Congratulations! All your employee positions are filled and you are back to full staff at your business (whether it is a farm, ranch or feedlot). Now you can sit back and worry about something like the weather rather than conducting interviews. But should you relax and take your focus off your employees?
To keep all elements of your business running smoothly, managing your employees should be a constant process and never be put on the back burner.
One of the areas often overlooked in employee management is assessing and allocating time for continued education.
It’s great when you can brag at the coffee shop that some of your employees have worked for you for 10 or 20 years, but does this mean “all” or just “some” of your employees?
Have you had employees leave your business because they were asked to do tasks they were not trained to do or were not certified to do?
Lifelong learning
Lifelong learning must take place because changes in our society are happening at such a fast pace, the skills you had when you were hired might not be adequate for today.
Harry S. Truman said, “It’s what you learn after you know it all that counts,” and Henry Ford said, “Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at 20 or 80.”
Shea Geelan, managing director of Gpac (a search firm based out of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, that places individuals nationwide in the agriculture industry), says, “In speaking with owners and managers in the ranch and feedlot industry across the country, we have found that the majority of them believe it is vital to provide continuing education for their current employees.
With the changing trends and technology in the industry, most of them have their employees participate in some form of continued training at a minimum of three to four times annually, and some are as often as every month.”
Six benefits of continued education are:
1. It can reduce the cycle of turnover. Turnover causes stress because remaining employees pick up extra hours due to the vacant position, and often important things can fall through the cracks.
Turnover may be attributed to the lack of training offered to the employee or by not selecting the right person for the right job at the time of hire.
Conduct constant communication with your employees to make sure they are comfortable with their skill set for their duties. If not, identify specific training or mentoring to occur.
2. A skilled workforce is a productive workforce. The more skilled your employees are, the better the outcome will be for your business.
Asking your employees to excel or reach goals that are unattainable due to lack of training, continued education or skill level will not help your business be successful, and in the end, can be costly and ineffective.
For example, sending your employees to get certified in beef quality assurance (BQA) can train them on proper handling of vaccines, adequate record-keeping and handling of cattle in general, making them more effective and productive to your business.
3. It improves employee attitude and success. When the attitude of your team is positive, your employees are motivated and willing to work.
Knowing management is willing to invest time and money into you, as an employee, builds confidence and pride. The U.S. Small Business Administration website discusses “Maximizing your greatest resource – employee training” and emphasizes confidence comes from ability and results in productivity.
Providing ample continuing education opportunities reinforces the trust you have in your employees by allowing them to grow and gain new skills.
You become a partner in helping your employees achieve their goals. Employees with continued education have the opportunity to move up in your business, take on more responsibility or advance further in the industry in general.
4. It reduces costs and impacts safety. Continued education helps employers retain better employees because they are more skilled at their job responsibilities.
Using the example again of training on BQA, this can result in saving dollars when vaccines are handled according to protocol and cattle are handled properly to prevent injuries, discounts, etc.
Enrolling employees in required training that offers certification (driving equipment, handling chemicals, etc.) allows you to document the percentage of your employees trained in these special skills and may impact insurance premiums or expand the marketing potential of your product.
5. It determines if job descriptions need updated. Job descriptions help define areas of training needed. They outline physical and mental requirements needed for a role as well as the tasks to be performed, specifically a listing of required skills.
If an employee identifies they do not have a specific skill set, or is struggling in their position, it may be because a skill set needed for that job was not properly identified or emphasized in the job description and hiring process.
If you are expecting your employee to have specific skills, you need to test them on those skills before you hire them or give them the opportunity to gain those skills.
6. It keeps pace with rapid advancements of technology. Technology is changing at such a fast pace in agriculture, it is critical to identify continued education opportunities and needs for your employees, especially some of your longer-term employees.
Fortunately, along with the advancements in technology come advancements in access to continued education through videos, podcasts or webinars – all of which can advance learning and don’t require the employee to leave the work site.
However, you may also need to consider hands-on training or specific conferences through extension, universities or organizations for your employees to attend. These are great opportunities to gain further education and also interact with experts and other agricultural employees in attendance. 
Lynn Gordon
Ag Leadership Specialist
Assistant Professor
SDSU Extension and Department of Teaching, Learning and Leadership
