The Mentality of a Labourer ! Part 1

I welcome you all to another wonderful year , 2017. A year that promises to be full of pleasant surprises , new challenges, creative ways out of those challenges and of course a profitable year for agribusiness. In the words of my mentor and former Principal Late Dr. Tai Solarin , ‘’ May your roads be rough ‘’ this year , enough for you to make mistakes , learn from it and profit therefrom. After all, experience they say is the best teacher . Experience can be a painful journey of self –discovery and it could also be a pleasant sail of comfort, if you are lucky enough to have a good one … but like we all know, good things don’t come easy …at least not every time .
As I am well aware that most of you would have started planning your budgets/programmes for the new planting year , some have even started implementation, key to making your plan a success is Labour . owing to the fact that much of Agri-business in this clime is done manually , not because the means of mechanization are not available, they are mostly out of reach for the average small holder farmer… and even if it was , how much of those equipment can you possibly have on your farm. If you cant procure the equipment for mechanization, you will probably require the help of Farm Hands/Labourers, Farm manager etc.…whatever names you choose to classify them, they are labourers and they have a unique way of thinking.

Many may not agree with me on this, but your employees are just out to protect their interest i.e. wages or Salaries. As long as they are in your employ, they want to be sure you can provide their emoluments in exchange for their services. In the same vein , you the employer, are also out to protect your interest i.e. Your Investment, to ensure that your business operates as a going concern, and you get value for whatever you pay for the services of your staff . In effect, everybody along the gamut of the business is selfish ! I’m sure if the employer could get the work done without paying a dime , he would most certainly vote for that , and vice versa, if the employee could get Salaries/Wages without doing any work, he is fine . Essentially, there exists a parallel between the desires of the Employer and the Employee.
I assume I am speaking only to those who have either taken up a career in Agribusiness, or are already warming up, I think you need to read this .

Note that your average employees are selfish (it is natural and don’t blame them) and in their selfishness, they will cut corners. They will undermine you and your authority. They will strive for inefficiency and ineffectiveness . Some of them even become deliberately wasteful , after all at the end of the month , he is going to get paid . I have had some pleasant experiences with labourers and some not too nice ones .
Infact one of them frustrated me for so long , that I felt like handing him over to the police. The guy almost sold my farm, entering into contracts on my behalf and claiming that Oga will sort it out. Some of them have this unique ability of looking busy , doing nothing ! They work aimlessly purposely or do I say purposely aimlessly ? In street parlance, that is eye service at its best ! This is not restricted to age or gender or even tribe . I could go on and on and on…. But as a business minded farmerpreneur , how do you recognize these traits or at best , manage these challenges when it rears its ugly head ? Remember , it’s a business you cant do alone .
Please look out for my next write up , as I’ll be sharing real life experiences of these issues and how I tackled them |( at least almost successfully) . Till that time , I remain ….

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Greenly Yours

'Sola Adeniyi
Chief Executive Farmer

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