September 2026 Blogs

  • Lessons from the Land: A Season for Both

    This weekend, I found something remarkable among the carrots.

    Tiny eggs, each suspended at the end of what looked like a nearly invisible thread.

    Lacewing eggs.

    I've written before about some of the creatures that visit the farm—some welcome and some considerably less so. Lacewings definitely belong in the first category. Their larvae feed on aphids and other soft-bodied pests that can damage crops, making them valuable partners on the farm.

    But what struck me wasn't only what I'd found.

    It was when I found them.

    This week marked the autumn equinox. The days are getting shorter. The quality of the light is changing. Summer is giving way to fall.

    There are plenty of visible signs of transition on the farm. Some summer crops are producing less. We're planting for cooler weather. The carrots themselves are stars of this next season.

    And right there, attached to those young plants, something else was beginning.

    New life in a season we often associate with things winding down.

    We tend to organize life into neat beginning, middle, end stages. We launch, we build, we finish. Then we move on to whatever comes next.

    Nature isn't nearly so tidy.

    On the farm, the tomato plants have completed their hard work while the Brussel sprouts are just emerging. Leaves are starting to fall even as roots continue developing underground. Okra pods are drying on the stalk to make seeds for next spring. And apparently, while I'm thinking about the end of summer, a lacewing is thinking this is a perfectly reasonable time to start the next generation.

    There's a phrase I use for that in-between space: the fertile void.

    It can feel like the blink of an eye or an eternity, that the space between something familiar winding down and before whatever's next is fully formed. And we can experience it as loss and uncertainty or excitement and anticipation, because we can't see the outcome yet.

    What if the space isn't really empty. Think about a seed underground. From above, nothing appears to be happening. Beneath the surface, the seed is absorbing water, changing, opening, and beginning the process that will eventually push a shoot toward the light.

    Or, in this case, consider tiny lacewing eggs suspended almost invisibly above a row of carrots.

    Something is happening.

    Something is becoming.

    We just can't see the whole of it yet.

    We experience these in-between spaces in our lives and in our organizations, too.

    When a familiar way of working may no longer serve us, but the new way hasn't yet taken shape. or  team changes. A leader leaves. A strategy runs its course. A project ends. We know we can't—or shouldn't—return to exactly what was, but we don't yet know what will replace it.

    Our instinct is often to rush through that uncertainty. Fill the position. Write the plan. Restructure the team. Find the answer.

    And sometimes action is necessary.

    But sometimes the uncertainty itself deserves our attention.

    What are we noticing now that we couldn't see before? What assumptions are being reconsidered? What relationships are forming? What new questions are emerging? What possibilities are still too small to recognize?

    The autumn equinox is a great time to ask these questions.

    We are crossing from one season into another.

    Summer crops are finishing.

    Fall crops are emerging.

    Roots are developing underground.

    And lacewings are beginning another generation.

    The space between seasons is anything but empty.

    It is fertile.

    Cultivating the Week

    Where are you living in the space between what was and what will be?

    Before rushing to fill it, look closely.

    Something may already be taking root.

  • Today is National Pawpaw Day.

    If you've never eaten a pawpaw, or even heard of one, you aren't alone. I learned about pawpaws earlier this year. Pawpaws are North America’s largest native fruit tree, and you can find them growing naturally commonly in woods, bottomlands, river valleys, and along streams in the eastern North America.

    It was fascinating to learn that they have been here all along.

    We can become so accustomed to looking for what's new, popular, or getting the most attention that we overlook something remarkable growing right under our noses.

    I've been thinking about that today for another reason.

    This evening, I'm sitting down with Nicole Alexander for a Planting Progress conversation about artificial intelligence.

    And one of the things I'm looking forward to discussing with Nicole is AI beyond the headlines.

    For many of us, artificial intelligence has become almost synonymous with generative AI: the tools that can write something, create an image, summarize a document, or answer a question. Those technologies are certainly worthy of our attention.

    But AI is so much bigger than generative AI.

    It is already woven into systems that help make decisions, identify patterns, offer recommendations, automate processes, and shape what information reaches us. In many cases, we were interacting with forms of artificial intelligence long before most of us started talking about "AI."

    Which brings me back to the pawpaw.

    Sometimes what suddenly captures our attention isn't actually new. It’s just come into our awareness. And once we notice something, we often ask, “What can I do with this?”

