Casey
0:00:00
From boardroom meetings to bedtime stories, Coffee in the Barn explores the delicate dance of balancing the demands of our professional lives with the joys and responsibilities of being moms. Join us each week as we discuss the latest trends in agribusiness, share insightful interviews with industry experts, and sprinkle in some heartfelt anecdotes about the humorous and heartwarming moments that come with being a working mom in agriculture.
Morgan
0:00:29
Welcome to this week's episode of Coffee in the Barn. This week we have Kaylee Keppy-McDonnell with us, a swine account manager with Zinpro. And she's here to talk to us a little bit more about the Zinpro's Women event that is hosted the day before World Pork Expo. Thank Thank you for joining us.
Kylee
0:00:56
Thanks for having me. Super excited to talk about this upcoming event, and I'll share a little background on it, really, and kind of where it stemmed from. You know, being involved in the industry for quite some time, I think, and being in this season of life, really, the work-mom-life balance. Again, this season we have a 16, 14, and 2 1⁄2-year-old. My husband travels for work.
Kylee
0:01:16
He's also in the nutrition industry. Life gets busy. So a while back, Casey, what was it? Six months ago? A little bit longer, maybe a little longer.
Casey
0:01:28
Yeah.
Kylee
0:01:29
You know, I had I had done my goals for last year and put down like, I really need to focus and invest in me a little bit. Kind of at this point in this crossroads, okay, my kiddos too, it's time to take some time and invest in myself to grow my career, to grow professionally, just personal growth development. And that's when I found Casey's program and fell into the technical sales training. And we got to talking and got to networking. And that's when I realized, I really enjoyed having an outlet.
Kylee
0:02:05
I hope my team doesn't take offense to this, but I work with all males, right, on my Swine team. So it was kind of nice to have an outlet or a third party or just someone to talk to, like Casey, outside of that network I talk to every day. And again, love my team. They're great.
Kylee
0:02:22
I would work with them every single day. But it just was nice to have that connection. We could talk about kids. We talked about our pregnancies. You know, outside of the technical sales training, we still had a network to connect and a platform to do so.
Kylee
0:02:38
So we are sitting at a meeting, a sales meeting in Florida with my team, and it was just kind of like it all kind of came together and kind of clicked that we need a platform for women to connect and talk outside of like, hey, Morgan, are you going to be at this conference and we can connect about this account?
Kylee
0:02:56
Or, hey, Casey, do you have so-and-so's contact information? Like, okay, those are our day jobs, but outside of that, do we get to connect anymore? Not really. So this Elevate Women in Ag Conference stemmed from that, right, and where's a place where we all gather and all connect from an industry standpoint?
Kylee
0:03:18
World Pork Expo. So I thought, timing wise, World Pork Expo makes sense. So then from there, it's like the name kind of speaks for itself. Elevate Women in Ag. Let's lift each other up. Let's find a place to network. Let's find a place to grow. Let's find a place to connect. And what I found really interesting, interesting. So our marketing team, myself, we came up with this survey and sent it out to just
Kylee
0:03:43
some really well-respected women in the industry. And just to get feedback on, would you attend a conference, an all-women's conference like this pre-expo? What dates would you prefer? What topics are of interest? And interestingly enough, not a single person wanted to talk about the swine industry, wanted to talk about livestock, wanted to talk about work. They want, or I mean, specifically topics within work. They wanted to talk about health, wellness, organizational tips, style tips.
Kylee
0:04:18
They want to talk about your work-life balance, your setting boundaries, how to say no, how to get a raise in the environment that they're in, how to have those conversations. And so the feedback was great. So then it all kind of started coming together
Kylee
0:04:36
and I'm so excited to have a place, a platform for women to grow, have these conversations. Whatever season of life they're in, I think we have something for everyone. I'm excited about some of the speakers we have and I won't go into detail because more will be coming out in the coming weeks, speaker details and agendas and things
Kylee
0:04:57
like that. But I will say we will discuss everything from style, how to put an outfit together for a meeting, how to set boundaries, how to say no when your plate's getting too full, and have open panel discussion where you can write a question, you can ask a question, and we have some really awesome ladies, some that are super well-known in the industry, and others that I'm excited to share with the industry.
