The most important part of your company tree

  
Recently I was looking at a photo of a tree where you could see the roots. The artist was showing the entire tree, not just the part that sticks out of the ground. And I started to think, a tree is a great metaphor for a company.

It starts as a little sapling, and it has to have all the right elements to build momentum. Enough of the right soil, enough (but not too much) sunlight, deer have to mind their own business, no bulldozers need to run over you, etc.

Very similar to a young business (minus the deer problem…unless you’re a landscaping business…or a home gardening startup…ok, fine, there are probably dozens of businesses that suffer from deer-related problems).

Once a tree starts to grow, it has a chance to flourish. And then, the most important aspect of the tree (for the rest of its life) is its roots. The roots of a tree provide the infrastructure. It’s literally what the tree is built on. If the roots are weak, then the tree will be weak. If the roots are strong, then the tree can reach its full potential.

The roots of a business – it’s vision, tenets, values…its people and culture… – are the things that allow you to build a healthy, growing business. If you build a business with bad roots – culture is bad, values are suspect, no vision – then the business will always be suspect to failure. But if you build the roots to be strong, then the sky is the limit.

Just watch out for those deer.