Women in Construction Institute Swaps a Sign to Challenge a Stereotype
The "People at Work" campaign, launched in Brazil by Publicis Brazil for the Women in Construction Institute in March 2024 around International Women's Day, replaces the conventional "Men at Work" construction sign with a gender-neutral alternative to challenge systemic gender bias across the Brazilian construction sector.
The campaign centres on a deceptively simple intervention. The Portuguese phrase "Homens Trabalhando" — Men at Work — appears on construction sites throughout Brazil as standard regulatory signage. Publicis Brazil, working with the Women in Construction Institute, redesigned that sign to read "Pessoas Trabalhando" — People at Work — and made the new layout freely downloadable, inviting construction companies, printing businesses, and industry associations to adopt it voluntarily. An online petition accompanied the initiative, seeking nationwide legal recognition of the updated wording, according to campaign documentation cited by Campaigns of the World.
The Women in Construction Institute, known in Brazil as Instituto Mulher em Construção, provides the organisational backbone for the campaign. Founded in 2006, the Brazilian non-profit has since offered courses, training sessions, and qualification workshops that, per figures reported by Mulheremconstrucao Org Br, directly empowered more than 6,000 women and indirectly reached 60,000 women living in peripheral situations across the country. The Institute's founder, Bia Kern, framed the initiative plainly: "We are changing not only the signs but the reality for many women." The campaign carries a Clapboard Score of 71 out of 100, reflecting strong conceptual clarity and cultural relevance offset by limited documented reach data.
Brazil's construction workforce is numerically dominated by men, but that dominance is measurably eroding. In Brazil, women represented approximately 10.8% of construction employment in 2023, up from around 8% in 2013, according to a 2024 academic study published via Tandfonline. That trajectory — a decade of steady incremental growth — gave the Women in Construction Institute and Publicis Brazil a credible statistical foundation from which to argue that the sector's identity, including its signage, had not kept pace with its workforce reality.
The strategic insight behind "People at Work" is rooted in the semiotics of everyday infrastructure. "Men at Work" signs are not advertising; they are regulatory fixtures. Their ubiquity makes them invisible to most passers-by, yet their language quietly reinforces the assumption that construction is male by definition. By targeting that specific object, Publicis Brazil chose a medium with guaranteed daily impressions that costs nothing to place and requires no media buy to circulate — a significant advantage for a non-profit operating within budget constraints.
The campaign also lands against a structural problem the industry cannot ignore. As Juliana Elia, Vice President of Strategy at Publicis Brazil, stated in March 2024: "In an industry lacking skilled labor, the new signs demonstrate that this is a sector where everyone is not only welcome but also necessary." That framing reframes gender inclusion not as a social obligation but as a workforce solution — a positioning that speaks to industry leaders, not only advocates. Competitors in the broader gender-equality communications space, including campaigns run by large construction conglomerates such as MRV Engenharia and initiatives tied to Brazil's SEBRAE network, have addressed diversity in corporate communications, but none targeted the physical signage layer of the construction environment with this degree of specificity.
The creative execution of "People at Work" relies on restraint rather than spectacle. The design intervention is minimal by intent: the revised sign retains the visual grammar of the standard Brazilian construction warning — its yellow field, its black silhouette of a worker, its authoritative typeface — and changes only the text. That fidelity to the source material is itself the creative argument. A sign that looks exactly like a regulatory fixture, yet carries an inclusive message, demonstrates that inclusion does not require disruption of systems; it requires only the will to update language.
Juliana Elia, Vice President of Strategy at Publicis Brazil, served as the strategic lead publicly credited with articulating the campaign's rationale, stating on March 11, 2024 that the initiative aimed to "deconstruct those stereotypes, starting with a simple change that sends an important message to the market and society." Full production credits for the People at Work campaign, including the names of the creative directors, art directors, and designers responsible for the sign redesign and downloadable asset package, are not publicly documented in sources available to Clapboard at the time of writing.
The campaign's distribution mechanic is an extension of its creative logic. By releasing the sign layout as a free download, Publicis Brazil transformed every construction company, printer, and site manager in Brazil into a potential media channel. The online petition seeking legal adoption of the new wording added a civic dimension, converting passive awareness into active participation. Taken together, the creative system — sign redesign, open-source distribution, public petition — forms a closed loop in which the simplest possible artefact generates its own amplification. The campaign was a finalist in the Outdoor Lions category at Cannes Lions 2024, as reported by Campaigns of the World, a recognition that reflects the jury's reading of the outdoor medium used unconventionally.
No verified sales lift, revenue increase, or independently audited reach figure for the People at Work campaign is publicly available at the time of writing. What the public record does confirm is a meaningful awards trajectory that speaks to the campaign's structural effectiveness as judged by industry peers.
The campaign won two Silver Effies at Effie Brasil 2024 — one in the Low Budget category and one in the Non-Profit category — as reported by Adlatina and confirmed by campaign documentation cited by Campaigns of the World. The dual recognition is notable precisely because the Low Budget award evaluates efficiency of effect relative to resource investment, and the Non-Profit award assesses impact within the specific constraints of cause-driven work. Winning both simultaneously suggests the jury found the campaign effective both as a communications act and as an advocacy instrument. The campaign was also a finalist in the Outdoor Lions category at Cannes Lions 2024, per Campaigns of the World, placing it in international peer review against work produced with substantially larger budgets.
Structurally, the campaign's effectiveness rests on three mechanisms: the zero-cost media placement inherent in regulatory signage, the open-source distribution model that extended reach without paid amplification, and the petition mechanic that converted interest into measurable civic action. In a sector where, according to figures reported by mulheremconstrucao.org.br, the Women in Construction Institute has reached more than 60,000 women indirectly since 2006, the campaign gave that existing network a visible, shareable symbol. The Clapboard Score of 71 out of 100 reflects the campaign's conceptual economy and award validation, tempered by the absence of independently verified audience or behavioural metrics.
The People at Work campaign is a 2024 initiative by Publicis Brazil for the Women in Construction Institute, launched around International Women's Day. It replaced conventional "Men at Work" construction signs with gender-neutral "People at Work" versions and made the new sign layout freely downloadable to encourage industry-wide adoption across Brazil.
Publicis Brazil created the People at Work campaign for the Women in Construction Institute. Juliana Elia, Vice President of Strategy at Publicis Brazil, is publicly credited as a strategic lead. The campaign launched in March 2024 around International Women's Day, targeting gender bias in Brazil's construction industry through inclusive signage.
People at Work won two Silver Effies at Effie Brasil 2024, in the Low Budget and Non-Profit categories, as reported by Adlatina. The campaign was also a finalist in the Outdoor Lions category at Cannes Lions 2024, per Campaigns of the World, placing it in international competition against larger-budget work.
The Women in Construction Institute, known in Brazil as Instituto Mulher em Construção, is a non-profit founded in 2006. Per figures from mulheremconstrucao.org.br, it has directly empowered more than 6,000 women and indirectly reached 60,000 women through courses, training sessions, and qualification workshops focused on employment in Brazil's construction sector.
People at Work targets gender bias embedded in everyday regulatory signage by replacing the phrase "Men at Work" with "People at Work" on Brazilian construction sites. The campaign also launched a petition seeking national legal adoption of the new wording, converting a symbolic design change into a formal advocacy action with measurable civic participation.
In Brazil, women represented approximately 10.8% of construction employment in 2023, up from around 8% in 2013, according to a 2024 academic study published via Tandfonline. That decade-long growth provided the Women in Construction Institute and Publicis Brazil with the statistical foundation underpinning the People at Work campaign's argument for inclusive signage.
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