The Fundamentals of Grit: Building Personal Effectiveness, Positive Impact and Influence
Friday, March 26, 2021
4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
What is “grit? Is it “toughness”? Or hanging in there when others have quit? Yes, but there’s more. Angela Duckworth, researcher, author, and psychology professor at the University of Pennsylvania, defines grit as “passion and perseverance for especially long-term goals”. It’s more important than you might think.
Experience shows that the best predictor of personal and professional success is not IQ or the selection of college major or family income or any of the other traditional “advantages” that individuals may have. The most critical element is grit. Talent and natural gifts are always helpful, but grit counts more. And as we deal with greater and greater grand challenges (energy supply, clean water, pandemic, freeze, business disruption… the list only grows) the importance of grit has never been greater.
Our discussion will focus on the key strategies that all of us can apply to build grit, both in our professional and personal lives, with the aim of building personal effectiveness, positive impact, and influence.
About
the
speaker:
Greg
Yeo
holds
BS
and
MS
degrees
in
Chemical
Engineering
from
Worcester
Polytechnic
Institute
in
Worcester,
MA.
He
recently
retired
from
ExxonMobil
Chemical
as
Chief
Engineer
after
a
41-year
career
in
the
petrochemicals
industry.
Greg’s
career
began
in
process
technology
and
progressed
through
roles
in
process
design,
manufacturing,
and,
during
the
most
recent
25
years,
major
venture
development.
He
is
a
Fellow
of
the
AIChE
and
has
served
in
leadership
roles
in
the
AIChE
national
programming
committee
as
well
as
the
ethylene
industry
group.
Greg
has
been
a
frequent
speaker
at
the
Annual
Student
Conference,
working
with
students
and
young
professionals
to
help
build
effective
career
skills.