Of course, there’s a step you need to take before ensuring documents are accessible – you need to collect all that information in the first place, and that takes place during onboarding. So, what exactly should you collect, and why?

For each subcontractor, you should collect the following during the onboarding process:

• Basic demographic information: This may seem obvious, but it’s surprising how often subcontractors end up working on a site without having provided it. Especially when documentation is provided via pen and paper, it can get overlooked.
  
  You’ll need:
  • Full name
  • Phone number
  • Email address
  • ID or EIN number
• Work permits or proof of citizenship: In our industry, it’s common to have immigrants on the work site, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) knows it, too. You definitely don’t want to be in the headlines if ICE conducts an enforcement action on your site and you’re unable to prove that everyone there is legally able to work.
  • Proof of citizenship or U.S. work permit
  • D/L or state-issued ID
• Emergency health and contact information: If there’s an accident or if the worker suffers a medical incident on site, you’ll want to have this information.
  • Emergency contact information
  • Health insurance information
  • Primary care physician name, phone and email
  • Known medication allergies
  • Pertinent underlying health conditions
• Compliance documentation: Depending on the job, you may need to collect a wide array of background checks, license verifications or other documents. For example, if you’re working on a hospital expansion, the owner may require all workers to be current on specific vaccinations. If it’s the project is constructing a high-security data center or a federal building, you may need to prove that everyone has passed a background check.
  
  And depending on local laws and your insurance requirements, subcontractors may need verification of licensure to operate machinery or perform specific jobs. You might even need to get them to provide signed NDAs.

Of course, collecting this information is just half the battle. You’ll also need to be able to access it when required, and in some cases, such as an on-the-job injury, you may not have much time at all to put your hands on it. If that information is stored on paper documents filed away in a cabinet somewhere, maybe on-site and maybe not, that’s going to take some time. And you’d best hope no one misfiled it or that there hasn’t been a fire, a flood or some other disaster that destroyed them.

���Ĵ�ý can assist you with the entire document lifecycle. Our web-based solution makes it simple to set up documents requirements for subcontractors, who can upload everything before they even arrive on-site. This not only saves time, but it also enables you to easily check to ensure that you actually have everything you need and that it’s all in good order. 

And because these documents are electronic, they’re protected and backed up in case of disaster. You won’t need to worry about a leaky trailer roof dripping water into the file cabinet, destroying all your precious paperwork. We’ve got multiple, protected, secured digital copies. In the event you need to access them, they’re just a few clicks away from any device at any location.

Interested in learning more about how ���Ĵ�ý can simplify and strengthen your subcontractor onboarding documentation process? Contact us and today!

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But while the commercial office and interiors construction space looks bearish, three other sectors are strong. The data center market has exploded. The global data center market was worth $213.5 billion in 2022 and is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.4% through 2030, , and the sector’s growth is primarily constrained only by the amount of power available to support these facilities’ infrastructure. Healthcare facilities, and hospitals in particular, are growing as well. In 2023, , which is 14% more than the prior year. Finally, in 2023 over 2022 to $1.4 billion in the US alone, with a 5.2% CAGR through 2027

But if you’re looking to move into these spaces, you’ll need to up your onboarding and data game for your subcontractors. All of these sectors differ significantly from the rest of construction. 

Unique Worker Data Requirements

Their concern is risk. The projects are tech-heavy, and the owners are forward thinking, so they’re prone to using and expecting technology on their jobs. And because the data center’s eventual customers will have high security expectations for the information and workloads that will live there, the construction site is a high-security environment. They’re onerous about who has access to the data center, what security measures are in place. They have access control, turnstiles on jobsites, and other measures that create a significant digital footprint to prove that these folks are authorized to be there. Owners and general contractors need this digital footprint to prove that the workers who are on site are qualified to be there, and they expect that information to be digitally stored in the cloud instead of on paper.

