To retain the job and to remain in the same organization, learn about Saguaro cacti – HR message for corporate employees

If you wish to be like ‘Saguaro cacti’ in your corporate, you must learn about it first.

Many people in corporate these days wish and aspire to be like Saguaro cacti but never know how to be like that.

Saguaro is an arborescent (tree-like) cactus that can grow over 20 meter height. This cactus is native to Sonoran dessert, Arizona and Mexico. This cactus is reported to be one of the slowest growing plant species on earth with just an inch growth over 10 year period. However, the Saguaro lives for 80 – 150 years.

Why Saguaro comparison? Many employees these days wish to be in the same corporate forever (from date of joining through superannuation). They are willing to compromise their promotion, yearly increments, bonus and even other perks. Saving and safeguarding the job becomes the only ‘objective’ they wish to accomplish in their corporate life. This syndrome is well pronounced in corporate that are run by ‘single man’ leadership.

The biology of Saguaro will tell us clearly that it lives in dessert. Life in dessert is full of hardships and difficulties. The plant that chose to live in such dessert has to evolve to the conditions prevailing in the dessert. This cactus hence has evolved to grow slow, as slow as an inch over 10 year period. Since the growth is extremely slow, the requirements of nutrients are also very limited for the plant.

It lives in dessert and the dessert soil, however deep one may go, water may not be available. Hence, instead of having deep vertical roots, the plant has developed horizontal/radiating roots. These horizontal roots, during rain, can gather water from larger areas for the plant. Further, the radiating roots also would give support to the plant from wind.

If we look at people who have been working in same corporate for ‘donkey’ years, we can find that like Saguaro, these people also would have established ‘horizontal’ contacts in the organization. Because of their horizontal contacts, they are extremely smart in gathering various informations about the corporate, the likely changes, the financial position of the company, the thinking of the top management etc. Based on the above information, they strategize further to remain ‘deathless’ in the same corporate.

We can see a perfect parallel between the horizontal roots of Saguaro and horizontal contacts of these people. The ‘Saguaro people’ will not develop deep knowledge or expertise like how Saguaro doesn’t develop deep vertical roots. These people know that knowledge and skill are burden and only smartness and cunningness are necessary for success in corporate.

Like Saguaro, they never aspires yearly promotion, increments etc., and hence the same are not given, still they will continue in the same organization. The only wish they have is to safeguard their job and be in the same corporate.

This article is for those who wish to be like Saguaro in corporate. They wish but do not know how to achieve the same. Some of them would have already achieved but do not know the fact that they have applied nothing but the biology of ‘Saguaro’. If you wish to like a Saguaro cactus, please learn about it first and then be a perfect Saguaro.

Dr S Ranganathan, ClinRise Derma Pvt., Ltd., Chennai