Back Where She Belongs

When Daynah Florence began Construction Ready’s Pre-Apprenticeship training in the spring of 2024, she was entering a familiar environment. Just two years prior to that, she, along with her fiancé, had owned a residential and commercial framing business herself.

“He had been doing the labor part of construction for years, and I was more savvy with reading plans, and organizing, and getting bids and things like that,” Daynah explains. “So we ended up starting a company.”

But when her life and business partner unexpectedly passed away, Daynah needed a break from the world of tools and contracts. Still, she says construction remained “on my radar.” When she discovered Construction Ready while exploring career options through WorkSource DeKalb, it was just the spark she needed to get back into the industry.

“I always had a passion for construction,” Daynah says. “Losing my fiancé kind of took me away from that passion, but [eventually] I wanted to get back into this field, and it was just a question of how to do it. When Construction Ready came across my path, I thought it was pretty cool, because it offered a whole lot of different certifications, and the course wasn’t that long.”

Daynah enrolled in the program at Westside Works, where she was a member of the 45th class to train at that location. The longtime partnership between Construction Ready and Westside Works has helped hundreds of Atlantans become trained, credentialed and ready to work.

“Westside Works helped with a stipend, Marta cards, a gas card – all of that definitely was useful,” Daynah says. “All the advisors there were helpful, too.”

Then there’s the Construction Ready Hiring Fair, which concludes the four-week training regimen. It’s a two-way process in which company personnel and graduates get to know one another to find the best fit for both parties. For Daynah, that turned out to be Hogan Construction Group.

“It was a chance to meet them so they could see who I am and I could see who they are,” Daynah says. “I liked the companies I met with. When we got to the interview, I met Miss Amy Sue Mann [Hogan Construction Recruiter] and the conversation was open and she just seemed relatable. It wasn’t just her interviewing me; I had a lot of questions, too, and she made me feel comfortable.”

Daynah started work as an Office Engineer and was assigned to work on a former grocery store site that was being converted into the new state-of-the-art Gwinnett County Record Management and Emergency Services Facility. When her senior project manager left for another job, she was given more responsibility and began working alongside a company Vice-President, Adam Killen.

“Being able to have insight from the VP and other people in management is awesome,” Daynah says. “He comes to my project’s owner meeting, so while we’re there, I might learn something I never learned before, like budgeting, working with owners, negotiating, different problems that come up with permits and inspections. I learn something new every time. It’s really nice to have that opportunity to learn so much.

“I was more used to just working in one particular scope, which is framing,” she adds. “[Hogan] is a general contractor, so we deal with everything. It’s a chance to grow and find my place.”

Like many of her fellow Pre-Apprenticeship graduates, Daynah endorses the training and happily recommends other potential students to it.

“I send Construction Ready’s information to them, because they literally have all the resources that people need to be successful,” she says. “The position and situation that I’m in right now is because of Construction Ready. [Getting back into construction] was on my mind, but until you act on it, it’s not really getting anywhere. So once I went there and graduated, it kind of pushed me to do what I had been putting off for so long. It really helped me in a lot of ways.”