Episodes
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Brooke Richie-Babbage is a nonprofit growth strategist and social impact advisor. She is the founder and CEO of Bending Arc, a social impact strategy firm that supports the launch and sustainable growth of high-impact nonprofits, and the host of Nonprofit Mastermind Podcast. Brooke has spent the past 23 years working as a lawyer, nonprofit leader, and social entrepreneur. She has founded and led multiple successful organizations and initiatives, including the Resilience Advocacy Project (RAP), where she served as founder and Executive Director for 11 years, the Sterling Network NYC and the NetLab Initiative, both initiatives of the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation, where she served as Director of Network Initiatives for six years, and the Social Justice Accelerator (SJA), an initiative of the Urban Justice Center, where she has served as SJA Director since 2019.
She has been a visiting lecturer and featured speaker at numerous graduate and law schools, including Harvard, Columbia, NYU, and Fordham. She has presented papers at conferences around the country on social entrepreneurship, non-profit leadership, and community lawyering, and co-produced and hosted the City Watch radio show on WBAI. She served as Secretary and then Chair of the Social Welfare Committee of the NYC Bar Association, as well as the Co-Chair of the Policy Action Committee of the citywide Welfare Reform Network, and an appointed member of both the Governor’s statewide Child Care Policy Working Group and Mayor Bloomberg’s Adolescent Fatherhood Advisory Council. She has served as a member or officer of several non-profit boards, including as Board Chair for the Community Resource Exchange, and most recently as an officer for the boards of the Urban Justice Center and Nonprofit New York.
Brooke received both her JD and MPP from Harvard and her BA from Yale. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and two sons.
Quotes:
I think that there are two versions of your strategic plan. The internal serves as a roadmap for you and your team. It serves as a foundation for work planning, annual planning, next steps, and funding. Then there’s an external version. That goes on your website. That is your vision. That is ‘where are you taking this organization in the long term?’
There is no one way to do strategic planning. Release yourself from the tyranny of what strat planning is, and start with the question, ‘what is the organizational set of goals?’ The process can be whatever you want it to be.
Strategic planning is not a pre-structured thing. It is a set of conversations that ideally help you determine where you want to go and what you want your adventure to feel like for all the interested parties.
To connect with Brooke:
Brooke Richie-Babbage
LinkedIn
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This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Shannon Curtis has been a recording artist and songwriter for the last 27 years, and has carved out a unique, community-driven DIY music career with her husband and co-conspirator, Jamie Hill, for the last 19. Her new album — 80s kids, her first-ever covers album — is due out in April 2025, and was a great excuse for her to (re)acquire an Atari 2600. She lives in Tacoma, Washington, and is in love with The Mountain, just like any good inhabitant of the Puget Sound.
“When we were forced to pause, it was an opportunity to realize that maybe we had pushed and pulled and prodded and explored every corner that we could creatively in that medium in that setting.”
“I recognize that presence needs to be my goal. The idea of what is before me today to do. I don't need to take on all of the things all of the time. That's been something that I've really needed to focus on.”
“One of the most powerful tools that we can use to exist and resist, is to hold onto our joy. Our joy really is a refuge and when we create experiences of joy with each other, we create a place of safety for people who are feeling threatened.”
“Leaving well is being able to have the knowledge that I showed up before the leaving, that I showed up to the work, that I showed up to that part of my life with all of me in the best way that I could.”
To connect with Shannon:
Website
Instagram
Facebook
Threads
Mastodon
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
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This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Vital Voice Training is a communication consultancy out to revolutionize the conversation about good public speaking and leadership presence — from stressing out about your “ums and uhs” to working creatively at the intersection of you and your context. Since 2014, they’ve been bringing game-changing public speaking and communication training to individuals and organizations, specializing in building public speaking confidence, navigating difficult conversations, balancing authenticity and situational adaptivity, and bringing out their clients’ own unique charisma. Co-founders Julie Fogh and Casey Erin Clark are experienced professional actors — their approach is grounded in theater and performance, neuroscience, somatics, socio-linguistics, and organizational psychology. Their clients are leaders in the finance, venture capital, law, and tech industries, world-changing entrepreneurs, and best-selling authors, as well as in-demand keynote speakers who regularly bring their ground-breaking ideas and perspectives to stages all over the world.
