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We're going behind the scenes to see and understand modern agriculture, because no matter whether you're in it or not, you probably don't know all the pieces to just how incredible, diverse and multi-layered agriculture is. We do this by uncovering the real stories, experiences and voices of modern agriculture.
Oli Le Lievre 0:00
Welcome back to the humans of agriculture podcast. This week I'm sitting down for someone who I had the chance to chatting with. Last year in Tassie, were at the Australian dairy conference. Lucy, you were the backup act or supporting actor Ned Brockman, which was an interesting hour and a half or so at the end of the dairy conference. So it's good to see you again.
Speaker 1 0:17
Yeah, I'm still I'm still dark on you for not bringing me a chalky milk that day, right.
Oli Le Lievre 0:23
Okay, I do want to know, so you could hear and I haven't ever said it publicly. But whatever the chocolate milk we were, we got from establishment. I think it might have been Brewster brothers or something like that, that chocolate milk was actually quite horrible. Yeah, so I think when it comes to, yeah, knits chocolate milk have tried it now. Because it was an idea that he talked about back then. Yeah, it's actually quite good. Have you tried it? No,
Speaker 1 0:45
I haven't tried it yet. I've just seen it on the shelves locally. So I have to give it I'm quite partial to jockey milk. So
Oli Le Lievre 0:50
yeah, okay. It's always an important question. Isn't a chocolate or strawberry
Unknown Speaker 0:56
way? Yeah, yeah, I bought my husband's strawberry. So. Yeah. Which is good. Because there's never any fights right. Well,
Oli Le Lievre 1:03
that's fair. Yeah. But I do get anyone ever takes up those. What even is the yellow flavour of chocolate milk? Oh, of milk. The
Unknown Speaker 1:11
yellow flavour?
Oli Le Lievre 1:13
Strawberry. Oh, yes. Banana.
Speaker 1 1:16
Yeah. Iced coffee is pretty good, too. That'd be my second. Yeah. Second preference. I reckon. Somebody told me once that that outsells Coca Cola in South Australia.
Oli Le Lievre 1:26
Iced coffee. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, there you go. South Australia supporting the dairy industry. Not that we're choosing brands or anything to support it. But next time, when we have the chance to catch up in person, I will buy your chocolate milk, but I'll be very selective of brand for you. Now, Lucy, when when we chatted last year, and I think I was running through your CV and what you've done, and I think what's really cool, what I'm keen to explore with you today is this growing up around agriculture, but not necessarily in it having really having the opportunity to colour choose and pave your own career pathway. And I know that there's no colour linear way to any crew, but for you, it's anything but linear. But when we look at kind of your resume today, and you can correct me if I'm wrong here but Nuffield scholar working full time with Fonterra as a dairy welfare officer. Glad I got that one. Right. You're on the board of Southwest dairies, you are farming alongside your husband. Forgot what your actual profession, you're, you're a vet, there's no longer practising full time. You've done a lot. And you've seen a lot of different areas of the agriculture sector, but definitely in and around dairy. It's been quite a cool career for you. Yeah,
Speaker 1 2:35
I think the one thing that holds it all together is cows. I really love that kind of tagline. Cows create careers, because they really have for me,
Oli Le Lievre 2:43
how on earth did you end up kind of down this path? I am falling in love, like was there a moment that you thought I'd just absolutely adore everything about this? I
Speaker 1 2:53
think it was always a curiosity that I had. So my parents have an agricultural contracting business. So we were on everybody else's farms a lot. But we were just sort of a hobby farm, I suppose you could say subdivided out of a dairy though. So I was really lucky that when I was old enough, those neighbours were happy for me to come down and throw my hand in and have a crack at milking and feeding calves and, and just generally probably being quite annoying. But that kind of encouragement and support really early, I suppose for that curiosity that I had is probably where it all started. Yeah.
Oli Le Lievre 3:26
Did you have interests? Like, did you think as a young, that excitement of being outdoors around the cows doing that kind of? Like, is that what you really kind of foresaw your Korean potentially dying?