    Why not broaden our curiosity and ask:

    Where did this come from?

    How does it fit into the larger ecosystem?

    What don't I understand about it yet?

    And what responsibilities come with using it?

    Regardless of your sector, agriculture, tech, education, consulting, these questions can remind us that new tools and new ideas don't arrive in empty spaces. They enter systems that already have histories, relationships, inequities, strengths, assumptions, and ways of doing things.

    That's one reason I'm especially interested in the ethical dimensions of AI.

    The question isn't only whether a technology works.

    We also need to ask who it works for. Who helped shape it. What assumptions may be embedded in it. Who benefits. Who could be harmed. And what happens when we introduce it into the systems we already inhabit.

    A pawpaw tree knows where it is.

    Over generations, it has become part of an ecosystem—growing in particular conditions, interacting with other species, responding to its environment.

    Technology doesn't have that kind of wisdom on its own.

    We have to bring the context.

    We have to ask the questions.

    We have to decide what we value.

    As AI becomes an increasingly visible and invisible part of our lives, it’s important to remember that intelligence isn’t just about producing an answer.

    Sometimes intelligence begins with understanding the ecosystem in which the answer will live.

    Cultivating This Week

    What might you understand differently if, instead of focusing only on what's new, you became curious about the larger ecosystem around it?

    And if you happen to come across a pawpaw this week, maybe get curious about that, too. And email me or send me a post and let me know what you think of them.

  • This week's Field Notes arrives at a moment of remembrance.

    Friday marks 25 years since September 11, 2001. Here in our community, we will gather at the former Bertie Backus school site to remember teacher Sara M. Clark and student Asia S. Cottom, whose lives were lost that day.

    Ileria Farms has been entrusted with providing refreshments following the memorial plaque unveiling, and I've been thinking about what it means to remember—not only the way someone died, but the way they lived, the people they touched, and what continues to grow because they were here.

    This week's Lessons from the Land is about legacy.

    Lessons from the Land: What We Leave Growing

    Twenty-five years is a long time.

    Long enough for children to become adults. For careers to begin and end. For neighborhoods to change. For buildings to find new purposes.

    And yet, some things remain.

    This Friday, members of our community will gather at the former Bertie Backus school site to unveil a memorial plaque honoring teacher Sarah Clark and 11-year-old student Asia Cottom, whose lives were lost on September 11, 2001.

    I didn't know Sarah or Asia.

    But I remember them.

    I remember reading about them after September 11 and feeling such sadness as I learned their story. They had set out that morning on an educational trip—a journey that, especially for a young student, should have been wrapped in anticipation, curiosity, and joy.

    Instead, we came to know their names because of an unimaginable tragedy.

    Twenty-five years later, we are still saying them.

    Sarah Clark. Asia Cottom.

    There is power in that.

    There is power in creating a permanent place where their names can be seen and their lives remembered. A memorial plaque says to the people who knew them, to those of us who knew only their stories, and to generations who were not yet born when they died:

    They were here. Their lives mattered. Remember them.

    And remembrance has a reach of its own.

    Some of the people who gather Friday will have known Sarah as a colleague, teacher, friend, or family member. Some will remember Asia as a classmate, student, friend, or child. Others, like me, may know them only through the stories that have been carried forward.

    All of those forms of remembrance matter.

    Farming has taught me something about this.

    We often talk about planting in terms of what we expect to harvest. We put a seed into the ground and imagine the tomato, the bean, the flower, the meal.

    But what grows doesn't always stop where we planted it.

    Flowers feed pollinators that travel beyond the boundaries of the farm. Seeds are carried. Food is shared. What begins in one small patch of earth can nourish something somewhere else.

    People can have that kind of reach, too.

    Teachers certainly do. What they teach moves through their students into families, workplaces, communities, and generations they may never meet.

    And young people leave impressions, too. Their curiosity, humor, kindness, hopes, and possibilities become part of the people who love and remember them.

    We don't always get to see how far a life reaches.

    That's one reason memorials matter.

    Friday's plaque will mark a particular place, but it will also connect different moments in time: a school community of 25 years ago, the community that gathers there today, and people who will encounter Sarah's and Asia's names years from now and perhaps stop to learn who they were.

    That is what remembrance can do.

    We speak the names.

    We preserve the stories.

    We create places that say, Don't forget.

    And then we carry those lives forward in whatever ways we can.

    Twenty-five years later, I still remember two people I never met.

