Distracted Driving and Road Rage

by | Aug 27, 2021 | Safety | 0 comments

The Dangers of Distracted Driving

Written by Peggy Drescher

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) stats show that while Americans drove less in 2020 due to the pandemic, there were still an estimated 6 million accidents and 38,680 deaths.  The main behavioral causes were impaired driving, speeding and failure to wear a seat belt.  Two causes on the rise were distracted driving (accounting for over 3,000 deaths last year) and road rage. We’re going to dig into these two causes in this article. 

Distracted driving is any activity that diverts your attention from driving. This includes talking, texting, eating and drinking, using phone, changing the stereo, etc.  How many people have you seen blow through red lights?  Chances are they were distracted by something causing them to miss the red light. –PRO DRIVING TIP – if you are first in line at a red light, when it changes to green DO NOT proceed through the intersection for 3-5 seconds and look both ways before you do.

Did you know that texting will take your eyes off the road for at least 5 seconds?  This amounts to driving the length of a football field at 55 MPH with your eyes closed!  Drivers using cell phones are four times as likely to be in a crash and about 1 of every 4 motor vehicle crashes involve cell phone use.  Those that are texting are 8-23 times more likely to cause a crash.

If you haven’t had a safety topic on Distracted Driving, now is the time to do so. During your meeting, discuss your company’s stance on cell phone usage while operating a company vehicle, because if an accident occurs on the job, it not only affects your business but also your employees and their families. 

Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA Dr. David Michaels states:

“OSHA’s message to all companies whose employees drive on the job is straightforward: It is your responsibility and legal obligation to have a clear, unequivocal and enforced policy against texting while driving.”

In addition, nearly every state has passed some sort of statewide law against distracted driving. There are plenty of resources that have sample cell phone usage policies, however, one that you could use as a reference is from the NSC.org inside of their Safe Driving kit.  

Now, to discuss road rage or just plain erratic drivers.  Road rage includes lane weaving, running red lights, speeding, tailgating, making obscene hand gestures, yelling verbal insults and even inflicting physical harm.  

I’m sure everyone has seen this before or perhaps even participated in any of these – have you ever been driving behind someone going 70 MPH and have them intentionally drop a piece of metal out of their window?  I have – and I am lucky it hit the bottom of my car but the sound was like a bomb went off.  What came out of my mouth was not very peaceful.  Besides it making me nervous to continue the 2-hour drive I still had to accomplish, I had bad thoughts about the driver for quite a while.  

If road rage happens to one of your crew during the work day what do you think that does to their performance?  I suggest having a safety discussion and ask your employees if they have any examples, I bet you’ll get some interesting stories to discuss.  

Here are a few ways to combat the urge to participate in road rage: 

  • Provide your crew with the resources to get the job done correctly before they leave the shop so they are not stressed about the work for the day.
  • Teach breathing techniques to use in difficult situations.  They truly do work!
  • Have all employees go through a defensive driving course once per year.
  • Investigate apps for cell phone blocking technology and safe driving

In addition, if you need help with incorporating driver safety into your safety program, reach out to an ArboRisk team member to enroll in our Thrive Safety Package and begin working one-on-one with our industry experts.  

Listed below are a few other links that have great resources for safe driving topics, free posters and even surveys that your employees can take to score their driving. If you need help with developing a safety topic on this subject, I would be happy to help.  Stay safe out there!

http://nsc.org

http://www.osha.gov

https://www.nhtsa.gov

GHSA State Laws – Distracted Driving

Traffic Safety Huddles

Road Rage Sheet

Improving Safety with Leading Indicators

by | Aug 26, 2021 | Safety | 0 comments

Improving Safety with Leading Indicators

Written by Eric Petersen, CIC

One of my favorite things about the tree care industry is interacting with passionate people from all across the globe who are trying to help get every arborist home safe each night. Sometimes conversations spark waves of momentum and begin to force change within the industry. I feel we are at the beginning of a new wave of momentum within the tree care industry when looking at how to prevent injuries. That new wave is being caused by using leading indicators to improve safety. 

While the concept of leading indicators is not new, it hasn’t been until recent years that I’ve heard people start to talk about them at tree care events. OSHA defines Leading indicators as “proactive, preventive, and predictive measures that provide information about the effective performance of your safety and health activities.” They are metrics that can be recorded and tracked prior to an accident happening. 

Just like a doctor will analyze your blood sample for irregularities to catch a future illness or disease before it negatively affects you and a quality control chemist will ensure the molecular compound of their product is just right, your safety committee can analyze certain metrics within your company to highlight future safety concerns, thereby giving you time to address that concern before an accident happens. 

In a recent TCIA Magazine article (Leading and Lagging Indicators), Bill Owen states, 

“Understanding leading indicators and incorporating them into a safety program balances a program and improves overall results by focusing on the behavior that leads to successful outcomes.”

