Ask many people who work in horticulture about why they got into the industry that relates to plants and they will say that to wasn’t to deal with people. It is most likely something to do with working outdoors, or directly working with plants, or because they don’t really want to work with people. It doesn’t work like that in reality-for good as well as bad!
I have worked with people that make being a horticulturalist an absolute pleasure, and there are a good few of them out there. They make the day go quick because you can have a laugh while working and just get on. They are also happy to get stuck in and get the work done and are really good at their job. The amount of work that gets done in these situations is more than is expected, and it doesn’t feel like the that work is too arduous. This is great.
On the opposite side if the coin is where you have a person or people who cannot do as asked, or insist on turning up late or generally cause drama. This is often a big time drain, not only in the time that they aren’t actually at work when they should be (being ill, etc is a different thing and not something I criticise as it happens to us all), but also because someone needs to keep an eye on them.
I say this because some people need reminding that they need to do their job instead of being on their phone all the time, or going to the toilet every half an hour, or doing something that they haven’t been asked to do. That is why ‘the boss’ has to spend a lot of time checking these people are working well, instead of doing something more constructive! It really can be an irritation when there are such people around!
One people related thing that takes time is when a new apprentice appears. It gets forgotten how long it takes to teach people how to do different jobs right, whether that is hedging a hedge, using a whipper snipper or just being able to work at a productive speed all day for five days a week. This isn’t the fault of the apprentice, as the whole point of the title is that they are new and are there to learn. They have to get their stamina built up, but that can only be done by doing the job. They also have to learn how to use the tools, use them safely and then to do a good job quicker with better skill than when they started. This also takes time. This can be hard to understand sometimes when you have been doing the job a while-it gets forgotten that you were slow and useless once!
This is some of the ways that people can have and impact on time in the gardens at work. While I did start working in horticulture to avoid working with people as much as possible, but found that I had to deal with them more. Some are fabulous, some are the opposite with most sitting in the middle.