“Come back with your shield or on it”

The 2006 movie, 300 was a fictionalized portrayal of the ancient Battle of Thermopylae that was fought between an alliance of Greek city-states led by King Leonidas of Sparta and the Persian Empire led by Xerxes I.  The battle took place in 480 BC at the narrow coastal pass of Thermopylae.  In the film, 300 Spartans defend the pass against a much larger Persian army, numbering in the 100,000 to 150,000 range (though ancient sources suggested that the Persians had more than 1 million soldiers).  The movie is not completely accurate from a historical standpoint, as the 300 Spartans were likely accompanied by 700 Thespians and a number of Helots and Thebans.  However, the battle was famous throughout antiquity and provides a great example of how a committed and patriotic army, motivated by the need to defend their homeland, can be a force multiplier.  The Greeks lost the battle, but their heroic stand is the stuff of legend.  Victor Hanson had this to say in his review of the movie:

"So almost immediately, contemporary Greeks saw Thermopylae as a critical moral and culture lesson. In universal terms, a small, free people had willingly outfought huge numbers of imperial subjects who advanced under the lash. More specifically, the Western idea that soldiers themselves decide where, how, and against whom they will fight was contrasted against the Eastern notion of despotism and monarchy—freedom proving the stronger idea as the more courageous fighting of the Greeks at Thermopylae, and their later victories at Salamis and Plataea attested."

There is a line in the movie, where Queen Gorgo (played by Lena Headey, of Game of Thrones fame) tells her husband, King Leonidas (played by Gerard Butler), "Come back with your shield, or on it!".  According to Plutarch, this was the parting cry of mothers and wives of their loved ones as they departed for battle.  It was a honor to die in battle for the defense of the city-state of Sparta.  It was an honor to be so committed to the greater good of Sparta, that one would willingly give his life in this cause.

There is a certain similarity to another tale from history.  Jump ahead a few years to 1519, when the Spanish General Hernán Cortés landed in Veracruz to begin his conquest of the Aztec Empire and gave the order for his men to burn the ships that had carried them there.  With this order, Cortés signaled to his men that there was no turning back.  They would have to be fully committed to their cause or die.  The story has been offered as a leadership lesson, though I am not sure I would completely agree.  I am more impressed by the level of commitment shown by the Spartans than I am by Cortés and his men.  The key distinction between the two is choice.  The Spartans had one, the Spaniards did not.

I am reminded, once again, of a response I often hear when I talk about lessons that health care organizations can learn from High Reliability Organizations such as flight operations on United States Navy aircraft carriers.  Whenever I talk about the leadership lessons that we can learn from the military, invariably someone will respond with a statement such as, "People in the military have to follow orders, otherwise they get in trouble."  That sounds a lot like the level of commitment shown by Cortés and his men, but it's not.  Individuals in the military follow orders because they are trained to do so - they learn, very early on, that they are part of a team.  Rather than disappointing the other members on their team, soldiers and sailors will do almost anything in the heat of battle, even if it means giving up their lives.  They are indoctrinated in a high reliability culture at the very moment they start boot camp.  In other words, these soldiers and sailors are much more in common with the Spartans than they do the Spaniards.

Choice matters.  You can choose to be committed, or you can choose not to be committed.  I get it, Cortés and his Spaniards were certainly successful in their conquest of the Aztecs, and the Spartans did, in fact, lose to the Persians (in fact, legend has it that King Leonidas was killed, and Xerxes ordered his body to be decapitated and crucified anyway).  But the choice to be fully committed is incredibly empowering.  And it can be incredibly successful too.  We have years of experience with other High Reliability Organizations to prove it.