SPEAKER_01 0:00

Because as I walked out on that tarmac, I knew that people around me were asking why women think they need to fly this thing anyway, right? And I had to walk out towards that aircraft and decide in that moment, on the tarmac, that I was going to own my own story, that I was going to be the one that controlled my own narrative, that I had to be better than the voices of doubt inside my own head and those voices of doubt that I heard around me.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

Hey there, Maureen Cherna here, founder of the MindSight Academy, neurocoach to executives, leaders, entrepreneurs, and a neuroleadership trainer using insights from neuroscience to help you deliver results by learning to work smarter, be in control of your brain, manage yours and others' emotions, change behaviors, flourish and exceed expectations. Welcome back to another episode of Lead to Excel Podcast. I am so thrilled to be with you today because we have a special guest. But before we get into that, remember to subscribe to this podcast wherever you listen to it. Because it will help other people find it and give them the opportunity to understand how they can rewire their own brain to enable them to achieve their goals. So without wasting any more time, grab your cup of coffee or your drink or whatever that might be. Put your feet up and listen in. Excited again to be back with another episode of Lead to Excel podcast. This week I have an exceptionally awesome guest with me. And you guys are going to be really interested and amazed at what we're going to be talking about today. It's one topic that I am so passionate about. So I'm not going to waste any more time. And I'm going to just say, Shannon, it's a great pleasure to have you on Lead to Excel Podcast. So Shannon Hoffman-Paulsen is our guest today. Shannon, welcome to Lead2Xcel Podcast.

SPEAKER_01 2:07

Thank you so much, Maureen. It's wonderful to be with you and to see you again over the uh across the oceans.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Exactly. So I'm just going to introduce you to our guests so that we kind of get to understand who Shannon is. Shannon Hoffman, Paulson, is the author of The Great Factor. We're going to be talking a lot about this book. And guys, if you haven't bought this book, I would say click now and buy it. It's an amazing read. It's one that when I started, I did not put down, and I've gone back to refer to it quite a few times. So she's the author of the Great Factor, Courage, Resilience, and Leadership in the most male-dominated organization in the world. And she's the founder of the Great Institute, a leadership institute committed to whole leadership development and a focus on grit and resilience. As one of the first women to fly the Apache helicopter in the US Army, Paulse combines her passion and first-hand experience in and the study of leadership and grid to deliver world-class keynotes and training to companies and organizations on leadership and grid. Shannon is a graduate of Duke University and the talk school at that month. So, Shannon, that was packed. Just in fact, when I was reading over that, I kept going, wow, wow, wow, wow, that is really amazing. So let's start touching on this. We said that you're one of the first, you know, one of the first women. Yes. You know, which is really interesting. Um, can you talk to us about that just briefly, and then we will really just go deeper into the experience and all that. So, what organization was this that is male dominated, and what were you doing there?

unknown 4:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

Um, Maureen, thank you so much for such a wonderful introduction. That was very generous and kind. And you have certainly many, many amazing things in your background as well. So, again, a pleasure to be with you. I did have the opportunity a number of years ago now to be one of the first women to fly the Apache in the US Army. I uh served on three different continents, leading three different aviation units before transitioning through my MBA at the Tuck School and then working in the corporate world as well, in both the medical device and the technology industries. Uh, but yeah, that time after college in the military, in the US Army, that's the most male-dominated organization in the world. And I'm guessing it's probably true in most militaries, was certainly an eye-opening experience, one that I would uh certainly not trade, but had a lot of opportunities to learn and grow.

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Yeah, I can imagine. If I when I was reading your book, I went, wow, it's you know, it's really interesting. And I just like the way you've kind of linked it to organizations and corporates because you kind of they really mirror each other. So, what got you into the US Army and to the place where you were flying? What was it that actually made you decide that was it? Because I do know that your parents were not so surprised. So, what actually made you do it?

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Well, you know, I grew up in Alaska, and uh and we say in Alaska that it's the place where men are men and where women win the Ididerod. And if your listeners are not familiar, the Ididerod is that thousand-mile dog sled race, which has been won by women, not in their own category, but in one single category, men and women together, uh, several times. And so I really grew up in a place where women were not only expected to pull their weight and contribute equally, but really had to in order for us to live and work safely. And so I think that was a great upbringing, along with parents who demanded quite a lot and with the opportunity to participate in sports and music and those other things where you learn to push yourself at a young age. And then I headed off to college at the other side of the country, other corner of the continent for us, really, and uh and then needed to find a way to help pay for college. And in the US, we have this thing called the Reserve Officer Training Corps, where we are both training while going to college in a way. And so at the end of that time, while the military helps to pay for college, we then owe an obligation back to the military. And so that's where I decided at that time that I was graduating from Duke, I had a degree in English with a secondary um focus in art history. That if I was going to spend time in the military, I wanted to do the coolest thing I could do and uh and do the most interesting thing that I could do. And so I requested and I earned, and I was assigned the opportunity to be an aviation.

SPEAKER_00 7:10

That is amazing. Now, one of the things you talked about was that time when you were walking to the helicopter the first time to fly. Can you just talk us through the feeling of now going to be in control of a helicopter and you're going to fly? What did it feel like in terms of for you, but also the people around you?

