Social Media can be a blessing and a curse – celebrating the blessings

Last Friday I got to spend 4 hours with the administrator of our local   community’s Facebook page


Jamberoo local Alan Smith ensures our community page is one where kindness is our first priority   

I have been watching this page with awe – somehow or other our community had managed to create something beautiful.  Something the rest of the world aspires to  – Kindness

I had personally benefited from this community so many times – the shock of my beautiful personal trainer deciding suicide was her only option to people rallying when Mr Fox decided my beloved chooks should be feeding his/her/they  family

I had taken in strays, whether its the Kelpie from up the road who thinks the menu is more exciting at my  house to feral cats who either feed themselves on the wildlife or what you have on your verandah.

A fortnight ago I left the door open as I do regularly these days as my orphan shadow is a little bit too grateful I have changed her life and my front and back doors are bearing the brunt of her being left out to discover there was a little red dog in my kitchen eating my cat food.

My tiny little feral friend  hangs on the door till I see her little face 

And he/she/they was still there when I went to have a shower


and we have these interlopers who want what we have – the things that greet you in the shower. The little red dog was definitely less frightening than the python or so I thought. Yes, us people people who live in paradise must learn to live with the wildlife    

I am thinking my beautiful neighbor Robin has a gorgeous  little red dog and she has come to visit but Robin was nowhere to be seen when I went to greet her

So I  let my latest hungry orphan go only to look out the window and see her chasing my chickens. Then the funniest thing happened when my shadows followed me outside to investigate this conundrum

The little red dog became more interested in them. After making sure my chickens were safe I followed the barking.

From the big smile of how my rescue cats took control of this current scenario  I just knew my team had our little community’s  back

They were saying everybody is safe and we are a team

How does this relate to our community Facebook page. I knew I could put this little dog’s picture on our Facebook page and this little dog would be back with its family in 30 minutes

One can hope and dream for great outcomes.

What drives you? I remember too vividly the disaster that was my parents marriage and how my father’s involvement in APEX gave us a short term sense of normality.

The one thing I am truly proud of is when you join the Young Farming Champions  you are part of community that is there for you for life

The ripple effects when good people do nothing

As I made very obvious in my previous post I am not a fan of people who operate like Barnaby Joyce

My experience  was just a small example of the behavior of politicians who believe they are all powerful

More than 10 years ago an extraordinary young woman who had been identified as a leading light sat at my kitchen table and told me her hopes and dreams.

When she told me all the people she was going to introduce herself to I cringed when she mentioned Barnaby Joyce’s name. Age gives you a wisdom you wish you could share with the world.

Catherine Marriott deserved better. We all deserve better. Its time to select people to represent us we can all be proud off.

Its time to stand up for everything that is good in this world

Show Catherine Marriot her courage matters. Vote for people with your values

The importance of speaking your truth

Watching Grace Tame and Brittany Higgins, being inspired by Cathy McGowan and her sister Ruth and politicians living their values like Helen Haines and Bridget Archer I am getting more and more courage to be honest about how tough it can be when you make the decision not to learn to fit in

To support our  Young Farming Champions and ensure their voices are heard over the past few years I have recommended they take my place when I get requests to do conference presentations or interviews .

I realised I had lost confidence when I was the only one who could take up this opportunity from Channel 7 .

I was smiling when I saw it.  It was a great reminder you cant always control the message.  Watch where this sentence gets tweaked “I love the science and technology and my family just loves milking cows”

To get my confidence back I have been accepting a few more interview opportunities as long as they promise to interview a Young Farming Champion as well.

Just like the Channel 7 team the majority of journalists will do a very thorough background on you and you can make it easy for them to do minimal edits by being prepared.

In my case no matter how much I say I want to talk about the work I do now, everybody wants to talk about my farming background.

That’s not easy for me to do these days.  Yesterday I got a request to be part of the media for 10 year celebration of the Bob Hawke Landcare Award and the request really hit a nerve.

Awards can be a blessing and a curse. They can put you on a pedestal or they can put you in a cage

Winning the inaugural Bob Hawke Landcare Award  was the most extraordinary night of my life. The team in the Dept of Agriculture Water and Environment (as its now called) had put together the most extraordinary prize package. There was a  large cash prize, personal and professional development opportunities and invitations to be part of a blue sky visioning think tank. When I won the award the Labor Party were in government, 8 months later the LNP where in government and Barnaby Joyce was Minister for Agriculture. He took away everything but the cash prize. I was devastated.

