7:02 a.m., South Florida. Four ride-on mowers and four trucks sit idle while a branch manager reloads his inbox for an offer letter promised days ago.
We just closed another month with millions of people changing jobs, yet landscape job postings take weeks to fill — when companies get any applications at all. It’s the oddest disconnect I’ve seen in 20 years — bustling demand, but empty crew trucks. How can a people-focused industry be starving for workers?
This isn’t just a blip on the radar. While we’re not seeing crisis-level staffing droughts like 2020 or during the Great Recession, hiring today in landscaping is at its slowest pace since the summers of 2015–2017, when the economy was still shaking off the recession rust. Compared to recent hiring booms, this summer’s lull is significant. It’s more than seasonal; it’s a clear sign of a deeper issue.
It’s not a labor shortage. It’s a translation gap between generations, private equity and technology.
Generations out of sync
Boomers are walking out the door with decades of field wisdom just as Gen Z digital natives walk in. The baton pass should be seamless, but instead, it keeps hitting the ground because neither side shares a playbook for success.
I’ve seen it firsthand. One client lost nearly half of a trusted route when a 30-year landscape manager retired. His younger replacement nailed the dashboards but skipped the 10-minute weekly swing by Mrs. Garcia’s home after her husband died. That extra care secured the client’s loyalty; now it’s gone.
Private equity’s double-edged sword
Private equity continues to pour capital into the industry, bringing rigorous financial processes and efficiencies. Legacy operators bring something equally vital: client trust and craftsmanship. Standardize a route without understanding its backstory, and decades of goodwill can vanish overnight. Resist every change, and real improvements never happen.
The teams that thrive translate both ways, turning field production stories into margin metrics and financial realities into practical strategies.
Technology that connects, not divides
AI résumé screens promise lightning speed but often turbocharge ghosting. Firms that actually solve their hiring problems still automate scheduling, but then immediately pick up the phone and make a personal connection. A quick live call clears hiring bottlenecks far faster than yet another automated message.
Technology should smooth the path, not replace the human touch.
A 90-second translation checklist
Before you revamp routes or overhaul hiring systems, ask yourself:
⦁ Who owns the customer handshake after the redesign?
⦁ What field quirks keep schedules running smoothly — and are they documented?
⦁ Which talent metric will your investors demand next quarter? Prepare that now.
⦁ How will a new hire learn all of this in their first week? If there’s no plan, there’s no path.
Then, consider options of all shapes and sizes that can make your company an attractive option for job seekers and one that rewards existing employees. Things such as:
⦁ Close your laptop and personally call 10 job candidates today.
⦁ Have experienced employees record one quick video tip daily and share them team-wide.
⦁ Test-drive a tech-based hybrid position of some sort, like a “digital field coordinator” that splits time between drones and turf checks.
⦁ Clearly show finance partners how employee turnover, rework and better retention impact the company’s bottom line.
Closing the gap
We’re not in a hiring drought; we’re in a selective stall. Capital, demand and eager talent are all there. What we lack is fluency between TikTok tutorials and hard-earned field experience.
Rehumanize your hiring funnel. Turn what’s been learned the hard way into systems others can follow. Speak both languages fluently. Do that, and next summer those mowers won’t sit idle; they’ll be cutting fresh revenue with crews who know exactly why Mrs. Garcia matters, and how to fly a drone.
We do face a labor shortage, but the bigger bottleneck is a translation gap. Bridge generations, private equity and technology, and the crews will follow.
