Leaders' approaches may differ, but their true obligation is a passion for their work and a commitment to their cause, former journalist Renee Poussaint told the newest graduates of the Professional Manager Certificate Program.

"I have always been fascinated with the whole concept of leadership and what makes a good leader. Probably because in part I've spent so much time covering bad leaders -- and some good ones too," she said, adding "our future really depends on developing generations of new leaders."

Poussaint, chief executive officer of the National Visionary Leadership Project in Washington, D.C., spoke to the certificate recipients during a June 12 ceremony in the Bunn Intercultural Center auditorium.

Sixty-one Georgetown employees from departments throughout the university graduated from the Professional Manager Certificate Program this year. University Training and Organizational Development organizes and hosts the certificate program, which aims to strengthen skills of Georgetown employees to make them more effective leaders.

The training program is marking a special milestone as it completes its 10th year of operations. Trainers held the 1,000th session this past semester.

Linda Hopper, director of training and organizational development, said the program's longevity is a result of the commitment of its students and instructors, as well as administrators and human resources officials.

"It's because of you that we're successful," she said. "You are Georgetown."

As the keynote speaker at the graduation ceremony, Poussaint told the group about her experiences in broadcast news and at the National Visionary Leadership Project, which she co-founded with Camille Cosby, wife of comedian Bill Cosby. The project's goal is to record, preserve and distribute stories and wisdom of older African Americans who have shaped history.

That work, and her journalism experience, has brought Poussaint face-to-face with leaders of different styles and personalities, from President Ronald Reagan to Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Poussaint has featured their stories in her news broadcasts, through the leadership project materials and in a book she co-edited with Cosby.

"Our future really depends on developing generations of leaders who understand how critical it is and how important it is" to be an honorable leader, she said. "There is nothing more important."

But all leadership styles don't have to be identical, Poussaint told the graduates. She highlighted several leaders of the civil rights movement, who were not necessarily in the spotlight, but whose efforts proved essential.

Consider Coretta Scott King, wife of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., who stayed home to care for family responsibilities during the movement's height. She is representative of thousands of such wives nationwide, whose work allowed the civil rights movement to flourish.

Or Dorothy Height, chair and president emerita of the National Council of Negro Women, the only woman to lead a major civil rights group in the 1960s. Her contacts and organization handled many of the logistics of the movement, but mostly behind the scenes. Height is now credited for convincing other civil rights activists that Martin Luther King Jr. should be the featured speaker at the March on Washington.

Poussaint also spoke about Rep. Shirley Chisholm (D-N.Y.), the first black woman elected to Congress and a candidate in the 1972 Democratic presidential primary. Her style was more in-your-face, Poussaint said, recounting how Chisholm would show up at neighborhood political meetings when she wasn't invited to illustrate how she wouldn’t back down from her passion.

Regardless of their styles, all these leaders had one thing in common -- something that is crucial for leaders in any context, Poussaint explained.

"As Coretta Scott King said, you must come to believe in your very soul that what you are doing is right and just, that you all -- in some fundamental way -- do what you're meant to do," Poussaint said.

That is timely advice for the newest graduates of the Professional Manager Certificate Program.

"The development of the training program as an opportunity for employees to spend time looking at themselves and their own development -- whether you're a manager or not – has been one of the most positive things that I've seen happen since I've been involved with the human resources department," said Mary Anne Mahin, Georgetown's vice president and chief human resources officer.

Hopper honored the program's "10-year instructors," who have been with the series since the beginning. They are: Mahin; Michael Smith, associate director of the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity and Affirmative Action; Annemieke Martinez, chief budget officer for Main Campus; and psychologist Michael Apter, development director of the consulting firm Apter International.