Kylee
0:05:28
And just they each have a unique story that's different to them, you know, as far as like some trauma-type events and how to be positive and how to stay positive, how to get things done, how to manage it all, how to do it all. So really, really excited for the Elevate Women in Ag Conference pre-World Bork Expo.
Casey
0:05:48
Is this- I'm really excited to get to attend the event.
Kylee
0:05:53
Yes.
Casey
0:05:54
I got the invite. I was like, yes, and I'm not speaking even better. I'm gonna just soak it all in. Yes, yes. What was your question, Morgan?
Morgan
0:06:08
I said, is this the first year of the event?
Kylee
0:06:32
Yes, so this will be our first year, so excited and nervous all at the same time. I hope it's well received. I hope women in our industry understand we're just trying to come up with a place and a platform to connect and to have more meaningful, genuine conversations than the, hey, do you have this contact info? Hey, can we have a meeting about this product?
Casey
0:06:32
I think a lot of people, and I would say in our industry and around World Pork specifically, that I think this is a great event because I know a lot of companies will bring their teams into Des Moines and have events or will try to do a customer pre-World Pork meeting and go over science. And there's lots of opportunities to get science in front of people. And I think COVID's helped us to where everybody can have a webinar. There's a lot more accounts, in my mind, open to a technical presentation via Teams than you have in a drive there in Connect.
Morgan
0:07:08
Sure.
Casey
0:07:09
And I think this mindset of putting, like, because Morgan's going to have to sit through a meeting full of going through sales accounts, objectives, maybe some technical information that we maybe need to embrace taking the opportunity to get together with our team to learn about our team and how to work with our team and how to support our team more than, oh yeah, well I haven't made my sales targets yet this year because of this, this and this.
Kylee
0:07:40
Right.
Morgan
0:07:41
Yep.
Casey
0:07:42
Well, maybe they didn't meet their sales targets this year because they think it's this, this and this, but it's really their mindset and things they're trying to get through and they're not approaching. And I don't think that comes in when you have formal planned out agenda meetings to where this event, you're getting there, we're not going to talk accounts, right? We're not going to talk business.
Casey
0:08:08
But if you hear points of like my mindset, and you're going to be able to apply it to what you do, sure, for work.
Kylee
0:08:17
Yeah, exactly. And I think to capitalize on that, Casey, we'll do some more like personality type stuff. And I think that'll help people better understand Morgan's thought process. Right. So you can use those kind of things and gain some valuable information from a meeting like this to take to sales calls or take. But it's more connecting versus regurgitating just some technical information.
Morgan
0:08:45
Right. Yeah. And I think it's really important to our team went through some personality testing and training and as a team, you know, being able to recognize how your team members, what makes them click, makes them work. And so, you know, how is the best way and like, you know, everyone has to learn as they're working with their team in different scenarios as well, but you're going to approach different team members differently based on the situation or the outcome or what you're trying to achieve. And I think that was really, I show up to work my very authentic self
Morgan
0:09:22
and you know some people I think are afraid to do that and for our team specifically I think that this was a I would say pretty eye-opening because you're like oh yeah I actually put a name to that trait. Yes. I identify as, oh yeah, like they have these tendencies, but it's actually called this specific name. And like five other people on the team have the same exact tendencies and you're like, oh, we're actually not different as I, as I.
Kylee
0:10:04
Right. It's so valuable just to operate daily within your team and without in the outside with folks like yourself or whoever, like you said, just how do they tick? How do they operate? What, their focus may be a little different. They may react differently, and this is why.
