What Nancy Pelosi Teaches Us About Women’s Leadership
As the Democratic drumbeat for impeachment grows, Speaker Nancy Pelosi has faced some serious backlash from party activists for her continued refusal to begin a formal impeachment inquiry. The voices against her position will continue to grow louder, but Speaker Pelosi and controversy are well-acquainted.
Though she represents a safe blue district in California, GOP campaigns and PACs have plastered her face on attack ads in every race across the country since 2006. Just this summer, she has weathered attacks from the president, who went on a tirade against her while visiting Normandy and posted now infamous altered videos of her speaking. Lest you think these attacks only come from the right or the squad, recall how many Democrats in 2018 campaigned on voting against Pelosi for Speaker.
However, not only has Speaker Pelosi survived these controversies, she has thrived. She was the first woman to become Speaker of the House. She presided over the passage of much critical legislation including the Affordable Care and Patient Protection Act, which many strategists and commentators believed to be an impossible task after the failure in the 1990s. She marshaled a landslide victory for her party against a GOP-dominated government without a major war or economic slump to discredit it. Speaker Pelosi’s success speaks to the power of her leadership style, and women who wish to lead could learn a lot from her.
Though she is Speaker of the House, Pelosi doesn’t fit the mold Americans have set in their minds for leaders. Instead of relying on blustering speeches, charisma, or televised rallies to sway national opinion, her power comes from closed-door meetings with her members. In fact, this type of coalition-building leadership is much more useful than our stereotype of leading through big, aggressive gestures.
To understand why, we need to agree on a definition of leadership. In my book, Follow the Leader, I argue that leadership is best understood as using your talents to build relationships and then using those relationships to exert influence. From making oatmeal raisin cookies for your school board councilwoman to organizing a march for gun control, you will find this definition covers all kinds of leadership, most of which women have been practicing for millennia, uncredited.
Most leadership is practiced on a personal, local scale, and all leadership begins at that level. This is because relationships are the basis for all types of leadership, and closer relationships create the strongest influence that can be leveraged for the greatest results. Two examples from Nancy Pelosi’s career stand out as successes in this regard. In 2005, the GOP made a huge push to privatize social security. Many Democrats in Congress, humiliated by John Kerry’s defeat the year before, were tempted to work with them. After all, Republicans had the majority in the House, and President Bush was determined to make this happen.
However, then Minority Leader Pelosi had a different idea. She knew that Republicans had no real plan for making privatization work, and they would not be able to create one without Democratic help. So, she worked around the clock to keep Democrats united against the proposal. The months dragged on and — just as she predicted — infighting consumed the GOP. Republicans demanded to know when the Democrats would start trying to make their plan work. “Never,” Pelosi responded. “Is never good enough for you?” And with that, the proposal died and the Democrats were on the road to winning the House in 2006. When they did, they made the woman responsible for their victory Speaker of the House.
Her next political miracle came a few years into her tenure as Speaker of the House. In 2009, after Scott Brown’s surprise victory, even President Obama got cold feet about the ACA. To many Democrats, healthcare reform rightly seemed like a suicidal vote. Once again, Pelosi got to work. She whipped together votes where she needed them, and let some members speak and vote against it if necessary. Arguably, it cost her the majority, but her leadership kept the coalition together and accomplished the impossible.
To win these victories, Pelosi needed her members’ trust. She needed to convince them that some dangerous stances were actually the safe bets and others would cost them personally but would benefit the whole nation. The long run has vindicated her. Where increasing entitlement spending and healthcare reform were once political third-rails, Democrats can now win support advocating programs like Medicare-for-All.
As a leader, whether you’re organizing a protest or pushing for a risky project at work, Nancy Pelosi provides great lessons in coalition-building. By building relationships with your team, you can influence them to stick together and achieve your goals. You will find that your voice carries farther when you speak softly with an army at your back than when you shout alone.
