Today we’d like to introduce you to Victoria White.
Victoria, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
Even from a young age, I always knew that I was a leader. Now, for a long time, I thought that it was just something that my parents or teachers told me to encourage me to make wise decisions or be an example. It wasn’t until high school that I began to realize that people seemed to give me their permission to have influence in their lives. This is where my journey to study, understand, and grow in leadership began.
In college, I began listening to and reading lots of John Maxwell, C. Gene Wilkes, Tony Robbins, and Dr. Myles Munroe. Eventually, I realized that unlike many others that I knew, the responsibility of leadership didn’t feel burdensome to me. It actually brought me great joy to influence positive transformation in the lives of others. This realization led me on a journey of discovery to find the purpose behind this passion of mine, so I took some courses on leadership, participated in leadership style assessments, and started considering what God had given me this gift to accomplish.
I believe that our gifts and talents are strategically given to us by God to accomplish a purpose greater than fame or success; this is the question I needed an answer to. What is my greater purpose? After lots of prayers, reflection, and introspective assessment, I realized that my gift is to build unique connections with diverse audiences, challenge them to desire growth in areas of leadership, and then to provide practical insight on how to achieve the desired growth and development in a fun and engaging way.
After finding my greater purpose, I continued to develop and strengthen my gift and I saw many doors and opportunities open for me. I now teach leadership content in professional and spiritual contexts regularly. I work in the higher education field and have served as a content developer and presenter for Sam Houston State University, the University of Houston, Stephen F. Austin State University, and Houston Community College. I have also consulted for many victim advocacy agencies, churches, non-profits, and community-based organizations (CBOs). Some of my favorite topics to teach are: Cultivating A Culture of Honor, Lowkey Leadership: Leading from Anywhere in an Organization, Feedback Rich Cultures, and Pursuing Passion.
I recently finished my first book – God Is…10 Week Interactive Devotional. This was something that I never imagined doing with my life, but I felt that God’s reputation had been ruined with many people because of so many people who misrepresent Him. I wanted to create a space and opportunity for people to experience and encounter God personally, and get to know who He really is. The book is available on Amazon.
I am also currently working on a curriculum called Living Room Leaders. This is a 5 part leadership series for Christians who are currently in or are actively pursuing leadership roles in the church and/or marketplace. It is intended to be done in small intimate settings to encourage open and honest communication and spur tremendous growth in each attendee.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
This has not been a smooth road by any means. One of the greatest challenges in leadership is learning to lead yourself. When I realized that this is what I was made for, I immediately asked myself, “how can I convince people to allow me to come and teach them to be better leaders?”. The greatest realization that I have had to-date is that my life is my true resume. People would look at me, the teams I lead, my life, my habits, and they would form a decision about my leadership consultant skills long before they allowed my branding, marketing, or client list to determine my worth. I had to be a product of my product. For me, one of the biggest gaps in self-leadership was time management. I needed to learn how to be a better manager of my time – that’s what leaders do. That was a struggle for me because I wanted to be everything to everyone and I didn’t have time to! Instead, what I was doing was being mediocre for a lot of people in a lot of things. I had no idea how to prioritize, how to delegate, how to say no or refer people to someone else equally as qualified. This was all a part of being a leader, and before I could continue creating my brand as a leadership consultant, I had to set up a consultation with myself and create a plan of action. I studied time management, why it was essential to leadership, how to become better at it, and how to do it without losing an opportunity for authentic relationships and connections with others. “Time Management” by Brian Tracy and “How to Win Friends and Influence People” by Dale Carnige was instrumental in my learning.
What do you do, what do you specialize in, what are you known for, etc. What are you most proud of? What sets you apart from others?
I am a leadership consultant. I consider myself a transformational leader. This means that I have a keen ability to recognize strengths and weaknesses within individual leaders, teams, and organizations. After I recognize these areas of strength and weakness, I encourage, inspire, and motivate innovative change and transformation within the person or group I’m working with. I do this by assessing what has been done, providing practical tools that can be easily implemented, and showing predictive results of growth and increase.
I work in professional and spiritual contexts. My experience in professional contexts, so far, has been in education, non-profit, victim advocacy, and community-based organizations (CBOs). My experience in spiritual contexts has been within the Christian faith community. I am currently employed by Sam Houston State University (SHSU), and I also serve as the Senior Pastor of Spirit of Integrity Worship Center. These two positions, as well as my continued education (current graduate student at SHSU), provide me with regular opportunities for growth and development.
My specialty is teaching organizational leadership. I have a true gift for developing leaders to support leaders. This removes the burdensome feeling of leadership from top-level leaders and allows them to be people-facing leaders who build a genuine connection with those they lead. Additionally, this also aligns the entire organization with the vision and mission of the organization and creates a natural pipeline for successors who have been trained to lead with the vision and mission of their organization guiding their decisions.
I think the thing that sets me apart from other leadership consultants is that I am not just concerned with your organization/business’ bottom-line. I am equally concerned with your people, your mission, your vision, and your achievement of all mission-driven goals. I believe wholeheartedly that if you create a team of leaders who feel valued and cared for, you will indirectly create a team of people who gladly commit themselves to mission-driven success for the organization.
What advice would you give to someone at the start of her career?
My biggest piece of advice to other young women who are just starting out on their journey would be this:
Do not let social media fool you into believing that good branding and marketing is all you need – you need a good product! This means that you should search for your weaknesses. Don’t be overly critical, but don’t be overly confident. Always look for ways to improve your product. If you sell services, always be your first customer because your own growth and progress tell your story long before your website ever does.
Contact Info:
- Phone: 936-223-1120
- Email: victoria.white@shsu.edu
- Instagram: instagram.com/victoriab.white
- Facebook: facebook.com/vbwministries
- Twitter: twitter.com/VictoriaBWhite
Image Credit:
Jakira Lewis
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