Being a wife of a farmer has some real benefits.

I get to experience the joy of harvest up-close and personal.

While harvesting is a joyful occasion every farmer wants to have after the long wait and prayers for a good climate, right inputs, and absence of deadly pests, it's not for the faint-hearted. 

We recently got haled out and what we would be harvesting is maybe 50% of our intended output. 

Equipment breakdowns usually occur without warning. These happened almost all the time with older equipment. 

Too much rain is not good. Less rain is not good either. 

If you harvest too late or too early in the season, the crops won't be viable. 

Markets dictate the prices, so farmers are at their mercy.

Internal and external issues crop up at during the harvest time, so agility and adaptation is key. Farmers tend to this season unceasingly with lots of prayers.

Now I can see why there are farmer suicides in many parts of the world.

A few harvest lessons I can share related to your organization strategy.

1. Your Strategy takes time, be patient with it.
Let the sun which is your collective wisdom, rain which is your internal controls, and water which is your care do their jobs. We tend to be obsessive-compulsive about it to the point where too much control leads to more dissatisfaction, lots of 'could-have-been, and regrets. 


2. It's not the end-goal, it's the transition to it that counts
The end of the tunnel is not the time to celebrate, that mostly the end of it, and the start of a new episode. What you need to account for outcomes is in the transition stage. Be watchful and observe if your realities are meeting your strategic goals. 


3. You can avoid all the traps and pitfalls, if you tend to it as a gardener/farmer not as a investor.

Tend to your strategy regularly and you don't need to be surprise if something is amiss or not on-point.  Course-correction will be the normal course of action. Beware of the file-it and forget-it mentality that sinks everything that you have done from the beginning, that would be the best recipe for disaster.

​Enjoy harvesting while in transition. The fruits cannot be far behind from the tree. 







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​At the time that you think you're set with your business strategies.

You realized that you have to make small pivots along the way to make it work.

Hence, the way strategies are developed nowadays is that it's not banking on certainty, but banking on uncertainty.

It's designed for complexity and agility, not set in stone. 

You know that your strategies, whether the Big S or the small S are as good as your implementation.

And in implementation, there's no one way to getting done. 

Sometimes you have to go to the back door to get to the front door.

Sometimes, there's no other way than to make adjustments when signals are staring you in the face.

Sometimes, you have to recalibrate your tactics in light of the changing environment.

The marketplace is tough. 

If you're not delivering you might as well go home and not put up the fight.

Or go home and get back the next day with better tactics and understanding of your business offerings/programs and your clients.

Either way, strategizing is an on-going process.

If you feel that you have arrived on strategy, it could barely mean that it's time for the next one.

Don't be afraid to pivot in as many reiterations as you can.

That's where you can get the most learning and absolute fun from. 

​Purpose-driven organization executives are not supposed to be selling and being overtly demonstrative about what they do, their organizations' achievements, and ambitious goals. 

Wrong.

You cannot generate the funding and resources base that you need to grow your organization by being obscure and being rated second-class.

You cannot grow unless you have good strategies and the discipline to focus your energies on the right tools, techniques, and approaches.

You cannot maintain your successes without seriously creating more opportunities for your organization by being bold enough to put a definite mark on what you do best.

In other words, being top-of-mind is the antidote for obscurity and being obsolete.

Learn to ride with the waves and avoid getting entangled with the thorns floating along the way.