Keep it Together: MBA President Lu Mueller-Kaul on community building amid crises

You wouldn’t take Lu Mueller-Kaul for the shy type but she is remarkably thoughtful. Mueller-Kaul, who joined the Metropolitan Business Association, eventually, becoming its president in 2015, understood that business requires communication.

“I was involved in the Referral Exchange Development Group (RED) before, and that was really why I became part of the MBA,” she says. “I was so awkward about running a business and promoting a business, that I thought, ‘OK, I could do something to learn this.”

Lu Mueller-Kaul (center) with other members of the MBA accepting an award and grant at the NCLCC event in Palm Springs, CA. Photo from Lu’s Facebook page.

Perhaps notoriously, the MBA fell on hard times when finances came into question under its former leader. Mueller-Kaul saw the trouble and did something about it.

“I sometimes hear people say that, Oh, this community is so divided and people don’t really talk to each other, but I don’t see it that way,” she says.

Mueller-Kaul’s leadership has helped the MBA to thrive again. The group received a grant of $2,500 from Wells Fargo in Palm Springs, California on Aug. 5 and a prestigious award from the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce.

Gallery photos by Jake Stevens.

 

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