SPEAKER_01 7:38

Yeah, and I'm glad you asked for that because I love telling this story, as you know. And this is actually a story that came a year after I had started flying. So I entered the initial entry rotary wing training at Fort Rucker, Alabama. I initially trained on Huey helicopters, the UH-1 that they used to fly in Vietnam. And then I transferred to the OH-58 observation helicopter, which was what anybody who was going to be flying what we call scout and attack missions would do. So we split partway through the training. And the OH-58 was a much smaller and much more finicky sort of a helicopter. Uh, but then I had earned, I graduated as an honor graduate from flight school, and I requested and I earned the opportunity to then go into the Apache Advanced Transition course. And I do remember that first day walking out on the tarmac towards the Apache helicopter that I was going to fly for the first time. You know, we'd been in the simulator. We'd done lots of study, we'd done lots of work, but the very first time walking out towards that helicopter, and it was crouching there on the tarmac, lined up next to other Apaches crouching there. It was a winter morning in Alabama, the sun wasn't quite up, just a little bit of light in the sky. And I had my flight suit jacket zipped up against the cold. And I walked out on the tarmac towards that aircraft and saw it crouching there. And it's 58 feet long, right? It's it's 18 feet across, it's 12 feet high. On its wings hangs any combination of the 2.75-inch folding venereal rocket and the anti-tank hellfire missile. And on the nose are three different sight systems at sea in day and night and infrared. And it's a tandem-seated helicopter. You know this because I believe uh some of your royalty has flown it as well. And so there's only room for two pilots. It's the most technologically advanced helicopter in the world. And I walked out on that tarmac and I had shivers going up and down my spine. But it had nothing to do with the fact that it was cold outside on that winter morning. It was more feeling a little bit excited and more than a little bit terrified, but I wasn't about to show anybody either one of those things. Because as I walked out on that tarmac, I knew that people around me were asking why women think they need to fly this thing anyway, right? And I had to walk out towards that aircraft and decide in that moment on the tarmac that I was going to own my own story, that I was going to be the one that controlled my own narrative, that I had to be better than the voices of doubt inside my own head and those voices of doubt that I heard around me. Because who was I not to fly that aircraft? I had earned that opportunity. So I walked out to the helicopter, I put one foot up onto the wheel, the other foot up onto the Ford Avionics Bay, and I opened that all-glass cockpit that opens up and out like a Lamborghini. Now I like to say I've never been in a Lamborghini, but it really doesn't matter if you get to fly the Apache, right? Exactly. And I swung myself into that front cockpit. We did the run-up procedure that I would know so well that I would know it by heart. The power lovers come to full RPM. You release the brakes and you taxi out on the tarmac towards takeoff. And then if I am in a keynote audience, even with thousands of you in the audience, and I hope that I can come to the UK and do exactly this someday, I would ask you to raise your hand and say, which way do you take off in the Apache helicopter? And sometimes I get a few hands in a smaller audience, people will yell out, it's up. And of course, up is the ultimate goal. But here's the key: here's the takeaway. In the Apache, like in any other aircraft, you turn the nose to face the wind. Face the wind. Oh, the right way. That resistance will help you to rise. And that is the metaphor that really informs the grip factor, right? The grip factor came about because of not just my experience, but because a young leader asked me to mentor her going into that same sort of environment. And I immediately realized my experience was limited to my own, you know, decade in uniform. So how could I scale what I offered to that young leader? And I started years of interviewing leaders in the vanguards of their fields. They happened to be women, they happened to be military. Every single one of them faced a double crucible, which is a Stanford law professor term that Deborah Rhodes coined that term, facing not only the incredible challenges of what the job required, but also the requirements to operate in an environment that was sometimes hostile to their very being there.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:00

So that is really the genesis of what became the grip factor. I know we'll get into more of that shortly.

SPEAKER_00 12:05

That is amazing. So it's interesting that you have to face the wind, the resistance of the wind. And that now brings us to something because even when you were going to, you know, taking that walk, one of the things you experienced was, like you said, excitement, but also fear. And these emotions come up, but you made a decision at that point. And you know, that's one of the things I really want us to dig into it a bit. How do you deal with fear? And one of the things you've mentioned, which is what the what the helicopter does, basically what you do in the Apache is to face it. How do we now talk to us in terms of real life experiences? How you can actually do that, because the most common response to fear is to run away, is to freeze.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 13:04

But actually saying that you go and you face the fear, you move forward into the fear. Wow. Can you talk to us about that?

