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Our world is changing fast, and the farm isn’t sheltered from it. Global politics, markets, input and commodity prices, technologies, practice standards, weather—together, these pressures become a huge weight bearing down on the farm.
Change. Adapt. Keep up. Or fall behind. At least, that’s the threat.
In my travels across North America, I’ve met a lot of different farmers and seen a lot of different farms.
At first, I noticed the differences in context: the weather, landscapes, soils, farm sizes, markets, networks, cultures, and so on all have this complex and unspoken influence on the decisions that get made on the farm.
But at a certain point, I started noticing how different farms handled change.
Some farms were constantly changing and seemed to take it in stride. They were always trialing new techniques, testing new products, demoing new equipment. You’d find them doing things their peers didn’t think were possible.
Other farms either weren’t changing or weren’t having much success with it. They were doing what had been done for generations—or, at most, doing what the neighbours did. Maybe they’d dip their toes into something new every now and again, but they’d get cold feet and stick with the status quo.
Regional differences didn’t explain why some farms were changing and others weren’t. You can find progressive and traditional farms no matter where you are.
It wasn’t the weather, or the landscapes, or the soils.
Farm size, what the farm was producing, or the markets they were selling to didn’t explain it either.
In fact, the likelihood of a farm adopting new practices or technologies had very little to do with any of these external factors.
What determined whether a farm handled change successfully came down to one trait:
Whether the farmer was curious.
Curiosity is the desire to know—to seek out and experience something new. It is a learner’s mindset, a posture of openness and discovery, a willingness to be surprised.
Curiosity is directly linked to our ability to adapt, innovate, and be empathetic with those around us.
If you’re a curious farmer, you recognize that what worked in the past doesn’t guarantee your future. In fact, some of the practices that have been core to your operation may even work against you.
To future-proof the farm, you have to stay curious. You have to be open to the possibility that there’s a better way, and then relentlessly search for it.
I think the curious stance is summed up in a phrase that we use often in the farming community:
Continuous improvement.
But that’s not the only stance we take up, and it’s not the only common phrase that comes out of our mouths. There’s another. Its exact opposite:
It’s worked like this for generations.
The hard truth is that curiosity is risky. For some, the pressure to change and the risk of doing so doesn’t drive them to be curious.
They get defensive.
In contrast to curiosity, defensiveness is an expert mindset. It says, I know. It’s not about openness, it’s about self-preservation. It’s about protecting legacy, tradition, reputation, family.
But that protectionism comes at a cost.
Defensiveness is curiosity’s kryptonite. If you approach the farm defensively, it acts like a kill switch on the curious, creative, and adaptive side of your brain. Live that way long enough and it doesn’t just become habit, it becomes a wall.
In some ways, it’s like driving impaired. Approaching the farm defensively clouds your vision. You’ll react to problems when it’s too late. You’ll have trouble focusing on the most important task, making sound decisions, and coordinating all the things with all the people that are on the farm.
At best, defensiveness reduces your productivity, profitability, and overall performance.
At worst, defensiveness—the strategy that we thought would protect the farm—spells the end of it.
Curious? Or defensive? Very few people are all one or the other. But if you’re looking to farm curious, you’re probably interested in figuring out what to do about those few moments when you have caught yourself reacting defensively.
For starters, don’t avoid it—by telling yourself that if you just ignore the problem, it will go away.
Don’t deny it—by telling yourself that what you’re feeling is wrong or misplaced.
And don’t dismiss it—by telling yourself that there’s nothing to worry about.
Defensiveness is a signal that you need to pay attention to if you’re wanting to future-proof the farm.
So pay attention to it! And try these four steps to disarm your defensiveness and gain access to your curious self:
1. Treat defensiveness as a perfectly normal response. Some people worry that if you give it an inch it will take a mile, but trying to shut down defensiveness—in yourself or others—just makes it get louder. If you’re feeling defensive, you’ve got good reason to be! Don’t beat yourself up about it.
2. See if you can name the feeling hidden behind your defensiveness. Is it fear? Frustration? Disappointment? Maybe you’re feeling lots of things all at once—in other words, you’re overwhelmed. If it helps, write them down as a list, and try to take them one at a time.
3. Dig a little deeper and identify the unmet need. You need some thing. If you had this thing, you wouldn’t be feeling afraid, frustrated, disappointed, or whatever. What is that thing you’re missing? Choice? Freedom? Trust? Purpose? Connection? Control?
4. Look for a small way to meet that need. Maybe you can’t give it the whole nine yards to meet your need for control, let’s say. But relieving just a sliver of the source of your defensiveness is still progress. So what small step would make your need a little more manageable?
The challenges facing your farm are real. They threaten things that matter: livelihood, identity, legacy, family, security.
Farming curious doesn’t mean pretending those threats are small. It means responding to them out of curiosity rather than defensiveness.
Because if defensiveness is your default—if you’re prone to jumping into protective mode—you will struggle to navigate the chaos of change. Defensiveness will impair your ability to lead the farm through uncertainty.
On the flipside, if you can disarm your defensiveness and bring your curious self to the farm, the challenges become opportunities, missteps become lessons learned, and sunk costs become tuition fees. It’s all investment in the future of your farm.
I’m writing a book called Farming Curious. It’s a guidebook for making change, navigating the chaos, and future-proofing the farm. I’m using these blog articles to share with you some snippets of what it’s about before it’s published next year.
I recognize this is a touchy topic, and we’ve gone pretty deep pretty fast. But in writing this book, I wanted to get to the root of the issue right out of the gate. The stance you take at the outset charts a course for all the decisions that follow.
My hope for you is that you can make a strong start.
If you try the four-step process, I’d love to hear how it went for you! Leave a comment or reach out.
And if this article made you think of someone leading change on the farm, send it their way. I hope it helps.