Starting in Scotland, the next two seminars will be held on 17 March at Hilton Park Golf Club near Glasgow and on 18 March at Carnoustie Golf Links.
The seminar will feature the results from the 2009 Punctus Study with detailed information on cost structures in greenkeeping from more than 40 golf courses and show how to manage cost levels in Greenkeeping sensibly.
At the end of the seminar the Punctus Program will be shown as an example on how to document.
The Greenkeeping software has been developed by a company called Punctus, established in 1999 by sister and brother Andrea and Herwarth Talkenberg.
The Punctus Greenkeeping Program has been on the market since March 2002, is used in 15 countries on golf courses from 9 to 45 holes, with Greenkeeping staff from 3 to 46 and is European market leader by a wide margin.
Here Andrea Talkenberg, an economist with many years experience as a business consultant, tells GBN about what she expects the seminar will achieve.
GBN: What is the seminar about and how did it come about?
Andrea Talkenberg: We started analysing cost structures in Greenkeeping together with customers two years ago. The results clearly show that good documentation is very important in managing cost levels in greenkeeping. There is a lot of room to influence cost levels!
Meanwhile we are holding seminars on cost management in greenkeeping together with the greenkeeping and club managers associations in Switzerland, Germany and the UK, are teaching at greenkeeping colleges – in the UK at Myerscough College.
This is a hands-on seminar. We will look at the benefits in having clear and easily available documentation in areas like employee records, machine repair and maintenance records, course maintenance reports – with all reports for the committee or owner ready at the push of a button – and more.
GBN: Why are you also inviting the Club Managers?
Andrea Talkenberg: Greenkeeping costs are a substantial part of the overall expenses at a golf club and there is an increasing need for good cost management. Documentation and daily management happen on the greenkeeping side, but overall management based on the reports happens between club managers, greens committees and course managers.
By the way: both hosting clubs – Carnoustie Golf Links and Hilton Park GC – are Punctus customers where the General Managers are actively involved in applying the information from the Punctus System to manage their cost levels in Greenkeeping .
GBN: The invitation mentions the new Punctus Study 2009
Andrea Talkenberg: Yes. The first study was very well received by our customers and so we decided to do another – bigger one – this year. We will bring the new Punctus Study 2009 to the workshop.
The study shows how much time is spent on which areas – from greens, fairways etc to machines, parking lots and the famous ‘5 minute jobs’.
If you take into account the cost of using the machines involved, you have real controlling information for the greenkeeping side. If you know in detail, where the man and machine hours are spent, you have the information to manage your cost levels.
This sort of information you cannot get from accounting data such as overall salary cost or how much you spent on fuel. The Punctus Study shows how big the differences are in each area and can help a club to identify areas in their own data, where they might want to take a closer look.
Another big area are machine costs and the tricky question of deciding, when a machine is no longer economical. Again, clear controlling information helps enormously! From data in the study you can see just how big the differences are between golf clubs.
GBN: Is the Punctus Program easy to use?
Andrea Talkenberg: Yes, very easy and also very fast. Ten minutes a day and you are done with your regular work.
GBN: What if I am interested, but cannot make it on the dates or am too far away from Carnoustie Golf Links or Hilton Park Golf Club?
Andrea Talkenberg: Contact us, there will be other workshops or ask for a demo version: www.punctus.com