Released: December 24, 2023
Joe discusses the challenges and triumphs of balancing business management with personal life, the vision behind Landscape Ontario’s training initiatives, and the importance of empowering employees for overall company and community growth.
“The ones that have the hardest time are the ones that can’t separate it.”
– Joe Salemi
Here’s what we discuss in today’s episode:
- Introduction to Joe and Landscape Ontario: Joe shares the growth of Landscape Ontario and its strategic vision for the future.
- Balancing Work and Life: Joe talks about the importance of support systems in business and life.
- The Art of Delegation: Joe and Robert discuss the necessity of trusting and empowering teams.
- Vision for Landscape Ontario: Joe highlights upcoming projects and funding for a new training facility.
- Leadership and Long-Term Planning: The conversation shifts to strategic visioning and the long-term impacts of thoughtful leadership.
- Inspirational Resources: Joe recommends significant resources and authors that have influenced his leadership style.
Actionable Key Takeaways:
- Delegate to Empower: Delegate tasks to trust your team and improve business efficiency.
- Strategic Visioning: Invest time in strategic planning to realize long-term visions.
- Harmony in Work and Life: Balance professional and personal life to enhance overall happiness and productivity.
- Funding Growth: Explore funding opportunities for business growth and development.
- Leadership Development: Engage with inspirational leaders and resources to continuously improve leadership skills.
Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
- Leadership book: “The Leadership Contract” by Vince Molinaro
- Hospitality and service insights book: “Setting the Table” by Danny Meyer
- Landscape Ontario Congress and trade shows
- Upcoming training facility project funded by the Ministry of Labor
Episode Transcript
Robert
00:00
Hi, everyone, and welcome to the I am landscape Growth podcast, where entrepreneurs help entrepreneurs grow faster, better, and stronger in the green industry. From leadership to sales to recruiting and operational excellence. We cover the topics holding entrepreneurs back and share how to get past those bottlenecks with the best in the industry. I’m your host, Rob Murray, co founder and CEO of Intrigue, a digital marketing company focused on helping landscape companies grow. So sit back and enjoy the show. Welcome back to another episode of the I am Landscape Growth podcast. Today I have an amazing guest, Joe Selemi, executive director of Landscape Ontario. Thanks for doing this, Joe.
Joe
00:39
Hey, Rob, thanks for having me.
Robert
00:42
As usual, to give the audience some context to who they’re listening to. Can you give us a Cole’s notes of, like, the experience you’ve had and how it’s all culminated into the position you’re in now? Because it’s kind of a unique kind of job history. When checking out your LinkedIn profile before doing the interview, I could see how it lend well to where you are today, but maybe you can give some folks a bit of background and help us understand how you ended up leading one of the largest landscape associations in Canada.
Joe
01:09
Yeah, I fell into this completely by accident. I had no idea there was a world. Yeah, I had no idea there’s a world of not for profit trade associations out there. I wrapped up my undergrad at Brock University and I did a postgrad at Mohawk. It was their first postgraduate human resource program. Then I had no idea what the hell I wanted to do. And sure enough, I’ve been working, doing something else and just started throwing in resumes. And I came across this organization was the Canadian Nursery Landscape association, and they were looking for a communications coordinator. And sure enough, you know, that was what my undergrad was in, is business communications. So I thought, that sounds close enough, I think, right? And, you know, I tossed my resume in and I never thought anything would come of that.
Joe
02:14
And it was December 23 and is Victor Santa Cruz, who’s now their current executive director, called me and he said, hey, Joey, really like what we see on paper. Can you come in for interview? This was December 23 in the afternoon. You know, everybody’s got Christmas events going.
Robert
02:28
On, literally the day before Christmas Eve.
