Livewire V4 2013 by IB Abel

2014 || VOLUME 4 || NUMBER 1

SUPPORTING SPRINT 4G LTE Rollout

THE IB ABEL COMPANY NEWSLETTER

WWW.IB-ABEL.COM | (717) 845-1639

UPDATES

Parking and Recreation A new lot will give visitors and employees a better place to park their cars.

arking has long been a problem at IB Abel headquarters, and with the company’s growth, employees and clients alike were having difficulty finding spaces on the street. “There are times when the only parking is three blocks away, on a street with no sidewalks,” says Chris Linebaugh, IB Abel’s corporate secretary. As many as 60 people now work in the IB Abel offices every day, and when field employees come in on Monday mornings to drop off paperwork, it can add as many as 50 trucks to the jam. Worse, snow removal and street sweeping can instantly cut the available street parking in half. “I have to leave my house at 6:10 a.m. to get a spot,” says Heather Glatfelter, assistant project manager in IB Abel’s Communication Division. The company had offered to buy a vacant piece of land across from its Edgar Street entrance on several occasions

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since 1988, but the City of York received the land in a will and couldn’t sell it. “We started out trying to establish a loading zone,” says Rick Fink, project development manager for Kinsley Properties, which manages the building. “People had no place to park except on the street. Then a daycare opened on the next block, and the problem got even worse.” In 2013, IB Abel and Kinsley struck an agreement with the City of York that will alleviate the problem by providing 42 parking spaces, including designated handicapped and visitor spots, for IB Abel’s use during the day, while also offering patrons of the adjacent city park a place to park their cars. IB Abel and Kinsley are building the lot, and the city will lease it back to IB Abel for weekday use. “It’s a nice partnership between us and the city,” says Patrick A. Kinsley, president of IB Abel. “We’ll be taking 40 parked cars off the street.” IB Abel’s engineer, LSC Design, incorporated state-of-the-art lighting, a

stormwater-filtration system and new trees to help the lot look like a natural extension of the park. “They designed it to follow the landscape of the park, and made adjustments to make it fit in better.” Instead of off-the-shelf high-intensity discharge (HID) lighting, IB Abel installed energy-efficient LED lamps, which cost more initially, but will pay for themselves by delivering significant savings on energy costs. “It’s a three-year timetable for return on investment,” says Don Jackson, IB Abel’s manager of electrical design. “HID lamps are only good for 24,000 hours, and LEDs should last 60,000 hours. That’s very good on the maintenance side.” Park usage peaks during evenings and on weekends, making the lot a community asset seven days a week. “It’s a high-use facility,” says Jim Gross, director of public works for the City of York. “It gives people a place for parking after-hours, and a trail comes right to the parking lot. It’s a great win-win for everybody.” •

SAFETY

CONTENTS

UPDATES Parking and recreation

SAFETY Human performance essentials

SAFETY SPOTLIGHT Effective safety strategies

DIVISION UPDATES • Communication • Electrical • Utility Services

SPOTLIGHT IB Abel employees with 25 years’ tenure or more

WELLNESS Stress-Fighting foods can calm you down. Get back to basics with the WellSpan EAP

Human Performance Essentials By Ed Milukas, Safety & Quality Coordinator

CUSTOMER FEEDBACK What our customers are saying

IB ABEL INC. 620 Edgar Street York, PA 17403 (717) 845-1639 www.ib-abel.com LiveWire is published in partnership with: The YGS Group 3650 West Market Street York, PA 17404 (717) 505-9701 www.theYGSgroup.com EDITORIAL Editor Kayla Resh VP, Editorial Services Kelly Crane Winkler Managing Editor Lori Racey Senior Writer Ian P. Murphy Editorial Coordinator Ashley Reid DESIGN VP, Marketing Services Jack Davidson Creative Director Jen Soucy Senior Art Director Mike Vucic Account Director Tina Enck

Last year, we concentrated on learning, understanding and utilizing three Human Performance Tools: Effective Communication, a Questioning Attitude, and Situational Awareness. This issue, we review those tools so that readers can engage in a discussion of recent situations in which using them helped prevent an incident.