    Sarah Clark. Asia Cottom.

    That, too, is part of their legacy.

    Cultivating This Week

    This week, perhaps there is someone whose name you want to say.

    Someone who taught you. Loved you. Encouraged you. Changed you. Or perhaps someone you never met whose story nevertheless stayed with you.

    Speak their name. Tell their story. Remember.

  • Lessons from the Land: What Do You Do When You Don't Have What They Want?

    A friend recently found herself with what I would call a very good problem: a pear tree producing far more fruit than one household could possibly use.

    So she shared.

    And I came home with pears.

    Lots of pears.

    If you've been reading Lessons From The Land for a while, you can probably guess what happened next. I started thinking about what I could make.

    The timing couldn't be better. September 4 happens to be Enjoy a Second Dessert Day, which strikes me as one of those wonderfully unnecessary celebrations that we could probably use more of.

    So this week, I'm giving us permission to keep the lesson simple:

    Have the second dessert.

    Not necessarily literally—although there will be samples at the market if you'd like to take me up on it.

    I'm thinking more about how readily we postpone small pleasures.

    We'll celebrate after the project is finished. Rest after the work is done. Call the friend when things settle down. Use the beautiful dishes when company comes. Eat the good thing later.

    There is always a later.

    Farming makes that logic particularly questionable.

    A ripe pear doesn't care what's on my calendar.

    There is a window when it is ready—fragrant, sweet, and waiting to be enjoyed. Leave it too long and the moment passes.

    The same is true of so many of life's small pleasures.

    And there's another part of this particular harvest that I love: the pears came to me because someone had more than she needed and decided to share.

    Her abundance became an ingredient in my kitchen. Something I make may become a sample you taste at the market. And what began on one person's backyard tree continues moving from hand to hand.

    There doesn't always have to be a profound lesson attached to that.

    Sometimes something good grows.

    Someone shares it.

    Someone else makes something delicious from it.

    And everybody gets a little joy.

    That seems worth celebrating.

    Cultivating the Week

    What small pleasure have you been saving for later?

    Maybe this is the week to enjoy it.

    And if it happens to be dessert, September 4 gives you an excellent excuse to have seconds.

August 2026 Blogs

  • Lessons from the Land: What Do You Do When You Don't Have What They Want?

    “Do you have any lettuce?”

    I've been hearing that question a lot at the market.

    It's an especially interesting question this summer. A large multistate Cyclospora outbreak was linked to iceberg lettuce, prompting a recall in July and putting lettuce, its origins, and food safety in the national spotlight.

    Right now, however, I don't have lettuce ready to harvest.

    What I do have is Malabar spinach.

    If you've never encountered it, Malabar spinach isn't actually spinach. It's a heat-loving climbing green with thick, glossy leaves that can be eaten raw or cooked. The young, tender stems are edible, too, and can be cooked along with the leaves. While more familiar leafy greens struggle through our hot summers, Malabar spinach seems perfectly happy to keep growing.

    There was just one problem.

    My customers weren't asking for Malabar spinach. They wanted lettuce.

    So, I've started inviting customers to try something different. And because access isn't simply about putting an unfamiliar vegetable on the table and expecting people to know what to do with it, I'll have a Malabar spinach recipe at the stand tomorrow.

    Instead of saying, “Sorry, no lettuce,” I can say, “Not yet—but let me introduce you to something else.”

    Some people are skeptical. I understand. Trying something unfamiliar asks a little more of us than reaching for something we already know.

    But this experience has me thinking about the difference between responding to demand and introducing possibility.

    It's a tension I encounter beyond the farm, too.

    Through Leading Across Difference, organizations and leaders often come to me with a clear idea of what they need—a retreat, a strategic plan, a workshop, help solving a particular problem. Listening carefully to that request matters. But intentional consulting also requires curiosity: What is the need beneath the request? What conditions are shaping it? And are there possibilities we haven't considered yet?

    That's not so different from the conversation happening at my market stand.

    My customers want lettuce. I hear them, and I'm planting lettuce. But in August, I can't make the weather behave like October. What I can do is understand the underlying need—fresh, healthy greens—and introduce another possibility that flourishes under the conditions we actually have.

    Malabar spinach loves the very heat that makes traditional lettuce difficult to grow.

    That's not settling. That's adaptation.