Joe
02:31
You got it. So I said, heck yes, I’ll be there. And I hadn’t been in a job interview in a long time, let alone tie a tie, wear a suit. So I got, how do I do this? We’re talking 2002. Internet really was just becoming a thing. YouTube was just becoming a thing. Looked on YouTube. How to tie a tie. Anyway, long story short, it was the fact that I told Victor that I had to learn how to tie and the fact that I was successful in tying my tie that landed me the job. I spent ten years there, and I did everything under the sun. And that’s the benefit of working in a not for profit organization connected to the landscape industry. Made it even better.
Joe
03:15
I got the opportunity to do everything from negotiating massive deals with John Deere and Caterpillar and General Motors to advocating on behalf of industry with federal government and provincial governments. And then at the end of that, I spent ten years there. And by the end of that ten years, I got recruited out by a company that a lot in the industry known as Dynascape Software. And so I got recruited out, ran that company for eight years, and in that time, I had the super cool opportunity to consult with just hundreds of landscape companies. So I was able to really develop a career in observing and understanding the challenges that landscape companies go through every single day.
Robert
04:05
Yeah, super cool, man. Like, very few people have that kind of, like, view and history and experience.
Joe
04:10
Right, right. But not just in Ontario, not just in Canada, but across North America and overseas. And so really got to see an awesome cross section of what industry looks like globally. And then, sure enough, you know, a gentleman by the name of Tony DiGiovanni comes along from landscape Ontario.
Robert
04:30
Kind of a popular guy. I’m not afraid of it. Yeah.
Joe
04:33
Yeah. You know, cast a really long shadow. Anyway, he had offered me a job probably three times officially over the course of my career, and it had never been either the right time or the right job that I was looking for. And jokingly, I’m the last one. Not joking, but not joking. You know, I said, tony, when you’re ready to retire, you let me know. And when I left the CNLA the first time, I’d always had in the back of my head that landscape Ontario would be kind of my dream if that opportunity ever came up. Anyway, he and I were having breakfast ahead of the annual general meeting at Congress, January 2020. And he said, joe, I decided when I’m going to retire, and I’d like you to be part of my retirement plan, my succession plan.
Joe
05:26
What felt like minutes that I had my jaw on the floor after I picked up my jaw and I said tony, you know what? That sounds like a dream come true to me. Let’s figure out how to make that happen. And here we are. When did you start? So I started with landscape Ontario. April 1, 2022. Weeks after the world shutdown. No joke.
Robert
05:49
All right, so you’re in. See ya.
Joe
05:52
Here we go. Jump right in. Let’s go. So he and I had, I mean, the timing, who could have predicted, you know, the world shutting down? But it was always planned that were going to have about a two and a half year Runway by the time he retired and I would take over as executive director. So we had two and a half years of transition time where I got to learn from him and I kind of got to put my signature on some things. And I couldn’t have asked for any better of a transition than that, quite honestly.
Robert
06:28
So what was it that made the transition so good? And this isn’t just from your perspective, but maybe for other people to listen to as they’re looking at transitioning their businesses. What does make succession work? And that transition, like two and a half years to some people might seem like a really long time. And then you’re saying that it could have been, it couldn’t have been better. What was it that made it so great?
Joe
06:46
Yeah. First of all, our value system aligned perfectly. Like you and Tony. Yeah, Tony and I, our value system really aligned well. Our styles are similar. Like, we’re very unique in the way that we handle things, but our styles, the way that we approach things from a people, from a human perspective, really aligned. You know, the entire two and a half years, we probably stepped on each other’s toes three times in that amount of time. So I think I stepped on my.
Robert
07:14
Wife’S toes three times in the first time we danced, you know?
Joe
07:17
Right, right. So, you know, what I would say is that what made that transition period so successful is, you know, we had a really open and honest conversation right at the beginning to say tony, you know, because I came in wanting to take any kind of weight off of his shoulders that I could. So I asked him, what are some things that you don’t really enjoy doing right now that you could give away right away and that I could just run with and gave me all the things that he didn’t exactly have fun doing, you know, in his last few years as executive director. And I wanted to make his last few years as enjoyable as possible. You know, you guys had a career of 33 years with landscape Ontario, so I also wanted to make sure that was a success.
