Leadership Empowerment guru Pegine Echevarria, MSW, is speaker, coach, and author who is described as "audacious, bold, brilliant, clever, comical, dynamic, effective, enthusiastic, fresh, humorous, knowledgeable, perceptive, relevant, talented, vivacious, vivid, and witty!” She is an expert on motivating leaders in a diverse world and empowering people to be leaders in their lives, work, family, and community.

Pegine appears on business and talk shows on CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, PAX, and national radio shows. Pegine is interviewed by newspapers such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago Sun Times, and The Los Angeles Times and is quoted in magazines including Health, Latina, Professional Speaker, Workforce Diversity, Hispanic Business Magazine, Woman’s Life Insurance Magazine, and Conference Planning. Hispanic Business Magazine named her one of the top two motivational speakers in the country in 2002. The summer of 2006 she taped a PBS Pilot called "Play BIG Expect the Best."

Raised in the Bronx by a strong, determined single mother, Pegine’s neighborhood included drug addicts (including a sister who died of a heroin overdose) and gangs. After a rocky road during her teens, which included her own affiliation with a girl’s gang, Pegine moved to Europe, where she transformed her life and opened two businesses. She came back to the states, finished her degree in improvisational and audience participation education (BA is in Theatre Arts) and a MSW (in Group and Organizational Development) because she became curious about how organizations support or hinder the development of leaders in a diverse world and how people can be leaders in their lives work, family and community. She moved up the ranks from receptionist to president in the corporate world. In the not for profit world , she designed and directed a Latino family support center which was named one of the top ten in the country by The Harvard Group Review

After 9/11 her business collapsed and she teetered on losing everything, and we mean everything! So what is a tenacious leader, speaker and entrepreneur to do? Become a stand up comic of course! Pegine takes audience participation to a WHOLE NEW level by incorporating her experiences as a stand up comic and background as a trained improvisational and children's theatre performer. Her programs are a physical, emotional, and intellectual experience. She is both smart and funny!!! Leaders take positive risks, connect with others and seek opportunities. She is a sought after speaker and master of ceremonies because of her ability to break through people's barriers through laugher and audience participation.

Pegine Echevarria has received numerous awards and proclamations for her leadership work including the 2005 Minority Enterprise Development Week Entrepreneur of the Year, Congressional Merit Award for Outstanding Leadership Program and the prestigious Orgullo Award for Leadership. She is nominated for the 2007 Hispanic Business Magazine Women of the Year.

Clientele includes Verizon, JP Morgan Chase, Merrill Lynch, Intel, Lucent Technologies, Working Mother Media, NY Life Insurance, Citibank, NASA and MIT, also the US Army Corps of Engineers, the US Army, the US Navy, and US Army National Guard.

National positions currently held:
• National Board Member and Vice President, Employers United for a Stronger America – a foundation that provides research, philanthropy, and education for the media, community, and government about employers and their US military reserve and national guard employees.”
• Society of Human Resources National Workplace Diversity Expertise Panel
• Jacksonville Women's Business Center – Advisory Board, Marketing Committee (One of three centers in Florida).
• National Speakers Association – Membership and Retention Committee (Minority Outreach Sub-committee)

She is the proud mother of a son, a National Guard solider, and her daughter, a US Army ROTC cadet at MIT & Wellesley-- both whom joined during the Iraq crisis (the military offers young people more than the Iraq crisis).