How can we manage hazardous attitudes in ourselves and others?

The FAA in the US has identified five hazardous attitudes that are present in human caused airline crashes. These five attitudes are anti-authority, impulsivity, invulnerability, macho and resignation. These attitudes can negatively impact judgment in any risk-taking situation.

In this episode Geoff Powter shares how we can manage these hazardous attitudes in ourselves and others.

Geoff Powter is a retired psychologist, an experienced climber, writer, and adventurer from the Canadian Rockies. He served as editor of the Canadian Alpine Journal for 13 years and has won 9 National Magazine Awards.

Geoff has authored several books, including Strange and Dangerous Dreams, which won the Jury Prize at the 2006 Banff Mountain Book Festival and was adapted into a radio series. His second most recent book, Inner Ranges, won the Climbing Literature Prize at the Banff Festival in 2019 and the National Outdoor Book Award in the USA. His most recent book Survival Is Not Assured: The Life of Climber Jim Donini, is the Winner of National Outdoor Book Award in the USA.

This is the second episode of two where Geoff, Jordy and Chris explore the five hazardous attitudes that can impact decision making and risk taking.

Key Takeaways

How to manage hazardous attitudes in ourselves and others:

Anti-authority: Is the “do not tell me what to do,” mindset.

To manage this, recognize that rules, guidelines and best practices exist to help us and follow them! To manage it in others, explain the reason why rules exist, give people control when you can, and involve people in decision making as much as possible.

Impulsivity: Is the “do it quickly,” mindset.

To manage this, be methodical, follow all the steps, and slow things down when we feel the need to rush into things.

Also, make others aware of the risk of rushing into things and encourage them to follow systems and processes without skipping steps. This reduces the chance of errors and missing information. It also ensures everyone knows what to do.

Invulnerability: Is the “It won’t happen to me,” mindset

To manage this, remind yourself that bad outcomes can happen to anyone. For others, try to personalize the fact that bad outcomes can happen to anyone by highlighting mishaps that have happened to people they may know. This can include sharing your own stories of misadventure involving negative outcomes. This can help to make things more real.

Macho: This is the “I can do it,” mindset

To manage this, look for signs of overconfidence. Celebrate humility and model an objective approach to decision making that involves accepting that some things may be beyond our capabilities and that’s normal.

Resignation: This is the “what’s the use,” mindset.

To manage this, believe that you have the power to change or influence the situation you are in. Involve everyone in decision making and ensure everyone is heard. Acting on concerns or suggestions can also demonstrate to others that they do have the power to change their situation.

Guest Bio

Geoff is a retired psychologist, an experienced climber, writer, and adventurer from the Canadian Rockies. He served as editor of the Canadian Alpine Journal for 13 years and has won 9 National Magazine Awards.

Geoff has authored several books, including Strange and Dangerous Dreams, which won the Jury Prize at the 2006 Banff Mountain Book Festival and was adapted into a radio series. His second most recent book, Inner Ranges, won the Climbing Literature Prize at the Banff Festival in 2019 and the National Outdoor Book Award in the USA. His most recent book Survival Is Not Assured: The Life of Climber Jim Donini, is the Winner of National Outdoor Book Award in the USA.

In 2012 Geoff was the recipient of the Summit

How can our attitude affect our decision-making? The Federal Aviation Agency in the US has identified five specific attitudes that are present in airline accidents when human error is the cause of the crash or mishap. They have labeled these attitudes, the five hazardous attitudes.

These attitudes are anti-authority, invulnerability, impulsivity, macho, and resignation. Each of these attitudes can negatively impact our judgement on a sub-conscious level, meaning we may not be aware of their presence.

In this episode of Delivering Adventure, Geoff Powter joins Chris and Jordy to discuss what the five hazardous attitudes are and how we can recognize them in ourselves and others.

Geoff Powter is a retired psychologist, an experienced climber, writer, and adventurer from the Canadian Rockies. He served as editor of the Canadian Alpine Journal for 13 years and has won 9 National Magazine Awards.

Geoff has authored several books, including Strange and Dangerous Dreams, which won the Jury Prize at the 2006 Banff Mountain Book Festival and was adapted into a radio series. His second most recent book, Inner Ranges, won the Climbing Literature Prize at the Banff Festival in 2019 and the National Outdoor Book Award in the USA. His most recent book Survival Is Not Assured: The Life of Climber Jim Donini, is the Winner of National Outdoor Book Award in the USA.

In this episode, Geoff uses his deep knowledge of phycology and risk taking to help us to better understand the five hazardous attitudes. This is the first of two episodes focussing on how we can recognize and manage these specific human factors.

