Unwavering: Taylor Kiland on Vietnam POWs, Leadership Lessons, and the Stories We Can't Afford to Forget
Some of the most powerful stories of American service were never told on the battlefield. They were told in prison cells in Hanoi, around kitchen tables in military towns, and in the quiet persistence of families who refused to give up.
This week on Next Steps Forward, Dr. Chris Meek sits down with Taylor Baldwin Kiland, a former U.S. Navy officer, third-generation Navy family member, and military nonfiction author who has written, co-authored, ghostwritten, or edited eighteen books. Raised in Coronado, California, a community shaped by the Vietnam POW experience, Taylor has spent much of her career bringing forgotten chapters of that era to light.
Chris and Taylor discuss the remarkable women behind Unwavering: The Wives Who Fought to Ensure No Man Is Left Behind, and why their campaign to bring their husbands home still matters to military families today. Taylor shares the six traits of high-performing teams she drew from the POWs' experience in Lessons from the Hanoi Hilton, and how resilience forged in captivity translates to leadership in business and everyday life. She also opens up about her own next step forward: leaving a twenty-year career in marketing communications to become a writer, and her work helping veterans turn their service into books that educate and inspire the next generation of leaders.
Finally, Taylor offers a look at her latest project, Murder of the Jujube Candy Heiress: A Coronado Cold Case, the true story of a 1975 unsolved killing that shook her hometown.
Whether you're a veteran thinking about telling your own story, a leader looking for lessons in resilience, or someone who believes that no one should be left behind, this conversation is for you.
About Taylor Kiland: Taylor has written, co-authored, ghost-written, or edited eighteen books, including three about our nation’s Vietnam POWs: Unwavering: The Wives Who Fought to Ensure No Man is Left Behind, Lessons from the Hanoi Hilton: Six Characteristics of High-Performance Teams and Open Doors: Vietnam POWs Thirty Years Later. A former naval officer, the third generation in her family to serve in the Navy, Taylor was raised in Coronado, California, and Alexandria, Virginia. She spent twenty years in the private sector as a marketing communications professional before starting her writing career. She holds a master’s degree in marketing communications from Northwestern University and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Southern California. She now lives in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia, with her husband and their daughter. Taylor’s work has been featured in NewYorkTimes.com, WashingtonPost.com, NBC Nightly News, CNN, C-SPAN, International Herald Tribune, Associated Press, Military.com, and Naval Institute’s Proceedings, just to name a few.