'Edge Moments' Leadership Interview Transcript

‘Edge Moments’ Interview
with Rachel Robertson
Gary Ryan Interview Rachael Robertson, just the second female to lead Australia’s Antarctic
Expedition for a 12 month period.
Rachael Robertson shares key insights about leadership when there is literally nowhere to hide!
May 2013

Gary Ryan Interview with Rachael Robertson
Big Leadership in Small Moments
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That Matter®. A small amount of editing has occurred to assist with the
flow of reading the interview.
Welcome everyone to ‘Edge Moments: Big Leadership in Small Moments.’
I am Gary Ryan and I’m going to be interviewing Rachael Robertson with
you here today and I am really looking forward to this interview.
‘Organisations That Matter’ is my organisation; in simple terms, I work in
the space of enabling people to move beyond being ‘good’ – whether that
be individually one-on-one with people, in teams or in organisations.
Often, people are very good at what they do but there is a gap between
their skill and talent and potential and what they are actually achieving
and that’s the space that I work in and why, when I connected through
LinkedIn with Rachael not all that long ago and I saw her story, I said:
‘I’ve got to interview Rachael’ because being in the Antarctic for 12
months, leading a team down there under such extreme conditions,
Rachael must know a thing or two about moving beyond being good so
that’s why we’re here today.
In terms of our time together, we’ve got this brief introduction because
I’m aware a number of you have never experienced a webinar before.
We’ll spend the vast majority of our time interviewing Rachael and many
of you have included questions in your registration which has just been
fantastic to enable me to create the interview-structure that we’ll be going
through. If we’ve got some time at the end, we might have sometime for
you to ask questions but along the way, still feel free to type them in
anyway and we will spend a few brief minutes at the end doing a wrap-up.
So you should have a little toolbar in the top right-hand corner of your
screen – please ‘raise your hand’ if you have a question that you would
like to ask or type in your question into the little textbox; a number of you
have already done that prior to the start of this webinar to let me know
that you could hear us.
Take notes; take notes and note down your lessons as if you were in a
face-to-face environment so that you can capture all the lessons that
Rachael has to share with us today and once again, I am recording this
interview so it will be made available for you at the conclusion of the
webinar within the next 24 hours.
Gary: So, Rachael welcome aboard. Thanks for coming along and thanks
for agreeing to speak with us.
Rachael: My pleasure. Thanks for having me.
Gary: Now, I’d thought we’d start with: what’s the story behind your
story? How on earth does someone end up leading an expedition for 12
months down in Antarctica?

Rachael: (Laughs) Yes, it’s an interesting question – I answered an ad in
a newspaper, believe it or not. People assume I must have trained for
years and years to be this expedition leader and I’d have to be like an
athlete, that it’s something that I’ would have strived to do since I was a
little girl but it wasn’t; I was just clicking through the Careers section of a
newspaper and I actually saw the ad for a station leader in Antarctica.
What intrigued me was that they were recruiting for personal attributes
rather than technical expertise so they were looking for people with
leadership ability but more importantly, people with compassion and
integrity and respect and I thought rather than – you didn’t need to know
a whole heap about Antarctica and I thought: what a fascinating concept
to employ people for the qualities that you want rather than the technical
and I thought that it would be great for people in customer-service roles
to recruit staff who had integrity and then you can teach them the
technical stuff so I was intrigued about that and I thought: I am going to
apply for this job because I want to find out what questions they are
asking at the job interview so that I can copy them and bring them back
to my organisation (laughs).
It was only once I’d applied for the job that I learnt that they don’t have a
job interview. It’s actually a week long what I’d call a ‘boot camp’ for a
week in the Central Highlands of Tasmania.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: They take the short-listed applicants away for a week and put
us through for an entire week and so that’s how I ended up there. But
when they offered the job and I was – because I wasn’t passionate about
the job at that stage – the reason I took the job was that I thought I
would rather have regrets about what I did do rather than regret what I
didn’t do and honestly I thought: what’s the worst thing that could
happen? The worst that could happen is that I get down there and I hate
it and you can’t come home ever and I thought I’d rather do that than
head 50 years into the future and then look back at my life and think:
what if I had done that expedition?
I couldn’t stand that thought of ‘what if’ so I thought I’d rather regret
what I did than regret what I didn’t do so it was purely an opportunity
that I saw and I thought: ‘Yup. I’ll have a go at this’ and it turned out to
change my life but it was absolutely an opportunity.
Gary: So, again at the start, you saw an ad that was focussed 100% on
attributes rather than technical skills and you thought to yourself: ‘you
know what, I want it’ because you hear about these sort of recruitment
processes but you don’t often hear about them first hand – you sort of
think it’s an urban myth that organisations actually do that and you’d
think that ‘no one really recruits just on attributes; they all might say that
but in reality, they want the technical skills’ but you’re saying: no, in
reality, this is how it was but I did obviously have to prove myself through

