A day in the life of the dock boys
Every spring and fall there’s great anticipation for the new dock season. Every season offers new challenges and obstacles that must be overcome to be successful. There’s also new wisdom that comes with each season which helps us become familiar with the variety of docks and lifts we’re servicing to help us become more efficient. Weather is one of the biggest challenges we face every year. Cold and rainy weather usually leads to a difficult season for us. In the fall, the weather is usually a little colder as we’re taking out docks and boat lifts all the way into November. But on the positive side, the water is still decently warm which makes a huge difference. On the opposite side, spring usually offers much better weather as we work throughout May and get jobs all the way into June. But unfortunately, the water is still frigid cold which makes getting wet absolutely miserable. Although the water is so cold, we would still much rather prefer the spring season due to the warmer temperature.
Another obstacle that we face is broken or damaged docks and boat lifts. This has thrown huge speed bumps in our scheduling throughout the years. We usually schedule each dock to take about an hour. So when we arrive at an appointment to faulty equipment we have to push back the rest of our scheduled appointments or schedule whoever we’re having trouble with to a future date to make repairs. This is a likely occurrence because the water wears on docks and boat lifts throughout the summer season leaving damaged and worn out parts. We also get the customers who want to hang on to their docks as long as they can while making faulty repairs in the meantime which can end up making their docks un-safe. We usually tell them to consider buying a new dock or in some cases we may not even put it out in case it would break and lead to injury.
One of our biggest pet peeves is picky customers. Some people want their docks and lifts placed with expert precision. This means they want it perfectly leveled, put out or brought in a certain amount, or moved at the last second when the job is just about complete. To their credit, they are the ones that have to look at it all summer so they want it to be perfect but sometimes that can greatly affect our timing throughout the day when special requests are made.
When we run into these obstacles it puts us into a little bit of a pickle. I’m required to call our customers and explain to them that we’ve run into a few “problems” and might be arriving late. But luckily by these days our customers understand that things come up and that we try our best to always stay on time and give them a heads up if plans change. This small company has taught us a lot about talking with customers, scheduling appointments, managing time, and battling adversity.
