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Learning from Peers

by | Nov 9, 2020 | Business Strategy | 0 comments

Learning From Peers

One of my favorite ways to learn is to listen to and interact with peers of mine; those that have gone through or are going through the same issues I am. I feel that done correctly, one can learn so much more from your peers than by researching an issue on your own or simply attending a seminar with one speaker offering only their knowledge/opinion to the audience. 

However, learning this way takes practice and must be done with intent to be successful at it. Below are my four tips to conquering how to learn from your peers:

Prepare – As with most things in business, being prepared is critical. Whatever you are attending; a conference, networking meeting, webinar workshop, take time beforehand to create questions that you want to ask others. This is especially important if the event you will be attending has a facilitated roundtable discussion. Jot down the issues you want help with so you can get your questions answered during the discussion

Contribute – Givers Gain. I truly believe in that statement. The more that you offer and contribute to the success of others, the more you will benefit personally. It may simply be from the satisfaction of helping someone else, but that positive energy will bring great things to you and your organization. However, a word of caution on this; don’t contribute with the sole purpose of your betterment. People will sniff out this insincere attitude right away and you won’t get the gain you had hoped. Be genuine with your intent to help others and you will prosper. 

 Respect – Don’t be like our politicians today. If you disagree with something that someone says, respectfully allow them to have their opinion and leave it at that, especially in front of other people. If their viewpoint could potentially cause unsafe or dangerous consequences, find a private time to talk to that individual alone and ask first if you could talk to them about it as you want to learn why they feel that way. In a non-confrontational setting, you both may be able to learn and help each other out. Basic respect for your peers is easy to do and will propel your ability to learn from others. 

 Connect – After the event, seek out another attendee that you enjoyed listening to and make a one-on-one connection with them. Perhaps schedule a call to follow up on a question that you had or to simply turn a colleague into a friend. Most of you will agree, that this is definitely the most rewarding part of attending events and building relationships in business. Yet doing this intentionally, will build your roster of unofficial advisors, confidants, and friends. Who wouldn’t want a stable of people to turn to for help within their business?

If you are looking for opportunities to interact and learn with your peers, seek out your local ISA chapter, TCIA and continue to follow ArboRisk, as each of these organizations have plenty of ways to learn from others. Personally, one of my favorites is ArboRisk’s Become Extraordinary Workshop, where you get 5 weekly topics to discuss amongst a small amount of tree care owners and leaders.

Written by: Eric Petersen

One-on-One Meetings

by | Nov 4, 2020 | Employee Management | 0 comments

One-on-One Meetings

We all can agree that your employees are your most valuable asset. You rely on them to do a good job yet, the busyness of the moment many times gets in the way of having direct meetings with them.

Taking the time to make sure that your people are engaged in their jobs is one of the most important things you can do for your company. Remember, most people quit their boss, not their job and not feeling important is a primary reason they quit. One-on-One meetings can be your most powerful tool to align the employees and management.

Simple 20 minute One-on-One meetings can help immediately address these issues:

• Under Performers – those employees that are not doing the job they were hired to do. Do not wait until the annual evaluation or when you have to write them up for something they did wrong. You can turn around an employee by either engaging with them or you will realize that they just are not the right fit for the company.
• Slacking Performers – those that are not performing like they used to or you want them to. You know they can do more. These employees used to perform better but for some reason their performance has slacked.
• Absent Performers – those that are not mentally showing up. An employee that is normally happy and joking around is now sullen and withdrawn. There could be a personal issue someone is going through, or an employee that was put into a role that they really don’t like.

Steven Covey said “First Seek to understand before being understood”.
Of course, One-on-One meetings should be held with everyone, but need to follow the same framework for truly effective communication. Use the following steps to begin utilizing One-on-One meetings within your company.

1. Meeting Flow – establish what you want to accomplish, include time for 5 minutes in each of these categories.
• Connect – building report – ask questions about their life, how they are doing, let them know some things about you.
• Inspiration – understand where they want to go in their career and how you can help them get there. et expectations and goals for work – what needs to be accomplished?
• Alignment – understand what they believe their priorities are and what you believe they are and what is missing. Make sure they are aligned with the companies, make sure employees have the skills and tools to do their job.
• Feedback – get feedback on your performance. How have I been showing up for you?