This is another must listen to episode for anyone who wants to better understand decision making and risk taking.

Key Takeaways

Anti-authority Attitude: This is the “don’t tell me what to do,” mindset.

Recognizing this in ourselves requires us to really question whether our decisions are being made because of our ego and the need to push back on being told what to do. Or is our judgment being influenced by reasoned self-confidence?

Impulsivity Attitude: This is the “do it quickly,” mindset. We can spot this by looking to see if we are skipping steps that we either would normally do or know we should be doing. Also, asking ourselves if we do really need to rush and involving others in discussions can be very beneficial in spotting this in ourselves.

Impulsivity is the one attitude that can cause us to move into situations faster which can push us into the hazard zone more quickly.

Invulnerability Attitude: This is the “It won’t happen to me,” mindset. Invulnerability affects our ability to objectively assess the probability and consequence of taking risks.

Spotting invulnerability requires us to be very aware of whether we really believe that a bad outcome can happen to us.

Macho Attitude: This is the “I can do it,” mentality. The challenge with Macho is that it can cause us to become overconfident. As Geoff pointed out, there is also no macha attitude meaning that the macho attitude is more of a male dominated attitude.

Resignation Attitude: This is the “what’s the use,” mentality. This is the attitude that can cause us to believe that there is nothing that we can do to prevent bad outcomes. This can leave us feeling resigned to fate. This can cause people to go along with what the group says, even if a person feels the group may be wrong.

Resignation attitude can happen when we don’t care or we don’t trust our judgment. It can also happen when we feel helpless or we are not being heard.

Guest Bio

Geoff is a retired psychologist, an experienced climber, writer, and adventurer from the Canadian Rockies. He served as editor of the Canadian Alpine Journal for 13 years and has won 9 National Magazine Awards.

Geoff has authored several books, including Strange

Longevity Delivering Adventure with Nadio Hachey

What does it take to enjoy a long career as an adventure guide, instructor or manager?

The reality is that there is quite a high rate of attrition in the adventure industry when it comes to guides and instructors. It can be costly to get certifications and experience in both time and money. It can be physically demanding. It can also be far from financially lucrative. For all of these reasons many people drop out early in their career.

That said, there are many people who have enjoyed long careers. One of these people is Nadio Hachey. Nadio has enjoyed a career in the ski and bike instruction and guiding industry that spans over forty years. Nadio supervises and trains ski and bike instructors at a high level and teaches at that level himself.

Nadio joins Jordy and Chris to discuss what it takes to make delivering adventure into a sustainable career. He shares his insights on everything from decision making on the mountain to making smart choices with your finances.

Nadio Hachey is a longtime manager in the Whistler Blackcomb Snow and Bike School. He is a PSIC level 4 certified ski instructor and a Level 4 PSIC LPT Trainer. He is also a certified level 2 PMBIA mountain bike instructor.

This is an engaging and candid discussion about some topics that often go unspoken about.

Key Takeaways

Master Your Trade: If you want to have a long career on a professional, or even amateur level, you need to master the necessary hard skills. This includes things like navigation, skiing, snowboarding, biking or whatever it is - you have to be good at what you are actually doing. This keeps you safer and quite frankly, the people you may want to lead, expect you to be good at what you are leading.

Decision making: It doesn’t matter how good you are at the hard skills of your activity. If you can’t make good decisions leading yourself and others, you won’t enjoy a long career. It’s that simple. People expect adventure guides, instructors and coaches to be able to make good decisions.

Motivated to Help People: It doesn’t matter if you are in Search and Rescue, heli-skiing, surfing, biking, hiking, ski and snowboard instructing or a guide trainer. If you want to have a long career, you have to want to help people. Just wanting to do your sport or activity is not going to be enough for you. The people you are going to be dealing with are also going to figure out very quickly if you are there for them or yourself.

Financial Needs: To sustain a long career in the adventure industry you need to be able to make enough and save enough to survive over the long term. This may mean picking up extra jobs, learning to cook so you can spend less going out, and being smarter with your money.

Guest Bio

Nadio Hachey has enjoyed a career in the ski and bike instruction and guiding industry that spans over forty years. Nadio supervises and trains ski and bike instructors at a high level and teaches at that level himself. This makes him a great person to share with us the secrets of what it takes to have a long career in the adventure industry.

Nadio Hachey is a longtime manager in the Whistler Blackcomb Snow and Bike School. He is a PSIC level 4 certified ski instructor and a Level 4 PSIC LPT Trainer. He is also a certified level 2 PMBIA mountain bike instructor.

