Meet Mary Barefoot

Mary Barefoot is AgCareers.com’s HR Services Manager. She has been with the company for 11 years and works from the Clinton, North Carolina company headquarters.

What do you do on a day-to-day basis in your role with AgCareers.com?

I feel that my role is divided across several different focus areas, one of which would be serving as the HR generalist for our team. My other hats involve providing compensation resources to our clients through our agribusiness compensation survey called our Compensation Benchmark Review. That portion of my job is somewhat twofold in sharing the service offering with clients as well as managing the process of collecting the data and reporting the information. Beyond the salary survey, we also conduct the Agribusiness HR Review on an annual basis which provides HR policy and procedure benchmarks for agribusinesses in a given year.

What do you enjoy about working with AgCareers.com?

I personally enjoy the challenge that it presents to me on a given day. I really enjoy the variety that’s offered through my role. Staying up to date on HR legislation to connecting with clients and then analyzing data that results in information that can be applied to businesses. I also enjoy that all of those efforts are within the ag industry because I grew up on a farm. I’m very passionate about that.

What advice would you give to employers using AgCareers.com for the first time?

As someone within HR, AgCareers.com offers a lot of free market research, however, some of those reports require participation to receive the results. I’d recommend that employers engage with these surveys so they may benefit from the information available at little to no cost.

What is one of your favorite memories while working with AgCareers.com?

Mine probably relates back to the salary survey. Identifying a need within our industry to provide salary data and starting literally with no resource and creating that for our clients was very exciting to lead and be a part of.

In your spare time, what do you like to do on the weekends?

I really enjoy just quality time spent at home with my family and pets and fellowshipping with the members of our church.

What’s your favorite snack and name one thing you can’t live without while working?

Dove milk chocolates—I love the little phrases on the inside. They’re always encouraging. The Clinton office can always count on me to have chocolate. I can’t live without a good cup of coffee while working.

Favorite book & favorite movie?

My favorite movie is The Holiday. I really enjoy reading Christine Hoover’s blog Grace Covers Me and her book The Church Planning Wife has been extremely encouraging to me.

Want more insight from Mary? Check out all of her blog posts from Talent Harvest.