2. Agenda – Create an agenda to use with everyone. It will help guide the conversation and keep the meetings similar between all employees. You can have notes on what you want to talk to the specific employee about right on the agenda. Perhaps you saw them overreact in a meeting, make a note on the agenda and ask them “how do you think you handled that situation?”

3. Skip a Level – Make sure you also connect with each level of employees so you get feedback on all employees, supervisors and front line production workers. Front line information will help you to know what is going on with the crew. This will help guide team, it can help you mentor them and shows you have a belief in that individual.

4. Connect the Future – Ensure that you are continually discussing the future within your One-on-One meetings. Use a career path diagram to explain how the individual can advance within your company. To develop a career path check out this article we wrote. Don’t let your employees get bored or uninspired by having them feel there is no chance of advancing within your company.

5. Your Performance – Not only will you be able to give critiques to the employee on their work, this is the time to let them comment on your performance. To do so, you must create a safe place for them be honest without fear of retribution. Let them know that you are only going to get better by knowing their concerns, that they are not going to hurt your feelings. Ask any combination of these questions:

a. If you were me, what is the one thing you would change in our organization?
b. How would you have handled the situation differently?
c. How am I showing up for you?
d. Is there anything in that last decision I made that you have questions about?
e. What are one or two things that would help me become a better leader for the team and yourself?

When you incorporate these five items into regular One-on-One meetings with your team members, you’ll see a drastic change in their energy, production level and overall happiness within your company. I don’t know about you, but doesn’t everyone want that within their company?

For more specific help with building the right culture within your company, reach out to an ArboRisk team member today.

Written by: Peggy Drescher

Knowledge Transfer to Better Your Business

by | Oct 5, 2020 | Business Strategy | 0 comments

Knowledge Transfer to Better your Business

According to a study from the Work Institute, the estimated costs of employee turnover ranges from 33% to as much as 200% of the departing employee’s salary. Costs include lost revenue from reduced human resource levels, project delays, accidents, recruiting, training and on-boarding new personnel. The range of cost is affected by the skills and experience (knowledge) lost with the employee. Consider the difference between losing a seasonal employee to the cost of replacing a long-term retiring employee with advanced skills and years of experience with the company and the profession. With the later, the loss to the company is not only an employee but the knowledge that employee provided to the success of the operation.

Understanding that knowledge loss is the major casualty of employee turnover is the first step towards better employee management.

Researchers began studying the impacts of knowledge loss in the early 1990’s. The concern was related to one generation retiring and the knowledge lost as retirements increased. From that research the concept of knowledge transfer developed. Knowledge transfer is a method of sharing information, abilities, and ideas across different areas of your business. It helps capture the knowledge before it leaves the organization and is then used to train replacements, expand service offering and or cross train employees to increase efficiency.

One of the major benefits of a structured knowledge transfer process is uncovering the ‘special sauce’. People who have mastered their job have skills and experience that make them more successful. In addition to having the knowledge, they know when, where, and how to use that knowledge to work effectively…the special sauce.

Googling ‘knowledge transfer’ will give you a whole host of resources, however, the Knowledge Maverick is a free web resource which can assist you with understanding the concept of knowledge transfer and how to implement it within your company. They have developed a series of questions to get you started. The questions were developed to be answered in a conversation between the person with the knowledge, and the person interested in receiving the knowledge. The conversations will help develop more questions and productive discussion. They are also a good framework for employee mentors.

Lastly, there are knowledge transfer professionals that can assist you in developing a transfer system. Because the loss of knowledge within your company represents a large risk to the health of the organization, ArboRisk has created a Knowledge Transfer portion of Thrive to lower this exposure. Don’t hesitate to reach out to the ArboRisk team to learn more.

