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| When the lady of the house runs the farm (December 2007) |
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It’s the smart banker who recognizes the differences in how the genders operate. The reward can be greater loyalt By Steve Cocheo, executive editor, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
Farm women have long had a big say in ag affairs. But a growing number of them co-manage with their husband, or are the boss. Bankers had better “get it”
Meanwhile, a salesman pulled into the yard, parked his truck, and began looking around for someone in charge. Ignoring Daniels, who was wearing bib overalls, her hair tied back, kneeling and refilling the corn sack, the salesman went to the farm office. Nobody there to talk to. He went to the main barn. No one there, either. He went to the house. No one answered. In all, he’d walked past Daniels two or three times. She hadn’t said a word, being busy with her chore, running behind, and, she admitted, not inclined to waste any time with a salesman with a day of work still ahead. She left him to his own devices. Finally, the truth beginning to dawn on him, the salesman crossed back to Daniels. “Well,” he said with some embarrassment, “who do I see here?” “Well,” Daniels answered back, “that would be me.” Daniels, owner, with her husband, Jarred Searles, of Heartwood, is the chief operator of the dairy, and says it seems to be taking many of the men of ag country some time to get their minds around the fact that a lady may be running the show. Even now, she says, when she and her spouse visit farm trade shows, seeking new products and new ideas in the exhibit halls, the first person that the salespeople reach to shake with is her husband. He always pleasantly advises them, “I’m not in charge. She is.” Daniels says her husband is a full partner in the farm, “but I am the general manager.” Daniels spoke as part of a panel about women in farming at the ABA National Agricultural Bankers Conference in late October. She and her co-panelists spoke about the rewards and frustrations of being women in what, ostensibly, has long been a man’s world. The challenges of navigating the credit system and of managing farm businesses were among the many topics explored. Women in blue jeans, banking Why say “ostensibly a man’s world”? Because that world is changing, perhaps so gradually that bankers and others aren’t always noticing it. Michelle Rook, moderator of the panel and managing farm director at radio station WNAX, Yankton, S.D., cited research from the National Association of Farm Broadcasters indicating that of the estimated 62 million “rural lifestyle households” in the U.S., 60% are headed by women. Not all such households are candidates for services from all ag banks, but the need to make sure that banker thinking is in synch with market reality is strong. One banker who has long understood this is Debra Lins, also a panelist, who grew up on a farm and who is married to a Wisconsin farmer. “I always go out to see the couple at the house, first,” says Lins, president and CEO at $55.2 million-assets Community Business Bank, Sauk City, Wis., which has about 10% of its credits in ag loans. She says she learned the importance of that from observing her own mother on the family’s farm, which ran 300 cows and more than 5,000 acres. “She was Irish, and she wrote all the checks for the farm,” Lins recalled, “and it really ticked her off when people went straight out to the barn to see my father.” Lins said that her mother might very well wind up sending the businessman or banker out to the barn to see her husband, but she expected them to come to her first. Lins cited some U.S. Census Bureau figures that indicate that woman farmers, while sometimes being generalists on the farm, are often specialists. Animal specialties, such as horse farms, are particular favorites. The research also indicated that smaller farms are more likely to have women as their primary operators. Also, women typically become farmers more often through inheritance, rather than setting out to be farmers, as did Laura Daniels. Indeed, the research indicated that women are more likely to inherit farms than men. Understanding female farmers Lins told banker listeners that it’s important to understand that women who own and operate farms are still women, and tend to go about things differently than men. “Men tend to make decisions quickly,” said Lins, “but women want them validated.” Bankers working with women on the farm can expect more questions and a longer time between the beginning of a deal and the finalization of it. The protocol of a business meeting with a woman farmer also works much differently than it does with a man, according to Lins. While men stress facts, women tend to stress relationships, she explained. “Females want to know that you care about them,” she said, “so there is some personal catch-up time before you get down to business.” Men, on the other hand, tend to go straight to the heart of things, trying to ascertain in the first minutes of a banker-to-farmer conversation