To prepare the bottle from which a tissue culture of a mushroom could grow, the tedious process of sterilization is done. A flat bottle is prepared for sterilization and along with it the “hugas bigas” (the water usually thrown away after washing uncooked rice) and some gelatin is prepared in proportion and boiled for some time. Both contain minerals that prove to be the food of the mushroom tissue. Then measuring about 40 ml., the mixture is left inside the bottle and covered with a tight wad of cotton made to fit the mouth of the flat bottle and to keep the bacteria away as the bottle rests in the pasteurization chamber lying down flat. The flat bottle with the mixture is then left in the pasteurization chamber for quite a while. After some time the water in the mixture will evaporate leaving all the nutrients in the very thin layer of gelatin that is left inside the bottle.
After sterilizing the bottle and the thin film of gelatin is left, almost always a small amount of water will rest at the bottom of the bottle. At this point, there is a need to go to the sterilizing chamber again. Sanitizing the hands by putting and rubbing the hands with alcohol, the one working to get the water out of the flat bottle where the thin layer of gelatin is, carefully takes away the cotton cover of the bottle, and let the bottle’s mouth go through the fire from a burner previously lit. This is done so that bacterial contamination is eliminated. The worker then carefully makes the water flow through the other side of the flat bottle, careful not to let the water pass through the side where the thin layer of gelatin is. All of these are done to ensure that the excess water will not be the breeding ground of bacteria later.
Leadership development must be like this! Leaders are aware that they need to develop more leaders and leadership development is essential to the growth and sustainable development of any organization.
Preparing the environment from which our young leaders can grow must be intentional. The necessary nutrients must be placed inside a safe pasteurized environment just like resources are made available for our young leaders to access and placed in an environment where they are safe to grow.
All the effort will go to waste if there is even a hint of bacterial infection that is why the preparation is so tedious just to ensure that bacterial infection would not happen. This is so true in training our young leaders. The training that they receive must be intentional and free from the growth of a belief system or a paradigm that the organization does not adhere to or even is diametrically opposed to. Leaders know that to develop another leader there needs to be a period where the young leader that they mentor needs to be shielded from possible intrusion from false hopes and a distorted vision.
Are your young leaders being prepared to take on the vision of the organization and run with it?
Are the resources from which they could find inspiration, motivation and nourishment made available in a safe environment?
Do the young leaders know how to access these resources and move along the lines of leadership development?
Are efforts being done to identify talents, train these talents, invest in these talents and give the talents avenues to exercise their leadership?
More questions to come as more secrets come out!
Read Part 1 here.
