Some Bushes Can't Be Trees — by Dan Lynn
By Dan Lynn
In 1998, I was promoted into a new VP of Marketing role at a Fortune 500 company and inherited a team of very talented people. They were great at what they did — traditional, old-world marketing. The problem was the year. It was 1998, and the Internet was about to rewrite everything. If our group was going to be relevant, I needed that team to become Internet marketing experts, and I needed it fast.
So I pushed. Hard.
My friend and colleague, Elazar Aslan, watched me do this for a while. Then he said something I've never forgotten: "I admire what you're doing — you're trying to turn bushes into trees. But just realize that some bushes can never be trees. They're bushes."
It stopped me cold. Because he was right.
He didn't mean it unkindly. A bush isn't a failed tree — it's a perfectly good bush. Elazar was telling a young, intense leader something I badly needed to hear: you can develop people, stretch them, believe in them — and you should. But not everyone can, or wants to, become the thing a particular moment demands. When you try to force it, you exhaust yourself and you're often unfair to a good person who was never going to get there.
The real skill isn't turning every bush into a tree. It's seeing clearly what you've got — knowing when to help something grow into more, and when to appreciate it for exactly what it is.
Questions this Key Learning answers
How do I know if someone can grow into a changing role?
The author’s lesson is to look clearly at the person’s demonstrated strengths, willingness, and available time. People can develop, but not everyone can or wants to become what a particular moment demands. Our analysis adds that leaders must distinguish between someone’s ability to make the journey and their own urgency about how quickly it must happen.
What do you do when pushing an employee stops working?
When progress stalls, the author suggests recognizing that more pressure may exhaust the leader and treat a capable person unfairly. Our analysis recommends examining the leader’s timeline and pressure, not only the employee. A deadline may accelerate learning, but it cannot create desire or make every transition happen at the same speed.
Does being wrong for a role mean someone lacks talent?
No. The author’s metaphor is that a bush is not a failed tree; it is a perfectly good bush. Someone may be highly capable yet mismatched with work that new circumstances require. The leadership challenge is to separate role fit from personal worth, then appreciate existing strengths rather than trying to force entirely different capabilities.