Professionalism Matters.
To prospective students in the industry, professionalism communicates that there are future opportunities to grow.
To customers, it communicates that the knowledge and expertise of the arborist should be held in high regard.
To the community, it communicates that the urban forest is in good hands, for years to come.
But there are a lot of messages currently within the industry that can take away from the building of this trust. In this article, I outline 6 ways that the industry sometimes puts a lower ceiling than necessary towards the path of building trust and professionalism.
1. Create a go-to source for species profiles
Imagine if car mechanics didn’t have troubleshooting manuals for each make and model of vehicle they worked on. With lots and lots of experience, they would eventually be able to fix most situations, but it would take a long time to get there.
This is how the tree industry operates. Unfortunately, there are few go-to sources for troubleshooting manuals for each species of tree. The sources that do exist are scattered amongst multiple different print and digital sources. In so doing, this fails to acknowledge a single, definitive, trustworthy source of information.
It isn’t good enough to say that young arborists will pick this knowledge up with experience, there should be a means to fast-track young arborists’ knowledge rather than potentially making decisions that will harm the client, their property, or their tree in the long run.
For anyone that has a Tree Risk Assessment Qualification (TRAQ) form handy, pull it out. There is a small section called “species failure profile”. Where do arborists find that profile? Sure, scouring the world wide web will reveal information but there seems to be no single, widely reputable authority on this subject matter.
2. Remove the title of “Tree Cutter” from wherever it still exists
It’s like calling a plumber a “Pipe De-Clogger”. Sure, plumbers do drain pipes but their occupation is more complex than that. Same for arborists.
Go to Facebook and look up a tree service company. Facebook will categorize these companies as “Tree Cutter Services”.
Even in my own municipality, arborists are expected to be licensed, the official title is “Licensed Tree Cutter.” By this logic, if a community member calls up a “Licensed Tree Cutter” it appears that the only solution the licensee will provide, is to cut the tree down.
How does the saying go? if the only tool in your toolbox is a chainsaw, then the only solution is to fire it up. Errr… maybe I’m mixing metaphors.
The point is, rather than the assumption that arborists only come to someone’s house to cut trees down, it should be that arborists can consult on whether it should be done in the first place.
Improve the language used in the industry and it will improve the perception of it.
3. Abolish free on-site quotes
I won’t lie, of all these suggestions, this is probably the hardest. Having had many, many discussions on this topic over the years, I have learned that this practice is deeply ingrained. It is an article unto itself.
Free quotes made sense for a period of time. 30 years ago, the primary way customers could learn about a tree company and their particular tree, was for a customer to look up a tree service provider in the YellowPages and have them visit the customer on site.
In today’s day and age, a single company could have more words and pictures accredited to them than there are words and pictures in an entire community’s YellowPages section.
Buyers have enough information to make a decision before an arborist shows up to their house. Buyers won’t go this route though because the tree industry is set up to encourage customers to take advantage of arborists time and resources. Look at how many tree services have it written on their trucks/websites/yard signs/billboards/etc “free quotes”. Actually that is a little bit incorrect, it doesn’t say, “free quotes” it proudly states “FREE QUOTES”.
This process enables and encourages customers to go ahead and reach out to multiple companies. Customers will do that, I’ve even seen it in multiple scenarios where they will reach out to 5 companies. The outcome is that it makes it far more expensive for paying customers, if that paying customer has to cover the “free” cost of the arborist quoting 1-4 other jobs projects.
I have yet to see a company that has singularly solved this, I imagine the real solution lies in a concerted effort on behalf of many companies.
4. Acquire local knowledge.
One of the limitations of a credential that is recognized internationally is that the trees themselves are anything but globetrotters. Trees live their entire lives in one place. A tree grows in unique regional ecological conditions that can either help or hinder its ability to thrive.
Truly understanding how a tree interacts with its local context is quite challenging, so quite often the industry adopts many rules of thumb by which decisions are made.
Here is a rule of thumb when it comes to planting trees, “right tree, right place.”
But what precisely is the right tree and where precisely is the right place? No rule of thumb can answer this, it is entirely dependent on the local context.
It could be argued that the reason many arborists don’t plant trees or perform plant health care (because it isn’t for lack of profit), is because arborists lack knowledge of their locality.
Imagine how much more the local urban forest could thrive if arborists had a greater knowledge and understanding of their unique context.
5. Partner with municipalities
This idea is connected to idea #4. Municipalities have a vested interest in seeing private tree companies do their job to the best of their ability. Why? It is by and large in their mandate to see the urban forest protected and expanded. Publiclyand Privately owned trees.
The problem for many municipalities is that they don’t have complete jurisdiction over privately owned trees. And there are a lot of privately owned trees. I can’t speak for every municipality but in mine, Hamilton, 56% of trees are located in private property.
Try as municipal arborists might to radically increase the canopy count in their municipality by planting on public lands, they might only be tapping into half their potential.
Sure, municipalities can start massive and expensive PR campaigns to promote forest health amongst every constituent in their riding, but isn’t it easier and cheaper to communicate with just a few dozen tree service providers instead?
To help drive home the point, here is an example. Let’s say a new invasive pest comes through a municipalities urban forest, what is the process to disseminate knowledge and an appropriate response to private tree companies?
Keep in mind, not every tree worker is ISA Certified, and far fewer are a member of a regional chapter.
To narrow down the illustration further, pick oak wilt. Can a locally “licensed tree cutter” prune an oak tree out of season? It appears that they can if there is no clear process through which knowledge is passed along.
Without a process in place there is no way to hold arborists accountable to higher standards.
A great big asterisks (*) to the municipal arborists reading this. Before pulling out the stick, try the carrot. Partnerships between municipalities and private tree services should be mutually beneficial. Offering CEU’s is one clear incentive, but it need not be the only one.
6. Set Canadian Tree Care Standards
I’m almost embarrassed to admit it but on our companies quotes/invoices we state clearly, “All work done in accordance with ANSI A300 Tree Care Standards”. ANSI stands for American National Standards Institute. These are U.S. Standards. We don’t have our own. This creates a large grey area in terms of what the expectations are for arborists here in Canada who work on trees. Without clear standards we are setting very low expectations for Canadian arborists.
Set higher standards and it will return higher quality results.
