I recently spent the weekend interstate at the house of a friend who had a new garden put in a year ago when she and her husband built a new house. This involved approximately 400 individual plants going into the ground. She is not what you would call an avid gardener so she paid to [...]

Tags: employee engagement, Employee retention, Karen Schmidt, Leadership and gardening, Leadership and management, Leadership skills, Leading is like gardening, New employees, Recruitment, Workplace gardening, www.letsgrow.com.au

So how attached are your people? Watch this short video for some thoughts on the subject. Tweet

Tags: Employee retention, induction, Karen Schmidt, Leadership and gardening, Leading is like gardening, Staff turnover, Workplace gardening, www.letsgrow.com.au

I finally got to do some volunteering at Northey Street City Farm (www.nscf.org.au) after a long absence due to other commitments. It was really good to get back in the garden although I was exhausted afterwards. I really need to keep up my garden fitness. I noticed lots of changes at the garden in the [...]

Tags: Change management, Leadership and gardening, Leadership and management, Leading is like gardening, Makeover, Staff turnover, Workplace gardening, www.letsgrow.com.au, www.nscf.org.au

One of my jobs recently at www.nscf.org.au was to cut the diseased leaves off the tomato plants so that the problem didn’t spread and affect the fruit crop. I was then instructed to put those pieces in the bin, not the compost pile, so that the disease would not be spread elsewhere. Once I was [...]

Tags: disengaged employees, Fierce leadership, inconsistent leadership, managing poor performers

My strawberries keep going missing. Just as they are about to reach the point where they are ripe and ready to pick, someone or something is getting in before me and eating them. It’s happened more than once now and I’m getting a bit frustrated. Whilst I wouldn’t put it past my neighbours to do [...]

Tags: employee engagement, Employee retention, engagement, Engaging conversations, Fierce conversations