Sonny Maken, COO, Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC)

Invest: spoke with Sonny Maken, COO of Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC), about advocacy in a heavily regulated industry, construction workforce shortages, and how technology is changing training and safety. “We will be releasing ABC Labs in 2027, a virtual reality-based platform for training and safety that has the potential to impact apprenticeship education across the country,” Maken said.

How is ABC shaping policy and advocacy efforts to support contractors in an increasingly complex regulatory environment?

We have five people involved in government affairs- two full-time government affairs staffers within the organization and three contractors that we retain. Government affairs is a huge part of what we do because, as you know, construction is a heavily regulated industry.

Sometimes bad ideas come out of government, and you need government affairs professionals to remind them why those ideas are not feasible. I think ABC-FEC does that better than anyone else. We help pass what we call pro-merit shop policy because we are in the business of freedom, meaning companies, agencies, and the government should be able to choose whoever they want for their construction projects.

So when bad policies come up, we advocate for good policies. ABC-FEC has been around for 58 years, and we have a great track record of success in reversing government policies that don’t make sense. One of the things we are most known for is how effective our political advocacy is at all levels of government, whether local, county, state, or federal.

How is ABC evolving its approach to address the skilled labor shortage in construction?

ABC Institute, our education affiliate, plays a critical role in addressing the construction industry’s ongoing workforce challenges. Nationally, according to data from ABC National, the industry faces a shortage of approximately 479,000 workers, and in addition, construction is seeing a major demographic shift with more people retiring from the trades rather than entering the field. 

As the largest apprenticeship provider in the state, we are extremely focused not just on upskilling workers, but also on bringing new workers into the workforce. One of the things that I am most excited about is that we have an agreement with a tech company out of Salt Lake City, Utah, where they are developing a virtual reality version of our training labs (called ABC Labs) that we teach in the different trades.

When I talk about labs, I mean the hands-on part of the classroom where they are actually working on electrical panels, HVAC units, pipes—whatever trade they are learning. Because of the amount of space it takes up and the cost associated with that, labs are difficult to scale. Labs are also not required by Florida law for apprenticeship, but we view them as a critical component to delivering a quality education. It is a critical component of retention, and it is a critical component of bringing in younger people.

Cost, scale, and the real estate labs take up make them inefficient. So we will be releasing ABC Labs sometime in 2027 to function on virtual reality glasses. We will be starting with our electrical program and then going into the other trades to scale up a virtual reality-based platform for training, including safety training, and plan to offer it to apprenticeship providers, education providers, and vocational schools all around the country. I am extremely excited about the rollout of this product and its potential impact on the entire apprenticeship education industry.

What new strategies and technologies are you introducing to improve safety outcomes across member companies?

A lot is happening in safety training. We are seeing advancements in autonomous vehicles, robotics, drones, and camera technology, all of which are being integrated into virtual safety training environments. That is one of the things that I am excited about with ABC Labs, where we are literally immersing students in a simulated job environment. This allows new hires to complete required safety training on their glasses, as opposed to having to go to a job site and having to listen to a person talk.

Safety is a huge part of ABC’s culture and longstanding history. It is something we continue to prioritize and even have a full-time safety director. We offer safety services to our members and have been at the forefront of melding safety with technology. 

I think our members are excited about that because it helps communicate the actual value of what it is you are trying to teach in a tangible way. It delivers scale in a way that in-person safety training simply cannot deliver and also allows for modification of the instruction quickly as new issues and challenges pop up. Technology and safety are intermingled, and they will be a part of what we do for a long, long time.

What tools or services are proving most impactful for contractors in today’s competitive market?

One of the ways we help members win work is through access to bid opportunities. When a public agency needs bids, they send that information to us, and then we share these opportunities directly with our members. In 2025 alone, we distributed $42 million in bid opportunities to our members, mainly in public works.

The second way we help is that our members love doing business with each other. There is an inherent understanding that because you are a member of ABC, you are operating at a high level. You subscribe to ABC’s mission to deliver work ethically, profitably, and safely, which indicates a level of sophistication and professionalism to other members. 

We host 70 to 90 in-person events a year, complemented by webinars and virtual programming. We encourage a great deal of relationship-building from member to member, and we do a phenomenal job of bringing opportunities to our members.

How do you communicate and defend the merit shop philosophy in today’s labor and political landscape?

I will give you an example of what the opposite looks like, especially on public and government projects. Agencies may issue bids with requirements to hire only local labor, or, on federal projects, mandate project labor agreements, which effectively require union labor. In a smaller market, there may not be enough union plumbers, union electricians, or other union workers who qualify under those terms. As a result, the cost of the entire project is driven up. It is inherently an inefficient model for building construction projects at market cost, at market speed, and safely.

Hiring local workers sounds like a great idea, but it requires a level of understanding of the market and sophistication to realize that what really builds the best projects on time and at the best cost is freedom. Freedom to hire the best people at a salary you can negotiate and having them come in and build your airport or your project.

In a market like Florida, it is a little easier because of the size and depth of the workforce. But in smaller markets, governments end up overpaying because of these regulations. I think one of the things ABC-FEC does well is communicate this message to policymakers and lawmakers. If you want to do what is best for your local market and your people, let freedom take over, because there is no substitute for the efficiency that freedom creates.

How does ABC’s ecosystem create advantages that individual firms would not have on their own?

People like doing business with people they like. If you are efficient, effective, and do good work, and you are a member of ABC, you will meet other members who are like you, who do great work, who are efficient, and who are effective.

You build relationships, and relationships are a driving force of business success. We create that opportunity for those relationships to be created. That is why we have been so successful. We have been in business for 58 years not by chance, but because we are consistently delivering value to our members.