The extraordinary power of a unified, talented and prepared team

Stephen Covey, the author of "The 7 habits of highly effective people", which remains one of the worlds best-selling books on leadership, once wrote the following:

'The greatest and most inspiring mountain climbing achievements in history are not so much stories of individual achievement, but stories of the extraordinary power of a unified, talented and prepared team that stays loyally committed to one another and to a shared vision to the end.'

I find it inspiring not only because it's true, but also because it ties together everything that the best companies I know strive for: Great results, unforgettable moments, talent, tenacity, shared vision, loyalty, commitment, methodical preparation and rigorous execution - all delivered by a unified team.

It's a cliché, but overwhelmingly true, that men and women can accomplish extraordinary things when working together, and comparably less by individual effort.

Consider the fact that millions of people know the iconic picture of Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary, standing in their old-fashioned mountaineering gear, in an unforgiving landscape, looking at us through the dark, round goggles of the time.

Along with this picture from 1953, and the awe it inspires to this day, we carry with us the impression that the ascent of Everest can indeed be subscribed to these two remarkable figures. Their names and faces have become famous and recognizable to people all over the world, while the names and faces of men like John Hunt, Tom Bourdillon, Charles Evans, Edouard Wyss-Dunant and Raymond Lambert remain more of less unknown.

The conquest of Everest however, is not a simple story of individual heroism - it is a timeless masterclass in the extraordinary power of effective teams.

John Hunt, the author of the seminal book about the Everest expedition, is arguably the most decisive factor in the successful ascent of the worlds highest mountain. In September of 1952, Hunt, a highly decorated officer in the British army, much to his own surprise, received a telegram from The Royal Geographical Society, asking him to lead the 1953 Everest expedition.

Hunt accepted, handpicked the team, consisting of 11 Brits, two New Zealanders and the almost 40 Sherpas who joined the expedition in Nepal. He planned, budgeted and orchestrated the entire venture - from the testing of new gear in the Alps, to acclimatization in the Himalayas and right through to the final stage of the ascent.

Hunt is seen here showing Hillary and Tenzing the way to the top with his ice pick.

Tom Bourdillon and Charles Evans were two of the 11 Brits on the team, and Hunt selected these two world-class climbers for the first attempt to reach the summit from Camp VIII, 7.9 km above the sea... and imagine, they went higher than any human being before them and came within 100 meters of the top of the world before bad weather forced them to turn back

The route that Bourdillon and Evans found and the extra oxygen they deliberately left behind were of instrumental value to the climbers that Hunt selected for the second and final attempt. It is true that without the two exhausted gentlemen seen here, no one would have ever heard of the now world famous "second team", consisting of Tenzing and Hillary.

Edouard Wyss-Dunant led the Swiss attempt for the summit of Everest the year before the British team succeeded. But even though the Swiss failed, alpine legend Raymond Lambert, who was the most prominent climber on Wyss-Dunant's team, and Tenzing Norgay, who was also on the Swiss team, managed to set a new climbing world record.

The two adventurers, seen here during the expedition, had to turn back when they were approximately 250 meters from the summit. Tenzing's experience was obviously immensely useful when he was hired to be part of the British expedition the following year - he knew the entire route except for the final 250 meters.

But that was not all the British got from the Swiss. John Hunt met Raymond Lambert in the Alps in 1953 to learn as much as he could from the Swiss attempt and later wrote that the Swiss had been "most helpful". When the triumphant British team did a stopover in Zürich on their way home from Nepal, the Swiss team met them in the airport and offered them unreserved applause. Hunt and Lambert went on to become close friends.

It is reasonable to claim that without the competence and generosity of the Swiss team, Hunt's knowledge of the route to the top as well as Tenzing's value as a Sherpa, would have been severely reduced.

Interestingly, the story of the first woman on top of Everest has an eerie similarity to the story about Hunt, Tenzing, Hillary, Bourdillon, Evans, Wyss-Dunant, Lambert and all the other people involved in the 1952 and 1953 expeditions.

Junko Tabei began mountain climbing at the age of ten despite being a fragile child. She wanted the sport to be non-competitive as she enjoyed it mostly because of the striking natural landscapes seen from various mountain tops. She found the existing Japanese climbing clubs, dominated by men, too competitive and unwelcoming, and consequently established Japan's first women's mountaineering club.?

After climbing Annapurna III in Nepal, using a new route,?achieving the first female and first Japanese ascent of the mountain, the club created a 15 member team known as the Japanese Women's Everest Expedition (JWEE), led by Eiko Hisano. JWEE applied for a climbing permit for Everest in 1971, but had to wait four years to receive a place in the climbing schedule. Tabei spent the time fundraising for the expedition, and reported that potential sponsors frequently told her that women "should be raising children instead".

The JWEE team used the same route on Everest as Hunt's expedition had taken in 1953, but with only six Sherpa's. The plan was to send two women to the peak, but due to illness only one Sherpa was available, and thus only one of the women from the JWEE team could go. Hisano nominated Junko Tabei and on 16 May, 1975, she became the first woman to climb Everest, accompanied by her Sherpa, Ang Tsering, who took this photo.

As Hunt before her, Hisano disregarded personal fame and fortune in order to make the right choice for the team to accomplish the mission. In both cases the team stayed loyal and committed to each other to the end, despite the unique opportunity each member might feel that they were sacrificing for someone else to step into the limelight. Think of Bourdillon and Evans leaving their spare oxygen for the next team (whom they did not know would be).

We pay tribute to our heroes, and rightly so, but without the competence, composure, selflessness and generosity of people like Hisano, Hunt, Bourdillon, Evans, Wyss-Dunant, Lambert and many, many others, we wouldn't have many people like Tabai, Tsering, Tenzing and Hillary. Because the key ingredient in all large endeavors is the team it self.

When revisiting Hunt's book 'The Ascent of Everest', there is a certain poetic edge to the final reflections - he lists the obstacles that human kind has yet to overcome and concludes with the sentence: "and there is always the moon to reach." The reader is left with a clear sense that even an outstanding adventurer like Hunt finds the idea of of man conquering the moon quite unlikely. And yet, a mere 16 years later mankind landed on the moon.

The Apollo missions, leading to the moon landing in 1969, produced some quite iconic heroes as well, but the people in the spotlight, be it Tenzing and Hillary, or Armstrong and Aldrin, are obviously only the visible symbols of a much greater effort carried out by a larger, yet unified, and talented, yet self-sacrificing, team.

And while the expeditions to Everest and the moon are epic tales of how mankind conquers and overcomes nature, and how reality conquers and overcomes our dreams, they are in fact proof of that fact that only when we foster and harness true team spirit can the greatest obstacles on earth and beyond be overcome.

Cynics will point out that in our current culture, qualities like loyalty and self-sacrifice do not deliver the riches that people desire the most; but my work, in my own company, and for a handful of world leading companies, show that iconic accomplishments and enduring friendships enriches us in deeper and more profound ways than wealth and fame ever will.