Leadership story: A leader’s reaction in a difficult situation

There was once a group of tradesmen who were traveling from one place to another to buy and sell goods. They went wherever the trade took them and they had only but a couple of rules. One of them was that they never risk their lives or their cargo on the unknown. The other one was that they always keep their word and do everything possible to honor the deal they made. After a couple of years, their reputation spread across the land and their service was very sought after. Not that long ago during the course of their travels, they came across a city where they made a very lucrative deal of transporting certain goods from one town to another. For the group of tradesmen, it was business as usual, except they had to take a route they have never taken before to make the deadline of the delivery. This was not in any way a breach of their rules, as at the point of making the deal they didn’t know they would have to cross a desert that was extremely dangerous. The deal was struck and the caravan took off on their journey. After a short time on their journey, they came to the edge of an unknown desert. The leader of the caravan was a very careful and experienced man so he decided to ask around at the nearby village about the desert before continuing. Very soon he discovered that they found themselves in a very difficult situation. The desert was not like any other they…