Onboarding and training your employees are time-intensive but necessary tasks. Properly training your team can help boost your overall quality of work and efficiency. It can also aid in employee retention and satisfaction as well-trained team members feel valued and better equipped to do their jobs.
There are various types of software that can help disseminate knowledge, track employee performance and expand employees’ skill sets. When looking to add a training platform to your company, think through your pain points and where training is needed most. Also, when considering pricing, always look at the cost of the next tier up as you scale your landscape business.
Keep in mind these systems do not replace the need for human involvement in training but can systemize and streamline the process. Buy-in from the top down is critical to ensure any of these tools are truly impactful.
Onboarding
The long-term success of your new hires can often be determined by how successful your onboarding process is. This goes beyond first-day orientation and should include a series of events that provide more details on best practices and company policies.
Leaning on technology to aid in systemizing this process can help ensure that everyone receives the same information in a consistent way, which is even more important as your landscape business grows beyond one location.
Trainual is just one of the options out there that can centralize your processes, policies and SOPs into a searchable, trackable system. This platform serves as a playbook for your business, where employees can better understand of who does what and your company story.
Safety Compliance
Making sure everyone is on the same page when it comes to safety standards is critical to keeping your crew members safe. Just like your onboarding, it’s ideal that everyone accesses the same information and safety management software can assist with this.
For instance, Rancho Mesa’s SafetyOne app helps streamline the implementation of your safety program for your team. On this app, team members can observe risks before starting a job and document them with photos and notes, fill out mobile forms such as incident reports, review toolbox talks and access safety training videos.
Adding safety management software can keep safety protocols top of mind, reducing workplace accidents and associated expenses like medical costs and increased insurance premiums.
Learning Management
When it comes to the boots-on-the-ground fieldwork, depending on the structure of your organization, you may not have a dedicated trainer to bring your new hires up to speed. However, if you don’t want them to learn on the go, a learning management system like Greenius or MyLandscapeAcademy can provide them with online training in English and Spanish.
These types of systems allow you to monitor employee progress and performance. You can see who is overdue to learn specific skills and set performance expectations with these platforms. What’s important with both of these tools is that they reinforce employees’ skills in the field, validate their work and recognize them when they have mastered a task.
Employee Performance
Once you’ve gotten past teaching the basics to your team, implementing an employee performance platform can help make sure you and your staff are setting goals, conducting regular performance reviews and holding regular coaching conversations.
Rather than going by a gut feeling, you can assess employee performance objectively and see an individual’s strengths and weaknesses. These types of platforms also provide open and transparent communication for your employees and managers to discuss performance expectations and align their personal goals with your company’s goals.
Platforms like Appraisd can automate review cycles and provide gentle reminders to encourage team members to proactively take the initiative and manage their performance and development conversations. They can also help you provide constructive feedback and support employees’ career development by adding structure and templates.
Language Learning
If a large percentage of your workforce has a first language aside from English, you don’t have to struggle against this language barrier constantly. There are a multitude of language learning apps you can access such as Babbel and Duolingo.
With these apps, you can also encourage bilingual learning with your English-speaking team members, so communication is fostered on both sides.
EarthWorks, lnc., based in Lillian, Texas, uses Babbel and receives reports on what their employees are studying and when they reach the B2 learning level, they are reimbursed for the licensing fee, which is deducted on an incremental basis from their payroll if they choose to participate.
This article was published in the July/August issue of the magazine. To read more stories from The Edge magazine, click here to subscribe to the digital edition.
