Cheers to Deadlines

Deadlines are a good thing. They create rhythm and flow to tasks and timelines, and establish a priority–often, urgency–to to-do’s. If ever there were a season for deadlines, it seems that, this year, September was the start of it.

Here’s a sample of some deadlines we may share. Growers are responding to Mother Nature’s deadline, bringing fruit in at the end of its maturation cycle and sending it on its postharvest production journey. Agencies and organizations are writing budgets and planning policy positions for the year to come. Scientists are writing grants, gathering collaborators and collecting letters of support for research whose time has come. And I’m feverishly working (with the help of many people) to finetune our organization’s bylaws and governance policies for greater growth, member involvement and strategic focus, and to ready for NGRA’s November Board meeting and the NGRA-ARS Sensor Technology Workshop, which I hope you’re readying for, too!

The next several weeks will be critical to the outcome of the projects we’re all working on. But they also will have bearing on the year–or years–ahead, serving to inform or guide or shape or, dare I say, change the future for our work-lives, our stakeholders and our industry.

So, cheers to September for the game-changing opportunities it set before us! And good luck to us all as we work through the end of the year, focused on the tasks at hand. Just set those deadlines and go!