Dad's wisdom with Mike Paulson

Mike

Paulson: We were talking about, you know, Dad's wisdom and so forth, and I was sharing with Chris here that when my dad was passing away at his home, he had hospice involved, and so I'd go down almost every night and kind of visit with him and Mom.

And the last, I don't know, 3, 4 nights before Dad passed, I was sitting next to his bed there holding his hand and kind of visiting, and when I Got ready to leave, I kissed Dad on the forehead and I said, "Dad, thanks for the wonderful memories." And even though his eyes never opened up, he just, he just quipped back and he said, "We did the best we could." And on my ride home that evening, I live about 6 miles north of here, and on that ride home I felt like a cloud had lifted off my shoulders because I've been one of these that You think, well, when you were raising the kids, you did the right thing or wrong thing, and you should have done something different. But at the end of the day, Dad was so right to share that with me, that you did the best you could. You and your wife did the best you could with anything you do. And that was the best advice that my dad ever gave me.

And here it was, his last few days of being on this earth, together. And anyway, it was— I was so blessed that he told me that.

Chris

Barron: Welcome everybody to another episode of the Ag View Pitch, and we are getting back into the summertime. We're right around the 15th of July, and we are sitting here in Genoa, Illinois, and we are doing the next Dad's Wisdom, and we're sitting outside here in the porch with with Dad, and Dad's name is Mike Paulsen, and we work with his son Joe, and Mike's got 3 kids, and I'm gonna have Mike introduce himself here in Dad's wisdom, and we're gonna see what kind of wisdom we can pull out of you here today, Mike.

Mike

Paulson: Hi, Chris. Speak up. Okay, yeah, up here in Genoa, Illinois, middle of July, things look pretty good right now. Here about 10 days ago, it was pretty dry, but we've had some timely rains and things are looking better.

Chris

Barron: So tell us a little bit about yourself. So you have 3 kids. Tell us about your kids and tell us about what that looks like and where you're at. And then we're going to get into a little family history and some legacy discussion here.

Mike

Paulson: Okay, we got 3 children. Our oldest is a daughter, in Chicago, married, one child. She works for Lurie Children's Hospital downtown Chicago as a child life specialist and doing really well. And then our second is Joe, who farms with me, and I should say I farm with Joe, and they've been farming together now close to 20 years. And then our youngest is Andrew, and he has his own Axis Seed franchise, corn and soybeans. And, uh, let's see, go just to back up a little bit. Joe, Joe has 2 children, 2 girls, and, uh, then Andy has 2 children, a boy and a girl. And, uh, yeah, they're, they're in Sycamore, Illinois, where Andy has his business. So yeah, doing good.

Chris

Barron: So you're not, you're not only dad, but you're grandpa, right?

Mike

Paulson: Yes. Yeah. Grandpa. Yeah. That's, that's the best part.

Chris

Barron: Yeah. Yeah. So it's good to be grandpa when you can here, right? So talk a little bit about, and you can continue talking about the family, but also we want to go back in time a little bit. Okay, so you're grandpa now, you're dad now, but you had the opportunity to grow up not too far from where we're sitting right now. Tell us a little bit about your family, a little bit of the background and what your early years of farming were like.

Mike

Paulson: Yeah, I was like married to my dad. You know, I was next, I was like attached to his hip all through my childhood and growing up. It was wonderful. And let's see, my great-grandfather was a farmer, my grandfather, my dad. And it was a wonderful place to grow up and very, very fortunate. And so, yeah.

Chris

Barron: So like I said, you know, we're in northern Illinois here with Mike Paulsen. Grew up here. We're starting to get a little sprinkled on out here, so maybe we won't stay out here. But anyway, tell us a little bit about the family history, kind of how the farm developed, you know, row crop operation, livestock, or kind of what was your farm, what did it look like, and how did it grow?

Mike

Paulson: Well, when I was a kid growing up, of course, like most farms around here, we had livestock— hogs, cattle, and always busy, never a time that you didn't have something to do, and we were very fortunate with that. And then, let's see, when I came back farming, I had on my place where I lived, I was a tenant farmer, had hogs, cattle, and feeder pigs, feeder cattle, and a lot of row crop. And then when the boys went off to college, it was a time to kind of get out of the livestock because Things were getting more consolidated, you know, and larger hog and cattle and dairy operations, and we kind of went on the avenue towards a larger grain farm. So that's kind of where it's kind of grown from there.