Casey
0:10:20
I think it's also gonna set the stage for these women going into World Pork, regardless of their role, either if they have, need to meet with suppliers or they are a supplier, I feel it's going to get them in the right mindset that, hey, I'm going to be more open-minded to reach out to people I don't know or go up to a complete stranger because you've prepped them in a positive environment to walk into Whirlpool and make that a success. Because a lot of times what I see at trade shows and I see at different events,
Casey
0:10:48
for instance, meetings, is weighing out with our colleagues. I walk up to tents or booths we're talking amongst each other and there's so many times that I see that I don't bother going in to talk to people because they seem preoccupied and you'll see people on their phones or different things and this is just kind of to me a catalyst of talking technical sales if I was to train people on how to do trade shows or different events are you open to those people that that comes in and all my coaches talk about this as
Casey
0:11:27
well you know they you may not see them as an important person or customer today but tomorrow they could be and you have every opportunity to start cultivating your network regardless of who it is if they're open to buy and people remember that friendly face they remember you being authentic but then they also remember you I'm not a Smithfield so I'm not going to talk to you you know like deal and I get that we're only focused on the integrators and I'm like our market changes a lot.
Casey
0:12:03
People move jobs, companies get bought. I think that mindset is very kind of negative that you don't think everybody's valuable or in my case, me paying attention to people 20 years later has paid off in my career. And I think you're opening that day up for women
Casey
0:12:24
to have that success because you're making them vulnerable in a positive environment where they can be. And I can't imagine. I know that these women, they're going to tend are going to rock it at World Pork. It's going to be like the best world pork I spoke for them.
Kylee
0:13:00
I sure hope so. I would definitely echo what you say. It's like there could be a lot of loss opportunities for those folks that don't feel comfortable opening up or just kind of in their own space. So hopefully this allows them to connect on a different level with other women. That are just as passionate within our industry and yeah, really just kind of connect on a different level.
Morgan
0:13:13
Powerful. That's why I brought my Zinpro coffee cup today.
Kylee
0:13:14
OK. Yes. I love it.Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Zinpro is super excited. We've been, it's kind of been an all hands on deck team effort within our marketing team and our swine team and our specialty teams. Zinpro, you know, as a whole is very focused on the well-being of animals, but also people.
Casey
0:13:33
We're definitely a people company. And so doing something like this really kind of fills our cups and providing a platform to do so. So we're super excited about it at Zinpro.
Casey
0:13:54
I was going to say, I don't know if it's because I've started it, like doing my outreach programs, my mentoring, young professionals and different things. I started on this journey four years ago. With that, I don't know if it's because I'm doing that, I'm noticing others doing it or is a result like there's this snowball effect of all these companies finally investing in young professionals women and different things and I know there's several organizations and ag out there but I think it's really important Kaylee for not only you but Zinp Pro to say hey we're here to help you regardless if I sell you zinc or not.
Morgan
0:14:29
Yep, absolutely. We're people's people, right? It's a people industry. It's connections, it's network. You may not be a customer now, but you could five years from now. Still not going to treat you any different.
Casey
0:14:53
Yeah, well, you're sitting here talking to Morgan who could be a potential, like, competitor, but she still could come if she wasn't going to be stuck in business meetings all day.
Kylee
0:15:23
At the end of the day, it's such a small industry and such a small network that someday Morgan could be a teammate. Why ruin that? So I think it's building each other up, curating good environment in a space where Morgan and I aren't going to talk products because we're competitors, but, hey, Morgan, how's life? You know, what do you have going on? Casey, how's the kiddos? You know, those kind of things. So I think it's really important to create that kind of network and that kind of space. I think it's really easy to get rocking and rolling in life, your career, your kids, school, outside activities. And I think sometimes you kind of lose focus of personal growth development,
Kylee
0:15:47
because you just kind of get rocking and rolling in life. So I think sometimes it's good to step back and find programs like I found within yours, because it was really when Zach and I sat down and we went through goal setting and we went through some things,
Kylee
0:16:00
I was like, there's some personal growth I need to do to reach some of these other goals. And I think it's really important to kind of put that into perspective and find ways to figure out how to do it and make it happen. And I'm thankful for your program, because not only did I learn the technical stuff, it brought us also another outlet to connect on outside things of, oh, Casey, I'm a little frustrated with this in life going on right now and have that space to connect.
