‘Move Over Bob’: Construction zine makes space for women

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Building has a repute for being a boys membership. That notion exists for a purpose.

About one in ten workers in construction were women in 2024, in response to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That share is even smaller within the trades.

In Arizona, Kate Glantz is looking for to get extra girls into the development workforce via an uncommon methodology: a shiny journal. The co-founder of the media and way of life model Transfer Over Bob has sought to teach extra girls about their alternatives to pursue a profession within the trades.

Right here, Glantz talks with Building Dive concerning the mission behind the journal, its objectives for recruiting and training and the response to its cheeky identify.

CONSTRUCTION DIVE: How did this journal come about? What’s the thought behind it?

KATE GLANTZ: A print journal in 2025 was clearly not the very very first thing we considered, however I will say this again and again: Ladies aren’t Googling tips on how to be a development employee. So we needed to discover methods to satisfy them the place they’re. And on the identical time, we face an enormous expert labor scarcity within the U.S. and I simply do not consider it is a problem of curiosity. I actually consider that is an consciousness difficulty and it is a narrative difficulty and it is a advertising problem. So we knew we wanted to get these tales to ladies the place they could not simply click on away.

We realized colleges are the place our prospects are. I now have partnerships with about 350 colleges — of which 80% are excessive colleges and 20% center colleges — throughout Arizona, so the journal is just not solely going into youngsters’ backpacks and residential to their households, however academics are utilizing it at school and steerage counselors are utilizing it of their classes. It’s not curriculum, it’s a shiny journal. This primary difficulty simply got here out in August. There are 20,000 copies, 18,000 of which have been distributed to colleges, girls’s prisons, nonprofits and a few public libraries. 

However what’s actually thrilling, is that we’re a teen journal in lecture rooms, proper? And so we employed a profession and technical training trainer to develop each a center faculty classroom information after which a highschool classroom information, one for CTE college students, one for non-CTE, after which we’ve got an English and Spanish household information.

Is it solely in Arizona for now?

The partnerships are in Arizona. We now have subscribers everywhere in the nation. However actually the storytelling is targeted on Arizona. And the explanation that we’re beginning there — we completely plan to be nationwide — is that development is sort of native. Certifications and subsequent steps and scholarships and coaching alternatives, they fluctuate a lot by area. And so earlier than we went actually broad with this aspirational, narrative-changing endeavor, we needed to ensure the backend was as shored up as attainable. 

It’s not simply cool photos and tales and sound bites. Each web page of the journal has a QR code the place you possibly can truly then scan it and get into the place the apprenticeship is. You’ll be able to see, what are the alternatives in my space for plumbing, for instance. 

What’s the connection been like with companions, contractors and apprenticeship packages?

Extremely supportive. They adore it. Everybody is aware of that we’ve got a workforce scarcity. And tradeswomen solely make up a small share of the workforce, although it varies by area. However we all know numerous views make higher companies. 

I feel that regardless of the place you fall personally, politically, there may be this kind of distinctive expressway for what we’re doing, which is bringing extra expertise into the labor market. Every thing that I talk via the journal and every part we speak about in any of our supplies, frankly, is as relevant to males. It is simply the messengers are the ladies, and that is simply by no means been seen earlier than.

Let’s discuss concerning the identify. Have you ever obtained any pushback for the title “Transfer Over Bob?”

I imply, in development, you’ve obtained to have an edge. You’ve obtained to have a humorousness. And if you do not have thick pores and skin, you are going to be in bother. So the selection between a extra edgy and provocative identify that you simply’re not going to overlook and can perk your ears up, I really feel like that is much more highly effective. 

That is an anthem. It is a motion. It is one thing that requires energy to say. “Transfer over Bob.” 

However we’ll at all times say, this isn’t in any respect about pushing males out. Once I ask girls, “How’d you get into development?” the primary reply, far and away is: “My dad.” Not one a part of our ethos is anti-man. It is the truth that every part is being constructed predominantly by one standpoint. We pose no menace to males by bringing extra girls into development.