Paula Reid is an adventure psychologist and motivational speaker who is only the third British woman to successfully complete the challenging 1000km trek across the Antarctic continent to the Geographic South Pole. A truly admirable and determined person Paula is one of few people to ever successfully ski full distance to The South Pole. Beginning her challenge at the Ronne-Filchner Ice Shelf on the edge of the frozen Antarctic continent at 82⁰20 South Paula Reid successfully reached the Geographic South Pole at 90⁰ South in less than fifty days. Now working as a motivational speaker Paula Reid travels the UK discussing her experience as a sportswoman and using her insights into the human psyche, perseverance and determination to offer advice to those looking to reach life goals and attain business success.
With a love for adventure coupled with her passion for psychology, having completed a master's in Positive Psychology & Coaching, Paula created a new niche, Adventure Psychology. Her aim is to provide people with the tools necessary to maintain peak performance over a sustained period of time by building endurance and resilience. She has over 30 years of experience working with business leaders to help them improve performance and overcome adversity. Some of her clients include Barclays, PaloAlto, the M.O.D., and GSK. Pauls is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and had the honour of presenting the Gold Duke Edinburgh Award at St James Palace. In 2018 Paula Founded Adventure Psychology and is also the owner of Paula Reid.
Paula’s experience as a mountaineer and adventurer required a great deal of personal strength and much determination. Ensuring she found the energy and willpower to climb for 12 hours every day (eventually completing an awe-inspiring 11,000 feet) in temperatures below –40°C; battling against severe wind chill and storms there were many moments when Paula feared she would fail in her life-long dream, however, her moving and engaging motivational speaker presentations, alongside her numerous awards, demonstrate that, thanks to her own personal strength she successfully achieved this death-defying challenge.
An adventurer at heart, Paula's work as a motivational speaker seeks to inspire people from all walks of life; she encourages others to take risks, work hard and aim high; write a list of things to do before you die, suggests Paula, and live your life to the full, pushing yourself to the limits and enjoying every moment on offer! As well as working as a motivational speaker and polar explorer Paula Reid has completed a number of other successful expeditions including a ground-breaking canoe expedition where she paddled 600 miles down the Mekong River and kayaked The Thames from source to sea. She also sailed as part of a core crew around the world in the ten-month Global Challenge Yacht Race. Paula has been to 64 countries and achieved 118 of her ‘things to do before she dies’ including: fire walking; glacier trekking; Hadrian’s Wall; The London Marathon; walking from coast-to-coast; trekking in West Papua; bog-snorkelling and even great white shark diving. She is also the world’s first Adventure Psychologist – helping people and businesses to thrive as they go knowingly into the unknown. If you are looking to improve your mental resilience to face any challenges of the future, do not miss your chance to hire Paula Reid today.
Books
Boat to Boardroom
Adventure Psychology: Going Knowingly into the Unknown (Routledge Research in Health, Nature and the Environment)
Live Life to the Full
How to hire Paula Reid
Contact the Champions Speakers Agency to provisionally enquire about hiring Paula Reid for your next event, today. To get in touch, simply call an official booking agent on 0207 1010 553 or email us at [email protected] for more information.
** We do not accept requests for autographs, signed merchandise, fan mail, birthday messages or any other non-commercial contact with the speakers or acts. Each speaker on the website may not have necessarily worked with Champions in the past but are known to perform such engagements within the industry.
Paula's official speaking topics are listed below:
- Adventure Psychology: Going Knowlingly into the Unknown
- How to survive, cope and thrive in challenging times
- Build resilience
- Cope with uncertainty
- Deal with adversity
- Success, failure and quitting
- Managing risk and fear
- Ski Full Distance to the South Pole
- Inspiration, resilience, achieving goals, courage
- Sailing Round the World - Boat to Boardroom
- Teamwork, leadership, crisis, motivation
Official Feedback from In-Person & Virtual Events
"Paula is onto something big here with her Adventure Psychology. The will to succeed and endure is key to performance." - Sir Ranulph Fiennes
"Over the space of eight hours you challenged The What If Forum as never before and took us to places we’d never dreamt of visiting. And all in such an easy going, totally engaging and completely non-threatening way. It was pure magic and blew eberyone away, thank you.” - WhatIf? Forum
"Paula is great! She's interesting, full of humor yet serious and know how to connect & relate her personal story to business insights. Everyone was fascinated by her and told us it was both inspiring & interesting. So… I have only warm recommendation for her." - VP Marketing, Tiny Love
"Many thanks - you were absolutely brilliant and inspiring yesterday. What a story you had to tell, and you told it beautifully. I could almost hear the guys in the audience revving up as you talked! PS You were right: your 'big wave pix' were way better than mine!" - CEO, RNLI
"Just wanted to say how much I enjoyed the presentation last night by Paula. The talk was exciting, interesting, and very well presented through an excellent speaker and backed up by wonderful video clips and photographs (and appropriate music!). Please continue with these excellent choice of speakers. I learnt a lot about how these epic events carried out by these individuals and the experiences and knowledge they gain can be passed on to others to improve their leadership skills in the NHS." -Leadership Forum, Plymouth Hospitals
"I have seen quite a few sportsmen/adventurers as business speakers now, but Paula was amongst the best at making her experiences relevant to the business needs of the members present. The group loved it and gave the session an overall score of 9.5 (four 10’s!) – a great result." - Chair, Academy of Chief Executives
"… the presentation was amazing, you did a really good job with good links – great lessons from your experiences – “a big thumbs up.” - Specsavers