Speaker 1 3:38
I remember sort of learning what a vet was, when I was probably maybe 12 or 13. And thinking, like, yeah, maybe like I do really like animals. I was constantly pulling books off the library shelves that were kind of around home farming and self sufficiency. And remember, trental like reading a book, trying to learn how to turn a hide and like just just really kind of, I suppose animal and agricultural based stuff, but probably just didn't have a lot of great places to put that enthusiasm at the time. And yeah, I spent a bit of time working with data on on jobs and, you know, painting weld and rigging up sheds and things and thinking like this is I like being outside. But the cat always be looking over what the cows were doing. Or you know, there would be people working in the yards. And I always thought that was kind of where the excitement was. And yeah, I was just really lucky that I had an opportunity with the neighbours in Derry early on, loved it. Did you
Oli Le Lievre 4:33
have quite the opportunity live with your parents being able to go and look at different farms and different operations and go Well, that one looks good. And that one looks average colour across the board?
Speaker 1 4:43
No, not so much. I think we're just yeah, we're really lucky that we're part of a great community and just based in Gippsland, and everybody there's, yeah, I guess friends as much as clients, which was really nice.
Oli Le Lievre 4:55
At what stage did you decide that? That was what you wanted to be?
Speaker 1 4:59
I think once I learned what they were, and that they did more than dogs and cats. Yeah, I think I remember being out on fire one day and said there was a vet kind of called out and thinking like, oh my gosh, I didn't even know that was a thing. That was probably the start of it. And again, we were really fortunate that there was some people in our local community who ended up paying family, friends and mentors during a couple of different stages of my journey. Again, were really supportive and encouraging there to probably didn't quite realise the grades I'd need at that point in time.
Oli Le Lievre 5:30
How old were you at this stage?
Speaker 1 5:32
Yeah, I reckon I must have been 12 or 13. Yeah, very young. Yeah, young enough, young enough to be impressionable, without, I guess, understanding the realities of what I was choosing to say I want it to be.
Oli Le Lievre 5:44
And I know like when you chat to so many kids, that they have that dream of being of it. And then it really is the grades which kind of pull you away from it was the thing, which meant that I was never ever going to become a vet. Basically, I was looking at different options. And even the at the lower entry scores, I still wasn't able to get them. So that wasn't a career pathway. But it's a really interesting profession in the sense of it. And I've chatted to a couple of vets because there's some real challenges in the industry, but you're looking for highly academic people. But then on the other end, you're actually looking for highly practical people.
Speaker 1 6:17
Yeah, I suppose. Yeah, I was, I was fortunate enough to do pretty well at school and have a really supportive home environment when it came to my academics. But I saw it as a way to be on farm and working with animals, cattle, specifically, that meant that I didn't have the challenges of farm ownership, I could hang out with farmers all day, really. And just, you know, animal based capacity. So it just seemed like a good fit. Yeah. And I didn't have Yeah, didn't have a clear kind of family farm pathway to follow. So sort of seem like a natural fit.
Oli Le Lievre 6:52
Yeah, we'll talk about maybe the vet stuff in a second, a little bit more. But you also mentioned about having mentors, and those people around today just kind of will just happen through osmosis being around different family, friends and Nicalis and curiosity, before being curious enough to ask questions about how stuff works and why things happen.
Speaker 1 7:11
Yeah, I mean, I'd say curious, they might say annoying. And, look, a lot of them had children that were sort of similar ages to me. So you'd sort of be hanging around with their kids or, you know, mucking around with their kids and kind of get exposed to what their parents and families were a part of what that was farming or that or so I guess just that kind of added exposure and being able to ask questions, but definitely always felt encouraged. And people were always happy to answer questions that I had, however naive they might have been.
Oli Le Lievre 7:45
One of our family friends always talks about, like, Oh, you're the kid that there's someone cutting down a tree one day, and so I grew up in in the suburbs of Sydney, someone cutting down a tree, a few doors down, and I can still remember that I walked up the driveway to the tree loppers, and was just like, annoying them. I was not quite in the way but I was definitely in their ear enough to be in the way and annoying, but I think it's like that natural curiosity. It's how you really do learn, isn't it? Yeah,
Speaker 1 8:08
definitely. Yeah. And it's funny because at the time, I probably never questioned my like, right to have that opportunity to both ask questions. But I just I was probably young and naive enough to think, Well, if that's the pathway that I want to follow, then great. And my family never made me feel anything other than I could have whatever opportunities I wanted to chase obviously had to work quite hard for them. But it was pretty idyllic, really. Just chase those dreams. If
Oli Le Lievre 8:36
to summarise probably your how you actually got to being a vet, to use two words would be like dogged determination, like it was that you knew where you wanted to get to. And it wasn't just a call as you here's the opportunity, you're in the course bang, you really had to work out. Can you just maybe for some of the younger people who have never, I guess, have that dream or aspiration. But what did that path actually look like for you?