Written by: Jim Skiera

Driver Training

by | Sep 25, 2020 | Risk Management | 0 comments

Driver Training For Tree Care Companies

Let’s face it, one of the largest exposures to risk within your tree care company comes from your trucks being on the road. To lower that risk, you must look at managing your fleet and your drivers, with the latter being perhaps one of the most difficult tasks you face.

In the past we’ve discussed ways to test your drivers before they drive one of your trucks on their own. In case you missed that weekly tip, you can access it here (Driving Tests). The next step after you have a baseline of each driver’s skill is to develop a training program so they can continually improve their skills. A driver training program should be written down and contain clear progress goals that encompass training from both internal and external sources.

Internal Training – Most tree care companies deliver driver training to their employees directly and do so only during their tailgate safety meetings. While this is a great way to provide some training, the tailgate meetings may not always be planned out too far in advance and could miss some crucial driver training topics. So I encourage you to create a more systematic internal training program. Use these questions when developing it.

What driver training topics do you already cover within your tailgate safety meetings?

What are some of the most common near misses that your company has when it comes to operating vehicles?

Who in your company would be proficient in teaching the driver training?

External Training – You most likely will not be able to cover all driving training topics with in-house instructors. This is when you need to look outside of your organization. Including training programs put on by outside vendors offer many benefits to your company and can really help lower your driver exposure. Because there are many different options, use this list of questions to help select the proper training vendors.

What type of driver training topics are your current team members not capable of delivering, but are important to your company (think defensive driving, roadside emergency preparedness, etc.)?

Are there local driving schools in your area?

Can you take your vehicles to use during the class?

Bettering your driver’s skills on the road will help you dramatically reduce injuries and accidents, lower insurance premiums and increase your profits. For help with instituting a driver and fleet management program within your company, reach out to an ArboRisk team member today.

Also, we are hosting a Driver & Fleet Management webinar on October 2nd, 2020 along with Streamside Green and Victorian Gardens. To sign up visit this link. In case you read this after the webinar is over, contact us directly and we can set up a time to discuss this individually.

Written by: Eric Petersen

Easily Increase Your Social Media Engagement

by | Sep 25, 2020 | Marketing | 0 comments

Easily Increase Your Social Media Engagement

The number one question I am asked when consulting with different tree care companies is, “How do I increase engagement across our social media platforms?” It can be incredibly frustrating to work so hard to produce quality content and have your followers scroll past without taking the time to even LIKE your post. Fortunately, there are some quick and fairly simple ways to help your engagement increase across your platforms.

Tip #1: Earn engagement

The top piece of advice I can give to help increase your engagement is to earn it. What do you do on a daily basis to encourage your audience to engage with you? Are you commenting and engaging on their posts? Are you posting content beyond sales pitches? Are people seeing #BTS (Behind the Scenes) of your life and business?

In order to see your engagement increase, you need to be an ACTIVE participant on your social media.

Tip #2: Create a trackable strategy

First and foremost, you should have a strategy when it comes to your social media accounts. Second of all, you should be able to track it in a way that makes sense to you. Take the time each month to analyze what you are doing. Which posts received the most likes? Which posts were saved the most? How many people viewed a particular story? How many DMs did you receive regarding your content? Which hashtags increased your exposure?

In order to up your engagement, use these numbers and create new content around what has already worked for you.

Tip #3: Likes does not equal reach

You never know who you are influencing. Just because someone doesn’t take the time to hit that “LIKE” button (even though it is literally the easiest thing on the planet to do), doesn’t mean they are not watching you. Something you post may trigger a sale or outreach 2, 4, or 6 months down the line. Do not give up simply because you are not seeing the “Likes” come in like you want. By continuing to show up with quality content, you are positioning yourself as the expert in your industry.

Even when you think you are not, you are making connections that will someday positively impact your business.

All in all, increasing your engagement does not need to be frustrating or defeating. Take the time to look at your strategy and Keep. Showing. Up. The more times you show up authentically, the better your engagement will continue to be.

 

For additional help with objection handling and one-on-one sales training, check out ArboRisk’s Thrive Sales & Marketing Package! Our team of industry experts has the skills and knowledge to help you take your tree care company to new heights. Click here to learn more!

Written by: Katie Petersen