Jim Casler
Jim Casler
North Coast Ag Advisors
Family Business Planning

231-218-7525

Know Your Numbers. 
Know Your Business.
  • Home
  • Financial Management
  • Succession Planning
  • Newsletter
  • About
    • Testimonials
    • In The News
  • Contact

What's Your Function

10/1/2014

0 Comments

 
Job_Descriptions_Roles_Function_Management_System_Family_Farms_Consulting_Jim_Casler
I strongly fear I may be dating myself with this image.  Who knows what this is from?  I am guessing that if you are under age 33, you don't have a clue.  

Surprise me with some comments.
Job descriptions serve many functions and if this is new information for you…great!   If you’ve heard it before and never really implemented anything…well, shame on you.  Just kidding.  Seriously, this is all about continuous improvement.  So, back to job descriptions.
In our practice, the unofficial statistics reveal that less than half of our most modern agricultural producers have adopted this as part of their management practices.  How can this be?  After working with many family farm clients in this area we learned that a common roadblock was that they did not completely understand the need for job descriptions or how to go about implementing the idea.  Secondarily, we have also heard feedback that formalized job descriptions were more for non-family business employees and staff.  Let’s examine further…shall we?  Job descriptions help in daily operations as well as succession planning in a few key ways.

  • Identifying responsibility and accountability for specific performance standards or decision-making for each member of your family business team is a key benefit.  

  • Job descriptions help management determine whether there is an actual need when contemplating bringing someone into the business, specifically a family member, but it applies to everyone.  Instead of the traditional mindset that mirrors, “Hey, I’m family and I deserve a job.”, by matching specific duties with specific and required skill sets, that someone may or may not possess, this becomes the basis for adding or replacing staff.  This is a much more effective way at managing your team…and your profits.

  • Performance appraisals and reviews are sometimes also lacking in a family business.  The sometimes awkward situation is eliminated when everyone is clear on what is expected.  No surprises.  Sure, it’s family…but it’s still a business.

  • Job descriptions and designated areas of responsibility aid in succession planning by helping provide guidelines for what skills are needed so that the senior generation can “step-aside” for future management.  The gaps that exist between the job description, job performance, skill sets and decision-making capabilities of the successor generation and those of the senior generation become the basis for personal development plans and training for the successor generation.  It helps spell out what the successor generation needs to learn before being offered the opportunity to manage the entire operation.  It also helps develop a timeline for management transition for clarity and understanding by everyone involved.

So, the need for job descriptions for your family farm have been clearly stated.  Now what?  A seemingly difficult, but fairly simple task is to begin by documenting the various tasks and decision-making areas of your family business.  There are now two key tasks to perform and listed in the order of importance below…
  • What qualifications and skills are needed for each task/decision?
  • Who performs these tasks now and in the future?
Skills_Responsibilites_Business_Planning_Jim_CaslerYou need a process for filling the gaps between the skills possessed by your team and the skills needed for the future.
Oftentimes, the least qualified person on the team is doing something they shouldn’t be, or is tasked with something that they really don’t have the skills to perform.  This happens for many different reasons.  By determining the qualifications and skills needed for the task ahead of time, it becomes less personal and more objective to assess who should perform what role in your family farm business.  Regardless of a transition plan or not, this exercise might help rearrange your team members to perform different roles that they are more qualified to perform.  You and your team might become more effective and happier.

This exercise also helps show where gaps may exist.  Oftentimes, no one is qualified to perform a certain task or area of decision making.  So, it needs to be outsourced, filled internally or someone needs to get the training necessary to fill that role.  As mentioned above, when looking toward the future and the “stepping aside” by senior management and the “stepping up” by a successor generation, presumably there are differences between the decision-making skills and areas of responsibility between the two generations, with the senior generation having much more responsibility and decision-making authority, along with the associated skills to do so.  The gap between the roles each performs today and what you have determined needs to be performed in the future becomes your management transition plan.  

For example, Uncle Joe and Dad make any land purchase decisions.  When Dad and Uncle Joe retire in 10 years, Billy and Susie are going to need to make those decisions.  What skills do Dad and Uncle Joe possess today that enable them to make good land purchase decisions (presumably) that Billy and Susie will need to learn to make good decisions in the future?  How are they going to learn them?  Do they want to learn them?  If not, who can they get to fill that role in the future?   Does that make sense?  Now, carry that line of thinking to all the roles and decision-making areas of the business. 

It’s just a matter of taking the time to determine the roles, gaps and timelines for gaining the necessary skills for continued success of your family business.  To best accomplish this, honest self-assessments, performance reviews, natural strengths and weaknesses and a system for helping flush this all out builds the basis for continuity in operations and accomplishes a formidable task of any succession planning. As you might imagine, we have some various forms and detailed exercise to help you with this specific task.  If you’d like a copy, please email me and we can get out to you right away.

Until next time, 

0 Comments

    Categories

    All
    Agriculture
    Benchmarking
    Best Practices
    Business Planning
    Challenges
    Communication
    Conflict Resolution
    Core Values
    Delegation
    Dysfunction
    Education
    Family Business
    Family Farms
    Family Meetings
    FarmFutures.com
    Farm Management
    Farm Pictures
    Financial Management
    Generation Gap
    Goals
    Harvesting
    Humor
    Improvements
    Interviews
    Jim Casler
    Job Descriptions
    Leadership
    Lessons
    Long Term Planning
    Management Systems
    Management Transition
    Michigan
    Mission
    Newsletter
    North Coast Ag
    Operating Philosophies
    Operations Manual
    Outside Business
    Personal Accountability
    Pictures
    Podcasts
    Policy Creation
    Press
    Project
    Project Planning
    Quotes
    Responsibility
    Roles
    Standard Operating Procedures
    Strategic Planning
    Strategy
    Succession Planning
    Teamwork
    Testimonials
    Thanksgiving
    Thought Of The Day
    Transition Planning
    Traverse City
    Video
    Vineyards
    Vision
    Wine
    Winery Benchmark Programs


    Reader Feedback

    Archives

    June 2020
    August 2016
    July 2016
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014

    RSS Feed



    Author
    Picture
    Jim Casler
    Tweets by @JimCasler
Services
Family Business Planning
Financial Management
Succession Planning
Real Estate

Testimonials
Newsletter
About
Contact Jim

Know Your Numbers.
Know Your Business.
​


​Contact Jim
PO Box 2, Kaleva, MI 49645
231-218-7525
email
Copyright  2016 - 2022
Sitemap
Jim Casler - agriculture - family-business - family farm - financial management  - consultant  - advisor - succession, business and transition planning - real estate - Michigan