Effective Communication: The goal of effective communication is to reach a mutual understanding between two or more people, especially when relating technical information related to facility operation or personnel safety. Effective communication is likely the most important strategy in preventing errors and events. Verbal communication carries a greater risk of misunderstanding compared to written forms of communication. Misunderstandings are likely to occur when the individuals involved have different mental models of the current work situation or use terms that could be confusing. Therefore, individuals must confirm verbal exchanges of operational

information to ensure understanding and the reliability of the communication. Use a Three-Way Communication Overview during face-to-face meetings, telephone conversations, or when using two-way radios to communicate changes to equipment, make personnel assignments, and provide direction to others. This requires three verbal exchanges between the sender and receiver to promote the reliable transfer of information and ensure understanding. The person originating the communication is the sender, and is responsible for verifying that the receiver understands the message as intended, and the receiver makes sure he or she understands what the sender is saying.

2014 || Volume 4 || Number 1

SAFETY

First, the sender gets the attention of the receiver and clearly states the message. Second, the receiver repeats the message back in a paraphrased form, helping the sender know if the receiver understands the message properly. During this exchange, the receiver restates equipment-related information exactly as spoken by the sender; if the receiver does not understand the message, he or she should ask for clarification, confirmation, or repetition of the message. Third, the sender informs the receiver whether the message is properly understood, or corrects the receiver and restates the message. A Questioning Attitude: Are we there yet? Why is the sky blue? Why is rain wet? Children ask an endless list of questions as they discover the world around them. But as we grow older, most people tend to ask fewer questions. This may be due, in part, to the fact that we start to make assumptions about many of the things around us based on what we have already learned or observed. Or perhaps we ask fewer questions because at some point, someone made us feel ashamed that we didn’t know the answer or made it clear that they had more important things to do than respond to our questions. Redeveloping the questioning attitude we had naturally as children is critical to our safety culture. The policy statement describes the questioning attitude as a part of a culture in which “individuals avoid complacency and continuously challenge existing conditions and activities in order to identify discrepancies that might result in error or inappropriate action.” A questioning attitude helps prevent “groupthink” by encouraging diversity of thought and intellectual curiosity. It challenges the entire organization to get clarification when something comes up that doesn’t seem right. Examples include situations as simple as walking by a broken door day after

LiveWire • IB-Abel.com

Situational awareness can be applied at worksites to avoid mishaps.

day without stopping and questioning why it remains broken, or skipping over a confusing step in a procedure you use every day rather than getting clarification and following the procedure as intended. It might be ignoring an alarm, since nuisance alarms go off all the time and rarely indicate an actual emergency. Or it could be more complicated, such as not questioning a rigging calculation aloud because a more senior employee performed it. A positive safety culture requires a collective commitment by leaders and

employees to emphasize safety over competing goals. A questioning attitude supports that commitment. Situational Awareness: The concept of situational awareness is not a new one. It has been recognized by military organizations for years, especially the U.S. Air Force. Its application has expanded over time to include other fields of work such as civil aviation and nuclear power plants, which require complex decision-making processes to help them mitigate serious

SAFETY

consequences created by their operation. A widely accepted definition of situational awareness is “the perception of elements in the environment within a volume of time and space, the comprehension of their meaning, and the projection of their status in the near future.” The situational awareness model asks a person or group to assess and be aware of the relevant factors in their current environment, consider any implications of these factors, and foresee future consequences. Obviously, situational awareness can be applied broadly even on work sites to help workers function properly within a specific environment. From a health and safety perspective, situational awareness means being aware of the surrounding conditions in your immediate area, and recognizing and dealing with unsafe work conditions before they become an issue. It can be more accurately described as a hazardous work condition assessment. In addition to identifying job hazards based on the last time the work was performed, situational awareness requires people to conduct a visual assessment of actual working conditions in the workplace before any new work begins in order to identify potential deviations from approved workplace standards. Looking back on past incident or accident investigations likely will confirm that hazards could have been identified and problems prevented before work began, if the work plan had incorporated situational awareness. A lack of situational awareness might lead to problems such as ignoring ice hanging dangerously from a building, poorly secured materials on a roof that could become airborne during a windstorm, or tools left in a position where they could easily fall if disturbed. Also remember to always conduct a Stop/Time Out when you face any uncertainty, and proceed only when you receive sound, factual information. Never proceed on an assumption. •

