7 survival tips
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"It's going to be very disruptive in the start up phase," Haskett says. "Depending on when they get here, it could significantly
affect our first mowing cycles. Our spring cleanups, mulchings, things like that we generally do in February and March into
early April, are going to be disrupted. We're going to have to do them with temps, or we're going to have to start earlier
and they'll run way late getting them done." He also expects his overtime budget to double for the first five months of the
season. And even with those challenges, Haskett still considers himself fortunate.
"We're the lucky company. My agent told me they got a little more than half but not quite two-thirds of their visas through
before the second cap for the April (arriving workers)," he says. "Somewhere between a third and a half of my agent's clients
got nobody." If you're one of those companies, what now? Living without H-2B workersDon't procrastinate. Start planning now if you're facing worker shortage. You have a short window of opportunity to work out
your plan. Start by assessing the potential damage to your company. View the situation realistically. For example, "I will lose two of
my best grass cutting crews. Or I will lose three laborers on my pavers crew." In addition to putting the "Help Wanted" sign in your window, consider these suggestions: 
Today's landscape industry owes a lot to willing and trained H-2B workers.
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1 Bulletproof your best customers, by doing their work first and giving them extra attention. If you haven't been tracking each client for profitability, shame
on you. Go over your clients' accounts to better identify the "keepers." Do this before spring erupts.
2 Focus on your most profitable service lines. If you've been struggling to make a particular service profitable, consider dropping it or selling it. There's no reason
to be "dabbling" in a particular service if you're short staffed. If you feel it still has potential, add it back into your
company at a future date. 3 Train like you've never trained before. Knowledgeable and well-managed crews perform significantly better than poorly trained and/or poorly supervised crews. As
obvious as that is many companies still fail to provide employees even the most cursory understanding of what they're to do
and neglect to set guidelines on how to do it efficiently and safely. 4 Reduce your workload by dropping unprofitable or troublesome customers. Almost all companies have at least a few marginal customers. They include
perpetually late payers, whiners or they could be just outside of your company's service area, making them expensive to serve.
You might have been better off passing them off to another service provider long ago anyway. 5 Do only the work that must absolutely be done, but do it well. Regardless of your circumstances, your word and reputation are still your most valuable assets. Will some
of your clients let you postpone your most labor-intensive projects until you can get out of the hectic spring season? Are
you confident enough about getting these projects done even then to offer a modest incentive to reward their patience? 6 Crunch time means longer hours, longer days. Remember when you started your business and worked six 10-hour days on a regular basis? (Perhaps you still do.) Can you count
on your remaining employees or those you hope to add to work six 10-hour days to make up for your labor shortfall? 7 It might be time to consider raising prices to cover the rising cost of fuel and almost every other product or material you use. Yes, raising prices is a tough call.
But overtime costs may force your hand because you will have fewer employees doing more production. Keep in mind, few of the
small owner/operators in your market use H-2B workers, so they'll see your scaling back as an opportunity to pick up some
of your business. The same goes for larger established companies that have their full compliment of labor. Combat this by
doing great work and stressing value, value, value. 8 Mechanize for more efficiency. This doesn't mean going out and buying equipment that you may use occasionally. It may not mean buying, at all, but rather
leasing or renting. Resist impulse purchases. Unfortunately, there's no piece of commercial equipment yet that can mow a property,
load itself onto a truck and go on to mow the next property. The same goes for stick trimming and cleanup. But tasks like
mulching and most construction tasks can be done more efficiently with the right equipment. 9 Unload your junk. How about unused or rarely used equipment in your maintenance yard? Is it just taking up space? The same goes for unproductive
or unreliable employees? Are they just taking up space and, worse yet, costing you money? It's tough shedding people when
you're already short-staffed? But it's worse to carry dead weight or a troublemaker. 10 Get the "help wanted" word out. The slowdown in the construction trades means there is a growing supply of work-tested employees without regular paychecks.
How can you make your job descriptions attractive to them? Chances are you'll have to pay them more than you used to paying.
The ripple effect Unfortunately, the labor shortage that many companies expect will create a big ripple in the entire industry — from customers
to product manufacturers. 
Items to include in your emergency plan
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"I talked to a mowing dealer who said that 90 days ago he had $750,000 in advance orders for equipment," Haskett says. "He
said more than half of that has been cancelled in the last two weeks. I had two trucks on advance order. I have cancelled
those. I had some equipment, a trailer and all the associated equipment to go with that to set up a new crew. I've cancelled
that.
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