To be a great leader, think like a farmer

As an educator focused on leadership, I am constantly searching for good metaphors. This is because leadership is one of the most misapplied concepts of our time. Those who are given the privilege and the honour to lead others mostly do it very, very badly. They lead through coercion, through inducement, and through a mistaken sense of self-aggrandisement. 

So I paid special attention when I saw an enlightening thread on Twitter (X) recently. Eric Partaker, a CEO coach, wrote that great leaders should think like farmers. In these parts, where many people seem to be farmers in one way or another, I thought that metaphor would go a long way. So let me riff on it with you today.

I have always said this to those who ask me about leadership: a great leader creates the right conditions for others, conditions that allow those others to give of their best. A leader’s key functions are to nurture, to aid, to unblock, to coach, and to guide. The results will come not because the leader is special, but because the leader was able to make followers special. With that in mind, let’s look at what leaders should learn from farmers.

A first lesson is: don’t blame your crops! The leader’s job is to grow the followers. If they are not growing, the first person to blame is yourself. How different it is in so many workplaces, though. Leaders blame the quality and attitude of their people before even having a second thought. They shout at them, belittle them, replace them. Picture yourself as a farmer doing this in a field with your crops to see the absurdity.

A second farming lesson: pick the right plants for the soil. As a leader, you must know your people as individuals, idiosyncratic and peculiar and special. Don’t expect every plant to thrive anywhere; match skills and attributes to roles. I have watched way too much potential be wasted because a person is stuck in what is patently not a good role for them. Leaders must pay great attention to thoughtful deployment: who goes where really matters. If you can allow people to play to their strengths, their best work will follow. If you plant them in soil that does not suit them, expect only weak growth and insufficient harvests.

Next: farming takes patience, and so does leadership. Good harvests require time, and there is a process to follow. You can’t fast-track an agricultural yield, any more than you can accelerate a pregnancy. Imagine an impatient farmer uprooting the plantation because the crops are taking too long to come to fruition. The business world, however, remains fixated on haste. Everything must be quickened; nothing can be reflected on. A message to all you board members: next time you are back at your farm, take a look at how slowly and patiently the crops grow, and ask why this lesson cannot be brought back to the boardroom. The best results in our lives come from patient persistence, so why is business life such a manic race to nowhere?

What else do farmers do? They irrigate and fertilize. Eric Partaker equates this to giving praise and recognition; and to investing in the training and upskilling of your employees. I agree wholeheartedly. We must give people every chance to succeed, not just watch them struggle to take root. If we do nothing to help them make the grade, the fault is ours.

Let’s move on to weeding. Weeds compete with crops for essential nutrients, and can harbour pathogens. A good leader understands that not every employee is worth nurturing, and must spot the weeds—the ones who spoil it for everyone else. Those who bully and intimidate; those who deceive and manipulate; those who take up all the water without delivering any fruit. Your plantation should have no place for such weeds. Careful scrutiny  and regular removal of these pests is an essential leadership activity.

And finally, consider the longer term, always. The best farmers think about soil health and environmental sustainability beyond just a season or two. Even the most bumper harvest is futile if it is done at the cost of the future. A business leader who delivers a couple of blowout years followed by long-term decline is in no-one’s interest. Those who play long focus on the culture, standards and values of the organization. They never allow those to be degraded, no matter how tempting it is to maximize the fruits of the here-and-now. And they accept that in any human activity there are good seasons and bad. We must get through the bad ones with our principles intact in order to enjoy the good ones.

So there you have it. A great leader, like a diligent farmer, plans meticulously, nurtures growth, shields from threats, adapts to change, celebrates harvests, and prioritizes sustainability. By embracing these agricultural wisdoms, leaders can cultivate a flourishing environment where their people grow robustly and achieve remarkable success. In leadership, as in farming, the harvest is bountiful when the cultivation is thoughtful.

(Sunday Nation, 21 July 2024)

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