The most difficult decisions in a business are often the ones made least often—strategic investments, new ventures, partnerships, or major directional shifts. They carry high stakes and uncertain outcomes, and managers are flooded with data, inputs, and expectations, making it hard to know what truly matters. Great managers don’t eliminate that chaos—they create clarity that allows them to act with confidence.
For pork producers, that chaos is familiar: feed budgets that don’t pencil, health data pointing in different directions, labor challenges, and market signals that shift weekly. All arrive at once, demanding attention and decisions. The best managers cut through the noise, turning uncertainty into insight and action.
Seasoned managers often rely on intuition—gut instinct shaped by experience—for these infrequent decisions. That intuition is built over years of seeing what works and recognizing patterns. Instead of analyzing every data point from scratch, they lean on rules earned the hard way.
Intuition works best for routine decisions. Managers follow these internal rules, often without thinking, when circumstances remain stable. The result: confidence and efficiency. A clear example is crop insurance. Many farmers buy the same Federal policies year after year, relying on past decisions. When conditions are similar, the choice is straightforward—and clarity comes easily.
Over time, though, new options appear. Higher coverage, lower subsidies, or private insurance products can change the game. Suddenly, old rules no longer apply. These decisions require fresh data, careful comparison, and judgment under uncertainty. Slower, more complex—but necessary—to restore clarity as conditions evolve. The same pattern exists in pork production. Routine choices—feed programs, vaccination timing, pig flow—often rely on experience. But when systems, health challenges, or economics shift, those same decisions demand fresh data and a willingness to rethink old assumptions.
When Every Decision Feels Big
So how do you build clarity when experience hasn’t caught up yet? For new managers, nearly every decision feels like a major one. Without established rules, the steady stream of data and uncertainty can feel overwhelming. Every choice matters, and the chaos is real. To compensate, they spend more time analyzing information and lean on advisors for guidance.
This explains why transitioning decision-making responsibility can be tricky. Experienced managers move quickly using proven rules, while new managers need time, structure, and permission to learn. Mistakes happen—and that’s okay. Each decision is a chance to learn and build long-term clarity.
Assigning a major decision to a new manager can even be valuable. Without intuition to rely on, they are more likely to focus on disciplined analysis. For example, when evaluating a new barn, relevant inputs might include construction costs, planned throughput, operating expenses, financing schedules, payback timelines, and comparable rental rates.
New managers should identify the variables that truly influence outcomes, gather representative data, and build a way to pressure-test the numbers before committing. Step one: understand historical results. Step two: use that insight to evaluate future scenarios. This process turns raw information into understanding—and chaos into clarity. As you consider expanding operations, building facilities, buying land, investing in vertical integration, or diversifying, resist relying solely on old rules. Conditions change, and new options demand fresh thinking.
If your organization lacks someone skilled in spreadsheets or AI-based decision tools, don’t worry—but don’t go it alone. Great managers know when clarity requires new capabilities. That might mean challenging a young leader to sharpen their skills or partnering with a trusted professional. Often, the cost of a wrong decision far outweighs the investment in expertise to make the right one.
