There’s more to being a leader than setting a good example or making important decisions. Guidance from leaders is vital to the success of teams, and without guidance, teams can easily fall apart. So how do you become the best leader? The answer is simple — it’s a...
I review and draft a lot of contracts. Many of these agreements are in the ag technology space, which presents unique drafting challenges. First and foremost, the subject matter of these agreements — personal information, data collection, license grants — is often...
Agriculture and food are dynamic and ever-changing industries. That means businesses and the people who run them have to possess a level of resilience in order to be successful long-term. Employees must to be able to adapt and grow in spite of the challenges that...
There are a variety of rapid-fire changes happening in the food and agriculture industry, including generational shifts and consolidations in farm business and agribusiness. With these changes and the rise in e-commerce and digital purchases, do relationships still...
For better or worse, marketing and sales efforts affect not only the profitability of a firm but also the firm’s liquidity, or its ability to meet short-term financial obligations. More formally, liquidity refers to the structure of a firm’s balance sheet. A firm is...
You make business decisions every single day. Every once in a while, a decision comes along with the potential to be a game changer for your organization. Maybe your company is considering mergers and acquisitions. Maybe you’re trying to decide whether to expand...
Human decision-making is a tough nut to crack. We would like to think of ourselves as making rational decisions, but we are often influenced by all kinds of extraneous factors. For example, the common logic in football when faced with short yardage on fourth down at...
When it comes to developing a talent-management process for any organization, simplicity and practicality are the name of the game. That mantra holds true even in the firms that make up an ever-evolving and complex agri-food system. Betty Jones-Bliss, associate...
Disruption and chaos. A fundamental transformation of the food system. The agri-food system is changing and your organization is no doubt working through the ways to cultivate competitive advantage in an industry that’s moving at warp speed. It can be intimidating at...
Tackling Marketplace Changes It’s no secret that consumer preferences in food production are changing or that there is constant pressure on agricultural producers to continuously improve their production practices. It’s also no secret that farmers are facing tight...
