Leadership and Recycling in Patagonia

Wharton Women on Lago Nordenskjold

Every head turned as a group of eight young women, all as beautiful as they are brilliant, walked into the
Albergue los Cuernos. They had come a long way from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business to this mountain hut in Torres del Paine perched between black-rock horned granite walls and the milky blue waters of Lago Nordenskjold. Angela Hawse ““ an Exum guide of many years and world-renowned alpinist ““ and I were guiding the group accompanied by management professor Chris Maxwell and his wife professor Kathy Maxwell, an academic advisor at Penn State University.

The goal on this second Wharton Leadership Ventures program to Patagonia was to help these young women hone their leadership skills by putting them in mountain leadership roles and challenging their decision making, cooperation and community visioning skills. Trekking and kayaking each day, the students took turns being the “leader of the day,” a role that challenged them to use all of their skills in managing the group throughout the day’s activities.

One of the hallmarks of our program is its service component. Each year we work with a local group to help with various projects. In the 2007-08 season we worked with local non-profit AMA Torres del Paine, an organization dedicated to helping to preserve and protect Torres del Paine National Park through trail projects, public education, and scientific investigation. The Wharton students helped them with new strategic and marketing plans that took AMA in a new direction and helped to redefine their mission.

This year we worked with AMA and the local Guides Association (la Asociación de Guias de Ultima Esperanza) to help brainstorm ideas for a regional recycling program. Each evening, and even sometimes on the trail, the “Wharton Women” would spend several hours discussing strategies for starting and promoting the program. Local business owners and guides in past years had put together their own program of recycling, getting help from local shipping company Navimag, who transported materials out of the remote region of Patagonia and into the heart of Chile. The program came to a halt when the town of Puerto Natales fined the ad hoc group of recyclers for stockpiling materials on a willing local citizen’s property.

So it was that ten days of discussions led to a meeting with local “recycling activists” at the Colegio Puerto Natales, a local private school that donated the use of a classroom for our community meeting. Participating in the meeting were local guides, hotel companies from the park, and other concerned local citizens from Puerto Natales. Unfortunately, there were no representatives from the municipality of Puerto Natales or the regional offices of Ultima Esperanza, despite invitations sent well in anticipation of the event.

Wharton Leadership Ventures in the Valle Frances

What transpired was a passionate discussion of the efforts that many local people had put into personal recycling and where to go in the future. It turns out there is some local expert knowledge in the processes of recycling, but little in the way of resources to put that knowledge into use. The Wharton students proposed involving all stakeholders from tourist operators in Torres del Paine, to municipal entities such as the town of Puerto Natales and Punta Arenas. One of the biggest obstacles, all agreed, was educating the local population to 1) push their elected officials to make recycling part of their mandate and 2) to get individuals to use a new recycling program rather than throw material into the landfill. Both are tall orders without some sort of tangible benefit to making the effort to separate trash and take it somewhere.

In the end, this year’s project still needs lots of work, but we created some awareness of the challenge and helped make some connections between people and organizations. There are many dedicated individuals in the region that are committed to seeing this happen both for the benefit of local business and the long-term sustainability of Patagonia.

As for the eight brilliant and beautiful Wharton students, they all made significant strides towards becoming the next generation of thoughtful, compassionate, effective leaders. It was remarkable to see how their different perspectives based on culture and experience shaped their approach to leadership. Each had different ways to tackle the tasks at hand and guided the group well through our daily challenges. Oh yeah, and they turned a few heads along the way.