In Ted Williams’ book, ‘The Science of Hitting’ is a diagram illustrating  that even within the hitter’s strike zone, there are certain locations of pitches that will produce better opportunities than others. Essentially, some strikes are simply better than others. I think it’s commonly referred to as the sweet spot.

This concept translates very well to business, and especially well into the broad business of trees.

If we consider arboriculture as the entire strike zone, we can sub divide it into plant health care, tree installation, pruning, removal, cabling and bracing, consulting, research, training, education and the list goes on. As arborists, each of these things presents an opportunity to make money, broaden client base, provide new opportunities for employees or advance our own personal careers. Connecting with people. They are potential hits that we can swing at in order to increase our average of success. Maybe one day, even make it to the hall of fame.

But the sweet spot, those few locations right in the middle of the strike zone, if we can focus our patience on those locations, on the pitches we hit well, our average is destined to go up.

Here’s the catch: every arborist may have a different sweet spot, or rather, we all hit different pitches better than others. A different sweet spot. It’s important to recognize it. Different education, different experience, different resources, different equipment inventory, different physical skills, different company structures and different philosophies. In other words, we need to understand exactly what our strengths our, what areas we are very productive in, what things we are passionate about and potential areas for improvement and fine tuning. Hitting and tree work is an ongoing maintenance.

But it also has a lot to do with individuality, and the recognition of it.

This passage from the book I found particularly attractive when considering individual character: