Edition 504 – Pot Plants

Summer has hit with a vengeance, even towards late Spring. We’ve had multiple days over 30 degrees already – including some in the mid-thirties. The ground is drying out fast. You can see the grass turn from green to brown, almost before your eyes.

Along our back patio area, I have a bunch of pots, filled with various plants. Petunias, African Daisies, Geraniums, some Succulents. I’ve liked to play in the garden for a while, mainly because my work over the years has been sedentary and inside. It’s nice to get outside, move around, and enjoy the glorious sunshine.

I’ve had a few busy days recently, and had left watering the pot plants until I grabbed a spare moment. Except, when you leave them, at this time of year, for more than a day or two, they start to struggle. They wilt. Some plants die off quick. When you water the pot, sometimes the water sits on top of the soil, for the soil inside the pot has dried out too much, too quickly. So, the water takes a while to seap through to the catch tray underneath. Plus, it always takes a little longer to water everything, if I leave it too long, than it does if I did it more regularly.

On a cool Tuesday morning, in the early morning light, as I’m watering away, I was reflecting on some recent client interactions, and how too many business owners are going about tending to their staff the wrong way, when it comes to upskilling them.

You have to teach them small amounts each day, every day. A little bit of what is taught, can then be put into action, which both reinforces the training, and prepares both you and them for the next stage.

Sometimes, you need to switch it up a little. Watering plants in the hot summer sun, works for a while. But there are times when you need to add fertiliser to the can, or water soluble crystals to the pot. In terms of your people, perhaps it’s some extra assistance internally, that might be needed to help reinforce the training. Maybe, it’s some external training, where your people go offsite and whilst they hear the same message, it’s said in a different way, that they pick up on it. Or, perhaps, it’s just that on that particular day, they heard what they needed to hear.

If the conditions are too hot, and you don’t go outside to water, you can’t complain when your plants die. Similarly, if conditions are too busy (which is a relative term, by the way), and you don’t continually train and invest in your team, you can’t complain when they don’t (or can’t) perform.

I’ve worked with small and family business owners for a long time. I’ve heard just about every excuse under the sun when it comes to why owners and managers don’t, or won’t, devote the time to training up their people. I’d say, a lot of it is down to mindset, and in particular, that of the business owners, not the employee.

Take a look out your window. What’s the garden looking like right now? Is it lush? Are your plants thriving? Or, should you invest in a little TLC, to help bring the greenery back up to where you’d like it to be?

This Week’s Tip

“Investing daily, in your people, says to them, you’re interested in them as individuals, and not merely as a resource.”