Casey Erin Clark is a voice, public speaking, and communication coach, performer, author, entrepreneur, podcast host, and leader in both the entertainment and business worlds. She is a fierce advocate for gender justice and spends her days speaking, teaching, and writing about the power of women’s voices, while seizing fulfilling opportunities to perform on screen and stage. In 2014, Casey and Julie Fogh co-founded Vital Voice Training, a voice and speech coaching company on a mission to change the conversation about what leaders are “supposed” to sound like and empower everyone to own the power of their full vocal instrument and presence. Casey hails from the cornfields of southern Illinois (where she grew up singing with her family Von Trapp-style) and has a BFA in musical theater from Illinois Wesleyan University. She also coaches musical theater pros of all ages, is a member of SAG-AFTRA and AEA, performed at the 2013 Oscars with the Les Miserables movie cast, and sings with the Grammy-nominated and Tony-honored Broadway Inspirational Voices choir. Recommending romance novels and breakfast restaurants is her love language. Will perform the Lafayette speed rap from Hamilton on demand.
Julie Fogh is a voice coach, podcast host, and interpersonal communications specialist who works with speakers and leaders helping them navigate their individual tensions and blocks, revealing the personal power and unique and captivating humanity that exists in all of us. Through Vital Voice Training, Julie and her co-founder Casey Erin Clark blend the toolbox of the professional actor with their powerful frameworks for embracing one's authentic speaking voice to businesses, schools, and organizations all over the country including Thrive Capital, Facebook, Google, NASA and The Hartford. Julie was raised in Seattle and earned her BA in Theatre and Women Studies from University of Washington. She earned an MFA in acting from Northern Illinois University, a rigorous interdisciplinary curriculum that engaged with the physical body, the emotional life, imagination, use of language, character construction, non-verbal communication and the truth of the moment. She has studied with the Moscow Art Theatre and University of Copenhagen and has studied Meisner Technique with Kathryn Gately, Michael Chekhov Technique with Deborah Robertson, and Movement and Period Style with Lloyd Williamson. She loves YA novels, introverts, and her very vocal rescue cat, Ashland.
Read the MM Lafleur piece
Quotes:
When we walk into a room, every time we go into a meeting, we are there for a purpose. We always communicate with a purpose in mind. So we need to give ourselves the agency to ask why am I here and what am I trying to accomplish?
Our mission from the beginning of this company has been to expand our ideas of what leadership looks and sounds like. We do that in part by showing up with more of who we are, even in spaces where that is risky and where that may not always pay off. But we do it strategically, we do it bravely, and we do it consistently so that other people can also do it.
Leaving Well is the ability to really figure out for yourself and for the people that you care about how to button this chapter, how to transition, how to move forward.
To connect with Vital Voices:
Website
Twitter
Instagram
Linkedin
To connect with Casey:
Twitter
Instagram
LinkedIn
To connect with Julie
LinkedIn
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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It’s time to reimagine workplace transitions and the way we say goodbye. Here’s the truth: People Leave. We leave towns and cities, and we leave relationships. We leave projects, volunteer opportunities, and appointed and elected seats. People leave jobs too, whether high powered roles and barely paid gigs.
Another truth is that organizations are exponentially terrible at preparing for and navigating workplace transitions. The combination of people leaving and the reality that our workplaces are ill-equipped for those situations makes for perpetually bad exits. I’ve examined the way people leave, and through the Leaving Well framework, believe we can reimagine and create the art and practice of moving on from a place, thing, role, or job, with intention, purpose, and when possible – joy, and want to invite you into the conversation with this episode.
Main Quote:
Leaving Well is not just about avoiding dreaded PR nightmares, scheduling exit interviews, or scrambling to toggle off access to email accounts. It's so much more than the departure itself. It's about the way we handle transitions, how we prioritize people, and how we ensure the ongoing health of our organization in the face of inevitable change.
Additional Quotes:
Leaving Well benefits not only those departing, but also those staying behind. It mitigates the loss of productivity. It protects the bottom line of organizations and prevents knowledge attrition. It builds company loyalty and a positive workplace environment.
Creating a culture of leaving well does not sow seeds of restlessness.
To connect with Naomi:
Website
LinkedIn
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Ingrid facilitates smooth leadership transitions for nonprofit organizations. Ingrid has built a consulting practice that focuses on strengthening nonprofit leadership, especially during transitions.
Over the course of five interim executive director appointments, Ingrid has seen a variety of ways leaving well can be implemented.
She also offers executive search services and guides organizations to develop comprehensive succession plans that promote leaving well.
Over the last twenty-five years, Ingrid has served in a wide variety of roles in nonprofit organizations. This includes eleven years as the executive director of a food system nonprofit, where she built the fledgling organization to be a community institution.
Main quote:
There’s a lot of great work being done but people are burning out because they're doing too much. If we can get organizations to work together, they can cut down on some of that and really improve their efficiencies.
Additional Quotes:
Leaving well is really being intentional in how you go, and not burning bridges, not taking a lot of knowledge with you that other people don't have. But really intentionally transferring that knowledge, those relationships, so that that work can continue.