I had only been back in agriculture less than a decade when all these opportunities came along. I had so much to learn,  it was happening and then Barnaby Joyce and his wrecking ball came along and crushed my spirit. I resonated with Grace -yesterday. The poor bureaucrats, the phone calls kept coming in “Minister Joyce would like you to resign from this committee” and the next day another bureaucrat would ring up apologizing asking me to resign from something else. I stood my ground I refused to resign to find all the opportunities no longer existed. It wasn’t just me, there were lots of other people getting similar calls.

On the farm my family were exhausted from keeping the farm spotless for the never-ending stream of visitors and media.

Its takes a lot of work to milk 300 plus cows and turn around and put on a function like this 3 hours later 

They were very hurt by the strange reaction from the industry we got up every day to promote. Just going down the street to get groceries was something to avoid

“ah the greenies from the hill are in town”

The dairy industry values quiet achievers – its rewards people who learn to fit in. It prides itself on the level of science and technology in the industry

Yes, it has a high level of science and technology but only 20% of farmers know how to collect the data and analyse it and use it to make on farm decisions

It’s the cotton industry that uses science and technology at a very high level

The dairy industry has a lot to be proud of that it doesn’t talk about ( or it didn’t then)

Our dairy farmers were the first to practice regen farming

They were the first to use cell grazing

The first to fence off their water ways and put water troughs in all their paddocks

They were the first to become gurus of growing water efficient and fertiliser efficient grasses

The animal genetics and animal nutrition knowledge is incredible. Australian dairy cows have doubled their capacity to produce milk in the last 50 years.

Slide Credit Dr Jo Newton

The reduction in green house gas emissions per litre of milk produced is  definitely something to shout from the roof tops.

Our farm was talking about things, that didn’t appear to be on the Australian dairy industry’s radar to have conversations about at that time. In reality we probably didn’t stand out from the crowd we had just done the sums

What have I learnt from this experience?

I have learnt being in the spotlight is a lot of pressure, its very important to have an inner circle that supports you. Its very important the organisations handing out awards have a pastoral care package in place. I learnt it would be wonderful if we all learnt to be a little kinder to the people we put on pedestals

 

 

What is the biggest threat to agriculture in Australia?

What is the biggest threat to agriculture in Australia?

The biggest threat to the Australian agriculture sector is the way the sector talks about itself

We could remind people that Australian farmers supply more than 90% of the food we consume in this country

In these challenging times when ‘food security” could become “national security” almost overnight that makes our farmers very important to every Australian who want to put safe, affordable nutritious food on the table everyday for their families

We could say agriculture is an exciting industry

  • where innovation, disruption and creativity are fostered,
  • where careers with purpose can grow limitlessly.

We could use this language instead we default to using deficit language* and reinforcing the negative

We have some industry bodies who appear to record every negative thing anyone who dares to challenge our environmental and animal welfare credentials says and repeats their list of negatives at every opportunity

This leads to an industry culture of normalising this language and focusing on the problem instead of the solution.

Its leads to our farmers not feeling seen, heard, understood and valued

The language we use has never been more important – lets work together on a common narrative that fosters hope.

*Speaking of deficit language in some sectors the word for resilience has been replaced with anti-fragility. How does the word “anti-fragility” make you feel ?

 

We are all scared sometimes. Understanding why and having compassion is our only choice.

Like many, many people I have been struggling the last few months.

To help me I have reached out to my tribe and done a lot of reading. Its a scary when you read “13 Things Mentally Strong people don’t do” and you realise that you are prime example of how NOT to react.

I run a charity with a wonderful bunch of people. We are all volunteers. When you are doing something that you hope improves the lives of others it helps to get some sort of validation the work you do is having impact.

In a non COVID year our organisation is able to hold events that celebrate the extraordinary things our schools are doing. 

Before those events I usually tag along with our artwork judge the wonderful Wendy Taylor and visit the schools and see in person what they have achieved and how they are changing the world

I realise its this that I am missing so much.  I miss the teachers and students I so miss having Wendy in my life

I know external validation isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it’s should be combined with internal validation. We need both to be healthy.

How do you ensure your internal validation????

How do you make friends with your feelings ???

How beautiful is this thoughtful piece on COVID and vaccination. And in human connection (ht Nikki Thompson)

The vaccinated people are scared.

They’re scared to get COVID.

They’re scared someone they love might get it and possibly die from it.

They were worried they might not get to travel again or see their international families.

They’re not ignorant or ‘sheeple’ (I loathe that term) – they feel like they’re doing the right thing for themselves and the people around them.

This may not have been an easy choice.

