Leadership Tuesdays: Using Our Influence To Effect Change...John Maxwell

“Leadership is not about titles, positions or flowcharts. It is about one life influencing another.” 

--John C. Maxwell, Best-selling Author and Leadership Expert

Every other Tuesday, WOMEN AT LIBERTY presents Leadership Tuesdays, a platform for a variety of voices and resources to develop, encourage, and strengthen women leaders. At this very moment, I am moved by John Maxwell's quote listed above and another one of his quotes that states, 'everything rises and falls on leadership'. In a few short days, August 24, the United States will mark the anniversary of one of the most powerful Civil Rights demonstrations in its history.  On August 28, 1963, 50 years ago, an estimated 250,000 people of all races conducted a peaceful demonstration in Washington, D.C. that began at the Washington Monument and ended at the Lincoln Memorial. The March was organized by Civil Rights leaders to bring attention to injustices and discrimination that the African American community was suffering. "The organizers of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom also demanded decent housing, adequate and integrated education, a federal jobs program for full employment, and a national minimum wage of over $13.001 an hour in today’s dollars."(1)

Tomorrow I will publish the first of a two-part blog series that talks about my experience in attending the 20th Anniversary of the March on Washington in 1983 as a young college student.  I will also share some of the subsequent civil rights experiences I have had.  In the second part of the blog, I will provide some key statistics that characterize African American life then and now. Although we have made major and significant advances that we should well be proud of, as the statistics and our current news headlines show, we still have work to do.

Going back to John Maxwell's quote, I will leave you with this: Martin Luther King's dream was one of a world where there would be equality for all and people would be judged by the content of their character and not the color of their skin.  If everything rises and falls on leadership and as Myles Munroe asserts, we are all called to be leaders, do we have a leadership problem?  Are we doing enough to effect change through our influence and actions.  Could "we" be both the problem and solution for what needs fixing in "our" community?

For more information on the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington, go to:
http://50thanniversarymarchonwashington.com

To read past features on leaders like Laurel Richie-WNBA President, Ruth J. Simmons-former President of Brown University, Toni Blackman-2012 Dove Role Model, and others, click here.

Note:
(1) Algernon Austin, The Unfinished March: An Overview, Economic Policy Institute, June 18, 2013 http://www.epi.org/publication/unfinished-march-overview/