Thrive! Your Personal and Agribusiness Check-Up Guide

Mother Nature never stops moving forward and as the owner of an agribusiness, there are constant demands on your time, too. That’s why it’s common to put physical and mental well-being on the back burner. If you can’t tackle each day with focus and energy, your business may suffer because you’re not able to provide enough attention to key areas like your agricultural business planning, financials, operational efficiencies, and customer care.

Whether you're juggling family responsibilities along with your business or you’re a solo entrepreneur working hard to get ahead, this guide will help you prioritize your personal and business health with simple-but-effective check-ups. By completing these regularly, you will create a strong and sustainable health foundation so that you and your business thrive.

Personal health check-up

Do a quick check-up of your personal health. How are you feeling, physically and emotionally? Your business can only be as strong as the energy and focus that you can give to it, so prioritizing your physical and mental health has to be part of your routine.

Physical well-being

Your physical health impacts everything from your energy levels to your decision-making ability–and those have a direct impact on your business’s success. Create a wellness routine that fits with your busy schedule by taking these simple-yet-effective steps:

• Schedule check-ups with your doctor, dentist, and vision-care specialist at the start of each year, then treat them as non-negotiable. If you don’t have health insurance, see if you can find clinics through nearby universities, medical schools, or hospitals that may offer low-cost care as part of their teaching practices.


• Eat well and drink lots of water—adding fresh fruits or herbs makes staying hydrated more appealing. As an agribusiness owner, you know the value of proper nourishment, so be sure to have some yourself every day.


• Include simple activities like walking, doing 10 minutes of yoga, or some strength training a few times each week. This will make a big difference in your physical strength over time. 


• Set a consistent bedtime and create a wind-down routine, too. A few minutes of reading, meditation, or nourishing your spiritual side can improve sleep quality.

Mental health and stress management

Running a business can be overwhelming and when challenges pile up, stress levels can climb. As with your physical health, there are steps you can take before stress gets the better of you:


• Talk to peers who face challenges like yours, whether that means other people in your industry or small business owners in your region. Sharing challenges opens you up to new solutions and resources while also helping to relieve stress. You can find people to connect with (outside of family and friends) by joining local business organizations or online communities of entrepreneurs.


• If you find that pressures from work and/or personal challenges are having a negative impact on your life and your ability to run your business, consider meeting with a mental-health specialist, therapist, or other counselor. Many offer flexible scheduling and virtual sessions to accommodate busy agribusiness owners. Consider inquiring about family consulting services from NY Farm Net, an organization that specializes in working with farming-related issues.


• Take small breaks to catch your breath and remember the things you love most about your business, your life, and your positive impact on your community. This can help to reset your mind and reduce stress.

Work-life integration

Although there’s a lot of talk in the news and entrepreneurial circles about “work/life balance,” in reality, there’s no such thing as the perfect mix. Instead of trying for something that’s hard to achieve, aim for “effective prioritization,” in which you prioritize the things and people that are most important to your well-being and bring you joy:


• Schedule time for family and friends and make it as important as work obligations.


• Make activities that energize you a part of your regular routine, such as crafting, walking, or reading. Even just an hour a week will fuel passion and creativity while giving your mind and body a break.


• Before saying yes to a new commitment, wait 24 hours to ensure that it’s a priority.

As you try to integrate this personal health check-up into your life, remember, this isn’t about achieving perfection: It’s about improving through small, consistent steps.

Business health check-up

Do a quick check-up of your business’s health. How is it doing financially? Do you have a good sense of what you can control and how to optimize those things for success? Are you staying in touch with customers and vendors? Regular business checkups are crucial. They help you spot issues before they become bigger problems, while also highlighting ways to grow or increase profitability.

Financial health

A thriving business starts with a strong financial foundation. To strengthen yours, implement these tips:


• Just as you need to schedule annual checkups with your doctors, schedule annual meetings with your accountant, attorney, business advisor, and banker and/or lender. This way, you can discuss plans for new hires, new equipment, or new markets and get professional insight that can benefit your business before you move forward. For example, your accountant can advise on the best time to purchase equipment, while your lender can inform you about potential financing options.


• Open a dedicated business bank account if you haven't already—it makes tax time easier and it helps you track business performance more accurately.


• Create a simple spreadsheet or use accounting software, such as QuickBooks or Xero, to track your cash flow, or money coming in and going out each month. Then, set time aside every week (each Friday, for example) to review and send invoices. Even just 15 minutes of weekly monitoring can prevent financial surprises and help to strengthen your business’s financial base.

Operations and efficiency

Regular process checks can help you prevent problems and spot opportunities to reduce expenses and/or build efficiencies. Try these tips, if they’re relevant to your business, or come up with a few that will help your operation run more smoothly and profitably:

• Hold regular meetings to ensure that your team is informed about your goals. Sharing challenges and successes helps everyone connect to the bigger picture while understanding their own roles in your success.


• Review your workflow each quarter. Whether you need new equipment or simply to reassign responsibilities, these can make a big difference in productivity and profitability.


• Look for tasks you do repeatedly (like sending follow-up emails) and spend an hour researching automation options. Software like Asana and Monday are popular project-management tools and Constant Contact and Mailchimp can automate marketing emails and more. Then, choose one and use it to automate your work and save time.

Customer, vendor, and market health

Great relationships with customers and vendors are essential to the health of your business, too. Give them the attention they deserve:

• Create a simple feedback process to follow up with customers and vendors, such as a quick check-in call every 90 days or a brief email survey sent after each order. SurveyMonkey is an easy tool to help with this.


• Quarterly "touching base" emails or calls to past customers often leads to new business, so make it a habit to check in throughout the year. Do the same with vendors, too, because you otherwise may not know if they have new products or services that can boost your business.


• Spend 20 minutes each week reading agribusiness news to stay on top of market changes and innovations. By doing so, you’re sure to learn about new opportunities or challenges, as well as to create solutions or innovative approaches in advance.

As you gather information and insight from your business check-up, create a written business strategy. Even if it's just bullet points on a page, getting ideas and goals out of your head and in writing helps you maintain focus. Then, set realistic goals for the next three years, breaking them into monthly milestones so they’re manageable and measurable.

Moving forward, review your goals regularly and be willing to adjust them based on new insight or opportunities. This helps you build a thriving business that’s positioned for long-term success.

Every step gets you closer to thriving

The sooner you prioritize your health and that of your business, the more benefits you’ll see, so don’t wait to start. Try implementing one tip a week from each section until you’ve got them all underway. Then, see if there are other areas that need some extra attention on a regular basis and include them in your own tailored personal and business check-ups as you move forward.

If you need financing to achieve your goals, build efficiencies, leverage new market opportunities, or more, HVADC can help. The Agribusiness Loan Fund is designed to help Hudson Valley, NY, agribusinesses to get the funds needed to build a strong and thriving business. Contact us today to learn more.