2012 Commencement: Address to Graduates, Carla A. Harris | The College of New Rochelle

it is now my great honor and privilege to call to this podium today our commencement speaker Carla Harris well good morning god is good all the time and all the time God is good alrighty good morning to president Judith Huntington Kol honorary doctorate recipients Wynton Marsalis Archbishop Francis Chilika trustees esteemed professors staff parents family and invited guests but most importantly good morning to the class of 2012 of the College of New Rochelle it is simply an honor and a pleasure to be here this morning to deliver your 150 men sment address and to receive this honorary degree from the College of New Rochelle it is quite special to receive this honor from an institution whose mission is to challenge students to achieve the full development of their individual talents and a greater understanding of themselves to encourage the examination of values through creative and responsible use of reason and to provide opportunities for spiritual growth in the context of freedom in ecumenism the message that I would like to extend to the graduates today is threefold maximizing your success will depend on three things the choices that you make how you recover from mistakes and the view that you have of yourself the choices that you make as you have no doubts already learned choice is very important and it is a very powerful thing every choice that you make has a consequence as you go from this day I will urge you that when faced with a choice choose to be a leader choose the option that creates the multiplier effect and make the choice that inevitably will push and stretch you the most when choosing to be a leader understand that you are choosing a seat that has power you are signing up for having the responsibility to make a difference to make it better to have a positive impact you are choosing to make life happen and not let life happen to you but understand something about power the easiest way to grow your power is to give it away the true essence of leadership lies in serving others as first Peter 4:10 tells us as every man had to receive the gift even so Minister the same one to another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God so as I like to put it he gives it I get it I give it away I'm a firm believer that it is the responsibility of each of us to positively impact the world around us and to create the change that makes it a better world a better state a better city and a better neighborhood for each of us each of us has the responsibility to be a leader in everything that we do and to train the next generation of leaders you are the next generation of leaders and now you must pick up the torch to put your imprimatur on this world class of 2012 I'm so excited for you because you could not be graduating at a more amazing time now if you have brought into the media hype that we are in a bad time that this is a tough economic environment rising educational costs are weighing down our visions our possibilities for the future skittish market environments and high debt are creating more international uncertainty then you might not be feeling that this is an amazing time now in fact you might be saying to yourself that this is a very chaotic time and while I might agree with you that this is a chaotic time that is precisely why I am telling you that it is an amazing time for you see I believe and I know that chaos breeds opportunity chaos breeds opportunity this is exactly the time that you can markedly accelerate your aspirations to inspire produce achieve and Excel for you see it is exactly in these types of environments that people look to other people that have the courage to lead woman or man for the solutions but in particular women get a shot when things are tough witness christine lagarde in her ascent to head the International Monetary Fund or and mulcahey who turned around Xerox and gave that legacy to Ursula Burns who has taken the company to new competitive heights it is during these times of chaotic environments when the challenges that exists they demand what you can uniquely bring to the table as newly trained leaders from the college of New Rochelle it is these types of environments when it is clear that the old ways of doing things will no longer do every industry whether corporate philanthropic government medical religious or academic is looking for a new way of doing things the rate of technological change is like we have never seen it before in this history and it necessitates a new new every two years which means as bright eager thoughtful innovative graduate leaders you will have an opportunity to put your imprimatur on this world far faster than any generation before you this is exactly the type of environment that plays to your strengths and your profile as a newly minted leader you have been trained to lead to innovate and with conscious each of you has at least three things to offer this world as a servant leader you have your time your talent and your treasure now as a college graduate you might be sitting there saying I certainly have talent and I have a little time for Carla up treasures a little short right now but fear not it will come it will come at different points in your life you will have more of one than the other but the requirement and the expectation is that if you choose the leadership seat if you want to optimize your success if you want to maximize your power you must use these three gifts in the pursuit of helping others you must leverage your career platform and the talents and treasure acquired there to make a difference in all that you do strive to help others and your personal objectives will always be fulfilled now one note of caution of these three gifts your time your talent and your treasure the most precious is your time for it is finite you can acquire more talents and you can always get more money and grow your treasure but you can never get more time so spend your time wisely spend it doing things that will give you the biggest return on your invested time the return of joy the return of happiness the return of satisfaction that you have done something positively that has impacted somebody else's life graduates you have been taught by an outstanding faculty you have been given the tools to be an outstanding professional and outstanding citizen and you have the power of choice to make it happen choosing to be a leader means understanding that effective leadership in the 21st century will not solely be based on functional expertise but rather on consensus building the ability to collaborate to build bridges across obvious divides to not only have vision but to be able to articulate a vision and inspire not require but inspire people to line up behind you and follow you I have had the great privilege of hearing about some of you from the graduating class this year and I as I extrapolate class of 2012 you are outstanding and the inspirational I have also learned that whenever I have endeavored to do something for someone else the returns the blessings come back to me manifold as a student of the College of New Rochelle you know that you did not arrive at this moment by yourself there were many sacrifices made by you your family and others you know that you are standing on somebody else's shoulders and now you have the opportunity to let somebody else stand on yours as I mentioned earlier when making your choices choose the option that will give you the greatest multiplier effect you want every choice that you make