Follow or Subscribe

Don’t forget to follow the show!

Share & Social Links

https://linktr.ee/deliveringadventure

Smart Risk Taking with Barry Blanchard

How can you know when to actually take a risk on a personal or professional level? What would a good risk, or a smart risk look like before and after?

In this episode Chris and Jordy are joined by world renowned Alpinist, ACMG / IFMGA Mountain Guide, speaker, author and friend of the show, Barry Blanchard to discuss what a Smart Risk looks like.

Barry Blanchard taps into his long career of risk taking and guiding to share the essential elements of what good risks look like, and what we should be wary of.

Barry is a recent recipient of the Order of Canada and is an honoured member of the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides. He is respected for his ability to complete technical, high-risk ascents on a personal level and leading others as professional guide.

Barry has worked on numerous movie projects as a stuntman including Cliffhanger and Vertical Limit. He is the star of his own documentary called Spindrift: The Barry Blanchard Story.

He is also the author of The Calling: A Life Rocked by Mountains. Barry has another book coming out in 2026 called The Echo.

Always engaging, thoughtful and honest, Barry shares some dark moments he has had in his career and many of the highlights. Along the way we define what makes a Smart Risk to take.

Key Takeaways:

Smart Risks: Are calculated, acceptable, necessary and prepared for. They are risks we can justify in the moment and after the fact because they are carefully considered, acceptable, needed to be taken and we were ready for the choice that we made.

Calculated Risk: Calculated risks are ones that are well analyzed weighing the potential consequences against the potential for both positive and negative outcomes. The hazards are known and if you decide to take it, the benefits outweigh the potential costs.

A calculated risk is a risk worth doing based on careful analysis.

Acceptable Risk: Acceptable risks are the ones we can justify to ourselves and others. They should fall within everyone’s risk tolerance. They should also prioritize your safety ahead of safety or providing service someone else. Acceptable risks for professionals fall within industry best practices.

Acceptable risks fall within personal, professional and legal responsibilities and limits.

Necessary Risks: Necessary risks are the ones that need to be taken. They add value to the experience and contribute to towards achieving the objective. They are also the best option for what needs to get done.

A risk might be acceptable to take, but also unnecessary.

Prepared for: These are the risks we are ready for because we have prepared and built in an adequate margin of error. Worst case scenarios have been considered and planned for.

Not Taking the Risk: This is also a risk. Smart Risks are the ones we did take for the right reasons.

Guest Bio

Barry Blanchard is an ACMG / IFMGA Mountain Guide, author, speaker, and sometimes movie stunt man. Barry has recently been the recipient of the Order of Canada and has just been recognized as an honoured member of the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides.

Both of these awards have been given in recognition of his numerous complex and demanding ascents in the Rockies, the Alps and the Himalayas, some of which have not been repeated. For more than 40 years, Barry has been a guide, resource and mentor to countless mountain enthusiasts.

Barry is one of North America’s top alpine climbers. He has spent his life pushing the standards of highly technical, high risk alpine climbing and ice climbing from the Himalayas to the Canadian Rockies. Barry is also renowned for his ability to guide complex, high risk alpine ascents.

Some of the movies that Barry has been in or has worked on include...

When it comes to delivering adventure, the difference between control and chaos can be as little as one small mistake. A situation can seem to be under complete control one moment and the next it can be spiralling away.

The worst-case scenario for leaders often starts with something small. It can be a trip, a fall, a moment of butter fingers, or some other unforeseeable fumble or mistake.

In this episode, Madeleine Martin-Penney shares a situation where a small misstep from one of her guests put her and her group in a potentially tough bind. Madeleine walks us through what happened and how she reacted to keep control.

Madeleine Martin‑Preney is a certified ACMG Ski Guide, Hiking Guide, and Apprentice Rock Guide based in Revelstoke, BC. Born and raised in Nelson, BC, she earned her full ski guide certification in 2018. An avid backcountry adventurer, she completed the first full ski traverse of the Selkirk Mountains (520 km, 43 000 m elevation) and participated in the Bugaboos‑to‑Rogers Pass expedition featured in the film Mind Over Mountain.

Guest Bio

Madeleine Martin‑Preney is a certified ACMG Ski Guide, Hiking Guide, and Apprentice Rock Guide based in Revelstoke, BC. Born and raised in Nelson, BC, she earned her full ski guide certification in 2018. An avid backcountry adventurer, she completed the first full ski traverse of the Selkirk Mountains (520 km, 43 000 m elevation) and participated in the Bugaboos‑to‑Rogers Pass expedition featured in the film Mind Over Mountain.

