I think if you're going to apply this strategy, you have to think about the reason why "the ships" actually harm you. In the historical example, it is because when you are fighting in line of pikemen and one group decides to flee, it exposes the rest of the formation to danger and leads them to flee...causing a rout.

In business, to prevent an analogous situation, you need some way to prohibit people from quitting the company in the face of poor morale. How does one do that ethically?

Instead, think about the nature of the 'distraction' and find a tactic that works for that. Maybe that means prohibiting the CEO trying to go fundraising until X target is met?