UnLeadership

69Leadership Goes Big and Goes Home

ONE OF THE HIGHLIGHTS OF our research on leadership was sitting down with adventurer, explorer, best-selling author, and faculty member at the Thayer Leadership Group at West Point Alison Levine. Growing up, maybe as a way to escape the oppressive summer heat in Phoenix, Arizona, Alison was drawn to stories of the early Arctic and Antarctic explorers and mountaineers. Although she was mesmerized by stories of adventure in really cold places, read books, and watched documentaries about people such as legendary explorer Reinhold Messner, who skied across Antarctica, she was born with a hole in her heart and Raynaud's disease, leaving her at extreme risk for frostbite. Alison never dreamed she'd go to those places herself; it was only after her second heart surgery, at 30, that a light bulb went on. She wanted to know what it was like to be out there. If those guys could do it, why couldn't she?

She went on to serve as team captain of the first American Women's Everest Expedition, climbed the highest peak on each continent, and skied to both the North and South Poles, a feat known as the Adventure Grand Slam, which only 20 people in the world have achieved. In January 2008, she made history as the first American to complete a 600-mile traverse from west Antarctica to the South Pole following the route of Reinhold Messner, and again in 2016 when she completed two first ascents: Hall Peak in Antarctica and Khang Karpo in Nepal. In addition to ...