Jared Polis
Governor
State of Colorado
San Diego, CA USA
“Pursue whatever you choose to pursue with everything you have.”
Videos
By Roadtrip NationJared Polis
Milestones
My road in life has taken me all over.
I started my career in business and entrepreneurship—I started my first company, an internet access provider, in college.
As a start-up and early stage entrepreneur, I helped several companies raise capital and get off the ground.
I eventually got into public service part-time by running for the State Board of Education—I wanted to be involved but I still had my day job, so it was nice to meet just a few times a month.
After selling one of my companies in 2007, I had the opportunity to run for Congress and go into public service full-time.
I was in Congress for 10 years before running for governor.
I’ve been serving as governor of Colorado since 2019.
Keep following my journey
Education
High School
Bachelor
Political Science
Princeton University
Political Science
Princeton University
Career
Governor
I'm a public servant currently serving as the state governor for Colorado.
Career Roadmap
My work combines:
My work combines:
Government
Politics
Helping People
Day to Day
My work is made up of reactive and proactive things. Reactive would mean things like there's a fire in the state or a big traffic collision that we need to take care of. Proactive would be pushing things that I want to move forward. For example, implementing preschool and kindergarten for every kid. My job is mainly about turning ideas into reality, improving processes, and finding ways to serve the people of our state better.
Advice for Getting Started
Here's the first step for everyone
There are many careers in the public sector. One of the less political routes is civil service—you work for your city or state. Some of those jobs require a college degree and some don't. If you want to be on the political end, a great way to start is one of the volunteer advisory boards. They have them at the city level and state level. You go to a meeting once or twice a month and start getting to know people. Then you can decide if you'd like to run for a position after that.
