Gardener vs. SDM

In many ways managers’s job is quite similar to gardeners. I came up with this analogy when talking to a team member who asked what it was like to be a SDM. A gardener will start by picking the best seeds one could find on the market. Well, a SDM needs to hire the best. Seeds need to be soaked before planting. New hires need good onboarding care. A gardener needs to create the growing environment: the soil, water and fertilizer etc. A SDM wants to build a learning organization with tech talks, knowledge sharing and cooperation. A gardener needs to root out the weeds consistently. A SDM needs to manage unproductive team members. A gardener needs to prepare for the pests. A SDM needs to control toxic personalities in the team. A gardener cannot rush things. Once the seed is in, the soil is tilted, water and temperature are sufficient, a gardener leaves nature to do its magic. A SDM can’t force growth from team members either. Growth takes time. A gardener needs to prune constantly to keep a garden in a good shape. A SDM needs to do performance management to keep a team healthy. There are many others we can think of: A garden needs a focus point. A team needs a clear charter. A garden needs unity and themes. A team needs culture and conventions. A garden needs biodiversity. A team needs people with diverse background and skills. A garden needs divisional lines. A team needs boundaries with clearly defined ownership. A garden needs proportion and scale. A team needs balance and space. Good plants need good planting —at the right height, in a sufficiently sized, and properly amended pit. Top talents need good coaching and opportunities — the assignments just outside their comfort zones, and real time feedbacks on what is going well, what is not. … "Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished." -Lao Tzu Well, that is the ultimate dream of a SDM, isn’t it?