Shackleton's Way: Leadership Lessons from the Great Antarctic Explorer

by Margot Morrell

Larken briefs his clients, he sometimes uses a quick comparative sketch of Shackleton, Scott, and Amundsen, to point to Shackleton's unique strengths. For Scott: ambitious, naïve technically, hierarchical, arrogant, wary of colleagues more able than himself, indifferent selector, poor trainer, bad safety record, a gifted author. Amundsen: single-minded, objective, meticulous technically and as a planner, good safety record, formidable but not charismatic, realistic, lonely, supreme achiever. For Shackleton: single-minded, excelled in crisis, technically sensible but not innovative, gregarious, excellent public speaker, broadly objective, good conceptual planner, effective selector and trainer, good safety record, erratic in business, bored by administration, politically astute.