Harvest Season
It’s autumn – a season that’s named twice, fall and autumn. Autumn, derived from the Latin word autumnus meaning passing of the year, is more frequently used in British English, while fall, referring to the falling of leaves, is more common in American English. The season was previously known as harvest from a Germanic word meaning picking, plucking or reaping.
Fall is part of a cycle, an invigorating time of the year when the air has a crispness to it. It is filled with a great deal of activity and there’s lots of work to do.
On the farms after the harvest, there’s cleanup from this year’s crop in order to get ready for next year’s growing season. Renew and sustain.
Speaking of farms, a trip to the farm or country is a great thing to do on a weekend – even if you live in a large city. There you can explore pumpkin patches, a sea of mums in all different fall colors, stacks of hay and hay rides, and apple orchards. Go apple picking, drink cider and eat apple pie! If a farm isn’t your thing, go to a winery where grapes are being harvested and wine is being made. And there are all the fall craft fairs with handmade items! New things are all over – ready for picking and plucking.
In terms of the business cycle, during spring, seeds are planted and they start to come to life. There’s lots of creativity, innovation, and energy associated with this season of the year and this stage of the business life cycle – the introductory stage. Then comes the growth stage – summer. All those seeds that were planted are cultivated and grow. And the organization is managing all the ideas that were cultivated during the start-up phase and meeting the demands of its markets and clients, customers and stakeholders.
Harvest season is the maturity stage – a time of reflection and contemplation, and a time to harvest the results of hard work and review successes. Smart organizations leverage the successful products and services they have already cultivated and look beyond.
It’s time to consider:
What can be renewed and repurposed?
What’s worked and what hasn’t?
What have we learned?
What can we do to avoid being entrenched in the past and going into decline?
What new and exciting things can we plan to do?
Recognizing and managing the various stages of the organization’s life cycle is important for leaders and the associates in an organization as well. As leaders, challenge your organizations to keep the growth of the summer season going even as winter – that pesky dormant phase approaches.
In autumn – the maturity stage – as a year passes and you await a new one approaching, it’s time to inform, influence and inspire your teams to be creative and innovative – to develop and cultivate new ideas and be ready to begin anew!