Employee development: Investing in your beef production business’s future

• Purchasing capital items
• Improvements in beef cattle genetics
• Land and building improvements

An important key to maximizing the return from these investments is hiring and retaining skilled, engaged employees.

An important and often overlooked ingredient for skilled and engaged employees is investing in their growth and development. Employee investments are different from the investments above, which require massive amounts of money. Employee development investments require little capital. They do, however, require an employee development mindset and development systems to ensure continuous growth and improvement. The key is that employee development is a priority.

Below we explore five employee development tools. They include both one-time development events and continuous systems. We’ll begin with the performance improvement system, as it has parts that can be implemented at any time.

1. A performance improvement system

A performance improvement system, often referred to as an employee management system, seeks to provide answers to the two key questions employees have about their performance:

1. What is expected of me?
2. How am I doing?

When the “system” answering these two questions is unstructured, employees guess at expectations and get feedback from your body language. Both lead to uncertainty, frustration, reduced performance and lowered retention.

On many ranches and farms, the only structured component is an annual performance review. However, research has shown that traditional performance reviews focusing on past performance during the year are rarely successful. Feedback on performance should be given as it occurs, not at the end of the year.

A performance system of this type has three key components:

1. Providing informal, continuous feedback. This allows employees to evaluate and improve performance. I encourage you to start here, as this can be implemented even during busy times.
2. Frequent – often monthly – structured meetings (formal informal meetings). These assist in assessing performance and resetting performance expectations.
3. Annual strategic meetings. These allow you to discuss and plan for the future.

2. Stay meetings

My preferred method for meeting the third component above is an annual “stay” meeting.

Key characteristics of a stay meeting are:

• Purpose: Develop plans and professional development to enhance performance and job satisfaction and increase the likelihood the employee will stay.
• Focus: A stay meeting looks forward, not backward, unlike traditional annual performance reviews.
• Engagement: Foster collaborative, open discussion, with the supervisor listening carefully and asking questions.

Let’s look at the stay meeting in a little more detail:

• How: This is typically a one-on-one meeting with the employee’s supervisor. In some situations, especially with beginning users of the stay meeting idea, an outside individual familiar with stay meetings can be a useful addition. I have assisted supervisors in person and online.
• When: The stay meeting is typically the annual meeting in the performance improvement system, replacing the dreaded annual performance review. Having a scheduled meeting conveys its importance.
• Who: Stay meetings have the key goal of increasing employee retention. The focus, then, should be on those employees who are most connected and important to the ranch or farm. A key goal of the stay meeting is to contribute to the employee becoming a career employee.

3. A development plan

I recently reviewed an employee handbook for a crop and livestock farm. One section detailed the requirement for each employee to have and annually update a development plan for the coming year.

I suggest that every ranch and farm should adopt this policy. The plan would identify focus areas for growth for the coming year. The plan could include on-site training; reading materials; websites, webcasts and webinars; and off-site learning opportunities for the focus areas.

This plan will be updated in late fall or early next year. As the owner or employee receives invitations or becomes aware of meetings/conferences, attendance can be determined based on the match between the event and the focus areas.

4. Employee interpersonal skills

Excellent communication is key to everyday operations, team meetings and all decision-making. Learning and practice can dramatically improve these skills and thus enable more effective communication.

The keys to excellent communication are listening, asking questions and psychological safety. There are numerous options for improving listening and questioning skills, from internet resources and programs to full-length courses through extensions, industry organizations and colleges.

Psychological safety means feeling safe to take interpersonal risks such as speaking up, disagreeing openly and surfacing concerns without fear of negative repercussions or pressure to sugarcoat unwelcome news. A beef production business culture that supports psychological safety is required. Here, the ball is in the owners’ court to create this culture, and there are numerous opportunities to learn the required leadership skills.

5. Career-oriented compensation

A key to having a great workforce is the retention of key employees. One component of employee retention is assisting these employees to view employment with your business as their career. Stay meetings, discussed above, are a key component in creating the view that employment with you is a career.

Compensation is also an important but challenging part of creating career employees. Young and often first-line employees typically focus on having cash as their compensation. As employees age, advance and become more family-oriented, they seek benefits such as excellent health insurance and a retirement program. Balancing these differing desires, especially in our difficult labor market, is a challenge. Being flexible in compensation and being in frequent communication with your employees is key to developing and retaining career-oriented employees.

A final word

Now is the time to select one or two of these development tools to invest in your employees and, therefore, in your ranch or farm’s future. In busy times, frequent, timely feedback is the best place to start.