When it comes to effective employee management, what’s the most important thing you can do to ensure you’re successful with your team? I’m sure we can all create a list of characteristics, concepts and techniques for effectively managing your workforce. But it’s a lot simpler than that. So let’s start at the very beginning. The most important thing you can do to make employee management easier and more effective is to hire better employees. Yeah, you probably already knew that.
Here’s the reality ... nearly every job that gets done at your dairy is done by your employees. So what does that mean to you? That means your company’s results are directly affected by the work your people do.
Good or bad, your people determine your company’s performance and make your business what it is. And on a day-to-day basis, your job of being a manager and delivering top-notch results is going to be a lot harder if your people aren’t very good at what they do. Ultimately, your dairy’s profitability pays the price.
So let’s play out a possible scenario ...
Let’s say you bought the best cattle and equipment you could afford. Once those pieces were in place, you needed to hire a team of employees to help you run your dairy. But instead of taking the same amount of time to select your people as you did when you purchased your equipment and animals, let’s say you ended up hiring the first people who drove into the yard.
And then, as you grew, you allowed the original employees to bring in their friends and family members who were looking for a job.
Even though you started out with a “quality advantage” by purchasing the best assets you (and your banker) could afford, over time your less-than-qualified team slowly causes damage to your facilities and cows (bent gates, smashed concrete, mastitis, DOAs, etc.).
As a result, your employees don’t build upon your initial advantages, but rather they diminish them.
You see, regardless of what your assets looked like when you started, your team will impact them in one way or another. If you start with people who possess a positive attitude and a commitment to doing quality work, they will most likely help your dairy perform better. And if you don’t, you’ll pay for it ... over and over, day after day!
Regardless of how you choose to build your team, ultimately you’re handing the dairy’s success over to the people you’ve hired to help operate it every day. Save yourself the frustration and financial losses – don’t settle for hiring just anyone. Hire good people and train them from the start ... it’s definitely worth the time and effort! PD
Tom Wall
President
Dairy Interactive, LLC