Safety Spotlight IB Abel leaders weigh in on what makes an effective safety strategy. Project Executive Thomas Tacconelli says that safety and quality must be considered from a global project-management perspective, ahead of scheduling pressures. “You have to keep in perspective how much you can compress your schedule without compromising the safety of the project,” he says. “Of course, there is always a deadline, and we certainly intend to meet our milestones, but if it means someone could get hurt, we won’t do it.” He advises leaders to be upfront about safety concerns and support employees in their efforts to follow safe practices continuously. “Safety comes first—it’s safety, then quality, then productivity,” he says. “We don’t just turn safety on when we get to work. We constantly practice what we preach and have our employees’ backs.” Project Manager and Estimator Thomas C. Miller says that safety is the most important part of any job from the outset. “Safety has to start in the planning stages, and employees must understand it at the commencement of the work,” he says. Leaders must demonstrate the importance of safety by doing the right thing every time, he adds, and avoid taking shortcuts. “You have to convey that safety is the end goal,” he stresses. “Communicate your expectations throughout the project, and make safety and quality a team effort. I talk to my employees and say, ‘Here’s the project, here are the safety concerns, and here are my expectations of what you will do to keep yourself and your employees safe.’” Project Manager and Estimator Lou Mulato attends monthly divisional safety meetings and assesses projects to see what crews need to perform their jobs in a safe and effective manner. Once IB Abel wins a bid, Mulato performs a walk-through with the foreman and a representative of the Safety & Quality team to identify any safety concerns. “Once a project is underway, I do weekly management safety inspections [and] assist the foreman and crew to make sure they have the proper PPE and other equipment to perform their jobs in a safe and efficient manner,” he says. “My strategy for ensuring safety and quality is to use human performance tools, with S.T.A.R. (Stop/Think/Act/Review) being one of the most important [strategies] to meet and achieve our goals.” “No two factors directly affect a company’s or professional’s reputation more than safety and quality,” says Daniel Stremmel, a foreman in IB Abel’s Communication Division. “It is my responsibility to first, ensure that all crew members understand what the safety and quality expectations are, and second, emphasize the importance of not becoming complacent and settling for ‘good enough.’” Leading by example, Stremmel adds, helps get people to take safety and quality seriously. “Working for a shop that not only preaches safety but backs it up with the necessary field support gives crews the confidence to request what they need to do their jobs safely,” he says. “This, in turn, increases morale, promotes professionalism, and produces quality workmanship.” •

2014 || Volume 4 || Number 1

COMMUNICATION

Supporting

SPRINT

4G LTE Rollout

ith the explosive growth in mobile usage, wireless carriers are scrambling to provide the fastest and best coverage—and to have it ahead of the competition. Current 3G networks no longer have the capacity to support the sheer volume of apps running on them or the trillions of terabytes of information transferred across them every second. And while that’s a challenge for the carriers, it’s great news for IB Abel. The company recently teamed with Young Kinsley Technology Group, LLC (YKTG), to pursue construction opportunities in telecommunications, and is now helping execute a major project for Sprint/ Alcatel Lucent. While IB Abel has provided

LiveWire • IB-Abel.com

There’s a tremendous need in the wireless industry to work with companies that are well-capitalized. – Andrew Woods, Young Kinsley Technology Group

similar services in the past, long-term evolution (LTE) projects like this one are set to take the company to the forefront of wireless technology. “There’s a tremendous need in the [wireless] industry to work with companies that are well-capitalized, and this opportunity came up through a previous relationship we had with Sprint,” says Andrew Woods,

executive vice president of YKTG. “[IB Abel crews] were already doing tower work in the industry; it made them a natural partner for us to work with.” Scheduling is tight, since Sprint is racing other carriers to offer the latest 4G technology. “It’s probably one of the most important things Sprint has going on right now,” says Jim Trebilcock, vice president

