Kate Johnson is President of Microsoft US, a $45 billion division  including all of Microsoft’s solutions, services, and support revenues across public and private sectors in the United States. Kate is responsible for a team of 10,000 people and she is currently very involved in Microsoft’s culture journey led by CEO Satya Nadella. Prior to Microsoft Kate served as the Chief Commercial Officer for GE Digital. She has held several key senior leadership roles at GE, Oracle, Red Hat, and Deloitte Consulting. With the chaotic state of the world right now we need leaders who are courageous and empathetic. One leader who truly understands how to lead with both courage and empathy in these challenging times is Kate Johnson, the President of Microsoft US. Leaders can’t just stay where they are comfortable anymore, they have to be willing to take a risk and own all the consequences. They have to be open, transparent, and vulnerable. They have a deep understanding of their people and their customers. When the CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, first approached Kate she was working for GE and felt very loyal to the company. She had no intentions of leaving the company. But she couldn’t turn down a meeting with Satya. And the reason she ended up making the move was because of something he said. When Kate had asked Satya about his philosophy around culture he said that Carol Dweck was one of his personal coaches and he spoke of how a growth mindset has the ability to unlock the purpose of a company and the potential of the people. Hearing that Kate knew there was alignment from the top to the bottom of Microsoft and she jumped at the opportunity to be a part of it. How to lead with courage  Most people probably think about courageous leadership as guns blazing in the heat of the battle or a leader who is invincible and strong. But Kate’s definition is a bit different than that. She says, “One of the things that we've been learning is the connection between courage and vulnerability. So everybody thinks if you're courageous, that you have no weakness. You are strong, they picture warriors, you know, with lots of armor and heading off. That's not what courageous leadership is. Courageous leadership is the willingness to activate the troops and own the outcome, but also to do so bringing all of your strengths and weaknesses to the table with total transparency and clarity, and kind of owning work with that and figuring out how to assemble the team to bolster wherever there are weaknesses. And that's a different kind of leadership that I think is essential today. One example Kate shared of how she is living out courageous leadership has to do with the training she has been going through with her team. Kate asked Brene Brown to help 140 leaders in her division. During this learning journey the whole group went to Alabama to spend time with the famed Harvard attorney Bryan Stevenson to talk about race in America. The group read his book and then spent a few hours talking with him. They were so shocked and moved by what he said they decided they needed to learn more. Kate asked Bryan to speak at the Microsoft Sales Kickoff, which was a great success. Not only did he receive two standing ovations from the entire US team but it opened up some great conversations about race. Kate and her team decided to go together--7,000 people across 42 movie theaters to see the movie Just Mercy. Throughout this year she has reached out to her team to ask what she can do to address racial inequalities and racial tensions. She has opened up some tough conversations and pushed the organization to do better. This is what courageous leadership is. When asked what courageous leadership looks like Kate said, “There's a million different examples that I could give to you. But the one that resonates most frequently, is when you see a person trying to get it right, instead of trying to be right. She mentioned how Microsoft used to be a company of “know it alls” but now, unde