#Strongwomen. "I write about the power of trying, because I want to be okay with failing. I write about generosity because I battle selfishness. I write about joy because I know sorrow. I write about faith because I almost lost mine, and I know what it is to be broken and in need of redemption. I write about gratitude because I am thankful – for all of it." Kristin Armstrong
This year we will be bringing together a cohort of twenty #youthinag determined to learn the techniques and have the knowledge to help lead transformational change to secure a prosperous and exciting future for the agriculture sector in Australia
When looking for wisdom Zoe Routh from Inner Compass never fails to provide great inspiration and food for thought for both me and our YFC cohort
What should you sacrifice as a leader?
As a global thinker and citizen, we ought to know what we would lay down our lives for. Is there anything for which you would make the ultimate sacrifice?
Sacrifice in leadership comes with the territory. It’s one of the main reasons that not everyone should lead others: sacrifice is a concept and action that requires great maturity and self-awareness. Not all are ready for this kind of surrender.
What should we sacrifice as leaders?
Selfishness. One cannot be a leader if one is driven by selfishness. To be a leader, our thoughts are on those who would follow us and support the cause we all rally behind. Selfishness has no part to play here. The distinction should be made around the self-first concept. Self-sacrifice is martyrdom, and is not always necessary or helpful. Self-first as a concept is where we tend to our own needs (like sleep, rest, exercise, health, well-being) so there is more of us to give. We need to look after ourselves if we are to live to serve another day.
Invisibility. To lead is to make a stand, to be seen and heard for the sake of what we believe and who we serve. Invisibility keeps us hidden, inspiring no one and encouraging nothing. We do not need to lead from the front as a hero; what we do need is to be a visible and vocal presence of encouragement. We need to be seen to model what we believe. Integrity is when action reflects thought and words.
Fear of criticism. Actually, many fears need to be sacrificed: fear of making a mistake, of letting others down, of not living up to expectations, of being found wanting. As leaders, we will make mistakes, we will disappoint others, and we may find ourselves short of skill or capacity to do the job. Leadership is knowing all this, and doing our best anyway, because we believe that our petty fears are not enough to stand by and let what matters go unsupported. There is something bigger than us that calls us to sacrifice our fears.
Feeling like a fraud. Everyone has a first day on the job. We all needed to learn how to walk as babies. When we fell down as toddlers, did we feel like frauds as humans? The essence of our humanity is in getting up again and trying once more. The longing for growth and contribution is the fabric of leadership. At this altar we may leave the shackles of fraud.
Hope. Hope is an emotion for those who feel powerless and victims in life’s wake. It is for those who wait to be rescued. As leaders, we do not waste energy in a lament of hope; we forge our own path, seeking a way through turmoil with effort and focus. We can replace hope with determination, conviction, and grit.
What do you sacrifice as a leader? What is the cause that you dedicate your life to?
I was very interested to read editor Andrew Norris’ article in The Land April 6th 2017 The Royal an underutilised event . Having made some strong and controversial comments in my 2015 blog post When farmers are their own worst enemy on the Australian dairy industry’s efforts to build warm and enduring relationships with the one million people who attend the Sydney Royal Easter Show I would like to take this opportunity to highlight some of the great work that is being done by industry and the RAS team at the show.
But firstly there was a reader comment following Andrew’s article that caught my eye
Yep, great Andrew…but the RAS Show will reach less non-farming people in the next 14 days than will the Sydney Morning Herald and Fin Review which are other Fairfax mastheads like yours. How many of your Show stories will those publications carry? Is the true problem to be found in the shallow coverage of rural issues – that don’t entail natural disaster – in non-rural media and organised social media?
I would like to address this comment on three levels
In the first instance Sydney Royal Easter Show is a marketing opportunity. Its a wonderful opportunity to raise awareness and appreciation for agriculture.
Students from Wilberforce Public School loved showing their Archie off to Farmer Tim
Show-goers no matter what age want to meet real farmers and have two way conversations with them. The show offers that opportunity en masse. Too often we make the mistake of thinking its an education opportunity only and we bombard our consumer show patrons with stats no-one will remember or are interested in and dull non interactive displays.
