I saw the movie, The Martian, shortly after its 2015
release. At the time, I thought that it was a good but not great movie. Matt
Damon stars as astronaut Mark Watney on a mission to Mars. (I feel obliged to
call a Spoiler Alert here. I’m about to reveal important details of the plot).
He’s stranded on Mars alone when his team mates leave for the return trip to
earth. He’s rescued and returns heroically to earth. And he continues his
career on earth as an instructor in the Astronaut Candidate Program.
I saw the movie again recently and I still don’t think
it’s going to win any awards. But… what did catch my attention was both the
quantity and quality of memorable leadership moments that are tucked into this
two hour film. There are the obvious ones about perseverance, resilience and
MacGyver-esque innovation. All worthy topics.
But my favorite leadership lesson came at the very end of
the movie, when Mark Watney gave the new class of astronaut candidates a dose
of reality based leadership as he described the most important take-away from
his experience on Mars. Here’s what he said: “This is space; it does not
cooperate. At some point, everything’s going to go south on you – everything! And
you’re going to say, this is it. This is how I end. Now, you can either accept
that or you can get to work. That’s all it is. You just begin. You solve one
problem; one challenge; then you solve the next one. If you solve enough
problems, you get to come home.” Simple. Powerful. Brilliant.
I think this leadership lesson applies directly to you
and me as we face daily challenges in our work. Ditch the drama. Stop
catastrophizing. Lighten up. Be a serial solution seeker. Repeat the next day.
