Meena Harris best known as the founder of the Phenomenal Woman Action Campaign, is also a noted lawyer, activist, best-selling children’s book author and producer. Born to a single mother, she spent her childhood surrounded by three strong and brilliant women; her mother Maya Harris, a senior policy advisor for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign, her grandmother, a noted biomedical scientist and Kamala Harris, currently the US Vice President. From them, she imbibed a fighting spirit and also a will to try and make a difference. Eventually, she earned her degree in jurisprudence from Harvard Law School and embarked on her career. However, she soon gave that up to form ‘Phenomenal’ with the intention of raising money and spreading awareness about problems faced by women. Starting with Black women employees, she soon spread her work to include other groups that have been historically ignored, eventually creating a space for all of them.

Childhood & Early Life

Meena Harris was born on October 20, 1984, in Oakland, a large and important city, located in the US state of California. Her mother, Maya Lakshmi Harris, is an award-winning lawyer, public policy advocate and writer. Nothing is known about her biological father.

Since Meena was conceived when her mother was still in her high school, her biological father played no role in her upbringing. She found a father-figure only after her mother married Derek Anthony aka Tony West in 1998.

After her birth, her mother went back to school, eventually earning her degree from the Stanford University.  During this period, Meena was chiefly raised by her maternal grandmother, Shyamala Gopalan and her maternal aunt, Kamala Harris.

Growing up among three strong and extraordinary women, Meena learned some vital lessons. While her grandmother taught her “to always try and make a difference—always, big or small—in everything“, she learned from her mother the value of hard work and from her aunt the impact of public service.

Later she said, “For as long as I can remember, I’ve considered myself to be two things: an optimist and a problem-solver“. Indeed, watching her single mother going to law school, through her first law firm job and her aunt tackling various tricky situations made her believe she too can do them.

As she grew up, she followed her mother to Bishop O'Dowd High School, graduating from there in 2002. Thereafter, she joined Stanford University, from where she earned her bachelor’s degree in 2006. Three years later, she entered Harvard Law School, earning her degree in jurisprudence from there in 2012.

Career

In 2006, soon after graduating from Stanford University, Meena Harris began her career with Facebook, serving as the Community Operations Manager in Palo Alto, California. Eventually in 2009, she left her job to join Harvard Law School.

After spending all her life on the West coast, she found the east little different, having an intellectual rigor and intensity, which was new to her. Soon, she began to love being surrounded by interesting people with diverse backgrounds and extraordinary mind, committed to ideals of justice.

In 2012, on graduating from HLS, she moved to Washington DC, where she began working as the Judicial Law Clerk at the District of Columbia Court of Appeals, serving in this capacity for one year. Then in 2013, she joined Covington & Burling LLP as Attorney, Data Privacy & Cybersecurity.

She remained with Covington & Burling, a multinational law firm, headquartered in Washington DC, for three years, eventually leaving the organization in 2016 to join Slack Technologies LLC.  Working from the company’s headquarters in San Francisco, she served as the Senior Policy Manager for its messaging program Slack for one year.