Colleen Barrett likes to say that her qualification for becoming the president of Southwest Airlines was that she was a legal secretary with an Associate’s degree. A native of Vermont, Colleen moved to Texas in 1967 and began working for a lawyer named Herb Kelleher in his San Antonio law firm—one of whose clients had started a little airline. After a series of brutal legal battles with a handful of other airlines, the little-engine-that-could airline emerged a bit bruised around the edges—and crystal clear on its purpose: they were going to be the airline that treated people right.

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