FRESH Labs: The Greenroom

In this minisode, Courtney dives into what we can learn from community in building conversations with real staying power and how friendship is a love language all its own.

This last episode of the Greenroom features not one but two brilliant humans: Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Dr. Katharine K. Wilkinson, a dynamic duo of climate scientists who are the visionaries behind the best-selling All That We Can Save .  We talk about rage walks, asks that feel like invitations, and DMing celebrities on Insta. It’s a laughter-filled conversation that provides a deep celebr...

In this minisode, Courtney dives into her and Bridgit’s conversation about watching Roots on TV and having, what Bridgit calls a “decolonial awakening.” She gets curious about how we bring our assorted gifts or superpowers to make sense of past and present suffering to shape where we go from here.

Bridgit Antoinette Evans is a groundbreaking narrative strategist at The Pop Culture Collaborative. She and Courtney sat down to talk about the stories that shape us in our families, on TV, and across our culture all the while asking: what other stories might we tell?

In this minisode, Courtney reflects on how Angela Patton took her time to make her documentary Daughters because she wanted to do it in a way that truly aligned with herself, her work, and she wanted to do it with someone she could trust. Taking that approach took a lot longer, but the result is truly phenomenal.  

Angela Patton is loving on Black girls in everything this does. In a conversation with equal parts laughter and wisdom, Courtney and Angela get into the power of taking risks, trusting your gut, telling your truth, keeping the girls she works with at the center of it all, and using her mama’s church training to memorize a TED talk on the spot. 

In this minisode recap, Courtney marvels at Edgar’s ability to see differing strategies as highly complementary in the long term work of making change. Oh and Edgar also compares himself to Paula Abdul on American Idol?!

Edgar Villanueva is changing how money moves inside of philanthropy and doing it with so much heart (and style). Courtney and Edgar’s wide ranging conversation covers how waiting tables prepares you for almost anything, the power of attribution, and why we have to risk saying the hard thing and saying it with  so much love.

Courtney dives deep with care champion Ai-jen Poo on the power of a braided strategy, what it takes to change not just opinions but the deeper, emotional beliefs that shape them, and admits that despite being a total genius at it - she doesn’t actually like public speaking.  You can follow Ai-jen, track the release of her new book, and follow her vast roster of organizations at Ai-jenPoo.com .  Th...

In this minisode recap, Courtney serves up some of the juiciest pearls from her conversation with Ai-jen Poo with a special focus on collaboration. Honestly, we’re still taking it in that 74 (!) organizations co-wrote the whitepaper on  “care as infrastructure”  which went on to become a real cultural and political touchstone during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Shannon Watts is owning all of who she is: a pugnacious mama, a brilliant ADHD brain, and a tireless organizer for a world without gun violence. Shannon and Courtney talk about what it means to start an organization from nothing and eat your humble pie along the way, how neurodiversity can be a superpower, and how we all get by with a little help from our friends.  Follow Shannon’s work on her web...

In this minisode recap, Courtney gets real about what is so striking about Shannon Watts’ authentic and audacious style of leadership. What might  get unlocked if we all took a page out of  Shannon’s playbook and said out loud: I’m really great at this! I’m total garbage at that! Imagine just how different our teams and organizations might look?

Aisha Nyandoro is crafting new narratives around deservedness, wealth,  and what we all need to thrive and we are here for it.. In her conversation with Courtney, these two get into why the term “thought leaders” is so cringe, what a difference it makes to have the folks living the problem crafting the solution, and how to tell if you’re going too far or not far enough in getting your message out...

In this minisode recap, Courtney and Aisha make the case for ditching the term “thought leadership” for the maybe less catchy but all the  more powerful “vessel.” We think there’s something to be said for how it captures the way  being deeply rooted in who you serve and where you come from reorients how you walk and talk and make your way in the world.

The Greenroom learns from some of the world’s most transformational advocates about how they flipped the script. Host Courtney Martin gets into intimate, strategic conversation with the people who are changing the conversations we’re having about care, money, violence, and love. Diving deep into longer half an hour episodes and getting straight to the heart of it in bite-sized minisodes, The Green...