Work Experience - The essential year two module at treeschool.
I have my first start at a tree services company – I'm a groundie in a domestic arb team. This is my first time working as part of a tree services team and so I am starting from the absolute bottom.
NOTE: I’m not using real names for the company or the people in this piece, because I haven’t asked or cleared it them. They’d probably be cool about it, but still. This is one place where I will ask permission rather than forgiveness.1
A big part of the second year at treeschool is work experience. The actual amount of required hours is relatively small at 150, but the unit plays a central role in the second year of the course. No work experience, no pass. It is that simple. It also cannot be fudged in that I can claim that me working in my woodland is work experience because it isn’t.
If you bear in mind this course is designed and typically attended by those aged 16 - 20 who have never had a “job” before then you can understand this. However, I’m in my mid-forties and I’ve been working now for nearly thirty straight years in various jobs. Here’s the thing though - none of that matters. The work experience unit is designed to get you out of your shell and break you into the work of a chosen pathway. In my case, domestic arb work. I am not special and I don’t bring with me any pre-qualifications in the field of arb so I go right in at the ground level. Literally, I’m a groundie.
A groundie, depending on who you speak to about it, is either the grunt or the kingpin of an arb operation. Let’s assume, given my total lack of experience that I am a grunt. Mainly I expect to be moving bits of tree, chipping bits of tree, fuelling and oiling saws, starting saws, tying stuff onto ropes and generally getting shouted at to do stuff that I should be doing, but have not yet figured out that I should be doing.
The Night Before.
Thursday, 7:56pm. In just over twelve hours I start on a “test day” at a local arb company. I’ve not cleared it with them if they mind me talking about them directly, so for now they are “the arb company”. I am nervous but I have had a LOT of nerve wracking experiences since I started treeschool and whilst I am not getting used to them, I am getting used to how they make me react and behave.
Yes, I should be nervous. Yes, tomorrow I will make mistakes that I should not be making. I don’t intend to make major mistakes, and I am aware of the work we will be doing is dangerous where fatality is on the list of things that can happen. Minor mistakes are fine, it is how I react to them that matters.
It is now 8:10pm. Yes, it takes me 14 minutes to write this much, so I’m going to wrap it up there. I start at 08:10. That’s exactly twelve hours from now.
Eight minutes before I leave.
It’s happening. I need to get there for 8:10am and that’s boots on, bag on back and ready to go at 8:10am. Realistically, that means arriving for 8:05am, which means allowing 15 minutes in the bank for traffic anomalies. I’m telling mapping software2 I need to arrive for 7:45am. It is now 7:07am, and the software informs me that I need to leave at 7:15am. So I leave in 8 minutes and not in the thirty minutes that I’d leave if I had been working there for eons and knew the traffic inside out.
Time to sleep the machine and get my boots on; the next words will be after I return from my first day as an actual paid newbie arborist working as a groundie with a team of seasoned arborists. Watch and learn Jamie, watch and learn. But don’t forget to be a good groundie.
This is a test day though, the real test is in if they invite me back for two days a week. Honestly, I don’t know if they will and I’m preparing for both outcomes.
Ok, I’m back – First Day Done - will I be returning?
Short answer – yes.
I’d love to write more, but it’s 7:22pm. I got home at about 6pm (traffic) and had to move these two into the log store. After a day moving trees about all day at work, I came home to spend another hour and a half moving more bits of tree in the rain.
Sunday Morning.
I did want to sit down and write this all up yesterday morning, but there was Saturday stuff to get done. In short, I had a great day and I am really excited to get back out there, which is good because I’ve been asked back for Wednesdays and Fridays for the next month. This is the best possible outcome for me and I am elated.
I was one of a team of three. The dude who’d been there for fourteen years (aka the lead climber who I will give the name “John”), the dudette who’d just finished her two year apprenticeship (let’s call her “Jane” ) and was now experienced and 100% able to do everything she’d need to, and me - wet, green, able to use saws and chippers with a can do attitude thrown in for good measure (the groundie). There was also the owner of the company (“Bob”) who demonstrated that he was quite happy to work when he turned up on the first job and assisted me with the cleanup.