Secondly on the subject of statistics, consumer reach is an output not an outcome. Its that old adage of quality not quantity and it can be very difficult to measure outcomes and impact at an event like the Sydney Royal Easter Show or print or TV media for that matter. But if you are missing in action or don’t do it smartly then its a no brainier that you are missing an opportunity
Thirdly my expereince tells me mainstream print and TV media are very happy to print/showcase good news stories about agriculture. I have plenty of examples to back this up. Agriculture just has to learn how to pitch these stories more effectively.
So getting back to the good news stories about agriculture and the Sydney Royal Easter Show. Please note I am showcasing ‘activations” (event lingo for interactive hands on displays) that I have been involved in. I would love to hear about others.
The Cotton Australia (CA) activation in the Food Farm at the Sydney Royal Easter Show finishes with a photograph of all the students in a field of cotton. Does a crop get any more beautiful than a field of cotton. Pretty sure all the students who met CA”s Sophie Davidson at the show will be able to identify a field of cotton anywhere
Number one on the list of great news stories is the Food Farm and in particular the Primary School Preview Day.
The success of this event is multi pronged. It starts with a great team at the RAS, a number of whom are former school teachers and one of their key areas of expertise is knowing how to engage with kids. Farming industry bodies have relished the opportunity to be part of this exciting event and have really stepped up to the plate and every year their activations get more and more impressive
Super kudos this year to NSW Government for their phenomenal Biosecurity activation – loved it.
Sydney Water also blew me away
and how impressive was the Drone activation
Our team bought along our videographer and we will be able to share with you our activation which was a partnership with Australian Wool Innovation as well as the Sydney Water and Drone and Vegetable activations on film shortly. in the meantime we have plenty of pictures
Our activation paired Australian Wool Innovation supported Young Farming Champions Peta Bradley ( wool farmer from Armatree) and Dione Howard ( soon to be vet and wool farmer from Lockhart) to create and deliver a fun activity that raised awareness and appreciation of the great Australian natural fibre that is wool and the farmers who produce it.
Peta Bradley in action introducing the students to her family and their farm as well highlighting the big difference in students numbers at the primary school she attended to the school sizes in Sydney
We made use of technology and used the Plickers app to ask the students a series of questions.
Examples of some of the questions
All the students were given cards that allowed them to select one of four answers
Dione then scanned their answers with an app on her iPhone which we then showed on the screen as a series of graphs.
This allowed to us to test their awareness of the industry in general, properties of wool and careers available in the wool sector .
Students loved the feel of wool and we found the lanolin sampling was a big hit
with the students deciding it makes the perfect hair gel – how adorable is Ryan
As I previously mentioned measuring impact to determine return on investment (and its very expensive to take a support team to the Royal Easter Show) is not an easy task. We have relished the challenge and this is how we measured our cut through impact
We asked the students to write one new thing they learnt on a chalk board Archie. What we found was that the groups of students picked up very diverse leanings.
and there was definitely a big consensus of opinion that We Love Wool
On another note RAS Dairy Councillor John Fairley has been working relentlessly over the past two years to engage Dairy Australia to help design and deliver a Sydney Royal Easter Show dairy activation in the dairy cattle sheds. John succeeded this year in bringing a Dairy Australia team to the show. and together with farmer ambassadors they hosted dairy cattle shed tours. Feedback from a few dairy people I have spoken to said it was a personal success for them and I look forward to the Dairy Australia’s evaluation and impact study.
Footnote
Special thanks to Greg Mills. What a treasure he is – not only does he design the questionnaires and teach us the technology he travels from Armidale to Sydney every year to assist on the day . We couldn’t do it without you Greg and we love you to bits
Previous Picture You in Agriculture activations at the show can be found here
The last four years of my life have seen me struggling with things that I could never have planned for. My solution is to get out and about and do as many different things as I can and surround myself with people who inspire me.
Some of those things haven’t quite turned out the way I envisioned either including my vision to make hiking all over Australia a way to meet new people and have fun. Case in question is my challenging hamstring injury . Must admit I have seen some very delicious specialists as a result and can’t fault the medical personal I have met along the way.
I just loved Dr Jason Fox’s keynote. You can sign up for his newsletter here
About Jason
Dr Jason Fox is a modern day wizard-rogue, author and leadership advisor. With deep expertise in motivation design, Jason shows pioneering leaders around the world how to unlock new progress and build for the future of work.
