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Mona Sutphen: The essential qualities of a leader, particularly of somebody like a president
of the United States, but I think it's probably true for all leaders, is the ability to make
a very difficult, consequential decision, understanding that there will be people who
get hurt, there will be people who don't like it. I used to say all the time that the issues
that used to come to my desk when I was working at the White House were always horrible. It
was always that a bunch of people were going to lose their jobs or something bad was going
to happen. Potentially something good could happen, but it was very, very difficult and
somebody was going to lose in the end. And I always used to say, if it were an easy decision
somebody else would have made it a long time ago.
My most awe-inspiring moments have been working in the White House because you always are
doing this pinching yourself. I can't believe this is, I never would have thought I would
end up in the White House once, much less twice. And you see history literally unfolding,
meetings where you think to yourself, "I know, I know for certain, that historians will write
about this meeting and this conversation, because it's going to alter the course of
the country or alter the course of the world."
The most satisfactory times have been when I've been working with people individually.
So, when I was in the Balkans, we successfully negotiated the release of about 100 prisoners
of war after the war had ended, several months actually, after the war had ended. And we
ended up on a darkened highway in the middle of the night, deep in Bosnian Serb territory
on a bridge, with cars and trucks on both sides, freeing these prisoners of war. And
that's a really profound experience, to realize you helped somebody get out of jail that didn't
deserve to be there in the first place. And so it's just a really satisfying feeling,
that you feel like you're helping somebody's life, you're improving somebody's life, oftentimes
saving somebody's life. Which is a great, there's nothing quite like it.
When people ask me, what's the most definitive moment in your career trajectory, I always
say going to Mount Holyoke College.