To connect with Ingrid:
Website
Facebook
Linkedin
Learn more about the Interim Executive Academy
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Jennie supports women who are ready to step into their legacy and maximize the impact they can have in the world. She has dedicated her life + career to building a more equitable world and supporting female founders and leaders at every stage of their journey.
🪩 At Wild Awake, she supports ambitious consultants who better the world through her signature program Consultant Catalyst, which centers on strengthening your systems and operations, elevating as a leader, and creating a magnetic brand + knockout website.
🪄 Delve is a mission-driven communications and creative agency that launches social good initiatives and works with nonprofits to make their work as impactful as possible.
🏛️ Outside of Wild Awake and Delve, Jennie is an elected state representative in Alaska, where she advocates for LGBTQ+ equality, paid family leave, mental health, and reducing violence against women, among other progressive issues. When not working, you can find her exploring Alaska with her family, cooking, reading a romance novel, or taking a course. She has lived, worked, and traveled across four continents + over 30 countries.
Main quote:
I learned and grew so much from the experience of having people who don't know you make judgments about you, make threats against you, come to your home. And if anything, it helped me step into my highest self and feel more confident in who I am and operate even more closely to my North star. Because if every day I knew I was acting in that way, what people said about me meant so much less because I couldn't be shaken. I knew the place from which I was working. I knew the values that I hold.
Additional Quotes:
Honestly, I just got scared. And I'm sad to say that because I didn't want to be scared and I didn't want them to ‘win’. But I just couldn't do it. If I didn't have kids, I would have just kept going. But I had my family to think about. Ultimately I just felt that it was going to erode me and age me in a way that was going to make me less effective.
To me, success is going to be when a single mom can run for office and be in the legislature. That takes support. It takes planning. It takes thinking.
Sometimes we have this thing where we want to look back. I think we need to just accept where we're at and then focus on what we're doing next because when we're holding on to the thing that we chose or didn’t choose to leave, it's taking away from the things that you can be doing and building right now.
To connect with Jennie:
LinkedIn
Wild Awake Creative
Delve for Good
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Melanie is a 3x former Chief of Staff passionate about the profession, spreading awareness on how impactful it is, and helping others get into this career path. She’s also a mom who loves watching her son grow (a 6’4 high school freshman - lots of growing going on). Her favorite way to spend an afternoon is reading a good book, when she has the time to do so.
Main quote:
We're not just problem solvers, we're problem seekers. So we say ‘what are the roadblocks coming up?’ What are the risks that we might be running into? What are the gaps that we need to fill, what bridges are we going to cross in the future?’ So the Chief of Staff seeks that out and then puts together a strategic plan for it. We’re a blend of the strategic and the execution.
Additional Quotes:
Chiefs of staff come in and create processes, they improve procedures, create and implement policies, and then hand the work off to other people.
Having a strong Chief of Staff who can be the home base, helping with decision making, making sure all the projects are running on track and getting you out of the weeds means then you can use your bandwidth to really shine.
To register for the free Chief of Staff masterclass
To check out the Chief of Staff training (with a special discount for podcast listeners!!): use code NAOMI for 24% off!
To connect with Melanie:
Website
LinkedIn
Instagram
The Case for a Chief of Staff - Harvard Business Review
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Lisa Marshall is founder and principal of Good Work Consulting, where she helps for-purpose professionals get to the strategic part of their to-do list.
She knows how it feels to be stuck fielding an endless list of to-dos that are urgent and important, but don’t necessarily build capacity. And what it’s like to daydream about the projects that would make things better (if there were only time to get to them).
She specializes in project management, implementation support, and data visualization and reporting. The work that energizes her the most is connecting people and tools, so that (work) life becomes just a little more manageable.
She lives in Dallas, TX with her husband and two dogs, Eleanor and Franklin.
Main quote:
“If you can create an inflow of all of the tasks and all of the information that comes to you into the work management system that you're using, you will get so much more done. There will not be balls dropped. You’ll be able to do more than you thought you could, and you'll be less stressed while you're doing it.”
Additional Quotes:
“There’s dashboards that nonprofits need and they fall into three buckets: executive, analytical, and public facing.”
“For me, leaving well is about having a mindset or looking at things through the lens of what's the best that could happen? And that's for the person who's leaving. It's for the people who are staying. It's for the things that are yet to come. But what's the best that could happen?”
To connect with Lisa:
LinkedIn
Good Work Resources
Good Work Services
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Minda Harts is a celebrated author and influential speaker, best known for her bestsellers "The Memo," "Right Within," and the YA book "You Are More Than Magic." She is a respected voice in advancing women of color, self-advocacy, and restoring trust at work. Minda frequently speaks at major conferences and companies, including Nike, Google, Disney, Best Buy, Dreamforce, and the Aspen Ideas Festival.
