Mission

Farmerline: Transforming farmers into successful entrepreneurs by increasing their access to information, inputs, and resources to increase their productivity.
MoringaConnect: Improving lives of smallholder farmers through the moringa tree.

Challenge

Recruit, train, and compensate field agents more effectively in order to scale.

Research Activities

We traveled to 6 regions of Ghana and interviewed 42 field agents, 69 farmers, and 13 partner organizations. We gathered best practices from other agricultural organizations engaging large networks of field agents.

Key Findings:

1. Agent recruitment should align with scaling strategy. Social enterprises seeking rapid scaling can consider agent referral systems and other low-touch recruitment strategies. Social enterprises interested in long-term, sustainable growth should invest more resources into agent recruitment and focus on strengthening agent-beneficiary relationships.

2. Standardized training can increase productivity. Ensuring consistent and clear training for a sales agent network diminishes role confusion and better positions agents for efficient field activities.

3. Aligning personal and community incentives holds promise. Agents embedded within a community have a strong desire to participate in its improvement. Many agents find motivation in compensation that benefits their community, rather than only themselves.

Best Practices in Field Agent Engagement. This report responds to challenges MoringaConnect field officers face while working with farmers. We present insights of partner organizations to effectively organize field officers, expand the farmer networks, and increase the supply of moringa.

Recruiting, Training, Compensating: How to Invest in Field Agent Management to Spark Network Growth and Increase Profitability. This report will provide Farmerline with insights into its field operations and an evaluation of its field agent network. We will provide strategies used by other organizations to help ameliorate challenges in the field and offer options for future growth.

Optimal Practices for Last Mile Distribution Field Agents. The article will augment the Miller Center’s Last Mile Distribution Playbook and provide insights into the challenges and potential solutions for improving the efficacy of last mile distribution.