Before I start I should say I’m not a big gardener and as I’m sat looking out at my garden right now, writing this piece, I’m also thinking of a million jobs that need doing out here! However, as an expert in leadership and management I can see some resemblance.
My garden is best described as a ‘Homage to Nature’.
So let’s think about the tasks and skills that a gardener must do/have, here is a short list:
- Planning based on key tasks for each season of the year
- Growing and Nurturing
- Protecting
- Training
- Weeding
- Mowing
- Recycling and Composting
- Harvesting
- Care for the environment
I am sure many of you are already smiling at the similarity of some of the above with leadership and management equivalents.
For those that haven’t spotted them here are some explanations:
Planning Based On Key Tasks For Each Season Of The Year
Planning is one of the key differentiate between good and great managers and leaders. Too many get bogged down in day to day activities that they forget to take time out for planning. As such they become totally reactive in their approach which may be a downfall to their best leadership and management skills.
Growing & Nurturing
Bedding plants are planted as seeds in the spring but need to be nurtured indoors or in a heated greenhouse to protect them from frost. As leaders and managers we know that new hires and newly promoted people will also need to be nurtured. In the early days, leadership and management are crucial, and the ‘learning dip’ is our equivalent of frost to the gardener.
Protecting
The gardener has many friends and enemies that can aid or hinder his work. He must encourage the good and protect his environment from the bad. Our environments are the same and we have a duty of care for all employees as leaders and managers. Health and safety rules are one key example of this.
Training & Support
Many plants, flowers and vegetables need training and support in order to achieve maximum yield. The gardener will use garden ties to encourage climbing plants to grow in a certain direction. In business, we do exactly the same for our people through our own training and support which would be a key role for leadership and management teams to put in place.
Weeding
Unfortunately no garden is immune from weeds and neither are we. Many ‘weeds’ are pretty, but they can rapidly become invasive and take over. Leaders and managers must be ever vigilant for people that are capable of having a negative effect on others and contain or remove them.
Mowing
Mowing represents those tasks that we need to do repeatedly throughout certain seasons. It also represents how easy it is for something that is perfect ‘one minute’ can quickly deteriorate, if we take our eye off the task, or delegate it to someone else that doesn’t do it! Part of good leadership and management is to focus on ‘behind the scene’ workings and to make sure the path is clear and manageable.
Recycling & Composting
I am a massive fan of recycling in business. Too many organisations have people repeating work that somebody else has already done somewhere else. Central repositories that are effectively indexed are the key. Composting is an interesting one, using waste to create something we can use in the future. We do this as human beings, every time we have an experience that doesn't work. The fact that it is not wasted, but instead it goes into the compost heap in our brains. After a while, the sum of all that experience has a tangible and re-usable benefit which great leaders and managers will use to their advantage.
Harvesting
The final point from a leadership and management view, is a fairly obvious one. The effort that goes into your garden is directly rewarded with results. The results may be visual or in the form of flowers, as well as tangible in the form of vegetables or seeds. In business, we reap our rewards based on our effort as leaders and managers that we put in.
I really must mow the lawn now, so until next time…happy gardening – erm I mean managing!