Unfortunately they might have felt obligated to do so.

They might have been scared to get the needle.

While you may not agree with them, it’s important to understand WHY these people have made their choice.

You may think they’re wrong, but I’m sure you’ve felt scared and afraid before.

It feels terrible.

We need to have compassion and empathy for people making a hard choice that’s different than yours.

 

The unvaccinated are scared.

They’re not inconsiderate monsters who thought “I’m going to try to screw over the rest of the people and not get my vaccine.”

They’re worried about long term side affects.

They’re worried about their immune systems.

They’re afraid of how much the government is stepping in on their personal choices, freedoms and rights.

They’re scared they might end up with Bells Palsy, myocarditis, shingles, blood clots, a miscarriage, a heart attack, heart palpitations, profuse unending vomiting, an autoimmune disease activation or death.

They’re worried they might never see their international families again.

It would be easier to get the shot. 

It isn’t easy to say no to the shot.

While you may not agree with them, it’s important to understand WHY these people have made their choice.

You may think they’re wrong, but I’m sure you’ve felt scared and afraid before.

It feels terrible.

We need to have compassion and empathy for people making a hard choice that’s different than yours.

 

This is NOT the time to turn on each other.

It is never the time to do that.

Stop the divide.

Come together with compassion, empathy, understanding, patience and forgiveness.

Take a moment to listen without judgement.

Take time to see where the others are coming from. 

Everyone is doing their best.

Lashing out and placing blame will only make things worse.

Shaming is not the way to change someone’s mind.

Understanding why and having compassion is our only choice.

 

Choose kindness, always ✨

HumanKind. Be Both.

Your value is not the awards you have won it comes from the inspiring a culture of “WE”

When I came back to agriculture twenty years ago I saw myself as a person who could give insights into what was working successfully outside the bubble of agriculture.

What I found was a culture that was more interested in who you were,  who you knew and what you had done than any outside world insights you could bring.

So I went on a journey to prove that I might have something to offer. What that journey told me is its not what you do its what you inspire others to do that matters/

My only regret is I didn’t wake up to that sooner. You can win as many awards as your walls will hold they don’t define who you are or what your legacy could be

Seeking farmers who want to meet and work with next gen consumers!

Building leadership capability is the art of learning how to influence change 

This requires us to join forces to share resources, skills, knowledge and experiences 

We cant do it alone and we cant do it in silos 

As I mentioned in my post “Are you curious about how greater investment in innovative and cost-effective programs will empower farmers?” I breathed a big sigh of relief when I found my tribe and “me” became “we”

What started out as an experiment in innovative ways to connect farmers and the community and support the agriculture sector to be appreciated by every Australian who is able to put healthy, affordable food on the table has morphed into a smorgasbord of opportunities for young people from kindergarten to early career.

Some interesting challenges  have been been posed on our journey.  The Australian agriculture sector doesn’t have an ATTRACT-TRAIN-RETAIN strategy and it doesn’t collect and share data from organisations who work with schools.

In the beginning we were often asked to deliver highly unrealistic expectations like tell us how many young people are now working in agriculture because they did your school programs. That type of reporting requires longitudinal studies that agriculture doesn’t fund. Expectations like this made measuring impact an interesting challenge.

Its has become a lot easier when we have funding partners who are very clear about why they fund us and you can meet their expectations.

For example St Vincent De Paul funds us because they have identified our programs build resilience to natural disasters in young people.

How do you measure that?

Well that’s why the tribe is so important. Experts like Dr Nicole McDonald can build questions into our monitoring and evaluation frameworks to measure “resilience building”

Working with schools is a joy because they tells and show us the impact our programs are having. Our competition judges tell us the impact our programs are having. Our teachers tells us the impact our programs are having.

We recently opened our Expression of Interest for Kreative Koalas and we ask our applicants why they want to participate. A return customer said this

“Having been a previous participant, our school values the opportunity to be involved again and integrate the Kreative Koalas program across all classes in the school. The whole school learning which came about from our previous participation, and the opportunity to connect with industry leading collaborators is something we cannot under value.”

 

The mention of “Industry leading collaborators”  brings me to the big challenge I am yet to surmount. How do we get more of the farmers that we want to build an appreciation for to come onboard. There is an enormous opportunity to involve them and immerse them in our school program experience.

All advice welcome

 

Are you curious about how greater investment in innovative and cost-effective programs will empower farmers?

We are all searching for meaning – to live a life that matters to us and the world around us

Twenty years ago when I was struggling to figure out what that meant for me and I discovered that I was never ever going to be any good at milking cows I went on a journey to find out how I could be use my skills to do some good.