We did two jobs on Friday. The first was a two metre reduction on a 25 metre section of conifer hedge with a pruning of a small-medium cherry tree. The second was a trimming job on 15 metres of mixed hedge. As a groundie, I was the person who mostly picked stuff up, who mostly dragged it from where the climbers put it and who mostly ran it through the chipper. I say mostly because Jane helped me out when she was out of work to do. Jane was kind to do this, she didn’t have to and I would have happily accepted being given more work to do.
In terms of tools I used the chipper and a petrol blower. I didn’t actually touch a saw on Friday. I was too busy converting tree and hedge into chips, raking and brushing stuff up. I don’t want to bore you all to death, which I fear I would if I gave a blow by blow account of the day and there’s only so much you can say about hedge trimming and reductions. “There was more, now there is less, we used tools to do it and we cleaned it up for you” pretty much sums it up.
I didn’t trim any hedges and I didn’t touch any parts of the customers trees whilst they were still connected to their root systems. This was my expectation and will probably remain my expectation for a while. My days will mostly look like the above picture.
What did I learn?
I learned that there’s no one to shout “public” when a member of public appears, so I had to be extra vigilant when using the chipper on the street and also ensure that the pathways were as free from debris as can reasonably be expected whilst trimming a hedge on a public highway.
I learned that ‘conifer arm’ is a thing. Leylandi and Cedar are both not that fun to handle in a t-shirt. They have scaled needles that when you handle them directly both irritate the skin, prick it and cut it. My arms are back to normal now, but tap dancing Christ they were savaged on Friday night. I also learned – the hard way, that hedges often contain brambles. I have a few choice cuts on my arms. Fortunately the van contains a pair of thick suede gauntlets, which I immediately put on.
The biggest thing I learned though, is that I still have so much to learn. There’s a world of difference between how this team handled these jobs and how I handled the three solo jobs I’ve done. Yes, this team has chippers and blowers and all the things that make jobs go quicker, but the real difference was the things you cannot buy. It was the attitude, approach and the confidence.
It is often said that the difference between an amateur and a professional isn’t in the quality of the outcome, it is in the time taken to do the job to a certain standard. Often the amateur will produce a better outcome in terms of standard, but will have spent many, many times longer getting to that point than the professional. You cannot be taught how to be a professional. You can certainly be tutored on how to get there faster, but the reality of it is that you must become a professional. You develop the attitude to the work, the team I worked with very much had this professional attitude.
As cleaning up was my main role as a groundie on hedge works, I need to know what the the standard is for cleaning up. As you’ll know from my third solo tree job, I go to the “far end of a fart” when left to my own devices. When I’m working for someone else, efficiency comes into play. If there was a scale in which “far end of a fart” was the extreme for too much and “you’re joking mate” was the extreme for too little, I need calibrating here. Jane was happy to oblige and show me. This is one example of where I have to develop the attitude, learn the approach and then become confident.
Treeschool can teach you the skills and show you mechanically how it is done, but it is me the student who had to learn how to become the professional. This is why work experience is central to second year. No experience, no pass.
Thanks for reading, I appreciate your attention.
Cheers
Jamie.
You can take me away from data protection and information security, but you cannot take data protection and information security from me. I’m now hardwired for it.
Waze is my preference, but it slays battery, Apple maps on the other hand is kinder to the battery.
"... but the real difference was the things you cannot buy. It was the attitude, approach and the confidence."
Reminds me of when I worked with 'Dangerous' Frank, an old school carpenter, during the summer after my first year at furniture school. I learned a lot about tools and house-building, but most importantly I learned how to be a tradesman -- at least that's when I started becoming a tradesman.
The part that the public sees, using various tools, is just the tip of the iceberg.