What Every Professional Needs to Know about Bananas (and Monoculture)

That title is a tip-off that Norm has really lost it this time. Gone bananas, you might say.

Seriously, what have bananas and monoculture (whatever that might be) got to do with professionals? Well, actually, plenty. Read on.

It’s hard to imagine a world without bananas. Probably the first solid food you ever ate was a banana, not to mention the fun you had painting your tray with it. Our species eats over one hundred billion of the things every year. You thought chimps were bad.

But there is sad news in bananaworld. Very sad news. In a perfect storm of depleted soils, resistant insects and two vicious pathogens, our familiar banana is at serious risk of extinction.

The absolutely central factor in this calamity is that every one of those hundred billion bananas is of a single strain: the Cavendish. This practice is known as monoculture.

Like most extremes in life, monoculture is marvellous when it’s working for you. Everything is nice and uniform, predictable and standardized. Every banana looks like every other banana, they all look so appealing, and they package ever so perfectly. Great when it’s working.

By now you’re thinking, “Yeah, but what if it’s not working?” Of course you’re right. Monoculture provides the perfect set-up for pathogens– they only have to evolve one deadly trick. So, unless we get really lucky, the Cavendish is doomed. Those of us who like to buy our bananas in air-conditioned splendour had better get ready for some odd-looking wild alternatives.

Putting all your eggs in one basket (if I may mix metaphors) always has its risk of disaster. The Irish Potato Famine, for example, was a classic example of monoculture gone bad.

Right, you say, but what does that have to do with professionals? Well, very simply this: It’s possible to become so micro-specialized that you have little room for recovery if your area of expertise falls out of favour or demand. Ask the carburettor specialists and harness makers of the world, and just try to find a radio repair shop.

This is not to suggest that professionals shouldn’t “choose a lane” and carefully hone their expertise. But maybe that can go a little too far– it never hurts to retain some familiarity and skill level for adjacent areas. Having one or two of your eggs in a second basket is not a bad idea.