Put another way – behavior first, results second. Building a safety culture around the proper behaviors will give you a better result. And the better result we are all looking for is to reduce or eliminate the severe injuries that continue to plague this industry. 

Common examples of leading indicators are: Safety meetings, Jobsite safety audits, individual and group training events, Jobsite Hazard Analysis, driving tests, Motor Vehicle Record checks, equipment inspections, etc.

When identifying what leading indicators you want to measure within your company, make sure they are specific enough to be easily tracked. A simple Excel spreadsheet can do the trick. Click here to download a free copy of our Leading & Lagging Indicator Dashboard, which was modified from Bill Owen’s example within the aforementioned TCIA Magazine article “Leading and Lagging Indicators.”

At your next Safety Committee meeting, have a discussion around what behaviors (leading indicators) your company can track to begin to highlight where future problems may arise. Create a goal for each of those behaviors and start to measure how your team is doing against the goal. When getting started looking at leading indicators remember, it’s okay if you adjust the metrics you’re using over time as the concept is a bit different than looking at lagging indicators (or using past incident data). The key is to shift your focus onto the behavioral metrics that ultimately help prevent injuries and accidents from happening. 

For more information from OSHA visit their webpage dedicated to Leading Indicators here.

Since ArboRisk’s mission is to get every arborist home safe each night, we’ve designed a specific consulting package to work one-on-one with your organization. Visit our webpage for the Thrive Safety Package to learn more. In addition to the Thrive Safety Package, all ArboRisk clients receive a Safety Culture Assessment that allows you to peer into your safety culture and find areas that need improvement.

Feel, Felt, Found: 3 F’s of Objection Handling

by | Aug 25, 2021 | Marketing | 0 comments

Feel, Felt, Found: The 3 F’s of Objections Handling

Written by Eric Petersen, CIC

Unfortunately, part of being in sales entails hearing objections from your prospective customers.  While many times the objection can be demoralizing to you, the sales person, it really is simply a statement by your prospect that they don’t yet see the value in what you have to offer. The key word is ‘yet.’ It is your job as the sales professional to find a way to overcome that objection and show the value to your prospect so they purchase from you. 

Think about the rejections you often encounter in the tree care industry – “Your price is too expensive,” “We just don’t need it right now,” or “I’ll just let the tree die and plant something else.” Each of those statements give you a glimpse into what matters to the prospect and where you missed in delivering that value to the prospect on the initial presentation.

After years of sales experience, participating in sales courses, and shadowing some very successful insurance agents, I want to share what I’ve seen as the best way of handling objections: the Feel, Felt, Found method.

1. Feel: “I understand how you feel.”

Letting people know you’re listening is one of the most important pieces of the sales process. The premise of “feel” is letting your prospect know that you understand how they feel about the product or service you’re trying to sell them. For example, if they tell you they feel your estimate is too expensive, let them know you understand they think your price is too high. Simply acknowledging their main concern is the first step in working towards a solution. 

 2. Felt: “I’ve felt that way before.”

Felt is your opportunity as a salesperson to let your prospect know that either you, or someone in the past, has been in the same position. With the price example, you simply state “others have felt that way before.” This puts your prospect on the same level as their peers. People crave a sense of belonging and informing them that they are not alone with their feelings brings a bit of humanity to the sale. 

 3. Found: “But what we’ve found is…”

Once you’ve set the foundation in letting your prospect know you understand them and informing them they are not alone, it is now your chance to explain why they should consider moving beyond their initial objection. This is your opportunity to explain to your prospect how you may not be the cheapest tree service in the area but the benefits of them choosing your company more than make up the difference in cost. Use real life examples such as, “we’ve found that companies without a Certified Arborist are two times more likely to damage your property” or “we’ve found our higher price to be worth it as our high end equipment ensures the job will be done on time and in a safe manner.”

 

The magic recipe is “I understand how you feel, others/I have felt the same way, but I’ve found that…” 

It is important for you and your team to recognize that the feel, felt, found method is not efficient unless you have a good understanding of why the prospect is objecting. If you don’t understand why they are objecting, it will be much more difficult to close the sale. For three ideas on how to dig deeper during a sales call, check out a past article here.

During your next sales meeting, I’d encourage you to brainstorm with your team about common pain points your prospective customers have. Then write down the ways your company can solve those issues and the common objections you hear for those solutions. Lastly, discuss previous customers who have given you similar objections and still purchased your product or service. This will give you and your team the building blocks you need to start feeling comfortable handling objections, and ultimately closing more sales.

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!

What is Risk Management?

by | Apr 5, 2021 | Risk Management | 0 comments

What is Risk Management?

If you’ve been following ArboRisk for any amount of time, you know that we believe in using a “risk management approach” to ensure our clients survive an unexpected event. But what does that really mean? 

Technically, a risk management approach focuses on identifying, analyzing and controlling exposures that could have a negative impact on the business. That means a tree service must be intentional and honest when looking at their business to first gain an understanding of what could go wrong and then be open minded enough to find ways to minimize the impact of those exposures on their business. 

