Former Mayor Pam Iorio is now out and about talking about leadership and trying not to talk about her political future. It’s a balancing act because after 26 years in elected office her immediate post-mayoral career has been that of a leadership speaker and lecturer. And it is now complemented by her book: “STRAIGHTFORWARD: Ways to Live & Lead.”
As to that political part of the equation, many pundits and political insiders see a 2014 gubernatorial run against the uber unpopular, eminently beatable Rick
Scott in her future. Especially if McBride-household candidates decide against making any more lackluster runs.
Iorio, to be sure, is well aware of how others read her political tea leaves but won’t deviate from her non-commitment script. “That’s not what I’m focused on right now,” she says.
Of course it isn’t, but running for governor is not like running for mayor where you can jump into the race with only three months to go. Leadership speaking and book tours, however, including some out of the region, are hardly incompatible with testing the statewide waters for name recognition.
One thing she won’t say about a future run: That she’s ruling it out. “Wouldn’t be prudent,” she underscores in a Dana Carvey-as-George H.W. Bush kind of way. But it was never-say-never serious. We get it.
“STRAIGHTFORWARD,” an intuitive, how-to primer with an eclectic range of personal anecdotes and applicable quotes, seems largely geared to fast-tracking corporate sorts who need to polish something other than networking skills and seasoned leaders who may take key facets of leadership for granted.
Iorio certainly doesn’t equivocate about the need for better leadership.
“It’s across the board,” she says of America’s “leadership deficit.” From “Politics to business. Never once have we heard a CEO stand up and say, ‘I’ve made a mistake, and it has cost this country,'” she points out. “Politics: Enough said. The approval rating of Congress is 9 percent. That’s barely staff and family.”