Cotton growers 'burnt out' due to staffing shortages

According to research conducted by the CRDC-funded SHIFT Project, 50 per cent of cotton growers have had an issue attracting staff and 30pc said they have an issue retaining staff.

Only 51 per cent of growers say they can easily hire others with the skills to operate or maintain automated machinery and that it's difficult to get the staff needed for the farm to be its most productive.

This workplace climate has been labelled "a recipe for burnout" for growers.

The research found that two in five growers spend more time working than they want to.

One in three growers are not getting the amount of sleep they want to.

Three in five growers are spending less time with family and friends than they want to.

Half of all growers are spending less time exercising than they want to.

Shift Project lead Nicola McDonald has been having conversations with growers over their kitchen tables across Queensland.

She said growers reported recruitment being harder than ever before.

"Gone are the days where you can put a job advertisement in the paper and you get more than double the number of possible takers who could do the work. The talent pool is a bit thinner out there now," she said.

"Growers are saying that as a consequence, new team members may not have that heritage links to agriculture and are greener than they've ever been.

"They don't necessarily have all of those non-technical skills that kids who grew up on farms have, so that really great situational awareness around the farm work environment in terms of what to pay attention to, how you communicate with an agronomist, and how you ask questions or problem solve."

Ms McDonald said employees were no longer only looking at salary packaging.

"People are looking for more than money from work."

She said they'd found having a value proposition was really important to potential employees.

"Your enterprise value proposition helps you get clear about who you are, what your enterprise is about and what you can offer a potential employee.

"What are those extra things that you do in your workplace that make it a great team to work with?

"How do you offer people opportunities to grow their career in your business?

"How do you connect them into a community beyond your farm so they feel like they're a part of something bigger than themselves?"

She said a quick solution for getting that information out there was to build an online presence through social media, something that may also help your business stand out if advertising a job.

"Have that social media presence, even if it's just on Facebook, throw up a couple of photos of the environment so it's not such a mystery for people.

"The more you can remove the mystery, the more people can see that it's something they might want to be a part of.

"We've found it doesn't have to be super polished. In fact, the more raw it is, the more authentic it is, the more it can appeal to people.

"Growers are doing good things but they need to learn to talk about it more."

In terms of avoiding burn out, the researchers really wanted to emphasise the importance of proactively managing energy levels, as reaching a state of burn out took a lot of time to recover from.

Ms McDonald said it started with how proactively growers were managing their own working lives.

As part of the research, Emerald cotton growers Renee Anderson and Aaron Kiely were interviewed for their strategies for preventing burn out.

They indicated it was important to protect your energy by managing commitments and learn to say "no" when necessary.

Spending quality time with family to recharge was vital to bringing about a sense of purpose to your work.

They said it was important to take moments to appreciate nature and prioritise activities that energised, rather than diminished you.

Staying connected with friends for support and maintain healthy habits like eating well, exercising regularly, reducing alcohol intake, and taking short breaks or annual holidays was another piece of the puzzle.

The SHIFT project plans to deliver extension programs to help growers understand how they can address these workforce challenges through online workshops, podcasts, and guidelines available at their website.