COMMUNICATION

Speed to market is what grabs market share for all the wireless carriers. – Andrew Woods

of IB Abel’s Communication Division. Young Kinsley’s Woods confirms this: “Speed to market is what grabs market share for all the wireless carriers.” The three-phase project includes installation of new antennas, control cabinets, cabling, and more at area cellular sites; decommissioning of outdated equipment; and deployment of 4G technology in a new spectrum. “The most challenging aspect of the project is meeting Alcatel Lucent’s requirements for closeout documentation,” says Cochise Keefer, tower climber foreman for IB Abel. “And for the most part, we’ve been very successful.” Most of the work is performed at heights of 30 to 200 feet—a constant safety issue. “We make sure that our guys are extremely well-trained, not only in the basics of climbing, but also safety and rescue,” says Mike Chapman, IB Abel’s Safety & Quality coordinator. “We also have refresher courses so that safety doesn’t get pushed to the wayside.” Radio frequency (RF) signals are also a concern, he adds, “since they can cook you from the inside out. We take every step we can to keep our guys safe, and not only during installation—we make things safe before they show up onsite. It helps them complete the job more efficiently.” Second only to safety is quality: “Out of all the partners and subcontractors we work with, IB Abel has the highest degree of quality,” Woods says. “They’re dedicated to getting the job right the first time.” •

IB Abel’s expertise in tower work helped secure the contract.

Crews worked at heights of up to 200 feet.

2014 || Volume 4 || Number 1

ELECTRICAL

The Lucknow Yard needed a complete renovation to handle increases in intermodal traffic.

An Intermodal Upgrade IB Abel helps Norfolk Southern improve its intermodal capabilities.

ntil about 20 years ago, there were almost as many ways to ship products as there were products shipped. Today, most products arrive at or near their final destinations in steel containers that transfer easily from ship to train to semitrailer, resulting in greater efficiencies in transportation and trade. And the ongoing boom in “intermodal” transport recently made it necessary for Norfolk Southern to upgrade its Lucknow Yard in Harrisburg, Pa., to meet demand.

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Working with general contractor Handwerk, IB Abel joined the project to help the railroad replace transformers, medium-voltage switches, and associated underground conduits, as well as install a new lighting and monitoring system. “It’s basically a total remodel to an existing intermodal yard,” says Project Manager Jeremy King. Despite having to work with the owner and its third-party engineer to overcome design challenges uncovered as the 15-month project progressed, IB Abel crews

ELECTRICAL

New, 100-foot mast lights feature heads that lower for easy maintenance.

The project includes a sophisticated railcar tracking system.

We made sure Norfolk Southern got a good end product that will be reliable for years to come. – Jeremy King, IB Abel

were able to maintain the project schedule. Crews had to cut deep ditches to install a 15KV system beneath existing utility lines including a four-foot gas main, ultimately laying more than 300,000 feet of cable with minimal disruption to rail service. “The guys did a nice job of using the tools they had and thinking outside the box,” King says. “The job just about doubled in size while we were doing it, so it took a lot of hands-on work with our engineering department assisting to get it back on course. But the hard work paid off.” IB Abel equipped the rail yard with 100foot mast lights with heads that lower for easy maintenance, additional site lighting, and a lighting control package. “We also

installed a sophisticated railcar tracking system which includes video monitoring, security, and software,” King adds. As always, safety was a chief concern. “We did daily huddles every morning where crews would discuss upcoming tasks. Any accident on a railroad is a serious one—there are no splinters,” says King. “We worked 18,000 man-hours safely [and] made sure Norfolk Southern got a good end product that will be reliable for years to come.” “We take good care of Norfolk Southern,” adds Harold King, IB Abel’s general foreman. “After we turned [the Lucknow Yard] over to them, they were at capacity within three weeks’ time.” •

IB Abel replaced the yard’s transformers and switches.

2014 || Volume 4 || Number 1

UTILITY SERVICES

Contractor of Choice: A Solid Foundation for Growth As a contractor of choice, IB Abel provides PPL with equipment and warehousing.

our years ago, IB Abel entered into an arrangement with PPL Electric Utilities that’s paying off for both companies. The regional utility named IB Abel a contractor of choice (COC), meaning IB Abel can count on a relatively steady workflow from PPL, at predetermined rates, without continually going through a bidding process. “COC allows IB Abel continuity of workload, which provides us with the opportunity to maintain and develop our workforce,” explains Robert L. Zillweger, IB Abel’s director of Safety & Quality. IB Abel won the COC contract for electric distribution and maintenance work in PPL’s Harrisburg, Lancaster, and Susquehanna regions in 2010, and in 2012 the agreement was expanded to include a fourth distribution region, Lehigh, as well as energized transmission work in the Lancaster and Susquehanna regions. IB Abel provides PPL with distribution and

