Since 1999, 9NEWS has recognized outstanding leaders in the community. This year, 9NEWS has again partnered with the Denver Metro Chamber Leadership Foundation – an affiliate of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce that educates and inspires people who want to make a difference as leaders in the community – to select and honor the next 9NEWS Leader of the Year, who will be named live at the Leadership Foundation’s Leading Colorado luncheon on Thursday, March 14.
The 9NEWS Leader of the Year finalists are: Anthony Aragon, Dr. Nita Mosby Tyler and Andrew Schmidt. They each embody the values of Colorado’s Civic DNA™: inclusivity, collaboration, leadership, shared vision and responsibility. Inclusivity, in particular, is a critical component to community leadership in Colorado – and this year’s three finalists all model inclusivity in different ways.
Get to know Schmidt, an alumnus of the Leadership Foundation’s Leadership Denver 2015 and Leadership Exchange, in his own words:
Career: Founding Partner of Core Contractors, Roofing Systems
Community: The main ways that I give back right now are through the Denver Metro Chamber Leadership Foundation board, the chairman of the board for The Other Side Academy: Denver and the vice-president of the board for Rocky Mountain Micro Finance Institute.
Leading with Colorado’s Civic DNA: The capacity to understand and respect and to fight for diversity of thought and to be inclusive in who you are and how you think is so important. We all have the capacity in any environment to be inclusive or exclusive, however subtly we may do it, and it makes a difference.
What drives him on TOSA: Denver: For me there were a handful of people that helped lift me up out of some dark situations. It was because of those people that I’m living such a different life right now. What feels like the culmination of a journey for me is really just the beginning. It’s been such a gift to me in terms of teaching me about myself and what we’re capable of.
Doing it right matters: That purpose statement for our business has served as a filter for how we hire and how we operate and a lens through which we look at our company. What keeps me close to the flame of our business is not the growth of our company or the success of how we do in the marketplace – which it is a part of that recipe – but what really makes me feel alive is watching that needle move in someone’s life and exercising small business as a vehicle for that movement.
Leadership Foundation alumni, as well as members of their new partner, B:CIVIC, and their longtime partner, the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, will have the opportunity to vote to select this year’s winner. Cast your vote between Feb. 5 and March 11 at denverleadership.org/vote.