Canada is at a skills-training inflection point. Improved training outcomes and a more skilled workforce are essential to the success of Canada’s sweeping policy reset, especially given the shock of tariffs and other adverse U.S. economic policies, the structural disruption of artificial intelligence and longstanding weaknesses in productivity.

Yet, despite billions of dollars in public investment in training programs, across the economy weaknesses in workforce skills and shortages in key sectors are a drag on Canadian growth.

Nowhere is this more consequential than in the construction sector. Construction is a cornerstone of Canada’s fundamental policy shift, yet the industry faces major training issues. The capability to build Canada depends upon its ability to find, train and retain skilled workers.

Our paper examines that training challenge. It focuses on Ontario’s construction industry, where the problems are not a lack of training opportunities but inadequate engagement, uptake and completion rates. We use a behavioural science lens to assess Ontario’s issues in construction-skills training.

Why Canada’s nation-building moment demands a skills revolution Retraining workers will be essential for our net-zero goals

Why Canada’s nation-building moment demands a skills revolution

Retraining workers will be essential for our net-zero goals

A behavioural approach incorporates the cognitive, social and structural forces that shape how people actually decide and act. Its lens offers practical insights into how people’s training choices are shaped by limited time, attention and information. It helps explain barriers such as why strong intentions to enrol or persist in training often do not translate into action.

Adopting a behavioural lens in training policy means designing the system around how people notice, think and act. It is essential to address the range of training issues from the need to attract more new entrants and reduce apprenticeship dropouts to helping sustain careers in the trades.

Demand for skilled trades is growing

Workforce-skills shortages........

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