Many farmers in Eastern Virginia are what I like to call “row crop” farmers. Corn, wheat, soybeans, peanuts, cotton, and barley are grown in neat rows in the fields. Even most vegetable farmers plant their crops in rows. You might think that row crop farmers without livestock are not busy this time of year. After all, most years we are done with harvest by now and the winter cover crops are already planted. But I think you would be surprised at just how busy we are during the cold winter months.
First of all there are meetings. Lots of meetings! As a former Extension Agent who used to schedule a lot of these meetings, I can tell you that winter is a good time to get a lot of farmers together. There are meetings to earn recertification credits for pesticide applicators. There are meetings to learn about the research the Land Grant Universities have conducted. Meetings are hosted by seed companies, chemical companies, and government agencies to tell farmers about their latest advancement or program offering. There are also organizational meetings for groups like Farm Bureau, commodity groups, and cooperatives. Did I mention trade shows? Well, I think you get the picture; there are a lot of meetings!
You might be able to tell by the kinds of meetings I have described that most of them are to help farmers evaluate the past year and plan for the next. This winter my dad, brother, and I have spent a lot of time planning for the 2010 growing season. Like many businesses, we use this time to evaluate what went right and wrong during the past year. We look at research done by the Universities to determine what varieties of seeds to order. We reexamine our nutrient management plan and talk about what crops to plant in what fields. There always seems to be maintenance jobs on barns, storage bins, and equipment that need attention. But one of the most important things we do when we are unable to be busy in the fields is to set goals for next year while taking into account what we learned a the various meetings we’ve attended.
I think sometimes we as farmers, members of organizations, and as individuals underestimate the potential benefits of sitting down and setting goals. Now, I’m not talking about the kind of goals that are set on Jan 1st and fade as gym memberships go unused. I’m talking about the kind of goals that are realistic but yet motivating. Goals that have benchmarks to determine when success is achieved and goals that create accountability are the ones worth setting. After all, if you don’t set goals to determine what success looks like in your business, organization, or life, how will you know when you are successful? How will you know when to try something new? How will you know when attending meetings at the sacrifice of something else have been worth it?
Do you attend a lot of meetings this time of year too? Sometimes I get so caught up in attending meetings, I just show up so I can mark it off my to-do list while I spend the whole meeting worrying about how I will make it to the next meeting or the next item on my to-do list. I forget the real reason I am there- to meet a goal of some sort. This year, I am going to make a conscious effort to make sure each meeting helps me to reach a goal.
How will you know if 2010 was a successful year? Do you have personal, business, and organizational goals? If not, you should start setting goals today so you can be successful in 2010.