Welcome to the 44th Edition of Upstream Ag Professional
Index:
Control the Narrative, Own the Outcome: What Agribusiness Professionals Can Learn from Chuck Magro, David Friedberg and John Deere
What’s the Egg in Your AgTech Product?
Consolidation’s Limitations: What vertical integration could mean for Winfield United and other Distributors
Purpose Driven and Customer Led Growth with Leah Anderson of Winfield United
Ag Marketing in 2034: The Trio of Roles to Keep Your Eyes On
Bayer Advances Genome-Editing Initiatives
*Upstream LLM Search Functionality
Human Psychology and Finances
Other Ag Articles
1. Control the Narrative, Own the Outcome: What Agribusiness Professionals Can Learn from Chuck Magro, David Friedberg and John Deere - Upstream Ag Professional
Key Takeaways
Controlling a narrative is crucial for agribusiness CEOs to ensure a consistent, clear direction is perceived by internal and external stakeholders, leading to better decision-making and execution. Examples from leaders like Chuck Magro and David Friedberg and companies like John Deere illustrate how effectively framing discussions and reiterating key messages can reinforce strategy and boost confidence within the company.
Over the last month, I have listened to or read more than 40 agribusiness analysts calls and talked to almost two-dozen agribusiness founders and CEOs.
This has highlighted some examples of what great CEOs and businesses do better than others.
One stand out has been controlling the narrative.
Controlling the narrative of your business is crucial for any company or CEO.
For a CEO, maintaining control over the company story ensures that internal and external stakeholders perceive a clear and consistent direction, and doesn’t let others, such as media or competitors, steer your messaging off-course while also paving the way for clarity in seeing the organization vision— leading to buy-in, better decision making and execution.
Chuck Magro and Corteva
One example is Corteva CEO, Chuck Magro. His ability to control the narrative about Corteva, their strategy and the market on an analyst call is exceptional. This skillset has been observable since his time at Nutrien and I think he has done an even better job at Corteva given they have a new strategy and KPIs to deliver on.
There are two specific things Chuck does well to control the narrative:
