Manage agricultural or forestry operations
Little of this can be handed to software today.
The reporting and paperwork around management automate well. Directing, developing and evaluating people does not, and people do not accept it when it is attempted on them.
| How automatable | Barely automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Managing, training and developing people |
| Jobs that do it | 5 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | Enterprise platforms |
| O*NET activity | Guiding, Directing, and Motivating Subordinates (4.A.4.b.4) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 5 occupations that perform it.
- Manage nurseries that grow horticultural plants for sale to trade or retail customers, for display or exhibition, or for research.
- Regulate grazing, such as by issuing permits and checking for compliance with standards, and help ranchers plan and organize grazing systems to manage, improve, protect, and maximize the use of rangelands.
- Supervise activities of other forestry workers.
- Supervise or train agricultural technicians or farm laborers.
- Monitor activities of logging companies and contractors.
- Direct and monitor trapping and spawning of fish, egg incubation, and fry rearing, applying knowledge of management and fish culturing techniques.
- Plan and direct construction and maintenance of range improvements, such as fencing, corrals, stock-watering reservoirs, and soil-erosion control structures.
- Plan and supervise forestry projects, such as determining the type, number and placement of trees to be planted, managing tree nurseries, thinning forest and monitoring growth of new seedlings.
- Supervise pest or weed control operations, including locating and identifying pests or weeds, selecting chemicals and application methods, or scheduling application.
- Manage forest protection activities, including fire control, fire crew training, and coordination of fire detection and public education programs.
- Direct and monitor the transfer of mature fish to lakes, ponds, streams, or commercial tanks.
- Plan and implement revegetation of disturbed sites.
- Direct, and participate in, forest fire suppression.
- Supervise forest nursery operations, timber harvesting, land use activities such as livestock grazing, and disease or insect control programs.
- Determine plant growing conditions, such as greenhouses, hydroponics, or natural settings, and set planting and care schedules.
- Plan and direct construction and maintenance of recreation facilities, fire towers, trails, roads and bridges, ensuring that they comply with guidelines and regulations set for forested public lands.
- Plan and supervise construction of access routes and forest roads.
- Direct the breeding or raising of stock, such as cattle, poultry, or honeybees, using recognized breeding practices to ensure stock improvement.
What we would actually use
Nothing in our landscape addresses this work. That is the honest answer rather than a padded list: this activity needs a person present, or a machine rather than a software agent.
Buy nothing. The reporting and paperwork around management run on whatever you already use for documents, and the part that is actually managing people does not automate at any price.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
The rest of the category
Context, not alternatives to weigh up. We name the layer rather than promise a named product does your specific task.
Enterprise platforms
Matched from the kind of work, not from vendor marketing. Check any of them can reach the system your records actually live in — that connection, not the model, is where these projects stall.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
5 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Manage agricultural or forestry operations”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
| Activity | Jobs |
|---|---|
| Direct activities of agricultural, forestry, or fishery employees | 5 |
| Coordinate forestry or agricultural activities | 2 |
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.