At this point in the summer, many students are preparing to return to school – or maybe some have already started their new school year. It’s an exciting time that can also come with some anxiety or worry around changes and transitions to come.

One thing is for sure: Learning will be taking place once again. The key for students in school – whatever grade or stage of schooling they’re in – is to continue moving forward and making progress in what they’re learning. They and their teachers strive to help them advance to the next level of whatever they are working to master.

Beyond a rookie

As a farm leader, the key is to be a student as well – of your own operation, of ag and of ag business. And just like a school-age student, you want to keep advancing in your knowledge and practice of farming as well. To put it another way, you don’t want to be ten years into your farming career and feel like you’ve simply repeated your rookie year of farming ten times!

To advance beyond that rookie year takes some reflection and planning in terms of what you need to learn more about and how you’ll seek to do it. It also takes an open mind – a “beginner’s mind” – to keep questioning, keep looking for new ideas and approaches and keep wanting to learn and improve so that your operation can improve too.

Keeping an open mind around what you can learn next gives your operation a true sustainable competitive advantage. It’s true that the only way to get and maintain that advantage is to learn faster and adapt more quickly in your farm business. The more open you are to learning and the faster you can learn, the more opportunity your farm will have to be competitive in the long run.

Three areas to build

Here are three different areas farmers can focus on continually learning and getting better – that also help the farm business.

The opinions of the author are not necessarily those of Farm Futures or Farm Progress