Technology that informs a self-driving car what a pedestrian looks like or that alerts you which of your friends are in a photo you posted on Facebook is coming to dairy farms. The technology could soon help dairy farmers detect estrus, monitor feed intake and predict when a cow is not feeling well.

I won’t say that you should treat your employees like cattle, but there are some good reminders for managing employees from the role of a cowboy moving cattle. Like them, your job is to ride herd. The most effective cowboys would say that involves the following responsibilities:

In the big game this Sunday afternoon, highly trained players will coordinate their activities as precisely as they can against the onslaught of the other team. If all goes according to plan, the quarterback may throw the ball to a certain spot on the field where his receiver is supposed to be at just the right time. They call it teamwork. It is a thing of beauty when it happens!

First-generation dairyman Brent Copenhaver bought his first 60 cows 10 years ago, and a decade later, sound financial choices have helped him to successfully purchase his own farm and grow his operation.

Your management philosophy translates into your thinking framework and behavior, impacting your management style. One way this impacts your dairy is by influencing how you work with people and their overall engagement – which translates directly into productivity and return on investment for you.

The beginning of my career and love for commodity markets stemmed from my first job dumping grain trucks at a terminal on the Illinois River. It was there I learned the basics of futures, options and hedging. As my knowledge of the markets grew, my role with the grain co-op did as well.

I don’t know how many times I’ve uttered, “Technology is great … when it works.” And it seems like, today, more and more of us are adding, “Technology is great ... when it works and doesn’t interfere with work.”

Best practices for keeping feeding equipment clean in the calf barn, including protocols for proper sanitation and culturing, were presented during a panel discussion at the Cornell Calf and Heifer Congress 2016.

Producing a quality product should be the goal of every dairy farm. However, not every employee’s idea of a dream job centers around milking cows 12 hours a day. With that in mind, Dr. Michelle Borek-Stine, DVM, of Thumb Veterinary Services in Sandusky, Michigan, developed a unique approach to “tame the tiger” of employee engagement and turnover.

With all of the data available to today’s dairy producers, the value of that data is easily lost in the shuffle. Data is raw material that should be used to “drive understanding,” Robert Goodling Jr. said in a Penn State Dairy Nutrition Workshop session.