Observations from the Solutions Guy

This month, I’m starting my 30th year wandering the roads, visiting turf managers, performing sales and consultation — which some call the dark side of the business. To me, it is the only side I have known since graduate school at Virgina Tech. Often, I reply to a question by asking more questions. The best answers usually come from better questions, and the answers are always changing.

The obstacles faced in turf management and the solutions to deal with them change as quickly as the weather because it’s the primary driving force in turf playability. I was asked THE QUESTION a few years ago: What’s the most difficult problem that I had encountered in my career?

My response? It’s probably being a “Solutions Guy” for you and many others. If I’m here with you, I’m not there with them. For me, them is my family or other clients. A friend in need is a friend indeed!

I asked myself: What is your real job description? Where do you see your career going in the next five to 10 years? I wanted to create a career master plan for my future. Was I making a living, a life, a legacy, or some combination of them all? After giving this significant thought and prayer, I decided it was time for my third and final job change, opening Agrono-Lytics full time with one employee. That employee is me.

Managing employees and golfers can be difficult and unpredictable. For me, being responsible for others’ livelihoods was difficult. Every action you or your company takes could impact the ability of others to earn a living.

In sales, I don’t have the individual responsibility for turf quality or playability. But I do feel significant indirect pressure through obligation to clients with those responsibilities. Listening to the customer without any reply is often the best action. Many just want to verbalize their thoughts and feelings to a listening ear. Collections from slow payers and not being able to help someone in their times of need can give you some thick skin rather quickly and potentially ruffle relationships.

Golf course superintendents work the grind of battling Mother Nature and meeting playability demands with incredible corner-office views. During the first half of my career, I worked on the manufacturing side, supporting distributors and turf managers and traveling most of the East Coast. The last half, I worked primarily with turf managers in the Carolinas, keeping me closer to home. By far the greatest stress in my job is the unpredictability of home life, just like anyone; however, I am a few hours or days away, not minutes.

Coping skills for maintaining health and stress levels are a must. The cumulative impacts witnessing the hardships confronted by all your customers will wear on anyone. Drinking isn’t an option with all the driving I do in the evenings or wee morning hours.

Not everyone will have the same goals or visions that you do. Seas will get rough leaving your home harbor to go fishing in the big water. The bigger the catch most likely means the bigger the costs of doing business in time, money and drama. Helping some can be perceived as hurting others in their visions. You won’t make everyone happy — just as golf course superintendents cannot please them all. Some people get out of bed to be the drain, not the fountain.

Helena hired me into sales during grad school. I moved to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina — the golf capital of the world, they said — not knowing a soul and having zero sales experience or training. Thanks to the Lord caller ID didn’t exist back then; Willie Pennington and Dr. Bruce Martin took my call. Riding with those two GOATS early set the tone. Most of the conversations they had with turf managers did not involve pesticides.

The competition ate lunch at 6 a.m. with half their day already done. You pulled all-nighters to keep up, learning quickly if four guys needed product by 6 a.m. with an hour between them, you don’t start at 5 a.m. I was fortunate to receive great sales training and agronomic updates from all three employers.

If I knew then what I know now, I would not change a thing, with every step of the journey being far more about learning and life experiences than successes or failures. Failures only happen when repeated without learning from them. Success is not final, and failures are not fatal.

I’ve been so blessed, never imagining attending college for turf would help me meet so many people and see so many places. My job is to make others look good and get their results, not mine. Yet it does provide so many incredible opportunities to earn a living and learn a life of memories.

The biggest change in my career and for others in a similar situation over the last 15 years was the 120 Days of Hell in the Cell from Memorial Day to Labor Day with bentgrass greens becoming the 245 days of Falls Count Anywhere with ultradwarf Bermudagrass greens. Same two holidays, but with eight months to tackle, not four. The shoulder season means not much rest, even on Christmas. They do provide great playing surfaces year-round with that being the name of the game for turf managers — safe and consistent playing surfaces, so make it happen captain.