Joe
08:03
You know, we were both invested to make sure that this transition was as good as it possibly could have been.
Robert
08:08
Cool, man. That’s great. Value alignment is super important. So I mentioned this to you before we started recording. And one of the reasons we love having conversations with folks in your position is because you have such a wide, broad perspective of what’s going on in the industry, as opposed to when we interview entrepreneurs who, as much as they might be part of peer groups, still kind of really are focused on their business. And so they should be.
Joe
08:31
Yeah.
Robert
08:32
The whole theme of this podcast is understanding what the growth constraints are, holding entrepreneurs back, and trying to find stories and bright spots and people that are breaking through them. So there’s always a common couple of answers to this, but what do you see right now as the common growth constraint in the green industry for landscape entrepreneurs?
Joe
08:53
Yeah. Uniquely positioned. I get to see what a lot of landscape business owners are doing and not doing and where they’re having a lot of trouble. There is a workforce out there and hallelujah. Yeah, more people need to hear it, right? There is a workforce, but where the growth constraints are, is around the business owners not being how they could adopt or take on people that have either physical or mental health barriers and those kinds of things. If more employers could adjust their level of where they think the barriers might be, it opens up an entirely different workforce that’s available right now today.
Robert
09:40
Very cool. So essentially, you know, there might be people that some think aren’t fit for this job or maybe aren’t able to do the job, but if we take a bit of a different perspective, could open up a huge opportunity. Can you just be a bit more specific and help us? Maybe give us an example of something that you’re talking about?
Joe
09:59
Yeah, I’ll give you an example. You know, there’s some people out there that want to start working today, but might not be able to have, maybe don’t have the physical strength to lift 50 to 75 pounds with any kind of regularity. But we know now, especially in hardscaping, there are tremendous lifting tool aids that companies can invest in that can allow people to be very productive, that’s not going to break their back, and that will allow them to lift with frequency throughout the day.
Robert
10:35
Yeah, yeah.
Joe
10:36
So investing in equipment and tools and technology opens up a whole nother workforce with people that might have those physical barriers that we’re just not thinking about.
Robert
10:48
I love it. And have you seen an example of somebody embracing something like this and like, having, like, success with it?
Joe
10:56
I’m seeing it with quite a few of our members now with landscape Ontario, as through our work with the grow program, we recruit people all the time with physical barriers, and we’re seeing employers adjust where they think the barriers might be. And, you know, as soon as you start to get that open mindset, that growth mindset, the world of opportunity just changes. So, you know, working with the employers through this program, it helps open their eyes to what kind of accommodation you might be able to do or investment in some of these kinds of tools that all of a sudden now you just have people ready to work where you’re not, you know, searching for people non stop.
Robert
11:44
So I’m a landscape entrepreneur listening to this right now, and I’m like, okay, that sounds great, but, like, what the f. Are you talking about? And how do I start to learn how to do this? Like, what do I do?
Joe
11:53
Yeah, first, what I would suggest is if you’re on, if you’re in Ontario, go to our website and go to growtraining. Ca will help you navigate all of those potential barriers that might exist with people with physical barriers or mental health barriers. We have a program for that. We have an employer program to help you through that, and we’ll help you navigate it. And anyone that approaches you that might have some difficulty lifting or just being able to have that physical stamina throughout the day, we have resources to help you with that.
Robert
12:29
Very cool. And so the website, if you go to Google landscape Ontario, and then there’s a link on there, just go to growthtraining cash grow training ca.
Joe
12:39
G r O W. Training ca.
Robert
12:41
Yeah, very cool. And, you know, it’s interesting, too. Like, I mean, this is the first time someone has mentioned this specifically around, you know, there is a workforce, and maybe it’s just not the workforce you thought was the one that you were looking for. But there is a common theme and people, you know, typically we find that there’s, like, there’s kind of three answers. The most common one is there’s no. There’s no people. That’s the constraint. There’s no staff. There’s just people don’t exist, which, I mean, whatever. And then the next one is workforce development. And I feel like your answer is almost like a part of that, in that, like, you know, just because someone doesn’t have the skills to do the job today doesn’t mean we can’t build the skills to them tomorrow.
