Jaylen Smith, Mayor of Earle, Arkansas
Empowering Leadership
English - May 08, 2023 07:44 - 23 minutes - 54.2 MBManagement Business Education leadership business dorrierunderwood garydavis management Homepage Download Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
One of the most common mistakes in leadership is the idea that it takes decades of experience to become a leader, but as 18 year-old Jaylen Smith reminds us, leadership knows no age limit. Last fall, Smith was elected Mayor of Earle, Arkansas, a town of less than two thousand people about thirty minutes west of Memphis.
Mayor Jaylen Smith joins host Doug McVadon for a discussion about what inspired Jaylen to rise to the occasion and take a leadership role when those twice his age either couldn’t or wouldn’t. Jaylen discusses how losing a cousin to gun violence made his pledge towards funding a 24-hour police department a top priority for his tenure. Mayor Smith also talks about his vision for the next forty years of his city, as well as his own goals for political office.