Land Management: A Metaphor for Better Leadership

One thing about me: I’m a creature of habit. I crave routine and familiarity; I like having something to depend on and to ground me.

 

So I go on evening walks. Every evening, after my son is in bed and the chores have been done, I take my dog, Odin, for a walkabout on the ranch where we live. In a world replete with technological advancements, constant connection, dinging notifications and ever-present change. I find solace in something simple , a walk through the pasture.

 

There’s something about the dusk of day when we, as humans, are often winding down, and much of nature is busy coming alive, that puts me right back in my place.

 

Last night I embarked on my walk later than usual, and I wondered at all the noise that peaked as the sun fell. The chorus of cicadas high in the trees married with the melodic call of a Chuck-will’s-widow, occasionally accented with the rustling and clucks of turkeys roosting in the creek or the trill of a cricket frog. I startled a raccoon that rapidly ascended a pecan tree, and a white tail doe and her fawn considered me carefully from a distance before silently slipping back out of sight into the woods. Dragonflies flitted across the road in front of me, and the very pasture seemed to writhe with movement as an entire community of plant, animal, and insect life skittered between blades of grass.

 

I considered the aesthetics of my surroundings and how they related to all that my ears were hearing. Some important context here is that this ranch has recently transitioned from conventional pasture and cattle management to a more regenerative approach. The land is still in transition as it repositions itself to thrive without synthetic inputs and as longer rest periods create opportunity for the seedbank to express itself.

 

In other words, the land is healing.

 

Many people might take the same walk I did and cast disdainful glances at the marestail and foxtail that dominate pieces of the landscape. They crave seeing tall, waving grass with nary a broadleaf in sight to mar the view. Historically in agriculture we have often succumbed to this narrative and created that very picture for ourselves. Make no mistake, it’s for us and us only. We forced the land to look like what we considered ideal, and despite our good intentions were ignorant of the unintentional consequences that our desired outcomes would create. As we realize our mistakes and recognize these consequences, words like “sustainable” and “regenerative” and “holistic” take the stage and we take action to undo what we have done.

 

The healing process can be ugly. But it’s beautifully loud and chaotic, and most of all it’s very, very alive.

 

The land comes completely and totally alive with renewed energy when we allow it to be what it always was intended to be.

 

It suddenly struck me that people can be the same way.

 

In our businesses, there are many jobs to do: accounting, planning, payroll, management, sales, marketing, and hiring. We also have grazing and nutrition plans to create, plus we need to benchmark and strategize. And we need people to do all of these jobs. People who are skilled and dedicated to those tasks and whom we can depend on to get the job done.

 

But sometimes we forget that people aren’t just the job that they do; they’re much more than that. Just as a big bluestem plant and a purple basket flower plant have two vastly different purposes above ground, so too they are serving many additional, subtle, but critical roles in the ecosystem as a whole. Roles that supersede our primary intended role for them as a forage source. In the same way, our people may have a primary purpose in the business, but they add much to the business in subtle, unique ways that only they can.

 

In the Ranching for Profit School, we talk about what motivates employees. Studies have shown that more than anything, people are motivated by autonomy, mastery, and purpose. Often, if you encourage people to do more of what they’re naturally good at, (the things they are inherently inclined towards) when you just get out of the way, they will astound you with what they can accomplish. A job needs to be done, certainly. But in the words of General George Patton, “Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.”

 

We need our land to grow forage and feed our cattle. But we’ve spent many years telling it exactly how to, and how not to do that. When we get out of the way, it surprises us with the many ways it goes above and beyond and achieves more than it was capable of when we were calling all the shots.

 

If you have hired the right people for your business, I guarantee you that they have great value in addition to completing the tasks they were hired to do. They have great ideas and great capabilities that grow and nourish workplace culture. To stunt those things is to stagnate the business.

 

Just as a land steward’s job is to help the ecology express itself to its greatest potential so, too, a great leader’s primary role is to give their people the autonomy and opportunity to create business value in new and unique ways.

What are you doing to empower your employees to thrive in your business? What opportunities are there for them to cultivate their skills and abilities in a way that excites and motivates them? Our people are the lifeblood of our business. By intentionally creating more of those opportunities, you might see your business come to life more than ever before.