In the last presidential
election, MTV and Sean "Diddy" Combs weren't the only ones galvanizing the
masses to get out and vote. The White House Project, a nonpartisan organization,
launched its initiative called Vote, Run, Lead in an effort to not only educate
women on the importance of voting, but also train them to run for and hold
political office up to and including the presidency.
Marie Wilson, president of
WHP, stresses the importance of getting more women politically involved.
"Frankly, women are social entrepreneurs. They're always coming up with new ways
to do things--that's the way women have gotten the power they have, from
thinking outside the box. Our country is in the most difficult place it's ever
been, and [women are] only 14 percent of the political officeholders," she says.
"We really need a critical mass of women--anything from 33 percent on--in order
to get new policies, [establish] new ways of operating and get men to operate
differently in our political offices."
Wilson enthusiastically tells
of the scores of women around the country who have embraced politics thanks to
WHP. By introducing them to female political leaders from their communities,
many women become "all fired up [about] running for office," she says. WHP will
train several hundred of them at a time at sessions around the country to run
for political office, and invited women last President's Day to encourage
another woman to run for office.
Though you may feel your time
is already stretched thin between running your business and having some life
outside of it, women entrepreneurs are integral to this movement and its
success. Wilson, who joined the Ms Foundation in 1984 to work on microenterprise
for low- and middle-income women, can attest to the fact that women business
owners and microentrepreneurs' involvement with government has led to the many
services available to small businesses today. "All the policies that set the
rules for how you can operate a small business are set by either your city
council, county commission, state legislature or the federal government," says
Wilson. "So you don't really have a choice about whether you're going to be
involved or not. You can get involved in the government, get to know it, run for
office, serve on a commission and make sure the policies reflect what you need
for your business, or be subject to those policies without a voice. It actually
takes less time to get involved than it takes to fight a policy."
The first step to getting
involved is deciding what issue or area you are passionate about making a
difference in. Wilson suggests finding out who is already involved in that
field--who serves on a commission for it--and make an appointment to talk with
those people. "You start to do what any great entrepreneur has to do--you just
network yourself to death," Wilson says. "Before you know it, you're involved."
Highly optimistic, Wilson has traveled around the world promoting her book
Closing the Leadership Gap: Why
Women Can and Must Help Run the World.
A surprising number of women entrepreneurs have told her they plan, at some
point, to run for office. Says Wilson, "The same drive that gets women to start
businesses every 60 seconds also makes them want to contribute to their
communities in some way." Look out, Hillary--competition's gaining.