Hard grinding for leaders – HR lessons from Koala

Some hard grinding are inevitable for some people in the corporate before they are elevated to the next level of leadership or are given bigger leadership responsibility. The corporate should learn the process of ‘leadership grinding’ from the marsupial animal – Koala. Koala is an arboreal mammal, native to Australia. The interesting aspect of this mammal is its food habits. Koalas are extraordinarily unique in their food preference as they almost exclusively thrive on the leaves of Eucalyptus tree as their main diet.

The leaves of Eucalyptus tree are hard to digest. Scientists across the globe have always wondered how Koalas survive by eating such leaves. The point is not about how Koalas eat the leaves of Eucalyptus. Koala digests the leaves of Eucalyptus because they have certain specialized microbes in their stomach. With the help of these microbes, it is believed that the animal easily digest the leaves of Eucalyptus.

When Koala delivers their pups, like any other mammal, the pups predominantly feed the breast milk. That is how all mammals engage in rearing the young ones. Once the weaning period is over, the mother Koala resorts to a most weird practice. The mother Koala would feed the young ones with her ‘poops’ (fecal material). This is done to ensure that the species of bacteria that are essential to digest the hard Eucalyptus leaves enter the gut of the babies so that when they shift from mothers milk to eucalyptus leaves, able to digest them easily.

If we look at the behaviour of the mother Koala feeding the young ones with her poops, it may sound wired, funny and unacceptable. But one has to look at the ‘intent’ behind such practice and also the associated ‘essential management insight’.

Before shifting people from one level to another, they have to be prepared first and only then they should be elevated to the next level so they can do better in the new role.

The corporate leaders and the HR function must study the behaviour of Koalas and must learn the right management insight. Instead of expecting different leadership traits from people after promoting them to the next level, they have to be adequately prepared and developed and only then they should be assigned with new responsibility is the management message, the Koalas tells to the corporate.

Feeding the young ones with the ‘poops’ by none other than the mother may sound strange and funny. But never get lost in the ‘fun’ but understand the inner meaning.

Most corporate leaders develop strong expectations from people after granting promotion. More often, the promoted employees are just happy but seldom show any great leadership skills. It is not due to the incapability of the people who are promoted but definitely it is due to the failure of the HR function to understand about how to develop people. Learn from the Koalas and be successful.

Dr S Ranganathan