Cindy McCain and fourteen other women were recognized for their hard work and accomplishments at the Women of Achievement luncheon at the Sheraton hotel in downtown Phoenix on Thursday.
The annual event honors one woman for the In Business Magazine Lifetime Achievement Award and allows for other women to tell their life stories.
“Today we honor…individual and meaningful achievements in both business and in life,” said Rick McCartney, a publisher for In Business Magazine.
McCain won the 2019 Lifetime Achievement Award. She is the chairman of the board of the McCain Institute for International Leadership at Arizona State University, the chairman of McCain Institue’s Human Trafficking Advisory Council and the chairman of Hensley Beverage Company.
“The very name Cindy McCain connotes dignity, grace and strength,” Arizona Governor Doug Ducey said.
From sex trafficking victims to special education students, McCain has dedicated her life to helping those who are less fortunate.
“There are so many people in this world who don’t seem to have a chance and I’ve seen Cindy step in and give them that sense of empowerment, a sense of freedom, a sense that they can make a difference,” Sharon Harper, a board member of the McCain Institute for International Leadership, said in a video that was played during the event.
Out of the 15 women who were honored as the 2019 Women of Achievement, six of them spoke about their life challenges and described what they went through to get to where they are today.
Joel Martin, president and owner of Triad West Inc., said she became so fascinated with transformational leadership after opening her agency that she went back to school, obtained an education degree and a Ph.D in communications and became a working fellow.
Triad West Inc. is a business consultation firm that “provides corporations with specialist support in leadership development, team building, diversity and inclusion,” according to its website.
“It was no easy climb for me, but I did it,” Martin said.
Letitia Frye, another 2019 Women of Achievement honoree, said she lived by a quote that said there is no line between work and play.
“I hate this quote now,” Frye said as she teared up. “Because it almost cost me my life.”
On Thanksgiving morning in 2014, Frye went for a jog when she got hit by a car and suffered a traumatic brain injury that led to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, she said.
A couple months later, Frye said she was at an event when her foot buckled in, her eyes rolled back into her head and her tongue dropped because she was having stroke. Eight months later, Frye’s husband died by suicide and more than a year after that her new partner lost his child to suicide as well.
Through the obstacles, Frye worked hard to get where she is within her own auction business, Letitia Frye, LLC, and has received many awards for her work in the community.
Among the honorees were: Lauren Bailey, Katherine Cecala, Debbie Castaldo, Kate Gallego, Anita Helt, Amy Hillman, Pam Kehaly, Christy McCledon, Linda “Mac” Perlich, Bahar A. Schippel, Candace Wiest and Sandra Wilken.
Contact the reporter at leberman@asu.edu
