really smart, but you know, financially he's probably not doing the best. But again, we've given second chances to people and you just see their whole, you know their mental health increased.
Speaker 1Yes, you just see their whole personality change, you know, when they come in the office and sometimes they're shy and they almost feel like they're not worthy of even coming into our office or interacting with us. And you know, especially Trevor Trevor's is the nicest guy, he's really warm. People come in. I tell people that I know, and your secret's out, sorry. And we, you know, welcome them in and, you know, just treat them like their family. I mean, we are a family here.
Speaker 1So you know, and you just see them really appreciate that and it's really humbling.
Speaker 2But they. What I think is really important is we have a very trusting culture here. You know the employees trust us and they know they can come to us and confide in us. And I'll tell you a lot of times, like you know, we go kind of above and beyond what our scope or typical HR safety still could be, because we actually care and they know it.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Speaker 2And you know that's that helps with retention as well. Right, when it comes to employees, we have some very dedicated employees, and if they're going to go for backwards for us, we're going to do the same for them.
Speaker 3Yeah, well, and that was what I was going to ask. You know it's funny you say HR and a lot of times people run away from HR people, you know, you know you never know what HR is going to do. But so what do you do to build that trust, especially in an atmosphere where you have people that may feel like, in a lot of circumstances, without even knowing them, they're all you know, they're automatically not trusted. Right, you're homeless, I'm not going to trust you, for whatever reason. It's a stereotype, right, but it's a negative one. So what do you build trust in an organization where you're full of people who are used to not being trusted?
Speaker 1Well, I think you know, just treating people with kindness and dignity goes a long way. You know, when people come in, we never treat them like we treat them like they're just part of us you know we don't treat our own on the same team not like.
Speaker 1You know we're HR, we're. You know we're the human resource. We're here for you. So you know we don't just hire and fire people. You know we're here to be a resource for you and help you. If you just need to talk with a special room that we take people into and you know, let them just tell us what's on their mind or how they're feeling. And you know, I just think that goes a long way with people.
Speaker 2Sure, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3It's about being a human being right.
Speaker 2Exactly, yeah, first and foremost, that's how we earn the trust. You know they don't feel judged by us. Yeah, right.
Speaker 1I mean, instead of running out of our office.
Speaker 2We have people running into our office behind us.
Speaker 1It's like a remover.
Speaker 2We need one of those old mall doors to do that. For sure, we're safe employees. Yeah, they come to us and we have meetings with our employees. In fact, every Wednesday, we have safety meetings with every single employee, and HR takes part of those as well, and we're just all about communicating with them, letting them know hey, we're here for you with whatever you need. You know, I think communication is key. I think some offices may make the mistake of just huddling in their office and staying in there where employees don't even know you.
Speaker 2What I can tell you is pretty much every single employee here knows my name and knows her name, and we know theirs. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3That's terrific, and you had mentioned and one of the reasons why we're having this conversation is that you had some success utilizing reemployability's transition to work program. I know you had mentioned when we first started that you had started with just a couple people in the program and did you say you've had five returned to work now.
Speaker 2So initially we had two in NFP and then, when I took over you know workers' comp, we bumped it up. It's now five people currently on NFP and we've returned since then nine, nine.
Speaker 3Since January. That's only since January. Yeah, that's a lot.
Speaker 2We had nine returns off NFP.
Speaker 3And so they're returning to work, retaining those skills that they've learned while they were there, right? Because when you can retain somebody, you don't have to go try to hire somebody new and retrain them and have a greater chance of them getting injured. One of the things that we find, and why I love talking to you all you're like a poster child for what we're trying to get people to understand is that communication aspect right. If an injured worker understands the reason why they're being put into this program is not as a punishment, it's because it's the best thing for them, it's a benefit to them and, as you mentioned, communication is key from the employer to the employee. It sounds like you guys retain that communication, even when somebody's out on workers' compensation, right? You don't just forget about them because they're not coming into the office every day, right?
Speaker 2I speak to you too, our NFP people, just as if they're here just as often.
Speaker 1And they have our phone numbers, they have our cell numbers, they have our email addresses. They know how to get in touch with us. Several ways.
Speaker 2That's what we're looking on. Coloners Right, yeah, we are sometimes we're all after hours, so yeah, we're open from a phone now seven, but seven to 1130 is our production, so seven am to 1130 pm. But even if we're not here, they know we're there for them. So yeah, yeah, we're very.
Speaker 1Well, especially Trevor, because if there is Dr Vittanasadent, they all travel at all hours.
Speaker 3Yeah, how many employees do you all have?
Speaker 2On our payroll.
Speaker 3How many on the floor at any given time?
Speaker 2A couple hundred.
Speaker 3A couple hundred 300.
Speaker 1Oh right. Union employees and then like 65 non-union employees.
Speaker 3So, union and non-union, you offer this program to both.
Speaker 1Well, we have a. Yeah, it is available.
Speaker 2We just haven't had any stop reading people.
Speaker 1Yeah, I'm sorry, non-union. Yeah, non-union people.
Speaker 2Discoincidence.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 3So you have not hadyou've only sent union people.
Speaker 2Yeah, yes.
Speaker 3Okay, okay. So the union is on board with what it is that you're doing here With non-unemployability.
Speaker 2Oh, absolutely yeah. And it's not that we wouldn't send a non-union employee, we just haven't had any that would fit that yes.
Speaker 1But believe me, if something happened to me at the, I'd be taking you on NFP and you'd be. I'd be ready to go working.
Speaker 2You'd be cutting the puppies over. If you need society, yeah for sure I'm a puppy cutter.