When not liberating the world from default thinking and the curse of efficiency, Jason enjoys partaking in the fine art of coffee snobbery, sun avoidance and beard maintenance. He is based in Melbourne, where the coffee is magic.
Jason gave us all a challenge I rather I loved
He said think of your life asan autobiography. Look at 12 chapters of last year and think of a word that sums them up. Then visualise the next 12 months and chose one word to describe what you you wish for.
In Jason’s lingo it looks like this
“Use a contextual word as a ‘fuzzy beacon’ to keep you steering to a desired new state, experience, our way of being and doing.”
The word that best describes the last 12 months of my life ( or last 4 years in fact ) is Butterfly inspired by this beautiful song by Claire Guerreso
My word for 2017 is Everest.
I want to stand at the top of the mountain and look down and see just how wonderful the world is.
Not stand at the bottom and look up and see the world as another tough mountain to climb
The less physical aspect of my investing in me To Do List involves a number of personal and professional development courses. 2016 finished with me getting a scholarship to undertake the Women in Advanced Leadership program.
The feedback from my mentors was “awesome Lynne but do you want to do a Women Only course”. I wasn’t sure. But what I found when I attended the first face to face workshop was women are pretty special people. The was a strong focus on soft skills and giving every opportunity for the participants to share their story .
What truly resonated with me was the women who had phenomenal personal and professional development challenges who made the decision early on to decide whether they wanted to either to sit around and blame the rest of the world or see their journey and all its hardships as a character building learning platform. It was so inspirational to be surrounded by so many women who had made the decision to not be a victim looking for hero to save them.
Mastermind is on the back burner but getting ready for it and having a major setback has only inspired me to find a personal trainer and get the rehab I deserve.
Investing in me is turning out to be an “interesting” journey
I am have never been much good at the work-life balance thing. Nailed the work side but always struggled to get a life. When I made 2017 the year I invested in me and signed up for a diversity of personal and professional opportunities I was starting to feel very comfortable I might start to nail ‘get a life’
When Zoe Routh invited me to be part of her new Mastermind program I jumped at the opportunity not just because I am a big admirer of Zoe, the Larapinta Walk component was a huge incentive to get fit. I approached the getfit thing with great gusto. I loved it and the places it introduced me to.
Serpentine Gorge Larapinta
Three months down the track I now find myself with a very serious hamstring injury (grade 3 with avulsion), with surgery and a brace looking more likely every day and Larapinta definitely off my agenda. Whatever I have done my scans have peaked the interest of the medicos and I am having no trouble getting into see the experts fast. But enough of the negatives.
When fitness becomes a high priority you rethink everywhere you go and are always looking for opportunities to get some training in and do it in beautiful places of which Australia has many and it has certainly opened my eyes to how wonderful life can be
Let me share with you some of superb places I have been as a result of my get-fit campaign
Let’s start with the Bombah Point Eco Cottages. In January I had the great pleasure of being the MidCoast region’s Australia Day Ambassador. I had spent almost zero time on the MidCoast and knew very little about the region. So out of respect I decided to take a week and drive up and explore the region.
My first stop was the Bombah Point Eco Cottages an absolute gem recommended by my business coach. The cottages are located 2.5 hours north of Sydney (4.5 hours drive from my bit of paradise) nestled in the Myall Lakes National Park between Seal Rocks, Hawks Nest/Tea Gardens & Bulahdelah.
My little cottage
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was located adjacent to the entrance to the walking trails and how good were they. So good even the day it got to 46 degrees as soon as the temp dropped 10 degrees and it started to sprinkle I was out there soaking up the atmosphere and providing fodder for endorphin release
The Eco Cottages are a new venture for host Duncan and his wife Suzie. As the former environmental manager for Cotton Australia, Duncan has a special affinity with native vegetation and the importance of biodiversity as central to Australia’s cultural identity. Duncan is determined to get it right using a combination of protection and rehabilitation of remnant vegetation and traditional knowledge transfer. Its clear there is no shortage of passion, commitment and vision.
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Everything about Bombah Eco Cottages is designed to make your visit a lifelong memorable experience, with access to the vegie garden and freshly laid eggs from the chook pen .
