Design
While certain tasks may also be auto-
mated in the future, this will still call
for highly qualified personnel, capa-
ble of overseeing the functions and
ensuring the quality mechanisms in
the process.
Issues Relating to Gender Equality
and Representation
Local legislative forces have made
important efforts in the past years
to promote participation of female
employees and to allow fairer com-
petitive ground for opportunities
and rewards. These initiatives have
included the introduction of an em-
ployer contribution for the mater-
nity fund, the extension of the ma-
ternity leave period from fourteen to
eighteen weeks, and currently discus-
sions are under way on the possibility
of having parents take time off work
when their children are sick. These
actions are commendable in their
intent in that they pave the way for a
situation in which employers do not
consider gender when employing, al-
though further work needs to be un-
dertaken in order to achieve parity in
opportunities and participation.
The construction industry has tra-
ditionally been a largely male dom-
inated industry and to a large extent
this has been the case even in recent
years. The prospectus offered by the
MCAST Institute of Building and
Construction Engineering empha-
sises the openness towards diversity
and the inclusion of the faculty of
female students. While demograph-
ics information is not readily availa-
ble, it still appears that the construc-
tion world is predominantly male in
Malta. Sang and Powell (2012) re-
30
Q 2 , 2017
The availability of skilled local personnel is decreasing as
mature workers retire.
viewing views present in the United
Kingdom and in Australia, describe
how women are underrepresented
in all construction occupations and
professions and how the women who
work in this sector face cultural and
structural barriers, such as harass-
ment and discrimination, limited
networking opportunities and long
and inflexible working hours which
often result in poor career prospects
and high levels of stress.
There is growing recognition that
there is value in diversity as this
paves the way for creative thinking
and problem solving, however work
needs to be undertaken in order to
entice a gender diverse population
into training and education and
changes in
construction
methodology
...is... creating
challenges
with regards
to employee
management
DESIGN&BUILD