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transmission services, materials handling, work management, warehousing, and more. ”While employee levels vary, on any given day, there are 125 IB Abel employees involved in the COC program,” says Willard R. Wolf, vice president of IB Abel’s Utility Services Division. “They keep us pretty busy,” agrees John Rhone, manager of Transmission Services for IB Abel. Everyone involved strives to make the relationship as transparent as possible, with an eye toward continuous process improvement. “PPL hears about failures, successes, incidents, and everything else pertinent to the job,” says Alan Mann, Jr. IB Abel’s operations manager of COC Distribution. To meet the company’s safety, quality, and productivity (SQP) goals, IB Abel’s Safety & Quality team is involved in every aspect of the COC program and all projects. The Safety & Quality team provides project and task training, coordination of preconstruction planning, project audits, incident

investigations, work method development, best practice collection, and specialized tool specification. “Following PPL’s lead, we implemented the Human Peformance program in 2010, teaching the workforce and managers to use these tools to be more safe and efficient,” Zillweger says. The Safety & Quality team also provides COC projects with PTAG coordinators— two of whom are retired PPL employees. “When working on power lines, permits are required to maintain authority over those lines. These permits require a tremendous amount of coordination and planning,” Zillweger says. “Until three years ago, we were not able to provide this service to the utility. We now can work more efficiently to serve the client while being more self-sufficient.” The COC arrangement helps the utility cover a large territory and cope with labor shortages. According to Mann, the primary advantage to IB Abel is that

UTILITY SERVICES

On any given day, there are 125 IB Abel employees involved in the COC program, and it’s a year-round commitment on both sides. – Willard R. Wolf, IB Abel

“It allows IB Abel to amass appropriate resources such as tools and equipment while helping to stabilize overhead, [giving] us the ability to maintain staff and expand our workforce.” Another benefit? IB Abel wins exposure to other potential customers when assigned to PPL’s mutual assistance work as a first responder in emergencies—for example, about 35 COC staffers spent the Christmas holiday in Michigan, helping out after an ice storm. “Along with other contractors, we will be assigned to respond on behalf of PPL and travel to wherever there is trouble,” Wolf says. The company also gets opportunities to bid on PPL projects that fall outside the boundaries of the COC program, many of which are small or emergency-related. “They come to us first,” says Tara L. Lackman, IB Abel construction specialist. “COC is our foundation.” That foundation will help IB Abel expand into new territories and projects. “The COC program reduces risk and cost on both sides,” Wolf says. “It gives us a stable base of work, so that we can compete on jobs with PPL and other utilities. It’s like a hub to a wheel, and other opportunities come from that hub. It’s a solid base for growth.” •

IB Abel performs much of PPL’s routine maintenance work in the territories covered by the COC agreement.

As part of PPL’s mutual assistance pledge to other utilities, IB Abel crews serve as first responders in emergency situations.

2014 || Volume 4 || Number 1

SPOTLIGHT

Employee

IB Abel’s success wouldn’t be possible without the many employees who have dedicated much of their careers to the company. The following are IB Abel employees who have now worked with the company for 25 years or more.

JIM BRENNEMEN started with IB Abel in 1984 following an IBEW apprenticeship, and now does “any job that takes a day or less” as a service electrician. He has also headed IB Abel’s infrared thermography department since 1997. “You can put a receptacle in, or a whole plant could be down, and you have to find out why,” he says. Brennemen appreciates the variety of tasks as well as the diversity of the IB Abel staff, and enjoys providing longtime customers such as M&T Bank with excellent service. He and his wife, Beverly, have two children and four grandchildren, and he enjoys hunting deer and turkey in his spare time.

