2007-E4 Labor: How to Find Hire Train and Retain Help

Labor: How to Find Hire Train and Retain Help
Welch, Woods

The people who work on our farms are key to our success and represent our largest expense. The importance of finding and keeping good help cannot be overemphasized.  Ed Welch of Sunny Pine Farm in Twisp and Maya Watershine Woods of Filaree Farm in Okanogan have nearly fifty years of combined experience with finding, hiring, training and retaining farm help. Ed will share how Sunny Pine Farm has evolved with its labor- moving from relying on interns to relying on a permanent workforce, and why.  He will talk about the challenges to keeping people happy, or not always keeping them happy—within a work situation which can be boring to some people, and where they are working very hard.  At Filaree Farm, a core group of six people have been with the farm for over ten years. Maya will share her experience managing crews of 6 to 25 people in a diverse operation that requires many tasks to be accomplished simultaneously.