For most of human history, we have understood that different seasons require us to have a different focus. Trees don’t bear fruit year-round, crops need to be planted in spring, and the harvest needs to happen before winter rolls around. Growth necessarily happens in a cycle of renewal, abundance, harvest, and dormancy, so it made little sense to deviate from this.
And although we have done our best to overcome these natural cycles and create a state of permanent abundance through greenhouses, modified plants, and global supply chains, these natural cycles still exist. We can fight them by exerting extraordinary amounts of additional energy, but perhaps we are also realising that doing so is ultimately unsustainable. Rather than fight the seasons, we should learn to work with them.
These seasons don’t just exist within nature; they exist wherever there are living things… and even though we might fight against them, they exist within our organisations. There natural cycles that shape product development, professional development, projects, teams and strategy.
However, like we’ve done with industrial agriculture, there are ongoing attempts to fight against these natural cycles in organisations, to create a state of permanently inflated productivity and abundance. But unlike our industrial agricultural systems and their reliance on fossil fuels, these organisational systems rely heavily on human energy, on our energy, to feed them… and everyone is feeling pretty burnt out right now.
Instead of fighting these natural energy cycles within our organisations, what if we were to embrace them? What season should we be in right now, and what should we be focused on?
These ‘seasons of strategy’ and ‘seasons of planning’ are not necessarily dictated by the tilt of the Earth and its movement around the sun. They can be shaped by an organisation’s financial year, where its operations are located, or the nature of its products and services. In Australia, there are also cultural factors that need to be considered. For example, the summer holiday period creates an extended period of ‘dormancy’ in many organisations that extends from late December through to some point after Australia Day.
So, what season is your organisation in, and how in sync are people with it? Is now your time of abundance, or is it the time for rest and reflection? And if, like me, this is the time for rest and reflection, what are you doing to make sure you do this well, individually and with your team?
And on that note, I’m signing off for the year. I wish you and your loved ones a peaceful (and restful) festive break. Trust me, you deserve it. In fact, we all do. I will be back and re-energised for the start of my season of renewal in mid to late January.
Oh, and in case you missed it…
The other week, I had the pleasure of being interviewed about my new workshop, ‘The Power of Being Strategic’, by the productivity, facilitation and workshop design guru that is Donna McGeorge. We delved into the workshop’s purpose, the thinking behind it, and the design decisions that shaped it. You can watch a preview of the interview above, and if you’d like to dive deeper, the full 30-minute interview is available below.
Simon
