We have highlighted a few key secrets for saving time.
- Organize your email inbox with priority-based labels, folders, and categories. (Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo)
- Unsubscribe to all unnecessary email communications.
- Allot a few minutes each morning to go through and delete unnecessary emails.
- Take immediate action on any email that can be completed within one to three minutes, putting longer tasks in their assigned folders for later.
- Never answer an email with an open-ended question.
- Don’t check your emails throughout the day. Set aside three five-minute blocks in your day to check your email, and don’t feel the need to send a reply to emails that don’t require one.
- Make priority lists to help stay on track. Consider using an app such as Todoist or TickTick.
- Divide and conquer. If you have a large project that’s causing you to procrastinate because of the amount of work involved, break it down into pieces. This will make it more manageable while helping you focus. This will also help prevent you from jumping into a large project haphazardly without an organized structure, which could result in the insufficient progression of deliverables.
- Delegate as many tasks as possible so you can concentrate on the most urgent and important ones.
- Find and use as many workflow tools and resources as you can.
- Minimize interruptions.
The Number One Time-Saving Secret for HOA Community Management
The best way to save yourself time is to hire an efficient and proactive landscaping contractor. Hiring the right partner will do much more than just take care of the grounds.
Here is how a commercial landscape service can save you time and money.
More Eyes on Your Property
A commercial landscaping crew sees every square inc of your property at least weekly, if not more. That also means your landscaping company, if you’ve hired the right one, will be able to see other issues and happenings on your property and report them to you immediately. This will enable you to be more proactive and handle issues as they happen. It will also help prevent your homeowners from identifying problems and having to report them to you themselves.
Less Driving Time
With your landscaping team helping you identify issues on your property as they happen, you will spend less time driving to and from your properties to look for issues. How long does it take you to drive to and from your property or properties? How much time would it save you if you didn’t have to do that every day?
Pictures as Proof
If you’ve hired the right commercial landscaper, they will immediately take pictures of safety issues and infractions and send them to you while they are on the property performing their duties. This will enable you to see exactly what’s wrong and be able to proactively handle it in a timely manner. It could be a broken window, damaged fence, missing light posts or covers, etc.
Reduced Liability
This one is huge—reduced liability. Your commercial landscaper will let you know if there is anything on your property that could create a liability, injury, or loss of life issue. For example, there might be a big hole in the sidewalk or lawn—it happened overnight and you have no idea how it got there, but you could still be liable if someone was hurt. An injury could cost you big making the cost of a commercial landscaper pale in comparison and worth every penny. How? Well, because the issue would potentially be brought to your attention more quickly, providing you with documented third-party proof that the issue wasn’t due to neglect or delayed maintenance.
Property Reporting
A good commercial landscaping contractor will provide valuable property information that is vital to managing your community. Informative reports will provide insights into what your property needs now and in the future so you can prepare and budget accordingly. The reports will provide you with ongoing written proof of any work that has been done on the property. This, in turn, will show that you are not deferring any safety or maintenance issues, which will reduce your chances of being held liable for injuries or other unfortunate events that occur in your community.
Reduce the Need for Repeat Follow-Up
When you have a mediocre landscaper, chances are they will tell you one thing and do another. You report a problem to them and they tell you they will handle it. They you check to see if it has been completed, only to find they haven’t corrected the issue. You then have to talk with them again and have to follow up on the issue again. And sometimes this process goes on several more times before the problem is resolved.
Having a professional landscape management and maintenance company like Serpico Landscaping will prevent the need for repeat follow-up. The issues are handled the first time. This pro-active benefit will save you time, as well as administrative time and solve communication issues.
Why do Veteran Community Managers Choose Serpico Landscaping?
To give you a better perspective, we interviewed Lisa Shepherd, a veteran community manager who currently manages 10 different HOAs in the California Bay Area. Here are a few of the reasons Lisa believes Serpico Landscaping is the choice commercial landscaping provider in the Bay Area.
Our value-added services and reports will save you loads of time.
- Lisa: “Serpico is proactive, and they know each property’s board members individually and their specific preferences. This keeps me from having to continually communicate and guide each property’s day-to-day landscaping issues myself like I have to do with other landscaping companies. Serpico takes the time to know each property and it’s specifics, saving me time by not having to continually take point. Serpico truly cares and provides a personal touch that most other companies don’t, and this is huge in my book.”
Our monthly reports include historical reports and billable maintenance to keep everyone informed and provide an extra layer of liability protection. Serpico provides a takeover report with an overview, recommendations, and maintenance schedule of activities. A Tree Management Action Plan (TMP) to service the trees based on the best tree health recommendations for long term, as well as reducing emergency-related expenses.
- Lisa: “Serpico’s proprietary monthly reports, takeover reports, tree care plans, and water management action plan are instrumental when it comes to effective management, saving money, and finding property issues before they develop into major CAPEX expenses. Having these customized reports is truly priceless. And what makes Serpico even better is that I never have to take the time to ask for what I need, Serpico always sends them to me automatically.”
24/7 emergency services for everything, including tree and water issues.
- Lisa: “Serpico offers 24/7 emergency services for everything your community might need, including tree and water issues. That means I never have to wait and wonder if I will be able to reach the contractor or if they will, in fact, show up. With Serpico, I know it will be taken care of.”
No delays waiting for a response from an account manager. You always have access to a live customer service representative in our local office.
- Lisa: “Serpico is like having a personal assistant. They proactively handle getting budget quotes and pricing for all of my property’s needs, including budget increases, trees, plants, etc.”
No empty promises or repeated follow-up requests.
- Lisa: “Serpico Landscaping does what they say they’re going to do; there is no babysitting. I never have to wonder if something is done. If they say it’s done, I know it’s done. This saves me a huge amount of time by not having to drive to a property to orchestrate and follow up on the issues. This also saves me from having to set up and attend excessive meetings with homeowners and the board to address pending issues, which is a huge time saver.”
Serpico will attend your HOA board meetings to help answer board and member questions directly so they get the information straight from the source.
- Lisa: “Serpico’s commitment to service includes attending the property HOA board meetings with me, so they can directly handle all questions firsthand; therefore, nothing is communicated incorrectly. Serpico sends whichever team member is needed to the meetings, and that includes the owner, designers, the arborist, and anyone else whose presence is needed. Additionally, all information that comes directly from the source is more powerful because the property needs are explained by an authority on the subject, whether that be short and long-term budget goals and needs, or emergency needs that will require a budget reallocation.”
Serpico has Waterwise expertise and strong relationships with local MUD districts that make us the market expert in water efficiency.
- Lisa: “Serpico takes the time to meet with EBMUD to ensure any issues are being taken care of and regulations are being followed. This saves me time and money because I don’t have to take the time to do it myself, and I know without a doubt that everything is getting done and getting done right. Not to mention that it keeps my properties in good graces with EBMUD.”
Serpico will take pictures and report landscaping and non-landscaping issues for your review.
- Lisa: “Serpico consistently goes the extra mile. If they are on a property and see a broken window, damaged fencing, damaged lighting, or other issues that might be dangerous or create a liability; they immediately send me a picture so I can address it before it becomes a problem.”