that week-long boot camp and I suspect there were times then where you
started scratching back at your head wondering: ‘is this right for me?’
Rachael: Yeah, it was and they were actually looking for people with
leadership experience and people-management skills and I guess they
knew you could learn the Antarctic-specific stuff so you could learn about
the science programme and you could learn about the Antarctic Treaty
and you could learn about the history of Antarctica.
What you can’t learn are the qualities like empathy and just to be put
through a week where we camped out and we were all taken to a level of
immense pressure laid on us hour after hour, day after day and they get
to see the real you. There’s nowhere to hide and I guess that’s what they
were looking for – to see how we’d cope: we’ll put these people under
intense personal stress and pressure and we’ll just see how they cope and
there was a whole heap of whacky scenarios and things to designed to
test us but that was purely to see how we coped.
For example, one of the scenarios was we were given five values – there
were things like loyalty, hard work, respect, integrity – and we had to pick
which one we thought was most important and then convince everybody
else that ours was best and straightaway, that hit me as ‘that’s weird, you
can’t do that.’ You can’t try and convince someone else that their value is
wrong because they would have held that value their entire life so when it
came to my turn to do that, all I did was I stand up and said: look, I think
integrity is the most important and this is why… and I just respectfully
stated my case and when the penny dropped, I realised – ah! That’s what
it was designed for. It was actually designed to see if you can state the
case in a calm, empathetic and professional way and not tear down the
other people which some people did – some of the other applicants took it
as a competitive thing and they were trying to convince other people that
they were wrong and I was like: aha! Now I get it (laughs) so it was a
very comprehensive programme.
Gary: So, it sounds like Rachael some people were using this boot camp
as practice for ‘Survivor’ (laughs).
Rachael: Ah! Yeah the interesting thing that I came to learn was that a
lot of the people were looking at this job as an escape – like they are in a
job or a situation that they didn’t want to be in so they thought: I’ll try for
this job in Antarctica and it will be this big adventure and I’ll get away
from whatever situation I’m in. It just doesn’t work like that; it’s not the
kind of place you want to be in to escape from reality because reality bites
real hard down there.
Yeah, it was fascinating to see the different motivations for why people
were there. For me, I went there with a fairly laidback approach and I
thought if I’m the right person and if the interview panel after a week
believe I have what it takes to lead in this environment – fantastic but if
not I’m not, if I get ‘you’re not right for this role’ then, so be it because

it’s not the kind of the place you want to be if you’re not cut out for it so it
was a very comprehensive selection process.
Gary: So, Christina is very keen to know this whole topic of ‘Edge
Moments – what are ‘edge moments’ and where did that term come from,
Rachael?
Rachael: Yeah – edge moments are those defining moments that stay
with you so they are the moments you have with your colleagues or your
boss that stay with you for a long time. They could be positive and they
could be negative and I think if I ask you and if I ask everyone tuning in
today to think of the best boss they ever had or conversely, the worst
boss they ever had, we tend to remember how they made us feel; we
don’t remember that you hit their targets and their KPI1
s and we don’t
remember things like the strategic direction; we remember how they
made us feel and we remember if they inspired us and made us feel right
or did they put us down and make us feel that we weren’t valuable and I
started to realise that it’s actually the moments that are real so the
innovation and the disruption and the alarm and all the big stuff – all
those big words – they are really important and critical for business but
you’re not going to get that – never going to get that happening unless
you get the moments right and the reason why I call it the ‘edge
moments’ is that it’s moments that happen around the edges.
So, you can get the big stuff right but unless you’re managing what’s
happens round the edges, you won’t be able to convey it and how I came
up with it was my performance review was actually undertaken by a
psychologist who interviewed my entire team privately and then gave me
feedback – so you can imagine how frank and honest the feedback was
because it was a third party. She said to me: look, your guys overall
around found you really inspiring. I was intrigued and I said: well, what
was inspiring – we did have a plane crash throughout summer – was it
how I handled the plane crash? She said, no and I said: was it the fact I
work 16-hour days in summer? and she said no. I asked whether it was
the fact that I changed a lot of the policies so they had more transparency
and she said no. I thought: what was it? What did they say that inspired
them?
She said: one of the guys mentioned that his child had a school concert
and the next day, you bumped into him and you asked, ‘how was Mark’s
school concert?’ and someone else – Sharon - mentioned that you knew
the names of all 120 people who ran your station and were they from –
they were of different nationalities and some of the names are a bit tricky
for an Australian like me to pronounce. She said they commented that you
were able to pronounce all of the names and so I am thinking: really?
And she also said that someone else mentioned that they were mopping
the floor one day and it was taking a long time and you came through and
put a few chairs on the table just to help him finish quickly and I’m like: is
1
Or Key Performance Indicator

that what they mentioned? And so immediately I’m thinking: so, it’s not
to work 16-hour days but (laughs) it just struck me that that’s what they
remember about me – the moments that we had and that’s where it came
to me and I realised that well, when I think about my past bosses I don’t
remember what they said or did – I remember how they made me feel
and it’s a really important thing for technical leaders in particular to learn
this – it’s about not charisma or being an extrovert you know inspiring
people but about these moments. It’s about the moments that you
connect with people and getting them on side and then they will do
anything and then you’ll get the innovation and you’ll get alignment. You’ll
get strategic thinking – but you won’t get that unless you have these
moments and that’s how I realised that.
Gary: Susie was also interested Rachael, in how did you feel using the
concept of edge moments yourself – were there times when you weren’t
supported in your leadership role because I would imagine that the folk
that you were reporting to were clearly back in Australia so were there
moments when you were feeling lonely and isolated because that happens
to leaders and how did you manage it in those circumstances?
Rachael: That’s a great question and I often get asked how I looked after
myself in such an isolated environment and I have to say: look, that’s just
geography. I’ve actually been lonelier as a leader working in a capital city
because leadership can be lonely and particularly, when you’re leading
change and the truth is whatever the change is, you have to lead it – that
can be quite isolating and for me, with my head office – yeah it was 4,000
kilometres away and when I didn’t feel like I was supported I just had to
come back to why I was doing what I was doing and to give you an
example, I established a leadership team with all my senior people on
station – so like my chef and my chief engineer and my doctor – it wasn’t
very well received back in head office (laughs) and so it looked like: look
what you are doing Rachael, you’re not running a democracy down there
and I had to say: look, I’m making the decision down here absolutely but
I need input from the experts and it would be crazy not to use the
knowledge and the experience of the people around me to inform my
decision-making and even though it wasn’t well received, I stuck by it.
I know this is what works for me and that’s why I can lead; it’s by having
a team of experts and calling in on their expertise – I knew why I was
doing it and so, eventually it got picked up and I was wrapped six months
later when they asked me to write an operations manual about how I
managed the station at the summer because everybody used it as a
blueprint for the next summer. So in the end, it was right but the things
that got me through I guess were - peer support is very important – I was
really good mates with the station leader at Mawson Station which was a
fair way away from us but I would pick up the phone and talk to the
leader there.
Gary: Yes.

