Remodel your career model

I’ve had the same conversation with at least a dozen superintendents over the past year: “I want to run agronomy at a top-100 club,” or “I eventually want to move into a GM role.”

“Great,” I reply. “What are you doing differently to get there?”

That’s where things get quiet.

Most of us are running the same playbook we’ve always run — hoping that if we put in enough hours, the job we really want will eventually show up.

It won’t.                                                                                                     

Whether you’ve thought about it this way or not, you already have a career model. It’s just three things:

• What you do
• How you do it
• Who you do it for

For most superintendents, this model just sort of happened. You took the first job, then the next one, then the next one. Same basic approach, different logo on the polo.

If you’re being honest, your current model probably looks like this: Put out fires. Keep grass alive. Long hours. Reactive planning. Serving whoever hired you, whether or not they align with your standards or long-term vision.

That model might get you from assistant to superintendent. It will absolutely not get you to the “impossible” career goal you just told me about.

Right now, most superintendents are paid to solve operational problems: green speed, disease pressure, staffing the weekend crew, fixing the same drainage nightmare for the 12th time.

Those matter. But they’re small problems in the eyes of ownership.

You get paid more when you solve bigger problems: labor model and retention strategy, multi-year capital planning, water and regulatory risk management, member experience, enterprise-level standards across multiple courses.

If your impossible goal is running agronomy at a top-100 club or moving into GM-level leadership, your model must shift from “excellent maintenance” to “strategic problem-solver” at a completely different altitude.

Here’s where most people get stuck: They want the new level, but they don’t want to let go of how they’ve always done things.

“I’ll still do everything myself, but I’ll also become more strategic.”

“I’ll still say yes to every last-minute change, but I want better work-life balance.”

You cannot keep your old model and expect a 10x outcome.

At some point, you have to say: “I don’t do 80-hour weeks as a lifestyle anymore,” or “I don’t take roles where there’s no clear path to proper resources.”

If you aren’t willing to let go of the old model, you’re choosing incremental progress, not transformation.

Top performers don’t win because they do more than everyone else. They win because they do far fewer things, far better, for the right people.

That means saying no to clubs that want championship expectations on municipal budgets and cultures that burn out assistants and call it “passion.” And it means saying yes to roles where you’re part of strategy, not just execution.

Don’t keep this vague. Get specific.

What is your impossible goal? What’s your income target? $200,000? $300,000? Work backward. What tier of club pays that? What responsibilities sit at that level? Can you build a five-year capital plan? Turn around a toxic culture? Protect a club from regulatory disaster?

Once you see the math, your pathway becomes clearer: “To be that person in five years, what has to change this year?”

With that, you must kill some false requirements.

Superintendents are full of “supposed to’s” that are killing their progression: “I’m supposed to be first in and last out.” “I’m supposed to say yes to every board member’s idea.” “I’m supposed to be on the mower to prove I’m working.”

Many of these are false requirements. They feel non-negotiable because the industry has normalized them for decades.

Here’s reality: You can’t be the long-term leader if you’re always the short-term hero. You can’t be the strategic voice if you never get your head out of the weeds.

And here’s the uncomfortable truth: If your career model stays the same, your trajectory will stay the same.

But here’s the flip side: You’re highly adaptable. You already adapted to the chaos and demands of this industry. You can absolutely adapt to a higher-level model — if you’re willing to let go of the old one.

You don’t have to blow up your life tomorrow. But you do have to admit which model you’re running, which game you’re playing, and whether your current trajectory is built for survival or for the level you say you want.

Because working harder in the same way will only get you incrementally farther down the same path.

If you want a genuinely different destination, you need a different map.

Tyler Bloom is a workforce and leadership consultant and principal owner of Bloom Golf Partners.