Yesterday’s guest speaker in Midwest Entrepreneurs class, Dr. Mauri Ditzler, is best known to those in attendance as the President of Monmouth College. He is now known to them also for his 35-year career as a business process outsourcing service provider whose entrepreneurial journey was  (1) characterized by discover and adaptation, and (2) enabled by keen understanding of both how to motivate workers and, yes, corn sex.

I should probably address that last issue first… By “corn sex” I mean corn breeding; specifically the de-tasseling aspect of the breeding process (so as to produce the best seed corn and, ultimately, maximize yields per acre and feed the world, etc.). Also, Dr. Ditzler is from deep in farm country and his Ph.D. is in the field of analytical chemistry. He understands this serious stuff in great detail. Enough about corn sex… But if you want to know more, see: http://www.hollowaysdetasseling.com/what.htm

The roots of Mauri Ditzler’s 35-year entrepreneurial journey are found on the farm in Indiana. He began de-tasseling corn when he was a young boy. When he was 17-18 years old he and a friend decided to start a business providing de-tasseling services to seed companies.

The company Dr. Ditzler helped run until his appointment as President of Monmouth College in 2005 was a business process outsourcing (BPO) de-tasseling services firm. As discussed in class earlier this semester, BPO is an area of vast opportunity for entrepreneurial innovation via performing services for organizations previously done in-house. The BPO firm typically specializes in performing one or a narrow set of related services—like bookkeeping or customer service—and doing what needs to be done better and more efficiently and effectively (i.e., better and cheaper) than the client firm can itself. In the case of Ditzler’s company, the outsourced service performed more efficiently and effectively was de-tasseling; reaching 6-8 feet into the air and taking the tassels off selected ears of corn so as to allow proper hybrid germination and breeding. Ditzler found a niche in the corn production value-chain where he could perform a task more efficiently because of specialized knowledge, increased efficiency, learning curves and economies of scale. By focusing on the single task of de-tasseling and searching for constant efficiency improvements, Ditzler’s firm was able to increase benefits for its seed company clients, himself, and his partner and their employees; the seed company saved money, Ditzler earned profits from his entrepreneurship, and the workers had more consistent employment opportunities and higher wages.

As Dr. Ditzler told the classroom full of Midwest Entrepreneurs students yesterday, his entrepreneurial journey was one characterized by discovery and adaptation, with key discoveries and adaptations taking place most significantly in the context of employee motivation. At first, the company was a way for a teenager and college student to earn extra summer income. However, for longer than he now wishes he had, he and his partner ran the company “like 18-year olds.” While Ditzler said the business “allowed me to live the life I wanted,” it took him an estimated 15 years to really figure out how to effectively run it.

One of the things discovered over time was that he and his partner should have hired a lawyer and a professional negotiator early on to better manage their dealings with large seed companies (who had lawyers and professional negotiators and, thus, held the upper-hand in negotiations with smaller firms such as Ditzler’s). Also discovered was that the key to success for the company—after noting that they could not possibly raise their prices enough to keep up with a 10-fold escalation in the price of labor—was that he needed to creatively find a way to be significantly more efficient.

Ditzler discovered that the number one key to being more efficient in the de-tasseling business was not use of advanced technology but rather more effective motivation of supervisors and the de-tasselers themselves. But it is not easy to effectively and continually motivate (1) teenagers to engage in hard manual labor in usually miserably hot and wet conditions, and (2) adults to walk through the fields keeping track of the teenage de-tasselers in similar conditions for up to 16 hours a day (for the 30-40 day de-tasseling season each summer).

So, how did Ditzler motivate his employees? In general, he strived to bring a sense of enthusiasm to the work place. At first, he focused on the de-tasselers by creating competitions and rewarding the fastest and otherwise best performers. This, however, can only work for so long; one can only go so fast in such harsh conditions without physical breakdown.

So, the focus shifted to the supervisors. Ditzler and his partner had always understood the importance of good field supervision and had, as a result, always compensated supervisors well. They began experimenting with different supervisor-to-de-tasseler ratios. As the ratio moved from the long-time standard of 1:8 (1 supervisor for 8 de-tasselers) to 1:6 and even 1:4, Ditzler discovered that efficiency continually increased in significant fashion. He and his partner adapted and began to focus their attention on the hiring, motivation, and, most importantly, retention of the best possible field supervisors available. Eventually, they discovered it was best to outsource the hiring of de-tasselers to a state employment office (so that they could focus on their time on the all-important supervisors).

Only after Ditzler and his business partner discovered that they could not grow the business “running it like 18-year olds” and adapted to focus on better motivation of their employees were they able to truly carve out a profitable niche in the de-tasseling marketplace. Their niche was as a BPO service provider uniquely capable of effectively and efficiently managing large de-tasseling crews—of 1000 and more—that could come into massive cornfields and do all the work needed on relatively short notice across a fairly large geographic territory.

The several members of the class that personally have done de-tasseling work know very well that motivating de-tasselers—mostly teenagers working their first jobs (and brutal ones at that)—is a very difficult task.

But Mauri Ditzler did it and did it well.

He discovered and adapted and came to realize that the key to success for his business—and client satisfaction—was employee motivation. This is nothing new to Midwest Entrepreneurs students; particularly those doing research in the area of how one of the best ways to ultimately satisfy customers is to hire, satisfy, and retain good workers.

Since he became the President of Monmouth College, Dr. Ditzler has not been back to see the business that his long-time partner is still running; seeing your old love again can be a painful experience that wisdom tells us is better avoided. Over 35 years, the seed corn de-tasseling business taught the chemistry professor turned college president that the world is a dynamic place that requires discovery, adaptation, flexibility, and problem-solving skills to survive. These are the among the most important of qualities of a successful entrepreneur. Funny how these same qualities also sound a lot like the foundation of a liberal arts education.

Thank you President Ditzler for a memorable class and a memorable jaunt down entrepreneurial memory lane!

Note: Portions of this post are adapted from a 20 March 2011 blog post authored by Dr. Mike Connell after a previous visit to Midwest Entrepreneurs class by Dr. Mauri Ditzler.