Rachael: …and it was a good thing; I would talk and I de-brief with
someone who knows what you’re going through, who knows the culture,
who knows the job – it’s just gold. The other thing that kept me really
sane was I kept a journal and that was…I was the second woman leader
at Davis Station...
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: The first woman was Donna Patterson and she suggested
keeping a journal and I was sort of like: oh yeah, she’s got time for a
journal.
Gary: Yeah.
Rachael: I thought: fine. I am keeping this journal because I had no one
to talk to and no one to confide in so I started keeping this journal and I
had two things: one, it was actually therapeutic – it got the emotion out
each day so I could sleep better and the second thing was it helped me
reflect so I could work out what I was doing well and what I wasn’t doing
well just by reflecting in this journal and if I hadn’t taken the time each
day to reflect on my leadership, I don’t think I could have done that so, it
actually forced me to stand on a balcony and look down and watch myself
in the team and work out what I wasn’t doing so well and what I was
doing well.
Gary: Rachael, lot of people hear about journaling and they think often
from the work that I do that there is only one way to journal and I
encourage them that no, that’s not quite accurate. What structure did you
use for your journaling?
Rachael: Mine was totally random and it was hand written because I
thought if I typed it, I’d probably sanitise it and I’d correct the spelling
and the grammar and just – I know myself (laughs). It just wouldn’t be a
stream of consciousness and it absolutely was just a random…you know, it
wasn’t just, I took the bikes out and went for a ride and photographed
penguins…it was also this person is driving me crazy and I just don’t know
what to do…and I’ve actually included quite a few of the journal extracts
in my upcoming book and it’s fascinating to watch the journey, to watch
the journal entry where I am talking: I don’t know what to do here but
I’m going to do this and then few paragraphs later, working out what
happened and for me, it was very much just about working and I’m just
trying to understand what was going on. So if I made a decision and there
was a reaction in the community, what was going on there, what’s
happening there? And the way to do that was to reflect which I would
absolutely take time out everyday and reflect on my issue.
Gary: So, there are two things there: there is the habit that you formed
and leadership requires habits and there’s the act of the habit of reflecting
for which you were using journaling and as you described it Rachael, it
was a random journaling activity but it was providing that opportunity to
reflect so that you could make sense of what was going on so the folk out

there listening in today – there are a couple of really keen insights into
leadership to help you get through the sometimes lonely experience of
being a leader. Clearly down in the Antarctic, it’s an extreme condition.
What was the goal or the main goals – Jason was in keen to learn about
the main goals or the goal that you were working towards Rachael, while
you were down there.
Rachael: Yeah, it’s a fascinating place and it’s a fascinating job that I
had. The main goal is climate change science so we’re doing research into
climate change and that’s all sorts of science – biology, geology,
geomorphology, seismology, glaciology – all the –ologies.
Gary: All the –ologies (laughs).
Rachael: All the –ologies – and that blew me away - you know the fact
that people had dedicated their entire career to the study of ice. I met the
glaciologist and it blew me away but as I got to understand their science a
bit better, I could appreciate what they were trying to do so, in some –
there is 120 of us on-station and the vast majority international scientists
from all over the globe who fly into the Australian stations and do
research on climate change and global warming and then at the end of
summer, they would go home and leave 18 of us behind. We had in that
18 – we did have 2 scientists who stayed behind to do some upper
atmospheric science work throughout the vast majority in winter where
we mainly have to keep the lights on and to keep the place running – and
I’ve got to tell you, the environment is extreme I mean, -35 degrees is
cold, 24 hours of darkness and 24 hours of daylight – it’s absolutely full
on and the environment itself was extreme but what was way more
difficult was the intense personal living and anybody who has lived in
remote areas like that - so even mining sites or mining camps or anyone
who has lived in those environments, even tourists on some of the islands
but it’s tourist areas and it’s tough to get up – that’s way more for us the
interpersonal pressure of living on top of each other 24 hours a day for a
year – that was way more difficult than the environment. We coped with
the environment.
Gary: So, I suppose that’s really what’s intrigued a lot of people Rachael
was how, as a leader you – you know, by the way folks, when Rachael is
talking about the summer and winter, summer was the start of November
through to the start of February and winter was pretty much the rest of
the year. Is that accurate?
Rachael: Spot on, yeah.
Gary: Yeah, so winter is a long time – there’s a long time between
February and November you know. That’s a long period of time to have
fundamentally 18 of you and as you say, having some pretty significant
periods of just darkness and we’ve got…Christine wants to know how the
extreme conditions brought out the extreme emotions from your team…
Rachael: Yeah, absolutely.