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The chook palace
and when you visit don’t forget to take the ferry ride and
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visit
Bennett’s Beach
and
the Tea Garden’s Boatshed
My 1st, 2nd and 3rd courses where sooooo divine
sit and soak up the atmosphere
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From here I headed to Forster where the locals describe it as God’s Country….. mmh I could certainly see why they could lay claim to that. Stay tuned for my pictorial of the Forster Region
In the meantime I am taking inspiration from this quote
The Picture You in Agriculture team has paired up with the Intrepid Landcare tribe to create and deliver a program that builds on the success of the Art4agriculture initiatives – The Archibull Prize and the Young Farming Champions to help young people in schools get their heads around the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and take local action
Schools participating in the Kreative Koalas program ( note landing page only at this stage) will partner with Young Sustainability Ambassadors (Expressions of Interest open here ) and investigate and reflect on seven of the UN Sustainable Development Goals
We are finding ‘Responsible Production’ tricky. Coming from generations of primary producers that these days would be seen as Big Agriculture, my mission is to show the Little vs Big Agriculture story is not a binary argument – Good vs Bad or Romantic vs Reality or Sustainable vs Non-Sustainable or Non-Sustainable vs Sustainable but a continuum. I am looking for objective views and some great cases studies on both Little and Big Ag.
Do we have food journalists that write level-headed assessments of Australian agricultural systems in plain English? If the answer is yes – please share them with me
I am a big fan of Will Marre and look forward to having the opportunity to participate in person in one of his seminars.
My post today is a section of his latest newsletter. Its good advice for me and I hope you enjoy it too
Nobody is perfect . . . at least not by our personal standard of perfection. The most we get in life in anything that we seek is 80% of what we believe we want. If we are getting 100%, it won’t last. But 80% is a lot. It’s all we need to be happy and loving.
When we fall in love all that we see is the 80% that we are crazy about. We ignore the other 20% of annoying habits. We create the illusion that we have found the perfect person. This wonderful illusion drives us to constantly ask ourselves what can I do to make this person happy. We become faucets of kindness, patience and thoughtfulness. We literally create an ecology of love.
But over time, when the love-fog caused by dopamine and serotonin lifts due to the realities and challenges of life, it is common to start focusing on the 20% of the perceived flaws, faults and imperfections of our beloved. It isn’t that they have changed. Rather it is how we view them that has changed. Instead of a faucet, we become a drain. The whirlpool effect is caused by either silent or vocal judgments, impatience, and criticism. And what was once sacred can become profane. Instead of asking “What can I do to make the person I love happy?” we focus on what they can do to make us happy.
Love is verb. It is what we do that creates love. The feeling of love is the outcome of a choice to be irrationally positive about the people you deeply love. Nobody wants to be viewed realistically. We all want to be valued. We all need people in our lives who see our highest and best self. And we need to see the highest and best of others. Committing to love someone’s 80% of their best self, and choosing to ignore the 20% of their unfinished self, is a sacred choice.
One last thing. Finding someone who is 80% perfect for you as a friend or partner is neither easy nor simple. There’re many people who aren’t even 20% perfect for you.
So, choose carefully. But as John Legend sings someone’s imperfections are likely to be perfect just for you.
Young people who work in the agriculture sector love what they do, they are proud of what they do and they want to inspire other your people to join them.
Getting that message out there has been traditionally tricky and inspired many Nuffield Scholar research projects. I have had the pleasure of meeting a number of scholars from both UK and Canada touring the world looking for initiatives that are kicking goals in this area.
Some important learnings from her executive summary include
Few Gen Zers know about the diversity of careers in agri-food. Many associate agri-food careers ONLY with primary production. Therefore, we must use an edu-marketing approach that focuses on marketing agriculture careers to youth using educational settings and programs. The edu-marketing tactics will build awareness, engagement and commitment to ag careers.
The steps are:
Step 1: Increase exposure of the agri-food sector and the diversity of opportunities available to the general population of youth
Step 2: Provide opportunities for youth to engage with careers through experiential learning (e.g. job shadows, co-op, etc.)
Step 3: Introduce mentors and ambassadors who can offer further positive influence to students who show an interest in agri-food careers
To fully address the labour shortage in agriculture, we need coordinated collaboration between education (schools & education organizations), youth development organizations, and the agrifood sector. Each stakeholder needs to play an essential role and work with the other(s) to ensure that the best possible programming is offered to Gen Z to encourage and inspire them to pursue careers in agri-food.