Kylee
0:16:29
But again, also grew my technical skills. I would say it grew my confidence by quite some margin to go have conversations and network with some other folks in an industry. Maybe I was out for just a brief moment or trying to learn how to work through certain situations or scenarios. And so to me, investing in yourself, just like you would in a health journey, just like you would in other aspects of your life,
Kylee
0:16:59
I think it's super important to take that time to invest in yourself, to grow personally.
Casey
0:17:17
Yeah, and I was going to say, I'm still gonna keep the mentoring coaching going, but a select few, and I'm still trying to decide what that looks like moving forward, if it's like just a small group that we do together, or I find a couple individuals every year to work with because it fills my cup to help others, but I think the message Kaylee's trying to get across and what I'm getting across is I invested in a mindset coach. I invest in coaching every year. I buy books. I'm investing in myself.
Casey
0:17:43
But what I've also found, like buying a book or doing just a virtual training, there's no accountability. And that's where I found value in having a coach that at least I was accountable. I had to show up. Hayley, you had to show up twice a month. You got to do some homework. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's important to take in mind. Can you be hold yourself accountable to just read books or do a virtual class? Because there's statistics out there that I mean, people buy courses and maybe like 10% only complete them. That's like 10% or 20% of people. And so that's the question that you have. And I get a lot of this from other women in the industry and we're elevating women here. And so I'm trying to use this as a way to elevate. It's like I'm stuck. Like what's next in my career, like I'm rocking and rolling I'm doing great at my job but I wanna grow to the next level. I feel like there is a glass ceiling, I cant do that. And I think that these types of women are like you need to find a mindset coach because its about what's in here that is
Casey
0:18:53
stopping you from that next step, but I also would like people to reflect on Am I willing to go to that next step and sacrifice all this and this I work Mitch that works with me is a prime example. He's finishing his PhD right now in life, he cannot travel. It just does not work for his family. He's not a woman saying that, it's a man saying that, hey, my family needs me here.
Casey
0:19:22
And so he's understanding that his opportunities may not be as great as other PhD graduates, right? And so that's also my question for moms of this mindset, like going to that next level, what are you giving up to get there? And is it worth giving up?
Casey
0:19:42
And but you can still grow. If I'm going to be a technical service manager or an R&D manager the rest of my career, you're an example of I invested in myself to get better at what I'm doing today. But it will open the door tomorrow for future opportunities.
Kylee
0:20:15
Absolutely. And to branch off of that and somewhat answer your question, I really think being in a supportive environment is key. Right. Like, I'm very grateful that my mentor, my boss, my company is very supportive and, hey, if you feel like you need to grow in that aspect, let's do it. Let's figure out how to grow. And I will say, my, Zach was very good at coming in and saying, hey, I'm checking in. How's your personal development stuff going?
Kylee
0:20:41
Is there anything I can do to support that? And I think it's very important to have that kind of environment to push you to grow. Then your accountability is there, right? Sometimes it's like, well, I don't know if I didn't get all my homework done this go around. It's easy to cancel it. No, there's accountability there. I'm not only getting accountability from my husband checking in house things with Casey, Casey's
Kylee
0:21:02
checking in, your company's checking in. So I think there's there's a lot of value in having a good support system to being able to get those things done and balancing your personal goals, your work goals and your home life goals.