Gary: How did you handle that?
Rachael: That’s the thing I mean, every issue I had, I’ve dealt with in any
workplace. I’ve got the same issues you have in every workplace – the
personality conflict, the boredom, the people who work massive hours and
people who don’t. Every challenge I had I’ve had before in a different
workplace.
The difference in Antarctica is that I had to deal with it; I mean in other
workplaces, you might not jump into it as a conflict. You might just sort of
think: oh, I’ll deal with that on Monday whereas, I couldn’t do that - as
things arose, as issues arose, I had to deal with it. The emotions are the
same as in any workplace but the difference is that it was like a
microscope and the fact that we couldn’t go home each night to our family
and friends; we couldn’t go and play sport; we couldn’t go to football – all
of the things that people do to keep themselves resilient we couldn’t do
that and we had to deal with it and so probably, one of the best things I
learnt down there was that it was not my role as leader to sort out every
inter-personal spat and it took me a while to work that out but I realised I
couldn’t cope, that’s not my job and there’s no way I could do this for a
year so I’d developed a rule that I called ‘no triangles’ and no triangles
just meant I didn’t speak to you about him or you don’t speak to me
about her and it was about having the common decency and respect that
if someone has upset you, you go straight to that person.
You don’t take it to a third party because you know we don’t upset people
deliberately – we don’t and when we find out we’ve upset someone it feels
awful enough but if you find out that person has gone to a third party
instead of coming directly to you, that’s just horrible and so for us to have
a respectful team which was my number one rule – I was pretty blunt and
I said: I don’t expect 18 strangers from all around the globe or different
backgrounds…
Gary: mm hmm.
Rachael: …to love each other because it’s not going to happen but you
will respect each other and part of the respect was ‘no triangles’ and so,
as a leader – and it’s a great tip for leaders that you can do this and if
people come to you with these sorts of conflicts, the first question is: do
you want me to intervene, is that why you are telling me? And if the
answer is ‘no, I’m just telling you’ well then, you have to say: well, okay -
what did they say when you spoke to them – no triangles and it took a
while, I’ve got to say.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: It took about 4 or 5 months to get that culture but once it was
part of our culture, it was absolutely part of our culture and it was just
accepted that you wouldn’t speak to a third party – you would go straight

to that person. It was a really powerful tool and that’s what I used down
there.
Gary: I’m really interested in you talking a little bit more about ‘no
triangles’ because I think it’s really powerful Rachael and particularly you
know you’ve mentioned it takes 4-5 months for it to get embedded in an
extreme environment – like it is in Antarctica but clearly out of the people
in the team, they would have had a wide range of personalities, skills and
preferences and all of those things so some folk could be more inclined
because of their personality and just their skill set they have got from
their communication point of view to have a ‘no triangles’ talk or
conversation and others would have been a bit more distant from being
able to do such a thing based on their starting point because of their
personality, preferences and so forth. Can you talk us through how you
managed those types of differences with people regarding the practice of
‘no triangles’?
Rachael: You’re absolutely spot-on and it is a skill that you can develop
in how to have that conversation and for people who were more
comfortable or had worked say, in intense corporate environment where
you’ll need to have these conversations, it was a lot – not easier but
therein, a lot more comfortable than with a say, self-employed person
who’d worked on their own…
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: …and didn’t have a team around them and so for those guys in
particular, I had to coach them and that’s the big caveat around ‘no
triangles’ that it will only work if your leaders are prepared to put up their
hand and coach people how to have the conversation and I just had to
give them very practical tips around it in things the same things like ‘don’t
get them first thing in the morning’ – you know, pick the right time and
get them at the right time of day and have empathy – try to predict where
you think the conversation might go. Take out emotion – so deal with
facts and it’s interesting when I work with emerging leaders now and I
talk about managing performance and I say to them: you would never
start a performance conversation by saying something like: ‘you’re always
late’ or ‘you’re never on time’ because ‘always’ and ‘never’ are pretty big
words.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: and you have to use data. You use data: Yes, I looked: ‘for the
last four days you’ve arrived at 9.30 – you’re meant to be here at 9’
because people can’t debate data whereas emotion they can so it was
about coaching them on how to take the emotion out and use the facts,
these are the facts and yeah, it took quite a while. It was worth it. It was
worth me investing that time, absolutely.
Gary: You know I coach people Rachael on how to have fact-based
conversations for the exact, same reason. You know we people have an

amazing capacity to generalise and once you say something is always or
never then it is very difficult to see it otherwise and yet, things are
actually rarely ‘always’ or ‘never’. Rather than ‘always’ it may only have
happened once!
Rachael: …and that…yeah… and that-it’s funny because I actually
developed a thing that I call – which is my own – it was called a ‘LADAR’
with a language radar and it was based on a light radar. We had science
equipment down called a LADAR which was a light radar. So I had this
LADAR which is my language radar and it was words like everyone, no
one, always, never and so when one of my guys would come to me and
say: uh everyone thinks blah, blah, blah…
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: I’d say: that’s everyone – it’s like this little ‘ping’ on my radar
going ‘everyone’?
Gary: Really?
Rachael: and I would say then: oh no – it wasn’t this person and that –
okay, it’s not everyone. It’s you. It’s you so you take responsibility for
what you’re telling me.
It’s not everyone and it’s a really good thing to keep in the back of your
mind – to have this little language radar – this LADAR that just picks up
those words because they are telling you a whole lot more than just the
word and it is spot-on. It’s just is too absolute a LADAR word.
Gary: So, Rachael, have you had some learning over time or some
coaching yourself that you developed this understanding of leadership
prior to going to Antarctica or is this stuff that you literally worked out
while you were down there learning how to do this job on the run so to
speak?
Rachael: It was a bit of both – I’ve held leadership roles for 16 years
prior to this job and I’ve worked in remote areas which really helped so I’d
know what it’s like to be located in a different environment to your head
office team and I know how important that relationship is when you’re
managing remote teams and I’ve also worked in ‘bloke-y’ environments –
managing teams of all men up so I know it’s a very different context when
it is a male-dominated industry and you’re a woman so I’ve had
experience there but equally, a lot of it I’ve learned on the job and most
of what I learned was when I got stuff wrong.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: One of the things I got wrong was – it was a tiny issue about
playing music on the radio station (laughs) whoever helps the chef each
day in the kitchen gets to pick the music that’s played on the radio station
and a couple of Melbourne guys decided that when it was a Saturday or

