Stay humble
“Humility is the compass that steers us to the prize”
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Stay humble
I’m a bit of an adventure nut and recently finished reading a book by Robin Knox-Johnston telling the story of his world-first non-stop journey around the world single handed in a small sailing boat. Back in 1969 there was no GPS tracking, satellite phones or solar/wind chargers so conditions were pretty basic and often scary!
The book tells a story of courage, sailing skill and tenacity, about a man with the inner resilience to endure 312 days alone on rough seas on a tiny boat. Phew!
But what struck me was the side story about another sailor Donald Crowhurst who joined the round the world race only to realise he was not going to make it. He had neither the skill nor the appetite for the treacherous journey. Prior to the race he had gone very public about his intentions and bet all his investments on the race so instead of accepting defeat and giving up, he spent months faking his reports and pretending to be sailing around the world whilst bobbing around in one spot in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. In the end according to the diaries he left, the pressure of the dishonesty and of being revealed as a fraud led him to jump off the boat in mid ocean never to be seen again.
A similar story in the recent Netflix documentary Race to the Summit, about two radical alpine climbers who challenged each other to be the fastest to reach the highest peaks in the Alps. As the story unfolds it becomes evident that one of the climbers Ueli Steck has started to fake his results, claiming to have lost his camera, dropped his camera, forgotten to switch on the GPS on his watch and a range of excuses why he was unable to prove that he had in fact summitted the mountains as claimed.
What struck me in both stories was the highly public profile of both men, which must have played a role in their slide into dishonesty – anything rather than admit failure and be publicly shamed.
I’m not sure what the lesson is in this for us as leaders, other than the reminder to ‘beware the ego’ and remember that no matter how high you fly, to stay humble and honest.
