Productivity

The quantity of goods produced per worker. The goods might be physical items, or the value of items produced or sold. This is a general measure of the efficiency of workers and work processes, however, it is not a measure of the quality of the product. In the context of grounds management, productivity can mean the surface provided (whether a sports pitch or ground area in m²) per worker. This can be broadened further to provide a more comprehensive definition to be 'The surface provided (whether a sports pitch or ground area in m²) per worker, in an effective way'. T

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  Program Evaluation and Review Technique

A project management tool, which is represented by a flow chart, used to estimate and analyse activity timings, which are estimates in weeks or fractions of weeks, to complete tasks within a project, along with any dependencies of activities on others being completed beforehand, ultimately helping to identify the critical pathway to achieving the desired outcome. PERT can be useful where times of activities are not known, or poorly understood, or potentially quite variable due to different equipment and / or staff capabilities. It can also be more useful where experimentation of activities is

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  Project Baseline

A well-defined starting, or reference, point for a project. This can be used to objectively judge progress made over time and for comparing against planned progress to determine if the progress is on course for completion on time, ahead of time or if there might be a delay, in which case contingencies could be applied to counter or mitigate the potential or actual delay.

  Qualified

This term can have several interpretations, although from a groundskeeping perspective there are three significant ones.

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  Racecourse Maintenance

The aim is to provide an even surface (a gradual and gentle slope to allow for surface run-off is acceptable), without a tight bend radius on the track, and a suitable width for the racing of horses to avoid congestion, improve horse safety and reduce the intensity of damage to the turf surface. A prepared racecourse should aim to provide a consistent racing experience during the entire period of a race meeting. The racing year has two seasons: Flat (typically March - early November), and National Hunt, ‘Jump season', (typically November - March); there are some racecourses which ha

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  Raised Lawn Edge

A lawn is slightly raised (typically about 50mm, or so) above the level of an adjoining area, such as a tarmac or gravel path. The top of the lawn's rootzone around its perimeter would be exposed if there was no raised edge protecting it down towards the top of the surrounding (lower) area. A wooden or heavy-duty plastic edging strip, a brick or smooth edging stone, would typically be used as the edging material.

  Rationalisation

The process of reorganisation with the aim to reduce overall input capacity and to increase efficiency of operations.

  Rationalise

The reduction in resources and/or efforts to achieve an outcome. Analysing and evaluating a work process can help identify areas for improvement, especially in the efficiency of an activity, but there may also be a pressing need to reduce costs and reduce the quality of outcomes, especially where the continued output of a very high quality exceeds the needs of the marketplace. Rationalising resources and efforts can lead to a product that is more fit for purpose, without unnecessary inputs in meeting market requirements. An example within the grounds care industry is that of producing a sport

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  Reactive Management

A management approach which relies on reacting to events, being able to readily correct problems and issues as soon as they arise. To maintain a reactive approach, resources must be able to be immediately redeployed on an almost continuous basis. For short term fluid and rapidly changing events, taking a reactive approach can prove very successful if implemented in a structured way, however, attention to detail and extent of variables impacting on the decision-making process can be considerable and can have a very wearing and degrading effect on performance over time. Being able to provide

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  Rebound Effect

With improvements in the efficiency of resource use in machinery and equipment there should be a saving in resource consumption. However, the benefit of having a more resource efficient item of equipment or machinery often leads to the item being used more or in different ways, thereby not making as many resource savings as possible. For example, a 7% improvement in fuel efficiency might produce a 4% drop in fuel consumption. This is expressed as a 43% rebound effect (i.e. (7-4)/7 x 100), meaning that only 57% of perceived benefits have been achieved.