Summer serial: A taste for adventure and leadership (ep. 3)
In the austral summer of 1914, Ernest Shackleton’s ship, the Endurance, is trapped in the Antarctic ice.
The hull is cracking dangerously. Water inlets appear. The ship is gradually broken up by the ice. It eventually sank, leaving the crew on the ice floe with food supplies and lifeboats.
No help could come from outside. The expedition was far from anywhere, and now, to make matters worse, the world was at war.
Shackleton is characterized by his empathy, self-control, exemplarity, sense of responsibility, flexibility and optimism.
👉Strategic optimism
Always optimistic about the outcome, he is nevertheless capable of giving up and turning back when necessary.
👉Flexibility:
For him, the mission has changed. The initial plan has been completely overturned. He’ll have to adapt to bring all the men back alive.
👉Sense of responsibility
There’s no question of sacrificing a single man to satisfy his ego, for a good photo that would make him famous or pay off his debts. It’s the lives of his men that matter most.
👉Exemplarity
Right up to the end of the adventure, he sacrificed himself for his men, giving his milk ration, for example, to those who needed it most, or rescuing one of his men who had fallen into freezing water
👉Self-control
He doesn’t show his concern. Yet, as we’ll learn later, he’s afraid. Afraid of not bringing his men back alive.
Shackleton knows himself well… his faults, his strengths.
What’s more, he’s seen other leaders succeed and fail. He has bitter experience of this, notably with explorer R. Scott in 1903
👉Empathy
His understanding of his men enabled him to detect leaders to lean on and to defuse insubordination.
His obsession is to maintain the cohesion of his crew, whom he treats as equals.
➡️Fort Shackleton’s leadership enabled him to ask the impossible of his crew.
Noting that the drift of the pack ice was not favorable, he had to make a difficult decision. To leave and take the gamble of reaching an island over 1500km away…
Do you know the rest? Maybe not? But are you interested in Pearl’s vision of this sequel?
Then wait for episode 4 of this summer soap opera…
You can also contact us to talk about Shackleton, and perhaps also to discuss your topics and needs in terms of commitment in your company, audacity, the agility of your teams and their ability to adapt, and your definition of extraordinary situations!
Look at things from a new perspective:
PEARL Crisis Response
www.pearl-crisis.com
