Ag Leader's products and solutions help integrate your entire farm year-round. Use our products to seamlessly connect your equipment and tasks so that your operation runs more efficiently than ever before. As a product owner in software at Ag Leader, I prioritize customer and stakeholder requirements of our feature development.

PowerPollen is an Iowa based start up that focuses on cutting edge innovations for the agricultural industry. They work with pollen technologies for the high volume collection, preservation and application of pollen. As a project manager for PowerPollen I focused on planning, executing, monitoring and controlling various projects as they arise. This involved enhanced technical recruiting efforts for scale up and facility expansion! Previous projects include the branding campaign for 2020, assistance in our video/photo shoot with Studio Iowa, and material movement for the production season. I lead efforts for our internship program and continued my involvement with safety and have taken the role of Crisis Manager.

As the production biology lead I managed multiple teams of biology personnel during the seed production season. I was responsible for research in the remainder of the year in offsite locations (Puerto Rico and Texas) as well as here in Ankeny, IA. We increased our internship program by more than five fold! From just 5 interns to 27, which increased the need for effective sourcing, recruitment, and onboarding. I assisted in an overhaul of our time record management and safety materials. I lead the effort in the development of more thorough training materials for incoming personnel.

I supported everyday operations including logistics of field locations, being the field lead for the production season across the Midwest, product manufacturing lead and data collection lead for year round operations. Lead a specialized project to utilize Mechanical Turk to create a more high throughput data collection system using image analysis. I also supported lab efforts where needed to help with the workload and was responsible for internship program management and recruitment. I also participated in the safety program development and implementation, which really sparked an interest I wasn't expecting.

Dallas Center is a Multi-Crop Research Station and I helped support their breeding efforts. The station conducts breeding nurseries for genetic population development and I supported all phases of planning, execution, data collection, and data quality for the 113 day maize breeding program. This included experiment creation and implementation, field mapping, seed preparation, seed filling, planting, plot maintenance, pollinating, data collection and harvest as needed. Communication was essential to my role within the research station to make sure deadlines and needs are met in house as well as with other stations. I also worked to coordinate and lead the shelling efforts across all the corn breeding programs as part of the overall station seed handling efforts. I had been coordinating our station seed requests as well as supporting an additional breeding program while a colleague was on leave. I was responsible for a pollination team of 31 individuals in selfing and crossing blocks and tagging efforts across our nursery and obs locations.

The Seed Science group characterizes corn hybrids for early season stress. There is a field component which I lead each summer and a lab component which I supported through out the year. All the data is compiled data at the end of the year and each hybrid is assigned a stress emergence score.Farmers can see the stress emergence scores (SE Score) and use them to determine which hybrids to plant in their fields depending on stress levels expected.

As a research assistant I participated in data collection in the field. We characterized hybrids for early season stress emergence. Along with the field component of my position, I was heavilyinvolved in lab operations within the group as well. I assisted with protocol development for heat emergence and varying germination tests. I lead an imbibition study as well as a categorization of raised embryos to aid in understanding effects of seed quality and handling practices. I have assisted in quality testing demonstrations with several departments across the company. We test breeding populations for their ability to germinate under extremely stressful conditions, as an assistant I was responsible for analyzing and communicating these results to breeders.

At Dallas Center's research station I assisted with most of the phenotypic data collection taken on corn throughout the summer. I assisted with field maintenance as needed. I was able to participate in a few experiments the summer I interned. We did a study involving leaf destruction in a tropical variety of corn. We also did a detassling study to determine the females eligibility to be mechanically destassled. The Dallas Center Station has a lot to offer anyone interested in corn breeding. With so many breeders in the building it was really easy to develop an understanding of what is expected in the commercial agriculture realm.

As a Maize Product Development Professional intern I assisted my group in hybrid characterization that would benefit farmers in early season stressed environments. I also participated in experiments that evaluated corn genetic differentiation to flooding stress and seedling vigor. Part of our responsibility included supporting efforts to evaluate breeding populations using a proprietary testing technique.

Bunge North America is an agribusiness and food ingredient company dedicated to improving the global food supply chain. They supply raw and processed agricultural commodities and specialized food ingredients to a wide range of customers in the livestock, poultry, food processor, food services and bakery industries. As a crop scout for Bunge I travelled across the United States performing crop surveys and data collection. I presented my research to the world research team for use in company forecasting. One of my projects was to put into effect a system for referencing previously collected data regarding yields by crop and state. A lot of responsibility was given to each crop scout; we managed our time, routes and travel arrangements. Through the internship program I was also able to participate in the Chicago Board of Trade on the floor and work with a previously acquired company for a week to attain experience within a grain elevator and production environment.

Montgomery Sales Inc. is a dealership for trucks, trailers, and dump beds. They also handle salvage for the area, have a parts department, and offer tow service. Through my experience with them I developed excellent customer service skills, including how to best help a customer in distress. I was exposed to Quick Books and processing legal documentation such as titles and notice of sales. One of my biggest responsibilities was to create and distribute company catalogs. I also created and maintained a network inventory system utilized by sales personnel.