Tia Kuss has kickstarted her career in agriculture with the ideal job that is taking her around the country to develop skills and knowledge that one day might prove invaluable if she returns to the family farm in Esperance.
She was one of only a handful of university graduates to be offered a place in the inaugural Rabobank Australian graduate program, which runs for 18 months and provides opportunities for regional - and potentially international - travel.
Already Ms Kuss has spent time at Rabobank's Moree, New South Wales, office and is currently working out of its Dubbo, NSW, branch for the company's country banking division.
These are a long way from Esperance, where she grew up helping out in her family's small Angus cattle breeding operation.
"I loved working on the farm and always had horses, which are one of my passions," Ms Kuss said.
"I would always be helping dad with checking cows for the calving period in winter, so calves could be weighed and tagged on the day of their birth, preparing for bull sales and getting exposure to a range of client-professional relationships through meetings with bank managers and stock agents and the like."
Ms Kuss went to school in Esperance and then took a gap year.
During this time, she worked for a local racehorse trainer, riding the horses to keep them fit for the Esperance race meets.
"I wasn't a jockey, but did lots of bush riding and track work," she said.
Ms Kuss also went back to helping her parents on their farm, both with physical work and in their relationships with various industry professionals.
She then headed to Gatton, in the Lockyer Valley region, to attend the University of Queensland's Gatton campus, where she did a dual degree in agribusiness and equine science.
Ms Kuss took her horses with her to Queensland and said riding them had been a godsend during the years of COVID-19 lockdowns when she was unable to travel back to Western Australia.
"I did apply to do uni at Curtin as well, but decided the University of Queensland would give me the opportunity to travel along with my studies," she said.
"I am keen to explore new parts of Australia and love getting out into nature, especially if I land in an area near the coast.
"I grew up with the exceptional beaches around Esperance and enjoy getting to the beach in other parts of Australia whenever I can."
Graduating last year, and now aged 24, Ms Kuss applied for the Rabobank graduate program position, which started in February this year.
"I applied because I wanted to further my skills with one of the country's leading agribusiness and financial institutions," she said.
"It is my first nine-to-five job and has been a great transition from university to work life.
"I want to use the position to widen my skill sets and gather as much knowledge from people as I can.
"I like that Rabobank is solely agricultural-focused and that there is scope to travel around."
While on a five-month stint in Moree, Ms Kuss was mainly involved in getting to know the operations of the business and those of its clients.
"It was frontline work and I went out and about, meeting local farmers and attending industry functions," she said.
"I learned a lot from the staff there."
Now at Dubbo, Ms Kuss is diving in deeper to how the client and banking relationship is maintained and improved.
A typical day sees her in the office learning many procedures and maybe attending a Rabobank-sponsored event.
Ms Kuss said there were many career development opportunities to be had through the graduate program.
Rabobank is the world's leading specialist food and agribusiness bank and one of Australia's biggest agricultural lenders.
It is a major provider of business and corporate banking services to the country's food and agribusiness sector and Ms Kuss said she felt privileged to be part of the first cohort of graduates to come on board with the company.
Through the graduate program she will spend time on location rotation and in the fields of rural banking, risk management, technology, operations, business transformations, people and culture.
"Rotations are tailored for each of us graduates," Ms Kuss said.
"This enables us to spend time across the bank's operations, working with a wide range of teams to learn from and gain experience in.
"I feel very supported and confident that I can progress my chosen areas of interest and have the chance to be part of Rabobank's inclusive and flexible work culture."
Each Rabobank graduate program participant is matched with a senior leader from the organisation and Ms Kuss said it was highly valuable having this mentor throughout the 18 months of rotations.
She said she was learning so much and developing skills that would be highly valuable in the family farming business if she went back to work there in the future.
"For example, I have learned how important diversification is to spread risk for a business and how complex finance is," Ms Kuss said.
"It has been a real eye-opener."
Ms Kuss recently sold her horses because she will be moving around a fair bit and said her new hobbies included getting out into nature whenever she could.
"I take any opportunity to venture out into the regions I am working in," she said.
Rabobank has now opened applications for the 2024 cohort of university graduates who have a passion for and interest in agriculture.
Company group executive, chief human relations officer Belinda Webber said the graduate program was proving to be an excellent pathway to attract, develop and retain talented young people within the business and Australian agricultural sector more broadly.
She said applications would close on Tuesday, August 29 and graduates would start in February 2024.