Robert
13:22
And then what I hear from association presidents, executive directors, folks in your position across Canada and the US is that the most successful landscape companies focus on safety and training. Like, there’s got to be a common thread there in terms of people that are making it work.
Joe
13:38
No, they’re 100% Israel. Workforce development is 100% the answer. There’s no magic bullet. For sure there’s not. But it’s a key piece to the puzzle. And I always hear people say when I invest in my employees, it’s just going to set them up so that they go work for someone else and then they’re trained and, you know, set up to better with working for.
Robert
14:09
So I shouldn’t train anybody ever.
Joe
14:11
Yeah, but what happens if you don’t train them and they stay right? So are you any better off? So why not? Why not invest in them? And, you know, investing in your people from a professional development perspective, first of all, makes them feel more part of the organization. It lets them know that you’re investing in them and in their future and what a culture that builds. So the more you invest in them, ultimately, at least the hope is some loyalty comes along with that. And for the most part, I think it does. When you have a culture of safety and professionalism, those are the companies that just absolutely crush it every day.
Robert
14:58
Yeah, that’s cool, man. And, you know, it’s like we might have planned this, but, you know, if I’m sitting there as an entrepreneur running, leading a landscape business and I’m like, well, you know, it’s all fine and dandy that I want to develop my team and train my team. So I got to develop this big training program and I’m super busy. I’m doing quotes, I’m trying to, like, hire, and I got to build this, you know, training program. That seems very daunting. But wait, maybe there’s some help from the association.
Joe
15:28
No, there totally is.
Robert
15:29
Yeah. So what does that look like? If I want to invest in my team to get them growing, how do I leverage my relationship with you guys?
Joe
15:38
Yeah, I think sometimes the association that they belong to or have heard of is kind of an afterthought. And that’s totally okay. We’re here when you’re ready. But we’ve got a professional development series that runs from middle of November till end of March. And we probably got a menu of 140 different seminars that you can take over that period of time, either in person or virtually through landscape Ontario. All the in person sessions are run out of our facility here in Milton. We’ve got a world class conference center that handles up to 350 people now.
Robert
16:15
Yeah, it’s awesome.
Joe
16:16
It’s unbelievable. We’re so lucky to have this place. So, you know, technically, if a landscape business owner wanted to send their people to training every single day at landscape Ontario in the off season, if they don’t do snow or when there’s no snow events. They absolutely could. They could have them enrolled in training full time in the off season.
Robert
16:37
That’s huge. And one of the things I think it’s really interesting is not only are you going to have them train from the program, but they’re also going to be around other like minded people that are wanting to build themselves up. So they’re building this, like, camaraderie and peer to peer network. Not to mention that if you’re an owner and want go do some of the training yourself, you get to be exposed to the people that are doing all this stuff. So can you speak a little bit to that? Because, like, I think sometimes people are like, yeah, I’ll just send my guys, gals, whatever, and hopefully they’ll get the skill, but they don’t necessarily think about all the other components of getting involved themselves and the other benefits people get from being exposed to that type of, like, learning environment.
Joe
17:16
Yeah, we’re really intentional about how we structure our training and professional development series. There’s quite a bit of networking that’s built into the sessions every single day in the off season, there’s 20 minutes breaks, there’s an hour lunch. And the idea is the people that are taking the seminars get an opportunity to talk to each other and to get to know each other a little bit better and grow their own network. I mean, how many of us can trace their success back to the network that they had built at an earlier age, earlier on in their career? And so when you’re able to do that, first of all, you know, a business owner sending their people to sessions like that, full day seminars at Landscape Ontario, it gives that person a much broader perspective.
