What does the future of Texas look like? When Cristina Tzintzún shows up at work each day, she inches a little closer to the answer.
As the founder of Jolt Texas and co-founder of the Worker's Defense Project, Tzintzún's resume is long. At Worker's Defense Project, she helped launch the nonprofit at 24 years old and became one of Texas' leaders in fair labor organizing. She currently runs her latest project Jolt, the largest Latino progressive organization in Texas. (You've probably seen Jolt in the news. Last year, the organization was part of a coalition of voter registrars that reportedly registered 1 in 5 Texas voters. They also hosted those famous quinceañeras at the Austin Capitol.)
Beyond her work as a founder, Tzintzún is invested in the next generation of leaders, too. She recently co-launched Movement Mujeres with Wendy Davis (former Texas Senator and founder of political advocacy organization Deeds Not Words) to prep 25 women of color from Texas to own their political power. Informed by Tzintzún and Davis' own experiences as women leaders in Texas, the two-year program is a crash course in professional development, networking and redistributing power. They had more than 250 aspiring leaders apply from across the state and the program officially opened its doors in mid-February this year.
A few days after the program launched, I sat down with Tzintzún to discuss her investment in Movement Mujeres. What does preparing the next generation of leaders look like? What do we need to know emotionally and practically to step into our power and advocate for the communities we live in and come from? Together, we dug into some of the lessons she has gathered as a nonprofit founder and creative entrepreneur (she's a published author and speaker, too!), moving through the gate-kept doors of Texas politics. Here are five takeaways from that conversation about becoming the leader you'd like to see in the world.
1.) Own your gifts.
Tzintzún stepped into leadership at 24 years old at Workers Defense Project. As she grew within her role and gained more experience, she began to realize the value of her vision.
"I've gotten a lot more comfortable with owning my gifts. That's been a real process for me. I used to think that my greatest gift was how hard I could work—like I could work more hours than anybody, but those aren't my necessarily unique gifts. I have unique gifts of making people feel their own power and giving them a sense of what they're capable of. And not everybody can do that. I also have this gift of seeing pathways to change where other people don't see it and knowing the pieces that will be required to bring it all together to make it happen," Tzintzún said.
2.) Don't be intimidated by rejection.
No matter how much you go after something (or follow the rules), you will be faced by rejection. Don't let it get you down.
"You will be underestimated and you will face rejection, no matter what path you are on. How do you be resilient and fight back? How do you turn some of those things on its head? If people underestimate you, I actually think that's a good thing. People have consistently underestimated me and what I'm capable of, and then they're genuinely surprised. They're genuinely surprised. But you know what, while they were underestimating me and ignoring me and not investing in me, I was building and building and building. And by the time they turned around, they had no idea how what I had built had gotten as big as it had and now they had to contest with it. So, be able to face rejection, but know deeply in yourself what's important and what your value is," Tzintzún said.
3.) Play long-game.
Being a leader is hard. Seeing the forest for the trees, especially when things are rough, is difficult. When things get hard, think long-game. Where do you want to be in the next five to ten years? How can you get there?
"We have to be able to take our work and vision to a place of positive change and power. At Jolt, we always try and honor our pain, but we also have to envision our own power and the positive futures. Leading is not an easy thing. I want us to be able to celebrate both our challenges and our victories as individuals, as well. And that's really important to me, for our staff. I want them to not just envision where they are now, but feel supported to envision where they could be in five or 10 years from now," Tzintzún said.
4.) You are just as qualified as anyone else to do the work.
Imposter syndrome is real. We have to remind ourselves that the doubt we feel and experience is not unique.
"Oftentimes we think that someone else has a master plan, that they see the same problems that we do and that someone's going to fix it or that someone else, like some other major institution or party, is better equipped to do it or they're just ignoring it. And I have found that usually the case is that no one has any master plan and you should just go do it, and you'll be surprised. You'll surprise yourself at what you're capable of and what you're able to build," Tzintzún said.
5.) Remember why you started.
As with any leadership role—whether you're working for yourself, leading a company or leading a movement—you will get burned out. You will get tired. You will want to give up. Return to your original vision when you feel stuck.
"Even when the work gets hard and like, I want to quit or I get tired, I remind myself that many of the people that I get to work for don't get to quit. They don't get to walk away from the problems that they experience every day. And if they don't get to quit, I don't get to quit and I'm not going to give up on them. I refuse to do that," Tzintzún said.
