Problems and issues this industry faces and how to deal with them.

[AHPP]

 

[KateH]

43 minutes ago, Mick Dempsey said:

 

Where is this lack of respect you talk about?

 

As for the ‘holding each other up and respecting our fellow arborists’ well that’s just New Age touchy feely nonsense.

 

Anyway, give it ten years and everyone will be in Mewps or using remote control lorry grab things.

Hi Mick, I have heard climbing arborists described as 'vertical waste removers' which may sometimes be what they are doing but I'm sure not all the time. And 'that article' on subbing published in the AA was not wholly respectful.

That said I don't really mean respect on a personal level, I mean that the role is not properly valued, financially or otherwise. Kate

[Mick Dempsey]

2 minutes ago, KateH said:

Hi Mick, I have heard climbing arborists described as 'vertical waste removers' which may sometimes be what they are doing but I'm sure not all the time. And 'that article' on subbing published in the AA was not wholly respectful.

That said I don't really mean respect on a personal level, I mean that the role is not properly valued, financially or otherwise. Kate

Ok, fair enough.

 

[KateH]

This thread is fascinating and has been a little surprising. I cannot believe I read the word ‘union’!

 

I’d like to put in my five pence worth, but before I do I want you to know this:

 

I have only been in the industry 6 months.

I sit behind a desk recruiting all types of Arb people from trainee climbers to consultants.

I speak to Arb employers and job seekers on a daily basis.

I know that I don’t know much and am still learning the industry.

 

The comments I make are my opinion based on my experience and very general, I’m not tarring everyone with the same brush… just saying what I see sometimes.

I’ll probably speak out of turn and expect to be told so (hi Mick!).

 

I am enjoying being in the industry and speak to nice people every day 😊.

 

Here goes, some issues I see are:

 

• The industry appears to be divided and I have yet to find anyone speaking for it as a whole… is there even a whole and where does it start and end? If a group can’t be defined it can’t have a voice and if it has no voice it can’t seek change.
• There is sometimes a lack of professionalism in the industry. Drugs, alcohol and especially poor time keeping/attendance come up a lot.
• The wages are too low in employed roles; Local Authority and private firms. We know that the solution to finding more arborist for these roles is to raise wages (and we push for that all the time) but LA banding needs a change at Gov. level and I’m not sure the margins are there for private companies to pay more.
• The grey area around whether a sub-contract worker is in disguised employment or working for a number of clients muddies the water. HMRC do not seem to be helping because they put in rules that they then do not enforce when push comes to shove. This puts everyone in a difficult position (those trying to do things right and those skating on thin ice and getting away with it year in year out) and does not help with transparency of discussion around pay in the industry.
• Arborists are qualified specialists (whether climbers, Tree Inspectors, Tree Officers etc) but it seems that the industry is not well understood or respected.
• Not enough arborists want the employed jobs that are on offer (it feels like there just aren’t enough arborists on the market but I’m not sure that’s true… maybe they just don’t want employed roles?)
• Not enough people are coming into the industry.
• Climbers looking to come off the tools don’t always plan ahead and have fewer options in the industry when they do (or they have to leave it) than they would have had otherwise.

[AHPP]

1 hour ago, KateH said:

• The industry appears to be divided and I have yet to find anyone speaking for it as a whole… is there even a whole and where does it start and end? If a group can’t be defined it can’t have a voice and if it has no voice it can’t seek change.

 

I have a voice and seek what I want for me. You don't have to go very far beyond that to run into commie talk and before long we'll all be standing in the arb lines for a week to get a new 5/32" file.

[AHPP]

6 hours ago, Retired Climber said:

I know stuff that nobody else on this forum knows. If we are talking content for your website, marketing, understanding clients, improving conversion rates, persuading staff to work harder or anything of that nature, my knowledge and experience will be unparalleled on this forum (or actually, any forum).

 

 

5 hours ago, Retired Climber said:

I'm not suggesting that I'm some kind of Guru with all the answers. 

 

It's all relative so which is it?

 

People on here must be forgiven for still not being sure whether you're a bullshit merchant or whether you really do know useful stuff. We don't expect you to give away valuable knowledge for free willy nilly but you are an awful tease and I don't recall seeing any of your posts that one could really hang their hat on. Like Mick said, throw us a bone.

[Retired Climber]

18 minutes ago, AHPP said:

 

 

It's all relative so which is it?

 

People on here must be forgiven for still not being sure whether you're a bullshit merchant or whether you really do know useful stuff. We don't expect you to give away valuable knowledge for free willy nilly but you are an awful tease and I don't recall seeing any of your posts that one could really hang their hat on. Like Mick said, throw us a bone.

I'm perfectly happy to give away information for nothing. I'm not doing all the work though. If something I say seems to make sense, or if it seems counter to the usual position on this forum, do some research around the idea yourself. 