Casey
0:21:33
Morgan, you're also technically being mentored by me and Coffee in the Barn, the restart is all about your professional development that you wanted to achieve this year. Kind of talk to the audience a little bit about your professional development and why you chose your path and kind of what you've done. They've learned that you're a real pusher, right? And you're like a triathlon, go get it done, girl. And like, I have a huge plate and I can handle it all. Kind of talk, talk to others about your journey today in professional development and kind of how you see that for you as well.
Morgan
0:22:06
Yeah, so Casey and I got paired as a mentor mentee through the Women in Ag program that Alltech puts on. And I think I've always been, I'm always looking for that next challenge, that next, how do I push myself to expand my skillset or to learn something new? And so if I, you know, growing up or throughout college, if I couldn't find that in that certain whatever, whoever I was surrounded by at that time, if I was looking for more, I was always
Morgan
0:22:34
asking for help or letting people know that I was open to the opportunity of taking on more skills, learning something new. I've never been one to be like stagnant. I'm always, you know, trying, I'm always doing something. So through the program that Casey and I got paired through, one of my, I guess, biggest, one of my biggest challenges I would say is,
Morgan
0:23:09
one of my goals through this program was to improve my technical speaking skills. In my current role with Alltech and Harvard, I'm doing a lot more customer presentations because I have a dual role on the R&D side and then as well as working in the field with customers. So I have to communicate that research and R&D to our account managers, to customers, to external companies that we're working with.
Morgan
0:23:40
And so technical speaking and just public speaking in general has always been one area that I would say I have struggled with. And it's not that I don't know the material, it's more the fact that as soon as I get up on stage or am in front of people that I've never met before, you know, you just stage fright, your mind blanks, you just, I get super nervous. And I know that it's very mental, and it's very much in my head. And it's one of those things that the more you practice and the more you do it, the more
Morgan
0:24:15
comfortable you're going to be. And so I would say since November, December this past year, that's one area I've really been working on. And so I and through that process I've learned that for me personally it takes me at least a week to prepare for a presentation. I'm not one who can just be like, hey you need to give this presentation tomorrow and can just you know look at the slides and just wing it. Like I can't do that.
Morgan
0:24:42
I've always been somebody that's like over prepares for everything. And so I trialed that out at one of our meetings. You know, it wasn't a long presentation but it was, you know, five or ten minutes and they asked if I could do it, you know, within like two days and I was like, oh yeah, like I know the material and whatnot. I wasn't, hadn't practiced it enough and I wasn't as comfortable with that, that I did it, but then afterwards I was like okay I need to re-evaluate how this went because it did not go how I wanted it to go and so now I know that I know I can't do that right now
Morgan
0:25:25
and I also let my team know that so I made them aware like okay if you want me to give a presentation give me at least a week in advance heads up and then great, I'll take it on. But right now, I'm not one who can just give a presentation with like a 48-hour notice. And my team was very open to like, okay, great, thanks for letting us know that. Yeah, right. Nobody wants to see you fail. No. And I mean, you have to fail to learn, which, you know, everyone has gone through and everyone has their different challenges that they take on but in different opportunities that bring about those learning up yeah
Morgan
0:26:10
different opportunities that bring about learning what you can and can't do so that was through I would say the last six months or so I've worked with my team and some other coaches on how to improve my technical speaking skills. I have an internal team that I can practice my presentations to and get positive feedback from. And so I think it's just asking for help, surrounding yourself with the people that are going to be able to support you and elevate you, help you pursue your goals, and yeah it's all for betterment of yourself and your team.
Kylee
0:26:56
Absolutely. Absolutely. And look at you, like setting expectations for your team, being self-aware and now like you're doing a podcast. That's kind of improv, too. Like you're look at you go.
Kylee
0:27:01
Exactly. And I was just going to say
Casey
0:27:03
that, you know, on some of the meetings that we've had in this women's and food and ag, I think the proper term WFA we've gotten this mixed up. But some of the mentors are saying, you know, my mentee's not reaching out, my mentee doesn't have a plan or some are like, this is what I want to work on and this is the plan and I want to meet this often.