Sunday – or probably not but they played football and would stream the
AFL live and then the Sydney, Newcastle and Queensland guys got
onboard and thought when the State of Origin was on they’d stream that
live so rather than playing music they’d have sport and this upset a few
people.
They came and saw me and said: Rachael, the rule is that they pick
music, not sport and I didn’t know what to do and the other people come
and say: no, the rule is it’s their choice and I honestly didn’t know what to
do so I canvassed all 17 people and asked them: what do you think about
what we should do? What should we all do?
And suddenly, everybody is talking about it, it’s all they are talk about and
I couldn’t work out ‘why?’ I’m thinking ‘why is this such a big deal?’ and I
realise you know I had turned this into the biggest issue that had hit
Antarctica in 58 years and it was all me and I’m writing in my journals
saying: why is this such a big issue? What am I missing? In the end, I had
made the right decision but I made it the wrong way and it’s you know
sometimes you are democratic and you collaborate and you get by; other
times, it’s your job – you’re paid to make these decisions.
It’s your job, make the call and that’s what I should have done in this
case and there are these other situations where you just don’t get
involved. That learning only came to me in Antarctica and so I don’t regret
it for a second because I learnt from it but I wouldn’t do it again so now
every time I have to make a decision like that, I sort of look at the risk
and I think: oh do I need to collaborate or is this my job – this is what I’m
paid to do and so yeah, it was partly what I knew but also because I faced
situations I’ve never faced before.
Gary: Mm hmm.
Rachael: Like when we had a plane crash for example and I have never
managed a plane crash and so, having to lead my team through that – the
search and rescue in that area was huge.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: and so it was a lot of learning on the job yeah.
Gary: And you know I think that’s one of the big insights for all of the
leaders listening in here today is that there is no single one way to be a
leader in terms of being autocratic or democratic; it’s about the right way
at the right time for the right reasons and as you say, it sometimes is
your job to make some of these calls and you have just got to step up to
the plate and do it.
We were talking about extreme conditions and emotion just before, there
was this thing that I’ve heard you briefly speak about called the ‘bacon
wars’ – you’ve got to talk about us through that, please.

Rachael: (laughs) Oh Gary yeah. I didn’t even know what was going on
and someone – one of the plumbers came and saw me and said: we need
to have a meeting to decide how to cook the bacon on Monday when the
chef has the morning off and I said why and he said – because the
plumbers like it soft and diesel mechanics like it crispy and we want you
to decide how it should be cooked.
It blew me away. I thought I’m not stopping a 20 million dollar
programme to decide how to cook bacon. You run a roster, cook it the
way you like it – but what it taught me once I asked a few questions – it
was actually a manifestation of an issue between those two teams.
It was another issue around how they were using the vehicles but it was
all about respect and I realised these are small things that are about
respect and every workplace has a form of a bacon war – I was reading
some research from LinkedIn the other day saying that one of the biggest
bacon wars - and it’s different in different countries but here in Australia,
one of the biggest bacon wars is dirty coffee mugs.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: and it drives people nuts – I had someone say to me last week:
oh look at the sign saying ‘Your mother doesn’t work here to put the
dishes away.’
Gary: (laughs)
Rachael: They could have just put the dish in the dishwasher and I said:
it’s not about the dishes. It’s not about the coffee mug.
Gary: No.
Rachael: It’s about respect because what it implies is ‘my time is more
important than your time’ and whether that’s – often that’s not what the
person is thinking when they do it but that’s the implication and that’s the
perception and I say you’ve actually got to manage your bacon wars
because they are only small things but if you ignore them, they get
massive and they are a deeper issue around respect so yeah, the bacon
wars were quite an extraordinary experience.
Gary: So, probably a similar sort of issue that is a bugbear for a lot of
people is timeliness to meetings and people’s ability to get to meetings on
time as an example and it’s probably the same thing that ultimately really
that issue is not about the clock – it’s actually about respect and respect
for time as you described with the bacon wars – and I think these lessons
are really important because I know some of the folk before the interview
were asking questions: well, how was what was happening in Antarctica
relate back to the workplace here today and I think we’ve been hearing
some very clear examples about – it’s not any difference; it’s just down
there, you can’t escape it which actually might be to our detriment back

here because we might put things off because we think, well we can
escape it.
Rachael: That’s absolutely true. I was just reading research this morning
that kind of last week that actually said – it was with the Harvard Business
Review and they interviewed 14,000 people. 50% of the 14,000 people
had said that in the past week, they had been disrespected or felt
disrespected at work – someone had been rude or disrespectful and I’m
thinking: 50% of 14,000 and that’s just in the past week so you look at
the flow on effect of that and how that affects the morale and the
productivity. The biggest issue I think today in Australian leadership or
even global leadership is that we need leaders who can inspire and the
way you inspire is you’ve got to manage these things.
You’ve really got to deal with these then and sometimes, it’s not always
getting involved – like in the bacon war I didn’t get really involved in it. I
just said: look, this is my decision you know – you’re on a roster. Once it
reads 17 weeks, it’s your turn to cook the bacon the way you like it.
That’s the thing in Antarctica that every issue we faced was an issue I’d
come across before but I had to deal with it. I had to dig deep into my
psychie to think: what’s the best way to deal with this because I had no
sanctions and I had no rewards other than how do you keep people
motivated during the Antarctic winter and most jobs have an Antarctic
winter; most jobs have a period of time where work is just work: there is
budget cutting meeting that there is no big capital project and particularly
in pharmaceuticals and construction and places like that where they have
long lead times on projects – might be two or three years – 4 or 5 years
and how do you keep people motivated through that and for me, it was a
couple of things but one of the big things was finding a reason to
celebrate.
Gary: Mm hmm.
Rachael: and the reason is that for some people it creates momentum so
even celebrating – and not having a party but just saying ‘thank you’ for
when the server hadn’t gone down for 100 days and when we do not have
a power blackout for 50 days – just celebrating the same things builds
momentum and builds progress and you feel like you’re still moving
forward even thought you might be in the middle of this project that just
goes on for years and years and that’s what they talk about when they
say inspiring leadership – that’s what it means.
Gary: Mm hmm.
Rachael: it’s about inspiring through those dull times; it’s about finding
those reasons to celebrate.
Gary: and that’s often the leaders’ job – to be on the lookout for them so
that you can celebrate them and you know we’re interested to know for
example, Chloe was interested to know – and Tony as well in fact - who is