Speaker 1 9:01
Yeah, so whilst I did do pretty well, academically at high school, I missed out on a direct entry pathway into that by a couple of points through my final year of high school, which was crashing at the time, but I wasn't discouraged because it was sort of at the time where other pathways were becoming available. So you could go and do an undergraduate degree and then through postgraduate. So that's what I decided to do. So I studied science and major choice to major in agriculture, which turned out to be the best thing I could have done because I loved it so much. I got the grades to them get into that, ironically, graduated with a heap of awesome opportunities, but probably in agriculture, but probably couldn't see the forest for the trees by that point. And I was pretty fixated on getting into that. So yeah, I backdoored it, I suppose is the best way to describe it. Got him in through roundabouts. But certainly, having done a degree that I enjoyed made all the difference to those marks.
Oli Le Lievre 9:59
Here Three years did it take after school to actually be able to then enter? I guess your first year of it?
Speaker 1 10:05
Yeah. So it was a three year undergraduate degree through Melbourne Uni. And then yeah, four year post grad degree.
Oli Le Lievre 10:11
Oh my god. It's a lot of study.
Speaker 1 10:14
It's a lot of hex. I wouldn't, I wouldn't change it. I had, yeah, I had sort of a few different options and things come up along the way. And then every time it's really big decisions, and that's where those mentors can play a massive role in in kind of giving you the support and guidance that you need to define those decisions. So yeah, I wouldn't change that the way that I got in, I think I was probably a bit more mature for having those couple of years and honestly, the friendships from my, both my agricultural degree and my, my vet degree, but certainly that that first three years, some of them are lifelong friends now and wouldn't have them if I hadn't done that degree. So did you
Oli Le Lievre 10:51
ever think of taking a pause, like during the degree or taking some time out or maybe even exiting?
Speaker 1 10:57
No, I did struggle, the first few years of the vet degree are really academically challenging and not very practical. And I'm probably more of a hands like practical based hands on learner. So I did really struggle and my grades were were pretty average. For those first two years. It wasn't until we started to get into the more practical base stuff that I that I really kind of hit my straps. I also struggled with living in Melbourne for that long, it had been quite a bit of time. By that point. I was fortunate actually my final year of my science degree, I was living on campus at Dookie the farm campus there with a really small cohort. And so I love that and then I'd probably going back to Melbourne and jumping straight into the vet degree. I did struggle for those first two years. So it's certainly not all rainbows and unicorns, but I don't I think that's probably where the the word dog does apply. I don't think giving up ever crossed my mind, it was probably more a case of like, are they gonna kick me out?
Oli Le Lievre 11:55
Am I gonna make it? And here we are to tell the tale. Yeah. And
Speaker 1 12:00
honestly, the grades don't matter. Once you get out,
Oli Le Lievre 12:03
as long as you're learning the practical side of things and who to ask is probably more important. Yeah,
Speaker 1 12:07
there's a lot of other stuff that matters a lot more. I mean, that's my experience and my pathway. It's certainly quite different if you want to pursue some of the more intense specialties and overseas type programmes and things like that. But yeah, certainly for what I wanted to do, the grades weren't important.
Oli Le Lievre 12:22
So you knew you wanted to be a vet? Did you know what kind of vet you wanted to do? Like, did you have the idea of what was sitting on the other side?
