Clay Putnam, CGCS said: Many of us have seen it. A new company or superintendent is hired and cleans house of the staff. Some of us may have experienced it. Some on the receiving end and some on the giving end. The new sheriff comes in town and clears the place to make room for his/her posse. I've never been a fan of this practice although there are circumstances that it can be justified although few and far between, IMO. This seems to be more commonplace, comparatively speaking, at higher profile locations and when companies are involved. I'm curious what other's opinions are on the subject. Would you prefer to start with a clean slate when starting a new job as a superintendent or is there value to the local knowledge and years of experience of the existing staff?
My take is this, not having a posse, I haven't had the chance to do something like that, even a new golf course I grew-in, I didn't even get to pick my assistants, they were family members of investors, (granted I was as well, but at least I had been in the business). Additionally, I have mostly worked at municipalities and the like, that if there was a crew in place, (other places I have been at only had a full timer or two, all places had crews of less then 10 except for that place we had 19, with the caveat, all of them except for 2 were part time or seasonal, so we equated to about 500 or so man hours per week.). Any crew I had in place I had to learn to live with, as we can't clean house at a municipality.
So to get back to my take after making a short story long, I have learned it is very important to have some local knowledge, especially if they are handled correctly. At my current course when I got here there were 3 of us hired in the past 4 months and one old timer. I was told the old timer wouldn't tell me anything, didn't want to do new things, this was from others in our system (3 golf course) who was working here while they were hiring people and myself. I found he was very knowledgeable, especially about the irrigation system. When I questioned him about why they did things a certain way, it was that was what we learned, if it was working, and my way didn't seem better I let him continue that way, when I asked him to try it a different way, he did it. Finally one day after about a year, I asked him, "You know, the other guys would tell me you wouldn't tell them things and help them" His response was, "They didn't ask me" So I do find local knowledge is a good thing. Of course I'm talking about crew positions and not management positions.
Mel