Summer Series: Are you getting the right advice for your farm?

"Bring more value," Ag Grow's Kara Annand tells advisors.

[Make It Count] This summer, the top job for more farmers will be to get busy evaluating the people who advise them 

Is it time to find a new advisor? 

Or would walking away from your current advisors be such a serious mistake that you’d regret it for years to come? Accountants, agronomists, grain marketers and other advisors are key parts of many farm management teams. But how good are we farmers at managing those relationships and making sure we’re getting top value from them? 

It turns out this is a crucial question, and summer may be your best opportunity to tackle it. 

Farmers are known for their ability to do a little bit of everything. But just because you can do everything yourself, doesn’t mean you should.These days, farmers hire paid professionals to help with anything from developing feed rations to registering new corporations, and many farmershave developed long-term relationships with professionals including accountants, agronomists, mechanics or input suppliers.

When the farmer/advisor relationship is ideal, the advisor knows their clients and their clients’ farms so well they become an extension of thefarm management team. The advisor knows how the farm operates and can suggest new ideas that might be profitable.

Farmers in ideal farmer/advisor relationships also take every opportunity to learn from their hired professionals instead of blindly following advice they don’t understand. These farmers spend time with their advisors and are comfortable telling them the gritty details about their farm.

But that’s not always the case.

Sometimes it’s obvious

Sometimes, next-generation farmers inherit professional relationships along with the machinery. Maybe your mom’s bookkeeper isn’t a great fitfor you. If you don’t trust this person enough to let them see all of your farm receipts, it’s clear. You need a new advisor.

Or your advisor may retire or relocate. Or the new banker assigned to your file might rub you the wrong way. If you’d rather go to the dentist thanstop by your bank for a quick meeting with your banker, again it’s clear. You need a new advisor.

Farms can also outgrow their advisors. If you want to try new technology your agronomist doesn’t understand and can’t support, again, it’s time to change.

Kim Gerencser, a Saskatchewan-based farm business and management consultant through his company Growing Farm Profits, adds another clear case as well.

Gerencser says it’s certainly time to find a new advisor “if you discover that your professional isn’t actually working in your best interests. That isyour number one trigger to find somebody new.”

For example, your advisor might have a conflict of interest. It might be an obvious case. For example, maybe your advisor earns money selling youinputs or services that you don’t truly need. Or it could be something more subtle.

If you’re in any of these situations, you need better advice. But don’t overlook that there is also a much more subtle — and important — warningsign. Are you afraid to ask your advisor a question?

RELATED: How these Ontario farmers are getting great at change

Go ahead, just ask

When you’re meeting with an expert, asking questions can be awkward. How many years can I ask my accountant to explain “inventory adjustment” at tax time before he questions my intelligence? If you’ve been using that herbicide for years, will you admit you don’t know whatmode of action it uses?