Mountaineering is an endurance sport that has proven to provide training on real-world grounds, thus instilling one with valuable lessons that can be used in daily life – especially in the business world.
To further prove our point, we reached out to professional mountaineers in the field, such as Yousef Hamed Al Refaie – a highly accomplished and revered adventurer, mountaineer, and explorer admired by many young aspiring mountaineers around the world.
His career as a mountaineer began in 2015 when he decided to take on the perils of the Volcanic Seven Summit Challenge with Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. Eventually, his years of skills and his drive to be the best explorer out there led to his imminent success. The next part of his journey led him to the Elbrus in Russia, Mount Giluwe in the continent of Oceania, the Ojos Del Salado in Chile, Damavand, Iran, and Sidley, Antarctica.
In fact, his most notable achievement includes being the youngest man – the 24th worldwide and first Middle East and Arab – to ever complete the Volcanic Seven Summits Challenge. And right now, he is working towards finishing the Seven Summits and the Seven Deserts of the World.
As a professional who has spent many years as a veteran mountaineer, here are a few things we have learned from his work that business leaders can use to help them in their careers.
Always Be Prepared
Most plans can become useless when put into motion – but their real value lies in the preparation of defining a goal to clarify the end destination. When going on an adventure, it is important to break down the process into steps. Ambition can be pretty great but keep in mind that you have a team with you, and they need to be able to execute the plan. Assess your team’s strengths and weaknesses so that you are aware of their capabilities before you move ahead in your journey.
Surround Yourself With Better People Than You
Teamwork is essential when it comes to working towards a common goal, and the ability to direct individual accomplishments towards objectives can lead to positive results. Hence, you must seek out people who are oozing with optimism so that they may be your strength during tough times. You also need to have people you can trust, so take your time to choose the best people for the job – and you will be with these people for a long time, so think carefully.
Risk Comes With Not Knowing What You Are Doing
When in the mountains, you are constantly exposed to the dangers of nature – a similar scenario of a business environment.
It all starts with being more aware of the risks you are taking. Analyse the environment around you so that you may be able to assess whether your company is soaring towards success or in grave danger. Then comes risk mitigation where you do the groundwork first and only take risks after thorough research and a support system that can prop you back up in case something goes wrong.
