Friday, March 29, 2024

FIELDAYS: Employment model tipped on head

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As dairy farmers struggle to hire and keep staff Woodville farmer and DairyNZ director Ben Allomes has tipped his farm employment model on its head.  He and wife Nicky aim to attract and retain people in an environment that recognises effort and nurtures potential while recognising a work-life balance.
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The challenges in attracting and retaining good people and a need to restructure their business two years ago presented the Allomes with a chance to look at how they employ people on their 750-cow operation.

“It also came from a realisation that if I was in this industry for the long haul and was relying upon key people then I had a duty to make it work for them. 

“I was not doing any service to the primary sector if I did not,” he said.

Allomes’ year spent as a Nuffield Scholar in 2015 played a big part in how he went about taking a long look at employment. His scholarship work looked at the importance of self-awareness and reflection in developing leadership among farmers.

“Basically, if you are going to start anywhere you have to start with who you see in the mirror and asking yourself ‘how can I influence a positive level of change within my business and within my team?’”

Thanks to earlier analysis Allomes knew the farm business takes 8000 working hours to run.

“Typically, we would look at that and say that it required four full-time equivalents. We tipped that on its head and instead decided to work it like a pasture feed wedge. That is, we have this much demand in front of us, how are we going to make up the supply?”

People were given a chance to say how many hours they wanted to work over a year and what sort of shifts they wanted.

“I worked closely with my farm manager. This was important as it meant I had input from the next generation coming through, recognising their particular needs and putting weighting on that.”

Rather than people dodging work or opting for the plum hours, Allomes found they were flexible and open about options and have tended to stick to what they originally said they could do.

“By having those conversations upfront about what they wanted was an excellent opportunity to build trust. 

“Now, over the course of a year we have 12 people working on the farm when traditionally it would have been that four time FTE set-up.”

Having that flexibility has also fed through to how Allomes recognises staff performance and spreads responsibility.

“Typically, responsibility is allocated based on experience. Newer staff may have less experience but they can still be allocated a narrow band of responsibility, right through to the top of the task.”

While unemployment rates are at an historical low Allomes does not believe there is necessarily a shortage of staff for the farming sector.

“There is a significant level of under employment where people would like to work more but can’t get hours that work for them.”

Having up to 12 people employed on his farm over the year means his core staff get greater exposure to a wide variety of people, building their professional and social networks in the process. 

The flexibility of hours includes three milkings in two days from January onwards, requiring only one person to start before 7am when cows are milking twice a day.

“Really, our team are our customer so the challenge is how can we make this work for them?”

The creative approach earned the Allomes the inaugural Primary Industry Good Employer Award for the primary sector last year. They also picked up the Innovative Employment Practices Award.

Meanwhile, he sees the benefits flowing into the work-life balance of the rural community. 

As daily interactions in rural areas get hollowed out by partners working in town and children often ending up in town schools, Allomes described his approach as a back to the future reinvigoration of small communities.

“People often want or need to do different things at different times of the day. 

“Urban places are trying to get more connected with their residents and that often involves the evenings. But we have the flexibility in rural areas to do things during the day, if we make it flexible enough.”

Allomes said his approach is a constantly moving target and good communication between boss and staff is vital, with a good dose of empathy required to stay tuned.

“The conversations tend to be more holistic, more around how the person is, rather than just about what they are or are not doing in their job.”

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