SPEAKER_01 13:51

Absolutely, Maureen. And if you'll pardon me for just a moment, I want to put it in context of the grit triad. And the grit factor, again, like it came from these interviews, it came from all of the surrounding and supporting research around leadership, grit, resilience, and the psychology of all of this as well. And so, what came out of that research, what came out of those stories and lessons learned, are the three parts of the book. And that is commit, learn, and launch. And that's aligned with owning your past. That's what we just talked about, owning your story, but also connecting to core purpose. It's deep engagement in the present. And then it's looking towards the future with that foundation, with that deep engagement, looking towards the future with audacity, with authenticity, and with adaptability. And the question that you're asking me right now is something that I fit into that audacity piece. So you've got to be grounded in the past. That's one of the things that's absolutely owning your own story, connected to core purpose. That's the foundational work that you've got to do before you're facing that fear, right? Or in order to be willing and able and ready for it for whatever might come. There's also this deep engagement in the present. And I know we can get into more of that lately, but that's making sure that you have your own team, that you build your own team, that you also are supporting others in their teams. So that's a piece of it, but none of us do it alone. It's learning the art and science of active listening, and it's developing the mindset of grit and resilience. And maybe we should come back to that in a moment. But ultimately, you're asking a question relative to that facing the future with that groundedness and with that engagement. And that audacity was a part and parcel of every single experience of the leaders that I interviewed for the grit factor. These are general officers across the services. There are aviators from World War II to the present. There are combat rescue swimmers in the Coast Guard, one of the first women Army Rangers, and many, many more. And this audacity, this willingness to face fear, the willingness to put yourself out there, to take on stretch assignments, or maybe simply to face the realities of what all of us have been facing over the past two years, right? That willingness to face fear was absolutely a part of who they were. And it was a conscious decision. And that's where this kind of ties into that mindset piece a little bit, is this is an opportunity. The opportunity to take action, the opportunity to choose your orientation is a choice that every single one of us make every single day. Now it's all connected to the other parts of the triad. So you can't really take one without the other. But it is this decision that you're going to understand. And I give you many examples, as you know, approaching the ideas through the story in the grit factor, and many, many stories in the grit factor. But it is this idea that we know that everyone who is successful pushes themselves, takes that leap, asks for that stretch assignment, asks for that job that nobody else is willing to do, and does it with determination and with tenacity, right? With perseverance, with grit. And when you do that, you take on those assignments, sometimes you're going to fail. Failure is a part of every leader's path to success, every person's path of success. And I like to say that you do the same thing with failure that you do on takeoff with the Apache, right? When we fail, when we're afraid, understand that that fear is just another form of resistance. That shame we feel with failure, just another form of resistance. And we do the same thing we do on takeoff. We turn the nose to face the wind. You have to face directly into it and take that next step. And I like to say that it's not fear and failure that matters, because that's part of the normal human condition. You're in very good company. There's no need to feel ashamed. We all feel that. We all have felt that miserably lately, especially, right? Over the last couple of years. But what differentiates you maybe is your approach, the decision to decide to face it, and understand that it's not the fear and failure that matters, it's what you do with it that counts.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

That was serious. That was quite a lot there. And the triad, let me just pick up on that again. What was the first one?

SPEAKER_01 18:01

So commit is really doing the work to own your past, understanding you're in control of your own narrative, and that it's really, really important work to connect to your core purpose. And we talk about an exercise there as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:14

Yeah, absolutely. And the good thing about the grid factor, your book, is that after every chapter, you put exercises for people to do. That is just fantastic. That is amazing. Because the whole essence of really getting to grit and developing that grit is practice, which you did mention. So I want to come back to the reason why you wrote it in the first place. Why did you write the grit factor? What specifically? And the next question I'll then ask is what's the difference between grit and resilience?

SPEAKER_01 18:53

Yes, wonderful. Well, so going back to that request from that young leader, uh, there was a I had a request through an online mentorship program to mentor a young leader who was, again, heading out on that same path in aviation that I had taken many years before. At that point, I had already transitioned out of the military through business school, had spent time in the corporate world, had written my first book, North of Hope, and uh and was continuing to write and to speak to companies and organizations, although the focus of that that uh that organizational development was really around grit and resilience and then also the leadership that goes with that. And when this young leader reached out, I realized, gosh, you know, number one, I've always wanted a way to find a way to pay my experience forward, right? To give back from my experience in a meaningful way that could really impact and help other people. And I didn't know what that way looked like. I knew that doing keynotes was part of that. I knew that um uh continuing to work with companies and organizations was part of that. But then when this young leader reached out, I thought, gosh, you know, there is there is a wealth of experience in my 10 years, but yet there's so much more out there. And the unique elements of my 10 years of experience in uniform on three different continents, leading these different units is again, you know, confined to my own experience. And so, how can I scale that experience? How can I scale what I offer to this young leader? And if I do that work, then scale the people to whom it was offered. So I started this series of interviews, I started, you know, throwing them up on a blog that I called the Grip Project. And then I realized once I had done this for a few years, I was like, this is incredibly robust information. And I started to do that secondary and foundational research in those areas that were starting to break out from those stories and from those lessons learned that these leaders shared so candidly from their own experiences. So now we have hundreds of years of experience of people facing leaders facing a double crucible and succeeding. You know, they fail along the way, but they ultimately, ultimately succeed. And then the foundational research as well. And I was like, you know what, to get this to the largest possible audience where the most possible people can benefit from this incredible storehouse of stories, of lessons learned, the research that tactical applications really should be put forward in the form of a book. And so that really is the genesis of what became the grit factor. And it's been an incredible honor to bring it and shepherd it into the world because, again, it's not just my own story, it's many, many, many other beliefs. And as you know, women don't tend to share their stories as frequently or as um as freely. I don't think we're conditioned to do so in most social settings, but it's so important. It's important not just for women, but for men as well, right? So this is not a it's not a leadership book for women, it's a leadership book for all of us. And I think that's really, really the key takeaway there.

SPEAKER_00 21:44

So, how long after leaving the US Army did you write the book?

SPEAKER_01 21:50

It was a while. I mean, I left in 2001. I actually, my my release date was a couple of months before the Twin Towers fell, actually, interestingly enough. Oh, wow. Okay. So uh, and that was actually a difficult transition as well. I just felt I felt very much without my own sense of purpose, which is really where a lot of my current work is with companies, organizations, and actually learning journeys at the Grit Institute is really focused on purpose and going deep into purpose because it's so critical for us to get through these really challenging times. Um, but um yeah, so it was 15 years probably after that I started this process of doing these interviews and starting to do the writing for the grit factor. And I had already been speaking and doing keynotes for several years before then on that topic. So I've been doing some of the research, and this really pulled. In that primary research, into the second theory research. And then we started, I started to make those connections and started to see where the where the stories were falling out. What were those things that came up again and again and again, the lessons learned that came up repeatedly through these experiences again that spanned generations, it spans continents, it spans wars. And that really was the was the jewel of what comes out of the grit factor. And again, you know, we enter into every element of that grit triad through story. So we come in through the story, we look at the research, we look at sometimes the corporate applications as well, and we always end with the tactical exercises. And for those who want to go deeper, again at the grit institute, we have the going for grit learning journey, we have the paths to purpose learning journey, and then there's others that will be coming up in uh towards the end of Q1. So that's the opportunity to really go much deeper into the concepts and really internalize them and make them your own, or help your team or your company to make it their own.