Madeleine has served on the ACMG Board of Directors with Chris and I for the past nine years. She is also involved with Mountain Muscox. Mountain Muskox is a community-based organization that provides peer support circles for individuals who have experienced loss or trauma in the mountains.

Guest Links

Madeleine’s Instagram: @madoalpine

Geary’s Guiding: https://gearysguiding.com

Mountain Muscox: https://www.mountainmuskox.com

Follow or Subscribe

Don’t forget to follow the show!

Share & Social Links

https://linktr.ee/deliveringadventure

How can we improve the decision making in others? When we are delivering adventure to others, it isn’t just the leader that needs to have good judgment. In every activity, there is a degree of decision-making skills that participants are going to need to be able to have, and if they don’t, the odds of achieving a good outcome start to go down.

There is of course another dimension to this in that many guides and instructors aren’t just leading guests, friends or family. They may also be supervising or working with other guides or instructors.

In this episode, we are joined by master guide, instructor, outdoor educator and friend of the show Bruce Wilson. Bruce returns to Delivering Adventure to explore how we can help others to improve their decision-making skills.

When it comes to outdoor education and leadership training, Bruce is literally a Jack of all trades. Bruce is an ACMG Hiking Guide. He is a sea kayak guide and guide trainer for the Association of Sea Kayak Guides. He is an avalanche educator for Avalanche Canada.

Bruce is a certified instructor in the Wim Hof Method, he has a master’s degree in leadership, and is a Vision Quest instructor, just to name a few of his many qualifications and certifications.

He currently instructs the Outdoor Recreation Management Program at Capilano University in North Vancouver. He also provides coaching and guiding through his company Warrior Wolf Guide Services and Coaching.

In this episode of Delivering Adventure, Bruce shares key strategies that leaders can use to help others to improves their decision making.

Key takeaways

How can we help others to make better decisions?

Trust Them: Whether we like it or not, we have to trust the decision making and judgement of others. Micromanaging everything is not a sustainable option for anyone in a leadership position, and it can be argued that that isn’t even leadership!

Create Opportunities: We need to give people the opportunity to make decisions. Decision-making is a skill. To develop skills, people need time on task to practice.

Right Process: Teaching them the right process can help to set them up for success. Part of this requires us to model and then explain what a good decision-making process is.

Go to Completion: It is important to let people bring their decisions to completion: this allows them to see and experience the consequences firsthand. This increases learning.

Take it Seriously: Treat every moment as if it is real. This can eliminate the risk of developing bad habits. It also maximizes the learning.

Guest Bio

When it comes to outdoor education and leadership training, Bruce is literally a Jack of all trades. Bruce is an ACMG Hiking Guide. He is a sea kayak guide and guide trainer for the Association of Sea Kayak Guides. He is an avalanche educator for Avalanche Canada.

Bruce is a certified instructor in the Wim Hof Method, he has a master’s degree in leadership, and is a Vision Quest instructor, just to name a few of his many qualifications and certifications.

He currently instructs the Outdoor Recreation Management Program at Capilano University in North Vancouver. He also provides coaching and guiding through his company Warrior Wolf Guide Services and Coaching.

Guest Links

https://www.snowolf.ca

Follow or Subscribe

Don’t forget to follow the show!

Share & Social Links

https://linktr.ee/deliveringadventure

How can leaders use self-reflection as a development tool with others? Self-reflection is one of the most effective learning and development tools that a leader can use with themselves and their team members.

Self-reflection can help everyone to learn from any mistakes that were made, flaws in systems that were uses, and to analyze actions that were taken.

When guides and instructors use reflection with their guests, they create an opportunity to become aware of and to address problems. It also creates an opportunity to highlight learning opportunities and to ensure that everyone leaves with an accurate memory of events.

In this episode of Delivering Adventure, Bill Mark joins Jordy and Chris to explore how leaders can use self-reflection with others.

Bill Mark is a CSGA Certified Ski Guide and Guide Trainer. He has spent over Forty years in the ski industry working in ski patrol and as a guide. Bill’s current role is the Assistant Director of Ski Operations and Senior Lead Heli-Ski Guide for Mike Wiegle’s Heli-Skiing.

Bill has extensive experience working with large teams of guides in high-risk environments where self-reflection is an essential tool for learning and development.

Bill shares how leaders can use self-reflection with themselves and others effectively to improve sharing and leverage learning.

