| Henry Carlson Company: Putting People First |
| Construction | |||
| Written by Mike Sharkey | |||
| Friday, 29 February 2008 | |||
 Henry Carlson, Jr. describes how this commercial contractor became the oldest and largest in South Dakota.
 Henry Carlson, Jr. “By sticking by our people, training and educating them, that’s how we’ll continue to be on top,” Carlson, Jr. said. “We want to be the company that craftsmen want to work for.” Landmark maker Under the leadership of Carlson, Sr., Henry Carlson Company constructed a number of buildings that are now recognized as South Dakota landmarks. Columbus College, which later became part of the Veteran’s Administra-tion Hospital, the historic Alex Johnson Hotel in Rapid City, the State Capitol Annex in Pierre, Sioux Valley Hospital in Sioux Falls, and Washington High School (now the Washington Pavilion) in Sioux Falls are just a handful of the company’s achievements. Like his father, Carlson, Jr. began his career in the construction industry as a laborer. He learned the family business from the ground up, and when his father passed in 1961, Carlson, Jr. was ready to take over the company. The new president quickly demonstrated his father’s employees-first mantra would live on. In 1964, Carlson, Jr. instituted one of the first profit sharing plans in the construction industry—a plan that lives on today through the Associated General Contractors of America. The company continued to grow and prosper, and like his father, Carlson, Jr. would oversee the construction of landmarks such as the Sioux Falls Arena, the Airport Terminal building, and the National Bank of South Dakota. But it wasn’t until 1981 that business truly began to boom. That’s when financial services juggernaut Citibank chartered a South Dakota subsidiary to take advantage of new laws that raised the state’s maximum permissible interest rate on loans to 25%—the highest in the nation. As the big fish in a little pond, Henry Carlson Company became the builder on a number of Citibank’s facilities, making it the company of choice for the wave of financial services providers that would rapidly follow Citibank to South Dakota. “When Citibank came to town, it changed the state’s economy from agriculture to banking,” said Carlson, Jr., who now serves as chairman of the board. “And our business has been booming ever since.” Safety excellence As Henry Carlson Company grew, it remained firmly grounded by the employee-centric roots planted by its founder and nourished by his son. Employee safety, training, and education programs were all enhanced as the company began to boom. The company hired a full time safety director, created training and certification programs for its employees as well as its subcontractors, and enacted a strict but fair drug-testing program. “Anyone that fails a drug test, we give them the opportunity to go through treatment,” Carlson, Jr. said. “One of our best superintendents had an alcohol problem. We sent him through treatment, he came back clean and sober, and today he’s running a $12 million project. We believe in giving our employees a second chance.” As a result of its employee training, safety, and education efforts, Henry Carlson Company has compiled a stellar record and been recognized by numerous organizations for its achievements. Most notably, the Associated General Contractors of America recently recognized the company with a Con-struction Safety Excellence Award. Winning a Construction Safety Excellence Award is no easy task. The award program requires finalists to achieve zero worksite fatalities and zero multi-catastrophic injuries. It also examines the contractor’s safety program for evidence of management commitment, active employee participation, safety training, worksite hazard identification and control, and safety program innovation. Further, finalists are required to present their safety program to an independent panel of judges representing organizations like OSHA and the Army Corps of Engineers. All the difference Like his grandfather and his father, Henry “Chip” Carlson, III began his career in the construction industry at the bottom and earned his way to the top of the family business. After earning a degree in construction management from the University of Louisiana at Monroe in 1982, he became a vice president, and in 2006, his father named him president of the Henry Carlson Company. Just as Carlson Jr. enhanced his father’s employee-centered philosophy with an innovative profit sharing program, Carlson, III quickly built on the family legacy by constructing a new headquarters for the company, complete with a state-of-the-art employee training facility. The 14,000-square-foot, $1.5 million building, which Henry Carlson built from the ground up, features a 30-person classroom space the company plans to use for the training and education of its employees as well as its subcontractors. “Things are a lot different now then when I started out in this business,” Carlson, Jr. said. “But the most important thing is still to have the right people working for you. We stick by our people, train them and educate them, and that’s made all the difference. And it will continue to make all the difference in the future.” |
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American Executive is a RedCoat Publishing publication.
American Executive is a RedCoat Publishing publication.
