- London, England
Bonita Norris Keynote Speaker
- Youngest person to reach the summit of Mount Everest and the North Pole.
- Attempted to become the first British woman to climb K2.
- Best-selling author of 'The Girl Who Climbed Everest', inspiring readers with her story of perseverance and courage.
Bonita Norris's Biography
Bonita Norris is the youngest person ever to reach both the summit of Mount Everest and the North Pole.
She did this having never climbed a mountain before the age of 20 and then reached the summit of Everest only two years later at the age of 22.
This rollercoaster journey that taught her the power of taking radical responsibility- for our own mindset, for how we show up in our team, and for finding the resilience to keep moving forward in life’s toughest moments.
Bonita went on to climb multiple 8,000m peaks including – Everest (8,849m), Lhotse (8,516m), Manaslu (8,163m), has skied to the North Pole, and attempted to become the first British woman to successfully climb K2 (8,611m).
The barriers she broke through in the adventure world earned her a nomination for Cosmopolitan’s Woman of the Year Award.
In 2022 Bonita’s book The Girl Who Climbed Everest became a bestseller.
She now shares The Mountaineer’s Mindset- a set of high performance tools learned on the ice face of the world’s highest peaks for more ambitious, resilient and connected teams.
The Mountaineer’s Mindset explores three pillars of high performance, Growth Mindset- “focus not fret”, being a “learn it all”, accountability, resilience, Marginal Gains- “success by smallness”, keeping tough moments in perspective, Teamwork- “Be great, make others great”.
Bonita’s rich and diverse experiences in the mountains have honed her understanding of performance in the face of uncertainty- and she shares these unique insights with audiences all over the world as a multi award-winning keynote speaker.
Bonita Norris's Speaking Topics
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Mountains Of The Mind
Inspiring Teams to Reach New Heights
To perform under pressure, we need to find daily resilience, motivation and confidence. In Mountains of the Mind, Bonita shares how we can achieve extraordinary feats when we take responsibility for our inner world and learn how not to let excuses, limiting beliefs and fears define how we show up for our goals, our teams and ourselves.
This immersive keynote is packed with actionable takeaways that audiences can implement immediately, leaving them motivated and inspired to conquer their own Everest.
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In The Death Zone
How To Utilise Fear To Achieve Success
We all hate making mistakes, and nobody wants to fail. Yet, if we want to achieve extraordinary goals then both mistakes and failure are inevitable parts of the journey to success.
In this immersive keynote, Bonita shares her own personal story of how a simple mistake in the mountains led to a failure that she initially struggled to mentally recover from, until she understood that failure could be, and then later became, the catalyst for even greater success.
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Data Over Dogma
How Data Made The First Ascent Of Everest Possible
Bonita explores how the first ascent of Everest was made possible through data and scientific rigour after 30 years of failed attempts on the world's highest peak. The story we all know and love about the first ascent of Everest in 1953 is that of man over mountain: Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay's superhuman effort to make it to the summit. But is that the whole story behind the first ascent?
This inspiring keynote tells of the unsung hero of Everest, Dr Griffith Pugh, who unlocked the mystery of how to get the two climbers to the top and back down again - alive, using data. Today, we are grasping to understand how the data and Al revolution will transform our lives. Within this uncertainty there is a reluctance to change, and a fear of leaving old ways behind. We wouldn't be alone in feeling this way: 70 years ago the pioneers of Everest were grappling with much the same- their belief system, so closely held onto, was actually holding them back from realising their potential.
This keynote reframes the story of the first ascent of Everest as a triumph not of man over mountain but of data over dogmatic thinking.
Why Book Bonita Norris as a speaker?
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She draws on record-breaking expeditions to Everest and the North Pole to show leaders how radical responsibility and mindset shape performance under extreme pressure.
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She translates lived experience on the world’s highest and most dangerous peaks into practical frameworks for resilience, decision making and teamwork in uncertainty.
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She brings credibility forged through multiple 8,000-metre ascents, a bestselling book and global recognition to inspire organisations facing high-stakes change.
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She equips audiences to stay focused, adaptable and accountable when conditions shift fast, helping teams perform at their best in their toughest moments.
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