Get planning OR chill out

Creating a strategic business plan is time well spend for a farm family. Writing out your goals and plans using a formal business plan template forces you to take a hard look at your current business model and how it must change to keep with the times and — if all goes well — to grow. With a plan, your family can communicate — with each other and with the banker — what you want to achieve and the most efficient way to get there. 

But I'm torn. Does a business plan take all the fun and spontaneity out of farming?

At my great uncle's funeral in October, one of my cousins told me that "the adventure had gone out of farming." He then told the story about how his grandfather and my grandfather — brothers — drove four teams of horses on a three day journey to get hay. Drought had left them desperate for winter feed. Each brother had two teams, one in the lead and the other following driverless in tandem. They slept with the horses, probably beside a slough somewhere. Eighty years later, this story has become family folklore.

Farmers don't experience that kind of adventure anymore, my cousin said. I'm not sure that kind of adventure would be any "fun," but I see his point. Are we so obsessed with the "business plan" that the pleasure of farm life has been diluted?

The ideal is to improve the business and provide time for adventure at the same time. Your business goals and lifestyle goals should be in balance. Just because you LIVE on the farm doesn't mean you have to spend every hour of day farming. No other working person does that. Think about this: Maybe taking time to strategize actually gives you more time for fun. 

I'd like to hear your thoughts on business plans (do you have one, why or why not?) and adventure in farming (have you had an adventure recently?). Please email me. I'll post them on an upcoming blog.