“I have learned that we are standing on a burning platform. And we have more than one explosion – we have multiple points of scorching heat that are fuelling a blazing fire around us… – Stephen Elop, Nokia

In February 2011, the new CEO of Nokia – Stephen Elop – issued his now famous ‘burning platform’ memo to staff, including the sentence above, which was quickly leaked to the press. And just in case staff still didn’t get the message, he goes on to say that “we poured gasoline on our own burning platform…Nokia our platform is burning.” Of course, Elop probably felt very justified using this kind of metaphor and language given Nokia’s poor performance over the past few years. Perhaps not surprisingly, however, Nokia continues to struggle with its performance, and Elop is not the most popular CEO in town.

In my experience, Elop is not alone; the burning platform metaphor is perhaps one of the most pervasive in the world of business. It was coined by consultant Daryl Conner more than 20 years ago, and popularized by Professor John Kotter of Harvard. It comes from the true story of Andy Mochan, a worker on the Piper Alpha oil rig when it exploded in July 1988, killing 167 of his colleagues.

In the story, Mochan is awoken by the explosion. He runs up on deck to see that the platform is on fire. He is now faced with a choice; does he stay on the platform and burn alive, or does he jump more than 150 feet into freezing water? As the flames engulf the platform, he makes the split-second decision to jump. Somehow, he survives the impact and is rescued by a boat before freezing to death. When asked why he jumped he replies “better probable death than certain death.”

This is an amazing story of survival amid tragedy, but I have several practical issues with the burning platform metaphor as it applies to business change and transformation. The first issue is that it implies fear and extreme urgency are not only necessary, but somehow desirable motivators for change; the implication being that in order to change, we all need to have our arses on fire.

The Power and Danger of Metaphors

From interviews I have seen recently, Conner intended the burning platform to be interpreted as a metaphor for commitment. Unfortunately, the power and danger of metaphors is that they are autonomous and uncontrollable. The mental picture most people create when they hear this metaphor involves fear and anxiety – not commitment, and anxiety is the single most contagious human emotion. It encourages many physical and psychological consequences, none of which I have found particularly conducive to change – either personally or in my work.

In our doctoral research, while we did find that some urgency helped motivate the leaders to commence a journey of transformation, it is not what enabled them to sustain their journeys over time. What we found is that aspiration is a far more important motivator; sustainable change requires the fire of a ‘burning ambition.’ To bring our research findings to life, and to explore this concept a little further, check out the animation above. The ‘Fire’ is one of seven metaphors that came out of our research on how leaders transform, and is also the first chapter of my upcoming book.

So how do you tap into your burning ambition?

Asking yourself these questions is a great start;

• What does success look like for me/us?
• What gets me/us out of bed in the morning?
• What do I/we want to be remembered for?

If you find yourself in a Nokia-like situation, and these questions seem too ambitious, you can always turn fear into focus by asking this simple but powerful question; what is the best outcome from here?

In my next blog post, I will showcase one of the CEOs in my research, Tim Castree, to illustrate just how powerful the shift from burning platform to burning ambition can be. Tim, by the way, was one of original founders of Earth Hour.

What’s Your Opinion?

In the meantime, I would be very interested to hear your take on the burning platform Vs burning ambition debate. Which of these have you found to be the most powerful motivator? Have you ever been burnt by a burning platform?

You can share your stories below.