Chris

Barron: So during that time, obviously you're married. Tell us a little bit about your wife, a little bit about that part of life when you're having kids and you're trying to farm and And then you can lean into the financial side of that too because, you know, raising kids is expensive no matter what year it is, right? And it's time-consuming, but it's why we do what we do.

Mike

Paulson: I had an aunt tell me years and years ago, she said, Michael, if you wait until you think you can afford children, you'll never have them. And that's true. So yeah, so I went to Illinois State down at Normal Bloomington back in '68 to '72, and my sophomore year met my wife, and best thing that ever happened to me, I think. And anyway, we've been married, we just celebrated our 48th wedding anniversary here, I don't know, 2, 3 weeks ago. And so that was a good part of my life. And she was from Peoria, Illinois, and we came back here farming after college, and kind of, I never looked back then.

Chris

Barron: Well, that's awesome. So, um, I guess as you and your wife were farming together, raising a family, um, you guys went through the '80s. That's always the infamous part of a conversation in almost every dad's wisdom. Um, we're going through a whole unique time as we record this with COVID with, you know, all kinds of economic turmoil in the world. So you guys, lived through the '80s, high interest rates, trying to figure out how to grow the farm, how to pay the bills, how to do all that. Talk a little bit about what that was like for you.

Mike

Paulson: That was really, really tough because unfortunately my dad and myself purchased land at the wrong time in the '80s, and it was really difficult to go through. But we survived and made it out on the other end. Kind of grateful when we look back what we did, but we— I was so fortunate to have my wife, my partner, that we were always constantly pulling together and we just made it. And it was hard, but yet looking back, we were raising the kids and the kids were great and it seemed bad at the time and now looking back why we made it through, you know, so.

Chris

Barron: So some of that's perspective, right? You know, it's living it and then looking back on it's kind of two different things.

Mike

Paulson: Yes, at the time we were living through it, we thought we'd never make it, and we just kept, you know, plugging along and putting one foot in front of the other, and I think that's the main thing, that you just kind of keep moving forward and doing the best you can. So that's— we came out on the other side.

Chris

Barron: So what are some of the secrets to that? You know, how do you manage the economics? How do you manage— you know, you hear in today's world from this generation a lot about life balance, right? You hear that all the time in today's world. And you hear about, you know, financial challenges. And, you know, in today's world with social media and everything, everybody looks around and sees what the next person has. And, you know, there's a big component to that too, right, is figuring out what works for you might not be the same for somebody else, and that's difficult in this world we live in today.

Mike

Paulson: Well, absolutely, Chris. You know, I think back, if we would have had the social media and so forth, it was difficult back then as it was, but then to have that layer added on top of it would be even more difficult. But Like I said, we just, we tried to do what we had to do. I mean, Maddie bought toys for the kids from, you know, garage sales and garage sale clothes. And we had a car that was all rusted out and the door even flew open once in a while. But we just did what we had to do and constricted down to try and make it through. Talking about life balance, Chris, I think that is a struggle constantly because your focus all the time is on the business and the farm. And sometimes I was the world's worst. I lost sight of family maybe, but we made it through.

Chris

Barron: So yeah. Yeah, when you're busy providing, sometimes it's hard to see the whole.

Mike

Paulson: The whole picture for sure. Right. And I had a neighbor, and who is my neighbor yet to this day, and back 30, 35 years ago, he said everybody's trying to jockey for position. And by that, I mean the life balance, you know, farm, family, faith, and everything. And I think that's the biggest thing is to have— God helped us. We had faith in God and We just kept going and we just kept trying to do the best we can. And I think that's the biggest challenge is just to tell yourself you're doing the best you can.

Chris

Barron: Good stuff, good stuff here. So I kind of forewarned you this offline here when we were starting and I said, Mike, I'm going to ask you about your best mistake. So you've had a little bit of time to think about this, almost 5 minutes to think about it. So, you know, what was your best— it doesn't have to be one, but what's one of the mistakes that you made in your farming operation that was really kind of a big deal, but you learned from it and maybe some good things came out of it?