Corporate Secretary MARY C. “CHRIS” LINEBAUGH worked at companies such as Hogg Construction before joining IB Abel in the early 1980s. “They wanted someone with computer experience,” she says. “But I believe that my experience in construction—more than my limited computer experience—won the job for me.” Nonetheless, Linebaugh helped IB Abel transition from handwritten ledgers and typed invoices to PCs. “It’s amazing—what once was done by hand is now done electronically and almost instantly, from design and drafting to estimating, purchasing, accounting, and more,” she says. Linebaugh has four children and six grandchildren, and enjoys inviting them over for Sunday dinners. “If you cook, they will come,” she says. Linebaugh is also an avid woodworker and theatergoer, and volunteers at a church thrift shop.

LiveWire • IB-Abel.com

SPOTLIGHT

WALT SHIPKOSKY had worked only one other job before entering an IBEW apprenticeship program and joining IB Abel in 1972. Since then, he has spent much of his career as a journeyman electrician with a single client, Glatfelter Paper in York, Pa. “I got sent there when I was a third-year apprentice to install a turbine generator,” he recalls. “They liked what we were doing and kept giving us more work. [Glatfelter] has its own electrical department, but they always make sure we have enough work and have at least couple of us here for emergencies.” Shipkosky and his wife, Gayle, have a daughter and two grandchildren, and when he isn’t at the mill, he hunts and works on classic cars such as his current project, a 1970 Triumph GT6. “In the not-too-distant future, I will probably retire,” Shipkosky says. “But there’s no question it’s been a good run. I’ve enjoyed it.”

THOMAS KNAUB, IB Abel’s general superintendent of operations and service in the Electrical Division, fell in love with electrical work in a 4-H class when he was eight years old. He completed a certification program in the late 1970s and became a journeyman with IB Abel in 1984, working with clients such as Caterpillar and York Steel. “I was here when IB Abel only had one pickup truck and now they have more than 300 vehicles in the fleet,” he recalls. In his free time, Knaub skis and runs a hobby farm with his wife, Jane, who “dabbles” in thoroughbred racing. “Some people golf; we have horses,” he says. They have a son and three grandchildren, and Knaub credits his long career to his second family at IB Abel. “You’re with your coworkers more than you’re with your family, so they become family,” he says. “You meet a lot of good people among your customers and contractors. It’s been a great, lifelong journey and experience for me.”

GREG MECKLEY worked on helicopters as an electrician with the U.S. Navy for four years before returning to civilian life when his first enlistment came up during the Iranian Revolution of 1979. He apprenticed with IBEW and joined IB Abel in 1988 (the year after he and his wife, Jill, had the first of their two children), where he was given a truck and asked to try his hand at service work. “It was a good fit, and I’ve done it ever since,” he says. He also works on old cars, and is now converting a 1934 Chevy into a hot rod; his daily driver is the car he bought new, a 1977 Chevy Nova. Meckley also hunts and fishes, and credits his long career to one thing: “the fact that I really like my job.”

Estimator SCOTT BOWMAN began a four-year apprenticeship with IB Abel in 1984 and worked as a field electrician before moving into project management in 2000 and discovering a knack for estimating. “We have a lot of great people in the field, and the resources IB Abel provides make my job easier,” he says. “The enjoyment is in working with the customers and the people at IB Abel. When I started, they had five guys in the office and 15 in the field—and it’s only getting better.” Bowman has been married to his wife, Lisa, for 22 years, and has coached his two daughters’ basketball and soccer teams for the last 12. “I really enjoyed it, but now that I don’t have any kids in sports, it’s nice not to coach six days a week. I’ve been spending a lot of time fixing things up around the house.”

2014 || Volume 4 || Number 1

WELLNESS

Stress-Fighting Foods Can Calm You Down

ot enough time in the day? Feeling overwhelmed at work? Home life less than relaxed? Regardless of the cause, we often turn to unhealthy goodies for comfort when we’re stressed—and contrary to what we believe, many of them ultimately make us feel worse. For instance, take the classic comfort of curling up with a bowl of ice cream. It’s a complete backfire. Why? After the initial sugar rush, the body’s insulin response kicks in, causing a blood-sugar drop that triggers the release of stress hormones. Soon, your nerves will feel more jangled than before you inhaled that pint of Chunky Monkey. And alcohol, of course, is a stimulant wolf in calm sheep’s clothing. However, true comfort foods do exist: • Berries. Eat them instead of M&Ms when the pressure’s on. Since the carbs in berries turn to sugar very slowly, eating them won’t result in a blood-sugar crash. The bonus: They’re a good source of vitamin C, which helps fight jumps in cortisol, a stress hormone.