Joe
18:06
You know, there’s much more to the industry than just what they’re doing on an everyday basis now. They’re becoming, they’ve become part of something much bigger. And that’s an incredible feeling right there. But then on top of that, now they’ve been able to grow their own network and they’ve been able to develop their own relationships with some of their peers at the employee level, maybe the supervisory level, that now that they can draw and say, hey, I’m having difficulty with this. I can ring them up, send them a text and just say, hey, I’m dealing with this. How would you deal with that? Or I just need somebody to vent to right now. You get that support network that’s outside of your own bubble, which is really important.
Robert
18:46
Yeah. And then, you know, it just leads me to this thought, and, you know, you probably see it or exposed to it more. You know, we here, we’re fortunate in that I think we’ve done a decent job as an organization, building a strong culture. And then, you know, we hear team members talk about how, like, they’re so lucky when they go and talk to their friends, and then they hear about their friends cultures and where they’re working. They’re like, oh, my God, we do have it pretty sweet. It just makes me think about the value from an owner’s perspective to build a strong culture. Who then is sending people to people where they’re learning, they’re talking about their work environments. Then one person’s like, oh, what do you do over there?
Robert
19:25
And like, I just don’t know if there’s enough emphasis on, like, building a strong work environment to breed personal growth and opportunities. So have you seen anything like that in some stories where people are building some stuff and just starts to gravitate?
Joe
19:40
Yeah. There’s a company in Toronto that is all about culture. They’re culture hounds, we’d call them. Whatever they do is specifically to either build or maintain the culture that they have in place, and they protect it at all costs. So when someone is operating outside of the values within their culture, they either dial it in real quick or, you know, have to make some decisions about letting some people go. So it’s really important. And, you know, when you are really focused on maintaining and building your culture, sending your employees out into the ether to go get training and talk to other people, you don’t have to worry about them leaving. You don’t have to worry about them leaving because they’re going to. They’re going to come back. They’ve fallen in love with the organization.
Joe
20:35
And what we know today is that especially with younger folks, they need to be connected to their work, needs to be connected to purpose. And when there’s a strong culture in the organization, they’re going to want to be connected to that. And so, you know, and really investing in that. Sending your people to training. This one company that I’m thinking of in Toronto, they’re in East York. The level of gratitude that they show their people on every single day basis, they have a kudos board. So, you know, they. And they talk about during their tailgate meetings in the morning, they’ll do a kudos conversation. So when a customer calls in or sends an email or a text and says, hey, thanks, and just want to call out that particular employee, they do it in front of the entire company.
Joe
21:26
Yeah, sweet and just really cool.
Robert
21:29
So then you talk about training the network, getting peers out, development of culture when it comes to one of the things we see. And if you’re listening to this and you are a member of Landscape Ontario, then pat on the back and you’re listening to this and you’re not a member of Landscape Ontario, but one of the things we see time and time again with our clients is that members of associations are more successful. We enjoy them more as clients. Not to say we don’t like people that aren’t, but there’s just this really high correlation to success, business success, and being part of industry association. So, like. And then even more so with the people that get involved.
Robert
22:09
So whether it’s committees and boards, but, like, the more people put into these things, we just see it almost one to one, translating into business success. Can you just share, like, what it is from your perspective that makes that happen? Like, what is that about?
Joe
22:23
I think by the time they’ve got to the stage where they realize that there is power and belonging to something that’s bigger than them, a community that has the industry’s interests in mind, by the time they get to that stage, they’re already focused on trying to be a better employer in a better company. So when they get involved with an organization like Landscape Ontario, they’re already in the mindset that they want to invest in their people and send people to training and do their professional development and get connected to committees and sector groups and do community give back projects. They’re already in that mindset. And then all landscape Ontario is doing is acting as the conduit and facilitating that. Right.
Joe
23:12
But by the time they’ve entered that mindset where they want to start doing those kinds of things, that they’ve already entered into the awareness that’s something that they want to get involved in. All we’re doing is facilitating it.
Robert
23:25
Yeah. And making it almost taking. Making it easier for them to do what they’re hoping to do already.
Joe
23:29
You got it.
