Lead from the Outside: How to Build Your Future and Make Real Change

Abrams helped found a nonprofit organization, the New Georgia Project, to register eligible voters in 2014. She raised millions of dollars and the organization submitted tens of thousands of voter applications to the state. The effort was a consummate success; yet, the organization was plagued with accusations of wrongdoing. By November 2, nearly half of those registrations were canceled by the secretary of state. Although, after a two-year investigation, the organization was found blameless, the New Georgia Project and Abrams herself were subject to criticism. She began with the best of intentions, but, because she was unorthodox in her approach to civic problems, her methods were scrutinized. Abrams uses this anecdote to demonstrate the difficulty of working within established systems, as they were not built for outsiders’ easy navigation. Abrams’s ultimate solution is to “hack” the system, to find a way to accomplish her ends outside of traditional means.

Abrams tells her reader to “look for an unusual point of entry” (99). Speaking primarily to an audience of outsiders, she relates the necessity of leveraging minority status: diversity quotas in the workplace and affirmative action in the university are windows of opportunity that they must not be afraid to open.