I had really tough times when I was

I had really tough times when I was named California first Latina cabinet secretary and I knew that Hispanics across the country wanted me to succeed. And yet I personally struggled with the fact that I left my family at home.

Speaking of challenges, what have been some of the toughest challenges for you over the course of your career?

You know, I felt challenged maybe because I was young. I felt that I had to prove myself, that I had to have all the answers and I think overtime we learn that there is so much intelligence in each in every one of our human resources. And so I had to remind myself that I'm not responsible for all of the answers but I'm responsible to ensure that I champion people and creating an environment that allows them to produce the answer that we need.

And how old were you when you came to the States?

I was five years old. I was five years old and it was a really interesting time because, you know, acculturation, you know, and I'm so much more sensitive now to people who come here to integrate and to learn about our society.

So amazing that you remember that- I mean, it's so... you were five years old.

Oh, you remember those things. You – I'll remember that forever, no, no question. And it informed a lot of the work that I did at state government to build culture competency, to make sure that once you learn the language whether it's a language of medicine, whether it's a language of business, once you learn the language you can get in the game and win.

And when you give mentoring advice to the young women, what you typically tell them?

When you are given a hand to help and you reach up, you don't grab the other person's arm with two, you take that one and then you reach back to pull another to get everybody out and I- I take that responsibility very seriously.

And so I thought the most important thing that I could do is to have other young women have an experiential learning experience about how to engage in government and so I started an organization called HOPE – Hispanas Organized for Political Equality and it's where we just took young women up to Sacramento to learn how to change the laws and how to amplify their voice and change things for the better in their community to become disciples of change. Whether you are female or male if you engage in public policy making I think that we can change the world.