If you have a succession plan, Rena Striegel, president of Transition Point Business Advisors, wants to give you a high five.
“I want every farmer to feel confident their succession plan is good,” she says. “But even when a plan is in place, it still needs to be reviewed every year.”
Striegel shares events such as additions of family members, new skill sets that evolve or devolve, and many other realities directly influence any plan in place. But at the same time, external dynamics have highlighted the need for strategy.
She also references such stressors as rising interest rates, uncertainty of labor, higher labor costs, elevated land values and an impending inheritance tax drop in 2025.
“It all adds up to making farmers wonder what we should do,” she says.
At the 2024 Top Producer Summit, a preconference workshop will address all of the above. Attendees will have four takeaways from the one-day session.
- Set goals for both the transitioning owners and the operation itself.
- Create a plan to ensure your heirs and successors are ready to lead and work effectively together.
- Address family disharmony or handle communication with successors who do not tend
- to get along.
- Choose your professional team and hold them accountable for the work they will be doing for you.
“No matter where you are, we’ve got something for you here,” Striegel says.
The workshop will outline the process and how farmers can step into it as well as manage it along the way.
“It’s important to assess if you’ve done an adequate job so the plan is flexible and can adapt to the changes coming,” she says. “You want a resilient plan so it works the way we want it to work when the time comes.”
Striegel’s workshop will share the tools available to match the goals set by each operation.
“I love the ah-ha moment with a hopeful look that we’ve touched on a topic with a pain point and we are able to provide a solution,” Striegel says. “While the challenges in succession planning continue to evolve, so does our tool set to connect a concept to an actionable item.”
To register for Top Producer Summit, click here.
