Arboricultural workforce strategy presentations for industry audiences
James Isaacs is available for conferences, professional forums, webinars and internal leadership events in New Zealand and internationally.
Since 2020, he has presented at five national and international arboriculture conferences, including as keynote speaker at the 2024 International Symposium on Arboriculture in the Tropics. His presentations draw on original workforce research, business ownership and frontline operational experience.
National and international audiences
Presented at arboriculture conferences in New Zealand and internationally including the ISA.
Original workforce research
Master’s research examining the causes of recruitment and retention difficulties among skilled arborists in New Zealand.
International keynote speaker
Keynote speaker at the 2024 International Symposium on Arboriculture in the Tropics
Strategy grounded in operations
Years spent implementing and observing workforce changes inside a growing arboriculture company
Arborist shortages are rarely just recruitment shortages
"A persistent shortage is evidence that the wider workforce system must be examined"
A shortage of applicants may be the most visible symptom, but it does not necessarily explain why an employer cannot build and sustain enough capable people.
Persistent shortages can also reflect slow and expensive training, poor use of experienced workers’ time, weak progression, physically unsustainable roles, overloaded crew leaders, limited management capacity and employment that compares poorly with contracting or self-employment.
James’s presentations examine these interacting causes and connect them to productive capacity, crew performance, training cost, retention and long-term workforce sustainability.
The aim is not to provide another list of generic HR practices. It is to explain why particular workforce interventions may work, what conditions they depend upon and where apparently sensible ideas can fail.
New Zealand National Arboriculture conference presentation 2022
Presented at the 2022 NZArb National Conference at Te Papa, Wellington, this presentation examines why persistent arboricultural skill shortages have not been resolved through immigration, recruitment and training alone. Drawing on Master’s research and industry experience, it explores wage-setting, product-market competition, lost productive capacity and the deployment of scarce skilled labour.
The presentation reflects an earlier stage of work that has since expanded into a broader examination of the workforce systems behind selection, training, productivity, role design and retention.
Selected presentations
2024
NZArb National Conference -Aotea Centre, Auckland
Presentation Title: Coordination, Collaboration and the Arboricultural Pie
Summary Article: HERE
Keynote speaker — online / Indonesia
Presentation Title: The Potential, Innovation, and Challenge of the Arboriculture Industry in New Zealand
2022
NZArb National Conference - Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington
Presentation Title: Skill Shortages and Wage-Setting in New Zealand Arboriculture
Full Video available on Youtube
International Society of Arboriculture Online Conference
Presentation Title: Skill Shortages and Wage-Setting in New Zealand Arboriculture
2020
NZArb National Conference - Queenstown
Presentation Title: The Arboricultural Skill Shortage
Current areas of focus
Presentations can examine the arboricultural workforce as a whole or focus on a defined operational constraint. Topics are adapted to the event, audience and available session length.
Why arborist shortages persist
Why limited worker supply is only part of the explanation, and how employment conditions, training, role design and labour-market alternatives interact.
Beyond recruitment
How vacancies, weak applicants and turnover can be symptoms of a wider workforce-system problem rather than failures of advertising alone.
Training economics
Why developing arborists is expensive, how trainees affect crew productivity, and what determines the time required for a new recruit to become safely useful.
Skilled-time deployment
How driving, transport, waiting, administration and low-value tasks can consume scarce technical capability and restrict crew capacity.
Physical sustainability
How workload, recovery, flexibility, injury and career design affect the long-term supply and retention of field arborists.
Progression and self-employment
Why capable arborists often leave employment, and how autonomy, status, income and broader responsibility can be developed without forcing people out of field work.
Topics can be combined into a broader keynote or developed as focused conference presentations, workshops or leadership discussions.
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