SPEAKER_00 23:33

Yeah, I think that's the great thing about what you do. So let me come back to grit. What is it? How would you define grit and how do you differentiate it from resilience?

SPEAKER_01 23:45

Thank you for reminding me of your question. That's a great question. You know, one of when I first started doing the interviews for the grit factor, I actually interviewed a woman who was on the first American or first all women's Everest climbing team. Her name is Midge Cross. She actually lives locally to where I live as well. And uh, and I love how she made the differentiation for herself. And she said, you know, grit, grit is like that rainy bivouac. If you've ever seen those climbers that, you know, sleep on this little cot hanging off the side of a mountain. Okay, yeah. Grit is this rainy bivouac that you've got to push through. And resilience is like that reed that bends in the wind and then comes back up. And I thought that was beautiful, but I'm gonna develop that a little. Uh, one of the premier researchers on grit, of course, is Angela Duckworth from her work at University of Pennsylvania's uh Positive Psychology and Character Lab. And she defines grit as passion and perseverance towards a very long-term goal, which is excellent, of course. I I have defined grit a little bit more gridtily, perhaps, as this dogged determination in the face of difficult circumstances. And, you know, over the last couple of years, when the horizon has been so unclear, when the future has seemed impossible to define at any given moment, which makes humans very uncomfortable, right? Um, I think that dogged determination is uh is kind of um the less sexy but but but more gritty explanation that I come back to again and again. And uh and I heard recently from somebody that I talked to that another way to think of grit and resilience, because they're very much tied together, right? The Venn diagram overlaps a lot, but not complete.

SPEAKER_00 25:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:20

He said that uh he told me that the samurai swords, this is so interesting. The samurai swords are made up of two different kinds of metal, and one of them is very, very um rigid, and one of them is much more flexible, but they work together, and that's why it's so effective. And so I think that's the encrypted resilience metaphor that I uh have just recently heard that I think I'm going to start to share as widely as possible. It's a it's a great way to flexible and rigid, and that combination of the two, depending on the circumstance, depending on the time, depending on what you're facing, you have to figure out which one you're going to employ.

SPEAKER_00 25:56

Awesome. Thank you. I'm going to get us a bit deeper now into how to develop grit itself. And one of the things you did talk about a lot was purpose, actually understanding your core purpose as opposed to that superficial, what is your purpose? So can you just talk to us? And the other thing you did talk about, which I don't know if we're going to have time, but this is why I keep really emphasizing the need to read this book and to go to the website and really look at what you do, is your you know, owning your story or actually crafting your own story. So if you can just touch on these two things really um briefly, but just so that people can understand the importance of actually knowing your core purpose, even as a leader in an organization, the reason why it's it's so important, and also touching on this story.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

