As a mental health clinician in Northern California, I often visited children in their schools.
We often dealt with some tough stuff, but we had a lot of fun, too. One of my favorite memories of the classroom is when the kids held a fundraiser where they sold bracelets they had made. One had a tag that said, “Rainbows indicate magic.”
What a phrase! 🌈
It’s stuck with me ever since, and now every time something good happens at Alder, I think to myself, “Rainbows indicate magic.”
The irony of safety support work is that it’s incredibly dangerous. At Alder, we demand workers’ physical and emotional safety because everyone deserves their pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
On the daily, I see the difference it makes when companies create truly safe working environments for everyone (not just their office workers). For us, we see it when we instill trust, transparency, and provide an emotional safety net when things get intense for our escorts, flaggers, barricaders and RPRs.
We know the work we do is sometimes considered the lowest of the working class, yet we show up and do it anyway.
We know our jobs are dangerous, stressful and with little or no downtime, yet we stand tall with our flags at the ready.
We know that together as a team, we will find more rainbows. What does that mean for our team?
It means a steady paycheck for the first time in years.
A real meal on the table instead of food pantry staples.
Insurance which will improve health outcomes.
On top of connection with one another.
Our crews consistently go above and beyond without being asked.
To me, that’s pure magic.
The work we do may not be pretty like a rainbow, but it’s important not only to our team, but to the safety of multi-billion-dollar international airport construction projects as well. We’re going to be safe and happy, too, because that’s when the real magic starts to happen.