Jessica Herrera-Flanigan Speaking Topics

• Sports: Revisiting an Approach to Youth Sports

  Discussed need for SafeSport and an organization that makes sports accessible and safe for everyone

  Describing the value of youth sports and the need to move away from “win at all costs.”

  Celebrating failures and acknowledging imperfection. What the future holds for sports.

• Cybersecurity

  Explaining the challenges created by technology and the need for cybersecurity.

  Describing the geopolitical divides between the US, Europe alliance with Russia, and China alliance with regards to privacy, cybersecurity, and misinformation. Setting the stage for what comes next.

Self-Awareness

Self-Awareness, like kindness, is something we teach our children when they are young and not in school. I mean, after all, it is the foundation of kindness. It is how we help kids recognize their emotions and thoughts and help them grow into competent, confident adults.

• Self-Awareness means looking at your whole you. It means owning up to your weaknesses while celebrating your strengths.

• Self-Awareness means looking at your whole you. It means owning up to your weaknesses while celebrating your strengths.

Knowing your weaknesses and where you may struggle also doesn’t mean you have to stop trying or give up when things get hard. Rather it means that you have the tools to find a better path to embrace your strengths & find your confidence groove, especially in a chaotic world.

If you look at most leaders you will see this confidence. Confidence alone, though is insufficient if you lack commitment. The best leaders are driven & avoid distractions. Quite simply, self aware leaders constantly search for more & strive for improvement.

What it’s not: It is not about being angelic perfect & making just and right choices all the time. Rather it is about having the wisdom to act with intention & recognize consequences.

We’ve come out of a global pandemic to face economic & climate crises, war, and tremendous politicization. If we ever needed self-aware leaders it is now.

Kindness

Whether your path involves medical, business, non-profit, education, science, or humanities, care for the mind, body, & spirit of all persons, including yourself. You have been given skills & value & how you use those to make your mark will be the hardest test you’ll ever take.

The test you will face is not a pass or fail or based on a grade but one you yourself will have to assess. As you do so, I ask you to ask yourself: what can I do to make kindness the norm as I make my mark? What act will I take to pay it forward or look out for others? There is no kindness cookie cutter.

The test that awaits you also is based on a simple premise that underlies both kindness & self-awareness, you do not have to tear someone down to build yourself up. This is true not only in actions but in words as words are powerful and can either raise people up or change lives.

Remember, you aren’t the future you are the present. So, yes embrace failures, persevere, and set goals. Let positive thinking and life lessons lead you.

But, most of all be kind, be self-aware, and in the words of St Frances De Sales, “be who you are and be that well.”

Finding Your Superpower: The Challenges and Opportunities Facing Female Executives in the Television Industry

In the corner of my office I keep a tattered picture of five women/five generations and how those women served as both professional and personal role models, each with their own superpower.

The first woman, Maria Inez, grew up along the Texas border, unclear if the border moved over her or if she moved over the border. She married her true love, made the perfect tortilla, and was still cutting her own lawn until she was 81.

• Her superpower: Independence

Her daughter Josephine, the second woman in the picture, ran away at 16 to marry her sweetheart and picked cotton. She was proud of her Mexican-American heritage by attending LULAC conferences and Our Lady of Guadalupe Church with her comrades.

• Her superpower: Pride

Josephine’s daughter, Dora, is the next woman in the picture. She married, had eight kids, kept the front door open and the coffee pot full. She loved technology, project tv, a satellite taking a whole lot next door, a VCR all cutting edge for the time. She worked a union refinery job a petite woman among roughnecks and I have her hard hat in my office.

• Her superpower: Determination

The fourth woman, Virginia, was Dora’s daughter and loved colorful clothes and clunky jewelry. She led a mild-mannered life as a housewife but found passion in African Violets and books and was inseparable from her husband Leo until she died at 55.

• Her Superpower: Love

The last person in the picture is only a baby is me. My journey took me away from Texas looking for my destiny. I have searched for perfect round tortilla, geeked out on tech, media, taken pride in my roots and found love with my family. Still trying to figure out my superpowers but know that they trace back to those four women: My great-great grandmother, my great grandmother, my grandmother and my mom.

I see their superpowers everyday in my daughter and have not been prouder to tell her she comes from woman warriors. Wonder women like those prove that the Justice League is not just for boys but girls belong too.