Did the boss come back and help you redo it for free, or are you eating that cost on your own? I get that he told you to kick it, but small room does not mean you skip the stretcher, it means you just have less room to work the poles. Berber has that heavy backing and it fights you the whole way, so a kicker never gets it tight enough to hold, it just looks good for a week until it relaxes. I've seen guys kick 12x15s for years and swear by it, but every one of those I've pulled up later had ripples at the seams. The stretcher is not about room size, it's about getting the backing to actually lock in, and a kicker just can't put that kind of pull on it. Next time tell him you'll kick to get it close and stretch to finish, that's the only way it stays flat.

Gotta say I see it the other way, man. I've done about 850 inspections myself and LiDAR still feels like a crutch for me. I get the elevation catch saves money, but I've found the setup time and processing drag kills my pace on smaller jobs. For bigger lots like your 40 acres, sure, I'll break out the fancy gear, but under 5 acres my old-school grid and a good visual walk beats it every time for speed. I just worry folks lean on the tech and stop trusting their eyes, which is where I've seen more mistakes happen than the LiDAR ever fixed.