I used to walk up and ID issues from the cart path. Now microscopes and specific testing methods are required. As Dr. Martin said, time to retire; symptoms are not diagnostic anymore. The No. 1 lesson learned in grad school was to read materials and methods first. Most often it determines results and discussions.

I make far more 911-TURF calls now than ever before with a lot of them being nematode and water quality issues more than disease. My to-do list is done by sunrise, or I circle file it and start a new one.

From the start, I was raised in a congregation of turf professionals helping me grow so I could assist them and others to grow grass. Success No. 1 is the long-lasting relationships formed. I have talked with many of them more than my own family for decades, so they are my family as well.

Turf managers are solutions-based people. They will find the way or create it. Defining agronomic needs and determining the solutions to deal with them can be difficult with so many variables, especially with the significant variations in obstacles and objectives. What works for one won’t work for everyone else.

I have learned the hard way to maximize results and minimize misses. I had to know more than I wanted about clients’ programs — not just what they did with me — to give the best advice. There is no I in TEAM and there is nothing that acts alone without interacting with other materials or methods utilized in turf management program.

I started Agrono-Lytics, desiring limited clients and doing just consultation in return for more family time. I knew how much growth potential I had missed of the boys chasing the next turf dilemma or sale. In less than two months, I realized the main reason the issues I was finding existed at all was the lack of solutions for them in clients’ programs. A problem will always exist until a solution is provided. Moreover, a solution for one problem often creates another one.

I was very fortunate to work in golf course construction during my college summers. My advisor wanted me to intern with the big names, building my résumé and networking. During the school year, I worked at the VT Turfgrass Research Center and on the athletics fields. These experiences allowed me to see so many different soil and turf types, inputs and variations in demands.

I’m often asked what advice I’d give to people looking at this industry. What do I think provides the best quality of life and opportunity? The best thing in my career and schooling was, from the start, I did golf, sod farms, lawn care and sports turf, giving me variety. Something was always going well in downtimes.

My advice for prospects is to obtain as much cross-training experience as possible with grass types and industry segments. On the grass and input side, I’m not sure if anyone could do it today like I did, because so many of the inputs have changed. Most of my grad school synergism tank mix sprays in the early 1990s are now the modern-day premix brands at the ratio and MOAs in their jug.

Annual budgets and property values of facilities today can be more than the lifetime earnings for the people managing them.

I delivered today to a course that I have called on since I started dealing with five different great turf bosses. When you walk in the shop, you see a banner reading “Greatness Has a Home.” When you drive in, you see and hear, “Greatness is Work in Progress being Constructed.” High standards come with high demands in time and money for those getting it done. Driving out, I pondered how many have traveled this road for 30 years!

I often take food to crews or give away testing or product. It’s my way of paying it forward for all the support I received from the start. Without question, that support with all three companies and now on my own is the only reason I am still doing this 30 years later.

VT brings the Ut Prosim education — “That I May Serve” — that helps you learn to help others. I have an obligation to those who support me and have taught me past and present. Seven years of college and I learn far more daily observing others in so many different situations and techniques. College taught me the best ways to take in and process information. I learned how to learn, and I get educated daily.

For years, I debated going back to college to finish my Ph.D. that I quit when Helena hired me. I ultimately decided not to do it due to loss of income while in school along with the commitment to my employers and customers. I learned so much in the field with the abilities acquired in college to assimilate and analyze information.

I never went to school to get into sales and consulting or thought I would be living in the same town and doing this 30 years later, so I am blessed with the personal life due to my career, which brought me to the beach. I get verbal thanks numerous times a day and the boys have some extra Santas riding along with me, but the biggest thank you is being able to go to the bank for the last three decades and sleeping at night making a living and a life.

Everyone who is successful in this business grows far more people than they do plants.

Mike Johnson is the father of twins and the owner of Agrono-Lytics Turf Consulting in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. This is his first Turfheads Take Over contribution.