The 100X Leader

6The Higher Levels

Wise man is a good Sherpa; he takes you to the highest places!

—Mehmet Murat Ildan

At 29,029 feet (roughly 8,850 meters), climbing Mount Everest is deemed one of the most difficult and dangerous feats on earth.

For most of us, climbing Mount Everest is an unrealistic dream, but the brave few pay the cost, both financially and physically, to attempt the impossible. Out of approximately 5,000 people who have climbed to the top of the world, roughly 300 of those climbers have perished on the mountain since records began.

Climbing Mount Everest is hard enough. Without the Sherpa, reaching the summit would stay a dream to most. It is virtually impossible without expert guidance:

Every spring, as hopeful climbers from around the world trek to Everest Base Camp (an elevation of about 17,500 feet in Nepal) to begin acclimating for a summit push in May, a team of local Sherpas is hired to create the season’s route up the mountain. They establish the course up more than two vertical miles that hundreds will follow.

First, the “icefall doctors” set ropes, ladders and makeshift bridges through the notoriously dangerous, ever-shifting Khumbu Icefall immediately above Base Camp. Others keep moving upward, setting anchors and stringing ropes until they reach the summit. The process can take weeks, and is often delayed by bad weather.

Only when the ropes are fixed to the top does the Everest climbing season open.

—John Branch, New York Times¹

The Sherpa are built for ...