It’s getting to be about the time of year when my job-shadowers will be calling, and the folks from UNL will be not far behind needing some real life information about managing an equestrian business for one of their Equine Sciences classes. Each year I have around 2 or 3 High School aged students who come to the barn and follow me around while I work, grilling me with questions. And about an equal number of College Students who come from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln who also hurl questions at me for a project they have to do in one of their required classes.
Although it can be a little strange to be followed around all day by someone you don’t know asking you questions and writing things down on a clipboard I make a point to talk to as many as I can every year. To me, it’s important to participate in the education of our next generation.
The students who have come to job shadow over the years range in experience from “I’ve never even seen a horse in real life” to “We have 6 horses at our house and I rodeo through the summer with my cousins.” The questions they ask are good ones, like “what kind of education did you get in order to do this job?” “Do you have a college degree?” And this is where the fun begins. I DO have a college degree! In Political Science. I even have a Master’s Degree….in Mental Health Counseling. Pause for confused face
My educational background in horses is well…the traditional model:
I grew up as one of those barn rat kids who get left at the barn all weekend long…you know the ones who ride, then graze the horse, then ride again, then eat lunch, then sweep the barn aisle…I morphed my barn rat status into Working Student when I entered High School. I spent summers under 3 different trainers across the country. One in each in Georgia, Colorado and California. Each differing styles of business, although all related to dressage. Each with differing levels of responsibility. I learned all about the lifestyle of a professional horse person, feeding strategies, supplements, training programs, lesson programs, barn management….Since tender years I have moved hay, shavings, feed sacks, hauled buckets of water inconveniently long distances…
So yes, student, I do have a very good traditional classroom education, and quite a lot of it. None of it in any way related the equestrian field. In large part, because my parents wouldn’t let me. And also because I thought I wanted to be an attorney and argue before the Supreme Court about really important Constitutional Questions…but I ended up simply getting a job at a law firm, where I learned I really didn’t like the day to day life of a lawyer. So I worked as an office professional, because you know, rent is expensive. Board is expensive. Car payments are expensive. Groceries are expensive. Insurance is expensive. Gasoline is expensive. Target runs are expensive…..well so for a good long while I enjoyed my steady salaried income that provided me with the money I needed to live, and enough time off to show my horse. I made enough money outside of the horse world to be a horse person.
Now as a professional horse person, I work to afford to be able to be a regular person!
Much of the education of the professional horse person, in my opinion MUST come from vast hands-on equestrian experience. I would not even consider running a horse boarding facility of any size if I did not have as much experience with horses as I do. IN MY OPINION: if you can’t put a standing wrap on a horse leg TODAY, or understand the basic floor to ceiling needs of a live horse and how much work it takes to maintain it…well you probably shouldn’t run a boarding facility.
The very best way. THE VERY BEST WAY to learn to be a horseman is the same way in which horsemen have become horsemen since Xenophon sat down to write “The Art of Horsemanship” 2,400 years ago. Learn from someone who knows horses. And learn from the horses. In short: experience. One horse is a lot of responsibility, but 10-35 is a whole other situation. A horseman has to speak, move and act horse everywhere they go in their barn (and try to remember to not act horse in the Grocery store). A boarding facility owner is called upon, frequently for all things horsemanship from catching a collic early to catching a loose horse.
To work in horses, you really REALLY REALLY need to have spent quite a lot of time with them.
From the outside looking in as my, 8 year old student puts it so eloquently “YOU HAVE THE MOST FUNNEST JOB IN THE WHOLE WORLD!!!!” She’s not entirely wrong. Although I feel like taste tester at Ben & Jerry’s might be a couple notches above my work, but what we do here at Lincoln Equestrian Center is fun. It’s a whole hekkuva lot more fun than say filing paper, waiting for a fax or decoding insurance codes. I know…because before I was here I was there…in the copy room…scanning endless documents in a space crammed with so much office equipment you come to understand that yes, electricity DOES have a smell.
I don’t often miss those days, although I do miss my wonderful co-workers, leaving work on Friday and actually LEAVING WORK. I always love doing anything that helps other people out, so that was good, as was the pay.
Now I do what I love for a living, and it’s both terrific and extremely challenging. The reality of the Boarding Facility owner is work. Labor. It’s a labor or love 365 days a year. Yes, I do pet horses every single day…but I also have to feed them every single day and make sure they are alive every single day and communicate with their owners and make business decisions every day. It’s physically, and emotionally tiring work some days. Love for horses in terms of barn management is less about having a horse on every shirt you own, and more about getting up and doing what’s right for the horse every single day no matter how badly you don't want to even if you are sick or hurt or really want a vacation.
So to my shadows: Its often as hard as it is rewarding. You need to think about that. If you really have a passion for horses, you need to think deeply and be honest about how much drive you’ve got for labor. Think deeply about how much time you are willing to put into learning the million and a half little details of horsemanship you need to have on recall in order to be truly good at this job. Know that along the way you’ll need to pick up 2 million more little details…
It’s a lot! I’m glad for all the myriad experiences I’ve had in my life both equestrian and “business causal” because each of those challenges and experiences has brought me here. To a place where I’m mature enough and have enough experience with people AND horses to run my own business…
….we’ll get to the business side next time!
