The opening general session keynote speaker at the NAMA convention was Scott McKain, pictured here in front of the flames of ???? (you supply the description). The flames actually made for a very cool stage background and conversation topic throughout the event.

Scott is Vice Chairman, Obsidian Enterprises, author of What Customers REALLY Want and a new book: The Collapse of Distinction. I spoke to him just prior to his session and he says that the most important thing today for any business, including agribusiness, is to “distinguish yourself from the competition.” His talk focused on ways to do this.

For one thing, he says, social media provides a good opportunity to do it. He says you “have to do social media in today’s world. The only other option is failure.” He says we need to be in the lead on social media. He also says that creativity is vital and just pick one point or way you can stand out from your competitors and focus on it.

You can listen to my interview with Scott here: Scott McKain Interview (mp3)

NAMA Photo Album

The pre-conference workshop for NAMA 2009 on Wednesday was tailor-made for today’s challenging economic climate.

Kevin Ochsner of Adayana Agri Business Group was captain of the ship for “Charting Your Course in Uncharted Waters – Strategic Decision Making in Uncertain Times,” which focused on gaining insight into the key principals of scenario-planning. “Now, more than ever, we have to both personally and professionally have a process that helps us sort through some of that uncertainty to make decisions as good as we can,” Kevin says.

Kevin will also be moderating a break out session on Thursday afternoon on “Thriving During Times of Uncertainty and Change.”

You can listen to Cindy interview Kevin here: Kevin Oschner Interview (mp3)

NAMA Photo Album

NAMA Chapter Leaders had a workshop then a lunch this morning.

I didn’t make it to the workshop but I did make it to the lunch. I have my priorities you know. The workshop presenters were Paige Gilligan, Agrestic Solutions, and Diana Monsen, CAPC. You can see them in the photo bottom left. I interviewed them after lunch to find out what they did during the morning program. Basically, they identified a few chapter leadership challenges and broke the participants up in groups to come up with creative ideas to address them.

You can listen to my interview with Paige and Diana here: Chapter Leader Workshop Interview (mp3)

NAMA Photo Album

If you were unable to make it to the 2008 Trends In Agriculture fall meeting, now is your chance to hear what you missed!

Audio presentations from Trends In Agriculture are now available for download at http://payment.nama.org/trendsaudio.html.

If you attended Trends In Agriculture, you received an email with a special coupon code to download the presentations at no charge. If you did not receive the coupon code and did attend the Trends meeting, please contact Kathi Conrad at [email protected] for the coupon code.

Yesterday’s reception provided Trends in Agriculture attendees a chance to see all the Best of NAMA entries. You could also play games at the same time.

I hope you’re enjoying Paulsen’s videos. I’m doing them audio only and have a couple more for you here:

Listen to my interview with Courtney Yuskis, Director of the Country Living Association, talk about the rural lifestyle survey they participated in here: Courtney Yuskis Interview (mp3)

Listen to my interview with Dan Duffy, CEO, United Country Real Estate, talk about what they’ve learned about marketing to this audience here: Dan Duffy Interview (mp3)

NAMA/NAFB Photo Album

The first speaker at the NAMA Trends in Agriculture conference was Franck Schuurmans, Non-Profit Practices for Decision Strategies International. He really made us work our brains early by speaking about strategies. For one thing he challenged everyone to not be so confident in “knowing what you know” as in “knowing what you don’t know.”

You’ve got to think about that a minute.

Hear some more words of his wisdom in my interview with him here: Franck Schuurmans Interview (mp3)

In the picture Franck is being interviewed by Paulsen AgriBranding because they are once again sponsoring the NAMA Blog and doing short videos of the speakers here.

NAMA/NAFB Photo Album

The NAMA Trends In Agriculture conference is underway in Kansas City.

Here’s what some of the attendees said was the reason they’re here: NAMA Trends Reasons (mp3)

You can see a photo album that’s combined with the NAFB Convention here: NAMA/NAFB Photo Album