Casey
0:27:26
And you're talking about your event. So regardless if you're and we're talking about paid coaching versus, Alltech's putting resources behind making this happen. But in your event, Zinpro's putting a lot of money and time and effort into creating these events. So regardless, if you do it on your own, you hire a coach, you get a free mentor at work. ZSM had that program as well internally.
Casey
0:27:59
You could reach outside of your work zone or department and get some different mentors to help you grow in the business. You have to be willing to want it. You have to want the change. You have to want the results and have the mindset,
Casey
0:28:16
I'm gonna do whatever it takes to get there. And that's what I'm saying. Don't go into the Zinp Pro event saying, oh, this is gonna be a fun thing. I like Kaylee and I'm a customer's iZinn pro so I'm gonna go right because I feel like I should. No, no. I want the women listening to want it. You have to be fully invested and change that mindset.
Casey
0:28:38
I just literally before this call went through my group coaching. It's a breakthrough mindset and she's like you make this sound like it's such a heavy load for you to carry, what's gonna make it fun? And I had to dive in, I'm like, what's gonna make it fun? If I get this program done and I get this number of clients and this much revenue, Casey can hire somebody else and I can take a full seven-day vacation without my computer. And, but it was that mindset, right?
Casey
0:29:12
I had to go into like, this is so much I got to get done in the next four months to make this happen. Like your event, like that event planning, right? So much we got to get done. But I'm sure you're not thinking of the workload and you're thinking about empowering and elevating women. Yes. And it makes it all worthwhile.
Casey
0:29:34
And I think you need to do that in professional development as well.
Kylee
0:29:57
Yep, I would agree. This process and planning this has been very rewarding. Obviously, a lot of work. And you hope women come with an open mindset to, again, network, elevate, lift each other up and connect and come out of there with something, you know, and find value there. So, yeah, it's been, again, a lot of work, but super rewarding. At the end of the day, if I can connect women and give them a space and a platform to do so, great.
Casey
0:30:16
Anybody can contact you if they're interested, correct? How do they get more information on the event or reach out to you to see if they can still participate?
Kylee
0:30:33
Yeah, absolutely. Great question, Casey. So again, there'll be a certain number of seats for this event. So if you do have interest in attending the Elevate Women in Ag, we'll have a social on Monday evening and then the event will be from 8-2 on the 4th. So again, people can attend other activities pre-expo. So try not to overlap with some of that. They can shoot me an e-mail. Can you guys provide that?
Casey
0:30:52
Yeah, we can put that in the show notes and go through there. Yeah, show notes, contact information. We'll tag Kaylee if all goes well with the different applications talking. It's not always easy, but we'll try to get you tagged. We'll share it. But, of course, you can always reach out to us because, you know, Casey's going. They did give me a complimentary receipt, and so I know how to hook you up.
Casey
0:31:14
I'll know what's going on because Kaylee will be sending me the agenda and everything else. Yep. So if you can't get a hold of Kaylee or somebody at Zinpro, Casey does. Obviously, everybody knows that Zinpro and I are kind of tight and carry around the blue mug and
Kylee
0:31:31
... Lead the blue.
Casey
0:31:33
Lead the blue and integrate a very similar blue into my brand.
Kylee
0:31:38
Yes.
Casey
0:31:39
So it's kind of really exciting when I saw you. Zach was like, look at my brand. It's got this blue a little, maybe slightly different.
Kylee
0:31:48
But yes.
Kylee
0:31:49
Yes.
Kylee
0:31:50
Well, I appreciate it today, Casey and Morgan. I had a blast talking to you guys. And yeah, again, be sure to reach out if you have interest in the Elevate Women in Ag event.
Morgan
0:32:02
Well, thank you.
Casey
0:32:03
Yes, thank you very much for taking the time today to speak with us. Yes, thank you very much for taking the time today to speak with us.
Kylee
0:32:07
My pleasure.
