Loving Plants Helps, but ....
You need more if you want a Successful Career or Business in Horticulture.

• This course helps you develop those skills that make a real difference in the workplace   
• Learn skills to develop management strategies appropriate to specific enterprises in the horticultural industry.

COURSE CONTENT

There are ten lessons in this course as follows:

1.  Horticultural Business Structures

2.  Management Theories and Procedures

3.  Horticulture and The Law

4.  Supervision

5.  Financial Management

6.  Staff Management

7.  Improving Plant Varieties

8.  Productivity and Risk

9.  Managing Physical Resources

10. Developing an Horticultural Business Plan

Course Duration : 100 hours of self paced study

Examples of things you may be doing:

• Compare the organisational structure of different horticultural enterprises.
• Determine the value of a business plan to a specific horticultural business.
• Determine the significance of consumer law to a specified horticultural business.
• Determine the duties of different supervisors, in a specific horticultural enterprise.
• Describe how a budget is applied to managing a specific horticultural enterprise.
• Determine the criteria for selecting staff to work in an horticultural enterprise.
• Explain the system for controlling the collection of royalties on a plant which is covered by plant variety rights.
• Monitor and recommend improvements to a specified work task in a horticultural enterprise.

Can You Manage Performance Properly in a Workplace?

Performance management is a systematic and cyclic process to ensure that the pre-determined goals and objectives of an organisation are consistently achieved, in an efficient and effective manner.  

Performance management focuses on ways of maximising the performance:

• Of an individual
• Of a team
• Of a department
• Job processes
• Production processes
• Delivery of services

The entire organisation

It is also a process which identifies and deals with under performing individuals, teams, departments, services etc. 

The key objectives of a performance management plan are to:

• Create clear directives regarding roles, responsibilities and performance expectations for employees to help them improve performance, and to ensure that their work output reflects the goals of the business. 
• Identify changes to existing job descriptions.
• Identify training and development requirements to meet individual performance, individual professional aspirations and long term company needs.
• Provide constructive communication between employees, managers and supervisors on organisational developments, operational plans and to ensure that work plans meet future needs. 

Create a process for performance appraisal in order to recognise and reward achievements; to identify and manage performance improvement issues.

Elements to consider:

• Have measurable goals that reflect the corporate strategy of the business
• Ensure that employees understand and support the corporate gaols of the business
• Have measurable goals and make sure that they are the same as the corporate goals 
• Ensure that employees know how they are performing in relation to the these goals
• Employees should be flexible enough to modify their approach as business goals change

Employee performance should be reflected in the rewards they receive; in order to do this accurately mangers must have detailed performance information on which to base their decisions 

Staff Appraisals
If a business is to meet its goals and objectives and grow in the future it must manage performance. One way to achieve this is through the process of staff appraisals during which management and staff share information about job performance and the potential for improvement. 

• The main staff appraisals are usually conducted on a yearly basis 
• The employee should be given prior warning so they can prepare for the discussion 
• Staff appraisals should not be seen to replace regular staff / management feedback. 

The aim of staff appraisals is to:

• Review an employees career and determine future development
• To enable planning in relation to an individual’s job activities for the following period
• To identify problems that require action
• To identify training needs – and the funding required
• To determine rewards – ie. wage increases. bonuses or other incentives
• To improve communication between staff and managers 
• To inform staff of future corporate goals, objectives and expectations
• To encourage staff motivation – informed staff are better motivated
• To identify an employees capabilities