 

 

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

7 hours ago, Retired Climber said:

Thank you. That is exactly the point, and much more concisely put than I have managed. 

I’ll add to that - a bit. 
 

The wife once had to take one of my work vehicles for her daily run into Plymuff (of course the mileage was deducted for HMRC purposes) it was a year or 2 old at the time, transit custom. 
 

She was going to a meeting and her guvnor didn’t have a staff car so she offered him a lift which he accepted. 
 

En route he commented on how smart the van was and asked how come she was driving such a vehicle. 
 

She said it was one of my work trucks, described my business and he said - if a ‘tree surgeon’ turned up in a vehicle like that I’d think they were charging me too much. 
 

She was too polite to be as blunt as I would have been as I told him I earned considerably more than he did but when he later asked for a price to mill up some Beech he had at home he realised just how off the mark his thoughts were in relation to going rates. 
 

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

7 hours ago, Retired Climber said:

I'm not saying you are not experienced, I'm saying you don't understand the underlying psychology and behavioural economics principles behind what's going on. I'm trying to explain them in a way that may be useful for you and other arbs if they genuinely want to discuss some of the problems and solutions in the industry. 

 

I'm very open to debate, but your declaration that I'm wrong, kind of put me off. I honestly thought you'd have come back today, having had a ponder, and we'd have had a better conversation about it. 

 

I can't say this without sounding like an a- hole, but I'll say it anyway. I know stuff that nobody else on this forum knows, and I thought I could be useful. I wasn't the greatest climber, and actually I probably got into arb to prove to myself that I could do a proper man's job. I was the skinny kid at school, and wasn't exactly the athletic type. I have little value here when the conversation is of a technical climbing nature, but if we are talking content for your website, marketing, understanding clients, improving conversion rates, persuading staff to work harder or anything of that nature, my knowledge and experience will be unparalleled on this forum (or actually, any forum).

 

Haha, I told you i'd sound like an a-hole. 

 

I haven’t read on to the end to see if anyone has already said it yet….

 

And similarly, I don’t want to sound like an ass (but genuinely don’t care if I do - it’s not intended) it seems to me like you are trying to make the ground fit the map rather than the map fit the ground. 
 

You ‘think’ you know better than Mick (the man, any man, with years of hands on experience) because you’ve sat through a lecture or read a book which gives you a view of the world that you believe in and you want everyone to agree with you. Now that’s proper cognitive dissonance. 
 

It’s kind of like that dick that wrote the article published by the AA. Not saying it’s anything like as dickish as that though - I’m just saying there could be the perception of low level similarities. 
 

 

[Peasgood]

4 hours ago, KateH said:

This thread is fascinating and has been a little surprising. I cannot believe I read the word ‘union’!

 

I’d like to put in my five pence worth, but before I do I want you to know this:

 

I have only been in the industry 6 months.

I sit behind a desk recruiting all types of Arb people from trainee climbers to consultants.

I speak to Arb employers and job seekers on a daily basis.

I know that I don’t know much and am still learning the industry.

 

The comments I make are my opinion based on my experience and very general, I’m not tarring everyone with the same brush… just saying what I see sometimes.

I’ll probably speak out of turn and expect to be told so (hi Mick!).

 

I am enjoying being in the industry and speak to nice people every day 😊.

 

Here goes, some issues I see are:

 

• The industry appears to be divided and I have yet to find anyone speaking for it as a whole… is there even a whole and where does it start and end? If a group can’t be defined it can’t have a voice and if it has no voice it can’t seek change.
• There is sometimes a lack of professionalism in the industry. Drugs, alcohol and especially poor time keeping/attendance come up a lot.
• The wages are too low in employed roles; Local Authority and private firms. We know that the solution to finding more arborist for these roles is to raise wages (and we push for that all the time) but LA banding needs a change at Gov. level and I’m not sure the margins are there for private companies to pay more.
• The grey area around whether a sub-contract worker is in disguised employment or working for a number of clients muddies the water. HMRC do not seem to be helping because they put in rules that they then do not enforce when push comes to shove. This puts everyone in a difficult position (those trying to do things right and those skating on thin ice and getting away with it year in year out) and does not help with transparency of discussion around pay in the industry.
• Arborists are qualified specialists (whether climbers, Tree Inspectors, Tree Officers etc) but it seems that the industry is not well understood or respected.
• Not enough arborists want the employed jobs that are on offer (it feels like there just aren’t enough arborists on the market but I’m not sure that’s true… maybe they just don’t want employed roles?)
• Not enough people are coming into the industry.
• Climbers looking to come off the tools don’t always plan ahead and have fewer options in the industry when they do (or they have to leave it) than they would have had otherwise.

All that applies to quite a few industries, I expect most of it applies to most industries.