It's all about the journey, not the destination
14 September 2009
Sean Russo
LAST year at Diggers & Dealers in Kalgoorlie Noah’s Rule hired “Connie” for the night flight and took a range of clients and “friends of Noah” up for a couple of laps of Kalgoorlie. I was so impressed with the people from the Historical Aircraft Restoration Society (HARS) who look after and fly the plane that I resolved to travel to Diggers on it the following year.
As the time rolled around it became clear the state of the global economy was against Connie and her four hungry supercharged radial engines. Not to be deterred HARS decided instead to seek out those interested to travel on another of their planes, a Dakota, still resplendent in its RAAF livery. The Dakota is the military version of the DC-3 and was first flown in 1935. Carrying 14 passengers sitting on paratrooper benches down either side the trip required two stops either way: Adelaide and Ceduna on the way out and Coober Pedy and Broken Hill on the way home, with a total of 26 flying hours.
Why would anyone (even plane tragic and failed trainee RAAF pilot like myself) spend four days to travel a return journey that can covered in 10 hours? I have to admit I wasn’t sure myself before I started. I have lost count of the number of times I have crossed the Nullarbor since my first visit to Perth in 1985 but it must be close to 200. I remember very few of them, they were simply a means to an end. A boring journey where at worst a cough would turn into flu, at best I would sleep the whole way.
In contrast I will never forget my return journey across this wide brown land on the Dakota. Come to think about it, I now know where that term comes from!
The camaraderie of our group throughout the journey suggests to me my fellow travellers won’t either. Without doubt the highlight for me was flying low over the Great Australian Bight as the crew yelled out which side was best for looking at the dozens of whales below us in crystal clear water metres behind the break. We were like children, our faces pressed against the glass trying to count how many we had seen (we had a sweep on the likely number of whales to be sighted). We lost count somewhere in the seventies!
I don’t know what it is about humans and whales but the atmosphere on the plane was electric.
On the return trip landing for the first time in Coober Pedy (a derivation of aboriginal for “white man in a hole” ... I trust they were talking about the opal mines not the town) I felt like I was an extra in the original Star Wars movie on Luke Skywalker’s home planet, Tatooine. Even the people in the bar looked similar. The next day we flew low level over a partially flooded Lake Eyre and then crossed the Flinders Ranges. The diversity of this country is astounding. An unexpected overnight stay in Broken Hill due to inclement weather in New South Wales was even part of the fun and an excuse for one more communal meal with our fellow travellers. No frustration, just a realisation it was all part of the experience; part of the journey.
I could enjoy all that was on offer out the window, or on board where we played cricket (not many can say they’ve caught Trevor Sykes out), read, chatted – loudly if you wanted to be heard – and slept fully outstretched (flatter than QF First Class) because I knew the plane was well built, well maintained and well run.
The professionalism of our two pilots, retired 747 captains with previous military experience, was evident in every action, every instruction. I knew they had a plan and several contingency plans. When they announced they would not put us in harm’s way, given the forecast for later that day over NSW, we didn’t quibble. I have no doubt one of the reasons that plane is still with us is because it has been flown by a string of dedicated professionals who know that the first rule of a long life in aviation is takeoffs must equal landings.
The professionalism of our two pilots, retired 747 captains with previous military experience, was evident in every action, every instruction. I knew they had a plan and several contingency plans.
By now you are thinking (assuming you stuck with me to here) what has this got to do with hedging, which is what he usually bangs on about? Well, all those hours looking out the window waiting for the landscape to change made me think.
All too often in life and in business we start imagining the end point and neglect the journey. There is nothing wrong with a strong focus on your goal but to achieve it it’s best to have a plan, in fact several plans, one of them being a contingency plan.
Most of us plan like we fly in jets but life (or business) still goes on like we are flying in a Dakota. We write a 12-month or five-year plan in days or weeks but we have to live through it a day at a time. The good part of that is we should have time to enjoy the journey. The challenge is that circumstances are seldom as we imagine so we need to constantly evolve our thinking and our plan.
Men, in particular – and both mining and financial industries are dominated by them – are notorious for being so focused on outcomes that they forget process.
We have recently been doing quite a bit of work on financial market risk management policies for a range of clients; importers, exporters and miners. Some of the challenges are quite different but the themes are the same. Use common sense, identify your risks and understand the potential impact on your circumstances. Clearly distinguish between hedging and speculation. Don’t set yourself up to fail, understand the tools available to you, and know their limitations. Establish clear controls, and delegate responsibility.
And this must all be done in the knowledge that whatever you expect is either unlikely to occur or unlikely to occur in the timeframe you expect it to, so the plan must be constantly modified to what you are observing rather than what you forecast.
Never “set and forget”; constantly review and calibrate the risk of not getting to your preferred destination with your proposed “flight plan” and revise accordingly.
One of the reasons most of us are comfortable in a plane is because the pilot is up there with us. They are invested in the trip to the same extent we are. All this talk of remote controlled airliners with pilots flying them from the ground will never happen. Passengers would feel about as safe as shareholders do in most large public companies where the investment is not the same.
There the investor has a seat they paid for while the pilot/CEO usually has options they got for free or shares they got a non-recourse loan to fund and a golden parachute, which they use at the first sign of foul weather.
If you want to make money investing in mining companies look for companies that talk about the journey and clearly appreciate the risks, not the ones that sell you on the delights of the destination (gold at $US2000, etc.).
Listen for the clear evidence of a range of plans or development options that give confidence in longevity, whatever the weather. Most importantly, make sure management is on the plane with you, not spending like they already got to the destination.