    And whether I'm standing in a field, behind a market table, or working with a client, I'm learning that sometimes the most useful response isn't simply, “Yes, I can give you what you asked for.”

    Sometimes it's, “Let's understand what you're trying to accomplish—and then let's explore what's possible.”

    And this week, that lesson takes on another dimension for me.

    I'm excited to begin conducting workshops at the weekly farmers market as a University of the District of Columbia-designated agriculture service provider. I'll be demonstrating sustainable farming practices and helping community members learn more about growing and accessing healthy specialty crops.

    Because increasing access to healthy food isn't only about growing more of what people already know.

    Knowledge can increase access, too.

    Sometimes that means introducing a new crop. Sometimes it's demonstrating how to grow it, sharing a recipe, offering a taste, or simply answering the question, “What do I do with this?”

    Those small exchanges can make something unfamiliar feel possible.

    I'll keep planting lettuce.

    But while we wait for the kale, collards, lettuce, beets, kohlrabi, and Brussels sprouts of fall, I'm also going to keep making the case for Malabar spinach.

    Because sometimes we need to give people what they're asking for.

    And sometimes we can invite them to discover something they didn't know to ask for.

    Cultivating This Week

    Where might you be so focused on what you expected to find that you're overlooking what is already flourishing?

    Adaptation doesn't always mean abandoning what we wanted. Sometimes it means becoming curious about what's possible while we wait.

  • When you visit the Ileria Farms stand, you see the harvest.

    Right now, that means cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes, okra, eggplant, and green beans coming from the farm. There is something deeply satisfying about a harvest. We can see it, weigh it, count it, cook it, sell it, and eat it. It is tangible evidence that the work is producing something.

    But most of what makes that harvest possible is much harder to see.

    This week, while managing the abundance coming out of our summer beds, we’re preparing beds for fall planting and installing a pollinator garden at our Brookland farm. We’re intentionally devoting some of our limited growing space to flowers and habitat that will support bees, butterflies, and other beneficial insects.

    Not everything we plant is intended for the market table.

    My husband, Earl, often says that he hates paying for work product he can’t see. It’s become something of a familiar refrain in our house. And I understand the sentiment. Most of us like to be able to point to something and say, That’s what I paid for. That’s what we accomplished.

    But some of the most important things we invest in are valuable precisely because they quietly do their jobs in the background.

    Consider a house. We notice the beautiful floors, new countertops, or freshly painted room. We don’t spend much time admiring the wiring behind the walls or the plumbing beneath the floors.

    Until something goes wrong.

    Poor wiring can threaten the entire house. A small plumbing problem left unattended can eventually cause damage many times more expensive than the repair that might have prevented it.

    The fact that we can’t see something doesn’t make it less essential.

    Farming is teaching me the same lesson.

    Customers see the cucumber. They don’t necessarily see the soil being amended, the irrigation being monitored, the weeds being managed, the beds being prepared, or the habitat being created for the insects that help pollinate our crops.

    And yet, neglect any of those things long enough and eventually it shows up in the harvest.

    Our organizations and communities the same.

    There is work that produces something we can easily count: a report completed, a grant awarded, a product sold, an event held.

    And then there is the infrastructure beneath the work.

    Trust. Relationships. Mentoring. Communication. Maintenance. Planning. Institutional knowledge. Creating spaces where people feel they belong. Checking on someone before there’s a crisis. Investing in people before we urgently need what they can contribute.

    Those things can be difficult to put on a balance sheet. Sometimes we recognize their value only after we’ve failed to maintain them.

    That’s one reason I’m excited about our pollinator garden.

    On a small urban farm, every square foot is valuable. I could ask what crop we could grow there and how much revenue it might generate. Instead, we’re investing some of that space in the health of the larger ecosystem.

    We’re planting something whose greatest value may be what it makes possible elsewhere.

    Perhaps that’s a useful question beyond the farm, too. What are we willing to invest in today—not because we can immediately see or measure the return, but because we understand what it will help sustain?

    A healthy harvest requires healthy infrastructure.

    So does a healthy home.

    And, so do healthy organizations, relationships, and communities.

     Cultivating This Week

    What important work in your life or community might be easy to overlook because its value isn’t immediately visible?

    And perhaps an even better question: What might it cost if we stopped tending to it?

  • Lessons from the Land: Making Room for What We Want to Grow

    I’ve been thinking a lot about community this week—and about how much of our growth happens because of the people growing alongside us.