Hospitals have different, but no less stringent concerns. They want to make sure, for instance, that all workers have their flu shots and covid vaccinations. It’s often the case that construction is taking place in a fully operational building with certain floors closed off, so hospital management is strict about making sure everyone on site has proper qualifications. And they want to be able to verify it with just a few clicks to obtain the information they need

Finally, government projects are also security conscious and just as meticulous about records keeping as one would expect. Plus, when the government provides funding for a construction project, one of the aims is often to create jobs locally. If the federal government funds a job in New Mexico and the general contractor flies in a bunch of contractors from Arizona, that’s going to be a problem. The GC needs data points on the zip codes of workers’ place of residence to keep funding and qualify for benefits such as tax write-offs. 

GCs typically have systems that can handle most of these requirements for employees, but for subcontractors it’s a different story. In most cases, subcontractors arrive on site with their documentation, which is copied and stored in a file cabinet in a trailer on site. That’s not going to fly for data center, hospital and government construction projects. These stakeholders want to have access to digital information, and if there’s a disaster – a fire, a flood, a tornado that destroys the file cabinet – that data disappears for good if paper is the only repository for that data.

The ���Ĵ�ý Solution

���Ĵ�ý provides a simple, elegant solution to these challenges. Subcontractors upload all required documentation to the SaaS-based service before arriving on site, so that when workers arrive, they can get started right away. And that data is digitally accessible from any device. ���Ĵ�ý can track what zip code each subcontractor comes from, identify all vaccinations and store all security qualifications, which makes it simple to provide a report to the GC, owner or other stakeholders. 

In fact, many ���Ĵ�ý customers print out a QR code for each worker and then turn them into hardhat stickers. It’s helpful in case someone gets hurt, because the supervisor may not personally know who they are, and, if they’re unresponsive, it’s simple to pull up all their info: emergency contact, allergies, and more. But this method also can make it simple to identify an individual’s certifications to prove a worker is qualified to be on the job. 

Want to learn more about how ���Ĵ�ý can help your organization easily collect critical worker data and make it digitally accessible? !

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Ideally, you want a score lower than one, but getting there will take time and preparation. The only effective way to reduce your score is to reduce your worker’s compensation claims, and the only way to do this is to reduce the number of injuries that occur on the job. 

The bottom line: you’ve got to improve safety. And one of the key ways you can improve safety is through strong safety training. shows safety training with construction workers significantly reduces the number of on-the-job injuries. By how much, you may ask? About 12%, give or take, though one study found a in workers’ compensation claims among workers 16 to 24 years old. That a meaningful reduction and, over time, it’s certainly enough to lower your EMR score

But training only increases the level of safety on a job site if it’s strong and workers understand it. Unfortunately, that’s often not the case, because while construction companies frequently have strong safety training programs and a strong learning management system (LMS) for training their own employees, subcontractor safety onboarding is often much less rigorous.

Does this sound familiar? Subcontractors arrive at the site on the first day, and a supervisor or safety manager brings them all into a trailer where they provide onboarding safety training about the site. It’s important information that might literally make the difference between life and death, or serious injury at the very least. But there’s no guarantee that the information is consistent across trainings or even that it was presented in a language that the subcontractors can understand. In construction, subcontractors often speak a first language other than English, and their command of English may not be strong enough to fully comprehend the information being presented. Overcoming the language barrier is a serious issue. There’s rarely a dedicated translator – usually it’s a bilingual Spanish-English worker pulled off the job to do that task – so the quality of translation varies widely. 

���Ĵ�ý can fill that gap with a web-based safety orientation tool that subcontractors can use to complete training from any device at any time, complete with assessments and in Spanish or English. Spanish-speaking subcontractors certainly appreciate it, as they’ve given ���Ĵ�ý a of 96 to 100 among different general contractors, which is an astronomically high score. Qualtrics, a company that specializes in helping other organizations improve their customer experience, categorizes their highest ranking.  