to have a positive ripple effect on the people that you will touch and on the people that you don't even know that could benefit from what you do or what you say always go for the choice that will give you the largest multiplier effect for your choices your actions your words your examples they touch other people and they really have the potential to really impact people somebody has been watching you graduates of 2012 somebody in this audience right now is not only proud of you but also inspired by what you have accomplished there is a professor there is a professor that has reaffirmed their mission to teach because they can see how they made a difference in your life there is a family member or friend in this audience that now has the courage to pursue their dreams or is that much closer to believing that they can go for it because you did in choosing the multiplier effect you must be willing to give it your all leave it on the floor when you give to any endeavor all that you have to give you create enormous dividends y'all know I'm a banker enormous dividends for yourself as well as achieving the multiplier effect when you give your all to anything and pursue it with excellence you create performance currency and performance currency gives you the power to choose what you want to do and not to be told what you can or you cannot do the second contributor to maximizing your success is how you recover from mistakes mistakes happen that is a fact of life however the point is not about making the mistake it is about how you recover from it as the great scholar dr. Benjamin emai says a stumble does not have to be a fall and as I like to say when you make a mistake take the blessing of the lesson and move on don't carry the baggage of having made the mistake embrace the valuable lesson that you received from that experience in fact I am telling you today that in order to maximize your success you must be willing to make a mistake you must be willing to fail you cannot you must not encounter life by trying to avoid making a mistake avoiding risks if you consider yourself a leader in the 21st century you must be willing and comfortable taking a risk you must be willing to stretch yourself to go into the unknown to take on new challenges when the outcome is not clear after all that's what faith is all about amen when making a choice go for the one that will challenge you the most as the Reverend Millicent hunter says in her book don't die in the winter you cannot advance the second base with your foot still on first you must be willing to let go of the familiar if you want to soar and truly ascend always reach outside of your comfort zone dare to try something new to forge new territory the worst that can happen if you take a risk is that you fail but guess what failure always brings you a gift and that gift is called experience now you know how to do it better now you know how to do it differently now you know how to do it successfully when I ask myself why we don't take more risks the only answer I can come up with is that record we're just scared it's fear and let me tell you something today the college of New Rochelle fear has no place in your success equation fear has no place in your success equation can I hear you say it with me fear has no place in my success equation one more time fear has no place in my success equation and if you forget that just remember 2nd Timothy 1:7 says God did not give us the spirit of fear but of power love and of a sound mind when you are faced with a new challenge welcome it boldly be willing to take on that risk be willing to make a mistake for you know how to recover and you know that taking on challenges always results in your growth always results in your arriving at a new place that you have never been before if you don't push past the problem you can't get to the prize the third the view that you have of yourself class of 2012 own your power many of you have had many twists and turns on your journey to get here and oh that's an amen huh many twists and turns and your journey here at this wonderful place called the College of New Rochelle but just guess what it doesn't matter how you got here the point is class what it's well you are here you are here you earn this seats and you made it own everything about yourself own the fact that you are a unique individual who creates his or her own competitive advantage wherever you go your authentic self is your competitive advantage nobody can be you the way that you can be you and any time you spend time trying to be someone that you are not you are creating a competitive disadvantage for yourself understand your greatness never doubt yourself or don't ever ever pick up somebody else's baggage about who you are or what you can or cannot do if you ever wonder whether or not you can do a new thing trust your data your data says that you are a winner because if you did it before and if you did it this time you can indeed do it again the most powerful determinant of your success is what lens you are looking through when you are looking at yourself remember in proverbs 23:7 it says as a man thinketh so is he in your view of yourself you must have a winner's lens as a winner you must always dwell in possibility there are a lot of unknown paths and roads in front of you you may have already experienced enough of life where most of you dwell in reality not dwell in the land of possibility I urge you today graduates don't let your past determine your future don't let the reality of a situation or the urgency of an unexpected crisis deter you from your agenda when you have a goal or a challenge continue to ask the questions how and when not if you see winners leaders they don't ask if they ask how they ask when because they are confident and they know how the story ends it will always end in your favor winners constantly dwell in possibility in your view of yourself you must see yourself dwelling in the possibility of what could be a great outcome dwelling in the possibility of achieving the highest rank in your career dwelling in the possibility that you could develop a drug a process a new way of thinking that not only changes your life but the way a generation thinks or the products that they use dwell in the possibility that you will achieve all of your personal professional financial and philanthropic goals I ask you to dwell in the possibility because if you dwell in the possibility you will naturally migrate to dwell in probability and then you will inevitably positively shape change and influence your reality dwell in the possibility and you will reach the reality of a great life in your view of yourself you must know that every class that you have had every experience that you have had has uniquely informed your ability to be extraordinarily successful know that you know that you know that you know that you have been given an amazing gift in your education at the College of New Rochelle and that you have everything you need to be extraordinarily successful st. Catherine of Siena said be who God meant you to be and you can set the world on fire class of 2012 expect to have an extraordinary life expect to win and you will I congratulate you I applaud you and I thank you well done

Channel: The College of New Rochelle

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Keywords: Carla A. Harris, Graduation (Field Of Study), Commencement Speech, College, The College Of New Rochelle (Organization)

Id: pBJ5VUWWK-I

Length: 22min 27sec (1347 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 01 2012