Sylvia Pfeifer
Leader Writer and Editorial Director of the Women in Business Forum 2020, Financial Times

Sylvia Pfeifer is a leader writer at the Financial Times. She has covered industry and energy for the paper and was energy editor from 2010 to 2012. She joined the paper in 2008 as defence industry correspondent.

Prior to working at the FT Sylvia was deputy business editor of The Sunday Telegraph and City editor of The Business newspaper, formerly Sunday Business, where she was part of the launch team in 1998.

Shannon Huffman Polson,
Author of The Grit Factor: Courage, Resilience and Leadership in the Most Male Dominated Organisation in the World and Founder of The Grit Institute

Polson served as one of the first women to fly the Apache helicopter in the U.S. Army, leading line units on three continents. She earned her MBA at the Tuck School at Dartmouth, and worked in market development and leading teams in the medical device and technology industries, including Microsoft. Polson also holds her MFA. Her first book is North of Hope: A Daughter’s Arctic Journey. Polson is an active community member committed to equal opportunity to education and information. She and her husband have two young boys.