Highlights with Shannon Polson: What You Need to Know About Grit and Nurturing Optimism Today (Summer Series VII)
In this first episode of 2021, Sylvia talks with Alaska native and speaker Shannon Huffman Polson about her journey as a thought leader on grit and resilience. She served as one of the first women to fly the Apache helicopter in the US Army and earned her MBA at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth before writing The Grit Factor: Courage, Resilience, and Leadership in the Most Male-Dominated Organization in the World and founding The Grit Institute where she coaches people on developing grit in careers and workplaces. We talk a lot about grit, what it is, how it is built and what its soft underbelly looks like.
We get under surface and talk about Shannon’s childhood in Alaska, the challenges and opportunities behind her military career, the tragic loss of her father and stepmother in the Arctic, parenting during COVID, books and much more.
Topics Include:
Resetting and refocusing; understanding what you truly want out of life
Growing up in Alaska
Mountain summits, literal and metaphorical
Resilience in the face of adversity
Grit: dogged determination in the face of adverse circumstances
Grit as a character trait that can be developed
Learning to fly helicopters
Tuning out the noise; focusing on your core mission
The grit triad: Commit, Learn, Launch
Post-traumatic growth and grounded optimism
Women in male-dominated industries
Raising gritty kids
Advice: not to listen to the naysayers
Resources Mentioned:
Angela Duckworth’s work on grit: AngelaDuckworth.com
Carol Dweck’s work on growth mindset
Connect with Shannon:
Instagram: @aborderlife
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