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News Releases
July 27, 2009
Summer Development - by Greg WolfI like to relate some of the natural rhythms of the seasons to different aspects of our family businesses. And we find ourselves in a time period now of rapid growth and development. A month ago, we saw a Kansas wheat crop rapidly develop to maturity. And this month, we are watching corn that not long ago was just coming through the ground, explode through tasseling and earing.
A couple of weeks ago I was visiting a client in central Ohio; and during the week I was there, I watched the corn crop in that area rapidly tassel over just a few days. As I watched that happen and observed the crops in the area closely, I had a couple of very strong impressions. One was the superiority of the planning and production practices that had gone into our client's corn and soybean crops, relative to the area. This was a reminder to me that superior production capabilities still stand out as superior, which I do regard as significant in 2009. It was made more dramatic, since there were some unfarmed fields in the same area that had grown up in weeds. But even those farms that were in production were, for the most part, inferior in color, stand, evenness, cleanliness, and stage of development. I'm not able to recount all the reasons why, but the client I was visiting clearly understood.
I do, however, understand one of the reasons why, and that was my second big impression. Numerous fields in the area had been set back due to excessive rain earlier, and crop flooding had created some of the poor coloration, uneven stands, and uneven development. I could fairly quickly chalk those problems up as weather-related and therefore uncontrollable. But as we drove those central Ohio roads, I discovered that the difference in the status and development of the crop was not really the weather conditions earlier, but the difference in tiling programs in the area. Tiling has always been difficult for a northwestern Kansas farm boy to relate to, but getting excessive water off those fields as rapidly and evenly as possible is a big part of the difference I was seeing between the crops of our client and the crops of the majority of the neighbors.
There are a number of family business lessons here. One is simply that outstanding production remains, well, outstanding in one's field! I have heard a good bit in the past, and have even concluded myself, that in 2009 outstanding production practices are kind of a minimum bar for success in farming, but the evidence from this trip would suggest otherwise. Another family business lesson is that planning and preparation, both in the short term and longer terms, pays off dramatically in the heat of the growing season--when the business is developing and progressing most rapidly. In most cases, early and untimely setbacks on a crop can never be recovered. Another lesson is that the crops I observed were benefiting from both annual planning as well as the longer term planning involved in the tiling program. Multiple years of investment and planning were coming together in that one excellent crop I observed.
Another great lesson is that events that are "uncontrollable," of which we usually regard weather, become less so over time. In other words, our ability to respond positively even to weather circumstances increases over time. Those responses include genetic and fertility choices, in addition to the management of the water cycle--whether getting it off the crop, or holding it on. I built quite a few miles of terracing in northwest Kansas a number of years ago, and in Gove County we didn't even empty them into drainages--we were attempting to hold every drop on the field that we could. Modern no-till methods are intended to do the same thing, preserving the maximum amount of moisture in reserve for crop development. This is in ironic contrast to the tiling programs of Ohio, but the return to planning and preparation for "uncontrollable" circumstances is a very positive one in both cases.
If an outstanding corn, soybean or wheat crop comes as a result of multiple years of good planning and preparation, surely the same is true for the business itself. For all the complexity of a single crop on a single field, a business grows significantly more complex with financial, marketing, and human dimensions. If, as we hope, our businesses find success through the period of most rapid growth and development, it will surely be in large part because of the quality of planning and preparation.
Editor's note: Greg Wolf is a consultant with Kennedy and Coe, LLC (www.kcoe.com) and works to help clients of the firm navigate toward better returns in all areas of their businesses. He is based in the firm's Pratt, Kan., office and can be reached at 620-672-7476.
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