The materials remain consistent across training, so you know exactly what safety information each worker is getting. And, instead of these safety records getting shoved into a file cabinet somewhere in a trailer on the work site, ���Ĵ�ý creates a digital record of all qualifications and training that’s accessible from anywhere. 

Reducing your EMR score requires dedication and planning, but it can be done. And ���Ĵ�ý can play a key role in helping you get there. Get in touch to so you can learn more about how we can help close your subcontractor safety gap and get that EMR down below one.

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Quick recap. Insurers use the EMR score to calculate the rate a company will pay for workers’ compensation insurance. Basically, it’s the equivalent of a credit rating, but for safety. And just as a higher credit rating will cost you more money in your personal life, a higher EMR will do the same for a construction business.

The calculation formula is fairly complex, with a lot of moving parts, but in broad terms, the more incidents you’ve had, the more serious they are and the higher your claims have been in the past, the higher your score is going to be. A score of “1” means your company is of average risk for losses. Any score above “1,” and you’ll be paying more for worker’s comp than your peers. 

So, the first impact of an EMR score is pretty obvious: insurance rates. Worker’s compensation is a significant expense. According to the Center for Construction Research and Training, which is more than twice the average for all businesses. Insurers take the base rate, and then multiply it by a company’s EMR score. If your EMR is 1.25, you’ll pay 25% more than the base rate. If it’s 0.75, you’ll pay just three-quarters. To put it more plainly, if the base rate is $200,000, a company with an EMR of 1.25 would pay $250,000, whereas one with a score of 0.75 would pay $150,000. 

But that’s far from the only influence the EMR score has on a construction company. When owners are evaluating general contractors (GCs), they take the EMR score into account. In turn, when GCs are evaluating subcontractors, the EMR score is often one of the determining factors. After all, the GC and the owner bear significant risk for those that work under them. They don’t want to hire a company with a poor safety record who’s likely to have a significant number of recordable safety incidents.

What’s more, a low EMR can indirectly have a negative effect on your reputation with partners and even potential employees. Even if the rating itself isn’t well known, the factors that go into calculating it typically are. Because, if you have a high EMR rating, that means you have had a higher than average number of employees who suffered on-the-job injuries serious enough to qualify for workers’ compensation. If you’re a worker or a partner who has a choice, who’s going to choose to work with the company that’s more likely to get your or your people hurt or worse?

If you’re skeptical, check out this . Dutra Group, a marine contractor, lost a bid for an $8.9 million pier substructure repair project at least in part due to the firm’s EMR rating. In another case, Michigan-based general contractor George W. Auch Co. used to automatically reject bidders with EMR scores over “1,” though they have since changed their policy. 

The bottom line? A company with a lower EMR is likely to win more business than a company with a higher one, and they’ll also have lower costs, because not only are they providing a safer work environment, but they’re also paying less for worker’s compensation.

���Ĵ�ý provides a platform that makes safety training less costly, more efficient and more effective for subcontractors. We’ll go into more detail in subsequent posts about how ���Ĵ�ý can specifically help your company lower your EMR, but if you just can’t wait, get in touch. We’d be happy to speak with you. 

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The point of an EMR score is to help insurers predict how large a risk you are for future losses by analyzing your loss history. It’s used for all kinds of businesses, but it is only for those whose premiums would be greater than $5,000 annually. Of course, there’s no construction firm that will pay a premium that low, so for you, it matters.

At the start of the evaluation, you begin with a score of 1. That’s the baseline. If the analysis shows your risk is low, your score goes down. If it’s high, it goes up. And that’s important because insurers will multiply the manual premium (which is your annual payroll multiplied by the workers compensation rate per $100) by your EMR to determine how much you’ll pay. For example, if your EMR is 0.8, and the base rate for workers’ comp insurance is $100,000, you’d pay $80,000 (100,000 x 0.8.). On the other hand, if your EMR is 1.5, you’d pay $150,000.

