The introduction to I Can Grow People - The Book

3. Contents
Introduction 1
Great Managers 10
Culture & Climate 20
Plant Personality 31
Your Vision 43
Strategy 51
Change 56
Tools for the Job 66
Watering 75
The Right Plants & Seeds 81
The Induction Greenhouse 90
Getting around the Garden 99
TAG for Results! 106
Performance Management 116
Feeding 133
Growtivate TM
141
Prize Blooms, Vegetables and why a Fish sticks! 148
Free Cuttings & Busy Bees! 154
Developing Teamwork through cross pollination 171
And Finally - Goodbye and Glossary 188

4. www.icangrowpeople.com
Ican Grow People
for blooming great results
A totally fresh way to understand and
grasp the essentials of Management and
Leadership. Our gardening metaphor
really sticks (like mud) and is changing
the way people sow the seeds of
success with their people.
I Can offer - Ican Grow People™
Seminars and Taster Days to germinate your
own Ican Grow People™ creavity
Management Development Programmes
and Workshops
Train the Trainer for in-house delivery
For more information on how I Can
fertilize your learning agenda,
contact us soon.
Office: +44 (0)700 345 1 789 Email: grow@icandevelopment.co.uk
Ican Grow People is a trademarked and under copyright to Ican Development Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

5. www.icandevelopment.co.uk
Ican
Involve Challenge And Nurture
We offer flexible and creative approaches to help
people feel Involved, Challenged and Nurtured through
the learning experience.
Specialists in Management & Leadership
Development
Training Consultation
Course Design & Delivery
Team Development
360 Feedback and Personality Diagnostics
Culture & Change Management
Employee Branding and Communication
Public Speaking
ILM Programmes
For more information on how I Can
support your Learning agenda,
contact us soon
Office: +44 (0)700 345 1 789 Email: ask@icandevelopment.co.uk
Ican Development Ltd - A People Development Company owned by Jason Stevens and based in Wales, United Kingdom.

6. I have spent many years in Training and
That was until I linked Development, helping, guiding and supporting
effective People managers to transform themselves into better
Management with managers.
effective Gardening I have trained, facilitated, mentored and coached.
Management. I have in some cases manipulated and bribed
people along the way, which definitely is not
good practice. But what else can you do when
someone just doesn’t get what managing people
is all about?
Sowing Your Seeds!
There seems to be a strong link (for me) between
How will this book a great gardener and a great manager. So,
rather than “sell” management as a concept and
get bogged down in theoretical management
Grow on you? gobbledygook, I focused on practical, pragmatic
steps to becoming a more effective manager, in
a fun and light way without missing or skimming
over powerful messages.

7. I have never known a more stimulating,
engaging and memorable way to get managers
to understand their role and the impact they
have on people to achieve results and
business success.
I Can Grow People™ is a great place to start
if you want to make management a simple
theory or process to understand.
This can be achieved by After facilitating the concept This is more than can be said
relating the skills, knowledge of growing people with for a lot of the dowdy, dusty
and attitudes of a great managers, clients, Directors, and boring management
gardener, who nurtures HR teams and professional books found on training library
and grows plants with a bodies, I soon began to bookshelves.
great manager who grows realise that everyone gets
and nurtures their people / the gardening v management People began to ask me to
employees to achieve results. metaphor. talk more about this learning
concept and so I decided to
write my own book.
I Can Grow People™ GERMINATED!

8. Just “cut and paste” the metaphor to
create your own Management garden
To be fair, the gardening metaphor has
been around for years – this is nothing
new at all and a quick internet search will
dig up someone with a view on how to
grow real people like plants.
However, with I Can Grow People™ you will
have a huge and varied selection of ideas
and approaches to work from.
And, because it is such a creative and
interesting way to think about people
management you will come up with
some wonderful ideas and management
concepts of your own too.
The metaphor can be taken and
used as far as your imagination
and energy will allow you to go.

9. The book is divided into small But you won’t miss out on
chunks with plenty of visual the important aspects of
stimulation intended to help managing people effectively.
your mind wander and give You will cover in various places
you space to make sense throughout the book;
of things where it needs to.
• Performance Management • Reward and Recognition
• Communication • Change Management
• Personality Types • Recruitment & Selection
• Training and Development • Motivation
• Management Styles • Setting Objectives
• Team Development • Personal Effectiveness
All the essentials are in here
This book has been designed in a way so as not
to give you all the answers but to feed your
imagination on how you or your people and
your business / organisation can make a big
difference if you get your hands dirty and get
stuck into some simple steps to growing the
ideal people garden.

10. My advice would be to simply Throughout the book I have Acknowledgements
read, pause, ponder and self- tried to encourage you to This book is dedicated to my family
reflect. Put the words and answer questions and make who have supported my weird and
pictures into context in your notes that will help you, or wonderful ideas over the years. To
have such faith in someone, even
world and then modify and help you to help others in
when you don’t quite understand
change what you do and how becoming more effective. what they do, I salute you. For the
you do it to bring a part or If you would like to immerse times when work has come first, I
aspect of your people garden yourself further and get thank you for your patience.
to life. bedded deeper into the story
and philosophy of I Can Grow I would also like to thank Barry
People™, then join me or one for always believing in my
entrepreneurial spirit, or is
of my team on the various Ican
it stupidity?
Grow People Seminars and
Development Events. Many thanks to John for providing
me with the space to grow my
business and be successful. Also,
Jon Knox who helped with the design
and transformed a PowerPoint
Dandelion into a book-like Orchid.
Finally, a big thanks to all of you who
bought this book – you don’t know
how much I appreciate it, but when
we meet, I will buy the Latte’s.
Visit
www.icangrowpeople.com
for more details.
Prepare to be Green Fingered
from a Management
perspective!
Enjoy the book!