a leader that you really respect – someone that inspired you - but not
necessarily you would have modelled yourself upon but someone that
really stood out for you over time?
Rachael: Yeah it changes and it sort of depends on what is on the radar
at the time but I guess someone who I’ve worked with recently and a
name known to people in Australia and New Zealand is John Gillam who is
the CEO of Bunnings and Officeworks and so you can imagine – I think
Bunnings employs 3000 people and Officeworks would have similar
numbers and so, he’s got a very busy job – big job.
Gary: mm hmm.
Rachael: and I did field events with Bunnings in Australia and New
Zealand and one of the things I remember was that – I was almost late
for my flight in New Zealand and I said to John: I’ve got to go, the plane
is boarding in 2 ½ hours and I’ve got to be there 2 hours before and then
I didn’t see him again for 6 months and the first thing he said to me when
he saw me was: ah, so you got the plane – you managed to catch the
plane and I’m thinking: gee how did you remember that?
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: another example was he actually sent me a handwritten ‘thank
you’ note in a mail and this is a man who has got a multi-million dollar
business to run, thousands and thousands of employees and suppliers and
yet, he took the time to write me a handwritten ‘thank you’ note for the
work I’d done and it’s getting back to those moments you know and I
remember that and I remember how they made me feel. I’ve seen him,
I’ve spoken to his staff and it’s the same with his staff and I just think
that’s what it’s about – it’s about taking the time to write a thank-you
note, taking the time even to – if you look around and it’s not a title –
that’s the other important message to it.
Leadership isn’t a title – it’s a way of behaving; if you think something
needs to be done and even if you’re having a morning tea and you notice
that someone’s not at their desk, they are in a meeting it’s about just
grabbing a slice of cake and putting it in the fridge for them so when they
get back, they haven’t missed out on the morning tea and having some
cake and I’ll remember that moment. That’s why I say ‘big leadership in a
small moment.’
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: it’s only a moment but you want to feel valued at work and
have people treat with you kindness and respect and simple things like
that and that’s what makes a huge difference.
Gary: clearly, your story about John Gillam there is connected to the
feedback that you got even though the feedback you got was before you
would have been working and experiencing John in terms of timelines –

yeah, bothering to know and learn 120 people’s names, bothering to know
about someone’s child’s birthday and these are the little moments or the
‘edge moments’ as you call them Rachael that really matter to people and
everyone listening knows this and really, that’s a challenge for everyone
listening on in this interview is how do you go knowing what’s going on
with the people around you and it’s not about prying is it – it’s about just
knowing and taking action when appropriate and to let them know ‘Hey,
I’m aware. I care’ even if it is a slice of cake as you just described after
you had a bit of a celebration someone couldn’t make it because of a
meeting – that’s really powerful to be able to use those edge moments.
Rachael: and that’s why I’m now ambassador for ‘R U OK?’ day because I
know how – I saw it with my eyes and I never used to ask those questions
because I thought: ‘oh I don’t have the answer’ and if I knew someone
wasn’t okay, I would think: hmm well I don’t want to make it worse and I
don’t know what to say. I’ve learned that it’s not about having the
answer; it’s about asking the question and how important it is - and
whether or not they reveal what’s wrong – it’s up to them but the fact
that one person at work has even noticed in the busyness of the day that
one person has cared enough to just come over and say: hey, how are
you going, are you okay? You don’t seem yourself – it’s just huge.
It just means that we do care even amongst this crazy busyness, we care
and we notice and we’ll treat you like a human rather than just a resource
and it makes a massive difference to your culture and if you want to get
person inspired and get them to work and to put in their best effort, they
have to feel like they are valued – absolutely.
Gary: Yeah well, helping people feel valued that also includes having
some fun. I see you in a green dress – just a quick story behind that.
Rachael: (laughs) yeah that’s our bachelors’ and spinsters’ ball (laughs).
Gary: Oh that’s a B and S ball - okay.
Rachael: and it was fascinating because - of course, I had to go to all the
social events but it’s a really important message for leaders and I think for
emerging leaders in particular but also a lot of leaders who have been in
these roles for a long time forget that you’re under intense scrutiny when
you’re in a leadership position – you’re being watched the whole time;
when you come in, when you go home, who you sit with for lunch – it’s all
being watched and so, for me at social events, I have to be dressed up
and be part of the community but I was also mindful of choosing –
typically for this one, a costume that was still quite conservative but then
I was part of the team but I know we’ve got some women tuned in today
so I have to point out to the girls in particular that’s not my green satin
dress – I just couldn’t stand hanging up and any of them pondering on
why would this woman pack a green, satin dress to go to Antarctica?
Gary: (laughs)

Rachael: but it does beg a question, doesn’t it? Somebody at some stage
did pack a 1980s bridesmaid dress to take to Antarctica.
Gary: Well I must admit – even some images I’ve seen over time in
Antarctica including some of the photos from Shackleton’s time down
there. It is a little bit strange when I am actually able to see a woman
actually wearing a green satin dress because I think I’ve seen some
images actually and so I’m wondering if it happens to be the partner in
the photo here who actually may have owned that dress ...
Rachael: (laughs) yeah it’s fascinating and particularly for women in
these leadership roles and it’s about…you just have to keep boundaries
and you have to be so clear and I guess that’s one of the big lesson for
me.
Gary: mm hmm.
Rachael: that I learned was all with time - one of the best things I did
down there was to have strong personal boundaries and particularly
around that time so that...
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: we all know what it’s like when people are hanging around and
saying: ‘have you got 5 minutes?’ and it’s never 5 minutes.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: and they would come and knock on my door at night or they
would interrupt my my breakfast and it got to the point after 6 weeks
when I thought: you know, I can’t do this – it’s not sustainable. I need to
look after myself and the next time it happened, I said: guys, this isn’t
urgent and I need to have my breakfast so how about I meet you in my
office in 15 minutes and we’ll go through it there – and once I put the
boundary there, they absolutely respected it and I realised that all this
time, when I’ve worked in corporate roles and I was missing lunch and I
was the first one in and last one out, it was never my time-management;
it was actually my personal boundaries and I needed to learn how to say –
not ‘no’ but ‘not now.’
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: so maybe 5 minutes from now – I’ll come back at 4 o’ clock and
you’ve got my undivided attention but just not now.
Gary: that’s an edge moment for yourself for you too, I’d argue. Christine
actually says that you’re green satin dresses from the Antarctica dress up
box...thanks Christine (laughs).
Rachael: it is, yes (laughs). That’s right.

