The Cattlehedging Times December 2011 Edition

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Introduction

CattleHedging.com has built its research on a scripture passage from Luke 12:54-56; “When you see a cloud rising in the west you say immediately that it is going to rain – and so it does; and when you notice that the wind is blowing from the south you say that it is going to be hot – and so it is. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and the sky; why do you not know how to interpret the present times?” While the intent of this scripture is Jesus talking to the crowds about their faith, the point for us is how the “present times” helps us interpret opportunities, risk and how to manage them. Unable to consistently forecast the future, what variables are present now that guides us to successful Risk Management decisions? From this the three Strategies of Profitability, Price Risk and Basis Risk or Opportunity grew over the past 37 years!

It is time to take Risk Management another step further! You may follow one, some or your own Risk Management philosophies but are you consistently successful? I can teach our three disciplines and some will be successful while others get discouraged because of failure to protect or grow their EQUITY! Why the difference?

To answer the question why some feed yards, ranchers or farmers are successful and others find difficulty in decisions, disciplines and failure, when managing risk, CattleHedging.com has hired a psychologist to do a one year research project on “Profiling those that take risk and try and manage their risk”!

About Lori-Hicks Fox

I have spent the last five years completing my Masters at Argosy University in Phoenix in the area of Psychology. I have worked as a Family Support Specialist and as a Child and Family Therapist in which I have learned patience, kindness, and the effects of our present time; which includes: poverty, addiction, loneliness, and success. I have a wonderful family and my two boys ages three and two keep me very busy. I am very happy to be a part of CattleHedging.com and working on a project that will hopefully provide you with a new and different outlook on profiling behavior and its relation to identifying and managing risk.

Lori Fox has a Masters in psychology that will guide questions and do research for those that choose to take risk and how they manage it. She will provide research, results, thoughts on specific areas of behavior for those managing risk, provide a quote and a question for your response. After a series of questions, evaluation and research she hopes to provide some conclusions to behavior between successful, failure and somewhere in between for all of us to consider. She may give us direction on whom or what behavior type of person should be handling your risk management, the owner, manager, employee or maybe your spouse or child?

What she is asking from you is your participation. Without your response she can not evaluate, conclude or share her findings. This first TIMES – NEWSLETTER will ask you to fill out a “Sign of the Times Demographics Survey”. Each week or biweekly Times – Newsletter will address “Current Research and Thoughts”, “A Quote of the Time” and a “Question” for you to respond to. Please fill out the demographic survey (only need to do once) and then each week you will only need to answer a new question. As we move through this process we hope that each Times – Newsletter will leave you with a thought, helpful research comment, quote to chuckle about and a question to add to the data base.

Please forward these Times – Newsletters on to anyone else (owner, manager, employees, banker, spouse, parents, kids, and traders, even your therapist) to participate in this study. The participants will be kept confidential by Lori. She has an email that you can communicate your thoughts and comments to help direct her studies. Please feel free to contact her at any time.

Thank you for your participation! Larry Hicks Owner & CEO of CattleHedging.com, LLC



Collecting demographic information and profiling

Profiling…There are varying types of psychological profiling today. This can include cultural, racial, forensic, offender, educational and many others. Most thesaurus’ would describe the act of profiling as a way to try and identify, record, and analyze a person’s behavior in order to predict or assess their abilities in certain areas or to identify a particular group of people. According to Dan Koreem, in his book The Art of Profiling, he describes profiling as a way of assessing how to predict how someone is likely to communicate, perform on the job, and make decisions in any profession.

Our focus for this year and our research will be on profiling behavior for those who take risk and try to manage their risk. Through profiling we hope to identify behavior that leads to success over failure when identifying and managing risk. We want to know how emotion plays a role in risk management. We need your help! When you receive our newsletter take a minute to read our question and quote of the time. Don’t forget to fill out our demographic form online. It will be used to collect our data. You will only need to fill the survey out one time.

We want to hear from you. Email me your comments, questions, thoughts and ideas. It is you, who we are doing this for; and it is you we want to hear from. Lori Hicks-Fox, MA lori@cattlehedging.com

“A good trader can make any strategy work, and a poor one will lose money over time, regardless of method.” -Mike Elvin

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