Speaker 1 12:28
Yeah, yeah, it was always cattle. And dairy specifically, I suppose, got a lot more going on with the sort of cattle side of things from a vet point of view. So there's, you know, a lot more day to day involvement with nutrition, reproduction, milk quality, etc, compared to sort of beef operations. So it's probably where I guess for lack of a better word, the excitement tends to be from a bid point of view. So that was always my focus. Yeah, from literally a week, I was like, how do I join the bovine appreciation group? What are the best placements? Like, where am I going? Which Who do I need to know here? Yeah, cattle all the way? How did
Oli Le Lievre 13:04
you come up with those different opportunities? Was it through the university? Or did you look back at some of those networks and people that you had developed through living in Gippsland. To do some of those private placements in a bit
Speaker 1 13:15
of both, I was also a bit strategic Ollie, I had the option of a couple of choices of university to do my vet degree. And some of those other options had a more agricultural slash livestock focus, they were known for it, but the degree was longer. And I sort of felt like the one of 60 to 100 kids who are all interested in cattle. Whereas strategically Melbourne for me meant a slightly closer to home. The I was probably more likely as the only kind of university in Victoria that offers a vet degree. And being interested in cattle was probably more likely to get those opportunities because statistically, that was probably less likely to be as many people in the degree interested in cattle. So I sort of thought I was pretty strategic about my decision. Yeah, to go to Melbourne. Just who do I need to talk to? What placements do I need to do to get those opportunities and like their farm placements initially, it also took the opportunity to do some really fun one. So I worked on a boat in Sorento for a couple of weeks. It does dolphin swims. So it wasn't I wasn't I wasn't entirely focused. I did some pretty cool other stuff. I did a few other kinds of things just to build some exposure. But I knew pretty early on which placements I needed to do to make sure I was meeting the right people and getting the right opportunities to end up where I wanted
Oli Le Lievre 14:36
isn't Not a chance. We're just gonna gloss over the dolphin both what is going on the dolphin swim boat and yeah, what do you do with it?
Speaker 1 14:45
So I mean, initially, they're kind of you have to do different categories of placement. So there's like farm definitely farm placements, and I sort of had them already pretty well ticked off. And I was spending a lot of my school holidays working on farms anyway. And then the type C category was more around like animal shelters, wildlife. And yeah, the type say I was like, Well, this is my opportunity to have a bit of fun. So I slept in the back of my youth in a caravan park for a couple of weeks and walked on the beach every morning and jumped on the boat and catered people out and wetsuits and, you know, took photos and got everyone enthusiastic and made scones and teas and coffees when people cold and got to jump in the water every day with the seals and dolphins, which was amazing. And they were just such a cool crew really ethical in how they operated and collecting a lot of data at the same time around the dolphin and seal populations that they're interacting with daily and feeding that back into wildlife organisations. But also, you know, there was a case of a seal that had been trapped in one day. So we got to kind of report that and follow up on that. And yeah, it was awesome. Love them interested in that too. Paul pero. They're great. And the dolphins, like they knew the boat, they'd come up and say g'day and check out what we were doing and who we had on board for the day. And yeah, it was really cool. drinkin.
Oli Le Lievre 16:04
Going back to your question for Derek and dolphins are curious or annoying?
Speaker 1 16:08
No, I definitely curious. But I mean, I'm now I'm now listening back to what I said earlier about it not being all rainbows and unicorns, and rainbows and dolphins.
Oli Le Lievre 16:18
It sounds pretty good. And the children's farm side of things. So not so much around wildlife monitoring and stuff. What was that? More education focused? Yeah,
Speaker 1 16:28
yeah. And just, it was probably a good exposure for me to some of the more community facing type operations. Also, I remember spending a day chatting cleaning out the chalk Sheridan. I remember the talks had something going on at the time. And it was really good exposure for chickens for eggs if you had a lot to do with them. So yeah, you do some really cool placements. I was fortunate in my final year took to spend a couple of weeks in Arnhem Land working on a programme up there too. So yeah, there's a lot of a lot of intense study. But the the practical stuff is pretty awesome.