Gary: you know I’m aware we’ve probably overshot time a little bit but I
just want to see whether anyone does have another question that we
haven’t addressed yet – a burning question that you’d just love us to give
Rachael a chance to answer. So, if anyone has got one, you can either
raise your hand or type your question in – something that for you we
haven’t yet given Rachael an opportunity can answer at this point in time.
So I’ll just give you a quick moment if you’re madly typing away to get
that in or you can just quickly raise your hand.
Chloe is interested in your favourite moment in Antarctica – thanks,
Chloe.
Rachael: Yeah, that’s a great question. It would have to be – there’s one,
probably two but the one that stands out the most was photographing the
Adelie penguins and they actually make their nest out of pebbles and I
was just out there one day watching them and one little fellow was
putting his pebbles on his nest and as soon as he turned his back, his
neighbour came in and stole the pebble and went to put it on his own
nest.
Gary: (laughs) Okay.
Rachael: and this happened about 6 times before the first fellow worked
out that his neighbour was stealing the pebbles off his nest and that
memory just kept me resilient to this day.
At the end of the day, it really is a choice. Everyone in this has a choice to
focus on what we have rather than what we haven’t got and for me, that
moment was about saying ‘this is what I’ve got’ so rather than pining for
my family and be homesick it was about: okay. What I have got is the
chance to see this extraordinary wildlife in its natural setting and very few
people get to have this chance so focus on what you’ve got rather than
what you haven’t got and that’s the secret to resilience in my opinion is
that choice that every single one of us makes every morning when we
wake up.
Gary: Wow. I’m going to also ask you Ralph’s question. Ralph says that
he’s actually commenced a job application process for a station leader
only a few weeks ago – (reading Ralph’s question) however I discontinued
when one question in the application process asked of me was my
experience in science projects but I had none – how important would this
particular selection criterion be in your opinion? So that might be very
valuable for Ralph to hear your answer on that one.
Rachael: Yeah and what I would say Ralph is what I suppose comes full
circle back to the first question that the technical stuff is important but it’s
less important than what they are looking for. What they are looking for is
a leadership quality – so people who can negotiate; people who can
manage conflict; people who can give feedback and performance
conversations comfortably and with empathy. What I would suggest – I’m
sure if you look into your own background, you will have projects that

you’ve managed – whether they are science projects or not, it doesn’t
matter. It’s the same principle of managing projects – so understanding
what you’re trying to do, timelines, the budget, the communication and
you can answer that question and if you get short-listed for the phone
interview which is the second round – between now and then, just get on
the web – and this is all I did; I knew nothing about Antarctic science
projects – I just got on the website and read about it. I read their science
strategy and that will tell you everything you need to know to get to the
next round and so, I’d suggest if you’ve got the experience in managing
people, that’s what they are looking for because you can learn the science
stuff; you can’t learn in short period of time how to lead people and lead
through tough times and lead through dull times and that’s what they are
recruiting for.
There is a certain fit for the job rather than a particular technical skill so
I’d get back in there Ralph and throw that application in before Friday - I
think the applications close Friday.
Gary: there you go, Ralph. Go Ralph, go and Rachael, Kathy asks how did
you – Ralph says thanks by the way. How did you handle clique-y groups
as they developed?
Rachael: Yeah and they do - the psychologist actually said to me before I
left that I should have a big table for meals rather than single tables
because cliques will develop and can be quite disruptive and cliques still
did form even though that was one of the tools we had to try and
minimise. It was all about respect and I keep coming back to it because it
was the overarching thing for my team that I don’t care if you don’t like –
someone has a got a hobby that you don’t like or this particular person
has got a hobby that you love – you know say, someone likes ballroom
dancing and I would not tolerate somebody saying: oh boring – dancing is
just stupid; that’s disrespectful so respect boundaries.
Respect time – if you’re going to meet someone at a certain place be
there at that time. Respect opinions, respect differences and so even
though we did have cliques, we did not have any or many issues with it
because it was back to disrespect but that was built on a whole heap of
things like ‘no triangles’ and like managing the bacon wars. So it was a
whole set of tools that put together constructed this culture of respect for
each other and even if we didn’t love each other we still respected each
other and so, with the cliques it was like ‘okay, that’s fine that they hang
out together and they like each other and they have got usually it’s
something in common.’
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: you know often, it was movies and we had a little cinema and
often it was like typically like James Bond movies or something like that
and just hang out together and fine, that’s cool - respect that.