So, let’s dive into how the EMR is calculated. It’s pretty complicated. Let’s break it down.

First, we’ll go through the factors they use in the calculation:

• Gross payroll figure for the most recent 12-month fiscal year
• The job classification rate, which is typically from the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI), but some states have their own systems
• Actual primary loss, which is the sum of all claims less than $17,000
• Actual excess loss, which is the sum of claims above $17,000, but it’s discounted. In this way, companies with many small claims penalized more than companies that only have one or two large ones
• Actual loss, which is the actual primary loss and the actual excess loss added together.
• Expected primary loss. To calculate this, multiply your payroll by your expected loss rate (ELR), which is determined by NCCI or your state agency, depending on your location. 
• Expected primary loss: This future is the expected loss multiplied by the D-ratio (also known as the “discount ratio”). The D-ratio changes from year to year, and, like the ELR, is determined by NCCI or your state. 
• Expected excess loss: Take your expected loss and then subtract the actual primary loss.

Got all that? Ok, almost there. We’ve got two big figures to determine before we get your EMR: the actual rate and the expected rate. 

• Actual rate: Determine this by multiplying the sum of the actual primary loss and the actual excess lost by the expected excess loss.
• Expected rate: Multiply the sum of the actual excess loss and the actual primary loss by the expected excess loss. 

Once you have these last two figures, calculating your EMR is easy: divide the actual rate by the expected rate. 

In future posts, we’ll go into more detail about specific ways in which you can push your EMR as far below 1 as possible, but a good primer is our earlier blog post, Lower Your EMR Score By Improving Safety Onboarding For Subcontractors. But the short version is that you need to improve your safety record.

Ensuring that your contractors are receiving high-quality, consistent safety onboarding is an important piece of the EMR puzzle, and ���Ĵ�ý can help. If you’re ready to learn how top construction companies are using ���Ĵ�ý to onboard workers across projects of all sizes, reach out today to .

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After all, safety training doesn’t do any good if the people undergoing the training can’t understand it, and far too often, that’s the case for subcontractors. Here’s what typically happens. The subs arrive on site in the first morning of work and are ushered into a trailer, where one of the general contractor’s safety people conducts training … in English. Likely, some if not most of the subcontractors in the room are not native Spanish speakers who do not have a complete command of English. 

In the best case scenario, a bilingual worker is pulled off their job to act as a translator, a job for which they are undoubtedly not trained, so the quality of their translations may vary quite a bit in their accuracy and quality. But in some cases, the subs will just have to do the best on their own they can to comprehend the safety information they’re being given in a language they may not fully understand, if at all. The end result is that non-English speakers end up frustrated and potentially, without critical safety information that they need to ensure they don’t suffer an on-the-job injury, which is no good for anyone.

It doesn’t have to be this way. 

���Ĵ�ý provides construction companies with a SaaS-based safety Orientation tool that enables subcontractors to complete safety training and assessments on any device at any time. And because the platform is bilingual, Spanish-speaking subcontractors can access the same safety content in their own language. 

Here’s how it works. The construction organization uploads training materials to ���Ĵ�ý, which can be in multiple languages. Subcontractors will receive a digital invitation, and they can do the training on any device, including smartphones, tablets and laptops. After creating a profile and uploading any certifications that are required, they spend about 30 minutes doing the virtual training and assessment. 

When they arrive on-site, English and Spanish-speaking subs alike arrive up-to-speed on safety and ready to work, while the construction organization now has a digital record that managers can access from anywhere. Anytime a manager needs to know who’s onsite with what qualifications, the information is right there at their fingertips. Plus, it strengthens the company’s legal position in case litigation arises. 