Mike

Paulson: Well, I think at the time we bought the land at the wrong time, and that was the biggest challenge. But I think That not only forced me how to look at numbers, how to budget better, and then at the time I sought outside counseling. And when I say counseling, I'm talking a financial counselor that I worked with, and I still work with him a little bit to this day. And I think that's— don't be afraid to reach out and get help. Whether it be for personal or for financial help, you know, and for guidance. And that was, that to me was the biggest key. And at the time I thought it was the wrong thing buying the land, but maybe it forced me then to be a better business person and carry those, that experience, training, education or whatever forward. And I think, you know, that That's what I'd say was probably the biggest challenge.

Chris

Barron: Yeah. Any other mistakes you can think of or any of that?

Mike

Paulson: Yeah, I made more mistakes than I care to admit. Yeah. Well, one of the biggest ones was drilling soybeans. And I had the wrong drill. And oh my stars, I beat my head against the wall for too many years. And one of the happiest days of my life was, other than getting married and having the children, was seeing that drill go down the road. Yeah. That was, yeah. So that was, yeah.

Chris

Barron: Sometimes we have those experiences and we live through them and we live through them longer than maybe we really had to, right?

Mike

Paulson: Yeah, yeah. If I hadn't have been so colored blind, so to speak, I would have bought a better drill.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, yeah, understood. So if you think about your career, and all of us can look back pretty easy. It's a little harder to look forward because we can't see into the future. But as you look back and review your career in farming, and you're still operating and still farming. As you said, you know, you're now farming with your son. As you said, you know, your son was farming with you. Now you defined it as you're farming with your son. So what would you say now, looking back from today all the way in the past, you know, what's been the best part of farming for you?

Mike

Paulson: Oh, golly. Well, There's so many facets. I guess at the stage of my life, the last few years, I'm looking back, Chris, at the people that we crossed paths throughout my life and the impact that they had. But yet you didn't realize it at the time, but you're— we're so blessed that the people we've been able to work with over the years and the impact that they had on me, not only personally, but the growth of the business. I just— we're so fortunate and thankful that we had those people. And I guess, you know, back when we were raising the kids, you know, I was— had the hogs, the cattle, trucking some of my own grain, and just busy, busy, busy. And then all of a sudden our oldest daughter, we took her down to Champaign for college and went to leave her off that day, and it just hit me like a ton of bricks that where did the time go?

And so you got to take time with the family and make that a priority and then spend some time. And so that's—

Chris

Barron: so I take that as the people and the family are probably the best parts of the farm.

Mike

Paulson: Oh yeah. Oh, but without a shadow of a doubt, Chris, that's We're just so blessed. We're blessed. Wonderful children. And, you know, I've said this before, that at our age, one of the biggest blessings in parenthood is watching your children grow up, choose their spouses and their careers, and then watching them have children. And you're just so fortunate and so blessed. And that's one of the best things that ever happened.

Chris

Barron: That's awesome. You know, it's really important because as we are in this, again, back to today's world, right? You know, it's— and we talked about that over lunch. It's essentially a situation where as we farm, margins are really tight. And we get focused sometimes on the wrong things while we're trying to focus on the right things. And keeping that perspective is really critical. What would you— Would you say during some of those difficult times on the financial side— this is getting towards the last couple of my questions— but speaking from a financial perspective, and you went through high interest rates, you went through, you know, those land purchases you talk about, which were maybe one of the best mistakes you made. Maybe you bought it and wondered if you should have, and it turns out in the end it was probably a good thing.

Um, what's— What's some of the secrets to your success working through that? What are some of the key things that you were able to do day to day, month to month, year to year?

Mike

Paulson: Well, I think I've always— looking back, I didn't realize it at the time, but I enjoyed trying to make what I had work better. And by that, you know, I had a couple old dryers and I made them go from, you know, from heat-cool to full heat and changing things and I don't know, just changing things within the operation and not spending a lot of money but improve the efficiency of the operation. And I think that's important to try and instead of looking at the new, try and say what have I got here and what can I do to improve it and not spend a lot of money. I think that's one of the secrets and having good relationships with not only your landlords but your suppliers and your ag business people you work with from day to day or week to week and they're just awesome. Where would we be without them? And so that was, it was a fun time working with those people.

We're just so blessed to have had them.

Chris

Barron: So we'll take that. One of the secrets that keeps coming back, I hear a common theme here, it's about the people.

