Selecting bulls that will work with your cows?

How do you go about selecting AI bulls for individual or groups of cows/heifers.

Keep current with breed publication, sale reports and get my hands on every sire directory I can get.

I try to balance phenotype and EPD's. A month before I'm ready to breed my cows I have a list of bulls that I might want to try. Then I start calling people who see a heck of a lot more cattle than I do and ask for their advice. I get some recommendations from my experts and then I make my decision. When I do decide on a bull sometimes I'll contact the owner and ask them questions or contact other breeders that have used the bull.

I try to stay away from young sires, I wait for reports from a bull's first calf crop before I'll use him.

Well, there's my 2 cents.

Thank you I really appreciate it.

Pick bulls with your goal already in mind... you simply cant get competive steers using bulls bred to have nice breeding heifers. you must pick if you want Steers or if you want heifers before you start picking a sire.
Another thing i usually like to look at when picking bulls is their dam, how they milk, their calving record, their phenotype, breed back rate, other calves she has raised, all helpful information