That was great! Its been a little over a week and I had fantastic
participation in my survey. So much so that if I want to collect
more responses I would have to upgrade to the "Professional" version of
the software. (FYI: I made use of a website that allows you to do
small surveys without any fee. The trade offs are numerous and include
things like only allowing no more than 10 questions, allowing only a
limited number of respondents, no ability to chart results, etc.,
etc.).
Now, as boring as this sounds, I think everyone needs a bit of back ground on what started this process of developing a maintenance standard. First another quote regarding the development of a maintenance standard:
"Golf course maintenance standards are guidelines that detail the manner
in which a golf course is maintained on a daily basis. They are not
instruction manuals for each cultural practice, or a list of job
descriptions for employees, although these can be included. They are,
however, formal documents that outline golf course maintenance goals
and the necessary practices for meeting these goals. These plans can be
very helpful in addressing budgetary concerns and customer expectations."
It's the last sentence that really got me going down this road. With both a shrinking budget and membership I needed a tool that could, hopefully, consider both those points while also aiding in giving members the best bang for the buck. In the past, the bonus of having a large membership and the associated revenue was the freedom it offered us when making maintenance decisions. Basically, decisions were made with an eye on always improving conditions with only a cursory glance at the cost (within reason, of course). Now maintenance practices that appear to be the norm for KGC may not be feasible in the present environment. One example is greens mowing. Not that long ago we hand mowed all greens everyday from May 1st to Oct 1st. Last year (2012) over that same time we frame we only walked 57% of the time. The rest of the time we triplexed to save on wages. I feel there is a substantial difference in the quality of cut when you compare a hand mowed green to a triplexed green with hand mowing giving a better cut. That is especially true when you factor in the triplex unit and the style of cutting heads it has. Next post I'll delve into the survey result.
Course Conditions
Another quick look around at some more greens and everything appears good. There is only just over 10" of snow on most the front greens compared to 18 to 20" on the greens last year at this time (and that was before we got all the snow in March). What does that mean? Not much since we never really seem to get going before the 3rd week in April regardless of snow pack.
