Safety and leadership in the Berg

As the saying goes (and excuse me for paraphrasing):

Good judgement is acquired from experience. And experience often comes from poor judgement.

Re: experienced but bad leadership
Excuse me quoting Naked Mountain again but it has a good example of this experience combined with a poor leader - Herrligkoffer was the expedition leader (well, on paper anyway). He had lead a few expeditions to Nanga so he was experienced at organising such trips. Problem was - he was not prepared to go past base camp and was not prepared to listen to the suggestions of others. Assuming we trust what Messner says as fact (personally I do for the most part, I believe most people also take Messner's side on this one) - Herrligkoffer was a shocker of an expedition leader.

Re: Plouw's comments
I wonder how many of you guys had the same experience as me - you get into hiking after tagging along with an inexperienced hiker (in my case - my brother, he was on his 4th 3000+m hike - 2nd time leading), and then struggled to find an experienced group that was willing to let you tag along. So to get into the habit of taking friends (who are less fit and less experienced than yourself) to the mountains. Pre-GT last year that was my pattern. I have been very fortunate in finding great people who are willing to join me on my ridiculous missions

It's not necessarily a case that I want to lead hikes (considering how often I like to stop and take photos it can actually be quite a nuisance to the guys I hike with) - I got into leading hikes because I couldn't find someone else who was willing to lead trips on routes I wanted to do. Not saying I don't enjoy leading hikes though...

@Stijn: I like that quote

The issue of 'turning around' has arisen a few times on hikes that I have been on, but it has never been a life threatening situation. More usually it was a very uncomfortable situation (bad weather or high winds) or someone in the group who was struggling. We do hike for pleasure mostly.
I have also seen very experienced people who are poor leaders and cannot handle emergency situations. A good leader is a people person. You need to be able to joke with others when the need occurs, make jokes of yourself if necessary, or turn on an extremely threatening attitude in an instant when some 'prima donna' with too much testosterone tries to take over the leadership role. Fortunately I have the large build, voice and acting skills to do this when it has happened to me. All this usually happens when you are in control of a large group. With small groups you are all friends and very seldom does drama happen. The worst leadership tests happen when the said 'prima donna' strides out in front, invariably not knowing when he is going, and several of the other sheep follow him. When finally meeting again after the sheep have done a large deviation from the route, the loud voice and several words beginning with F are required. After that the issue is usually over for that trip. You will note that I am only using the masculine gender. A good leader need to be confident in his or her navigation and also knows how to follow another designated leader without intruding, except when asked. You can lead a large group from the front, middle or back, or swapping to either of the three when necessary. The training courses I have done invariably say that the middle is the best place to lead from, especially from a communications point of view, except when close navigation is needed. Again, all of this only applies to large groups.
I definitely agree with plouw about using the collective experience of others in the group. This does not amount to lowering your status in the group.

BobbyStanton wrote: The issue of 'turning around' has arisen a few times on hikes that I have been on, but it has never been a life threatening situation. More usually it was a very uncomfortable situation (bad weather or high winds) or someone in the group who was struggling. We do hike for pleasure mostly.

I agree completely with that. We also turned around on Saturday due to the wind (I was also worried about the fact that the top of the pass is exposed and if a gust was to cause one of us to loose our balance, there was a potential to fall over 100m). But definitely no point in doing something you won't enjoy.

BobbyStanton wrote: You can lead a large group from the front, middle or back, or swapping to either of the three when necessary. The training courses I have done invariably say that the middle is the best place to lead from, especially from a communications point of view, except when close navigation is needed.

Makes sense.

The hike leader I enjoyed the most is John Pickup - his ploy seemed to be to put the slowest member in front (specifically me) and the fastest member 2nd to make sure I keep going faster than I normally would (usually Jo Hall for GT last year). You can tell when he did this by the lack of photos for big stretches of the GT (mainly the day we did Leslie's to Yodeler's cascades). That wasn't the part of his leadership I enjoyed, but I do think it was a clever approach. His general handling of a group was not invasive, but very effective - he's in control, but makes it feel like a team.

I can't name specifics, but there are certain leaders at a certain club whos trips I will not go on again (if they're leading). I have absolutely no confidence in their abilities.

The old story is that a lot of people have a lot to say after the incident, but the truth of the story is one can not
really comment on the situation unless they were actually there to experience the situation, things go wrong very quickly
and unexpectedly most of the times, sometimes no matter how much experience you have, its how the situation is dealt with that really matters.

For most situations that might be true, but not always. E.g. a member gradually getting sick (usually from exhaustion) usually doesn't happen quickly. But the later action is taken, the worse they'll be for it.

In October last year when a group of 3 of us ended up coming down Judge Pass at night, that was a case of an escalating problem. Realistically I knew before we were half way up Judge Pass that we were not going to break the Mafadi speed record (even though we ended up at the top of the pass 6km short of the target well ahead of the time required to secure the record - only 8 hours in shooting for a record that was 27 hours at the time) - one of our members was having issues from as early as Bannerman Hut - if we wanted the record we should have told him to stay there and we'd go ahead. The thing is that my thought process in the moment went something along the lines of "we can always overnight in UI Cave if we abandon the record attempt. The thought of not reaching Mafadi hadn't crossed my mind at the time. In the end we sat under a small rocky overhang at the top of Judge Pass for 2 hours in patchy mist and sleet/rain/wind and eventually decided it would be safest to go and sleep in Bannerman Hut. Took me an hour to realise that the distinctive looking peak right in front of me was Popple - that's how out of it I must have been at the time

I've been puzzled by the prominence of the hike 'leader' concept. I mean it as no criticism, but my experience in the mountains has been quite different. I've never really gone along on a trip with a hike leader. We've always been a bunch of people making decisions together - most often the decisions too obvious to even require discussion. In the beginning, I went with school mates who knew as little as me and we muddled along until we learnt more. It may be the case that a leader only really comes into play in groups bigger than 3 or so, which I've stayed shy of.

maybe the idea comes from kzn mountain register, which asks you write down your party names "starting with the leader" ... but i agree, in my circles not really the "leader" but more like the "organiser" i.e. person who can get it together enough to organize a hike

mnt_tiska wrote: I've been puzzled by the prominence of the hike 'leader' concept.

I had missed the contribution that Plouw made on page 2 of the thread. I think he said what I was trying to say better:

"It is imperative for the whole group to know at all given times where they are and all members should make the decisions together. Experienced hikers have collective experience and I believe all should be consulted and opinions shared. Obviously this only works in small groups.

When I organise hikes with my friends, we determine a suitable route and take it form there. There is no authoritative figure in the group, and every breakfast, lunch and dinner stop we assess our situation and set our goals for the next stop"