The feedback we’ve received from Spanish-speaking subcontractors who have used the ���Ĵ�ý platform has been overwhelmingly positive, giving the training a net promoter score (NPS) of 96 – 100 across multiple different general contractors. Here’s just a small sample of what they’ve had to say: 

• “Muy bueno el curso y muy bien explicado” (Great course and explained very well)
• “Muy ilustrativo el curso y de gran ayuda muchas gracias” (The course was very illustrative and helpful. Thank you so much!)
• “Informativo. Esto es mejor que hacer la orientación en un grupo grande, hay menos distracciones. Es más fácil prestar atención.” (Informative. This is better than doing the orientation in a large group, with fewer distractions. It’s easier to pay attention.)

With the aid of a technology platform purpose-built for subcontractor onboarding, construction companies can ensure that everyone, no matter what language they understand best, receives clear, consistent, high quality onboarding training – with a digital record to prove it. If you’d like to learn more about how ���Ĵ�ý can help make your subcontractor onboarding process more comprehensive and efficient. Reach out today to and discover how top construction companies are using ���Ĵ�ý to digitally onboard workers.

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So, construction companies would do well to evaluate their insurance costs and devise a strategy to position themselves to qualify for lower rates in the future. One way to do that is to lower your experience modification rating, better known in the industry as EMR. Insurers weigh a number of factors — payroll, job classification rate, claims made over the past three years, etc. – when calculating the score. An EMR of “1” means you’re right in the middle of the pack as far as risk is concerned, so you’ll likely get the standard rate, absent any special discounts. The goal is to go low. A score of less than “1” means your risk is lower than average, so you should get a lower than average rate. More than “1” and you’ll see your rates climb higher.

Lowering your EMR score is not a quick fix, because, ultimately, the best way to reduce your score is to reduce worker’s compensation claims, and the only way to do that is to strengthen safety.

The first order of business is to ensure that everyone on site is getting proper safety training. Understand, this won’t directly lower your score, but studies repeatedly show that strong, consistent safety training significantly lowers the recordable incident rate, and lowering the number of accidents over time will definitely lower your score. But to be effective, training has to include everyone, not just your direct employees. Subcontractor trade workers also need safety training, and nearly all general contractors provide it as part of their onboarding process. But in most organizations, that training is done in a way that doesn’t allow management much insight into quality, consistency or simple completeness.

The only way an organization can ensure that strong, consistent safety training is occurring is by tracking training and other key safety KPIs to identify where the program is weak, understand how safety trends are moving and address those weaknesses so that trends continue moving in the right direction.

For example, subcontractors are typically trained in-person by a supervisor on-site in a trailer before their first day on the job. Their attendance is recorded on paper, as are the results of a post-instructional quiz, if given, and those paper records get stored in a file cabinet. Unless a manager calls the supervisor to manually fetch those files, there’s no way to access the data, and there’s certainly no way that the data can be analyzed as part of a larger effort to track safety KPIs.

But there are additional problems beyond tracking with the way subcontractor safety onboarding is typically conducted. There’s no way to assess whether training is consistent from site to site and day to day. Plus, many subcontractors either do not speak English or do not speak it well — is instruction being given in a language that they understand?

Automating the subcontractor onboarding process can address all of these issues, and ���Ĵ�ý provides an elegant solution. Instructional material in multiple languages can be uploaded to ���Ĵ�ý, and then subcontractors can access training via any device. The solution tracks the result of safety assessments following instruction, all certifications and even who is on site at any given time. As a result, construction companies can save time — because subcontractors will be all trained up before they even arrive on site — and ensure that all subcontractors have the safety training they need to avoid injury on site.

Additionally, because they’re not constantly tied up providing safety training to subcontractors, safety managers gain additional time to walk the site more frequently. As a result, they are able to note more hazards and unsafe behaviors, which is one of the keys to reducing recordable incidents and, as a consequence, reducing EMR scores.

It’s a big step towards a stronger safety program, a lower EMR and, ultimately, lower worker’s compensation insurance fees.

If you’re ready to learn how top construction companies are using ���Ĵ�ý to onboard workers across projects of all sizes, reach out today to .

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