Absolutely. Yeah, Maureen, this is so, so important. This is again of that grit triad, and grit means looking at every part again and again, right? It doesn't, it's not something you do once, it's something that you revisit again and again. And and what came out of these stories Why is that important to revisit it again and again? Yes, great question. Um, what came out of these stories again and again is that grit is not this discrete thing we pull off the shelf, right? For mile 23 of the marathon, although it's very helpful there as well. But it's part of the content of our character, it's part of what makes us up who we are. And and when we get in the midst of things that are really challenging or really disorienting, like the last two years for almost all of us, right? Actually, I would say for all of us, it's easy to lose sight of that foundation of grip, even if you've done that work. And so having that somewhere that you can come back to, that you can revisit, you might refine it, you might even change it. And that's the beauty of it, is it's something that you own, you decide on. So, what's your narrative? What's your core purpose? Well, that's something that you can revisit and say, hey, I want to tweak this. This isn't quite working for me. I want to change the direction of this, I want to make this foundation uh even stronger and maybe add a little bit of ornamentation to it. But um, but revisiting that foundation and reconnecting to it even daily is actually a really powerful thing. It's why ancient wisdom traditions have the rituals that they have that are daily rituals, right? And it is because you're coming back to the core of what matters again and again. And I'm so glad that you asked me about purpose because, again, that's kind of my passion area right now as a segment of grit, as a segment of what matters the most in the world. All of us want to live a life that matters, right? All of us want to contribute meaningfully. And we don't want grit to get through something that doesn't mean anything. We we want that to be connected to core purpose. And um, and core purpose, I like why, yes, why? Because we're made for it, right? We're made to contribute our best selves. We're made to show up authentically as who we are in a way that we can give back and uh and make the world a better place, honestly, in whatever way that is, in whatever whatever realm it is that you work in, it doesn't make any difference at all. And I like to think that core purpose, we always talk about uh what's been made popular recently with Simon Sinek, this you know, start with why, which is a great place to start. Um, it's not a new concept, it's been in philosophy for a very long time that you know the person who knows their uh their why can manage through any how, right? You can get through anything if you know the why. But I sometimes like to think that we've got to go a lot deeper than why. And the exercise that I bring you through in the grit factor, and again, the paths to purpose learning journey at the Grit Institute just blows this out in about four different directions at least. Um, but I like to say that we have to ask why more than once, because we have to get to a core purpose that is agnostic of the organization and agnostic of the specific job. What we're doing is we're getting down to values that we can put into action. And you know, the story, Maureen, you know this, I that I tell about this is I was working in an office as my very first assignment after I was trained in the Apache. I was newly trained, I was ready to go, I was ready to fly and lead. I was so excited to take that first flight platoon. And I was assigned to this back office position, right? And I was typing up the appendices to operations orders, not even the operations orders themselves, and putting them into Harvard Graphics, which preceded PowerPoint. So I've given away my age here. Um, but um, and it was really frustrating. And I went to the captain that I was working for, you know, I did my best work, of course, and I was getting great feedback. And I went to the captain I was working for, and I said, Sir, hey, you know, I'm I'm gonna keep doing the best job I can at the work I've been given, but when's that platoon gonna open up? And he looked at me and he said, Lieutenant, the army doesn't owe you anything. And I realized with this pang that although I had done the work, although I had earned the opportunity, that it may not be forthcoming. And so I kept doing the best job I could at the work I was given. I was flying a little bit, but not a lot. And then I went to go see the major that we both worked for. So this is now a field grade officer that outranks me by a couple of ranks, in case your listeners aren't familiar. And I said, sir, look, I'm gonna keep doing the best job I can at the work I've been given, but I think I can do more. And he looked a little surprised. And then he gave me one additional duty after another, and I made sure that I hit every single one out of the park. It's our baseball terminology in the US anyway, and and basically made sure that I exceeded the standard. And then that flight platoon came a year later. And so I like to tell that story because if I had asked why, why was I there? Right? Let's go back to purpose now. Anytime in that year of doing work that felt like it probably was unfair that I was there, that I was frustrated, that I wasn't it, didn't feel like I was really contributing. And I had said, why was I there? I'm there to fly the Apache helicopter, to be an aviation leader, right? That's why I'm there. Well, I wasn't doing a lot of that. And I couldn't impact how the office was run at that stage. And so I like to suggest the exercise again that goes much deeper than that that first why, by asking ourselves why, not one time, but five times. This is a technique that Toyota engineered, actually, to drill down to the root cause of deficiencies on the manufacturing line. But we're going to use it here to drill down to our core purpose. So, why was I there to fly the Apache helicopter? Why I was trained to do so. Why I had asked for, I had earned that opportunity. Why? Well, I wanted to serve my country. That's pretty good, right? But force yourself to go down to that fifth level why, or the level that is again agnostic of the organization and agnostic of the job. Why? Because I wanted to serve service.

SPEAKER_00 32:42

Yeah, let me pick you up on that because it's there's something you wrote in the book that I just love. Because when you got to that fourth why, which is serve my country, which is, you know, yeah, we could you could even easily have stopped. You are not serving your country, doing what you were doing at that point, and that was why it was so important to go down and ask yourself another why that brought you then to I want to serve. Sure. And yes, and and from what you said, that was exactly what then helped you. So carry on from there in terms of you want to serve. So, how did this now link with what you were doing to then give you the motivation to continue?

SPEAKER_01 33:26

Right. Well, I mean, I think connecting to service and understanding that that was a part of, again, that story that I that I craft, that I tell myself. Like it was a part of how I was raised, where we, you know, we we went to church and we made food for people who didn't have enough, and we we brought food to people on Christmas Eve. That was part of what my family did as I grew up. And it's part of what I internalized as what was important, what I was meant to do, what we're all meant to do. And that concept of service as a key value and then put into action. That's the purpose piece, is translating that value into action was a really important thing. And then I could say, hey, I'm typing up the appendices to operations orders. I'm doing my absolute best. That's absolutely a value of mine as well, is to do my absolute best in anything that I do or deliver. And to connect those two and say, look, I am serving. I'm serving my country by doing the thing that my country asked me to do, but I'm also serving because of that in a capacity that I may not have chosen, but will continue to move along and ultimately translate into something that is that is connected to a goal of mine. But I did need to get down to that core value to say, when I'm frustrated with this work, this is part of something bigger, right? It's part of something bigger than even the US Army, than even the military, than even serving your country. It's part of the fabric of who I am. I'm continuing to live in accordance with who I am authentically and contribute in a way that is in concert with who I am authentically. And so when you can connect to that, even when it's frustrating, there's real power in that. Now, I'm not saying that you should then relinquish your goals. You continue to work towards your goals, but you regain your sense of foundation and of self and of forward movement and contribution by reconnecting to that core purpose. Now, I go into a lot of nuances and complexities of this, uh, both in the book as well as and especially in the learning journey paths to purpose at the Grit Institute. So we but um, but I think that that kind of that gives you an idea of what that foundation needs to look like and why we need to come back to that again and again. I would say you post your purpose somewhere, you'll see it every single day.

SPEAKER_00 35:31

So when you're feeling like don't feel like showing up today, you're like, that's what I'm here to do, right? Exactly. And I think that is so important because a lot of times, like you know, in fact, as you are saying it, I just remember there's so many people who are in jobs that they don't like, or they're carrying out tasks that they don't like, or they've started something that they're asking themselves the question, why am I doing this? So really going back to that purpose and the core purpose of who you really are really willing to make that decision about okay, there's a reason, there's a bigger reason why I'm here. But you know, it's also remaining focused on where I want to go. But with what I'm doing now, I'm going to give it my best and still keep that vision of where I want to go, really. So that's that's that's so good. The other thing was stories. What is the importance of really crafting your story in terms of in terms of grit itself, what you know, helping you to develop that grit, but also helping you as a leader when you're actually leading other people.

