Executive Summit

PARADISE ISLAND, Bahamas – Tom Oyler opened PLANET’s winter executive meeting by taking the industry to task for its lack of innovation, focus on short-term improvement and management by comparison. 

In his keynote address to open PLANET’s Green Industry Great Escape, the consultant said too many landscapers take a “me-too” approach to managing their businesses, and spend too much time worrying about improving their processes instead of innovating their companies. 

“The coarse labors of running a business should be done by people in your organization, not the CEO,” Oyler said. “It’s not who can cut grass the best, or plant plants the best. How can you manage this whole outside environment, and communicate that me and my investment are going to be protected?”
 

Left: Tony Burzo, director of landscaping, gave attendees a tour of the resort’s 700-acre property, Right: John Gibson of Swingle Lawn, Tree & Landscape Care, PLANET’s Lifetime Achievement Award winner, and Lawn & Landscape’s Leadership Award winners Jerry Schill, Schill Grounds Management, Phil Allen, Brigham Young University and Pam Stark, ValleyCrest Landscape Cos.

Problem areas for companies and the industry as a whole that Oyler cited include:

• Myopic leadership – the industry has little clout in the real estate or financial industries
• No pack-hunting – association members haven’t pooled their resources to their fullest potential
• Management by comparison, not to capacity – companies spend too much time focused on what their competition is doing and worrying about how they stack up, and not thinking about what they themselves could do 
• No good ideas for growth – besides acquisitions, many companies have no model for large-scale organic growth

“I hate to see people come in who can bully and buy, and they’re not innovative,” Oyler said. “They just have capital. I love the small guy.”

The keynote, sponsored by Caterpillar, was the first event in a three-day meeting designed to give attendees fodder for innovative thinking and time to network and develop their ideas.
 

GIGE’s 200 attendees toured the property’s extensive landscapes and attended multiple networking receptions.

The rest of the week included talks on sales from Kevin Kehoe and digital innovation from Roger Phelps, Bruce Robert and Pat Schunk. 

Saturday also featured the presentation of the 12th class of Lawn & Landscape Leadership Awards and PLANET’s Lifetime Achievement Award. 

Other sponsors of the event included: Agrium Advanced Technologies, Snapper Pro, CNA, Bayer, Syngenta, STIHL and John Deere.
 

John Gibson, middle, celebrated the honor with his family, including his grandmother. Lawn & Landscape Editor Chuck Bowen presented Jerry Schill and Pam Stark their Leadership Awards.

The author is associate publisher and editor at Lawn & Landscape. He can be reached at cbowen@gie.net.

If you missed our Leadership Award profiles, check out our March issue at www.lawnandlandsape.com. Also look for reporting on a behind-the-scenes landscape tour of the resort.