Collaboration draws on the strengths and resources of each stakeholder, resulting in educational initiatives and programs that excite and engage future agri-food employees.
Again and again this word collaboration comes up. Something we are yet to embrace in Australian agriculture – the capacity to, and realising the power of working together.
Students were surveyed prior to and at the completion of The Archibull Prize and the results are staggering with a significant shift (from 19% to 52%) in students believing they have a sound knowledge of farming and agriculture.
At the beginning of The Archibull Prize primary school students struggled to identify more than two jobs within agriculture and most suggestions were vague and related to labouring jobs on farm. None of the primary students mentioned science or technical related jobs.
On completion of their projects for The Archibull Prize 64% of the primary students were easily able to nominate up to three different agricultural careers and the jobs they now thought of were more specific (crop duster, farm manager, fashion designer, wool classer etc). The career list also included science based careers such as agronomist, food scientist and veterinarian, which were absent from the entry survey.
AWI Young Farming Champion Dione Howard explores diversity of careers in the wool industry with Hurlstone Agricultural High School students
Similarly, in the survey prior to The Archibull Prize secondary school students also struggled to identify more than two farming or agricultural jobs, with less than 5% of jobs related to scientific roles. By the end however 30% of the jobs mentioned related to the sciences and other jobs were more specifically labelled. Examples of the range included animal nutritionist, rural real estate agent, crop consultant, geneticist, gin machine operator, horse trainer, banker, food engineer and dog trainer. “There are many other jobs apart from just farming in agriculture,” was one student comment. “You can do anything you want in agriculture,” was another.
Students reported that most of the information about careers in agriculture came from speaking to a Young Farming Champion. Also run by Art4Agriculture the Young Farming Champions Program takes young people working in, and passionate about, agriculture and gives them the skills to communicate and present their story to others. “We had a Young Farming Champion talk to us,” commented one secondary student. “She was an agronomist, which I didn’t know was a profession in agriculture.”
At The Archibull Awards Ceremony held in Sydney on 22nd November Mr Scott Hansen, Director General of the NSW Department of Primary Industries, also spoke of the assorted careers available.
Are the Young Farming Champions inspiring young people to take up careers in agriculture. Yes they are and the success stories show the power of collaboration
Sharna Holman our first YFC who was inspired to follow a career in cotton pathway by a collaboration between Art4Agriculture, RAS of NSW and Cotton Australia
and its creating a domino effect – Sharna has now inspired Emma Longworth
I went to school at Muirfield High School and participated in Art4Agriculture’s The Archibull Prize Program in 2012 as well as the Sydney Royal Easter Show school’s display from 2013-2015. From these opportunities I was given, my passion for science and agriculture definitely commenced.
I graduated from Muirfield in 2015 with an atar of 95.65, 3rd place in the state for Primary Industries and 8th for Agriculture. I’ve always had a love for animals and outdoor adventures and so I followed my next door neighbour, Sharna Holman’s, footsteps by participating in these events and then pursuing a career in agriculture. Unlike Sharna, I chose to move to Armidale and study a Bachelor of Rural Science at UNE and have definitely had the best year of my life.
Over the last few months I have been invited to participate in some events that have significantly lifted my spirits and reinforced I am heading in the right direction.
One of those events led to me being invited to be a community Australia Day Ambassador. I must admit I was flabbergasted (and proud) when I asked what they wanted my key messages to the community to be in my speeches and conversations with people on the day. Wow, The Archibull Prize and the Young Farming Champions concept appears to have no end of value adds for communities right across Australia.
This blog is about the invitation I received from the Australian Women in Agriculture team. AWiA is nurturing 20 young women from the agriculture sector through their AGenHer initiative and those young women were invited to nominate 4 women in Agriculture that they would like to do a webinar with.
It was an exciting invitation that I saw as an opportunity for me to hear from them
how can Agriculture better invest in its young people
what are the personal and professional development gaps for young people
how do young people in agriculture hone their newly learned skills in a safe environment
who should we be lobbying to help fill those gaps
who should be investing the $
and what are the safe environment vehicles and opportunities to hone their skills
But there was a trade-off before that conversation happened. The brief was to firstly share a little bit about my journey and the background behind Art4Agriculture and why my wonderful team of Young Farming Champions do what they do.
