Presented by Cornell CALS PRO-DAIRY and the Northeast Dairy Producers Association (NEDPA), the biennial Operations Managers Conference 2023 drew an engaged crowd of middle managers and industry leaders.

“Leave me alone and let me farm!” I’ve heard this from many a client over the years, sometimes in response to my request for timely financial reporting. But it is the wrong response. 

“The only thing worse than training your employees and having them leave is not training them and having them stay.” Since this quote is from Henry Ford, it is approximately a century old. If this was true for his assembly line workers, it certainly is even more true today.

The underlying factor when trying to make big decisions on whether to build a freestall barn, heifer shed, new parlor or that new robot barn is what it will be worth once it is erected and operational.

Here is an unarguable fact: A high-functioning and effective farm team – with all team members in alignment and focused on achieving established farm goals – has a distinct competitive advantage over a farm that operates without a team.

If we go back 10-plus years, most dairy farms bred all their cows and heifers for dairy calves and raised all heifer calves as dairy herd replacements.

High-functioning family businesses need good conflict just as much as they need the right protocols for production.