It’s hard to believe that three months of good old days of summer vacation, the much-needed break from academic rigor, the perfect time to snooze and dream about the future, are over. As the time of “just do nothing mentality,” the time of dreaming, comes to an end, the time to be alert to plan, prepare, commit perseverance and work hard in efforts to bringing those dreams to fruition begins.

As the scheduled day of Faculty/Staff Institute approached, I reflected on Claflin University President Dr. Henry N. Tisdale’s address last year at this occasion. “A New Era of Transformation” was the theme. Tisdale talked about the film U.S. Students Can’t Compete in High-Tech World, a documentary called “2 Million Minutes” and referred to a variety of books to illustrate his inspiring address. Recalling his enthusiastic mention of Our Iceberg Is Melting: Changing and Succeeding Under Any Conditions written by John Kotter and Holger Rathgeber, I went to the Orangeburg County Library looking for the book. Especially, when the librarian made a special effort to secure the book for me and after I saw this good little (which can easily be finished in one sitting) attractive book in bold font, illustrated with images of emperor penguins, pretty and perpetually dressed in tuxedoes, I couldn’t stop myself from reading it.

Our Iceberg Is Melting is an enchanting fable of action that is informed, committed and inspired to help us learn how to do well in an ever-changing world.

One of the 268 occupants who live in Antarctica, Fred detects worrying signs about their home: The iceberg that has been always their residence is melting and might break apart soon! He observes water trapped inside the iceberg cracks, canals and caves. Since freezing liquid dramatically expands in volume, he thinks of the iceberg breaking into pieces as the trapped water freezes during a cold winter.

Unnerved, Fred reveals his worries by presenting a model to the Leadership Council and establishes the sense of urgency with an experiment using a glass bottle filled with water, sealing the hole on the top with fish bone and placing it in the cold wind to see if the bottle is broken by the force of the expanding water as it freezes. The next day, they find the bottle broken.

The Leadership Council calls for the general assembly. Louis, the head penguin, knowing that he can’t do the job alone, selects a team of five to guide the needed change. The team members are asked to search rapidly for solutions by talking to others in the colony. After listening to colony members’ suggestions, to no avail, the desperate team members walk around. They see a flying seagull. Meeting and talking with the seagull, they learn that he was a scout and was flying ahead of the clan looking for where they might live next. After learning about his clan’s nomadic existence, the team members think a great deal and discuss its implications and are convinced that they have succeeded in creating a sensible vision of a better new future: “This iceberg is not who we are. It is only where we now live…. We will find other safer places to live. When necessary, we will move again. We will never have to put our families at risk from the sort of terrible danger we face today. WE WILL PREVAIL!” The leaders communicate the new vision with others to make them understand and accept it. They remove as many obstacles as practical, in order to put the vision into action.

Finally, the team sends out a selected group of strong, bright and highly enthusiastic scouts to explore the territory to find good places for the colony to move next. Though exhausted and one hurt seriously, the group, creating “a short-term win,” returns with exciting stories to tell. The second batch of scouts goes out and succeeds in finding a suitable iceberg. Then on May 12, just before the start of the Antarctic winter, the birds begin their move to their new home.

The move is not bereft of chaos and panic, and everything associated with the new home is not perfect, so they move again. The critical step is not becoming complacent again and not letting up.

Today, the colony moves around like nomads. As time goes on, the colony thrives, grows and becomes more skilled at handling new dangers, in part from what it had learned from the melting adventure. The story typifies that change is hard, and these changes will not be overcome by adhering to stubborn, hard-to-die traditions. Eventually, many colony members, including youngsters, become less fearful of change and work well together to keep leaping into a better future.

The story comes to an end with a note about change in the Leadership Council (rewarding the active participants and keeping the troublemakers at bay) and how the retired Head Penguin Louis, a grandfather figure to the colony, proudly narrates the story of The Great Change to younger birds at their repeated request.

John Kotters’ earlier book Leading Change outlined an actionable 8 steps process for implementing successful transformation. The authors Kotter and Rathgeber show in this book the 8 steps: 1) create a sense of urgency, 2) pull together the guiding team, 3) develop the change vision and strategy, 4) communicate for understanding and buy-in, 5) empower others to act, 6) produce short-term wins, 7) don’t let up. Press harder and faster after the first success, 8) create a new culture. The steps are needed change in a colony of penguins, as the colony copes with potential catastrophe.

The story is short; sentences are simple; and every minute detail is well imagined, artistically linked and illustrated. The striking idea that everyone in a group must play a role in navigating change makes the story more interesting, as the authors inevitably develop the story around the characters -- the naysayers, nitpickers, the innovators and agitators, the leaders and the followers -- who are like people we recognize, though cleverly tactful penguins handle the very real challenges a great deal better than most of us. At times the matters in the story are handled too tactfully for a reader to remember that the characters are penguins; for instance, one may easily forget how hard it would be to act on the suggested solution of drill-a-hole to drain the trapped water to prevent the iceberg from collapsing, until he or she reads: “This drill-a-hole idea was briefly discussed before the professor pointed out that with all 268 birds pecking away 24 hours a day, they would break through the cave in 5.2 years.”

Change is the law of nature. Some may love it. Maybe some never will. However, everyone must learn to accept it, since we all are bound to live in an ever-changing world. Any change, welcome or unwelcome, anticipated or unanticipated, is not easy to deal with until one gets emotionally and physically settled and is comfortable with the situation. This fable presents the notion that culture changes with as much difficulty in penguin colonies as in human colonies. Tradition dies a hard death.

Thus, this story of The Great Change encourages the reader to think about his iceberg, if it’s melting, and how he is going to meet the challenge.

It’s hard to end the column without mentioning that this book reminds me of another fable “Who Moved My Cheese? An A-mazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life,” written by Spencer Johnson, another enchanting book that teaches us how to manage the necessary change that surrounds us all and another one of Tisdale’s favorite books.

Mandakini Hiremath is a Claflin instructor and coordinator of the university writing center.

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