Robert
23:30
Yeah. That’s cool. At the same time, though, I also hear people saying, I’m too busy to be a part of this right now. And that could be anything. Not your association, but anything. But the people that are the most involved, I find are the most successful and have the most time. So there’s this very weird dynamic. I just don’t know. Like, have you observed the same thing? Do you know what I’m talking about?
Joe
23:49
Yeah. There’s this old analogy that busy people can get way more done.
Robert
23:54
Yeah.
Joe
23:55
You know, and it’s those kinds of folks that, you know, when they’re already busy, realize that, you know, they’re too busy not to do something like that. They can’t afford not to do that. So regardless of how busy they are, they got to do it anyway and incrementally. Is it really going to take up that much more time? But the overall value and the payoff is going to be that much is more exponential.
Robert
24:22
Yeah, it’s massive. Switching gears a little bit, we talked a little bit about this before. In your position, you are the leader of leaders. You know, you’ve got a staff, but you’ve also got a bunch of people in committees and on boards and a bunch of volunteer leaders. So there’s not a lot of position, power or authority. And, or if you use that approach, maybe it doesn’t work so well. So from like, a leadership perspective, what have you learned when it comes to, you know, leading a group of a type personalities that run their own businesses and are there on their own time?
Joe
24:59
Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, you get a table full of alpha personalities. Everyone wants to be heard. Everyone’s opinion is the one that matters and it’s the right one. And it’s the right one. And, you know, in a committee environment, in a board environment, it’s all good. And divergent thought is actually really encouraged. So we want to hear everybody’s opinion. But, yeah, it’s not always easy, but at the same time, taking a collaborative style approach and empathetic approach I think has really led to landscape Ontario being able to do some really cool things around the board table and across the committees. Every single one of our committees has adopted a consensus style approach.
Joe
25:50
So when there is something that might be a little bit contentious around a conversation, we get the temperature of the room and say, how do we all feel about that? You know, if someone with a, you know, if we had a reporter in front of us tomorrow, you know, a reporter from CP 24 and they had the microphone and the camera in front of us, how would we respond? And are we okay with that response? So let’s make sure we’re good with it now and we’re all on the same page in case that ever were to happen. So having that approach and that philosophy gets us to consensus pretty often.
Joe
26:27
And so even though you’ve got a lot of strong personalities around the table and some of the people have been around the table for 20 plus years that they’ve been involved with the organization, divergent thought is always welcome. It’s always healthy to have to explore all the angles. And then at the end of the day, we’re all singing from the same song sheet by the end of the meeting.
Robert
26:53
That’s cool. And not easy to do, right? It takes patience.
Joe
26:56
I imagine an incredible amount of patience. And sometimes, you know, you just got to let conversations go and conversations will meander and they’ll take different flavors and the temperature of the room can go up and down. But by the end, even though we might not all personally agree with the direction, we believe it’s the right direction for the organization.
Robert
27:20
And then people can just kind of like, okay, we made our decision. Let’s move on and be good with what we’ve made a decision on, which takes a lot of maturity and the leadership to make that happen. That’s not necessarily a simple thing to do. So, you know, hats off to you, Joe. So you’ve got a neat perspective. We talked about that at the beginning, like working with Dynascape, working at the nursery and Landscape association. Now working at Landscape Ontario, you’re probably exposed to more than 1000, you know, landscape businesses on a one to one level. You know, literally what is the thing that you see make people the most successful? And doesn’t mean the biggest companies, but just that they’re rocking, they’re making money, they’ve. They’re liking their loving life.
Robert
28:04
They got a smile on their face, and they’re running their show the way they want to. What do you see as like one or two of the most common denominators over the, you know, decade plus, maybe two decades that you’ve been doing this for?
Joe
28:15
Yeah, first, I love that. First of all, what I’ve been able to observe is those companies that are the. And maybe we’ll narrow it down to those business owners that are the most happiest. They know themselves the best in the type of work that they do, and they really focus in on what they’re great at. And then don’t try to be everything to anybody, everybody, you know, they’ve got the right amount of staff to do the work. They’ve got the office support, no matter how large.
