AUBURN — Alan Hahnel has 140 employees at Hahnel Bros. and if he could hire 15 to 20 more tomorrow for his roofing company, he would.

It’s just not that easy.

Not too long ago, he hired a man who passed the employment physical and then sat through safety training.

“The first day on the job, he’s climbing the 25-foot ladder to the roof, halfway up, he freezes,” Hahnel said. “Why does he freeze? Afraid of heights. We never asked. It’s a challenge and we all have it.”

Hahnel spoke Thursday night at the Lewiston Auburn Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce’s monthly breakfast, held at dinnertime at Martindale Country Club. His talk kicked off the chamber’s new series, “Working the Workforce,” on challenges and solutions to finding employees.

The challenges are many, said Hahnel, president of the 102-year-old company founded by his grandfather and his grandfather’s younger brother.

They started as a skylight and roofing company and it’s since diversified into siding, heating and air system work, and custom stainless steel projects with offices in Lewiston and Bangor.

When Hahnel asked how many people in the room were hiring, many hands shot up.

He’s after people who are punctual. Reliable. Team players. Strong enough for manual labor. Intelligent. Drug-free.

“Inebriation, impairment and gravity do not mix,” Hahnel said.

With a fleet of 80 vehicles, he’d also like them to have a driver’s license, a harder ask than one might think, he said. “It’s unbelievable. I have crews of six people and there’s only one with a driver’s license. It’s shocking.”

His turnover is about 30 percent, or 40 people, per year.

“We’re cycling through way too many people,” Hahnel said. “We’ve taught many people what they don’t want to do the rest of their lives.”

With the unemployment rate so low, temp agencies aren’t the source for labor they used to be. Hahnel has raised his hiring referral bonus from $50 to $200.

Talking to a local bank official, “theirs is $500 and it’s still not working,” he said.

Companies need to offer more vacation, better benefits, he said. “You’ve got to draw them in. Money, money, money.”

They also have to be willing to try something new, Hahnel said.

When his vice president, John Ferland, suggested the company get involved with the Lewiston Construction Training Program, a pilot partnership with several local agencies teaching construction skills to new Mainers, he was skeptical.

He’d heard disparaging stories about people hiring immigrants. Then, he saw the class of five men in action and hired four of them, people from Yemen, Kenya, Angola and Djibouti.

A year later, they still work for him.

“You can’t arbitrarily discount a large group of people,” he said. “They’re good employees. They’re reliable, they’re punctual. They work hard, they understand. They’re learning. They’re everything we want. They’re not special, they’re not super-sized, but they’re working every day.”

That program is teaching its third class and has expanded beyond new Mainers. Hahnel has his eye on members of the class.

“I suspect you’re going to want one of these guys and you can’t have them. They’re mine,” Hahnel said, laughing. “Tim Hebert stole the entire second cohort and I’m still ticked off about that.”

Chamber President Beckie Conrad said thinking differently about hiring and being willing to try new approaches starts at the top in organizations.

“There are people in our community who want to work and we want them to work in our community,” she said.

kskelton@sunjournal.com

Alan Hahnel, president of Hahnel Bros. Co. in Lewiston. (Kathryn Skelton/Sun Journal)

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