Oli Le Lievre 17:03
If you can get through those first two years of study, it sounds like a pretty good to grey. Yeah,
Speaker 1 17:08
I mean, yeah, I did. I went up to Northern Territory and worked on a station for a bit, I was really lucky enough to get a scholarship to go to California in my final year and spend a bit of time over there at one of the universities and work in them pretty hectic, like livestock department. While it was mind blowing, like some of the cows over there. They're they're like racehorses. Once you get through those kind of first couple of years of hard slog, it's, that's where the fun really starts, or I can
Oli Le Lievre 17:37
have you got a favourite memory or like something that as you're talking, you're talking about these different experiences and things. Is there an experience of university life of that actual degree that really stands out colour front and centre? No, I
Speaker 1 17:49
think it's just the feeling you have you're part of a community at a time. That's, you know, you're all in it together. Yes, you're doing different placements. But you're all riding the same roller coaster. I think that's probably just that feeling of being part of a really strong, close knit cohort. And
Oli Le Lievre 18:07
so what was life? Like? Once you got out into the working world? What was that like? And what did you start to see and experience?
Speaker 1 18:13
Amazing, really, like it was a lot, the first, so you graduate, and then there's a period of time where you can't work until your registration comes through, and I lived on a lot of talking milk. And then you get your first paycheck. And that's really exciting. I remember taking a trolley to the supermarket. So the first time and thinking like, Well, I'm a grown up now. It's a lot you go through, you go through a lot of kind of big life stages, I suppose as a graduate, but also the, you're working in a new practice, I was really lucky that I was able to end up in the practice that I wanted to go to in northern Victoria at the time, which was a dairy practice. But you know, you're trying to make friends with all your new clients and get on with all this stuff. And also at the same time, like, why do they keep the syringes again, I don't want to ask anyone for the third time, like there's also just a lot going on your brain and mental loads massive, and everyday is different. And as much as you spend, you know, X number of years at university being exposed to cases, you're still seeing things for the first time, and you're the decision maker for the first time. And you're refining a lot of skills. And so the first three months was pretty intense. And again, that having that kind of peer support group of your cohort that are all going through the same things at the same times and, and things like that was really nice. I remember doing a presentation back to the next year's worth of graduates at the end of my first year. And I titled it living the dream because it really felt like I was yeah, it was everything I hoped it had been would be.
Oli Le Lievre 19:39
Did you have any moments like at a time where you went from this? This is the dream career? I'm I'm living it to going? Wow. Okay. Reality is kind of setting in a bit here. No, I
Speaker 1 19:50
think I've loved every job that I've had. I think I remember getting to I think I was probably two maybe two and a half years out. One of my mentors and experience vets Add to me, Lucy when things start to feel when nothing feels new, when things start to feel easy when you know that you're not getting hard carvings, when you feel like your clinical skills probably aren't progressing, that's when you need to start asking yourself what's next. And it's probably my nature to just do that to kind of constantly be setting goals and looking for the next kind of stimulating learning experience that I can have or the next set of skills that I can gain. So I am highly motivated by learning. So that was a really good piece of advice for me to about two years out to just kind of constantly challenge myself and look for other opportunities, not necessarily other jobs. So then I actually pursued a master's degree at that point in time, which was a dairy residency programme, which should have been three years but COVID COVID put a bit of a challenge on that I actually haven't quite finished it yet. But um, so it was a research and clinical based programme, that felt like kind of a natural next step. And I've had a few friends and colleagues that had gone through the programme and really enjoyed it, and it opened a lot of doors for them. So that's what I chose to, to do.
Oli Le Lievre 21:08
You and I think people talk about kind of lifelong learning and all of that, but you are absolutely kind of the definition of someone who's like the practical side of things, but also continue to challenge yourself in terms of that learning and development and the different pacifiers like, is that something you think part of who you are?
Speaker 1 21:26
Yeah, I don't think it's super unique. I also just don't like being told that I can't do things like, I want to figure out how to do that. I'm sure we'll get to the point where we talk about the fact that I'm now on a farm, but even just watching someone go out and do something on the tractor that I don't know how to do yet I find really frustrating, like, I just want to know how to do it. I'm often quite impatient with the learning process. That's probably my problem. But
Oli Le Lievre 21:49
then very patient as well, in terms of learning the portobello, the tractor thing like that. But learning the theory side of things to then marry that with you experience practically the same. Well, how do you actually get the best outcome as well?
Speaker 1 22:01
Yeah, yeah, I think when you spent the time learning and understanding the why the how and the wise and the doing becomes the satisfying but easy bit.
Oli Le Lievre 22:11
At what stage do you did you decide that you're going to exit being a full time vet?