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• Guacamole. If you’re craving something creamy, look no further. Avocados are loaded with B vitamins, which your body needs in order to maintain the health of nerve and brain cells—and stress depletes B vitamins quickly. • Mixed nuts. Just an ounce will do. Walnuts also help replace depleted B vitamins; Brazil nuts offer a whopping amount of zinc, which is also drained by anxiety; and almonds boost vitamin E, which helps fight the cellular damage linked to chronic stress. • Asparagus. Each tender stalk is a source of folic acid, a natural mood lightener. Dip the spears in fat-free yogurt or sour cream for an added dose of calcium with every bite.

• Spinach. Spinach gives you a hearty dose of magnesium, which helps regulate cortisol. Too little magnesium can trigger the headaches and fatigue often associated with stress. • Salmon. Salmon and other fatty fish such as tuna can help prevent surges in stress hormones such as cortisol and adrenaline; they also protect against heart disease. Aim to eat three ounces at least twice a week. • Chai tea. This warm drink is a supersoother, and curling up with a cup of aromatic decaf chai can make the whole day look better. • Milk. Loaded with calcium, milk can reduce muscle spasms and soothe tension. Research also suggests it eases the anxiety and mood swings linked to PMS. Warm it up for a bedtime nightcap; warm milk is proven to encourage sleep. • Dark chocolate. Okay, there’s nothing in it proven to relieve stress, but when only chocolate will do, reach for the dark kind. The antioxidant flavonoids in it fight cancer and heart disease, and that knowledge is a stress-reliever in itself. •

WELLNESS

To reclaim YOU, try these

“back to basics” tips:

Commit to making time for YOU. Start small, with maybe five to 10 minutes a day.

2. 3.

Do a favorite activity. Hunt, fish, hike, read, or garden.

Take a walk. Pay attention to all of your senses—look, listen, touch, and smell.

4. 5. 6. 7.

Go somewhere special either in your mind, or for real.

Watch a television show that makes you laugh.

Get Back to Basics

was with a person the other day who told me they had forgotten “what they loved.” They were lost in the “busyness” of life—working long hours, running after the kids, and trying to take care of their parents. They were struggling financially, could no longer have a conversation with their significant other without fighting, and couldn’t remember the last time they actually had a family meal together. They felt lost and alone. When I asked them what made them happy, they couldn’t remember. I suggested they go through

old pictures or videos and find ones where they were smiling or laughing. I told them to think back to that captured moment and remember what they were doing and whom were they with. I am hopeful that this offered a new starting point for them. How long has it been since you’ve done something you really love? How long has it been since you sat still and listened to the sounds around you? How long has it been since you laughed—really laughed? If you answered, “Too long,” it’s time to do something about it. Remember, it’s never too late! •

Make a date with your significant other.

Do a one-on-one activity with your child. Read a book, shoot hoops, or go out for ice cream.

8. 9. 10.

Smile at everyone you meet.

Spend time with someone you care about. Listen to music.

If you find that it’s hard “getting back to basics,” it may be time to consider the WellSpan Employee Assistance Program’s free, confidential counseling. There, you can sort through the chaos, clear your vision, and reclaim your life. Call toll-free, (866) 227-6527, or visit www.wellspaneap.org.

2014 || Volume 4 || Number 1

620 Edgar St. York, PA 17403

Customer Feedback

IB Abel did an exceptional job. That is why I am giving it the second-highest score that the Turnpike has ever given to a contractor for work performed.

I like working with IB Abel because we can work well together to keep the customer happy and stay on target for our production schedule.

– Jeff Rupert, Pennsylvania Turnpike

– John Goehler, The H&K Group

For general company information, contact one of our divisions: ELECTRICAL DIVISION: Denny Geiger (717) 324-2205 dgeiger@ib-abel.com

COMMUNICATION DIVISION: Jim Trebilcock (717) 577-3081 jimt@ib-abel.com

UTILITY SERVICES DIVISION: Willard R. Wolf (717) 577-1685 wwolf@ib-abel.com