SPEAKER_01 36:44

Yes, that's wonderful, Maureen. And I know that you know this from your background as well, but it's very, very clear from the most uh most current neuroscience that our brains process information in the form of story. And so both doing work on our own stories, but also learning from others' stories is critical and helping others to connect to their own stories. And the way that we think about this really and why it connects so so so critically to grit and resilience is that the way that we understand our own story, the way that we craft our story, and as a writer, and you know, I do a lot of creative work in addition to the leadership narrative work that I do, you have to craft a narrative, right? And and to craft a narrative, like any artist knows, in any kind of a medium, you include some things and you exclude some things, and you decide how it is that you're going to share a particular idea. And so when we go back and look at our own storylines and our own journey lines, and that's one of that's the exercise at the end of chapter one. And again, we go more into this at the uh Grit Institute in all of the all of the work that we do, you have to look at the positive and negative experiences of your life. And then I have you go back through that journey line and say, what does each one of those mean to me? What did I learn at each of those places? And if I failed or if something horrible happened that I didn't ask for, what did I learn? How did I get stronger? Who did I rely on? What did I learn that I can take forward as I go as I go into other challenges and other uncertainties? And so then you go back and you connect those to values, and then we go back and we connect those to saying, hey, I am a stronger person because of this experience. And and understanding that this experience, this journey line that you have, this story that you have of your life is the one you tell yourself. And you can tell yourself that you're a victim, or you can tell yourself that you are a survivor, that you triumph over these challenges, that maybe you fell down and had to dig yourself out after a couple of years, but you dug yourself out. You came down, you came up from this rock bottom. And the stories that you tell yourself influence how it is that you face those challenges and changes going forward. As a leader, you've got to have that for yourself, absolutely. But you also have an incredible opportunity to help your people connect to their stories. That's where you want to run them through the learning journeys at the Great Institute, right? And you also can construct and you must construct the story of your organization or your company in a similar way. How do you talk about hardships? How do you talk about failures? How do you show what you learned from and became better as a result of those hardships and failures? And that's really a choice that every single one of us has the opportunity to make.

SPEAKER_00 39:21

Thank you so much. You've talked a lot about, in fact, when we talk about stories, one one of the key thing then is actually rewiring our brain or reframing things we've done in the past, reframing those false stories that we've worried that we've wired over time. And there's a place that you use it because you said in your book that after a particular incident, which was the passing of your dad and your stepmom, you this you made a choice to craft a new story. And you said, because, and like you said, it we've all experienced difficult situations, could be loss, trauma, failure. So talk to us about you know this particular incident, how you then crafted a story because eventually a book came out of that as well. So if you just talk to us about that.

SPEAKER_01 40:17

Yeah, this was uh something that happened um four years after I left the military. My father and stepmother, who were very avid wilderness um uh veterans and explorers, were on a kayaking trip in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. So we're jumping out of the military now and we're going up to the northeast corner of Arctic, Alaska. And they hadn't done trips like this before, but they were kayaking the Hula Hula River uh in the late June of 2005. And um, and you know, I there's challenges with that, of course. There's many different challenges, but one of the things is that you're very, very remote. You're so remote that it takes two small airplanes to get to this place that is that remote in Alaska. So nowhere near where I grew up, even though I grew up in the same state. It's a big state, as uh as you know. And um and you know, the my experience, the way that I learned what happened is I was walking with my brother in Portland, Oregon. I was visiting him um for the weekend, and I had a text on my cell phone that had a 907 area code, which is the area code for Alaska, followed by the numbers 911. And for us in the US, 911 is an emergency. So I called the number and the voice on the other end uh asked if I was Shannon Huffman at the time, if I was the daughter of Richard Huffman, and I said that I was, and and then he said, I'm sorry to tell you this, but a bear came into their campsite last night and they were both killed. And gosh, so that was um that that that was one of those moments in life that um that I still uh get the chills telling you about. Um I knew in that moment, you know, everything seemed to stop completely around me. The shock. And I don't, we I know we don't have time to talk through that next year, but but I realized in the course of the next couple of weeks that I had to start to put things into place to make sure that I didn't fall through whatever the bottom might be that I had never seen before. And um, and then I needed to do work to start to face it, right? To face into the wind, to face that I couldn't run away from this, that it was going to destroy me if I ran away from it. And uh was very close to my dad. And so I um actually signed up. I was a choral singer, I have always been a semi-professional choral singer, and I signed, I auditioned for the Seattle Symphony Chorale to sing the Mozart Requiem, which was being directed by Itsak Perlman. That was part of my work. Um, and I realized in the course of that year as I was we were rehearsing for the Requiem that um I needed to go back to where they had spent their last days and where they had died. And um, and so that next summer, I took the same trip that they had taken and I visited the campsites that they had visited. I had their maps, I had their journal. And um, and that is the storyline for what became my first book, North of Hope, uh, A Daughter's Arctic Journey. And I realized that I had to decide what that story was going to be. That story was either going to be me uh falling apart completely. And I did have my moments where I fell apart completely, even for some periods of time. But um, or it was a story where I realized that I was part of this broader human condition where I was part of, I mean, I realized on the river as I was rafting the hula hula, I was there with with two other companions, and I realized like this is part of this is the human story. You know, in in most parts of the world, people have lost whole families to war or to famine or to disease. And and I have just suffered this loss of of two people that are closest to me, and I and I'm part of this human story. And there was, and I need to understand how to make something beautiful out of this thing that's tragic. It doesn't make it okay, it doesn't say that it's okay it happened, but that I had to craft the narrative and be very specific about how I crafted that narrative. I was lucky to have 33 years in in my life with my dad, right? And and somebody who had shaped my life in meaningful ways. And uh, and what could I learn from that? What did I take forward? How could I share that story with those that I knew and loved, and anybody else who might know about it, anyone else who might read about it in a way that said, in the midst of dispatch, Despair in our lives, there is hope. There are ways through. There is a way to face that wind, right? And that that crafting of the narrative was my responsibility and also my opportunity.

