Nonprofit Mastermind Podcast

This is the second installment of my short series revisiting some of the incredible conversations I’ve had with folks as part of my Next Normal series at the beginning of this year. As so many of us continue to grapple ith the implications of COVID for how we work and how we lead,  I wanted to revisit the idea of leadership in this next normal that’s being created.  I call it the next normal becau...

In reflecting on some of the incredible conversations I’ve had with folks, I wanted to revisit the idea of leadership in the next normal; to dissect it and pull apart some of the themes that my guests have unearthed about what it will mean to be an effective and whole-self leader in the world that is being rebuilt in real time, as we head out of COVID. This week, I’m looking at one question that I...

In this week’s episode, I get to have a conversation with someone I’ve wanted to talk with for this podcast for some time: ​​Heather Vickery. Heather is a celebrated public speaker and success coach that inspires audiences and supports others with the tools they need to live empowered, bold, joy-filled, and successful lives. She’s a published author and the host of The Brave Files Podcast.  I’ve w...

This week, I’m joined by Rhea Wong, my long-time friend, and multi-time guest on the podcast. Rhea and I talk all the time about the work that we each do supporting and coaching small nonprofits in the areas of fundraising and strategy, and occasionally we hit on a topic that gets us really excited.  This is one of those topics: the messy and complicated relationship between fundraising and founde...

This week I'm talking with Emily May, the co-founder and Executive Director of Hollaback,  a global, people-powered movement to end harassment.  Emily is an incredibly thoughtful steward of the Hollaback mission, as well as one of the most incredible strategic minds I’ve known.   In this conversation, Emily pulls back the curtain on her strategic prowess. She talks about her growth as a leade...

This week, I'm talking with two incredible and inspirational women - Donnie Belcher and Lauren Burke -  CEO and COO respectively,  of Camp Equity. These women have, multiple times in their lives, seen a deep social problem and jumped into action - as a teacher and lawyer, as a Skadden Fellow, as Echoing Green fellows, and now together, through Camp Equity. In this conversation, we talk about...

In this episode, I have a wonderful conversation with Charlie Vazquez.  Charlie Vazquez is a storytelling consultant, workshop facilitator, and Buddhist meditation instructor. He’s designed and facilitated multi-sensory storytelling and wellness programs for the NYC Department of Health, New York Public Library, Bronx Council on the Arts, and PEN America, serving LGBTQI youth-of-color, undocumente...

I'm joined this week by one of my oldest and dearest friends, Terri Davis-Merchant. Terri works at the intersection of affordable housing development, homelessness, policy & philanthropy as a Program Officer at Trinity Church Wall Street Philanthropies.  This is one of the most open and frank conversations I’ve had, and about a topic that is so often opaque: Philanthropy and the inner wor...

This week's guest, Rachel Mills,  is the Founder and CEO of Harmony Consulting , and has been on a mission since she was 16-years-old to help others, help others - a personal and professional mission that just really resonates with me. For over a decade now, Rachel's been working with and creating award-winning campaigns for world-changing nonprofits such as Big Brothers Big Sisters and...

This week, I'm sharing a recording from a really great panel discussion that I facilitated with four inspiring nonprofit leaders who each grew their organizations to $1M and beyond:  Jill Eisenhard, founder and former ED of the Redhook Initiative  Kemi Ilesanmi, ED of The Laundromat Project  Steve Choi, former ED of the Min Kwon Center and the NY Immigration Coalition  Suzy Myers-Jackson, for...

Today I’m talking with Alexa Kasdan, Director of Policy and Research at Demos, here in NYC. I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Alexa for almost two decades. We met in the early 2000s when she was working at an incredible organization called Community Voices Heard in NYC, and I joined the board as an Ally Member. It was through Alexa, and her policy work alongside the members of CVH, that I first cam...

Very rarely have I met someone as naturally gifted at resource generation as Suzy Myers-Jackson. I say resource generation, rather than fundraising, because what Suzy has spent the past 18 years doing - first as the ED of Opening Act, and more recently as a strategic consultant and coach, has been more expansive than just raising money. Did she grow her organization from $25K to a multi-million do...

