farm is only as successful as its team of doers. The owner, their family, employed workers — whomever resides at the center of an operation directly influences production

s trailside Holsteins grew, so did owner Michael Johnson’s need for employees. Longer, more frequent shifts at the dairy called for more hands on deck — and not just any hands

Developing a successful employee begins with the quality of the onboarding process at your dairy

A successful business runs like a well-oiled machine: everyone knows and executes their roles in operating efficiently to meet the company’s goals

We take a lot of steps to help our employees feel like they belong at our farm, so they want to come to work every day

Almost every dairy farmer is also an employer. That means in addition to all the work that surrounds owning and caring for cattle, dairy producers must be proficient in human resources

A third human case of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) A(H5) virus infection related to dairy cattle was reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last Thursday, May 30

GIVING others the authority to act on your behalf as an employer can be unnerving, especially if you’re accustomed to bearing responsibilities on your own

The joke — according to Steve Abel of Abel Dairy Farms — is that dairy owners are full-time firemen and part-time dairymen

Young people who are looking to learn have been great fits for our farm team

It isn’t so much that people don’t want to learn, it’s that they don’t want to be made to learn

As dairies have gotten bigger and more diverse, the need for a reliable workforce has only expanded

In addition to providing effective training, leading your team members so that they can do their jobs well requires setting clear expectations and providing feedback

Trusting your workforce to complete their jobs accurately is the foundational need of any business. But for employees to know what needs to be done and how to do it, they need effective training

A lot of jobs in the dairy industry are very specialized in that they require an understanding of the biology of the cow and the unique characteristics of farming

So often when we discuss mental health in agriculture, the suicide statistics are cited, and the stresses of the job are rehashed

The author is a freelance writer and dairy farmer from Wisconsin.FARM owners need to be aware of the legal side of hiring and retaining good employees and handling underperforming employees

How does the saying go? Something like, “The worst sentence in the English language is ‘That’s the way we’ve always done it’”? Man, if that doesn’t sound like...

Dairy farms are not alone when it comes to a shortage of help. Problems associated with a limited workforce span across other sectors of agriculture and different industries

Dairy farmers in states including California, Minnesota, New York, and Washington have had their labor costs swell in recent years as their state legislatures implemented requirements for overtime pay