Agriculture is about working with biology. So why do we ignore biology when it comes to the human side of running the business? That question is underneath most of what I talk about.
Jessi Roesch spent fifteen years in commercial lending, underwriting north of $10B and, starting right after the Great Recession, shutting businesses down. The ones that failed almost never had a bad business. They had nobody who had handed them the rules. She founded Downland to hand them over — a succession platform helping farm families and beginning farmers decide the future of their land before someone else decides it for them.
Agriculture works with biology everywhere except the human side of the business. This talk is about why you’re avoiding the decision you already know you need to make, and what actually moves people off the mark.
Most people think a will or a trust means they’re done. They have not started. The seven steps that actually transfer a farm, and the conversations that have to happen before any of the paperwork matters.
A working session rather than a talk. People leave having planned the specific conversation they’ve been putting off — with the person, the opening line and the date on the calendar.
Where your food comes from, what the label is telling you, what it’s hiding, and the range of things a person can actually do about it — from the smallest move to the largest.
Fifteen years underwriting from the other side of the table, and what that taught me about why good operators get turned down. For founders, and especially for the ones nobody handed the rules to.
I’ll do a keynote or a panel and enjoy it. But the format that changes anything is a co-hosted working session, where the room leaves with a decision made rather than a topic considered. If you’re deciding between the two, ask me about the workshop.
Request Jessi