Mike

Paulson: It's about the people. It's about the people. If you don't have the people, what have you got? Not only in your own personal family, but in your business also.

Chris

Barron: Okay, so I'm going to kind of wrap up here with a kind of a final question. This is Dad's Wisdom. So what, what advice do you have for this next generation coming up? There's been some interesting black swans here in the last probably couple of years, you know, between weather in 2019 for a lot of the listeners that listen to this podcast, and then also you, you throw COVID into this and ethanol and just other, other challenges. As you look to the future for these young people, What advice do you have?

Mike

Paulson: Well, I've said this over the last couple, 3 years that I'm so impressed with the next generation coming through that I feel that they are so much better equipped to deal with problems, the experiences that they've already had, and to work through these issues and problems, whether it be local, national, international that we're working with nowadays. The world is getting smaller. And I think they're so much better equipped. And so they seem to have a better vision, plus they have all the technology that we never had, Chris. And I think that, you know, if they hunker down and look at the big picture and watch their finances and their own personal relationships, they'll do fine.

Chris

Barron: I think that's pretty good advice. So that was essentially about the last question. But I want to sum up kind of what I'm hearing and then have you wrap it up even better than this. But what I'm hearing is kind of in this order— faith, family, farm.

Mike

Paulson: It is.

Chris

Barron: So I'm going to have you wrap it up from there.

Mike

Paulson: Oh boy. Uh, yeah, to me, stay focused on God and what he's given you, and always, always remember that all blessings, all things come through him. And I know it's difficult when we're in these times, whether it be, you know, the COVID or, you know, the prices that we're seeing on the Board of Trade, uh We got to stay focused on the big picture of life and relationships with one another. That's all I can say at this time.

Chris

Barron: Well, I don't think it could be said any better. So Mike, we have Mike Paulson here from Genoa, Illinois, outside of Chicago. And it's really nice to be out here in the country even though we're getting rained on right now.

Mike

Paulson: Yeah, get a little shower, get more pot— we're in pollination right now. So yeah, it's a good time.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, that's right. So we'll take it. We'll take getting wet out here in the middle of July. And thanks a lot. I really appreciate the conversation, Mike. Any final thoughts?

Mike

Paulson: Well, just— and Chris, I've told you this before. We've worked with Chris now for— I think this is our third or fourth year. Fourth year. And we're so blessed to have stumbled on. I'd like to add this if you'll let me. Chris had written an article, I believe it was in Top Producer, and at the bottom of the article it said if you want this spreadsheet, get a hold of me. So one day I just picked up the phone and called Chris. He picked it up on a second ring and I was wanting a spreadsheet and he said, well, you know, where are you from? But, you know, and I kind of told him. He said, well, I think I could help you, Joe, because I was talking about transition. Of the farm. And so we started working with Chris, like I said, 3, 4 years ago, and it's just— you're a wonderful person, a wonderful man, and what you bring to the table has just been just awesome.

And we just appreciate what you and your organization do for us, Chris, and we feel very blessed.

Chris

Barron: Well, thank you, and I didn't even have to pay you for that plug, so I appreciate that.

Mike

Paulson: Well, I just— yeah, like I said, I can't The people that we've worked with are just phenomenal, from our neighbors, our neighbors, the place where we live, and our suppliers, everybody, they're just awful, just, we're really fortunate.

Chris

Barron: Mike, appreciate your very kind comments, that's very nice, appreciate that, and you guys have been a pleasure to work with, you have a phenomenal operation, an even more phenomenal family, and It's been a pleasure to work with you guys in your operation, and I see nothing but success in the days and months and years ahead. And we'll just keep plowing forward. And with that, again, thanks, Mike. And we'd like to thank everybody for listening. And again, if you have somebody out there that's a dad that's full of wisdom, or a grandpa, or somebody that we could interview and have a conversation with, our whole goal with the Dad's Wisdom Series always is to get some good information out there because, uh, um, obviously if you've lived through it, that experience says a lot. So again, with that, thanks everybody for listening. We'll catch you next time on the Ag View Pitch.

Narrator: Thank you for tuning into this episode of Dad's Wisdom. Please make sure to leave us a rating on Apple Podcasts, and for any questions or ideas that you would like discussed, please email us at cbarron@agviewsolutions.com. Have a great day.