I found the journey never ends as we learn more and more about the world we live in

In 2009 the programs I was designing moved from being  delivered by “me” to “we”.  (Ever grateful to my mentors, coaches, true believers and the very courageous who stand in the arena with me.)

When we started to identify and train young people in the agriculture sector to be the face of our programs and role models of who you can be in agriculture we soon realised we needed to go beyond training them to be confident communicators and trusted voices and support them with all the other things that help develop “human capital”

We began to look at moving beyond skills development, training and education to include more abstract aspects such as self-esteem, empowerment, creativity, increased awareness and mindsets.

When the industry you work in doesn’t have a leadership capacity building framework all we could do was experiment and see what worked and what didn’t.

We also discovered whilst our programs fell into the workforce “Attract-Train-Retain” space, agriculture doesn’t have a workforce strategy either .

Our work has been one big experiment and lots of little ones. We are entering exciting times with increasing interest and invitations to write the story of our journey and publish the learnings from 10 years of collecting unique data sets

We now have a big picture goal to understand how to best support the Australian agriculture sector to develop human capital through a variety of initiatives.

Our farmers increasingly face disruptive changes, including a rise in digital technologies, rigorous food safety requirements, shifting diets, climate change and global pandemics.

Keeping pace with this rapidly changing environment requires farmers to have a stronger capacity to analyse, innovate and respond, while managing their own farm businesses. If we want to transform our agri-food systems to be more productive, sustainable, inclusive and equitable, we need to invest in the people behind them.

Investing in farmers can contribute to autonomy, empowerment and economic development, and is key to successful agriculture and rural development policies.

Yet very little attention has been paid to investing in agriculture human capital over the last decade or so.

In fact less than 3 percent of global agriculture development finance between 2015 and 2018 was invested specifically in strengthening the skills and capacities of agricultural producers.

We look forward to showing how greater investment in innovative and cost-effective programs will result in new technical and business capacities and skills and empowered farmers. This in turn will lead to increased incomes, yields and the inclusion of the previously marginalised groups of indigenous farmers, women and youth .

If this is a space that excites you too – we are always looking for collaborators

#BigGoalBreakthrough

 

 

 

Who are your champions of change?

‘If not us, who? If not now, when?’

I have spent the year watching a number of very courageous women tackle a very insidious system and I am reflecting on what it must take to have the resilience to wake up every day and do it again and again until you are confident that change will happen

I look at women like Louise Milligan and Adele Ferguson and I see employers who support them

I see women like Brittany Higgins and Grace Tame and my heart bleeds for them such extraordinary courage and I hope resilience

I see women like Catherine Marriott and wonder why rural and regional Australia and The National Party continues to enable her alleged abuser.

One of my standout Champions of Change is Cathy McGowan. She has become my role model for change. Yesterday she agreed to run a workshop that will support our Young Farming Champions to truly live their values.

When you have a minute listen to two more courageous women truly live their values

Zoe Daniels and Sam Mostyn ask

‘If not us, who? If not now, when?’

In this podcast Independent candidate for Goldstein, Zoe Daniel, and President of Chief Executive Women, Sam Mostyn discuss the shocking revelations uncovered in Kate Jenkin’s independent inquiry into Parliament House culture.

 

 

What if Charlie Bell hadnt said yes to the McFlurry

Today I had the opportunity to participate in a briefing of a program agriculture is currently rolling out

What was beautiful was how proud the people who work in the industry are of it

What was scary is the model is exactly what I presented to that industry 12 plus years ago. The model wasn’t my original idea, it was something I adapted for Australia from a successful model from the US

I am shortly catching up with some-one very special in my life. Gaye is a  very interesting contrast to my journey. Gaye is the girl who bought the McFlurry to Australia.

The McFlurry isnt her idea, it was something she saw in the US and thought Australians would love it. How right she was

Its a beautiful thing to hear Gaye talk about Charlie Bell who was the CEO of Maccas when she was the CMO.  How it made such a difference to her career journey that Charlie believed in her and supported her when she presented big ideas. And when Charlie was in charge there was always a cohort of bright minds – so often he would say lets ask “Numbers” aka Steve Jermyn 

The industry body I was part of the briefing for today didn’t believe in my idea  12 plus years ago but there is no shortage of courageous people who did.

What is awesome is Charlie believed in Gaye and Gaye believes in me.

Hoping you have plenty of Charlies and Gayes in your life too

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_Bell_(businessman)