Founded in 2008. The Landscape Juice Network (LJN) is the largest and fastest growing professional landscaping and horticultural association in the United Kingdom.
LJN's professional business forum is unrivalled and open to anyone within within the UK landscape industry
LJN's Business Objectives Group (BOG) is for any Pro serious about building their business.
For the researching visitor there's a wealth of landscaping ideas, garden design ideas, lawn advice tips and advice about garden maintenance.
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I don't know so presumably few other people outside the industry would either.
There are other recognised qualifications in associated skill sets such a bricklaying etc....with various awarding bodies such C&G etc
However, qualificaion mean nothing if the person can not put them use in the real world.
A colleague I know who runs a hard landscaping business near to me interviews any prospective hard landscapes first, then invites them to his yard for the 'afternoon' and introduces them to a mixer, shovel, 6 slabs and ask them to prepare the mix, lay a 6 90*90 slabs on a suitable bed....
He then returns with a level, checks out the gaps and lifts the slabs to see whether it duff 4/5 spot lay or a full bed and finally what the mix is like and finally how neat the area and pointing is...
He reckons based on this he knows what quality that person will provide in the future...
Fenlandphil said:
Years ago when I was in the motor trade there was a clear qualification based route to membership of the Institute of the Motor Industry, is the same sort of thing used to gain membership to these landscape bodies?
gary @ affinity landscapes said:
However, find me someone who is qualified and shows real life experience as my mate does and anyone with any sense will snap that person up if they are looking for good staff.
I don't fully support the BALI / APL trade association structures. It's my understanding they vet the 'company', thru references & visits, not the indviduals....Correct me if I'm wrong?
I'm not bashing them before certain people get on their high horses about this. Its my personal view. I believe they are outdated for my business needs in this current business climate.
Others swear by them. My view, go with what makes you, as a landscaper, happy & confident to run your business...
To me it is all about educating the general public and making them understand that cheapest is not always best, and to compare everything on alike for like basis and to check out previous work themselves. As has alread been said aswell to make them get the right trade for the job i.e. Hard landscper for patios/drives not general builders or brickies as I have been told by a lot of very good tradesmen every man to his trade.
I took qualifications in horticulture and greenkeeping but not landscaping or design but I consider myself to be skilled or at least highly experienced/proficient in a wide range of disciplines.
It continues to be my view that it is the responsibility of every individual or business to be honest about what they can provide and describe themselves and their skills accordingly.
It has been previously pointed out to the APL and BALI that it is inaccurate for them to advertise that all association members and their staff are fully qualified and it's noted that they have now removed (apart from one APL press release) all reference to members and their staff being fully qualified, from their publicity.
It's not a problem Gary, I think the thread should continue.
It seems that although most practitioners who post on here are quite rightly anxious that their profession is regarded with respect for their competence, there seems to be no objective way of presenting to the public an assessment of that competence.
To me, qualification isn't merely a paper accreditation but it comes in many forms. Doing a job for a client and being paid is a qualification in itself; it means that you have done what you've promised to do and the client has been satisfied with the results - there's no tougher examiner than a client who is parting with their cash.
LJN's ethos has been one of self regulation and this site provides many tools for the practitioner to present their credentials in an open and honest way - it is a perpetual system. In contrast, any accreditation organisation can only take a mere snapshot (at best once a year) of the company or individual that they are trying to vet - a bit like having an MOT on a car; the car might be legal and roadworthy on the day of the test but three or six months down the line, there might be some catastrophic failure of some vital part of the car.
Self regulation is no worse than third party accreditation but there is also one other key element to how transparency and honesty works when anyone signs up to a voluntary charter such as this site; there is a real danger than if anyone is lying about their credentials then they will quickly be caught out and exposed for their wrongdoing.
I am still in favour of client feedback and client rating.
For example; LJN devises a table say A-Z if you like and we categorise each placement. Our member businesses are then asked to categorise themselves with A being a top rated company and Z being a beginner or one that is still low in experience and client feedback.
A table will exist for each definable trade - Lawn Care, Garden maintenance, landscape and design (and perhaps special crossover tables for operators who deal in more than one area).
After each job (or monthly for maintenance gardeners) the practitioner presents their client with a feed back for and that for is then sent to LJN in confidence. This feedback can then be used as an assessment and over time, an accurate position on the table will be defined by results.
In my view, there's no regulation like self or client regulation.
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