    At the American Psychological Association convention, I chaired a panel that brought together presenters at different stages of their professional journeys, from emerging professionals to seasoned consultants. As I listened to the different perspectives around the table, I found myself thinking about intergenerational farming.

    For generations, farms have been places where knowledge moves in more than one direction. Experienced farmers share what they have learned over decades, while younger farmers bring new ideas, technologies, questions, and ways of seeing. Each has something to teach. Each has something to learn. The strength is in what becomes possible when those perspectives come together.

    A few days later, that idea about growing in community became much more literal.

    Two retreat participants joined me on the farm. Together, we harvested green beans, giving them the experience of seeing—and tasting—the results of something that had been planted and tended weeks before.

    Then we turned our attention to the weeds.

    There were far too many to simply pull one by one. Instead, the three of us moved a huge sheet of clear plastic across the field, covering a particularly weedy area. With help from the summer sun, the tarp will suppress the weeds and help us reclaim that space for future planting.

    As we wrestled that enormous sheet of plastic into place, I couldn’t help thinking about how much the experience resembled our lives and our work.

    When we’re overwhelmed, our instinct is often to work harder: answer another email, accept another request, attend another meeting, add another obligation. We start pulling weeds one at a time while the rest keep growing.

    But sometimes working harder isn’t the answer.

    Sometimes we need to change the conditions.

    On the farm, we’re using the resources available to us—the tarp, the heat of the sun, time, and one another—to address a problem that would be exhausting to tackle plant by plant.

    Our lives may require the same kind of intentionality. Saying no is one way we create boundaries around what gets our attention. Changing a process, asking for help, sharing responsibility, or simply deciding that something no longer deserves space can be others.

    The lesson isn’t that every weed—or every demand on our time—is bad. It’s that our capacity is finite. If we want certain things to flourish, we have to protect the conditions that allow them to grow.

    And perhaps that’s where community matters most.

    I couldn’t easily have maneuvered that enormous tarp by myself. With others beside me, an overwhelming task became manageable.

    The same was true of the APA panel earlier in the week. People at different stages of their professional journeys brought different experiences, questions, and ways of seeing. Like intergenerational farming, knowledge wasn’t simply passed from the most experienced person to the least experienced. We learned with and from one another.

    Whether we’re cultivating a field, a career, an organization, or a community, growth doesn’t require us to do everything ourselves.

    Sometimes cultivation means planting.

    Sometimes it means harvesting.

    And sometimes it means gathering a few people, spreading out a very large tarp, and making room for what’s coming next.

    Cultivating This Week

    What are you trying to make room for—and what conditions might need to change for it to flourish?

    Instead of asking only, “What do I need to work harder at?” perhaps this week we can also ask, “What could I do differently?”

  • This week, the weather reminded me that abundance and access are not the same thing.

    After days of relentless heat, the rain finally came. But instead of a slow, soaking rain that could replenish the soil, it arrived in torrents. The ground, hardened by the heat, couldn't absorb it quickly enough. Much of the water rushed away before it could nourish the plants that had been waiting for it.

    For farmers, one of the greatest challenges isn't simply whether it rains. It's whether crops can actually access the water they need when they need it.

    I've been thinking about how often that lesson extends beyond the farm.

    In our lives, we can experience abundance without access. Opportunities exist, but we can't reach them. Resources are available, but not evenly distributed. Some receive more than they can possibly use while others struggle to find enough.

    New business owners search for capital. Parents search for time. Young adults search for opportunity. Community members search for affordable housing, healthy food, quality health care, and meaningful work. The resource may exist somewhere—but access remains unequal.

    The land teaches us that flourishing requires more than abundance. It requires stewardship.

    Soil in a healthy ecosystem doesn't hold tightly to every drop of water. It absorbs what it needs and gradually releases moisture so life can continue. Healthy ecosystems are built on movement, balance, and reciprocity.

    Healthy soil reveals so many lessons.

    What if we received our blessings with gratitude, held them with care, took what we truly needed, and looked for ways to ensure that others could flourish too?

    As I walk the fields this week and harvest as the sun rises, I'm reminded that the goal isn't simply to have more.

    It's really to create conditions where everyone has enough.

    Cultivating The Week

    Where do you have the capacity to increase access for someone else?

    Sometimes the most meaningful thing we can share is the opportunity for someone else to grow.

July 2026 Blogs

  • Hello!

