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| Gail Hannemann – CEO of the Girls Scout Council of Hawaii, First Lady of Honolulu |
 PRINTABLE VERSION |
EL: What kept you there for 15 years?
GH: It's an interesting place. It's a place where lots of decisions are made. And I said, when I decided to stay it was really so that I could actually learn what makes the world tick. Basically, you can see that happening in Washington, DC. You know, you start thinking your day's going to be this, you watch the news and you know your life just changed because it impacts what you're doing and the things that happen in the world.
KL: During your time at Washington, DC, are you able to share with us, maybe, who was the most influential or impactful person or leader that you met, and were able to talk to them and learn some important lessons that have carried with you until today?
GH: That's a hard question. I actually worked for seven elected officials. So actually to me that was the biggest benefit, was that when you work with seven different people, they have seven different styles, not only styles of leadership, but also just what they're interested in, and what their constituency looks like, etc. And so that in itself taught me a lot about how to be flexible, how to focus on what you're supposed to get done, but finding the right style to work with each one of the various bosses because they all had very different ways of doing things. So I can't say there was one person, oh, I guess, I could say actually I worked for the chairman of one committee, and I remember he started off the legislative session saying this one bill that he was working on was the most important bill of his career. And he had a long career in Congress. So of course, that puts the ante up, and everyone's very focused on it and it was a very complicated and very contentious bill that we were pushing through. We dealt with resources, and this particular one had to do with water and energy--there were two different bills, actually. And so we got through it, we made all this big progress, and it came down to actually signing the papers, and somebody messed up on the paperwork. And so it was like the close of business at the 11th hour. So the parliamentarian had called me and told me that there was this major mess-up on the paperwork, and that we had to work it out. He gave us about a half an hour, otherwise the bill would have died--it was about two years to try to get this done. So one of us had to go tell our boss. And of course, you would expect, actually, to be fired under those conditions. And the first and only thing he said was, "What do I need to do to fix it?" He said, "I know nobody did this on purpose. What do I need to do?" And he went and did it. We had to basically run around all over the place. And I thought, afterwards, that he had every right to come back and scream and yell and everything. He never did. He said what he said, and he said, "I know no one did this. I know everyone did their best." And that was it. And it taught me a lot about how you treat people, and how you can make a situation and you can turn it into a terrible thing, but that in itself almost galvanizes the whole staff because they realized what he could have done. And he didn't do it, and it really pushed us to move forward and to do other things. So I think I learned from him about how you treat people with respect and that to always look at the intent of what people are doing as opposed to a particular situation.
KL: Gail, then what took you away from Washington, DC?
GH: Actually, my husband. [laughs]
KL: So you folks met in Washington, DC.
GH: We met in Washington, DC, many, many, many years ago.
EL: How'd you guys meet?
GH: Well, I can tell you that we agree on how we met. Then after that the story changes drastically. He was actually working for the Department of Interior, and I was working for a Congressman who represented an area that was multi-ethnic and it had a lot of Asian-Pacific Islanders. And so, clearly I understood the Asian side to it. It was the Pacific side of it, in terms of some of the cultures I really didn't quite get a full appreciation for. So actually, we had met actually at a Congressman's reception, and we started talking. And I was asking him a lot of questions about Polynesian culture which, clearly, that's what his orientation is. And then, after that, we developed mainly a working relationship.
EL: So you guys worked for a while together and then.
GH: We didn't work together it was, no, I don't know.
KL: That's where the story changes.
GH: Yeah, that's where the story changes. I was working. I don't know what his story is, but I was working.
[laughter]
EL: Then when you first moved to Hawaii, was it culture shock at all, or was it pretty comfortable? How was it for you?
GH: I grew up in LA area in the Gardena/Torrance area, most everyone now knows where that is. Back then, actually, Gardena this was in the '60s and '70s had more Japanese-Americans per capita than any other place in the United States. So it had, and I think Hawaii has a very similar Asian culture in that, there's obviously other mixes that go in there. But a lot of the customs and things work the same. In fact, when I moved to DC it was very strange that was a culture shock to me--because it was a very different way of doing business; people are much more up front. I won't say it's in-your-face, because it's a lot of subtleties that go beyond, but it's a very different way of dealing with people, and I actually struggled in the beginning to kind of figure out how to find my place and to fit in. But I remember that, one of the long-time friendships that I've developed, with this friend of mine, it all started with, if you look at her, she looks very "haole" She's an Italian/Irish extract. And she and I are like night and day, personality-wise, interest-wise, etc., but we became really good friends and it came over a simple custom where, we like food. So Italians love food, I love food, and we were exchanging food back and forth, and of course these little containers, and she actually knows it, she said to me, "The way you were brought up, can you never return something empty?" And I thought, "Well, I don't know, I never thought about it." You know? You just do it. And I said, "I guess so, that's how I was brought up." And she said, "That's how I was brought up! And nobody else here understands that, you know?!" So that, you know, that actually, that cultural orientation actually brought us close. So coming to Hawaii, it was very similar to how I grew up. You know, I actually missed that part, I think I would say, living in DC. So it felt like home from day one.
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Jay-R Patron
Jay-R Patron, 24 years old, currently works as content provider for a multinational IT consultancy firm, under its interactive marketing department.
He was a writer for Hawaii-based Greater Good Inc., a media company behind the much-acclaimed Greater Good Radio. The show promotes social entrepreneurship and servant leadership.
Jay-r is a Journalism and Communication and Media Studies graduate from the University of Southern Queensland.
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