Value your own time

One of the biggest mistakes many business owners (especially farmers) make is not fully valuing their time and labour.  It is easy to account for money paid to staff or consultants.  Valuing your own time, whether in the field, in front of the computer or meeting with buyers can be more difficult–but it needs to be recognized.    

Failure to consider your time and labour likely means that products are under priced, therefore directly contributing to financial stress and instability.

Opportunity Costs are a useful tool for assessing different options for your time and money.  Your labour isn’t free, even it there isn’t a bi-weekly paycheque. By doing a farm activity you are passing up opportunities to earn money somewhere else.    The number you choose to value your time can be based on what you could earn off-farm or a number based on area wages.

Understanding what your time and effort is worth is critical to understand whether or not you are earning a fair living for yourself.  It can be useful in other decisions such as whether to hire someone else to do the work (at a lower wage) or focus on a specific part of the operation.  It helps you stay in control and make informed decisions. 

A note about WWOOFERS
On organic farms, where WWOOFers (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms) and other volunteers are often utilized. The value of their labour should also be considered.  It is important to understand how that “free” labour influences your costs and therefore prices.  Meals, accommodation, mentoring time, transportation and other costs should be accounted and compared to other options.  Contingency planning is another good reason to understand the value of volunteers.   Volunteers and apprentices are not always available.

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