SPEAKER_00 44:47

Wow. Thank you so much for sharing that. Because I know that is a really sensitive aspect, but I'm so grateful you share that. Because people, a lot of people, and I really believe that everyone that hears that will take something from that. And there's something you've talked a lot about or you've mentioned quite a lot is choice. Choice. We have to make a choice.

SPEAKER_01 45:10

Yes. Yes. You know, it's an interesting thing. I uh actually almost went down that rabbit hole because one of the things that is critical to grit and resilience, and leaders need to remember this. Uh, individuals need to remember that we do have more choice than we think. We have all the choices in the world about how we face a challenge. We really do, even if it feels hard. Every day, every moment, every hour, we decide how we face challenge and change and how it is that we're going to address the places that where we don't think we can move forward. We get to choose to move forward. We get to choose to face the wind. For leaders, understanding that the element of agency is a critical part of grit and resilience. And the more agency you can give your people in the construct, of course, of what needs to be done, the more that they feel confident in the face of challenge and change. And so for those companies that have said, instead of saying, all right, everybody back to work on Monday in the pandemic, right? I've said, hey, I want to hear from you. I want to hear from you how you would you would choose to go forward after this unprecedented global event, right? And people that have agency, they're not being forced into something that is exactly again, we're in an unprecedented time. There's no way you can try to pretend there's any kind of precedence in our lifetimes for what all of us are experiencing now. And employers that understand that when they give their people agency, those people will be better able to connect to story and purpose. They will be better able to make the choices of grit and resilience, and they will be better able to contribute their best selves. And that choice in that agency is a key part of grit and resilience. It's not equal opportunity, that's a whole other conversation. Uh, but for most of us, we do have more choice than we think about facing these challenges and the difficulties in our lives.

SPEAKER_00 46:57

No, thank you so much. There's a question I wrote here, but in a way, I think you've answered it. I said, why is it important to understand yourself first as a leader? And in fact, what you've just said answers that question. Bless you. What you just said actually answers that question because when you understand yourself first, you know, as you know, then you're able to then help the people you work with. When you understand that you've got a choice, and what you you know, how you choose to do things will then determine the results you get, will help you when you're working with people to understand that they have a choice, give them a choice, and you get the best out of them. So, no, truly, I really appreciate that. The book is just packed with so much. It's you know, really unbelievable. I have, you know, I was just making notes while I was reading it, I was highlighting, I was making notes. It's just amazing. But the last thing I'm going to touch on, because I know we're running out of time, is resilience, you said, involves developing six core competencies, self-awareness, self-regulation, optimism, mental agility, identifying one's own and other's character strength and connection. Now, the mental agility, because that is one of the things we've been talking a lot about, the core purpose, the story, and mindset, and all that. And you said in the army they call that the battle mind, which I love. So talk to us about the importance of mental agility and kind of give us that as our final tip. Why is mental agility important? And how can one actually develop that mental agility? How can we be make ourselves adaptable to situations, to change? How can we face fear with courage? Because that is what you've described to us when you're turning the aperture to face the wind. That is really, you need courage to do that. How can we do it?

SPEAKER_01 49:03

Oh, Maureen, this is a whole nother hour of conversation, at least you understand. So I think, you know, one of the things and we we talked about the battle mind and we talk about resilience relative to these core competencies. And these are, by the way, drawing from uh the US Army's master resilience training program, which is drawn from the University of Pennsylvania's positive psychology training program. So this is decades and decades of research into these different ways that we can develop grit and resilience. And tried and true, I'm a big believer in many of them. Um gosh, again, I'd love an hour to answer this question because I think it's actually really important that we have creative uh approaches to things and that we have different ways to engage our minds and to pick different paths when one doesn't work. And that is why, by the way, the grip factor ends up on adaptability, right? We're talking about mental ability as part of the mindset piece, but the whole trait of adaptability is key. And I think the last two years have certainly taught us that, right? For those of us who work in front, you know, I give keynotes in front of huge audiences of anywhere from 50 to 5,000 people, and suddenly we couldn't travel, and suddenly we couldn't go to conferences, and suddenly we and so you could just say, wow, my my business is done. Like I can't, but you know, none of us did that, right? We realized there's another way to reach people, to accomplish the end goal, which is not big conference rooms and travel. It is reaching people and transforming their lives and experience at work and at home. And so we figured out how to use Zoom and we figured out how to use many other platforms, and we figured out how to engage when we did that. And that's adaptability. It's finding a creative solution when one of them is cut off. And the way that you develop that, you read, you read about lots of different things, you read widely, like read read fiction, read poetry. I mean, read all the time, I think, because those stories, again, your brain processes information in the form of stories. So we learn from the stories of others. So read about the stories of others who have overcome things, who have overcome challenges, who have been mentally agile, who have been adaptable. And the grip factor, as you know, will feature a number of those people and there's a number of those examples. So read widely, challenge yourself to do something out of your comfort zone outside of work. I actually would really love to take a corporate group through like a watercolor painting class, something where you're like, what are you talking about? How are we doing this? Because you're engaging your brain in different ways where suddenly you say, Hey, this is our goal, this is the path that we're going on. Oh, wow, that's not gonna work anymore. What are we gonna do? And and whether it's personal or professional, we've got to be able to continue to maneuver to find new solutions.

