Facilities management teams and construction organizations are bringing new talent to the skilled trades, and the opportunities they offer are increasingly attractive to younger workers, experts say.
The increasing complexity of buildings and strong construction activity in high-growth sectors are expanding the need for skilled trades, according to JLL. professional talent research reportpublished in April. These trends are creating demand for workers with advanced skills who can handle more complex construction assets, mechanical and electrical specifications, and health and safety regulations, according to the report.
While U.S. labor conditions are not as tight as they were immediately after the pandemic, demand for skilled trades has been outpacing demand for other major job categories, with annual job openings doubling over the past decade. This outsized growth is expected to continue as the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure and the emphasis on energy efficiency and emissions reduction drive the need for electricians and HVAC technicians in particular. The wave of older workers nearing retirement is also driving demand.
“It’s been building over a number of years,” Paul Morgan, JLL’s global chief operating officer of property management services, told Facilities Dive. The demand for skilled labor is “sharper now than we’ve seen before. And the reason it’s probably getting sharper is the fact that we have a retirement cliff that’s building.”
From 2024 to 2034, employment is expected to grow by 9.5% for electricians, 8.1% for HVAC technicians, 6% for construction workers and 4.5% for plumbers, plumbers and steamfitters, according to JLL, citing data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. That compares with a 3.1 percent increase over that time for all occupations, the report says.
Existing talent pools are not sufficient to meet demand: About 2.1 million skilled jobs are expected to go unfilled by 2030, which could result in annual economic losses of $1 trillion. Last year, only about 150,000 new workers entered the skilled labor pool through apprenticeship programs, compared with the nearly 600,000 jobs that were posted for top skilled trade positions in the US, JLL said in its report.
“The pendulum, however, may be swinging back,” says the JLL report, in part due to the high costs of higher education and uncertain job prospects for those with four-year degrees.
College tuition has risen 900% since 1983, nearly twice the rate of growth in medical costs and four times the rate of growth in housing prices, the JLL report states. “Mathematics is recalibrating” young people’s demand for training, says JLL.
To attract new labor and develop talent in the skilled trades, some organizations are working to lower the barrier to access to education and help train technicians in the field.
Unlimited Service Group, a coalition of companies that service commercial kitchens across the United States, has strengthened its workforce through an in-house training school, Training Unlimited, according to Kristen Nowak, USG president of field services.
The training process involves “a mixture of sitting in a classroom [and] traditional school learning, plus hands-on team learning inside that classroom,” Nowak told Facilities Dive. “And then we pair up. [trainees] with superior technicians in the field. It is this mixture of classroom and work [training] which we think is really critical. This is the ticket to move them to one [role as a] technical future of our industry”.
The proportion of students and teenagers considering apprenticeships, vocational schools and technical programs will more than triple between 2018 and 2024, from 12% to 38%, indicating a “generational shift in career expectations”, says JLL. Enrollment at community colleges has also increased 12 percent over the past five years, compared to 3 percent growth in enrollment at four-year institutions. Trade-related majors are among the fastest-growing programs at two-year schools.
Concerns about white-collar jobs being replaced by AI add to the dynamic. “The ongoing dialogue around artificial intelligence … doesn’t seem to be slowing down in any way,” JLL’s Morgan said. “Some roles are starting to become more disrupted… Some people are now thinking, maybe in the long term, [that if] this AI interruption continues: “Where is a safer place where I can have longevity in my career?” I think the skilled trades are exactly that.”
The increased complexity of construction is also helping to attract talent, Morgan said. Smart building technologies such as IoT platforms, automated building management systems, real-time sensors and analytics are transforming the requirements of certain jobs.
The increased deployment of sophisticated technology such as LiDAR scanning and thermal imaging in building maintenance and repair is one example, JLL says in its report.
It’s a “compelling proposition for young, digital-native talent entering the workforce,” the report says, “and a defining opportunity for the industry to rebrand skilled trades as the next-generation, technology-enabled profession it has become.”
Companies are investing 1 billion dollars per year to bring robots to the construction trades, according to JLL Research. Robots can conduct building inspections and act as security patrols, among other things, and while still early in development and adoption, they can increase the scope and sophistication of skilled trades in the evolving built environment, JLL says.
“If you think about the broader sense of operations and buildings in the future, that resource will be a combination of humans, robots and AI agents,” Morgan said. “The workforce of the future will be a combination of the physical and the electronic that must work in harmony.”
According to Nowak, ensuring harmony has emerged as a training focus at Unlimited Services Group. When Training Unlimited started, it only trained technicians on the equipment, without giving much weight to the customer interaction aspect. That has changed with the amount of technology his customers use, he said. Technology and soft skills have become very important to training, he said.
“We find that as we bring younger candidates into our school, they’re more savvy with it than maybe some of our older technicians, and they bring new skills with them as well,” he said.
Integration of supply and demand
Looking ahead, everyone with a stake in skilled labor should look at both the supply and demand side of the equation, JLL said.
The supply side includes trade schools, community colleges, professional advocates such as trade associations and unions, government agencies, and private organizations, including employer coalitions.
Unlimited Services Group is trying to increase supply by offering potential technicians a stipend while they train. “We pay to associate them with our top technicians,” Nowak said. “We pay them all the time, so they can make that investment in themselves. That’s what flips the script for these technicians. They can invest that time without it affecting their family. [or] their personal finances”.
On the demand side, organizations can create school-to-employer pipelines and offer career pathways to enhance skills to drive retention. The JLL report states. Contractor partnerships, co-investment skills development and pay-for-performance incentives that tie compensation to asset performance can also play a role, he says.
Additionally, tenants and other building occupants can use hiring decisions to reward workforce development and collaborate with operators to identify emerging skills needed, he says.
