Today’s Tuesday Reading is from Dustin Hilt, Director of the HBS Live Online Classrooms and a MOR program alum. Dustin may be reached at [email protected] or via LinkedIn.
In October, I finished summitting all 48 of the 4,000+ foot mountains in New Hampshire. The effort required hundreds of miles over the past six years and provided plenty of time for reflection on a range of professional and personal issues. One lesson has been especially important as I think about how to approach management and strategic efforts: the goal when hiking is not to reach the summit; the goal is to return safely to the parking lot.
This shift in thinking had a major impact on how I approached my hikes. Early on, I was stubbornly set on reaching difficult summits with the most incredible views. This pushed me too far past my skill level, resulting in hikes where I was dragging myself through the final miles. It meant that my friends and I did not have shared goals to fall back on if we ran into trouble. I was very hard on myself to reach the goal of the summit.
Prioritizing a safe return to the parking lot improved my actions and outlook. One weekend in January, a friend and I had plans to tackle Mount Moosilauke. That morning, we saw very concerning weather forecasts. Because we agreed on a safe return as our primary goal, we switched to Mount Monadnock, a smaller mountain in another part of the state with a better forecast. It was an uneventful hike until we broke out of the protection of the tree line into the thickest fog I have ever encountered in my life. We were hundreds of feet from the summit but could barely see the trail. My friend and I conferred, yelling over the howling wind, and once again, the decision was easy. Despite being so close, we retreated to the safety of the trees and soon found ourselves back in the parking lot.
As leaders, how can we apply these lessons to our day-to-day work?
Determine Your Summits and Parking Lots
Recently, we learned that the company which provides software for our virtual classroom is retiring the product. This kicked off a search process, and initially the team was focused on how to perfectly replicate the functionality of the current platform. For IT organizations, this type of goal is often our version of the summit. Reaching it is fantastic because you know everyone will be impressed, but this focus can overlook the challenges and conditions you might encounter on the way, such as timelines, resources, and the functionality available in potential products. As we continued, we were able to develop our parking lot goal, which was to identify a new software component that can replicate critical features as defined by stakeholders on the necessary timeline in a way that is intuitive for students, faculty, and staff. This approach provides clear guidance on the non-negotiables while still giving us room to try to reach the summit if time, budget, and other resources allow.
Communicate Your Priorities
On Mount Monadnock, my friend and I were able to make a quick decision in deteriorating conditions because we agreed on our priorities ahead of time. As a result, we avoided a common problem when hikers encounter dangerous conditions: pushing on because they (wrongly) assume that everyone else wants to do so. For our software replacement project, within the team leading the work, we defined our parking lot goals early as well as the reason for that approach. That generated the understanding and buy-in necessary for every member of the team to internalize how they fit into the larger effort and created a culture where everyone feels comfortable challenging whether a particular effort is necessary to reach the parking lot safely or is a stretch towards the summit. As a result, we are all hiking together with the same goals in mind.
Success is More Than the Summit
Earlier in my career, I was very hard on myself when provided opportunities to stretch into new responsibilities. I am a recovering perfectionist, and my primary goal was to do the job perfectly on my first attempt without help. It was the professional version of overextending to try to reach difficult summits with incredible views before I was ready. When I realized that the primary goal was to learn, it transformed my relationships with these experiences. This shift has allowed me to embrace challenges with curiosity rather than anxiety about immediate perfection. I make time for learning, leverage my network for support, and try not to be too hard on myself. If I have done each of these things, I feel as though I have made it back safely to the parking lot.
Was our attempt at hiking Mount Monadnock a failure? Despite turning back, it still provided me valuable experience evaluating and contending with winter conditions without putting myself in danger. I spent hours outside chatting with a good friend. We made it back to the parking lot without issue, knowing that the mountain would be there another day.
In the end, knowing the real goal—whether in hiking or in leadership—keeps us grounded and ensures we make choices that serve both immediate and long-term success.
Which best describes your current work goals?
Last week, we asked which actions appeal most when considering gratefulness.
- 22% said send a note of gratitude to someone you appreciate invested in you
- 22% said look through a gratitude lens at your job or life and identify three aspects for which you are grateful
- 22% said randomly share some gratitude with others
- 15% said invite your colleagues at an upcoming meeting to have a go-around sharing one thing for which they are grateful
- 10% said write down three gratitudes per day for the next 28 days
- 9% said offer at your Thanksgiving table what you are grateful for
There are many ways to express gratefulness. The key is doing it. And you don’t need to wait until Thanksgiving time once a year. What can you do to strengthen the habit of gratitude?
