Thanksgiving to Three Courageous Leaders

On Thanksgiving Eve, I’m grateful to three courageous leaders. First, Dana Kennedy, Executive Director of Emerge Arizona. Dana not only works every day to recruit, train, and support pro-choice Democratic women to run for office, she put her convictions into action by running for Phoenix City Council. Though she didn’t prevail this time, I hope she will run again until she joins the ranks of leadership consultant and occasional guest poster here, Anne Doyle and political blogger par excellence Jill Miller Zimon, both of whom mounted their first political races and won city counil seats in Auburn Hills MI and Pepper Pike OH respectively.

As then-AZ Governor Janet Napolitano, now Secretary of Homeland Security, once told me, “You can’t win if you don’t run.” That’s a great leadership lesson, whether we’re talking politics or profession, civic engagement or choosing life goals.

Nervous about taking the plunge? Help is a Google away. In the political realm, check out this report featuring Emerge Arizona.

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