    It's been a week of growth in every sense of the word.

    On the farm, we're celebrating our biggest harvest yet—more than twenty pounds of zucchini, beets, and two varieties of cucumbers. Each harvest reminds us that the seeds we planted months ago are beginning to bear fruit, as we continue building toward our Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program later this August.

    As for our team, Xavier shares what our Marion Barry Summer Youth Employment Program interns have been learning and contributing as they experience the many sides of building a social enterprise and an urban farm.

    And beyond the farm, I'll reflect on a conversation I had this week with the American Psychological Association's Committee on Women in Psychology. It reminded me that many of the lessons we learn from cultivating healthy soil can also help us think differently about cultivating healthy people and communities.

    Thank you for following our journey. Whether you've been with us since the Great Eight or joined more recently, we're grateful you're here.

    Lessons from the Land

    This week, I had the privilege of joining a panel hosted by the American Psychological Association's Committee on Women in Psychology to reflect on the future of women's well-being.

    As I prepared, I found myself thinking about the farm.

    One of my favorite moments each day is discovering a seedling that has finally broken through the surface of the soil. After days, often weeks, of quiet work underground, there it is: a tiny green shoot reaching toward the light.

    It reminds me of the moments we witness in students, clients, colleagues, and friends when something finally clicks. The breakthrough may seem sudden, but it's usually the result of unseen growth, steady support, and the right conditions.

    That image also shaped another thought I shared during the discussion.

    Too often, we celebrate women's resilience without asking why so much resilience is required in the first place. Resilience matters, but it shouldn't simply prepare women to return to systems that continue to deplete them.

    Farming offers a different metaphor.

    In regenerative agriculture, we don't just try to keep plants alive. We work to restore the soil, replenish nutrients, strengthen the ecosystem, and create the conditions for long-term health. The goal isn't simply survival; it's renewal.

    What if we approached our communities the same way? What if, instead of asking people to carry more, we asked how to restore capacity, share responsibility, strengthen relationships, and build systems that replenish rather than exhaust us?

    It's a question I've been carrying with me this week, both on the farm and beyond.

    Cultivating This Week

    What in your life needs replenishing, not just repairing?

    Sometimes the greatest growth begins not by asking ourselves to do more, but by creating the conditions that allow us to flourish.

  • One of the realities of farming is that we don't control the weather.

    Forecasters are predicting a strong El Niño pattern this year, reminding us that farmers everywhere are preparing for uncertainty. Whether it's extreme heat, heavy rains, drought, or shifting growing conditions, the weather shapes not only what we harvest, but also the lives of people who live with food insecurity, housing instability, health challenges, and economic uncertainty.

    While we can't control the weather, we can decide how we respond.

    This week I found myself staring at a challenge in the cucumber bed. The vines were sprawling across the ground into the next bed, where poor air circulation and excess moisture can invite disease. I needed a trellis.

    I didn't have a fancy system or a budget for more supplies. What I did have were T-bars, tomato twine, a few basic tools, and the willingness to experiment.

    So I built one.

    Is it perfect? Not even close. The twine isn't perfectly straight, and it certainly won't be featured in a gardening magazine. But it's sturdy, functional, and built with what I had available.

    As I stood back and looked at it, I realized that the trellis wasn't just supporting cucumbers—it was reminding me of something much bigger.

    Growth rarely happens by accident. Whether we're cultivating vegetables, building organizations, strengthening communities, or developing ourselves, we all need structures that provide support while allowing room to climb.

    That's one of the lessons behind the Cultivation Wheel™. We don't create growth. We create the conditions that make growth possible.

    Sometimes the most important resource isn't the newest tool or the biggest budget. It's the creativity to see possibilities in what we already have and the courage to begin.

    This week, my cucumber trellis became a quiet reminder that resilience is often built one knot, one post, and one small solution at a time.

    Cultivating the Week

    What is supporting your growth right now?

    Every vine needs something to climb. Every person does, too. This week, consider the people, habits, structures, or communities that help you grow—and ask how you might provide that same support for someone else.

  • I had a fascinating conversation with Dr. Gaynel Nave, NMD, BSc, of FullJoy Wellness, during my Planting Progress webinar on October 16, 2025. Dr. Nave, trained as a naturopathic physician with a concentration in psychoneuro-endocrinology, shared what she learned in medical school about foraging for herbs and plants in the wilderness. As she described the methodical process of testing unknown plants, I couldn't help but see a powerful metaphor for leadership.

