Contractors Look Into The Future: Industry Roundtable

This dearth of capable employees has forced contractors to look toward an array of possible solutions or ways to maximize the productivity they achieve with the employees they can find. Equipment manufacturers have already offered a great deal of help with the development of machines like zero-turn radius mowers and reduced vibration hand-held trimmers.

Husqvarna Forest & Garden Co., Charlotte, N.C., explored this issue extensively with the 15 contractors it hosted at the second industry roundtable, sponsored by Husqvarna and Lawn & Landscape magazine.

Following are excerpts of the conversations:

OBSTACLES AND OPPORTUNITIES OF A HISPANIC WORKFORCE:
“I’m concerned that the general public doesn’t see the need for immigrant labor because it’s tired of immigration stories. If we have to start calling in social security numbers we’re in trouble.”
- Bill Gordon, Signature Landscape

“As an industry, we have to do a better job of showing the legislators the need for this work force.”
- Mark Arrimour, Penninck Arrimour

“We have to demonstrate to the INS that there aren’t other people out there willing to do these jobs.”
- Jack Hasbrouck, The Groundskeeper

“You have to make sure you can set up crews so they can communicate with their own crew members.”
- David Harting, Nanak’s Landscaping

“It’s very important to the other Hispanics that their crew leader be Hispanic, but there has to be someone who can communicate with the client as well.”
- Hasbrouck

“A lot of times Hispanic laborers from different countries and cultures won’t always get along with each other.”
- Tim Lynott, Chapel Valley Landscape Co.

“You also have to think about what Hispanic laborers will do if your market means business is seasonal. Will they come back after the winter?”
- Michael Byrne, Byrne Brothers Landscape

“Our biggest challenge is understanding the necessary papers to make sure they’re legal workers and what is good or bad paperwork.”
- Gordon

“We’ve started paying for English language classes for our Hispanics.”
- Harting

“We have an interpreter who serves as the Hispanic laborers’ liaison to management, looks out for them and communicates between the groups.”
- Mike Rorie, Groundmasters

“Not being able to understand what the laborers are saying is dangerous because you can have a bad apple and not know it.”
- Gordon

“The second generation of Hispanic laborers developing now is not as good of laborers.”
- Larry Neuhoff, Landtrends

KEY FACTORS IN PREVENTING TURNOVER:
“Developing a fun culture to work in to go along with providing satisfying work opportunities is important.”
- Phil Lundy, Northwest Landscape Industries

“The number one thing is salary, obviously. The number two thing is to provide consistent hours, which means for 52 weeks a year for us. The criteria is the same for all of our laborers because they live paycheck to paycheck.”
- Peter Bowman, Four Seasons

IMPROVING LANDSCAPE CURRICULUM:
“Instructors need to get out in the field and see what is real, and students need more internships.”
- Gordon

“Students have to have leadership and communication skills that aren’t associated with the industry education.”
- Hasbrouck

“Too many students think a formal education grants them more than it does. They don’t place enough value on interpersonal skills.”
- Rorie

CREATING VALUABLE EMPLOYEE HANDBOOKS:
“The only time they are used now is when there’s a discipline problem.”
- Arrimour

“One thing you could do is review important policies in the handbook, like the drug and alcohol policy, three times a year."
– Chris Kujawa, Kujawa Enterprises

“The use of some graphics and pictures can help make it more interesting to look at.”
- Michael Currin, Greenscapes

“We hired a human resources consultant to customize our handbook to our company. Now we use it for everything we do, and we’ve eliminated the grey areas of different policies.”
- Chuck Richardson, Gator Landscaping

“We use our handbook as a hiring tool and give it to prospective employees to take home and look over. Then we go over the high points in the orientation.”
- Bowman

“A handbook can be used to talk about the company’s history and culture and how it got to where it is today. We miss an opportunity to do that by focusing instead on the legalese.”
- Kujawa

GREEN INDUSTRY WORKFORCE OF NEXT CENTURY:
“Equipment will look a lot different than it does now with entirely new concepts and categories.”
- Gordon

“We’ll see companies go the Wal-Mart route of being low cost operators with cheap labor before they’ll invest in the new equipment. Cheap labor is the core commodity for too many companies.”
- Rorie

“Eventually, we’ll see a decrease of employee-related costs as a percentage of revenues.”
- Hasbrouck

“Companies need to get better at developing work processes so they don’t have to worry as much about what the labor is doing.”
- Steve Wood, Husqvarna

“There will be a change in turf’s genetics so they’re more disease resistant and don’t have to be mowed as often.”
- Currin

“We’ll see the more innovative companies start taking care of maintenance through the design of the landscape rather than with manual labor.”
- Rorie

“With so many government regulations and personnel issues, equipment will be the key. We have to eliminate people because they won’t necessarily always be there.”
- Lynott

“The equipment side of the industry has unlimited potential for change, but we haven’t brought the right resources together. I think manufacturers have missed the opportunity to partner with groups and take advantage of R&D ideas to create entirely new equipment categories.”
- Currin

The author is Editor of Lawn & Landscape magazine.