Farm stronger: The Farm CEO Checklist

There’s no shortage of challenges in farming. Building business management skills and becoming a Farm Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is an effective way to navigate challenges and grow your business.

Knowing where to start can be tough, though. FCC’s Farm CEO Checklist is designed to help farmers become effective CEOs by outlining priority actions to mitigate risk, seize opportunities and build a sustainable business.

Table of Contents

Why be a CEO?

“Today’s farmers aren’t just producers. Their role has really evolved from operator to executive, making high-stakes decisions daily,” says Jason Fiske, FCC’s manager of knowledge products. Given this evolution, being better prepared to make those decisions and handle the consequences is critical.

Taking a page from the corporate world isn’t just a trendy thing to do. There’s plenty of data to support why farmers should think like a CEO.

The data backs it up

Farm Management Canada’s 2015 Dollars and Sense study revealed a “measurable link between farm financial performance and the adoption of farm business management practices regardless of producer and production demographics.” Seven practices in particular – including having written business plans, monitoring the cost of production, and keeping an updated budget and financial plan – were found to be significant drivers of higher farm profitability. In fact, profitability increases between $10,000 and $160,000 were directly linked to these practices.

Five years later, a subsequent survey highlighted a concerning trend: the rate of adoption for the vast majority of business management practices had declined, including those practices found to have the greatest impact on farm financial performance.

“Only 22% of farmers have a written business plan, down from 26% in 2016, which was a low number to begin with,” says Fiske. “People may not get into farming because they like accounting and other aspects of business. It’s certainly not everybody’s preferred thing, but it is important.”

Know where to start

Lack of time and the belief that the farm is successful without adopting business management practices, such as formal business or market planning, were consistently listed as barriers to taking a more executive approach to management. Another was not knowing where to begin.

Fiske says FCC developed the Farm CEO Checklist to help farmers identify their own starting point – the areas where they most need to focus by recognizing both their strengths and gaps. Comprised of 14 overarching sections, with subcategories in each, the checklist functions as an informal scoring system, serving as a practical to-do list for addressing essential areas of farm business management. Checking off more boxes on the list helps ensure success by mitigating risk and providing greater confidence in decision-making.Becoming a farm CEO is an effective way to navigate challenges and grow your business.

The Farm CEO Checklist is not meant to be followed sequentially. Fiske reiterates that farmers should not expect to work on “everything every day,” nor feel the need to follow it step by step. Its purpose is to help individuals prioritize each task and achieve wider gains by taking small steps.

“Many of these tasks are ongoing. Some can take weeks, months, even years to complete,” Fiske says.

“You could have a list of 60 things you should be working on – but what we really wanted to do is narrow this down to things we think are critical and that are beneficial to all farms regardless of their size or geography.”