John Deere’s new approach to the Develop with Deere conference in Kansas City last week drew a lot of attention. Instead of focusing on software developers exclusively, as has been done in the past, the company opened the event to dealers. But did all the fuss boil down to anything useful? Shannon Norwood of TriGreen Equipment, LLC John Deere Dealership seems to think it was.

Norwood attended the conference looking for opportunities to serve her customers in Athens, Alabama and other TriGreen dealerships across the south. She told Chuck Zimmerman about the sessions and the set-up Deere created to allow dealers to approach presenters later for follow up questions. “I’m definitely learning!” she laughs.

“Our customers have a tremendous amount of interest in information that is flowing through the Operations Center because with the current economic climate we’re looking to do anything we can to increase productivity and increase those economic returns.  So I feel like really having a data set that they can look at to make economic-based decisions on is going to be key for our growers.  That’s what we’re after.”

Heading back home with something concrete to take with her was Norwood’s priority. She’s found that and more. In addition to sessions, contacts with software developers will be valuable to her. Connections with other John Deere dealers who share what they’ve done to help farmers use the Operations Center successfully are vital as well.  Hallway time is important, Norwood asserts.

As she arrives in Alabama, Norwood plans to coordinate presentations between her customers and three to five of the companies from the event, hoping to help create even better solutions for 2017.

Hear more about the Develop with Deere Conference here: [wpaudio url=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/zimmcomm/jd-develop-16-norwood.mp3″ text=”Shannon Norwood, TriGreen Equipment”]

Photos from this year’s conference can be found here: Develop with Deere Photo Album