Lewis Tree Service

Holding the treeline┬áSince it was founded in 1938, Lewis Tree Service has focused on doing one thing and doing it well. John OÔÇÖHanlon uncovers some secrets of its remarkable recent growth, in conversation with COO Tom Rogers. They say that if the human race disappeared, after a century youÔÇÖd hardly know we had existed. Nature is vigorous and quickly encroaches on any neglected space. That includes the terrain through which we have run our oil pipelines, our electricity lines and, of course, our roads.  Lewis Tree Service provides a vital service to investor-owned utilities, electric cooperatives and municipal utility companies, principally in transmission and distribution vegetation management, keeping facilities clear of vegetation and dealing with weather-related incidents when they do occur. That single activity accounts for 98 percent of LewisÔÇÖs activities, and Tom Rogers knows this business better than most, having joined Lewis 35 years ago. He has seen and done it all. Lewis Tree Service has gained much industry recognition for its best practices in employee recognition and customer focus, though many readers will find its growth statistics mesmerizing: in each of the five years up to and including 2008, Lewis grew its sales turnover by 25 percent. You would expect acquisitions to account for growth like this, but in the case of Lewis it was nearly all attributable to increased market share and organic expansion. Based in West Henrietta, New York, the company has extended its service as far west as Ohio and as far south as Florida. ÔÇ£Our divisions in the South are the fastest growing, and there are two reasons for that,ÔÇØ says Rogers. ÔÇ£One is the increase in population in the South, and the second reason is our success in the bidding process.ÔÇØThese factors Lewis can and does control, but it canÔÇÖt control the weather. Hurricanes may increase revenues, and a quiet year can flatten the bottom line. ÔÇ£Most times power lines fall to the ground because of trees. Our crews will remove fallen and damaged trees, which then allows the construction contractors to rebuild the facilities. Many utilities have tree removal programs that identify hazardous trees that could fall over and create an outage. ÔÇ£That includes trees on adjoining property, not just the trees growing on the customerÔÇÖs right-of-way,ÔÇØ says Rogers. ÔÇ£Our business is regulated in several states by a public service commission. In many states the PSC mandates utility companies to remove and maintain vegetation within the utility right-of-way as a method to ensure reliable electric service to the consumer.ÔÇØ Overhead lines are clearly vulnerable to storms and vegetation; traditionally, pipelines have not required such rigorous vegetation management programs. However, with homeland defense a new priority, the federal government has issued security contingency planning guidance to pipeline operators, so keeping these rights-of-way clear for inspection will undoubtedly be a growing market for Lewis.ItÔÇÖs easy to look on Lewis Tree Service as a branch of the forestry industry because it involves tree management. Not even close, says Rogers. ÔÇ£WeÔÇÖre selling reliability. If we perform our job properly for the utility companies, weÔÇÖre providing their consumers with a safe and reliable vegetation management service.ÔÇØ And reliability is intimately linked to safety. LewisÔÇÖs safety record is more than an aspiration; itÔÇÖs a key part of the bid. ÔÇ£Our customers look at our program very closely, and they want to know our results.ÔÇØWith 3,000 employees, this means teaching and maintaining a basic culture of safety as well as high levels of skill. This is intrinsically dangerous work, carried out with powerful equipment, often from elevated platforms and close to live high-tension cables. So employees are first trained in observation, job assessment and risk awareness, all built into Lewis Tree ServiceÔÇÖs Total Safety Culture (TSC) human performance program. ÔÇ£We teach our employees how to identify risks. Then we empower them to have the confidence to intervene when they see at-risk behavior.ÔÇØ The objective, says Tom, is to make at-risk behavior unacceptable. So before any job is started, the team members engage in a pre-job hazard survey so that everyone knows what risks they may have to manage. The TSC program, with both written and field assessed components, is modeled on OSHA guidelines for working around energized conductors and is accredited by that organization. To get the best-practices message right through to the newest recruit, Lewis has trained more safety supervisors so they can be out there with the crews, observing their work and coaching them through any risky behaviors. ÔÇ£Every two weeks we have a high-level safety conference where we discuss any incidents that have occurred during those last two weeks. The managers involved have to bring to the table a full report on the incident and what they did to prevent anything like that from happening again.ÔÇØ As a result, Rogers says, over the last year alone there has been a 47 percent decrease in the number of work accidents where someone was hurt and 66 percent fewer vehicle accidents.The thing that binds Lewis together most tightly is employee ownership. Since 2000 it has been wholly owned by its staff under an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) that all non-union employees are entitled to after just a yearÔÇÖs service, and the benefits have been appreciated by everyone, says Rogers. ÔÇ£It has proved a great opportunity for our workforce and has given them a potential pension income that most of them would never have been able to save. A lot of it has to do with the growth of the company and our share value.ÔÇØIn 2005 the ESOP Association named Lewis ESOP Company of the Year, not least for its ability to communicate the benefits to its staff. ÔÇ£This company is always looking for ways to instill the value of the ESOP within the company, and on top of that task it has the extra challenge of reaching out to employees in multiple locations in several different states,ÔÇØ said ESOP Association president J. Michael Keeling at the time. An ESOP committee made up of field operators as well as corporate management meets three or four times a year to develop programs on how to communicate the benefits and the responsibilities of being an employee-owner.ÔÇ£WeÔÇÖre an employee-oriented company,ÔÇØ Rogers concludes. ÔÇ£We recognize that itÔÇÖs the employees on the trucks and in the field that make or break us, so we aim to treat them with respect and integrity, and to provide them with the training they need. ItÔÇÖs because of their loyalty, dedication and hard work that this company is a success, and it makes my job so much easier.ÔÇØ  ÔÇô Editorial research by Kristina Perley┬á