Melissa Woodall: Growth Can't Be Forced - It Has to be Nurtured

I like a plan. Ideally colour-coded, well-paced, and backed up by a second plan in case the first one falls apart.

Then I had Brooke.

In eight months, she has systematically dismantled my belief that life can be managed through preparation alone. Just as I thought we’d escaped the sleep regression, she started using the night to practise crawling. Just as I accepted she hated the bath, she became impossible to get out of it. Just as I wondered whether I’d ever get the cuddly baby I’d imagined, she started handing out the occasional sleepy snuggle entirely on her own terms.

Motherhood has been a crash course in the limits of control. It’s also taught me something about leadership: growth can’t always be forced. More often, it has to be nurtured.

Nature Doesn’t Read Your Project Plan

For months, everyone warned me about the four month sleep regression. I waited. Nothing happened. Brooke carried on sleeping and I briefly wondered whether I’d accidentally cracked parenting.

Then she discovered mobility.

Instead of sleeping peacefully, at six months she started waking in the night to practise getting onto all fours. It was less 'regression' and more 'hourly training camp.' Now she is standing and cruising too, which feels less like a developmental milestone and more like a formal declaration that the calm phase of my life is over. Send help for when she works out she can do it faster!

In reality, it is all progress. Development has been happening quietly all along before it becomes visible.

Leadership is often the same. We want proof that things are working, but some of the most important growth happens underground first: confidence, trust, resilience, capability. Not all progress arrives on schedule, and not all of it looks tidy while it’s happening.

You Can’t Force Growth

Brooke used to hate the bath with real conviction. Every bath felt like a personal betrayal.

Naturally, I decided this was a problem to solve. My first strategy was simply more baths, because repetition fixes everything, apparently. It did not.

So I changed tack and started taking her swimming. Slowly, the water became familiar. Her confidence grew. And now the child who once protested like I was lowering her into a vat of despair has to be coaxed out because she’s having too much fun.

I couldn’t force her to enjoy the water, but I could create the conditions where confidence could grow.

That’s leadership too. You can’t demand confidence, trust or engagement on command. But you can build environments where people feel safe enough to develop those things for themselves.

Stop Trying to Grow Oaks into Roses

Before Brooke was born, I imagined a cuddly baby who would happily snooze on me for hours.

Instead, I got Brooke: strong, wriggly, funny, busy, and deeply committed to movement. From the start she has seemed to approach life with complete determination, as though she arrived with places to be and no intention of wasting time on stillness.

For a while, I wondered whether she’d ever be the cuddly baby I’d imagined. Then, around six months, she started crawling over, climbing into my lap and settling in for the kind of sleepy cuddle that makes the whole day better. The kind you want to freeze in time because you know how lucky you are to be the person she chooses.

And I realised there was never anything wrong with Brooke. She wasn’t failing to be the 'right' kind of baby. She was just being herself: curious, affectionate, determined and entirely uninterested in conforming to my expectations.

The truth is, Brooke is my whole world. Loving her has sharpened everything for me. It’s made me see more clearly that the people we love, lead and work alongside are not projects to perfect. They are people to understand. They do not need forcing into a shape that suits us better; they need the space, safety and encouragement to become more fully themselves.

Leaders do this too. We create an image of the ideal employee, colleague or team member, then get frustrated when real people don’t fit the mould. But healthy teams don’t thrive because everyone grows the same way. They thrive because different people bring different strengths.

Over the last eight months, Brooke has taught me that growth has its own timetable. You can support it, encourage it and make space for it, but you can’t rush it or force it into a shape that suits you better. In motherhood and in leadership, the job is often the same: notice what’s already there, love it for what it is, and help it grow.

Melissa Woodall, Senior Housing & Construction Leader

This blog is part of Melissa's 'Leadership Lessons from the Cot Series' originally published on LinkedIn