The Farmers Club Newsletter

The “Club Notes” for Saturday, the 24th of February, 2024.

By Dwain Duxson

6 days to go

Our FarmTender2024 - Entrepreneurs in Farming event is not far away. Click here for more info. See the media release here. Read some of the questions we are going to ask: Danny Thomas, Rob Dawes, Claire Booth, Andrew Weidemann, David Jochinke, John Gladigau, Hayley Grosser, Cassidy Johnston, Jeff McDonald, Broden Holland and Sam Van Assche.

Communication breakdown

I was listening to a podcast yesterday with the subject being communication. I think we underestimate the importance of communication and how we relate to each other on the Farm. But it shouldn't be just communication for communication's sake; there has to be a bit of strategy behind it. Things like weekly meetings, structured roles, a communication platform like Whats App, text, skype, slack, etc, whatever it is, you have to nominate it as the platform that we all use. You also need to establish some rules around the communication platform, like saying good morning when you start and just letting the others know when you are going off the Farm to do something. Also, you, as a leader of your Farming operation, need to know that people receive information differently, and you have to observe each individual and deliver accordingly. One person might be sensitive, another you might have to deliver the message twice, someone might not like swearing, and the list goes on. Have you set up a user-friendly communication system for your Farm? Reply to [email protected]

What was your favourite Ute ever?

I reckon this might become a bit of a series of What is your favourite ever? I have some ideas around it so watch this space. We will start with Utes because they are probably the most important thing we use on the Farm. And it's great that everyone on the Farm has an allocated Ute, and more often than not, we get to choose it. And within our community we all know what each other drives, so you can tell a mile away who is coming and to greet them with a neighbourly wave. In my case, I have been off the Farm for nearly 20 years now, but I still drive Utes. My favourite was a Ford Range Duel cab I had probably 5 years ago; it was just a ripper. Our son drives it now. I also remember driving the Kingswood and WB Utes, but that was before I had a license, so they weren't mine specifically. So, what has been your favourite Ute ever and why? Reply to [email protected]

Building your equity

When you hear the word equity, you would mainly think about how much you have as a tied-up in the Farm or House in town. But what I am talking about here is your personal equity. It's something we build up over time as we create new associates and connections. Each connection is building your personal equity a little bit more. Trust and relationships are key in Agriculture, and you want to be a person seen as trustworthy. And you want it to be not only about creating relationships but also maintaining them. There is an absolutely great podcast on this subject. The podcast interviewee is Craig Tiley, the CEO of Tennis Australia. You can listen to it here; it runs for an hour and 36 minutes and is a good one when you are driving along. So, it's important to keep adding equity because you can lose it as well by not doing the right thing. If you want to succeed in Ag, it's essential to have equity. What sort of things have you done this week to build yours? Reply to [email protected]

Your replies

Below are snippets from some of the replies you sent in. All quotes will remain nameless. See a few current ones below:

• “But has anyone thought of going the other way? Think 'portable shearing shed'. I know there are trailers that unfold to produce a one-stand, but that's not big enough. What about a semi?” - In reply to our Note on Multi-use Shed. This Farmer suggested going mobile.

• “Interesting topic: the Shearing Shed; we had a classic old Shed, but the shearers would not shear there anymore, timber, iron roof, 4 stands; the original engine was imported from England and arrived on horse and cart. It’s still on site. A new Shed was constructed with iron, and Stock Pro supplied the 4 stands pre-fab with internal yards; nice job. As the Shed would only be used a couple of times a year, we cemented two-thirds of the floor area; this area is used for Shedding Farm Equipment, trucks, etc. It's user-friendly, but it didn’t come cheap”. - A great story on adding multi-uses to the Shearing Shed.

• ”Talk about getting out of Sheep. I went to a funeral in Warracknabeal (Vic) this week. A stock agent told me between his company and another brand, 17 clients have got out of Sheep since the price dropped and will never go back in. Wonder how widespread this is”. - I am not sure how widespread it is, but this is alarming in such a confined area.

• “Interesting fact for you Dwain ...Friends of mine have a daughter who was a secondary school teacher here in South Australia. She was poached and now teaches in San Francisco.  She says the American Education system is 10 years behind South Australia. Perhaps we are doing a bit better than we give ourselves credit for, but there is always room for improvement”. - I suppose this is like the internal and external benchmarking. Do we want to be comparing ourselves to others, or do we want to be looking within and seeing where improvements can be made?

• “So I wonder if some strategic education to the masses would help them understand”. - This was in reply to our Farm Tender Daily story about educating the non-Ag people about Ag. Read the story here.

End of message.

Dwain Duxson
0427 011 900

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