Cultivating a Thriving Workplace: Insights from The People Gardener

What if you could cultivate a work environment where every team member feels genuinely valued and motivated? Tune in as Rhonda Delaney, the People Gardener, shares her expert insights on the four fundamental pillars—effort, thought, love, and presence—that can transform your workplace culture. Discover actionable steps to create a thriving business culture whether you’re starting from scratch or revitalizing an existing one. Learn how consistent effort, thoughtful consideration, genuine care, and active engagement can inspire your team to flourish, leading to a more productive and harmonious work environment.

Stay connected and supercharge your leadership journey by exploring the wealth of resources available on Rhonda’s website, rondadelaney.com, and the Raving Fans Society app. From a treasure trove of teaching content and a comprehensive resource library to monthly group coaching sessions and quarterly guest speakers, there's a bounty of tools to help you lead with confidence. A free membership offers a taste, but the full experience at $49 a month unlocks everything you need to cultivate a prosperous people garden. Join Rhonda and become part of a community dedicated to nurturing and growing exceptional workplaces.

Chapters

• 0:01 Tending the People Garden
• 8:30 Membership Benefits and Resources

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Well, hey there, welcome to the People Gardener podcast. I'm Rhonda Delaney, your host, also known as the People Gardener, thrilled to put this podcast together to help small business owners, new business owners, frustrated business owners and aspiring leaders, whether they're inside business or outside. Each week, we bring you some actionable steps so that you can actually improve your skill as a leader. That's what we're about. We're here to help you become a better leader by giving you access to lots of different perspectives. By giving you access to lots of different perspectives. The guests are varied. We're thrilled to have them. Get out your pen, get out your paper and be ready to learn Every single episode. You're going to be able to take something away that you can implement. Are you ready? Let's get to work. Well, hey there. Welcome back to the People Gardener podcast. Happy to have you here this week.

Speaker 1: 1:10

Back in episode I believe it's 37, I did a description of what is a People Gardener. It's all about creating people gardens within your business, understanding that people are going to come in all shapes and sizes, all with different experiences in life, different degrees, different learning, different understanding and perspectives, and we need all of those. Those and that's what makes an incredible people garden is all of the differences. So I got thinking. You know what? I haven't really talked about tending the people garden for quite a while, so, okay, let's, let's have a go at that this week. There's four different areas that I really encourage small business owners to live in, for it to become part of who they are on a day-to-day basis. And that's effort, thought, love and presence. That's what tending is. Those are the four components of tending. You know Trev he teases me often when we're gone and I come back, the first thing I do is go out to the garden and I check and see what's going on, where a plant might be struggling, a plant might be thriving, and I figure out what might need to change or be done. Every day when you're interacting with your people, that's what you're doing when you have these four components.

Speaker 1: 2:52

So the first thing let's talk about is effort. Whether you have a blank slate, as in, you're a new business owner and you are constructing this workplace culture from a blank slate, nothing there. Or you may have bought a business, or you may be in business for several years and it's not something that you have focused on and you are really having to tackle a culture that's wild and overgrown, doesn't matter which it is. What matters is that you put in the effort. You know there's going to be days where you feel like, oh man, this is so heavy, why are people just operating the way that they are and making things so difficult, and why can't people just do their job? Lots of things will go through your head and then other times, man, it just feels like you're firing on all cylinders and everything is great. When you show up every day and you put in the effort to see the culture as it is, when you do the walkabout, if you have people in house or if it's remote, that you're connecting, that you're putting in the effort you're connecting, that you're putting in the effort. You're showing people that you're invested. You're invested in the company. You're invested in them. You're invested in solutions. You're invested and are willing to put in the effort for outcomes. They need to see that, because it's a trait that you want them to mimic. You want them to put in the effort.

Speaker 1: 4:42

The next is thought when you're always thinking about the people in your garden and you are considering things from their perspective. Considering things from their perspective, you are planning and getting creative on ways that you can help them in their position to do the job that you've asked them to do. You want to take the time to think. So often you get busy as a business owner and you probably have said to yourself I just don't have enough time. You're going to need to make some time, because your thinking and your creativity and your problem solving and your helping your people is paramount to the success of your business and the success of your culture. A lot of things happen in that thought process. I would say probably the most important ones as a leader is how do I help these people grow? Taking time to think not only helps you because you're going to discover places that you need to grow, but you're going to discover ways to help your team do what you are asking it to do.

Speaker 1: 6:10

So the next one is love and man. This is a beautiful, warm emotion that has been maligned in the workplace as something that is weak and inappropriate. Humanity needs love. We all need to feel love and affection and kindness and openness, learning to express love. I'm just talking about the human emotion of huge affection and care and kindness and love for those that you lead. We need more of it in the workplace, so don't be shy about showing how much you care.

Speaker 1: 6:59

The other thing is presence, just being there with them and helping them to know that you have their back Spending time. Those conversations about life, about family sports, about cooking, about kids you can go on and on. Those are really meaningful conversations when it comes to connection, when being present, when giving your team the opportunity to see you as you are and to appreciate your presence with them. It is so worth tending your people garden. The energy that you bring to that is absolutely going to resonate with your team as care, that you are interested and I say this over and over you have to first be interested in order to get to the place of caring, and you need desperately to care about your people, because that is how they are going to feel like they are in the right spot, doing the right job and are all in on it, and they become raving fans. That's it for this week. We'll talk to you again next week.

Speaker 1: 8:30

Well, thanks for joining me today. Just a quick reminder if you were not on my email list, go to my website, rondadelaneycom, and there's a place there that you can subscribe, keep you up to date on all things people, gardening and leadership, and also a reminder that the Raving Fans Society app is available on the Apple Store and the Google Store. I do have a free membership in there that you'll be able to access some of my material, and then there's also a paid membership and right now it's $49 a month and you will receive access to all of my material, all of the teaching content, including a resource library that will really help you along, as well as group coaching every month month and then quarterly bringing in guests that will talk on topics that pertain to small business owners and leadership. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you again next week.