My work has always been about designing transformation across systems and communities to create a more compassionate and just world. I've started up and led social and environmental change initiatives in the private and nonprofit sectors, in large institutions and small organizations, with a passion for actively engaging and co-creating with all stakeholders, ensuring that the work lives within the context of their culture and ethos.
A critical component of any change initiative is how to connect with each other despite fundamental differences. This can feel impossible these days. Organizations work with me to learn how to communicate with and influence the public and policymakers across ideology and transform advocacy campaigns into authentic narratives. Now more than ever, we need to reconsider how we talk to and about each other and the effects that has had on public support for systemic, long-term solutions to the most intractable problems, including poverty, climate change, and health care.
Recently I led a multi-year initiative to disrupt and shift the public discourse on human services. We mobilized community and national leaders across the country to change attitudes about the people human services benefits, expand the knowledge of how human services works, and improve policy support for this work. With my team, we have trained nearly 4000 sector leaders in dozens of communities to rethink and reframe their public narrative.
Throughout my career I’ve been dedicated to creating lasting social and environmental change, including launching new organization-wide initiatives at national and global institutions like the University of Chicago. My focus is always to ground the work in institutional lexicon, values, and culture so that it feels and becomes authentic to that organization or community.