Moving the Business Forward

The order to abandon ship was given at 5 p.m. For most of the men, however, no order was needed because by then everybody knew that the ship was done and that it was time to give up trying to save her. There was no show of fear or even apprehension. They had fought unceasingly for three days and they had lost. They accepted their defeat almost apathetically. They were simply too tired to care.

She was being crushed. Not all at once, but slowly, a little at a time. The pressure of ten million tons of ice was driving in against her sides. And dying as she was, she cried in agony. Her frames and planking, her immense timbers, many of them almost a foot thick, screamed as the killing pressure mounted. And when her timbers could no longer stand the strain, they broke with a report like artillery fire.

By 7 p.m., all essential gear had been transferred to the ice, and a camp of sorts had been established on a solid floe a short distance to starboard. The lifeboats had been lowered the night before. The date was October 27, 1915. The name of the ship was Endurance. The position was in the icy wasteland of the Antarctic’s treacherous Weddell Sea, just about midway between the South Pole and nearest known outpost of humanity, some 1,200 miles away.

Much is said today about the need for:
• IT to have a roadmap,
• IT to obtain critical business buy-in (i.e., to be aligned with the business),
• IT to prepare for the inevitable changes the future will bring (i.e., IT becoming a shared service – Future State CIO), and
• CIO’s to become game-changers (CIO Executive Council)

The bottom line is that IT needs to move the business forward.

But how does IT move the business forward? How does it become transformational? How does it become innovational?

While I do not have all the answers – I myself and S-K are on this same journey – let me state that moving the business forward (at a minimum) requires:
• A firm foundation,
• A proven process, and
• A culture of innovation.

Or stated differently, IT needs to be:
• Foundational,
• Transformational, and
• Innovational.

I plan on using the story of Shakleton’s Incredible Journey (as told by Alfred Lansing) as a framework for our discussion on moving the business forward.

Sir Ernest Shackleton was an English explorer and one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. After the race to the South Pole ended in 1912 with Roald Amundsen's conquest, Shackleton turned his attention to what he said was the one remaining great object of Antarctic journeying — the crossing of the continent from sea to sea, via the pole. To this end he made preparations for what became known as the 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition.

Two ships would be employed: Endurance would carry the main party into the Weddell Sea, aiming for Vahsel Bay from where a team of six, led by Shackleton, would begin the crossing of the continent. Meanwhile a second ship, the Aurora, would take a supporting party to McMurdo Sound on the opposite side of the continent. This party would then lay supply depots across the Great Ice Barrier as far as the Beardmore Glacier, these depots holding the food and fuel that would enable Shackleton's party to complete their journey of 1,800 miles (2,900 km) across the continent.

Despite the outbreak of the First World War on August 3rd, 1914, Endurance was directed by the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, to "proceed", and left British waters on August 8th, 1914. After final preparations, Endurance then departed from South Georgia for the Weddell Sea on December 5th, heading for Vahsel Bay.

As the ship moved southward, early ice was encountered, which slowed progress. On January 15th, 1915, there were within 200 miles of Vahsel Bay. Unfortunately, a northerly gale blew up and before they could do anything to save themselves, Endurance became frozen fast in an ice floe. What happened was simple enough. The northerly gale compressed and crowded the whole Weddell Sea pack against the face of the land, and no force on earth could open up the ice again – except another gale from the opposite direction.

On February 24th, realizing that they would be trapped until the following spring, Shackleton ordered the abandonment of ship's routine and her conversion to a winter station. The sled dogs were moved off the boat. Seals were killed for blubber (fuel) and meat. Eventually 5,000 pounds was accumulated (storage was not a problem in the sub-zero temperatures) so that they would not have to dip into the tinned food items.

In early May, 1915, the sun appeared over the horizon for the last time, then slowly dropped from sight and the Antarctic night (with an average temperature of -17) began. In all the world, there is no desolation more complete than the polar night. It is a return to the Ice Age – no warmth, no life, no movement. On July 17th, just as the men’s thoughts began to turn to Spring (and the opportunity to make a new assault on Vahsel Bay), the sounds of ice flows grinding together (pressure) began.

On August 1st, the ship briefly broke free from the ice, rose, and resettled at a 5 degree angle. Three more times the ship was attacked by the ice and withstood the pressure. But on October 24th, the worst fear of the men began to come true. Two ice flows pinned the boat and slowly began crushing the hull. Shackleton had no choice – on October 27th, Shackleton gave the order to abandon ship.

The order to abandon ship, while it signaled the beginning of the greatest of all Antarctic adventures, also sealed the fate of the one of the most ambitious of all Antarctic expeditions. Evidence of the scope of such an undertaking is the fact that after Shackleton’s failure, the crossing of the continent remained untried for 43 years. Even that expedition which was equipped with heated, tracked vehicles, powerful radios, and guided by reconnaissance planes and dog teams, was strongly urged to give up. It was only after a tortuous four month effort that it was accomplished.

Few men have borne the responsibility Shackleton did at that moment. They were for all practical purposes alone in the frozen Antarctic seas. It had been very nearly a year since they had last been in contact with civilization. Nobody in the outside world knew they were in trouble, much less where they were. They had no radio transmitter with which to notify any would-be rescuers, and it is doubtful that any rescuers could have reached them even if they had been able to broadcast an SOS. Their plight was naked and terrifying in its simplicity. If they were to get out – they had to get themselves out.

The crew went from the comfort of a ship to living in crammed tents, lying in reindeer sleeping bags, on bare ice. They were castaways in one of the most savage regions of the world, drifting they knew not where , without a hope of rescue, subsisting only so long as Providence sent them food to eat.

Though their floe remained undamaged throughout the summer, Shackleton did not want a false sense of security to develop among the men. On November 15th he put in place an emergency plan with specific duties for each man (that they regularly practiced) if they had to suddenly strike camp. By April 7th their floe measured only 200 yards across. It was surrounded on all sides by open water. Finally, on April 9th, their ice floe broke into two, and Shackleton ordered the crew into the lifeboats, to head for the nearest land.

After five harrowing days at sea -- enduring gale force winds, 30’ rollers, and dodging ice bergs intent on steamrolling them -- the exhausted men landed their three lifeboats at Elephant Island. This was the first time they had stood on solid ground for 497 days. To be continued…..