Kelly E. Skwarcan
Kelly Skwarcan is the Founder & CEO of Kelly Communications, LLC; a graduate of the University of Notre Dame with a degree in psychology; a speaker, researcher, and the author of Iron & Ice: The Full Tale of the Titanic. Her work centers on delivering psychology-driven leadership training to high-performance organizations, with a special focus on the United States military.
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Her signature program, "Leadership in Crisis: The Titanic, Carpathia, & Californian," began as an internal training initiative she developed for the University of Notre Dame’s Naval ROTC battalion. It has since rapidly expanded into a nationally touring interactive case study presentation now used across four branches of the U.S. military, with continued growth across educational institutions, conferences, and professional leadership platforms.
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Kelly began writing Iron & Ice: The Full Tale of the Titanic at age 10 and embarked on her national speaking tour at 22. Today, through Kelly Communications, she equips leaders—military and civilian alike—with research-based tools to empower them to uphold the highest standards of leadership and integrity, make moral decisions under pressure, build and repair trust, and enhance team performance in complex and uncertain environments.
Iron & Ice: The Full Tale of the Titanic
​​The Titanic arose from the Belfast gantries as the crown jewel of her time, the conqueror of the ocean itself. During her maiden voyage, seasoned first-class personas sparkled, humble third-class immigrants anticipated a fresh start, and stokers sweltered in the bowels of the engine room’s grit and grime. Amidst all this buzz, a competent shipbuilder stood, worrying over the compromises his shrewd superior insisted upon.
Iron & Ice: The Full Tale of the Titanic is sure to captivate both those with no prior knowledge of the ship and long-time enthusiasts. Narrative in nature, character-driven, and tastefully detailed, Iron & Ice is set apart by its exploration of previously-glossed-over topics and its fresh perspective on familiar ones. This book explores the Titanic’s “best-of” narratives, divulges little-known facts, and simplifies pedantic technicalities to render the iconic tale engaging and meaningful to the modern reader.
With Iron & Ice, readers embark on a spellbinding journey that begins before the Titanic’s first sketches and ends over a century later in summer 2023. As one of the first books to connect the eerie parallels between OceanGate’s Titan submersible’s implosion and the Titanic disaster, Iron & Ice forges new ground, enthralling readers all the while.
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Iron & Ice is available on Amazon and in select maritime retailers across the U.S.
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