Ag Supervisory Leadership Training in Spanish: Transition to Supervisor

Agricultural Supervisory Leadership NOW in Spanish!

Spanish-speaking leaders in the agricultural industry representing dairy, apple, vineyards and even a SUNY college educator came to learn about how to take the step from high-performing employee to supervisor! This event was located at the CCE Ontario office and included four bilingual instructors: Libby Eiholzer (Cargill), Kaitlyn Lutz (Cornell), Santiago Ledwith (Action Dairy and Talentum4) and María “Bess” Lewis (Cornell). Cornell Agricultural Workforce Development organized and led the event as the first step in providing supervisor training adapted for Spanish speakers and based on their successful Agricultural Supervisory Leadership certificate program that is already offered in English.

“It is important to be a positive person so that your team can be motivated. This will help me apply it to my team in the workplace.” – Participant

“Something that I can use in my workplace from this workshop is to work on communication between the supervisor and the owner and we need to give all the tools necessary to achieve good results of quality.” – Participant

An Investment in the Minds of Future Leaders

The agricultural workforce is expanding to include many cultures and diverse languages. Cornell Agricultural Workforce Development is a leading provider of training and development for leaders, managers, and supervisors in the industry. This two-day workshop was taught completely in Spanish and focused on employee management skills, a major addition to the technical skill training that is more frequently offered in Spanish. Nineteen supervisors and potential supervisors learned how to mentally engage and take a more team-centered approach to leadership. Participants were challenged in re-thinking some of their communication techniques especially when it came to conflict resolution. Exercises were offered in how to overcome biases when it comes to new hires and how to lead multi-cultural groups in the ever-changing agricultural world. Participants also self-evaluated their leadership style and then discovered how they can retain and build relationships within their current workforce. The two-day session was finalized with a celebratory ceremony of completion in the six-course program leading toward a certificate in Agricultural Supervisory Leadership from Cornell.

Many farm owners understand that investments into the minds of future leaders is priceless. There are very minimal resources offered in the industry to help Hispanic employees advance as leaders. This training was specific to agriculture and used real-life examples with practical solutions to day-to-day leadership issues. The course was taught in participants’ native language to encourage dialog and dig deeper into thorny topics. One participant offered this feedback about the course: “I learned that communication is important and that we should have a love towards the business we belong to.” Cornell Agricultural Workforce Development is focused on helping farmers and agribusiness professionals develop committed and effective teams. This two-day course was designed to be engaging and rewarding for the Spanish-speaking workforce so that these managers can learn to apply the best human resource management practices.

In the near future, Cornell Agricultural Workforce Development plans on launching this course in Spanish online for even more participants to access. These future classes will fill up fast. To stay updated on this information, please subscribe to Ag Workforce Journal: https://agworkforce.cals.cornell.edu/

Cornell Agricultural Workforce Development – Developing the people who feed our local families and the world.

We exist to: Increase farm employer understanding and compliance with regulations, Develop leadership and supervisory skills of farm managers at all levels, Identify and Train the future farm workforce and Instill a culture of learning, continuous improvement, and employee engagement in farm businesses.

https://agworkforce.cals.cornell.edu/