Wilderness Drum > Wilderness Writings > Team Building

Team Building in the Wilderness
Steve Beyer

Introduction
Campfires
Conflicts
Confrontation
Cooking
Council
Darkness
Decisionmaking
Development
Drumming
Followership
Leadership
Meetings
Stress
Trust
Wilderness Ethics

Stress

NOTE: Chronic stress has been studied in a number of contexts (for example, after shipwrecks, airplane accidents, and other disasters, Leach, 1994). One of the principal sources of understanding chronic stress is military combat, and two U.S. Army field manuals – FM 8-51, Combat Stress Control in a Theater of Operations: Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (1998) and FM 22-51, Leader's Manual for Combat Stress Control (1994) – have provided much of the basis of this discussion. See also the discussion of stress in the wilderness context in Graham (1997, pp. 136-145).

All teams experience stress – the stress of deadlines, disappointments, frustrations, miscommunications. Stress occurs in the wilderness as well, but many of the normal coping mechanisms are unavailable – including the coping mechanism of withdrawing from the situation. In the wilderness, you are stuck in a stressful situation until it is resolved. Moreover, the stressors that can occur in the wilderness include serious life threats – forest fires, lightning storms, avalanches, and the critical injury or death of a member of the team.¹

Stress is simply a demand placed upon an organism. Rounding a bend on the trail and finding yourself facing a mother bear and her cubs is stressful; so is dancing with a person you find incredibly attractive. For the first case, psychologists use the term distress or "bad stress," and, for the second case, they have coined the term eustress or "good stress."

In either case, the person experiences what is called a normal stress reaction, a protective reflex common to all mammals and mediated by adrenaline – the well-known "flight or fight" reaction. The feeling is familiar – fear or anxiety, rapid heartbeat, sweaty palms and forehead, rapid shallow breathing, nausea and sometimes vomiting, trembling or shaking, and dilated pupils, all of which help the organism increase its alertness, vision, strength, and speed. The reflex abates when the emergency is over.

But sometimes emergencies last longer than a relatively brief time. Extended survival in the wilderness, long-term care for a seriously injured teammate, or being lost with a group in the wilderness can impose almost continuous stress. Such stress can have both adaptive and dysfunctional effects. The stress can help increase a team member's alertness, strength, endurance, tolerance to hardship, sense of purpose, and loyalty to the team. It can also lead to fear, panic, loss of hope, apathy, carelessness, impaired performance, and the breakdown of team cohesion.

Dysfunctional stress reactions can range from mild to severe. At the mild end of the spectrum, a team member may complain of aches and pains; be jumpy and anxious; become startled at sudden sounds or movements; tremble, fidget, or fumble with things; have cold sweats, dry mouth, pale skin, or a pounding heart; have difficulty concentrating; appear distant and haunted; or complain of shortness of breath, fatigue, diarrhea, vomiting, constipation, or frequent urination. More severe cases may show significant personality changes; rapid, pressured talking or, alternatively, complete withdrawal and total silence; memory loss; visual or auditory hallucinations; complete lack of interest in food or drink; or panic or hysteria. Under conditions of long-term stress, team members may easily become angry, irritable, tearful, argumentative, or belligerent; have difficulty paying attention, remembering details, or communicating with their teammates; have trouble sleeping or complain of nightmares; or constantly complain, expect the worst, and express loss of confidence in the team.

Prevention

One of the primary causes of a dysfunctional stress reaction is for the individual to feel alone, isolated, and helpless. Therefore, prevention should be directed toward support, team cohesion, and hope. It is vitally important that everyone get enough sleep – at least five hours a night, and preferably from six to nine hours, although even an hour or two can be helpful in relieving stress. Uncertainty should be reduced by keeping the team informed, and free discussion should be encouraged, while avoiding complaining and blaming. Steps should be taken to promote cohesion among team members. Team members can share water, prepare and share food, and work together to ensure that everyone has adequate food, water, shelter, hygiene, and sanitation.

Leader Stress

A wilderness group leader can easily be put in a situation of great stress. A planned or unplanned survival situation or a medical emergency can place great strain on the leader's ability to cope effectively with multiple demands. There is no magic formula for dealing with the stress in such a situation. But the following are some thoughts that might be useful when a leader starts to feel overwhelmed, either when the situation first begins or when the situation seems to have persisted beyond endurance.