Speaker 1 22:15
Well, so my master's degree then kind of evolved because I met a farmer, I met a dairy farmer, and I became involved with their family farm. And as a result of that, I then applied for a Nuffield Scholarship, and was fortunate enough to receive one and my topic for for Nuffield was around kind of dairy welfare schemes and programmes and assessments on farm. I was quite interested, having had some clients in in northern Victoria that had participated in a programme like that I'd sort of never heard of it, and was curious to know more. And, again, the more I researched it, the more I realised, actually, there's a big wide world of them out there. And we probably didn't really have an equivalent in Australia. So I was keen to go on explore that. So yeah, I was fortunate enough to be able to complete a Nuffield programme. And then off the back of that I was offered an opportunity. Yeah, with Fonterra milk processor here as their animal health and welfare manager. So I made that it was a really difficult decision. It took me about six months to make that were really patient while I, while I am denial about it, because I guess until that point, like being a dairy that had felt like a huge part of my identity. And I think like this is a really common experience for vets is that you spend so many years studying and kind of fixating and focusing on the end goal, which is getting out into clinical practice. And there's so many more opportunities than that. But it does become a hard thing to let go of. And I don't actually don't think I could have done it if I didn't have our farm and our cows here to still keep my hand in for one of a better phrase. Literally, literally. Yeah, I don't think I could have completely walked away from the cow itself physically, had I not had the farm. So I'm really lucky I now get to have my cow needed to.
Oli Le Lievre 24:12
And how was the Nuffield pay? So you're looking at Dairy welfare, and the different schemes that there weren't globally? What did you learn colour through that process? And, yeah, well, let's talk about that the Nuffield side of things and then we can talk about maybe how it's applied back at home as well.
Speaker 1 24:26
Yeah, I think I'd always known what Nuffield was, again, because of some phenomenal members of our local community growing up who actually gave me my first potty calf, Max and Bob Joba. They were wonderful to my family, and really good role models and probably a reminder, a constant reminder for me that you can think like they probably wouldn't have reflected and thought that they had played any massive role in my life. But it was super influential for me and Max was a Nuffield scholar, and very well respected in both our local community and the broader Every industry. And so I'd always grown up knowing what a Nuffield scholar and scholarship was, but had never really thought that I would have the opportunity to do one because I sort of didn't really identify as a farmer at that point. And yeah, I suppose I then all of a sudden realised that I did actually have this question. And it did apply to both our our farm that I was now involved with, and, and also the broader industry. So I just kind of thought I'd have a crack.
Oli Le Lievre 25:29
And have you been able to apply that into the role of Fonterra? Was this a role that existed for them? Or was it something that was a new role? No,
Speaker 1 25:35
no, it was a new role for Fonterra Australia. Yeah, so COVID made it a bit challenging, but I was really fortunate that the Nuffield board made the decision to sort of postpone or, or extend our our scholarships so that we could still have the travel experience that's involved with that scholarship, because it was really important for a lot of us and for our topics. There's only so much a zoom interview can tell you, particularly when you're talking about things like welfare, where you kind of need to see the cows to understand, you know, is the programme working? Is the farmer genuinely happy with the programme and things like that. So yeah, a couple of years of travel and, and the report and during that time, I had kind of interacted with the woman who ended up recruiting me to Fonterra through some different industry forums that I had contributed to. So their job was a direct result of my Nuffield, and it didn't exist beforehand. So yeah, pretty lucky. I've been there 18 months now, I think. And it's just a whole different side to the dairy industry that I had never really considered I'd, I'd considered my day successful if the cow was alive and the milk left, the farm gate had never really thought about what happens to milk post farm gate. So it's been another huge learning curve, both from the point of view of another side of the dairy industry that I knew nothing about, but also just the skills required for this job compared to I'm very, very confident stitching stitching an animal out but um, organising a calendar meeting over teams as a whole was a whole new skill set that I didn't have.
Oli Le Lievre 27:06
When you look at, I guess, the potential careers in the dairy industry and what like or and let's just say agriculture more broadly. But as I guess, society's expectations change like this, this welfare piece really coming front and centre creates new jobs and opportunities. How excited are you about what potentially your career could look like into the future as the needs of the industry changed as well?
