Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you’re trying to have a conversation with someone and they don’t agree with what you’re saying? You could be making the best case in the universe for your point of view, with facts, figures, graphs, statistics, life stories, testimonies, technological advancements, etc. However, despite all of your attempts, you still can’t break through? I’d love to say this article is a magic wand of sorts that allows you to change people so they do what you say, but sadly, that’s just not the case.

The harsh reality is that we all are human beings with complex thoughts and individual lives with individual perspectives. We all have our highs, lows and in-betweens, with a million things going on in our minds, and we won’t ever know what another person is thinking, feeling or experiencing in this life. This thing we do every day – life – is relentless, and it can be hard. Whatever we are called to do as the main character in our life story, as well as by being leaders in the various aspects of life – be it as a parent, at our job, in our industry, etc. – we get to experience adversity and have hard conversations.

At TCI EXPO ’24, I presented on this topic, “Having Hard Conversations and Changing the Conversation on Safety.” A long title, but it’s a topic I’ve struggled through and learned a lot from in my life. Here’s some backstory on me to help put the topic in context.

I’m the oldest of three boys. We grew up in the ’90s and early 2000s, raised by amazing parents who did everything they could to ensure we had an amazing childhood, preparing us well for the world outside of what my brothers and I refer to as “Pleasantville.” I learned early on that my love language is words of affirmation and my default personality trait is one of people pleaser. Growing up, and still to this day, I’ll suffer so that others thrive. I’ll take on the hardest tasks so others don’t have to experience the hardship. I’d rather shoulder the responsibilities so others can live and work more freely.

I don’t mind that my default is to serve others in this way, as it’s made me the person I am today, but there are some definite downfalls to this. The one that is most pertinent to this article centers around having hard conversations, especially when I don’t like what I’m seeing or how others are acting.

Hard conversations
For me, I’ll soak up things like a sponge until I can’t soak up anymore. I’ll go and go and go. Do more, help more, move things out of the way more. But eventually I hit a point where I can’t do anymore, and I tend to react in one way. I blow up. I get angry. I don’t act like a responsible and balanced adult. Any of this sound familiar? Maybe not. Maybe you don’t have an outburst, but instead you retreat. You shut down and quit. You walk away from the situation, never to return. Quit the job because you can’t handle being around that person or that boss, rather than try to confront the situation.

Maybe you’re my antistyle – the type that is blunt and direct. Man alive, am I envious at times of this personality type. To speak more plainly and address things as they come on. Sure, this style has its pitfalls as well, tending to portray the person as one who is largely unapproachable and difficult to have a meaningful and impactful conversation with. I’ve heard folks refer to this personality type as robots. People who have a difficult time making change happen without causing frustration on the other end of the conversation.

I’ll ask a question we all should ask ourselves as leaders when faced with adversity, “How did that go?” How did the people you’re around respond to the outburst? How did it go after you quit and walked away, to hold onto those thoughts and feelings, to never confront the issue and let it fester in your life? I’ll bet it hasn’t served you well in either situation, the same way it hasn’t served me well, especially in a work scenario. Especially in our work scenarios, where the consequences of doing something slightly wrong carry massive impact. How it takes less than a second for a normal day to turn into a scary, life-threatening moment that might lead to someone not going home. Make no bones about it, while we all love this work, it has inherent risk that we must confront and mitigate each and every day. There are no relaxing days in our world. Gravity is always on, chain saws are always sharp, power lines are energized, etc.

Tough crowd
I have the unique honor and pleasure of working with arborists all over the United States.

One thing I’ve noticed is that people, and especially tree people, are stubborn. We don’t like change, big or small, especially when it comes to how we conduct our work. We take a great deal of pride in what we do and what we’re able to accomplish in a day. How we are able to preserve trees and ensure they live a long life. That we can make a tree disappear from this earth faster than anyone else in town. That we are God’s gift to this green world with how well we can operate equipment. It’s all true, and I’ll be the first person to admit to this type of pride and hubris. We think our way is the best way, and we don’t like to hear otherwise.

What happens, however, is that often it takes something happening close to home to enact change in how our work is done. To start wearing the proper personal protective equipment (PPE). To implement proper work practices that ensure injuries and damage don’t happen. It’s sad that we arborists are bound and determined to learn this way, but it’s how things have historically played out. Someone gets hurt, we analyze what happened, we roll out a new policy, procedure and/or standard – hopefully it gets talked about as a group – and then we go on with doing tree work.

Why the heck do we have to be this way? Why can’t we be proactive in preventing accidents and injuries, as opposed to being reactive in the way we as an industry always have been? I appreciate rules; remember, I’m a firstborn child, and our birth-order default is to be dutiful and follow rules. But I’m sorry, rules aren’t fixing the issues fast enough. We continue to have struck-bys and falls out of trees, be electrocuted and cut ourselves with chain saws, all with either poor work practices (one-handing) and/or not wearing PPE.

I’ve asked myself in the past, what if we change the way we do our work? Only do a certain type of work, hold clients to higher standards, hire trainers at every tree company in the world, only have specific equipment that is impossible to be misconfigured and have manufacturers supply every arborist with chain-saw pants, fancy helmets, communication systems, ear protection and eye protection? Wouldn’t that be nice and make things easy? It probably would, but that feels like a dream state/utopian-type solution to the situation, and one that I’d argue isn’t fast enough, either.

