I cannot stress enough the importance of good accounting: I cannot stress with enough occurrences (frequency.) I cannot stress with enough emphasis (urgency.) I cannot stress with enough significance (magnitude.) You’ve read how I feel about good accounting: you get what you pay for, and if you want to go cheap you’ll get that kind of […]
I bought a used truck last week. Since I am no longer actively farming, I decided that my beautiful ¾ ton diesel was more truck than I needed. It took me 2 years of searching to find that truck, so some people are astounded that I would be selling it. It was still a terrific […]
“It wasn’t until 1954 that tractors finally outnumbered horses on prairie farms.” I learned this interesting factoid from Steve Leibel from FCC’s Management Software division when he spoke to our local CAFA chapter in Regina earlier this spring. The presentation was on technology, not economics, so we didn’t examine why it took so long. Maybe […]
No not the Hollywood movie, but the way prairie farmers have been blindsided by these late spring frosts. I haven’t done the research, but it’s fair to say that we’d be hard pressed to recall a year when we’ve had such a string of days where the daily low temperatures are well below freezing. Word […]
“If you’ve inherited an asset, you should act more like the custodian, not the consumer, of that asset.” I was having coffee with Bill Allen, a Sun Life advisor and friend of mine that I met through CAFA (Canadian Association of Farm Advisors; great organization, check them out www.cafanet.com) and as we were discussing business, […]
Alan Weiss is my mentor’s mentor, so naturally I subscribe to Alan’s work. One of Alan’s recent newsletters contained a short piece about The Human Condition: Procrastinating. Let’s be honest, we’re all guilty of it at some point. Alan writes, “We procrastinate out of sloth (I don’t want to get up); out of fear (what […]
This is a verbatim copy of Seth Godin’s daily blog from April 22, 2015: Demand higher standards. On a long flight a little while ago, I saw two couples watch movies while they let their six kids run around like maniacs from take off to touchdown. A seven-year old actually punched me. (I didn’t return the […]
I’ve been staunchly encouraging (ok, pushing) my clients to up the ante on how they manage their business information. As we look at 2015, it is clear that opportunities for profit will be harder to find than in years past and we must use every tool at our disposal to make the best decisions possible. […]
I very briefly got into a Twitter discussion on Sunday with a few farmers when the question was posed about sustainability, specifically if the ag industry in western Canada is actually advocating for sustainability or just preserving the status quo. I waded in because “what is sustainability?” My tweet was a question: How do you […]