Articles

Practical Guide to Build a Culture of Safety on your Farm

Beyond preventing injuries, a positive safety culture can improve worker satisfaction, increase productivity, strengthen relationships and boost employee retention, making it easier to attract and keep skilled workers.

Psychological Safety in Agriculture: Challenger Safety

Challenger safety is essential for innovation, continuous improvement, and creating a workplace where open and respectful dialogue takes place.

Psychological Safety in Agriculture: Contributor Safety

Being part of a team and contributing to something larger than oneself, naturally creates a desire to be heard and to add value. Contributor safety ensures that individuals feel supported as they bring their unique skills and perspectives to the table.

Psychological Safety in Agriculture: Learning Safety

Farm business managers must create opportunities for learning and professional development among their teams in order for their operation to succeed in a competitive agricultural sector.

Psychological Safety in Agriculture: Inclusion Safety

Inclusion safety forms the foundation of psychological safety by ensuring individuals feel accepted and respected. When employees feel or are excluded, motivation and engagement drop while turnover rates soar.

Psychological Safety in Agriculture: Belong, Learn, Speak and Innovate

Psychological safety is a critical foundation for team success. Learn ways to build trust; encourage learning; and create, maintain, and build high-performance teams in your farm business.

Understanding the Total Compensation Statement Benefits Everyone

Understanding the total value of annual compensation statements is important for both employers and employees. Paychecks reflect only part of the compensation; the statement shows the full range of benefits and rewards provided by the employer.

Large Language Models: A Powerful New Tool for Wisconsin Agriculture

While many people think of AI chatbots as sophisticated question-answering tools, research shows these systems can do much more. Advanced AI systems hold the potential to reshape how farmers and other agricultural professionals work.

There’s Opportunity in Those “Near Misses” on Your Farm

Farms are busy workplaces with the potential for injury lurking around every bend. A proactive tool to guard against future mishap, and an important part of improving your overall farm safety culture, is “near miss” reporting.

Workplace Conflict: Why It Happens and What You Can Do About It

In labor-intensive environments like farms and other agricultural operations, conflict between employees can happen. Conflict is friction—disagreement between two or more people. Our brains often perceive conflict as a threat, which makes it uncomfortable and leads many people to avoid it.

Creating Career Paths For Your Farm Employees

Creating career paths, or “career pathing” is the process of aligning opportunities for employee career growth with organizational talent priorities.

Take a systems approach to people-management on your farm

A system is a series of interconnected parts that drive an organization forward. A “systems approach” to human resources management on your farm considers the interconnectedness of all the efforts you’ve made to make your farm a great place to work. It includes every aspect of the employee life-cycle, from the first time a prospective […]

Is it time to rethink employee onboarding and training?

In this recorded Badger Dairy Insight webinar, UW-Madison Division of Extension Farm Management Outreach Specialist Jim Versweyveld discusses onboarding and training for dairy employees and discusses how interactive learning experiences can help build confidence by allowing dairy workers to actively participate in their own training.

First impressions matter: The importance of onboarding farm new hires

Labor shortages are widespread, workers are expecting higher starting wages, and after farms hire and train a new employee, there is a risk that they will jump ship for a better-paying job. Improve the retention odds on your farm by putting a plan in place to improve the employee onboarding experience.

Develop an organizational chart for your farm business

Organizational (org) charts are a visual depiction of your farm’s staffing structure. They define roles and clearly illustrate “who reports to whom,” with connecting lines showing accountability and reporting relationships. An org chart for your farm can help keep things running smoothly and efficiently by providing several benefits.

Anhydrous Ammonia-It’s time to review employee safety

Used extensively as a source of nitrogen fertilizer due to its relative ease of application and wide availability, the obvious downside of anhydrous ammonia use is the serious hazard it presents to workers during transfer and application. The word “anhydrous” comes from the Greek, meaning “without water.” Because of the chemical’s strong affinity for water, […]