Joe
28:46
We could even talk about a small company, but making sure that you have the back office support so that it’s not the business owner that’s in the field all day on the tools and on the equipment, coming home or before going home, doing a couple of sales calls, coming home, saying hi to the fam, and then go and take care of all the estimates and getting invoices out, responding to emails and all that kind of thing. There’s got to be a level of being able to turn it off and connecting with your family.
Joe
29:17
If you have a family or your friends, those ones that you care about to have time to separate from the business, those are the business owners that are the happiest, that have the ability to say, I have someone that I can rely on and right now I’m going to dedicate it to my family. I have my kids hockey game that I’m going to be at, and while I’m at the game, I’m not taking a call, I’m not responding to an email, I’m going to be present during that game. Those are the business owners that are the happiest that I’ve been able to observe over the last 20 years. The ones that have the hardest time are the ones that can’t separate it.
Robert
29:50
Right. You know, it’s really interesting that you say that too, because it’s almost like a catch 22. It’s like you need to let go in order to separate it so you can be present, but you almost need to focus on wanting to be present so that you can let go. So it’s like this very interesting double edged sword as a phenomenon. And sometimes I find people are like these perfectionists, like, well, you won’t know exactly how to do it the way I know how to do it. And it’s faster for me to just do it myself instead of training you to do it 85% as good as me. What do you say to that?
Joe
30:24
You know, I used to subscribe to that, too. You know, everything had to be perfect and, you know, let me head it off at the pass and that way there won’t be any mistakes that are made. But then the people that you’re entrusting to do that work for you, how could you ever trust them to do the work if you’re never willing to let go? I think you have to be able to empower those people that you’re putting in place to do that kind of work to fail and let it be okay that there’s some failures happen and let them be responsible to fix those mistakes because they’re going to learn the best when they make those mistakes and correct them on their own, you know, with your guidance, absolutely.
Joe
31:04
Be there to help them and understand what went wrong, but allow them to fix it.
Robert
31:08
Well, it’s like the, it’s the human condition, you know, no kid will ever believe fire’s hot until they burn themselves. Like, literally, you could tell they understand fire is hot. You can tell a million times. No one’s going to believe you until they burn their finger. It’s our human condition. So I think that’s really cool that, you know, empowering people to fail and let it be, obviously with some guidance to make sure they don’t fall off the rails completely and kill somebody. But letting them fail is definitely necessary. Okay, so we’ve got a few minutes left. Landscape Ontario suit organization. Like, what do people need to, like, look forward to? What do you got coming up? What are you guys focused on right now? What’s the. What’s the kind of vision and what’s going on at landscape Ontario these days?
Joe
31:47
Yeah, so market calendars, January 8 to 11th is Congress. Landscape Ontario. Congress. And you’ll definitely be there. Let’s catch up when we’re there. but if you have not been to landscape Ontario’s trade show and conference.
Robert
32:01
And just for the record, 2024. So this podcast will be live from, you know, probably a couple of years. If anybody’s listening to it, we’re talking about the 11th, 2024.
Joe
32:10
You got it. Thanks, Rob. I appreciate. It is the. It is the homecoming for the industry. It is the community builder. This is where you. You connect with people you haven’t seen in years or in a full year. This is where you meet people that you’ve never thought you would meet, and you build long lasting relationships at. This is. This is the event that you do that. So that’s coming up something really interesting. The provincial government, through the Ministry of Labor, opened up a stream of funding that will allow industry groups to renovate or build new training facilities. And for anyone that’s been to our facility knows that we have an 18,000 square foot greenhouse that kind of dates back to the sixties.
Joe
32:59
Anyway, through this fund, we’ve put in an application officially to demolish the greenhouse and put up an 18,000 square foot world class landscape horticulture training facility, complete with full green roof and landscaping. So landscape Ontario is uniquely positioned as an industry. You know, we need indoor training facilities, but we need outdoor training facilities, too.
