More Than Money

My conversation with a business efficiency consultant about balancing finances, production and marketing soon turned deeper.

Clint said entrepreneurship is hard -- making money is not enough.

A businessperson must have a reason beyond making money to carry her through the stressful times.

Clint worries about people who open businesses without a passion or a long-term larger goal.

Maybe manufacturers, marketers or media influencers are seeking a quick buck, but the ranchers I know are in business for the long run.

In fact, we ranchers live with the implied criticism of “we don’t do it for the money, we do it for the lifestyle,” mostly because the income usually barely keeps the ranch afloat.

Clint didn’t realize it, but he affirmed what farmers and ranchers already know.

That felt good.

His comments made me consider just why ranchers do what they do.

Where do their passions lie?

I don’t speak for other ranchers, but I have some possible answers.

Many ranchers see how their actions make a difference on their land and livestock.

Especially in the spring, fragile new life offers immediate commentary on those actions.

Lambs quickly reflect poor decisions.

They die.

Calves and young grass usually manage to buffer bad ideas a little better because they have more stored energy, but poor choices harm them, too.

Yet lambs, calves and grass thrive with attention, effort and care.

Many ranchers feel an obligation to the land and the animals they raise.

That deep sense of duty to do the best they can for the life that counts on them resonates in their bones.

Satisfaction and joy come when those obligations are met.

Unlike businesspeople who work indoors, ranchers live with seasons.

We see the cycles of each year – spring, summer, fall and winter – and the necessity for each of those seasons.

We see how the seasons of the year create the cycles of life – birth, growth, reflection, death, decay and new birth– and know each is critical for the next.

Ranchers have to plan for the long run.

Rangeland improves slowly -- and it can always improve.

Weeds don’t die immediately.

A heifer calf won’t wean her first baby for three years.

A lot of factors influence those three years.

Conversely, a widget-maker might work on a weekly or monthly production schedule.

Most ranchers value authenticity.

In Western lore, authenticity came with horses, ropes, campfires and cattle drives.

Modern authenticity comes with four-wheelers, cell phones and semi-trucks, but the honesty, integrity and courage to face what ranchers can’t control is still paramount.

Maybe a rancher’s passion comes with winning a few of the bets she places against all she can’t control – weather, markets or the fickleness of society’s opinions.

You can’t win them all, but it’s hard to lose them all, too.

Clint sees many people who have no connection to the products they produce.

That lack of connection is completely alien to the ranchers I know.

Maybe that is why it is hard to respect people who buy a ranch on a whim and then flip it when the thrill disappears.

Ranching insists on intellectual, physical, emotional and spiritual efforts.

When a heifer might need help having a calf, the rancher reads the signs, reaches in, feels the heifer’s contractions squeeze her arm, hears her moans of pain and effort and then helps deliver either life or death.

It’s hard for me to believe that a fashionable social media influencer finds intellectual, physical, emotional and spiritual satisfaction from multiple posts in a day.

So, while the financial markets and business schools often overlook the ranching business model, maybe they are missing a fundamental key to success.

Maybe real success comes from lifestyle after all.