Numerous agriculture meetings and events are held this time of year, as it’s the “slow” time. Of course, it seems no time of the year is slow anymore, especially if you are a dairy owner wearing many hats, such as milker, feeder, crop manager, people manager, “waste management technician,” repairman, marketer and more.

The generational makeup of society and the workforce is rapidly changing. The baby boomer generation is comprised of about 78 million people born between 1946 and 1964. This generation is six years into the retirement age and will continue to retire for about the next 15 years or so.

If you’re like me and seeing a little more gray on the top or you have an occasional ache or pain you didn’t used to have, you are probably not in the millennial generation. No, I was not born between 1982 and 2000, which are the traditional boundary years that define generation Y. (I was 19 years old in 1982. You can do the math.)

Have you experienced a situation where having many communication tools at your disposal has actually made it more difficult to effectively and efficiently communicate? We can’t deny that things like email, voicemail, texting, Facebook and smart phones have increased our ways to connect with one another. But are we truly communicating with each other to get things accomplished and avoid mistakes? With all the tools we have to “talk” with one another, we still gain great value in bringing team members face-to-face for effective and efficient farm team meetings.