Gary: and I think that leads us to and this will have to be our last
question from the audience. Christine says: do you still keep in contact
with the people that you led and we were having a little chat about that
issue prior to this getting started so what would you say to Christine?
Rachael: Yeah it’s interesting isn’t it and I assumed we would be in close
contact forever after such an intense experience but no, I keep in touch
with half a dozen of them. There’s another cohort that I’m connected to
on LinkedIn or Facebook and there’s another group that I haven’t spoken
to and then some of them actually got off the ship in Hobart after we’d
sailed home - two weeks sailing home – and got off the ship, grabbed
their families and their bags, took off and we’ve never heard from them.
It’s that whole experience that Gary you’re a team at the time and you
pull together and we’ve worked very well as a team but once that was
over, bang! we all went out and we all have different lives now and some
of us have got families and some of us moved overseas so we’ve changed
but it was fascinating for me to see that because I kind of went thinking
that these people would be my mates for the rest of my life and I learned
that no.
Gary: Yeah.
Rachael: the feedback I got from my performance review was that the
psychologist said: look, they thought that you were very inspiring. They
thought that you were decisive and a great leader but one criticism they
had was that you weren’t their friend and she said ‘you were friendly but
you weren’t their friend’ and I said that’s cool because I was never going
to be.
Gary: Yes.
Rachael: If you have to lead, you’d have to have that arms-length
relationship so you’ve just got to cop that leadership is a choice and it’s
one of the choices that you make.
Gary: Yeah and actually Christine says like when Richard Parker walked
away from Pi without turning back - making a reference to the movie ‘The
Life of Pi’ recently. Thanks Christina. That’s a really important insight for a
lot of leaders because if you think that you’re going to be friends for life
and you would or might judge your leadership afterwards when you
discover that’s actually not what happens; you might think you were not
valued as a leader but as you said it was about pulling together for the
period of time when we were in the Antarctic and then after that, it’s okay
if different people went their different ways and that doesn’t mean that we
hated each other or anything like that; it just means we’re different,
we’ve moved on and we’re now doing different things and that’s cool.
Now, talking about different things, we’d like to give everyone the
opportunity to sign up for Rachael’s newsletter which is as simple as going
to www.Rachaelroberston.com.au/subscribe and if you subscribe, you will

get access to Rachael’s new book and you’ll get 15% off the
recommended retail price so, what are you calling the new book if you’ve
named it already and when should we be able to expect it to hit the
shops?
Rachael: It’s called ‘Leading on the Edge’ and it’s exactly what we talked
about today in the webinar – it’s stories with business insight or a
leadership insight so a story and an insight based on my journals that I
kept while I was in Antarctica and we’re offering 15% off now for people
who just sign up. We don’t take money now and we won’t get your credit
card details or anything till the books comes out in September but if you’d
like to be notified when the book is available then, drop us line and we’d
be more than happy to add you on the list of people who we’ll send out a
note when the book is available.
Gary: in addition as you can see here, Rachael does keynote speaking
and clearly you can hear with the way that Rachael has articulated herself
throughout today’s conversation – she’s been an awesome keynote
speaker; in fact, I do know a number of people in my network Rachael,
that when they found out that I was interviewing you they said: oh she’s
fantastic, make sure you learn about this story and learn about that story
so you’ve got huge raps of people so those of you who are looking for
some keynote speakers for conferences, etc. please be in contact with
Rachael to engage her to come along and inspire your troops to be able to
do some edge moments the way that you did your leadership.
I’d really like to thank you so much for your time. We have gone overtime
and I know you’d said that you were up for that in the end to be able to
do that. I appreciate everyone also staying online for a little bit longer
than we had originally anticipated. There were a vast amount of
opportunities for people to take some insights from what your experience
was down in the Antarctic, especially the whole ‘edge moments concept’
that the little things in other words, really do matter and a leader has to
be aware of what those things are. The personal space that you talk about
just recently in our conversation is really, really critical and I think some
leaders really struggle with that in creating boundaries, the ‘no triangles,’
about getting people to have conversations with people that really matter
rather than bringing in someone else and talking with the wrong person in
other words and bothering to teach and coach people the skills Rachael
that you said to be able to have those conversations is absolutely critical.
So once again, I’d like to thank you for sharing that information with us.
Some brief information for those of you that are really interested in
developing their own skills is one of my programmes called ‘Yes for
Success’ which is based on my plan for personal success programme. It’s
an online platform and I do this in face-to-face programmes as well where
we can actually create a personal plan for life balance and personal
success and as you can see in this illustration here, there are 6 critical
elements to creating success that help you to move from where you are in
your present to the future and if you don’t have those 6 critical elements
you’ve been working on in some fashion and when I talk about life

balance, I teach people life balance is to be judged over a year, not a
month, not a week, not a day. The programme helps you to come up with
a plan to be able to put that into practice so that you in fact, create the
success that you desire.
If you folk want to find out more about that, it’s as simple as going to
planforpersonalsuccess.com/trial and you can watch the brief video and
see the information on that side about how you can access that
programme. You have now all of my details in front of you and if for some
reason you lose Rachael’s details and you’d like to get in contact with her,
please make sure that you send me an email or contact me on Facebook
through the ‘Organisations That Matter’ or ‘Yes For Success’ Facebook
pages or through my blog at garyryans.com and I will pass your question
or comment to Rachael.
A number of you are passing through your thanks and appreciations to
Rachael for her time – absolutely I pass that on too. We really appreciate
your time as well everyone. Any further comments Rachael that you’d like
to pass on to everyone?
Rachael: Thanks for taking the time to everyone who has given up the 50
or so minutes to sit in and listen and hopefully Gary and I have given you
some practical tools – we did talk about this before and we didn’t want to
give you theories or strategies – we wanted to give you some practical
tools that leaders can take away or if you’re in HR and learning and
development you can take back to your leaders and coach them so
hopefully, you’ve got a couple of practical tools that you can take away
today and get some inspiring leaders in your organisations.
Gary: Well Jason, who I do know is a business owner in the finance sector
says that he’d like to thank us both and he really enjoyed it and he’d be
much more aware now of how he cooks bacon going into the future
(laughs).
Rachael: (laughs)
Gary: Thanks, Jason. Alright, thanks everyone. We really appreciated
your time and this has been really valuable, says Kathy – thanks Kathy
and others are making very similar comments too so thanks – really
appreciate you being onboard too and we will speak with everyone soon
so once again, keep learning and be the best that you can be.

'Edge Moments' Leadership Interview Transcript

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'Edge Moments' Leadership Interview Transcript