How to farm like a "big" farmer

Yesterday I had the privilege of attending the customer appreciation day for Precision seeding technologies listed to the right.  The keynote speaker was Texas A&M professor Danny Klinefelter.  He has an interest in large farms and how they do it.  One of the things he sees in large farms is some sort of diversity.  He says that smaller farmers can bring diversity into their operations by collaboration.  Many of these relationships are formal, like hiring consultants, accountants etc. Another route is cooperatives.  One of his biggest issues was, "If you enter into such a relationship, how do you get out of it?" 

The second part of his presentation was about performance based borrowing.  Credit is a necessary part of businesses in general and agriculture is no exception.  Klinefelter discussed using business planning to document your track record.  He says you cannot go to a lender unless you know how much you need, how will the loan be re-paid, are your projections realistic based on past performance, and what happens if something goes wrong.  I cannot begin to capture his entire presentation, but suffice to say, that if you get a chance to listen to a guy like Danny Klinfelter, Mike Boehlje, Darrell Dunteman, Barry Flinchbaugh, David Kohl, Bryce Knorr, or Arlan Suderman, don't pass it up.  They are great thinkers and I was privileged to hear all of them this winter.