See something, say something
So, if these options aren’t fixing things fast enough, what could? That’s where this topic was born, with having the gumption and caring enough about the people you work alongside each and every day to say something when you see something. The overwhelming majority of the folks I work with aren’t working by themselves. It feels silly to say that, but when we go out to do jobs, we are working with other people and as a team to accomplish the task that day. We don’t always get along with one another, but we share the mindset that we all want to go home today and not have anything happen. Why not tap into that feeling?

It’s not that we all need to hold hands and sing songs to breed togetherness in order to get lasting change. Our hands are sweaty, and few of us can sing well. We need the rules and standards. We need to have more buy-in from manufacturers, companies and leadership to fix things. We need to be brave enough to say something when we see something that isn’t right. Like most things in life, it’s not as simple as implementing one magic pill to fix it all, but the conversation point is the one we have the most access to each and every day.

However, it has to start with us as individuals believing what we say enough to stick up for it, even when it’s hard. Even when no one is around. Even if it’s something we’ve done for years and can probably get away with. Set the standard individually and be unrelenting in how hard you work to follow your own standard. I promise, your people are watching to see if you practice what you preach.

Culture is what is tolerated, and a culture of safety is no different. If we enable poor and unsafe work practices, it will continue to be that way. I believe it also is important to highlight that change takes time, and no matter what route we choose to focus on, it’s not going to happen overnight.

Concepts for change
In my presentation at TCI EXPO ’24, I highlighted a few key points I’ve learned to apply that inspire me to have the hard conversations. I went through leadership training from G1 Solutions several years ago, and they shared these points. The concepts are pretty simple and not overly original, but adhering to them has helped me when I find myself frustrated on a job site or struggling to get a conversation started around something specific.

Assume the best: Trust that everyone is operating out of a mindset that they are doing the best they know how to do and giving you everything they have. It’s why I started the article by highlighting that we are all human and have unique thoughts and perspectives, but also that we won’t ever know everything going on in someone else’s head. So, as leaders, we should be trusting and assume that our people are doing the best. It has helped me reframe my own feelings by starting this way. That the person I’m staring at is giving me all of what they have to give in that moment, but maybe they don’t know the impact they are having on those around them. In most cases, this concept of extending grace toward another has helped me approach the conversation with a much more level head.

Call up, not out: Mind your tone when speaking with someone. I am highly sensitive to someone’s tone, and especially on a loud job site, I have misinterpreted people’s words because of the tone in which they’re communicated. So, when it comes to speaking to someone about, for example, not wearing chaps when cutting with a chain saw, mind your tone. Reinforce that we are a team working together, and that if they get hurt, we can’t work together as a team. We’re down a person, they’re out of work and it’s a bummer all around. Call them up to help see the solution rather than yell at them about how dumb they are for not doing something so basic, even if that’s what you want to do. Flat out, no one responds well to that approach, and it’s proven to not create lasting change.

Discover their why: Be curious about the people you are working with. Knowing what makes someone tick, what excites and motivates them – as well as what depresses and demotivates them – are wildly important data points. Ask questions. Why do they do this work? How have they learned to do the things they do? Why do they choose to not wear a helmet when they have one in the truck? Are they lacking motivation or the ability for a task? Are there things going on that you don’t know? I find that relationship building helps to have the necessary conversations. The person you’re speaking with feels that curiosity, that care in who they are and in their lives. It might not lead to a change that day in them choosing to do the right thing – and when it comes to PPE, I am quick to call it out – but it reinforces with this curiosity and explains why you’re asking them to wear the PPE.

Make a plan: It’s well and good to talk about things, but it’s vital to have a plan moving forward with that person. Accountability is a bit of a buzz word these days, probably because we all are lacking it in some form or another. But to change anything, we need to have something and someone to be accountable to. Write down what needs to be done and be specific. Have a start date and an end date. The timeframe is important, because it gives everyone a goalpost to chase down. But be realistic with the timeframe. Too short and too long are both ineffective. Something like wearing PPE every day is a shorter timeframe, whereas one-handing a chain saw is going to take longer to correct. Keep that in mind with the action you are trying to correct. Follow up and check in often, ideally at the end of every week. It doesn’t have to be long, but it’s important to do it in real time and do it consistently, otherwise it loses effectiveness and the lasting change won’t happen.

Conclusion
Ultimately, this whole thing is about taking accountability for what we can control. Each of us gets to show up at a place to work each day, and we all get the opportunity to be a little bit better today than we were yesterday. Just as Rome was not built in a day, the perfect company culture will not be either. It takes lots and lots of hard, intentional work toward improvement. Toward growth. Toward the evolution of an organization. It starts with having conversations, with saying something when we see something and with accountability.
That accountability, however, needs to start with us, as leaders, setting and holding a high standard for ourselves and then inspiring that change down the chain. Pour into your direct reports and encourage them to do the same. Work together and, as my good friend loves to say, “Do good, be good.”

Jeff Inman Jr., CTSP, is an ISA Certified Arborist, is ISA Tree Risk Assessment Qualified and is an ISA Tree Worker Climber Specialist. He is national safety director for Canopy Service Partners, a two-year TCIA corporate member company based in Chicago, Illinois. He previously was risk manager with Truetimber Arborists Inc., an accredited, 23-year TCIA member company based in Richmond, Virginia, now a Canopy Service Partners company, and is Truetimber Academy director.

This article was based on his presentation on the same topic at TCI EXPO ’24 in Baltimore, Maryland.