I’ve had the pleasure of working with Toya and her organization, viBe Theater Experience, for over a year now. I’ve loved watching Toya in action, as she’s taken her organization to the next level. The tremendous increases in her budget, staff & programming over the past year have been so exciting to see, as has watching her continue to carefully cultivate an internal culture that centers well...

This week I’m having a really fun conversation with my good friend, Steve Choi. Steve is a lawyer, activist, organizer, political strategist, and nonprofit leader. Most recently, he was the ED of the NY Immigration Coalition here in NYC.  In the decades that Steve and I have been friends, I’ve come to understand him as a truly gifted advocate and political systems thinker & strategist. In this...

This is week two in my series on fundraising for early-stage organizations. During this brief series, I’m bringing back some of my favorite conversations from my Fundraising Virtual Summit last year  - these are interviews with incredible folks on topics ranging from how to think about building relationships with corporations to brandraising.  As I’ve mentioned, when I started the podcast and call...

In today’s episode, I have a great conversation Sarah Durham,  the CEO and founder of Big Duck.   She founded Big Duck in 1994 to help nonprofits increase their visibility, raise money, and communicate more effectively. She is also the CEO of Advomatic , which builds and supports websites for nonprofits.  Sarah and I do a deep dive into branding - what it means and the nuts and bolts of how small...

This week’s guest is very very special to me - she’s a long-time leader in the education, youth development, and nonprofit space, and she’s also my sister. Darcy Richie is the Senior Director of Programs and Impact for Generation Citizen. I invited her to join me to talk about something that lies at the core of almost any conversation about effective leadership - communication. More specifically,...

This week’s guest is Reverand Dr. Emma Jordan Simpson. Emma is the Executive Pastor at the Concord Baptist Church of Christ in Brooklyn, NY, a writer, a social justice activist, and the Executive Director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation USA.  She has practiced leadership in many roles and in many ways over the past few decades. She and I have a frank conversation about the different ways to ho...

Rhea Wong is a recovering Executive Director who now coaches other nonprofit leaders to greater fundraising success.  She is passionate about helping leaders to attract resources to fund their work because the world needs so much.  When she's not talking about all things fundraising, she can be seen walking around downtown Brooklyn with Stevie Wonder-dog and possibly performing at a stand-up...

I’ve known the incredible Ana Polanco for going on three years now. Ana is an intuitive, international coach, storyteller, and wisdom keeper who helps culturally diverse women and social change organizations find new ways of leading. One thing that I have come to know and respect about Ana is how authentically she shows up in every space that she inhabits. She is a beautiful case study in how to d...

I had the absolute joy of meeting this week’s guest - Marcella Tillet - in 2019, through her work as VP of Programs and Partnerships at the Brooklyn Community Foundation.  Marcella is an incredible steward of the philanthropic and programmatic work at BCF, as you’ll hear in our conversation. She is thoughtful and intentional and proactive in centering the experiences and perspectives of grantees a...

Today I'm speaking with management and leadership whiz, Kishanana Palmer.  Kishshana is an international speaker, facilitator, trainer, coach and strategist, and a quintessential social entrepreneur.  Kishshana and I get deep into the why and the how of sustainability. She talks honestly about her path to greater sustainability, what it feels like to burn out, why sustainability is so importa...

This month marks the one-year anniversary of the official start of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was during this same month last year that I had the pleasure of talking with Vu Le, writer,  speaker, former ED of RVC on the West Coast, and author of fantastic Nonprofit AF, about this very topic of sustainability in the NP Sector.  I'm resharing this conversation during this anniversary month, both...

In this episode, we speak with Chitra Aiyar.  Chitra is an attorney, educator, community builder, and former Executive Director of The Sadie Nash Leadership Project. Throughout her career, Chitra has found that creating sustainable leadership is not a short-term process - that it must be viewed long-term. The question we discuss in this episode: How can we create an environment that will support t...

Phil Li, President and CEO of the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation, is with us in this episode. The mission of the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation is to create a more vibrant New York by investing in leaders, the organizations that develop them, and their networks. Phil has seen and thought about leadership from so many angles. Since joining the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation, the organization...