My journey mmmmh – not a road I would wish on anybody – the positives yes but how do I help others avoid the nightmares
So as I always do these days I call on others in my life who are much wiser than me in these areas – my brilliant business coach Mike Logan and my very special mentor Zoe Routh
Zoe said talk about what its like to put forward a radical idea that you passionately believe has the best interests of agriculture at its core. A big idea that only a few will get from the beginning and how you bring people on the road to a successful and enduring roll out of that big idea .
So what did I say
I am a big believer in the saying
‘whilst young people may only be 20% of the population they are 100% of the future’
At Art4Agriculture our mission is to ensure that Australian agriculture is investing in its future.
We are harnessing the energy and enthusiasm of our young people to create a better future- for both agriculture and Australia.
We are helping our young people to be confident and independent thinkers
We are developing their talent and growing their ideas
We are creating a culture of collaboration and cooperation across industry sectors. We are throwing out the silo mentality that has been crippling agriculture for far too long
These skills not only benefit you as individuals they are absolutely critical for the food production systems that provide Australians with 93% of the food that is consumed in this country
Yes, the future of farmers in this country is really important to every single Australian who eats and wears clothes and benefits from all the social and environmental value adds that Australian farmers deliver
From a personal perspective, the reason I do what I do – i.e. my “why” is
I am a proud farmer and I want my fellow farmers to be loud and proud too. But Australian agriculture hasn’t been traditionally good at sharing its story and I have made it my mission to change that culture. A new culture of communication and transparency and two way conversations
A new culture of selling hope not despair – agriculture has for far too long sold despair. We sell it par excellence
The reality is – Hope attracts people – Despair repels them
I am big ideas person and often my big ideas have been perceived as quite radical
I am very grateful to the industries who have believed in my big ideas and supported them with funding.
My journey hasn’t been easy. There has been lots of blood, sweat and tears. Lots and lots and lots of tears
At a grassroots level, i.e. my peers – As a broad sweep generalisation women get my “why” They understand that it is pivotal for agriculture to be consumer focused
Men ( again broad sweep generalisation) tend not too – they have this mindset – ‘I am a farmer you should appreciate me’ – ‘Thank a farmer’
Our agricultural boards are stacked with men
So men control where the $ go
They are focused on research and development (R&D) and they don’t think that marketing and looking after our people and building their capacity is a high priority
They don’t see the elephant in the room and that is the biggest immediate threat to farmers’ livelihoods is negative consumer images and perceptions of modern farming practices and how we (the agriculture sector) can meet or exceed consumer expectations.
At an industry level, there is a silo mentality – farming industries in Australia don’t traditionally play well with each other. They compete. Very few people who work in our industry bodies come from farms. They have been to university and they are experts in their fields. They don’t want a farmer telling them how they should do their job.
So how did I cope with rejection after rejection?
One of the best pieces of advice I got in the beginning was to treat the word “no” as “almost yes” and never give up
I surrounded myself with people I could learn from. Interesting enough in the beginning the majority of those people were men.
If you are a big ideas person you tend to be tactical, the men I surrounded myself with have taught me to be strategic
I needed all the help I could get. I started my personal and professional development journey in my 50’s I had a lot of bad habits that I had to undo and personal demons I had to shake off
and that is truly the take home message I wish from the bottom of my heart these young women took away from the webinar
Don’t do it my way. My public face and my private life are polar opposites. I wasn’t in any shape or form ready to take on this journey emotionally
I have no downtime. Getting the best outcomes for agriculture and particularly our young people in agriculture is all consuming and this crusade has taken a very heavy toll behind the scenes.
Resilience what’s that? Getting out of bed and putting on the brave face mask when you go out in public is exhausting. I love what I do but its one thing to have a big idea – its another thing entirely to have the emotional resilience to keep on doing it no matter who or what barriers you come across.
Love this little animation
I have taken Megan’s advice – I only wish I had done it 40 years ago.
2017 is the year I am investing in me and a big shout out to the wonderful people and scholarship providers who are helping me do this.
Take home message ‘Start your journey by investing in YOU‘
and we found the lanolin sampling was a big hit 
Bennett’s Beach
