When a Submarine Sinks...By Accident!

Does your business ever feel like a sinking ship?

True story...

Our boat's digital depth meter was changing fast…

200 feet…

225 feet…

250 feet...

“Oh s**t! We’re sinking!”

I watched as our depth crept up faster by the second. This digital readout with its ominous red LCD lights was spelling out certain doom for myself and the other 120 crew members aboard our submarine.

We had just started running a drill to test our skills, and lo and behold something went wrong…

Terribly wrong!

300 feet...

My mind was scattered and I couldn’t think straight. I felt like I was in the middle of a movie where the doctor is trying to resuscitate a lifeless body, and each breath lasted an entire minute.

There was an eerie silence in the engine room. A compartment normally filled with the sounds of machines whirring, steam blasting through pipes like bullets out of a gun, gauges and fittings rattling slightly due to the heat and pressure suddenly sounded like a quite cave.

That’s when it finally hit me that we weren’t in a drill anymore - we had no air conditioning.

350 feet...

The fans were off…

There was no circulation, nothing keeping us cool in the 130 degree heat inside this giant, black, SINKING, steel nuclear power plant!

This was real. We were in the middle of a real no-sh#t situation where lives were on the line.

Soon equipment would begin to fail, and without steam, the power would go out, making it near impossible to recover our momentum.

I could hear my heart thumping in my chest. Sweat was dripping down my eyelids and drenched my collar.

What seemed like an eternity was just a matter of seconds!

400 feet...we were dropping like a stone in a lake!

All of a sudden the silence was broken by a very direct, stern, and impatient order over the loudspeaker:

“Engineering watch supervisor, EMERGENCY RESTORE THE ENGINE ROOM!”

I will never forget the words because they were the first time I thought I might actually die on that boat.

It was the first time I felt real fear…

The kind of fear that grips a man and shakes him to his core. The kind of fear that would paralyze any mortal and rob him of his ability to utter a sound, let alone move.

But these weren’t just men I was working with…

These were SUBMARINERS!

Poseidon himself plucked these rare specimens from the land and bestowed upon them the ability to withstand the crushing pressure of the deep blue sea.

It was then that this resiliency made itself known. As quickly as the fear of death entered into my mind it disappeared and took a back seat to the steel resolve to overcome our situation.

The crew jumped into high gear, opening valves, running past one another like running backs squeaking through the line, narrowly but expertly missing each other.

“Open that valve, now!” Came the direct order from my Chief, pointing his fat sausage finger at a large valve situated amidst a barrage of steam pipes. I wasted no time in answering the call, and reached for the valve handwheel with my sweaty hands.

Everything was hot. Damn hot. The bright silver pipes left burn marks on your arm and let out a light hissing sound when you accidentally brushed up against them in your haste. But now was no time to complain. Now was the time for action. Besides, scars make for a good story.

The valve opened slowly at first as pressure had built against it during the accidental shutdown.

“Put some a$$ into it, Barnes” came my Chief’s call of "encouragement" as I manhandled the giant white wheel.

This valve could mean the difference between a crushing steel coffin or freedom. I chose freedom. Summoning the will of Hercules himself I was able to inch the valve open.

The steam rushed past the valve like a tornado tearing through a mobile home! It opened easier as the pressure equalized, and finally the sounds returned to the engine room. The steam was fast making its way back to our turbines that had been idle since the beginning of the drill.

Propulsion was more important than anything else in our lives at this point.

Momentum...we needed momentum.

Someone screwed up the drill and we lost all momentum. The emergency motor didn’t start like it was supposed to, and we completely lost momentum.

You learn a scary truth about submarines in this scenario- no momentum, and you don’t make it back to the surface.

Soon turbines were turning again, and the propeller along with it…

The digital depth gauge reversed its trend…

400...350...300…200 feet!

We were safe - for now….

___________________________________________________________________

In a submarine you need forward momentum if you ever hope to make it back to the surface again to see the light of day and take another breath of fresh air.

No momentum and you don’t survive.

The same is true in business.

If you fail to keep moving forward, you fail. Period.

Just like a submarine needs propulsion to keep going and stay afloat, so too does a business need momentum to continue to grow and serve its customers.

The problem is that most business owners spend their days battling situations like the one I just described above. Okay, maybe not just like the one above, but the feelings are still the same.

As dramatic as this scenario may have seemed, you didn't sense or see fear in the eyes of the men in that boat. It was literally just another day at the office. There were ways to overcome and correct this misstep before it became a tragedy.

Most owners focus all of their time on somehow trying to regain momentum, just managing to stay afloat.

They spend all of their time dealing with headaches and putting out fires…

Phone calls from upset customers…

Staff drama…

Vendors, bill collectors, regulators - the list goes on and on.

Your energy is drained, and in the back of your mind you’re thinking “So help me! If I hear one more complaint about…”

But you have to let it go. It drives you nuts, but you know you must simply fix the problem if you want to stay afloat.

A submarine travels thousands of miles under water, undetected, on a mission, and it and its crew can overcome obstacles and keep moving forward because of the systems they all use. The systems run the ship, and the crew runs the systems.

The fact is that if you don’t have the right systems in place, you won’t ever achieve continuous momentum that will set you and your business free.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

My name is Jeff Barnes. I'm a former US Navy Submariner turned Fortune 500 Director, Author, Business Advisor, and Consultant. I help business owners, executives, and entrepreneurs develop innovative solutions to growing their business and impacting more people through speaking, consulting, and advising.