Federated Farmers: Team culture

One staff house on Bluff Station was shifted metres off its foundations by the intensity of the November earthquake.

" If we can get through the next period we will be stronger for the challenge. We get to invest in our business and our staff are pulling together," says High Country farmer Hamish Murray. He is bullish as he outlines his future vision for the quake-affected Bluff Station.

This sprawling High Country station spans 13,800 hectares, including 135 subdivided paddocks. The damage from last November's earthquake is clearly visible to anyone viewing the paddocks and hills behind the homestead.

Then there's the damaged staff house where online images went viral around the world, depicting the intensity and sheer rage of seismic activity which descended on the house, shunting it off its foundation by several metres.

We are so lucky to have staff who are resilient, positive and working together.

The other staff homes were so badly damaged they also need to be rebuilt.

Inland, the extent of damage is keeping five regular staff and a fencing team from Agstaff busy. Being a large expanse, it could take years to repair all the fencing and reopen access tracks.

In the aftermath of the quake, Hamish looked internally for resolve and support while employing the usual stoic outlook which High Country farmers are renowned for.

"We didn't have any great expectations around someone coming to help us. Anything we have received we are especially grateful for," he said.

He contacted Auckland based Corene Walker, a leadership mentor, and followed up with sessions with staff around team morale and building resilience.

"Team culture is something we wanted to promote and build and Corene is helping us with that. This period coming up is risky in terms of how people are coping and dealing with things, and we need to keep positive," he said.

Hamish's father Chid said, "We are so lucky to have staff who are resilient, positive and working together. Morale is good. They are quite frankly amazing after what they've come through and dealing with now."

At the moment staff had taken up residence in an old shed that withstood the earthquake. Nicknamed "Hotel California", facilities were limited with essentials like beds, a table and an indoor fire for comfort.

Agstaff volunteers were generally from non-farming backgrounds and included university students and disillusioned urbanites seeking a new challenge and lifestyle. They are rotated on a two to three-day basis.

"Some of the helpers aren't particularly skilled but we can appoint a skilled supervisor to work with them who knows how our system works. So if we can get everyone even 50 per cent more efficient then that's great," Hamish said.

Keeping the production cycle ticking over was foremost now. Any drop in performance would impact on the business and have consequences in terms of the rebuild timeframe.
Ten per cent fewer lambs, for example, would have implications.

"It takes time to recover to find a system that works, knowing what resources are available. How you co-ordinate those means we can start planning more efficiently. I'm sure when we look back good things will have come from this situation," said Hamish.