General

Site accidents and fatalities. A mental health crisis in which the industry has a suicide rate almost four times the national average. A gender and racial imbalance that persists despite years of “awareness campaigns” and hollow promises. Cut-throat competition that forces contractors to underbid, underdeliver, and undervalue the very workers who make their businesses possible….Read moreRead more

Progress and innovation do not move in a straight line. They don’t travel neatly from point A to point B. They are not linear. In fact, it often appears that progress is random; leaping forward in one area while stagnating or even regressing in another. Humankind has evolved sufficiently to send men and women into…Read moreRead more

Deconstruct has been given the green light on the demolition of Grenfell Tower. The company is the right choice for many reasons. This article is for Demolition Insider subscribers only.

Evolution is not optional. You might choose to disembark from the progress train, but that train is going to continue its journey, with or without you. Now, admittedly, I am not the best person to deliver this not-very-surprising news. The most-listened-to album on my iPhone was released 43 years ago. I firmly believe that men…Read moreRead more

Ever since I returned to the Substack platform as a home for my long-form writing, I’ve found myself increasingly drawn to the subject of US politics: not just as a spectator; but as a student of dysfunction. It’s not the drama or the spectacle that grabs my attention. It’s the patterns. The eerie, creeping sense…Read moreRead more

She was fifteen when she said it aloud for the first time. It wasn’t a joke, or a dare, or a moment of adolescent rebellion. It was just a simple truth: “I want to work in demolition.” Her classmates froze. Then came the laughter. A ripple at first. Then full-throated howls. Like she’d announced plans…Read moreRead more

Bauma is a mountain. It is not an event you attend or a place you visit. It is a thing you conquer. Rising to the challenge of Bauma requires grit, resilience and endurance. But when you have scaled the peak, the view is amazing; the feeling is euphoric; and you will have memories that will…Read moreRead more

I’d like to tell you a story. It is a story that can trace its origins back to a Toyota factory in Toyota City, Japan in the 1950s. Our tale centres around an engineer named Taiichi Ohno, who is remembered as the man who shaped Toyota’s production system. Now, as in all factories, there was…Read moreRead more

When construction giant Carillion collapsed in 2018, it did so with debts of £2 billion owed to more than 30,000 suppliers. By the time that ISG folded in 2024, it had amassed debts of more than £1.1 billion. At the time of the collapse, it was about to post a pre-tax loss of £138 million….Read moreRead more