Transcript What do you feel was the most useful part of the program?

“Building a Winning Team” – Management
and Marketing for Farm Couples
National Extension Risk Management
Education Conference
Bret Oelke and Bill Craig
April 1. 2009
Overview of Presentation
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This program, designed for farm couples, has been
offered for three years in cooperation with the
Minnesota Farm Bureau, Minnesota Corn Growers
and other sponsors. The target audience has been
young farmers and ranchers who want to improve
their farm management and crop and livestock
marketing skills. Program partisipants also
expressed interest in wanting to include their
spouses in more active roles in those areas. The
program consists of five sessions which will be
summarized for attendees. We will also provide
evaluation results from past partisipants.
Objectives for today
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Provide you with an overview of the program
and its target audience
Review end of session evaluation results
Encourage the development and delivery of
similar programs in your state
Why this type of program is important
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Fantastic opportunities are ahead
Incredible risks are ahead as well
Skills in marketing and management will
increase your odds of long term success
Gain a competitive advantage
Improve management and markting and
have better business relationships between
family members and with those who they do
business with
Why was the program developed
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Marketing and
management groups
and Annie’s Project
participants and
alumni requested a
couples program on
marketing and farm
management.
Program development and delivery
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Marketing and management
group material and tools used
as a base
Annie’s Project format used as a
guide
Designed specifically for a
couples audience, primarily
young farmers
Include communication
segments
Building a Winning Team Objectives
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Improve Business Communication
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Enhance Marketing Skills
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Internally
Externally
Identify or develop marketing philosophy
Market and purchase planning
Expand Management Expertise
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Understand how to utilize farm records
Recognize skill areas
Explore areas for outsourcing or in-sourcing
Build a “Winning Team”
Session One
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Introductions
Overview of Program
Marketing and
Management
Resources
Understanding Markets
Session Two
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Session One Review
The Language of Marketing
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Marketing Terms
How to Read and Utilize Marketing Resources
Session Three
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Session Three Review
Keeping Track and Utilizing Your Records
Communicating with your spouse and other
family members
Session Four
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Session Three Review
Building Supplier and Buyer Relationships
Planning for Marketing
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Cost of production
Developing marketing plans
Developing Better Relationships with
Landlords
 Defending and expanding your land base
Session Five
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Session Four Review
Assembling your “Winning Team”
 Internal and external members
Group Directed Discussion
Evaluation
Evaluation Questions
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
What topics (not covered) do you feel should
be included in this program?
What would you change about the program?
I was surprised by…………………
I changed my mind about………………..
I now understand………………..
I plan to……………………………
Evaluation Questions
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Other comments:
Would you recommend this type of program to
others?
Is there a better (or different) way that this type
of program could be delivered?
What kind of follow up, if any, would you like to
see as a result of your participation in this
program?
Over 50 couples completed the program in three
multi session and one weekend version of the
program.
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
1. What do you feel was the most useful part of the
program?
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General knowledge increased for me – we’re busy and
with everything else going on with family, my husband
and I don’t always have time to talk about this.
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Spouses attending together.
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Finding all the different websites. Suggestions for the
land rental contracts. Learning the terminology.
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Knowing where our partner stands in what they know
and what they do.
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Landlord rental agreements.
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
1. What do you feel was the most useful part of the
program?
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Resource – website addresses for “free”
information for farm information.
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Learning how important it is to not only work
the farm together (in the field) but (in the office)
as well!
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Bret’s observations and experiences.
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Getting the website information. Getting more
familiar with the terms. Being able to understand
more and therefore better communication with my
husband.
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
Learning how to read commodity exchange
information when using my computer.
Having a better understanding of what actually
goes into marketing and management on the
farm. I never realized the factors that are all
involved and the time and research farmers
need to do – wow!
The vocabulary! Just a review and new
vocabulary. The understanding of what was/is
being talked about.
The websites and how to get around in the sites
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
I know my husband enjoyed the program and was
able to pick up some pointers – he loved to pick
Bret’s brain for marketing tips.
All the websites you gave us was (is) very useful.
Reminding me how much I don’t like
marketing! Understanding what’s going on
and all the number crunching is more stress
than I care for.
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
I think there is value in having husbands and
wives together to talk about what issues are
facing farmers and what it takes to be
successful. Team work! Listening and
spending time with other couples going
through the same things.
Having the handout to go along with the slides.
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
An understanding of how vast marketing is and a
small understanding of what/how marketing occurs.
When my husband sat down with me outside of the
class to explain everything at a slower pace and in
words that made sense. The class did help give
me more interest in our operation and learning
more about it. I also appreciated the
discussions regarding communications and
interpersonal relationships
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
Nice to go over terms and explanation of marketing
info. Good use of examples throughout class.
Breaking down terminology with marketing.
Reading charts and understanding what they
mean. I am not involved in the “hands-on” part of
our operation but have an interest in learning
Evaluation Summaries
Female participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
Marketing plan discussion.
Understanding how to calculate (and realize)
your cost of production to apply to a marketing
plan.
Learning how to read markets and learning about
calls and puts
Evaluation Summaries
Male participants
1. What do you feel was the most useful part of the
program?
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The last meeting for rent agreements.
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Websites.
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Sharing the information with my spouse and
friends as a group.
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Flexible cash rent information.
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It was all very good in every aspect.
Evaluation Summaries
Male participants
1. What do you feel was the most useful part of the
program?
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Education is important. Wife needs to help
with overwhelming tasks.
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The last session.
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To develop a written marketing plan and stick to it.
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Showing us the resources that we can use to find
information i.e. websites, etc
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I liked the comprehensive approach to the
whole subject. The most useful part was the
discussion involving managing risk.
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Rethinking the marketing plan.
Evaluation Summaries
Male participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
The best part of this program is when I listened
to the other people carefully I learned that you
can learn from everyone.
Bret Oelke – Bret’s knowledge and persistence on
marketing plans and advice is second to none!
Being able to bring my wife up to speed on
marketing. Great being able to learn with
others in age bracket.
A good refresher from college marketing class.
Better than my 300 level ag marketing courses.
Evaluation Summaries
Male participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
Bret’s “URL’s.” I have used a lot of his web
address gathering information. Better yet. Put
them on a CD for faster use.
The group gathering to discuss different ideas
and options. The ability to find out many
different resources available to all of the
groups.
The terms in the marketing terms presentation
Evaluation Summaries
Male participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
Giving my wife information that would have
created guide the “conversation” if I would
have tried to inform her.
The interaction with the group. Everyone sharing
ideas about what works for them. Also, the
Internet tools and websites we discussed.
Free email information.
I believe a very simple snapshot of something that
really will work for me is make small, increment
sales.
Evaluation Summaries
Male participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
The marketing stuff.
It gave a good introduction into parts of marketing
that I didn’t understand and got me thinking on
how to improve upon it.
How to calculate cost of production, setup
marketing plans, evaluate financial records,
making networking connections.
Evaluation Summaries
Male participants
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What do you feel was the most useful part of
the program?
I feel this program brings a couple closer
together getting away from everyday routine.
Networking with other couples and bringing
forth a lot of good discussion topics about the
business.
Financial analysis and how it applies to my
farm and what a banker might look for and
enterprise analysis.
Everything was useful
The budget planning – landlord relationships –
farm communication
Thanks – Let’s keep in touch
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If you want to learn more contact:
Bret Oelke:
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[email protected]
218.770.2428
Bill Craig:
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[email protected]