The Edge March/April/May 2026

PEER PERSPECTIVE

from working from daylight to dark like many landscape companies do in the early days. “We adopted a 4-day work week many years ago and have found that it really helps to mitigate burnout,”Sweeney says. “Weather plays an impact from week to week, but this schedule really helps man agers and crews manage burnout.” Additionally, when managers take the time to express their appreciation in vari ous ways, this can boost employee morale. Salsbery says their management team will organize events throughout the summer months to break up the grind. “We might end the day early and meet back at our shop to grill out for dinner or have a food truck stop by,”Salsbery says. “This gives our team something to look forward to and gets their minds off of their work for a bit.” At Ruppert, one branch level event they host is ‘Branchgiving,’where teams gather for food and fun and receive a turkey to take home to their family. “Building these strong relationships ensures that when challenges arise, team members have a supportive network to rely on,” Snyder says. TE

setting realistic expectations and fostering a team environment where employees feel supported. “I coach the managers to stay hands-on with their people, not micromanaging, but just be engaged,” Sartori says. “That means monitoring their workloads week ly. And that can come up through branch meetings or their one-on-ones, knowing when to jump into support crews during peak periods. I want my managers to reassure their teams that if they need to jump in to help out and support the team, that it’s a team effort, and they feel like they’ve got the support from upper management.” Sartori recommends managers review employee PTO balances to see who is banking them up. “I want to make sure that we’re keeping our ax sharpened and if someone’s got 200 PTO hours, their ax is probably not too sharp,”Sartori says. “We’re encouraging people to take PTO.” Snyder agrees that managers should redistribute workloads when needed and encourage employees to take time off during slower periods. Sweeney says they’ve moved away

programs allow new hires to acclimate and become productive quickly. Salsbery says optimizing your technol ogy stack can also take care of simple and mundane processes, allowing your team to do more of what they love.

MANAGERS’ ROLE IN MITIGATING STRESS

Managers can also make a major difference when it comes to preventing burnout by

 KEY TAKEAWAYS ■ Watch for behavior shifts,

print work, and consider structural moves like splitting branches when teams are stretched too thin. ■ Proactive staffing, strong organizational charts and involved managers call all reduce burnout risk and make scaling up smoother.

tone, mistakes and a lack of engagement for early warning signs of burnout. Also monitor hard metrics like overtime and weekly hours. ■ Protect your capacity by being more selec tive. Tighten your ideal client/service mix, drop low-margin/out-of-foot

Big Ups®

Spring Loaded®

Plant Colorblends this Fall

Pinkster™

18 The Edge // March/April/May 2026