Jayna Trueblood

I would attribute my success to a lot of confidence, my parents' support, and the connections I've made. My parents are very much city people, so they have no idea half the time what things I talk about, but they were very supportive. I live in a small town in Illinois, and there's a lot of people there - I've gotten some friends there, and then they introduce me to people, and I get to talking to them, and they've been very supportive. Really, it's just kind of small-town people, my parents, and people I've known, and the connections I've made that have allowed me to make a little bit of a name and be able to talk to someone. The main thing is just having confidence. I've had a couple interns that were scared to be in ag just because they're girls, and I'm like, that doesn't mean anything. It's all about your work ethic and how you're willing to put yourself out there and just have the confidence to just keep working at it. It may take nine no's, but eventually you're gonna get one yes out of it.

The best career advice I've received, especially in the agriculture industry, is that it's not what you know, it's who you know. That stands with me very positively, just because I didn't grow up row crop. I showed a little bit of goats and cattle growing up, but nothing to the extreme. To be able to be in this position compared to other coworkers or colleagues that grew up doing it with dad or grandpa - I didn't have those opportunities, but that doesn't mean that you can't do this job. It's just all about putting yourself out there and communicating and just connecting with people.

Have a lot of confidence and don't be afraid. Just have a positive mindset, and if you don't know something, ask. I'm in an office with eight salesmen, and I'm the only woman in that group. They've never really treated me like I'm less than them, but they do hold me to a standard, and it's the same for everyone. It's just having that confidence and not worrying about the fact that you don't know everything. Quite frankly, in the ag industry, I've seen that they would rather have someone hired that doesn't know it all, so that way they can train them to become what they want them to be, instead of having someone that does know it all and they have to kind of retrain them on their thought processes. It's really just about confidence and stepping out of your comfort zone, because I definitely didn't work in this or grow up around it, so it's definitely out of the comfort zone. If you have that thought that you want to leave your hometown, do it. You're only young once, and to do it while you're young is the best thing to do, in my opinion. If you're wanting to leave, do it while you're young and enjoy it, because you never know where you're gonna end up or what door's gonna open.

The biggest challenge I've faced is probably knowledge - not knowing everything. If you would have spoke to me three years ago, I wouldn't have a lot to say, just because I don't know anything. But as you grow and learn, sometimes you make mistakes, and they're not something to dwell about. It's just a learning curve, and you take it as a learning point and you move on from it. As far as opportunities, there are a lot with my current location and company. You can definitely move up from the bottom and move up into a sales role or even move up beyond that. We have plenty of opportunities with meetings that they set up for us to gain more knowledge and to learn. They created a team full of us new crop consultants called the Red Sales Team, and they give us mentors and all the information we need and contacts. If you become stuck or if you want to go ride along with someone, you have those opportunities. We get to attend events like the Commodity Classic - this next week we all fly out to San Antonio, Texas for it. It's a big farm show where they present a lot of the high-yield growers across all 50 states. Last year I had the opportunity to go when it was held in Denver. I've had the opportunity to listen to presentations by Alex Harrell, who is the soybean world record yield holder, and David Hula, who is the world record of high yield in corn. Those are two things that not very many people get the opportunity to be in front of or even listen speak.

Communication is number one, and probably loyalty and kindness. Those are pretty big three factors that I use in my work and use in my everyday life. I work in ag, and there's large farm machinery moving around constantly, and it's just all about communicating where you're gonna be at so that people know. It does the same thing when you're working around large livestock - communicating is important because those four-legged animals already have a mind of their own, and if you're in the mix with it and you're working with someone, you have to communicate what you're doing so that hopefully keeps everyone safe. That'd probably be my fourth one - it'll be safety.