    Here's the foraging protocol she shared:

    1. First, smell it. What information does the fragrance give you? Does it seem inviting or does something feel off?

    2. Second, rub a small piece on your skin and wait. Do you have a reaction? What kind? Your body is giving you data.

    3. Third, take a tiny bite, chew it, and spit it out. Again, monitor for reactions.

    4. Finally, take a bigger bite. If you don't get sick, you know it's safe to eat.

    Of course, the experienced forager has done their research first—they're not going in completely blind.

    The Leadership Parallel

    When we step into a new leadership role or launch a new project, we're essentially foraging in unfamiliar territory. The temptation is to dive in fully, implementing sweeping changes or committing significant resources before we truly understand the environment.

    But what if we approached it like a forager?

    Smell it first. Before making any moves, observe. What's the culture like? What are people saying in informal conversations? What does your intuition tell you about the team dynamics or market conditions? Research on leadership transitions emphasizes that successful new leaders use their first 90 days to listen, learn, and observe before implementing major changes—those who rush into action too quickly often create "vicious cycles" that undermine their ultimate success.

    Test on the surface. Introduce small pilots or trial initiatives. Float ideas in one-on- ones. Make minor adjustments and watch carefully for reactions. How does the team respond? What resistance or enthusiasm emerges? Studies show that pilot programs are essential for testing new initiatives in a controlled environment, allowing leaders to identify potential challenges, gather feedback, and refine approaches before full implementation.

    Take a small bite. Implement something slightly more substantial. Launch a beta version. Try the new approach with one team before rolling it out company-wide. Chew on the feedback and reassess. Research confirms that well-selected and well- conducted pilots create strong commitment to change in managers and translate into willingness to champion the initiative within their organizations.

    Then commit more fully. Only after you've tested at increasing scales—and confirmed you're not about to poison the system—should you roll out major changes or make irreversible commitments. This incremental approach aligns with research showing that continuous incremental organizational change, when properly managed, leads to improved employee performance.

    The Value of Incremental Testing

    This isn't about being timid. It's about being wise. Experienced foragers can identify many plants on sight because they've built knowledge over time. Similarly, seasoned leaders develop instincts about what will work. But even they test first.

    The leaders who succeed in new environments are often those who resist the pressure to "make their mark" immediately. They observe, they experiment, they learn from small reactions before making big bets.

    When the Plant Is Poisonous

    Here's the harder truth: sometimes you test and discover the plant is toxic. You get a reaction at the skin level, or the small bite makes you ill. In leadership terms, you try a small change and the resistance is overwhelming. You pilot a new approach and it fails despite good execution.

    The forager knows what to do with a poisonous plant: don't eat it. Move on.

    In leadership, this means recognizing when a team member isn't going to change, when a system is fundamentally broken and can't be incrementally improved, or when the culture is so resistant that your initiative—no matter how good—won't take root.

    Research on resistance to change reveals that opposition can stem from factors including fear of the unknown, loss aversion, and disruption of established habits. While some resistance can be overcome with proper communication and support, studies show that persistent, overwhelming resistance—especially when it appears early in testing phases—often signals that an initiative is fundamentally incompatible with the organizational context.

    This reality can be particularly acute for women leaders and leaders of color. Research suggests that women leaders often face a "double bind"—the same assertive behaviors that signal strong leadership in men can diminish perceptions of likeability in women,

    creating a lose-lose scenario where competence comes at the cost of being well- regarded.

    For leaders of color, the challenges compound: they face what researchers call the "minority tax" of disproportionate service requirements, invisible labor, and inequitable evaluation processes. Recent research identified four key challenges experienced by faculty of color: invisible service, lack of opportunities for leadership roles, inequitable evaluative processes, and departmental climate. Black female leaders, navigating intersectional barriers, frequently must embrace higher risks to counter invisibility, yet face costly barriers to success.

    The foraging metaphor holds dual significance here. First, incremental testing becomes even more critical when you face environments that may judge your initiatives more harshly or hold you to different standards. Small tests provide data that can protect you from overcommitting to initiatives that will face disproportionate resistance. Second, knowing when the plant is poisonous—when to stop pursuing an initiative or even when to leave an environment that consistently rejects your leadership—is not failure. It's wisdom. Recent research on women of color in leadership reveals that structural barriers including anti-Blackness, institutionalized patriarchy, and performative diversity initiatives create environments where even excellent leaders can’t thrive.

