The Honorable Karen Struthers, Minister for Women was at the Worldskills National Championships to promote Woman in Trade and in particular The Women in Hard Hats Initiative.

The Minister introduced a Career Building Women panel session, which gave the audience the opportunity to speak and listen to successful tradeswomen from Queensland and learn about their careers face to face. There were lots of enthusiastic questions from school girls directed towards the panel.

Alan Ross, CEO of the Construction and Property Services Industry Skills Council (CPSISC) commented "We have an overarching Workforce Development Strategy on our website (www.cpsisc.com.au) as we want to attract, train and retain workers in our industry. We have supported Worldskills for many years as we believe it is a key event for showcasing the quality of young people in our industry.  Worldskills provides an opportunity for young people to test their skills and demonstrate what they are capable of achieving. It also gets people excited about the construction industry and makes them want to be a part of it."

"At the moment only 5% of the construction workforce are women. Key people like Sam Sheppard of The Buildmore Group’s Women into Building Housing project are great role models for young women wanting to join our industry. We need showcase projects like this to attract young women into the construction industry and to demonstrate the quality work that they are capable of in a non-traditional role."

SkillsOne talked with two of the panelists Sam Sheppard and Carlie Boyce.

Sam Sheppard is from the Sunshine Coast and is a licensed builder. She loves building something from scratch and watching it grow. She started building when she was 17 years old, working at a cabinet making business and has been in building ever since. She also mentors women wanting to enter into non traditional trades, which she believes is important to remind these women she is guiding, that they have the power to lead in this industry and really instilling in women they are role models too.

Carlie is a cool headed Auto Mechanic that lives in Queensland. She strives on always learning more and getting among the action. She is really satisfied in her trade, and got into it by doing some work experience with mechanics in year 9. She currently works at a Holden dealership which she enjoys. She Does find being female in this male orientated industry challenging at times, but she remembers to keep her head up and not to take things too personally.

Even though they are in different trades, being Sam in Building and Carlie in Mechanics, they both share a common thread. They are both driven and talented women that work in non traditional trades, who are motivated by what they do and aren't afraid to show it.