Speaker 1 27:26
Yeah, so awesome. It's really exciting, I think, not just for my role, but for so many of the roles in dairy technology and developments and jobs that didn't exist five or 10 years ago, are now super important to what we're doing day to day on the farm. I mean, you look at things like the activity metres and collars that are being used on dairy farms in Australia at the moment and around the world. Yeah, the adoption of technology is a massive one for the industry. And that's changing what the job looks like. And the way we work constantly. So huge opportunities. I'm constantly out there, like, what am I going to? What can we innovate? What does what does the industry need? I'm sure you know, in another five years, you'll be talking to someone and their job won't have existed. Now. So it's it's really dynamic, and it's changing really quickly. And I think that's probably one of the brilliant things about the dairy sector is that we are really open to change and adopting new things as they come along. Whether that's, you know, improved monitoring that has, you know, production benefits or better welfare outcomes, etc. Yeah, yeah, it's a really agile space to be in.
Oli Le Lievre 28:33
And I presume the different hats you wear in terms of the board side of things, the vet side of things that you still actively involved in the farmer at home. And then from the welfare point of view, like you must be just seeing things all the time and have these like, houses, having the 750 cows at home benefited you, but also maybe challenged you as well, in terms of seeing all these other things, and then bring it back down to what you guys can do at home.
Speaker 1 29:00
At the start, I probably thought of it as a disadvantage, I remember talking to Fonterra, and saying, like, gosh, it's going to be really difficult for me to take my farmer hat off for this role, and I need to, and I reckon maybe six or 12 months and I realise it's actually an opportunity or a benefit for both sides, I can come back to the farm and and think about, you know, the things that we're talking about in an industry level or at a meal processor level and think or how does that play out for the farmer? How do we make sure that that lands the way we want it to, and then equally I can go in into an industry meeting and have a really good understanding of how that plays out. So I think where I've got to now is I don't try and take any of the hats off and put them on anymore. I sort of used to feel like I really needed to silo all my opinions or perspectives and now I've realised that there's more benefit to kind of having all of those different inputs play out. And yeah, certainly certainly back on the farm, it's it's really cool to be able to kind of walk some of the talk as well. That does don't always play out as nicely as or as ideal as I do like, because I probably make it sound. There's definitely been times when we've had arguments because I've wanted to do something a certain way. And I've been told it's not the practicalities or the realities of how we shouldn't be doing things, or it's much less efficient. So it's been a learning curve for me as well to balance that kind of, I suppose, textbook or idealistic idea of how things should be done with the realities that that happen on phone, when
Oli Le Lievre 30:28
you can have the best planned out plan. And then something comes out of the top and back to that experience and wisdom that comes from others.
Speaker 1 30:35
Yeah, so much of it comes down to respect and communication, though I think
Oli Le Lievre 30:40
the message is delivered. Yeah.
Speaker 1 30:42
I think my in laws probably had a few drawer drop moments initially, when I started working on the farm, like, what is this all about? But they've been, they've been wonderful, everybody. Everybody's really embraced my involvement, so better.
Oli Le Lievre 31:02
To me on that, because, like marrying into the family farm, still having these active interests that then actually only say, wearing the farmer hat into an industry role, how have you overcome, like, stepping into these different waters? And yeah, well, I know, like, from when we've talked previously, feeling out of depth, but also knowing that you've got really valuable contributions to give as well.
Speaker 1 31:24
Yeah, it's a tricky one. I don't know if I will completely overcome it. To be honest, Elliot's probably just a constant. It's just that remaining sort of open minded and learning attitude, I suppose that I'm trying to take with it all. But certainly, it's a really overused term. But the imposter syndrome was real. Especially once I left clinical practice, I was sort of like, well, I don't really identify as a vet anymore. And I'm only really a part time farmer and sort of what am I? Who am I anymore? But what is when you introduce yourself, what do I what am I saying? Yeah, I guess it came back to that kind of multiple hats thing again, I realised, well, I'm just Lucy, and I'm a bunch of stuff. And why do I have to have one specific title? It doesn't mean that I don't have things to say, or contributions that I want to make. So yeah, it's tricky. I suppose from the operational perspective on the farm, we try and use my skills strategically. So, you know, whilst I'd like to be able to learn how to use a baler, or, or do something that I don't know how to do currently, there's a lot of stuff that I can already do that, that we try and make sure we utilise. So, particularly are obviously around cows.