Speaker 3When you're checking in with these folks while they're in the program, what sort of things are they telling you? Are they surprised by it? I would imagine a lot of them don't have a whole lot of volunteer experience in the past, sure. So when you're trying to find out something kind of new to them, what do you hear from them? When you speak with them while they're on an assignment?
Speaker 2Well, when they initially find out they're going to be in the program, there's lots of questions, so we try and be proactive with that. So when I find out that they're approved for a placement, I'll communicate with them and speak to them and let them know exactly how it works verbally and the benefits of an NFP program with them and how they're benefiting the community too and helping people in need.
Speaker 1And maybe they're retaining their same pay, which I think is huge. They're not getting their pay Absolutely. That's probably their first question how am I going to get paid? How much am I going to get paid?
Speaker 2Absolutely yeah, and I don't blame them.
Speaker 1Yeah, once they know that they're going to retain their same pay. They're like oh, okay, I'm on board with that.
Speaker 3Yeah, they retain their benefits as well, just like they're an employee right.
Speaker 2Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1And they're sick time and they're vacation time. So if they are sick they can use their sick time or their vacation time.
Speaker 2Right, they're still accumulating the benefits. Yeah, we're, in a way, around the biggest some of the most positive feedback that I get about the NFP program from the actual employees themselves is they feel Like they haven't lost their self-worth. You know, again, we're big on mental health here, with an entire mental health initiative Very, very important to us, and we publicize resources to our employees all the time. But yeah, mentally I think it's fantastic for them and that is something that they pretty unanimously are thankful for.
Speaker 2Yeah, I bet Instead of sitting at home upset their hurts, you know.
Speaker 1Making less money Making less money.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's depressing right. Anyone of us could easily be in that position. Yep.
Speaker 3You have a great part of your website called the Humans Behind the Housing. I absolutely loved it. I was watching the videos earlier today.
Speaker 2There's so many great stories.
Speaker 3Was that your idea, Trevor? Did you put that together?
Speaker 2That one I cannot take credit for.
Speaker 3There's so many great stories. There's stories of people who were stuck in addiction and are now working and have self-worth and are doing so well. There's a story of a gentleman who had time in prison and he talks about an organization called Delaney Street where it was like a transitional program. There was another lady whose husband worked there and she began working by sweeping the floors and she says she cleaned the floors in the toilets and now she's doing electrical in these houses.
Speaker 2I know exactly the people you're talking about.
Speaker 3It's really amazing. If you're listening and you want to check it out, it's factoryoscom and the section of the website is called the Humans Behind the Housing. Can you tell us a little bit more about that Delaney Street organization? What do they do and how do they help you with hiring some of the folks that you have? Rehabilitation House?
Speaker 1It's a rehabilitation home. I know one of our supervisors here works there when he's not here, so he's mainly working around the clock, because when he's not here he's there. He was incarcerated at one time in his life. Once he got it together then he decided to work there and help out and he's just helped a lot of people rehab through that program. What's great is sometimes they pay it forward. Once they get rehab and they're back on their feet, then they start helping other people and it has a domino effect. It does.
Speaker 2And the supervisor that she's speaking about. He started his just a factory for employee and worked you know, coming out of incarceration, Starting on, you know, the the base of our production floor and then becoming a supervisor. You know he busted his butt and he again. It's about paying it forward and he's still hoping people that went through the same or similar that he did. You know it's awesome to see that.
Speaker 1Yeah, I'm helping them through. You know substance abuse and substance addiction and so you know it's just. I can't even put words to how awesome that is when you see somebody come out the other side and then help other people and other people help other people.
Speaker 3So that pay it forward mentality I can see that in some of these videos and what? What I loved about it was these people telling their stories. They're very well-spoken it they, and I think that comes from the confidence that they get from what they're doing with, with factory OS, right, so you can definitely tell that that they have some people that believe in them and and are vested in their best interest and they are paying it forward, and I'm sure that's not not a prerequisite of being hired there, right, it's just something that happens when, when you're given a chance.
Speaker 1Yeah, it's just a beautiful byproduct of what we do. I'm sure said I think we take a lot of pride in what we do and once people you know See what they've done and and how it affects other people you know, it gives them a really a sense of pride.
Speaker 2So yeah, they have an end result they're looking at. Yeah.
Speaker 1They come to fruition and see how it affects other people's lives. You know.
Speaker 3The model you have is is really unique and and just I didn't expect to to learn so much about the employees that you have there. When we first agreed to talk I I kind of imagined it would be more about how the program has helped you all, and we're really glad that that's that that's the case, and we're really glad that we're able to work with you, with your folks that are injured. But but I was just really astonished with the story of the people that you're hiring and how you're training them and Really giving, giving them hope in a second chance, and I think that's why our program and your company work together so well, because that's what we're trying to do too. More information about the company. Some of those stories that we talked about. It's a factory OS. What does the OS stand for? Oh well, I guess I should have figured that out. Oh, os, calm, trevor and Jeannie, thank you so much for your time. I hope you enjoyed it. I did. I love learning about companies like you and it's been a real pleasure.
Speaker 2Thanks but we appreciate you, thank you.
Speaker 3Thanks for listening to REA audio. Now we need you to help us out. If you know someone whose story should be told, please let us know. Email Todd at re employabilitycom. That email address link will be in the show notes as well. We'd love to have you follow REA audio on Apple podcasts or Spotify or Stitcher, wherever you get your podcast. You can also check out more content at listen to REAcom. Remember, leave with the good and have a great rest of your week.
