How Does Your Garden Grow?
An organisation is like a garden it has great potential for growth and beauty. But cultivating a garden requires resources. Time and effort, it also demands that the organisational leadership look out for and deal with weeds, removing them as necessary to avoid them growing and killing the plants that have been planted.
Two of the most common weeds in an organisation are;
Pet Projects; where the leadership show favouritism towards particular schemes or people running projects regardless of their actual merit or business priority. Good business leaders don’t show favouritism. How about you? Do you realise that too? Or do you mix only with your own kind? Cliques in business are highly damaging and may exclude individuals who have the potential to deliver great performance for the organisation. Look out for employees that are shy, disempowered, insecure or lacking in trust – you might just be able to bring them into a project that will enable them to thrive.
Rumours; The corporate tom tom drums are incredibly powerful, but how often do you take part in spreading the gossip? When you hear a rumour about the organisation, a department or an individual do you stop it dead in its tracks? Are you willing to find out the truth by talking directly to those involved? Don’t talk about situations or people, and don’t let anyone else talk about them either. Rumour and gossip is the art of saying nothing, and leaving nothing unsaid. If you want to promote organizational harmony, don’t indulge in it!
The fact is that all organisations have a purpose, it was why they were created. Organisaton’s don’t just exist to make money or profit for their shareholders, they exist for a higher purpose. It is the leaders job to do the work that the organisation is designed to do. Not keeping busy, not squeezing square pegs into round holes, but expending time, energy and resource on achieving the organisation-shaped purpose. The leadership need to be at the helm, steering the organizational ‘ship’ to do immeasurably more than you ask or imagine.