Robert
33:24
Yeah.
Joe
33:24
And so this will allow us to landscape our property. And it’s all 50. 50 cent dollars. Right?
Robert
33:30
Right.
Joe
33:31
So we put in the concept is a net zero building, possibly even LEED certified. And we put an application in for $15 million with the Ministry of Labor. And at 50 cent dollars, so, you know, it’d be a major investment into training and professional development within the industry.
Robert
33:56
That’s huge, man. That’s like raising the standard for the whole industry. By bringing something like that into Ontario.
Joe
34:01
We’Re going to change the trajectory for professional development across all trade associations in the province, in the country, in North America. There’s nothing like it. So, yeah, so that’s our vision. We’ll find out in the next couple of months if we’ve been approved. And if we are, we’ve got pretty cool next two years ahead of us to get that built.
Robert
34:23
So. Applications in?
Joe
34:25
Applications in.
Robert
34:26
Oh, you’re like just holding your breath now, waiting to see what happens.
Joe
34:29
Fingers are crossed. We’re knocking on as much wood as we possibly can. You know, we’ve. We’ve got great connections with the ministry of labor and the minister there, but, you know, they’re reviewing it with a fine tooth comb.
Robert
34:42
Cool. Well, it’s a huge initiative and just, you know, hats off to you and the team for putting that together like that is not a small application. I can only imagine the amount of time and resources it takes to put something like that together.
Joe
34:52
It was a months long process over the summer and into the first week of October to put together. It took some massive vision time, strategy, development and what we wanted this facility to do. You know, we go back to the vision of the board of directors for Landscape Ontario. Back when they bought this property in 1994, they bought 48 acres here in Milton with the vision then that this property would be the center of excellence for training and development for landscape horticulture in the province. Well, here we are almost 30 years later, and after severing off half the property so that we could build the current facility that we’re in, very well likely we’ll be able to bring that vision from 30 years ago to a reality in the next two.
Robert
35:45
That’s very cool, man. And I think, if anything, there’s a really neat lesson to end this on about. You know, people often overestimate what they can do in a year and underestimate what they can do in ten. And, you know, taking that long term view and approach to the vision for landscape Ontario, your business. So many people are focused on the quarter and the year ahead and forget to think about what the world can look like in ten or 20 years. And I just think, you know, this culmination of that idea from the nineties is a really neat reminder for everybody to remember that we’re in this for the long haul and a great resource. Simon Sinek just came out recently, the infinite game. You know, these years that we create are all arbitrary. You know, they’re just trips around the sun.
Robert
36:32
So, like, you know, it’s not about the year, it’s about the vision. And I just think that’s really cool. You can remind us like that to finish this up. So thanks for doing that, Joe.
Joe
36:39
Absolutely. You got it.
Robert
36:41
Last one. Resource, author, podcast, speaker, someone that’s inspired you. One or two folks that kind of come to mind from your perspective that people should look into. Who would you say?
Joe
36:52
Oh, my goodness. Okay, so the very first leadership author that I got to meet, doctor Vince Molinaro of the leadership contract. He’s an Oakville, Ontario native, so look him up. If you reach out to him on LinkedIn, he will get back to you. He’s become a good friend of mine. So the book that he wrote is the leadership contract. Read it, sign the contract. It’s amazing. And there’s a field guide to it. So with the leadership team, if you have a leadership team or management team, there’s 15 minutes field guide sessions to keep your leadership skills sharp. And then most recent book by Danny Meyer called setting the table. And it’s all about the restaurant business, but the lessons that can be learned about enchanting hospitality is unreal.
Robert
37:44
I love it. So we got Danny Meyer setting the table and Vince Molinara, leadership contract.
Joe
37:50
You got it.
Robert
37:52
Rock and roll, Joe. Thanks for doing this. And thanks everybody for listening through this one. This is awesome. Thanks, Joe.
Joe
37:57
Thanks, Rob.
Robert
38:00
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