what the proposed credit terms will be, and, ultimately, “What’s it going to cost?” Interestingly, Lins finds that more and more of her bank’s commercial clients, including male business owners, have a preference for dealing with female business advisors and bankers. “They tell me it’s because they find there is less ego involved,” says Lins. In a related vein, panelists noted that one area where women may actually make faster decisions is in commodity marketing. Moderator Michelle Rook noted that her father, a grain farmer, “has trouble pulling the trigger” and accepting a price on his crops, always hoping that holding out just a bit longer may get a few more cents per bushel. She’s found that it is often the wife who is making the farm couple’s marketing decision, because she wants to see some money coming in the door. “The men want bragging rights” for holding out and getting so much more per bushel than their fellows, said Diana Goldammer, Mitchell, S.D., another woman farmer on the panel. Where gender doesn’t count But differences based on gender only go so far. Farming, done by man or woman, means time-consuming, demanding work, full of the unexpected, and sudden change. Yet it’s possible to find some humor there, too. “When you read Cosmopolitan, it will tell you to beat stress by taking a bubble bath,” said Diana Goldammer. “When the tractor is stuck in the mud and nothing is working to get it out, there isn’t time to stop and take a bubble bath.” Dealing with the husband-wife team, on the farm, can present itself with interesting challenges. Lins, for instance, sometimes finds that the man and woman, both life partners and business partners, don’t see eye to eye on some matters that bring them to her desk. Whether it’s a matter of expanding or not, or simply accepting the terms of an offered loan, Lins said she simply tells couples who aren’t in synch, “You two need to get on the same page, so that I’m hearing the same thing from both of you on this.” The concept of “the same page,” rather than any thought of majority rule in a family, is important. In response to a banker’s question about dealing with a couple who can’t agree, and how to find a “tie breaker,” dairy farmer Laura Daniels scoffed. “If a couple needs a ‘tie breaker’,” Daniels said, “they aren’t ready to start out on a farm yet.” Diana Goldammer, who works a full-time job off-farm as an publicist for Dakota Wesleyan University, is also chairman and president of Women In Blue Jeans, a large peer organization for women farmers. Goldammer and her husband, a veteran farmer, are both quite busy. Both work town jobs, in addition to their farm labor. Goldammer notes that, “I am not the knowledgeable farm partner that Laura Daniels is.” Sometimes, her role is carrying out instructions from her husband, such as picking up FSA forms while in town. She says she often has trouble understanding the FSA office staff, so her husband frequently calls ahead for what he needs, so she can pick up the right documents. Indeed, the FSA office is a source of friction in Goldammer’s life. She does farm-related errands on lunch hours, weekends, and nights. Time is tight, and Goldammer finds that the FSA officer frequently doesn’t have promised paperwork ready at the time she’s arranged for. “My time is valuable,” she says with aggravation, and she doesn’t like to see it wasted. More loyal, more vocal Understanding each female farmer’s situation will help the banker seeking their business. Making the extra effort, or not, determines not only success in the immediate relationship, but in any future business that the bank hopes to do with female farmers. Banker Debra Lins said that women tend to be both “more loyal and more vocal.” “They’ll send someone your way,” if they like the way you treated them, said Lins. On the other hand, she added, if you’ve served them poorly, “they will also tell people not to bank with you.” Either way, the impact will be lasting. A banker asked, “How many chances do we have to get it right?” “It depends how much my husband likes you,” Goldammer admitted, once a bank has disappointed her. If he likes the bank, there’s still a shot. But should her husband be against continuing with the bank, or merely be on the fence, she said, the couple would change banks. Daniels said she and her husband had to shop around a bit when they were first purchasing and outfitting their dairy operation. Besides their savings, getting the farm up and running depended on a combination of FSA funds, aid from a state program, and financing from a bank. The couple banks with Marshall & Ilsley Corp.’s local branch. Broadcaster Michelle Rook’s parents once became very frustrated with their bank at one point. Rook told listeners that the couple’s banker just wouldn’t accept that her mother had an equal voice with her father in decisions about the farm. So they decided to change banks—together. BJ
The electronic version of this article available at: http://lb.ec2.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/sb/ababj1207/index.php?startid=22
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