Key Takeaways

Using self-reflection as a leader effectively requires:

Developing a Culture of Self-Reflection: Self-reflection is an essential component of developing a responsible risk-taking culture within teams. It is also one trait that can separate amateurs from true professionals. To leverage self-reflection, teams need to create a culture where self-reflection is encouraged and the time for it is set aside. This means scheduling it into the day and finding ways to make it a sustainable habit.

Create Phycological Safety: Self-reflection only works if people are forthcoming and truthful with events, actions and thinking. To create an environment of open and honest communication, team members need to feel safe. To accomplish this, people should be rewarded for sharing mistakes instead of being punished or shamed. This is an essential component of creating psychological safety within the group.

Look for Trends and Patterns: Humans are creatures of habit. When using self-reflection with others, leaders should be actively looking for unhealthy patterns or weakness in systems regardless of the outcomes. Correcting negative patterns, biases in decision making or poorly constructed or executed processes early, is an essential part of preventing future mishaps.

Mentorship and Training (up for success): Leaders may need to train mentors and trainers how to use self-reflection effectively. It is a mistake to think that people in leader positions know how to use self-reflection effectively. Leaders may also have to train team members on how they can be mentored more effectively. This includes coaching them how to ask the right questions, how to learn from feedback and where to access mentorship.

Guet Bio

Bill started his career in the adventure industry working as a ski patroller in New Zealand before moving to Whistler for what was meant to be a season. Bill joined the Blackcomb Ski Patrol in 1987. He liked it so much he started doing back-to-back winters shuttling between the Whistler and working ski patrol in Cardrona in New Zealand, where he went on to become the ski patrol director.

In 1991 he joined Mike Weigle’s Heli Skiing as a ski guide. Bill is now the Assistant Director of Ski Operations and Senior Lead Heli-Ski Guide for Mike Wiegle’s Heli-Skiing.

Bill is CSGA L3 certified and has ISIA full certification (from NZ). He also instructs on CSGA courses and on CAA Industry Training Programs.

When it comes to using self-reflection as a skill development

How can we use self-reflection to improve our decision making, performance and experience delivery?

One of the best ways to undertake personal growth as an individual, a risk-taker and leader is to build self-reflection into our day.

Self-reflection can help us to improve our performance, decision making, our delivery of information, and our relationships. While experience can be an essential tool for a guide, instructor and coach to have, experience itself is only good if we learn from it.

In this episode, Jordy and Chris are joined by Tracey Fraser to discuss how we can harness the power of self-reflection more effectively.

Tracey Fraser is the training manager at the Whistler Blackcomb Snow School. She is a certified CSIA Level 4 and PSIC Level 4 ski instructor. She is also a PSIC Level 4 LPT trainer which means that Tracey is certified to train ski instructors at the very highest level.

Tracey shares how we can build self-reflection seamlessly into our day, how we can use it and what it can teach us.

Key Takeaways

How can we use self-reflection on a personal level effectively

Adopt a Growth Mindset: This means approaching situations from the perspective that you want to know how to make them even better in the future, regardless of how well it did or did not go.

Make Time to Reflect: This can include stepping away from others to think about what just happened, making time to ask other people for feedback or taking time at the end of the day to analyze high and low points.

Be Curious with Yourself: This can include asking yourself if there is anything you would want to do differently, asking what went well, what were the challenge points, and what did not go well.

Look for Patterns or Tendencies: We all have ways of doing things that could be problematic and may not be effective. These can include cognitive biases that can compromise our decision making. It can also include flaws in our systems and ways of doing things. Addressing negative patterns is an essential step to improvement.

Embrace Being Vulnerable: It is okay to admit that there is room for you to do things better or to improve. Being vulnerable is not a weakness, it is a strength that you hear in most of our guests.

Be Objective: To do this we have to focus on the facts by being non-judgemental. This includes avoiding the trap of rationalizing our actions to the point that we miss the opportunity to spot weaknesses in what we did.

Guest Bio

Tracey Fraser is the training manager at the Whistler Blackcomb Snow School which is one of the largest Snow Schools in the world with close to fifteen hundred staff. She is also involved with the Professional Ski Instructors of Canada and has worked with the Canadian Ski Instructors Alliance where she Chaired the CSIA Women in Skiing Committee.

Tracey has represented Canada at Interski twice. She is a certified CSIA Level 4 and PSIC Level 4 ski instructor. She is also a PSIC Level 4 LPT trainer which means that Tracey is certified to train ski instructors at the very highest level.

Follow or Subscribe

Don’t forget to follow the show!

Share & Social Links

https://linktr.ee/deliveringadventure