To us here at ArboRisk, the risk management approach starts with having the simple attitude of; always seeking to improve. 

All too often in the tree care industry, we hear or see the “that won’t happen to me” or “we already do everything we can” attitudes from business owners. These viewpoints block all attempts at proper risk management by closing the business owner’s mind to helpful exposure reducing ideas. Unfortunately, those attitudes are not the only dangerous mindsets we see. We have presented on 7 Deadly Sins of Work Comp at numerous national and local tree care conferences to help tree services avoid common pitfalls and implement a risk management approach. 

Once the tree care company embraces an open mind, then and only then can they identify and assess the risks that their company faces and make a plan on what to do with those risks. It’s also very important to remember that purchasing insurance doesn’t mean you are practicing risk management. While insurance coverage is important it is only one part of risk management. For more on that concept, please read this article (Why Insurance is NOT Risk Management).

If you’re looking to institute a risk management approach within your business, reach out to an ArboRisk team member today. 

Written by: Eric Petersen

Electrical Hazards Awareness

by | Mar 29, 2021 | Safety | 0 comments

Electrical Hazards Awareness

One of the best characteristics about a tree care professional is how they get excited to talk about and work on trees. Unfortunately, many times that excitement and desire to do tree work brings arborists in close proximity to electrical wires. 

Make no mistake, electricity is a serious and widespread hazard to arborists every day. Even a simple telephone line can be energized with enough voltage to kill. Because of our exposure to electrical hazards, ANSI Z133 states that “The employer shall train each employee….” on the topic.  (4.1.2 – 4.1.4(f)).

Training your team on the following tips is a great start to preventing electrical accidents within your company. However, we strongly recommend that you engage in a full electrical hazard training with every member of your field team at least once per year. 

Job Hazard Analysis (JHA) and Job Briefing – Properly setting up and inspecting the jobsite and surrounding area is the first step in preventing an electrical accident. Formally, this is done when performing a Job Hazard Analysis and again during the Job Briefing before work begins. When you arrive at the job site, be sure everyone on your team checks for electrical wires and guy wires. If it is after a storm, look for electrical lines mixed up with a fallen tree or lines down on the property. When planning and performing your work, you must follow the Minimum Approach Distance (MAD) chart for working near the electrical lines. The MAD charts can be found in the ANSI Z133, section 4.

Work Positioning – When working in the tree or bucket in close proximity to electrical wires, the arborist should always face the electrical lines. Ground workers must also set up the jobsite to avoid any guy wires. Simply place cones to create a visual barrier so a team member does not trip over or walk into a guy wire. REMEMBER THAT LESS THAN ONE AMP CAN KILL A PERSON, so no matter what wire (house service wire, cable and telephone lines, secondary and primary wires) runs through the jobsite, all workers must respect that wire. Being aware of work positioning when working near electrical lines will help prevent:

Contact – Obviously, avoiding direct contact with wires is paramount, but indirect contact can be just as dangerous. Indirect contact occurs when something the arborist touches is energized:  for example, a branch that is contacting an energized wire or other object. Every arborist must ALWAYS KEEP THE WIRE IN FRONT OF THEM to avoid direct or indirect contact with a wire. 

Arcing – Arcing or arc flashing is discharge of electricity caused when wires from different phases are touching or an electrical explosion happens due to a fault in the system. Proper distancing from electrical wires will reduce the risk of injury or death due to arcing.

Step Potential – Step potential is another monster when talking about electricity. Step potential is a voltage difference between the worker’s feet and the electrical grounding object. It can occur when the bucket or truck comes in contact with an electrical wire, thereby changing the electrical path and making a very dangerous situation for the ground worker. Because of this, each crew member must remember to NEVER TOUCH THE BUCKET TRUCK WHILE IN OPERATION NEAR ELECTRICAL LINES, EVEN TO GET A TOOL OUT. Step potential can also occur near guy wires, which is why all guy wires should be discussed during the job briefing and marked when the jobsite is being set up. 

Equipment & Vehicles – Every crew member must also recognize that equipment like gaffs, spurs, or chainsaws can be conductive. Some equipment is labeled “non-conductive” however this does not mean it is electricity safe. Ropes, wooden/fiberglass ladders, fiberglass or wooden pole pruners, and hydraulic saws all are listed as non-conductive.  However, they can become conductive if they are dirty or wet, making proper gear inspection vital. For a more detailed article on gear inspection check out this one. Bucket trucks should be dielectrically tested at least once a year; however, that is the minimum. We recommend getting them tested at least twice a year.

Wind – Wind is always a factor while performing tree work, but it is even more important when working near electrical wires. To avoid potential contact or arcing, consideration must be given to how a cut branch or a rope will react with the wind.  

Get energized by your work, not electricity!  For additional resources on how to institute an electrical hazard training program within your company, reach out to an ArboRisk team member today.

Written by: Dawn Thierbach

and Margaret Hebert