SPEAKER_00 51:43

Exactly. Keep firing those neurons in the brain so that they are very agile. Yeah, I love that. Yeah, so there's so many pieces to this.

SPEAKER_01 51:51

I would say start with reading the grit factor, go on to reading widely in many different genres, go on to challenging yourselves in ways you haven't challenged yourself previously, artistically or physically, or intellectually or or socially. And um, and it really is about building the blocks of grit and resilience in all of those different facets that you just uh mentioned, that are all, of course, in the book, as well as part of the the learn or deep engagement in the present, is about pushing yourself out of your comfort zone again and again, a little bit more, a little bit more, taking those baby steps and continuing to expand your lived experience. And I think that might be a way to kind of put a bow around these many, many different aspects that are so powerful in so many different ways.

SPEAKER_00 52:35

That's a fantastic way to actually wrap this up. It's you know, I love that. Thank you so much. Really focusing, and you know, I think I think I just love the way you said it. One, it's being open-minded, just read, you know, be open-minded to different things and give, be creative, try things you haven't tried before, embrace the discomfort of you know, when you're uncomfortable. There's that quote I love be comfortable, being uncomfortable. That's so powerful. Shannon, I am so grateful. Honestly, we could go on and on because just speak it when I met you, the fact that you know you you you're really focused on grid got me so excited because it's so important. I've experienced failure, and the fact that is because of the experience I had that has gotten me where I am today. Yes, because one of the things is not staying down, you know, finding the way out, looking for different opportunities. I am just so grateful for you coming onto this podcast today. I can't thank you enough. You've really given us so much to think about, so much to take away. Now, where can people find you? I know you've touched a bit on what the great institute does. Can you just you know give us an example of you know how it works, what people would expect, and just where they can find it? I'm gonna put the the links and all that in the description, but just talk us through what you do at the grit institute. Sure.

SPEAKER_01 54:10

Yeah, you can find me online at Shannonholson.com or at thegritinstitute.com or on LinkedIn, uh, a little bit on a couple of the other social platforms as well. But I'm I'm grateful for your question about the Grit Institute because what we're doing at the Grit Institute is developing and have developed learning journeys for individuals and for organizations to be able to go deeper into the learnings of the grit factor. That's in the learning journey called going for grit. And then paths to purpose is really blowing out this concept of purpose, which a recent McKinsey study shows how critical that is for retaining employees, engaging employees, and really seeing their absolute best work. So whether you're an individual or whether you're a larger organization, paths to purpose is a learning journey that absolutely will pay dividends for years and years to come. And these learning journeys are typically four to six weeks. They're developed for the hybrid and remote work environments with asynchronous learning that is video and worksheet supported. There are opportunities for reflection, and you go through the modules in a particular order to then end up with the activate and integrate section where you say, This is what I've learned, this is what I'm going to work on with my manager, and this is the way that I'm going to set goals with these things that I've learned, and then review those goals at the end of each week. So we really work to make that uh these lessons and these stories really help each person integrate those into how it is that they show up for their work in their life. And, you know, honestly, now, Maureen, I've taken thousands of people through Paths to Purpose in particular as a uh as an additional optional opportunity to have me come in and kick it off with a webinar and close it with a webinar. And and it is truly transformational in people's lives. And it's just been amazing to see. So yeah, thegreatinstitute.com, you can find it for yourself or for your team or organization and reach out if you have questions.

SPEAKER_00 55:59

Yeah, no, I can really imagine how you know successful it is because just understanding your core purpose. In fact, now at the beginning of the year, when everyone is talking about goals, how to achieve goals, always say that most people do it wrong. They just start by writing goals. This is what I want to achieve. It's such a wrong way. You need to go back to that first part of really discovering what your core purpose is. And I love the fact that you said you take people on a journey because that is so important. Because it's the it's the journey that will really help the new behavior stick, it's the journey that will help those neurons to fire, it's the journey that will create the new neurons that will bring about the behavior change. So, Shannon, you a star, thank you so much. And anyone that you know, listening, listeners, I would say go check it out. Check out the Great Institute, check Shannon out on social media. I'm gonna leave the links in the description. Get the book, The Great Factor. It is an amazing, amazing book. Shannon talks a lot about stories. In the book, you're gonna find so many stories of women that have had to really push through barriers, obstacles, challenges, working in male-dominated areas. We're not even able to go into that much today. But just uh, you need to get the book. I can't say anymore because we run out of time. But Sharon, thank you so much for coming on to the podcast. Maureen, it's an honor and always a pleasure to be with you.

SPEAKER_01 57:43

Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 57:45

Okay, three things before we finish today. Have you subscribed to this podcast? If you haven't, make sure you click that subscribe button wherever you listen to this podcast. Because once you subscribe, you will not miss an episode. And as usual, if you have a topic you would love me to speak about or bring a guest on, do let me know by leaving a review. Finally, do have a fantastic week and remember that you are limitless. So I look forward to seeing you in our next episode. Bye for now.