Oli Le Lievre 32:34
I kind of love that you dislike it, I'm losing. This is kind of what I do. And yeah, the different roles, I think if we look at it, like in terms of responsibility, you're you're a director, you're a farmer, you're a vet, you're an animal welfare officer, like there are these hugely different things you do. But then also like that sphere of influence that you have, and how the industry and how the farms benefit, as well as where you're getting the ideas from and the conversations you're having, but also to them how especially say through the animal welfare lens, and the director role, how's that actually then flowing back into tangible change within the industry as well, like the impact you're having? would be and is huge?
Speaker 1 33:11
Yeah, I don't know. It's not it's certainly not, I don't think it's down to one individual. It's probably just a lot of us trying to make every day better than the last for both the roles that we play off farm, and in drone drone industry sort of level, but also, operationally what we do on farm. I think that's it. That's everyone know, Holly, and I think that matters, whether you're a full time farmer or full time that I think most people will just want to try and make the world a bit better than they found it. For
Oli Le Lievre 33:38
sure. Why are you going to stay involved in agricultural and I guess, the dairy industry going forward? What's making you passionate about it?
Speaker 1 33:45
I mean, I love how dynamic it is. There's so many, like, we've already talked about the different kinds of roles and opportunities and changes that are happening and within the industry. That I feel like I was always one of those people that had kind of a five year plan of what was my next kind of career outcome. And now I sort of almost feel like I'm at the point where I will I don't really know what's next. Because like it's developing so quickly, particularly in the animal health and welfare space, the landscape is changing. We've got societal expectations that are really important to, to hear and understand when it comes to dairy farming, and how do we kind of approach those conversations and implement the changes that we need to on farm? So and that's where I'm, I'm really lucky. And I really love that I do have kind of that farm involvement as well to not just have these kind of high level strategic conversations around where does the industry need to go or what we need to be thinking about, but also, what are we doing on our farm about it? The Nuffield programme really exposed me to a lot of that from an overseas perspective as well.
Oli Le Lievre 34:48
And so in the next little while, you've got the masters to tick off. Don't worry about that so much. But we thought you've done it. I guess that's over a short period of time. I know it's it's not like it really has been, I guess your life Today, but if you had the chance to talk to younger losers out there who are thinking about careers and what's out, there might be your advice, probably
Speaker 1 35:09
stay true to the bits that you enjoy, because they're where you'll do well, which for me has always been cows, and dairy farming. And don't necessarily say yes to things just because you think you should, or because you think it's the right thing to do. As much as I wouldn't change the pathway that I've had, I think I could have been equally as happy having graduated my agriculture degree and ending up in possibly a very similar situation, working with cattle and enjoying being on a dairy farm, and not having the extra stress and extent. But for me the pathway like I've stayed true to what I've enjoyed, which is cattle, but it's probably just that other societal expectations that sometimes play into the decisions that you make, that I'd probably advise myself to ignore a bit more. Yeah.
Oli Le Lievre 35:57
It's that it's the noise is probably the best way to describe it, isn't it? You get caught up in thinking what others are perceiving or others are saying it's literally just know it.
Speaker 1 36:07
Yeah, yeah. Right. And the same, you know, you sort of talked earlier about maybe not letting yourself really thoroughly enjoy something. Yeah, just be authentic. Still figuring out what that looks like for me, but certainly Kaz is the centre of it. So
Oli Le Lievre 36:22
thank you so much, Lucy, for taking the time out. I think your story is so interesting. And there'll be something in here for everyone that they can relate to, as well. And I think it's so interesting, the career journey you've taken, how it's kind of really started and been heavily in and around the dairy industry, but it's kind of reflective of just the opportunities in agriculture kind of more broadly, as well. So thank you. Thank
Speaker 1 36:43
you. I think, for me, it's just been a constant growth and learning curve. And I'm really grateful for the opportunities that I've had through the dairy industry and their support and mentorship and encouragement from everyone who's been influential on my pathway today.
Oli Le Lievre 36:57
Thank you
Transcribed by https://otter.ai