Looking back, what’s one defining moment that shaped the way you lead and work today?
I had an interesting frost delay one October morning in 1987 that taught me to always be proactive!
A club Board Member drove down to the maintenance area in his expensive car, stopped in the driveway alongside the 14th fairway and put his passenger window down. Now what happened next was not expected, [and a not so smart moment on his part].
The smart part was what his act taught me, and the not-so-smart part led to his ears ringing for hours.
You see, after putting the passenger window down, he picked up a .22 rifle and fired – hitting two crows with one shot that were picking grubs out of the rough. He then put his window down further, looked at me and said: “Just trying to help you out with your problem!” He then backed up and drove away.
What a wonderful Board Member he was, and he soon became Club President for many years. He and I got along very well over the years, and we had many one-on-one conversations about ALL aspects of how the club was running. I found him to be a very good businessman, and a great human being for the people around him in his world. His family members were also very personable people. I worked with his wife who was on the golf committee and even had conversations with his father.
I never met any of his children but one became a top actress on the hit show Modern Family.
I had a somewhat low budget at the time for a private club. It had been set for the year since the previous Fall, and I never wanted to go over budget too far. I only had funds to spray insecticide on green tops, tee tops, and fairways. This was my second Fall at the club, and I never saw crow damage in the rough before. I had already seeded the spotty areas which made them look worse after using a seeder box in different directions.
After the crow incident, I went into action getting acreage and cost to see if the club would go for the expense to spray the rough for grubs. They did and I soon realized the benefit to “Proactive Management” and still use those processes in my life today.
I got away from the “fix it when it happens” attitude.
Within a few years I had quadrupled my budget, doubled my labor force, had two Assistant Superintendents, a new maintenance building, a new pump station, a new state-of-the-art irrigation system, and a separate equipment budget with yearly inventory focusing on depreciation, life history, and replacement.
The next step was redoing the golf course back to the Seth Raynor original that was hidden there. That took a few more years, much communication and convincing on my part, and for another man on the Golf Committee to take the lead and champion the project.
That is another story for later.
-Mark S. Merrick, CGCS Retired
Introducing ‘Merrick Mondays’, a segment where we hear from Mark Merrick, our resident brand Ambassador, Chief ‘Cool” Officer, and general source of wisdom and secrets of the universe, to spotlight a dose of interview-style content, weekly.