News

From the Treetop: Kendra Julie Chapman

November 25, 2010
By Kendra Julie Chapman, Vice President of Administration

It’s 2010, and just like that, another decade is behind us. A lot has changed in our work and home lives since Y2K – especially in the area of technology.

I can’t remember the last time I walked into a bank or a Blockbuster. I pay the bills and rent movies online, sometimes without leaving my couch. I carry my cell phone with me everywhere. I hardly ever get handwritten letters in my mailbox, and my mother is on Facebook. My kids can’t imagine life without the Internet, and I recently heard about 94 percent of people who filed income tax returns for 2008 did it electronically.

But we didn’t get to this technology-filled world in one day. Every new gadget took time to get used to.

The first time I used my credit card to buy something online, I was nervous. It took me a long time to remember to take my cell phone with me on errands and turn the volume up so I could hear it if someone called. I used to think e-mail was impersonal, my mother is always asking my kids questions about Facebook, and I certainly couldn’t file my taxes electronically without TurboTax!

The same goes for changes in technology at Wright Tree Service. Each employee deals with new tools differently. It is important we take time to help each other during these times of transition.

No one at Wright Tree Service receives a paper paycheck. All of our employees get paid by electronic transaction. But that didn’t happen overnight. We did it slowly and offered a lot of education and training to explain the benefits and details of the change. Some employees still prefer phone calls over e-mails, but the employees who are used to e-mail are helping them feel more comfortable with it. We’re planning to transition most of our employees to an electronic time-sheet by the summer of 2011, and that’s also going to take time, education and training.

The future of Wright Tree Service and the vegetation management industry depends on technology – but it also depends on employees like you. Your hard work is the most valuable asset to our company. We implement new technology to help you. This saves money, and eventually enables us to be a more successful company.

The technology that will help make the Wright Tree Service of 2020 successful probably don’t even exist yet, but here’s to helping each other year after year with each new gadget to maintain the strong company we have today.