[INSPRATIONAL MUSIC STING] - Hi, everyone.

Steve Adubato.

We kick off the program with Greg Lalevee.

He's been with us many times.

He is the business manager of the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 825.

Good to see you, Greg.

- Good to see you too, Steve.

Thanks for having me back.

- You got it.

Let me disclose that I do leadership coaching for 825 and they're a long time underwriter of our programming.

So Greg, one of the things I've always been fascinated by in a lot of our offline conversations, which we'll talk about now, is the connection between the trades overall, operating engineers more specifically, and the higher ed community, to do what and what is this very significant accomplishment with some of your members that have just gone through a terrific apprenticeship program?

- Sure, well for operating engineers, technology is in our world and growing.

Our members operate heavy construction equipment.

We also repair it.

And when you look at what's out there, cranes have sophisticated computers on them now.

The earthmoving equipment has GPS control and equipment on it and it demands a higher level of education.

Somebody has to program the machine.

Our members know full well how to operate it.

So a better level of education we believe is going to be the operating engineer of the future.

- So 22 members of your local just completed an apprenticeship program.

They got Associate degrees?

- They got an Associate's degree in Technical Studies.

- From Hudson County Community College.

What does that do for them in their careers?

- It brings their level up.

So they did some of the traditional classes of English, math, speech, which is going to just make them a better communicator on a job site or with their employers.

Then they did some of the technical sciences that go into what it is we do.

Physics is a big part of what we do.

So it's going to make them better employers, or employees to their employers, a more rounded individual and we think an employee who companies will want to put into their team on a permanent basis.

- Greg, you and I have been talking for years about leadership development.

You're a student of leadership, I'm a student of leadership, which is why we're doing the, in a lot of ways, the coaching we're doing at 825.

But what's interesting to me is when I first met you and we first started talking about your connection to the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 825.

It's personal and it's family for you.

Talk about that.

- Sure.

- As we talk about the future, talk about the past.

- Well, my father was an operating engineer.

So when we talk about advances in technology, very personal.

My father had a steam license because machinery in his early days were steam-operated.

And then came the internal combustion engine, gas and diesel, hydraulics moving the machine around rather than cables.

So we went through that evolution.

That was more or less his evolution.

Most of my career, I got to live in that world.

And now we see a changing world with the technology coming on board.

And just like my father's generation had to transition and master the new equipment, we have to, in this day and age, transition and master what the equipment is becoming.

- Greg, AI, artificial intelligence.

Does it scare you, make you excited about the future?

Or are you agnostic?

Or can't you be?

Four part question.

You can't ignore it, right?

- You cannot ignore it, absolutely not.

- What the heck do you think, oh it's gonna take our jobs, it's gonna take the job.

Talk about what you believe is real and what is people's fear that is unfounded.

- Sure, well, in each and every Industrial Revolution, we've seen the workforce get scared that technology is going to take their jobs.

I just finished a book called the "Blood in the Machine" that talks, speaks to mid-19th century England, how the machines that did textiles became automated on the back of steam engines being invented.

A lot of unrest.

Workers broke into factories, destroyed machines.

Same kind of unrest happened in the Industrial Revolution here in the United States with assembly lines.

So people are going to naturally be nervous.

But in each one of those transitions, there was still work to be done and workers needed to do it.

It's a matter of how do you adapt, how do you overcome whatever the change is, and plug into it and move on.

And that's what we're trying to do here with our training.

- Let me push back a little bit.

So one of the other themes in the coaching that I've done, and you and I have talked about this before, is change is inevitable, it's the only constant.

But the resistance to change is very natural on a part of a lot of us.

And Greg, look, we're doing this.

Greg, when we first started talking to you, it was in person.

- Yeah.

- We're doing it this way.

And again, there's a hybrid.

People are doing it.

And some of our stuff's on location, most of it's this way.

Long-winded way of getting to this, to what degree do you find most of your members going along with, accepting and embracing these changes, versus those who are like, Greg, I just want it to be the way it was.

- Well, I think the majority wishes it was, you know, the old way.

However, I also believe the majority acknowledges the changes.

And we've done a lot to try to educate them.

You look, there's YouTube videos out there that shows autonomous equipment.

We've played that at Union meetings.

This is not fake.

- Whoa, whoa, autonomous equipment, what, what?

- So equipment that has no operator in it.

It's run either remotely away, just like drones.

We see our military operate drones from a distance.

Heavy equipment's going the same way.

And we've brought these videos to our Union meetings.

We've educated our members that this is the future.

Whether or not we pick that future or try to deny it, is immaterial, it's here.

There were some autonomous equipment deployed on a job site in California operated by our brother and sister operating engineers out there.

So there is a way to do this, there's a way to educate yourself.

There's a knowledge base that you need and a knowledge base that's valuable to an employer who might deploy this equipment.

- So you're doing what you're doing at Hudson County Community College.

To what degree are you able to, planning to take this initiative with higher ed and move it to other community colleges, vo-tech schools?

Talk about that.

Got about a minute and a half left.

- Sure, I mean, we're looking for partners everywhere.

The community colleges have programs in construction management, so there's a lot of good classes in there that would fit our members.

So every day, we're talking about partnerships.

And then to your point, to go back and look at the vo-techs.

Two of New Jersey's vo-techs have heavy equipment programs.

One of the vo-techs in our area, our part of New York State where we exist, has a heavy equipment program.

So there's partnerships to be made to capture these kids when they're young, they're teenagers, who wanna do this and incubate them and bring them right through.

They'll be right in with the technology.

They're all gamers, they all enjoy this.

They're all bred on simulators.

So it's just going to be a natural fit to move people through.

And that's going to be the operating engineer of the future.

- Greg Lalevee, business manager of the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 825.

Greg, as always, thank you for joining us.

Incredibly important topic and people need to understand the trades better than they do and also what the future holds.

Thank, Greg.

Thanks Greg, talk soon.

- Thanks Steve, I appreciate it.

- You got it.

Stay with us, we'll be right back.

- [Narrator] State of Affairs with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Celebrating 30 years in public broadcasting.

Funding has been provided by RWJBarnabas Health.

Let’s be healthy together.

PSE&G, Valley Bank.

The Turrell Fund, a foundation serving children.

The New Jersey Economic Development Authority.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

The Adler Aphasia Center.

NJ Best, New Jersey’s five-two-nine college savings plan.

And by The Fidelco Group.

Promotional support provided by Meadowlands Chamber.

And by New Jersey Monthly.

- (Narrator) Since 1903, PSEG has worked to keep our commitment to customers and communities, to keep your lights on and homes warm.

We’re there when challenges strike like storms or economic uncertainty.

We're preparing for tomorrow by working to replace aging infrastructure, provide carbon free nuclear energy, and deliver energy efficient options to customers.

PSEG, powering progress.