📌 Alumni Spotlight: Barbara Pucher
Meet Barbara, our first Vision Youth graduate in our Alumni Spotlight series. She is a New York and Toronto-based entrepreneur whose career has taken her from the finance world overseeing a multi-billion dollar portfolio, to raising $1M in seed funding for nonprofit tech start-up Rumie.org, to today, running POPSocial, an Experiential Technology and Digital creative agency with headquarters in LA and NYC.
What does leadership mean to you?
"You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget the errand." --Woodrow Wilson
Life is about discovering who we are; leading is about striving to become better than we are, and helping everything and everyone around us to become better too.
What was your most memorable moment from the program?
My Gold expedition in Garibaldi Park, BC. I was not much of an outdoors person, but the program pushed me out of my comfort zone towards personal growth. It was, at the time, the most challenging thing I had ever done. It was my first trip away from home and away from my parents. There were times I thought I would never finish. But, I did finish, surprising myself with this accomplishment. I explored a new corner of my country, immersed myself in a different culture for my residential project learning about the First Nations people, met many of my goals for my physical activity and spent 4 days in nature in a challenging circumstance.
“Two of the most valuable lessons I took away from the program were self exploration and cultivation through challenges — key principles of Vision Youth.”
As you’ve grown in your personal and into your professional careers, how has Vision Youth had an impact on who you are today?
I am grateful that Vision Youth helped equip me with the right tools and opportunities at a young age so I can pursue my dreams with conviction, purpose and intuition. I built myself up to bigger challenges — completing the Gold award level and taking on more demanding challenges and leadership roles in various stages of my life; moving to New York City to further my banking career to manage a multi-billion dollar portfolio; a 12-day hiking trip with my husband to the Mount Everest Base Camp; finding purpose through my involvement with Rumie.org to bring free education to undeserved communities around the world.
How are you involved in the community today?
Why is community involvement important to you?
Fast forward almost 20 years later from when I first joined Vision Youth as a Visioneer, I’m thrilled to be involved with the organization again, but in a different capacity, having recently joined the board as a director. I was drawn back into the program not only because of its meaningful mission to cultivate young visionary leaders by teaching them to inspire by example, cultivate through challenge, and serve others, but most importantly, it was because the program had a lasting impact on my path in life by encouraging personal growth and self discovery through challenges.
If you had to give one piece of advice to your younger self and those in our Vision Youth community, what would it be?
I share the following advice for our Vision Youth community and young leaders in our community. Throughout each transformation that you experience in your life and career (and there will be many), you will be confronted with uncertainty, doubt, fear, and thoughts that are overwhelming enough to make you never want to get out of bed. I hope you’ll be able to take what you have learned in this program and apply it in real life to help you navigate these challenges and ultimately find your own voice and story.