The Path to Success: Susan Ann Davis on Risk, Resilience, and Mentorship

This week Ivy Slater, host of Her Success Story, chats with her guest, Susan Ann Davis. The two talk about resilience in the face of challenges, the importance of mentorship and community among women in business, and the strategic choices involved in scaling a company globally.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How Susan’s career path veered from law school ambitions to falling in love with Washington D.C.'s vibrant environment, leading her to strategic communications instead.

• Why mentorship is vital, rooted in Susan's experiences and efforts to create supportive networks like the International Women's Forum.

• Being unafraid to take risks and the power of listening more than talking to drive success.

• Handling difficult situations and failures.

• Overcoming challenges as a female business owner

 

 

Susan Ann Davis-President of SDI is a pioneering woman business owner who opened her agency when relatively few women were experiencing success in the business world, and fewer still owned their own business. Over decades, she has grown SDI into a global public affairs and strategic communications powerhouse, receiving accolades and recognition from industry peers and earning the respect of business and government leaders around the world. Internationally known for her expertise in strategic positioning, reputation management, government relations, and crisis communications, Davis has provided counsel to government and industry leaders on six continents and was a strategic U.S. advisor to the Irish Bishops Conference for the Vatican World Meeting of Families and the papal visit to Ireland. She is a co-founder of IPREX, a global agency network covering 100 markets worldwide.

Davis has worked with more than a dozen countries on issues ranging from economic crisis to nation building and trade expansion. And for decades she has been a strategic communications and public affairs consultant on U.S. military and veterans’ issues for the defense industry and to multiple Secretaries of Defense, DOD agencies, service branches and support organizations. Over her professional career, Davis has played a key strategic communications and government relations role in high-profile crises ranging from reputation management, product liability litigation to airline crashes, environmental threats, and foreign government economic crises, affording her deep insight into senior management policy, planning, execution, and decision making. And as a leader and business visionary, she is expert at developing engagement, media, and business opportunities for executives throughout the globe.

She led the Global Irish Forum recommendation for Ireland to develop as a global hub for smart aging technologies, products, design and services, was a founder of Smart Ageing Living Labs of Ireland, and a former producer of a White House Conference on Aging and Silicon Valley Venture Boomer Summits.

A lifelong advocate for social entrepreneurship, democracy building and leadership development for women, she is board chair emeritus of Vital Voices Global Partnership, the preeminent NGO that trains and empowers emerging women leaders in 115 countries. She was a founder and the first international president of the International Women’s Forum, the global leadership organization now representing more than 7000 women of achievement. She serves on numerous philanthropy boards including the American Ireland Fund and the Razia’s Ray of Hope Foundation, for which she is board chair. The Foundation continues to educate over 700 girls in rural Afghanistan.

Davis chaired the landmark U.S. Ireland Business Summit, creating the groundbreaking US-Ireland R&D Partnership, and has been formally recognized for her leadership by the governments of Ireland and Northern Ireland. She’s been named among the Top 100 Irish Americans, 75 Most Influential Irish American Women, and Top 100 Outstanding International Irish Business Leaders, and received the Flax Trust Award for Service to Northern Ireland. Along with then Prince Charles and former PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi, Davis received the Global Empowerment Humanitarian Award in the United Kingdom, and she was awarded the Noble Humanitarian Prize in Glasgow, Scotland and the prestigious Order of Merit by the Knights Templar.

Among her many professional