Take a deep breath. Move your shoulders to relieve tension. Calm down. Center.
Face facts. Honestly assess the situation without blaming anyone or wishing you were somewhere else. Sometimes the only way out is through. Sometimes you have to go through unpleasant and demanding experiences. Accept it.
Acknowledge your own competence, training, and experience. You have thought about just such a situation, read about how to deal with it, trained for it. Remember that you are capable of doing what the situation demands. Say, "OK, I can do this."
Recognize that you can control your feelings and reactions. You don't have to be angry or upset.
Accept that you have limited ability to determine how everything turns out. You can only control inputs; you can't control outcomes. Your responsibility is to do the very best job you can under the circumstances. What happens then is not in your hands.
Do something useful. Get out your medical kit. Start water for coffee.
Make a plan. Break down what you need to do into small, manageable steps. Prioritize. Do the first thing on your list.
Change your perspective. Reframe the situation. Think about it as an unfolding story you will be able to tell your grandchildren. Think about it as a challenge to your people management skills. Think about it as a potential article for Outside Magazine. Focus on what you are learning – about your equipment, about the team, about your training – and consider the ways you can improve things when the situation is resolved and you are back home.

NOTE: Wilderness survival expert Ron Hood once told me that, in a crisis situation, the first thing to do is to take a shit. This has three benefits. First, it is useful. You will have to do it sooner or later anyway, so you are accomplishing a needed task. Second, it provides perspective. There you are, in the middle of a crisis, squatting down with your pants around your ankles. This lends a sense of self-deprecating humor to the situation. Third, it puts you into problem-solving mode, since you now have to remember where you put the toilet paper.

Team Member Stress

Remember that, no matter how stressed and panicky you may feel, a team member who is ill or injured or just plain scared feels a whole lot worse. Sick or injured team members may have serious concerns about whether they will live, or whether they will be permanently impaired; team members faced with forest fires or lightning storms may believe that they are going to die. Team members may feel that they let down the team by becoming ill or injured or lost. They may be angry at another team member they blame for the incident or accident. They may blame themselves for their own stupidity. They are in pain, uncomfortable, scared, worried, upset, anxious, and pissed off. And they expect you to make it better. The following are the major components of treating this sort of stress.

Sleep Encourage an injured or stressed team member to sleep if at all possible. Expressions such as "You'll feel better in the morning" and "What you need is a good night's sleep" are clichés because they are true.
Communication It is also very important to communicate frankly and openly with the ill or injured or stressed team member. Not knowing what is going on contributes to isolation and despair. You should communicate the facts of the situation clearly and truthfully but in the most encouraging way possible. Avoid false reassurances; an injured or stressed person will spot and resent any phoniness. You can be reassuring and still be honest. You can say, "We are doing everything that can be done for you. I know you're in a lot of pain, but hang in there. We're preparing to carry you to help as quickly as possible." Be very careful about what you say around an injured or stressed team member, even when you think the person is asleep or unconscious. You never know what a person will hear. All of your encouragement and support will be worthless, and your credibility will be destroyed, if the team member hears you say to someone else anything that is inconsistent with what you have said face-to-face. The leader should also encourage an injured or stressed team member to express concerns and feelings, and provide a confidential and nonjudgmental setting in which to do so.
Autonomy Ill or injured or stressed team members have feelings of lost control. They may feel embarrassed or ashamed at having vented emotions while talking with you. They may feel they are a burden, infantilized and dependent. All of this contributes to feelings of isolation and hopelessness. Therefore, in addition to clear factual information about the situation, to the extent possible make such team members into participants in the decisionmaking process.

In other words, if a team member is even just starting to appear stressed out, then it is probably best to assume that a dysfunctional stress reaction is setting in, and to intervene appropriately.

Make yourself appear calm and in control.
Express the expectation of recovery. "It's just stress. It will go away with rest." Make it clear that the team expects the member to continue contributing.
Remind the team member that stress reactions are normal and that other team members have them too. Joke about it.
Focus on immediate tasks. Assign work that is routine but productive – personal hygiene, equipment maintenance or repair, collecting firewood, making coffee.
Encourage the team member to talk about worries and fears. Assure confidentiality. Listen quietly and nonjudgmentally.
Talk honestly about the situation. Put the problems into perspective and clear up any misunderstanding. Talk about succeeding.
Make the person rest. If an injury to a teammate has disturbed any team members, separate them from the sight of the injured person. Try to have them get a good night's sleep.

References

Department of the Army (1994). FM 22-51 Leader's Manual for Combat Stress Control. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office (available from http://www.adtdl.army.mil/cgi-bin/atdl.dll/fm/22-51/22-51_toc.htm; http://www.vnh.org/FM 22-51/01FM2251.html).

Department of the Army (1998). FM 8-51 Combat stress control in a theater of operations: Tactics, techniques, and procedures. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office (available from http://www.adtdl.army.mil/cgi-bin/atdl.dll/fm/8-51/default.htm; http://www.vnh.org/FM851/Booklet1.htm).

Graham, J. (1997). Outdoor leadership: Technique, common sense & self-confidence. Seattle, WA: The Mountaineers.

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