In certain circumstances, the organisation will need to make decisions in the third category — the Summit (or ‘Death Zone’ ) — terrain so unfamiliar and bewildering that normal rules no longer apply.
Is it Time to Rethink… Strategy as Mountaineering?
Across bestselling textbooks, keynote speeches and online image banks, Strategy is commonly compared to mountaineering. In this — the third article in my series re-examining metaphors in business — I’m going to argue that enacting successful strategies is like climbing a mountain, only in ways I’d never before appreciated or understood.
In the past, I’ve been sceptical of the idea that strategic transformations are like climbing a mountain, especially when progress is shown as a straight climb from the base to the summit.
Since reading various books about mountain climbing, I’ve come to realise the issue isn’t the metaphor itself, but rather a basic lack of understanding of how mountains are climbed. For one, there are no direct routes or shortcuts to the summit — just as the most successful transformations are full of unexpected setbacks, obstacles, dead-ends and improvisations.
When considering major strategic transformations, one aspect reliably reoccurs: they are about achieving something new. Therefore, the most analogous climb in history is the first ever attempt on reaching the summit of Everest by George Mallory in 1924.
When Mallory’s team originally arrived in the Himalayas, close to nothing was known about the mountain or its environs in the western world. Yet just as strategic transformations require Agile thinking to succeed, Mallory’s team intuitively grasped the concept of ‘test and learn’. Before the summit was even attempted, the team launched two lengthy reconnaissance missions. The lessons learned from these difficult (even deadly) rehearsals led them to devise new principles that are still followed by mountain climbers to this day. For example, the team pioneered the use of bottled oxygen to mitigate the effects of altitude, helped develop new clothing fabrics, and established a sequence of high camps on the mountainside at which to acclimate.
Mallory’s attempt on Everest has another, more unfortunate similarity with the vast majority of transformations —it failed. Or should I say, it might have failed. The question of whether he was the first to reach the summit of Everest is one of the great unsolved mysteries. When the clouds briefly parted on the morning of the final ascent, Mallory and his climbing partner were spotted less than 800 feet below the peak, climbing confidently. Then the clouds rolled in, and they were never seen alive again.
The Three Decision-Making Zones of Everest
If mountain climbing is a decent metaphor for describing how iterative, experimental approaches can help organisations achieve transformative, long-term goals, its true power was revealed to me by this article, written by a team of academics who’d climbed Everest themselves.
Writing in the Harvard Business Review, the authors argued that the three distinct physical zones on Everest relate to the optimal patterns of decision-making in successful businesses.
Reaching Base Camp
The majority of decisions fall into the first category — the Base Camp — which is a predictable and stable environment, featuring lots of infrastructure, at which a relatively low number of decisions need to be made. As such, tried-and-tested rules can be applied with confidence, and decisions reached through consensus.
When you’re at Base Camp…You’re in the realm of Business As Usual (BAU) decision-making, which at most organisations is done by committee. The impacts of your decisions are widespread but incremental, and a single decision can apply for months if not years. Your best decisions gradually improve things by degree.
Into Thin Air
Figure 1: A classical depiction of strategic transformation as mountain climbing
Since reading various books about mountain climbing, I’ve come to conclude that the issue isn’t necessarily with the metaphor itself, but rather with a basic lack of understanding of how mountains are climbed in real life. Visualising progress as a straight and certain route from the base to the summit is absurd for a number of reasons.
For one, the mountain is constantly changing. There are no direct paths or shortcuts to the summit — just as the most successful strategies are full of unexpected setbacks, obstacles, dead-ends and improvisations.
Although no two strategies are the same, one aspect reliably reoccurs: they are about trying to achieve something new and valuable. By reaching the strategic goal, the company is transformed , for the better. The most analogous climb in history therefore is the first attempt on the summit of Everest by George Mallory in 1924. The tallest mountain in the world was then known as the ‘Third Pole’, and after failing to reach either the North or South Poles first, the British Empire was determined to claim this victory as their own, to remind the world of their pre-eminence.
When Mallory’s team arrived in the Himalayas, close to nothing was known about the mountain or its environs in the western world. Yet Mallory and his companions intuitively grasped the concept of ‘test and learn’, and before the summit was even attempted, they launched two lengthy reconnaissance missions. The lessons learned from these difficult ( even deadly ) rehearsals helped them devise new principles that are still followed by mountain climbers to this day. For example, the team pioneered the use of bottled oxygen to mitigate the effects of altitude , helped develop new clothing fabrics , and established a sequence of high camps on the mountainside at which to gradually acclimate.
Mallory’s attempt on Everest has another, more unfortunate similarity with the vast majority of strategic transformations —it failed. Or should I say, it might have failed. The question of whether he was the first to reach the summit of Everest is one of the great unsolved mysteries. When the clouds briefly parted on the morning of the final ascent, Mallory and his climbing partner were spotted less than 800 feet below the peak, climbing confidently. Then the clouds rolled in, and they were never seen alive again .
The Three Decision-Making Zones of Mount Everest
The principles and practice of mountaineering established by Mallory and his team demonstrate how an experimental approach to problem-solving is the best way to achieve transformative, long-term goals. However, the true power of metaphorically associating strategy with mountain climbing was revealed to me by this article , written by a team of academics who’d climbed Everest themselves.
Writing in the Harvard Business Review , the authors argue that the three distinct physical zones on Everest relate to optimal patterns of decision-making in successful businesses.
Figure 2: The Three Decision-Making Zones of Everest
Reaching Base Camp
The majority of decisions fall into the first category — the Base Camp — which is a predictable and stable environment, featuring lots of infrastructure, at which a relatively low number of calls need to be made. As such, tried-and-tested processes can be applied with confidence, and decisions reached through consensus.
When you’re at Base Camp… You’re in the realm of Business As Usual (BAU) decision-making, which is typically done by committee. The impacts of your decisions are widespread but incremental, and a single decision can apply for months if not years. At best, your decisions gradually improve things by degree. At worst, you end up creating frozen, stifling and dehumanising bureaucracies.
