Ep. 82-Virginia Harris: Leader of 100 Black Women

In this interview, Virginia W. Harris, National President, National Coalition of 100 Black Women, Inc., with 60 chapters and thousands of members nationwide, shares reflections of her start as a servant-leader that, more likely than not, was planted as a seed when she found herself as one of only three Black girls integrating an otherwise all White high school in south Georgia during the early 1960s. Her high school years were followed by college years and then the early career-making years where she continually found the need to defend both her gender and her race. She juggled the demands of being a wife and mother of two young children and the self-imposed strategy to succeed by being the First at work and the Last to leave; remaining mindful of the needs of the young women who reported to her for both leadership and mentoring with consideration of the demands on becoming a wife, a mother and a professional; a journey that mirrored her own! As a resident child and adult of the "deep south" living in Florida, Georgia and Louisiana, her school teacher mom and her military dad stressed to their three daughters that being Smart was more important than being feminine. With only three girls, her parents repeatedly stressed: SMART, STRONG, INDEPENDENT. And, so, she shares her journey and the successful outcomes borne of Becoming and Remaining, SMART, STRONG & INDEPENDENT!