You today
You wake up and run the farm on autopilot. You do what you have always done, handle what comes up, spend the day putting out fires. If someone asked you, right now, what you want the farm to be for you three years from now, the answer comes out vague: “do well”, “improve”, “not be squeezed”. That is a felt direction, not something you can check later. And this is where management begins, because there is no good decision without a destination.
Why this step exists
Management is getting what you want with what you have. Notice the start of that sentence: what you want. Without it written down, no decision is good or bad, because there is no yardstick to judge by. Selling early is right for someone who wants to sleep easy and wrong for someone who wants to squeeze the last cent out of the price. Buying more land is right for someone who wants to grow and dead weight for someone who wants room to breathe. The same decision changes value with the destination, and the destination is yours.
And the destination is almost never money alone. In a 2008 survey for the UK government (Defra), 93% of farmers said they truly value the rural way of life, and 79% agreed that farming is also about maximizing profit. Both live in the same person; what changes from one farmer to the next is the order between them. That is why this step does not hand you a goal: it makes you state your own, and put it in order.
This is Step 0, not Step 1, because it depends on no data from the farm. You can do it today, at the kitchen table, before you record a single operation. It is the compass for the other six steps.
A goal is not a dream
Here is the part almost everyone skips. “I want quality of life” is a dream, a direction. It is not a goal. The proof is simple: a year from now, how will you know whether you got there? Quality of life, said that way, cannot be checked. A dream points the way; a goal is the dream turned into something you can look at and say “I made it” or “I did not”, with no argument.
The work of this step is that translation. You start from your dreams, which are legitimate and come first, and you turn the most important one into a goal you can check. The tool for that has a name and fits on the back of a page: the SMART target.
How to: the SMART target, and why each part matters
SMART is five demands that separate a goal from a dream. A goal that fails any one of them slides back into being a dream. Let us take them one at a time, each with its reason, because the reason is what keeps you from skipping any.
Specific. Say exactly what, not “improve the farm”. “Improve” fits anything and commits you to nothing. Trade it for something with an edge: “know what it costs me to produce my unit” (the bushel, the hundredweight, the head), or “have a cash cushion that keeps me out of a panic sale”. Why: a vague goal does not tell you what to do tomorrow morning; a specific one already points at the first move.
Measurable. Put a number or a fact you can verify. This is the demand that is missing most often, and the one that turns a dream into a goal. “Quality of life” cannot be checked; “one Sunday off a week and two weeks away from the farm a year” can be checked on the calendar. Why: without a measure, you never know whether you arrived, and a destination you cannot confirm reaching guides no decision at all.
Achievable. The goal has to fit what you have today, or what you can build within the deadline. If you take no day off at all, aiming for two months of vacation next year only sets you up to quit in March. Start with one Sunday a month and raise the bar later. Why: a goal out of reach does not motivate, it discourages, and a goal that discourages is worse than no goal.
Relevant. The goal has to serve what actually matters to you, the top of your list. A polished growth goal is no use if what you most want is time with your family. Why: energy is scarce on a farm, and spending it on a goal that is not yours is the quietest waste in all of management.
Time-bound. Set a date. “Someday” pressures no one. “By the end of the next production cycle” (the next harvest, or the next batch of animals finished) puts the goal in time. Why: with no deadline, the goal is always put off, and “later” never comes.
One example, from dream to goal
Dream: “I want more financial peace of mind.” It becomes a goal like this: “I want to finish the next cycle with enough cash on hand to cover three months of the farm’s bills, so I do not have to sell at the worst price just because a bill came due.” Specific (a cash cushion), measurable (three months of bills), achievable (you size it to your own reality), relevant (it is the peace of mind you asked for), and time-bound (the next cycle). Now it is a goal: one cycle from now you look at the cash and you know whether you made it.
Why keep at it, and come back
A goal written down and forgotten in a drawer changes nothing. It only works if you come back to it. On this path, your goal does not stay in Step 0: it returns in Step 3, when you build the plan for the next cycle, because the plan exists to serve the goal, and it returns in Step 6, when you compare what happened against what you wanted and see whether you moved the right way. Writing the goal is the start; revisiting it each cycle is what keeps it alive. Once a year, reread your list: what mattered may have changed, and changing it is fine, as long as you know it changed.
The five directions, to put in order
Before the SMART target comes the compass: what matters to you, in order. Five directions cover almost every farmer. There is no right order; there is yours.
- The family’s income. What the farm has to generate to support the people who depend on it.
- Time and quality of life. Rest, health, being home. In the 2008 UK survey, the way of life was valued more than profit.
- Continuity and succession. Leaving the farm standing for whoever comes next, and preparing whoever will take over.
- Growth. More area, more activity, more production.
- Protection against a bad break. Getting through a bad year of weather or price without losing everything.
Rank the five, from what matters most to what matters least. That order is what will break the ties in your decisions over the next steps.
Common mistakes, and how to avoid them
- Stopping at the dream. Writing “I want to do well” and thinking you set a goal. Always translate it into something checkable, with a number and a date.
- Too many goals at once. Five goals at the same time is none. Pick one or two from the top of the list for the next cycle.
- Aiming at what you do not control. “I want the price to rise” or “I want a year without drought” are not goals, they are wishing. Aim at what is in your hands: the cash cushion, the records kept current, the decision made on time.
- A goal with no date. With no deadline it never starts. Put a cycle, a year, a season on it.
- A goal only you understand. If you cannot explain the goal to someone else in a way that lets them tell whether you reached it, the goal is still vague.
Where to start
Take a sheet of paper. Write the five directions and put them in order, from what matters most to what matters least. Then look at the first one and ask a single question: “how would I know, one cycle from now, that I got there?” The answer to that, with a number and a date, is your first SMART target. One is enough to begin.
Done when
You have, in writing: the five directions in order of priority, and at least the first of them turned into a SMART target, with a number you can check and a date. The final test is this: if you handed that sheet to a stranger, could they tell, at the deadline, whether you made it? If they could, you have a goal. If not, it is still a dream, and it is worth a little more work right here.
What this step does not cover
Here you state what you want, not how to get there; the road is the rest of the path, from Step 1 to Step 6. And setting your own goal is an owner’s decision: it is not financial or legal advice, which, if your case calls for it, is a matter for a qualified professional.