President foreword | PPC97 November 2019
Trust is a vital ingredient for business and personal success.
You trust me to provide a service, and I trust you to pay me when the work is done.
This is the most basic trust equation between you and your customers.
You have to trust your colleagues to look after your clients professionally and ethically, thereby representing your company ethos.
They, in turn, need to be able to trust you to pay them, keep them safe and treat them fairly.
One of the many reasons people join BPCA is because an endorsement from a third-party helps customers trust them more.
Accreditations, qualifications, insurances and continued learning all promote trust; that’s why they’re part of BPCA membership criteria.
BPCA has to trust it’s members to uphold its good name.
But for trust to work, it needs to be a two-way street.
You need to be able to trust your trade association to keep you in the know, campaign with your interests at heart, and give you a competitive advantage over non-members.
Should you trust BPCA?
Many in our sector are sceptical by nature.
Trusting too easily isn’t a savvy business move.
Trusting nobody is a recipe for disaster.
Charles H Green talks about the trust equation.
Let’s talk about credibility
Do you see the things that BPCA does as credible?
Take a look at this magazine, our Codes of Best Practice, our training, forums, website, bulletins, PestEx, technical advice.
Is it good? Do they suggest BPCA knows pest management?
For me, I believe BPCA’s credibility comes from its 76 years of experience as an association.
I believe in the professional Staff team we employ, who live and breath this organisation.
I believe in the credibility of our committee/elected-Board structure.
I’ve sat on committees, and I’ve been on this Board for years now; the passion around these tables is second to none.
What other pest organisations are winning awards for helping eBay to stop illegal pesticide sales?
Who else is organising events in the Scottish Parliament?
Who else is organising free, accessible webinars that everyone can join in with? The list goes on.
Now take reliability
We’ve got some fantastic examples of the Association’s reliability from this year.
During the bird licensing debacle, BPCA led the way to inform the sector.
We sent out emails, fielded hundreds of technical questions and organised free webinars to keep technicians on the right side of the law.
BPCA campaigned on our behalf and was the only named pest organisation in Defra’s summary of the call for evidence.
BPCA Registered is not even one year old.
However, it’s already recognised by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) in Ireland for their register of Pest Management Trained Professional Users (PMU).
In Pest magazine’s latest survey, they show the majority of companies surveyed were on BPCA Registered already!
When was the last time you asked BPCA for support and didn’t get it?
Now I suspect if you don’t trust BPCA - it’s probably because of the “I” in the trust equation.
Intimacy comes from engagement
Trust doesn’t work if you’re not willing to experience what BPCA’s got to offer.
Come to BPCA’s Forums. Meet the team and the Board. Come and observe one of our committee meetings. Book onto a webinar. Do some of our CPD quizzes online. Talk to us at PestTech or PPC Live or give the team a call.
Finally, we’ve got to talk about the undoing of trustworthiness: self-orientation.
Simply put, this is self-interest. We might say, “I can’t trust him on this deal – I don’t think he cares enough about me; he’s focused on what he gets out of it.”
BPCA’s a not-for-profit trade association, owned solely by its members. If you don’t like something, you can change it.
Nobody is profiting from your membership fees. All profits are reinvested in member benefits.
Having said that, if you are entirely self-orientated, you might not get the return on your membership you want.
Do you trust BPCA?
If you don’t think that what we’re doing is credible - tell us and we’ll fix it.
If you don’t think we’re reliable – tell us when we’ve let you down.
If you have no feelings of intimacy toward the Association - come join in.
And if you think we’re all self-orientated, remember: BPCA is its members. Come and engage with us before you make up your mind.
Phil Halpin
BPCA President
Director, Countrywide Environmental Services
president@bpca.org.uk