A Moment with Matt: Give Yourself a Christmas Gift

By Matt Woolfolk

Christmas time is quickly approaching us and I hope that you and your family get a chance to relax during this time of the year. Between the shopping, parties and all the other chaos of December, I think the time leading up to Christmas can be pretty overwhelming!

If you remember from last year, my way of relaxing during the Christmas season is to watch “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation”. The tale of the Griswold’s wacky Christmas adventures keeps me laughing and reminds me that I have it pretty easy compared to Clark Griswold and his family!

Believe it or not, there are some lessons that can be taken from this movie. Clark is one of those folks who overdoes Christmas decorating, spending hours putting 25,000 imported Italian twinkle lights all over his house. He’s proud of his work and gathers his whole family in the front yard for the lighting of the house. When he plugs in the lights, nothing happens. After a few more failed attempts, Clark throws a tantrum and eventually punches a plastic Santa Claus and abuses his eight reindeer. In one last desperate effort to make his hard work pay off, he slams his two extension cords together and his lights miraculously start working. Clark is amazed that his anger paid off, but what he doesn’t know is that his wife turned on the switch in the garage that was preventing his lights from working all along! The lesson here is two-fold: 1. Work smarter, not harder and 2. Getting mad doesn’t really fix the problem.

As Beefmaster breeders, the best gift you can give to your operation this Christmas season is to find ways to work smarter, instead of working harder. I’m sure there are tasks around your ranch that make you say “there’s got to be a better way of doing this!” In between the Christmas presents and watching your favorite team in their bowl game, take some time to evaluate what you can do better. If you aren’t satisfied with your working facilities, look at how you can make them better. If there are traits that you want to make improvements on within your herd, study up on bulls you can use in an AI program to improve those traits. If you or your spouse are frustrated with registering your calf crop and entering your performance data, consider enrolling in the new BBU Pro Services program to get help with your data entry, as well as improving herd management.

In any operation, there is always something that can be done better. Make it your gift to yourself to find something within your own herd and “work smarter” to improve upon it. Improving the efficiency of your operation will free up more time to spend with family and friends during the Christmas season, enjoying the holiday season and hopefully a nice steak in the middle of your plate! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all!