Helping people becomes passion of Farm Credit CEO

MAHOMET, Ill. — Business and numbers attracted Aaron Johnson to a career in agricultural financing, but the relationship and people aspect of the business became his passion during the past several decades.

“It was early in the ‘90s when I knew what I loved to do every day was find ways to help people,” said Johnson, president and CEO of Farm Credit Illinois.

“Even in the ‘80s, in the middle of the farm crisis, there were still ways to help people,” said Johnson, who will be retiring from his position on Dec. 31.

“The lesson I’ve learned is that it doesn’t matter what’s going on in the farm economy or the economic standing of the country, there’s always things you can do,” he said. “I feel that Farm Credit does that better than anyone and it’s been a privilege and honor to be associated with this cooperative and watch all the remarkable things Farm Credit Illinois has been able to do.”

Johnson, who grew up outside of New Holland in central Illinois, studied at Lincoln Land Community College for an associate’s degree in accounting and transferred to Illinois State University to complete his bachelor’s degree in organizational business management.

“I went straight to work in St. Louis, which at the time was the Federal Intermediate Credit Bank, at a training pool that included 26 of us from Arkansas, Missouri and Illinois,” Johnson said. “It was a unique program where we trained, went out to the country for a while and worked, then came back for additional training.”

“I interviewed with the president of the Production Credit Association in Decatur and he’s the one that got me excited about joining Farm Credit,” he recalled. “I was hired in October and started Jan. 8, 1985.”

Johnson worked at the Pontiac office until 1988 and then went to a commercial bank in northwest Illinois for two years.

“I really enjoyed my time at that bank and I still have lifelong friends there,” he said. “But I felt the mission and cooperative structure of Farm Credit is where I wanted to be, so I came back to Farm Credit in 1990 and have been here ever since.”

For several years, Johnson worked as a loan officer and regional manager, managing loan officers. In 2002, he joined the senior management team at the Champaign office in east-central Illinois.

“My first position was strategic initiative as a senior manager,” he said. “It had a lot to do with rebuilding a reputation in the marketplace.”

In 2019, Johnson was the executive vice president of Farm Credit Illinois, when CEO Tom Tracy unexpectedly died.

“I was working closely with Tom, he was a great leader and a good friend,” he said. “It was a trying time for all of us when he passed and then the board named me CEO on Jan. 1, 2020.”

Three months later, the COVID pandemic resulted in drastic changes to how companies conducted business across the country.

“It was amazing the way the team pulled together and we were able to serve our members throughout the pandemic,” Johnson said.

“We really didn’t miss a beat and that’s a testament to our employees and how passionate they are about taking care of the members,” he said. “But it stopped all our customer appreciate events, networking and our ability to hold learning conferences with our young farmers and that was really hard on us.”

During his almost 40-year career, Johnson has seen a lot of changes and one of the most impactful has been the increase in speed of sharing information.

“When I started in 1985, you waited on something to come in the mail and it might take two weeks after someone wrote a communication before you saw it,” the CEO said.

“Today, we have all this information at our fingertips, and if you want a message out, you can type it, send it out and everybody in the company gets it in six seconds,” he said. “It’s amazing how much more effective it makes you.”

Johnson’s first cell phone was a bag phone.

“It only worked in about 20% of the territory and the rest of the time you had to find a hill,” he said. “Now the approval process is all electronic on our cell phones.”

The risk management tools for farmers to use have also changed significantly.

“In 1985, we had one rate and it was variable so there was no risk mitigation by being able to lock in an interest rate,” Johnson said.

“Now having the ability to lock in rates and still be able to reprice when rates come down, that’s a huge benefit compared to the mid-80s,” he said.

“Crop insurance in the mid-80s was yield only so it didn’t protect you from much,” Johnson said. “And the commodity prices were so low that it wasn’t worth much so only about 10% of the farmers purchased it.”

“Now the ability to protect revenue has really been amazing, let alone all the marketing options,” he said. “I’m pretty confident we’re going to get there on livestock because I see a lot of good discussion about changes on how to make the livestock insurance better than it is now.”

Although Johnson has experienced a lot of changes, he said he doesn’t think those changes will compare to what’s going to happen in the next 40 years.

“With fast internet just about everywhere, that will make it easier to access digital tools,” the CEO said.

“At the same time what we continue to hear is you have to be high tech and high touch,” he said. “Our members tell us these are great tools, but don’t get away from serving us with good people that understand our operations.”

Following retirement, Johnson looks forward to spending time with his six grandchildren from Illinois to Pennsylvania.

“My wife, Debbie, and I have a corn, soybean, hay, CRP farm with some timber on it in western Illinois, so I plan to spend some time there,” Johnson said.

“We’ve been married for 40 years and my wife is one of the main reasons I’ve been able to do what I’ve done with Farm Credit,” he said. “You must have a spouse that’s supportive and understands the time commitment it takes to engage in the business in the way we do and she’s always been there.

“The relationships with board members, employees and member borrowers have been the highlight of my career and many of those will be lifelong friends,” Johnson said.

“Being able to be a part of a cooperative that has member experience as the top priority even over income is a different way to get up and go to work every morning.

“Our owners care deeply about agriculture and young farmers so they’re willing to give up some of the patronage they would receive for us to invest in rural communities and young farmers,” the CEO said.

“We’ve got the best young and beginning farmer program in the country with FreshRoots,” he said. “So, working for a cooperative that has that kind of culture and direction is a blessing that I’ll always be thankful for.”

The Farm Credit Illinois board of directors began the process to hire a new CEO on May 1.

“We have some very talented internal employees and the board will also search outside the Farm Credit system and accept resumes through June 15,” Johnson said.

The goal is to select a new CEO by Sept. 1 and have that person in place by Nov. 1.

“I’ll have 60 days to transition,” Johnson said. “I’m confident they’ll find someone that will take the association to even higher levels of performance and member experience than what we’ve done to date.”

The CEO job posting is available at https://tinyurl.com/47e6azbe. For more information about Farm Credit Illinois, go to www.farmcreditIL.com.