    The testing protocol doesn't just tell you what's safe to consume. It also tells you what to leave behind. Organizational change research consistently shows that a significant percentage of change initiatives fail, often because leaders don't recognize early warning signs or abandon efforts that were never viable in the first place. The most successful change leaders understand that knowing when to stop pursuing an unworkable initiative is as important as knowing when to push forward. Sometimes the most important leadership decision is knowing when to stop trying to make something work and instead find nourishment elsewhere.

    What's your approach to testing new initiatives? Do you have a "foraging protocol" that's worked well for you?

    This post draws on research from organizational leadership, change management, and diversity in leadership. For those interested in the scholarly foundations, the full reference list is below.

    References

    • Bailey, J. R., & Raelin, J. D. (2015). Organizations don't resist change, people do: Modeling individual reactions to organizational change through loss and terror management. Organization Management Journal, 12(3), 125–138.

    • Carter, M. Z., Armenakis, A. A., Feild, H. S., & Mossholder, K. W. (2013). Transformational leadership, relationship quality, and employee performance during continuous incremental organizational change. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 34, 942–958.

    • Ely, R. J., & Rhode, D. L. (2010). Women and leadership: Defining the challenges. In N. Nohria & R. Khurana (Eds.), Handbook of leadership theory and practice (pp. 377–410). Harvard Business Press.

    • Franko, D. L., Taylor de Barroso, E., Nawaz, S., Rinehart, J., & Blake-Beard, S. (2025). Academic leadership development for Black and Latinx faculty: Program refinements and participant change over time in a mixed-method study. Diversity & Inclusion Research.

    • Galsanjigmed, E., & Sekiguchi, T. (2023). Challenges women experience in leadership careers: An integrative review. Merits, 3(2), 366–389.

    • Georgalis, J., Samaratunge, R., Kimberley, N., & Lu, Y. (2015). Change process characteristics and resistance to organisational change: The role of employee perceptions of justice. Australian Journal of Management, 40(1), 89–113.

    • Grauer, S. (2023). The new foragers. The Grauer School. https://www.grauerschool.com/p/~board/dr-grauers-column/post/dr-grauers-column-the- new-foragers

    • Higgs, M., & Rowland, D. (2021). Leadership in the implementation of change: Functions, sources, and requisite variety. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 34(7), 1433–1453.

    • Kamarova, S., Gagné, M., Holtrop, D., & Dunlop, P. D. (2024). Integrating behavior and organizational change literatures to uncover crucial psychological mechanisms underlying the adoption and maintenance of organizational change. Journal of Organizational Behavior.

    • Kotter, J. P. (1996). Leading change. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.

    • Lundmark, R., Tafvelin, S., Fors Brandebo, M., & Stenling, A. (2025). Organizational change from a leader's perspective: Change characteristics as antecedents to leaders' role clarity and laissez-faire leadership behaviors. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 46(9), 31–43.

    • Nirmul, U., & Talero Cabrejo, P. (2025). Social structures and their impact on leadership development for women of color in occupational therapy in the United States. American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 79(2), 7902180180.

    • Pogrebna, G., Angelopoulos, S., Motsi-Omoijiade, I., Schilizzi, S., & Tunn, V. (2024). The impact of intersectional racial and gender biases on minority female leadership over two centuries. Scientific Reports, 14, 111.

    • Ramseook-Munhurrun, P., Naidoo, P., & Armoogum, S. (2025). Navigating the challenges of female leadership in the information and communication technology and engineering sectors. Journal of Business and Socio-economic Development, 5(1), 55–70.

    • Scharinger, C., & Takacs, F. (2011). The art of piloting new initiatives. MIT Sloan Management Review, 53(1).

    • Settles, I. H., Jones, M. K., Buchanan, N. T., & Dotson, K. (2021). Epistemic exclusion: Scholar(ly) devaluation that marginalizes faculty of color. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 14(4), 493–507.

    • Stouten, J., Rousseau, D. M., & De Cremer, D. (2018). Successful organizational change: Integrating the management practice and scholarly literatures. Academy of Management Annals, 12(2), 752–788.

    • Watkins, M. D. (2013). The first 90 days: Proven strategies for getting up to speed faster and smarter (Updated and expanded edition). Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.