Ernest Shackleton Qualities

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Sir Ernest Shackleton was the ultimate leader, but why was he? This man led with equality, calmness and caring. In addition, Shackleton was a valiant man who led a troop of gradually dying men through the perilous Antarctic; arguably the most treacherous location on this planet, to safety after their barquentine was crushed by the pack ice in the Weddell Sea. All together, the expedition was like playing a game of Russian roulette, extremely dangerous. In 1914-1916 when they paraded across the hundreds of miles of pack ice that laid between them and the nearest populated safe haven, South Georgia Island, the entirety of the continent was essentially unmapped. Yet, with Shackleton's tremendous leadership skills, and the immense skill of the …show more content…

Shackleton was an impartial leader; no matter what you were hired for, you did your part. Everyone took their turn doing even the most obscene work. This included Shackleton himself, as Cheetham said “‘He don’t run you into any danger if he can help it; but by gum! if there’s danger, he goes first.’” Shackleton considered no one to be more important than another Everyone was important, and quarrels were quickly broken up by Shackleton by making up an excuse to change the tent arrangements. Also, he said that their survival depended on them all working together. No matter what your rank was, whether you were Blackborrow, the stowaway, or Shackleton himself, everyone was equal. Yet every single man on that expedition knew that Shackleton was the boss, no matter what. On page 12 it states, “As Dr. James McIlroy said, ‘Shackleton could be a very frightening kind of individual; like Napoleon, he was very stern-looking and fixed you with a steely eye.’ In the months that followed, they learned to follow him almost without question.” Except for McNish, who had tried to perform a coup d’état on what was essentially their government down far south on the icy, glacial wasteland they at that point called home. However, Shackleton dealt with it rather appropriately, as I will explain in the next paragraph. The respect that his men had for him was enough to cause him to be the ultimate boss on the

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