Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Succession Planning Part One

Communication Barriers

Managing for Today and Tomorrow

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

What are Your Barriers to Communication?

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Common Barriers to Communication

• Lack of role separation• Not an easy topic to discuss• Noise and Stress• Off-farm heirs and on-farm heirs• Generational differences• Personality differences• Gender differences

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

A Simple Case of Role Separation• Dad has breakfast

with the family (family)

• Dad drives to work (business)

• Dad plays a game of softball after work (personal)

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Lack of Role Separation• Dad has breakfast with

family, takes 2 phone calls (family and business)

• Meets with neighbor/ landlord/hunting friend after breakfast (business and personal)

• Has noon meal with his 70 year old parents/ landlords (family and business)

• Teaches daughter how to operate new combine (business and family)

• Attends 4-H meeting with son in evening as advisor of small engine projects (family, personal and business)

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Not An Easy Topic to Discuss• Money• Management • Family differences• Job competency• Disappointments• New Ideas• Hopes for the future• Risk

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Message Effect

CommunicationChannel

Encodes

Decodes

SENDER

Decodes

Encodes

RECEIVER

Feedback

Message

Noise

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Off-farm Heirs and On-farm Heirs• Off-farm heirs may only get bits and pieces of what is

happening within the farm business and begin to draw their own realities.

• They often have a very different perception of what it takes to run a farm based on their childhood memories of working along side Mom and Dad.

• On-farm heirs may over value their time and inputs to the farm and expect more than what others think they should have.

• Big issues: knowledge and perception of fair versus equal.

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Age Year Titles

65 + 1922 to1945

Veterans(silent, traditionalists, hard workers, formal

communication style, deliberate, no news is good news)

46 - 64 1946 to 1964

Baby Boomers(workaholics, face-to-face communication, diplomatic,

need to feel valued )

31 – 45 1965 to 1980

Generation Xers(entrepreneurs, work life balance, direct &

immediate communication-blunt)

1 - 30 1981 to Present

Nexters(millennials, entrepreneurs, multitasking, work

life balance, communicate through technology)

Generational Definitions

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Personality and Gender Differences

• Communication style• Listening style• How individuals deal with communication

barriers• Working as a part of a team• What is important to an individual

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

Patrick Penny

PerryPam

Say NO to Secrecy!

Perry, Jr.Pete

Paul

Managing for Today and TomorrowSuccession, Business, Estate, and Retirement Planning for Farm and Ranch Women

How can we improve family business communication?