Conflict 111 productivity, increased stress, wasted energy, and diminished problem- solving ability. It can also result in an unhappy workplace; loss of revenue; vulnerability to competition; and, ultimately, organizational death. This chapter looks at cases in which conflict has spun out of control and resulted in the loss of lives, along with examples in which conflict was managed effectively under the most stressful conditions. It illustrates how proactive leaders can skillfully use conflict to their advantage in creating and sustaining higher performance. Deal with Anger in Small Doses The Karluk expedition (described in Chapter 1) suffered from a gaping leadership hole created by Stefansson's abrupt departure, and by the sub- sequent inability of Captain Robert Bartlett--who was left behind with the ship--to create a cohesive team.The fatal effects of this fragmentation became magnified as the months wore on and conflicts erupted un- checked among the members of the ill-fated expedition. In a sledge march even more grueling than that faced by Shackleton, Captain Bartlett managed to lead the remainder of the Karluk expedition across the ice from the trapped ship to land. Having reached the relative safety of Wrangel Island, however, Bartlett saw no alternative but to leave the exhausted survivors and set out for help. Leaving fifteen surviving members behind, Bartlett and his Eskimo guide, Kataktovik, began their journey to Siberia in a snowstorm on March 18, 1914. It was a treacherous 200-mile journey across the float- ing, unstable sea ice. On April 5, 1914, the two exhausted travelers reached land and were soon taken in by a party of friendly Siberian Inuits. Bartlett and Kataktovik rested for two days with the Inuits, but-- concerned about those left behind on Wrangel--set out once again with their weary dogs. On April 25, 1914--thirty-seven days after leaving Wrangel--Bartlett and Kataktovik arrived at the Siberian settlement of East Cape.They had covered about 700 miles of ice and shoreline and had averaged almost 20 miles a day, in what has been called the "most dan- gerous ice journey ever made by human beings." 2 As heroic as this effort was, it was not until May 1914, when the ice American Management Association · www.amanet.org