As an NYU assistant professor, Minda shapes future leaders and empowers professionals. Honored by LinkedIn as the #1 Top Voice for Equity in the Workplace in 2020 and by Business Insider as one of the top 100 People Transforming Business in 2022. Minda is currently working on a new book with Flatiron Books, focusing on the crucial topic of restoring trust in the workplace.
Main quote:
“Each and every one of us, our voices are our legacy. And the moment that we allow people to shut our voices down, even ourselves, then that's impeding upon our legacy.”
Additional Quotes:
“When it comes to trust in the workplace, we don't necessarily put a high value stake on it. In our romantic and platonic relationships, trust is everything. So why wouldn't we want that same character trait inside the workplace with our colleagues, with our managers, with our leadership. Because you can't have equity in the workplace without trust.”
“You belong in every room, but not every room deserves to have you.”
“Leaving well is freedom. Definition wise it’s one no longer feeling confined and I want us all to be free. I want us all to be able to experience our lives inside and outside the workplace, the way that we were created to experience them, which I feel is joy, peace and equity.”
To purchase Minda’s books:
Talk To Me Nice: Amazon | Bookshop
The Memo: Amazon | Bookshop
Right Within: Amazon | Bookshop
You Are More Than Magic: Amazon | Bookshop
To connect with Minda:
Website
Instagram
LinkedIn
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
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Laurell Jones served with distinction in the United States Air Force and retired in the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. During her 23 year career she held multiple roles in financial management and financial analysis with increasing levels of leadership responsibility in international and US based locations. In Laurell’s post military career she was a Senior Managing Consultant with IBM for 14 years. Laurell has been a volunteer with Dress for Success Tampa Bay since 2018 and currently serves as the President of the Board of Directors. Laurell is passionate about empowering women to achieve economic independence. Laurell is a graduate of Syracuse University and also holds an MBA and MPA. She resides in Tampa with her husband. In her free time, Laurell enjoys mentoring youth, gardening, traveling and exploring Tampa.
Judy Bensinger has a passion for women’s empowerment. Judy is on the Hillsborough County Commission on the Status of Women, the board of directors of Dress for Success Tampa Bay, and the Advisory Board of Gems. She is also a team leader for a new, international women’s organization: Age of Possibility. Judy sees 2025 as a great year full of opportunity and promise.
Tanya Cielo is Sky Marketing’s founder and Lead Strategist, and her passion is marketing! She is a certified marketing facilitator with more than 20 years of marketing experience for media companies such as Clear Channel, Cox Radio, Beasley Broadcasting, and AOL. Her work brings new life to her client’s marketing efforts and results in revenue growth. Tanya loves networking and is a member of several organizations. She is the Board Chair for the South Tampa Chamber of Commerce and a Board member for Dress for Success Tampa Bay and FBI Tampa Citizen's Academy.
Main quote:
"Our organization fell prey to what many organizations do when you're going about the business of the organization: looking at what's urgent and what's important. Succession planning, I can't underline enough as important. Make sure you carve out time for that very important activity of succession planning, because if you don’t, there may become a time when it becomes not only urgent, but a crisis."
Additional Quotes:
"One of the best gifts you gave us was the organizational assessment. Something we had not done as a board, something we had not done as an organization. It is a foundation, we'll continue to build on for years to come. That is invaluable."
"I always believe change and transition will lead to positive growth. No matter where you're starting, I believe when you bring in new individuals, new mindsets, new exposure to things, you're going to get better because you're not starting from ground zero."
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Dr. Jaiya John was orphan-born on ancient Indigenous Anasazi and Pueblo lands in the high desert of New Mexico, and is an internationally recognized freedom worker, poet, author, teacher, and speaker. Jaiya is the founder of Soul Water Rising, a global rehumanizing mission to eradicate oppression. The mission has donated thousands of Jaiya’s books in support of social healing, and offers grants to displaced and vulnerable youth. He is the author of numerous books, including Daughter Drink This Water, We Birth Freedom at Dawn, Fragrance After Rain, and Freedom: Medicine Words for your Brave Revolution.
Jaiya writes, narrates, and produces the podcast, I Will Read for You: The Voice and Writings of Jaiya John, and is the founder of The Gathering, a global initiative and tour reviving traditional gathering and storytelling practices to fertilize social healing and liberation.
He is a former professor of social psychology at Howard University, and has spoken to over a million people worldwide and audiences as large as several thousand. Jaiya holds doctorate and master’s degrees in social psychology from the University of California, Santa Cruz, with a focus on intergroup and race relations.
As an undergraduate, he attended Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon, and lived in Kathmandu, Nepal, where he studied Tibetan Holistic Medicine through independent research with Tibetan doctors and trekked to the base camp of Mt. Everest. His Indigenous soul dreams of frybread, sweetgrass, bamboo in the breeze, and turtle lakes whose poetry is peace.
Main quote:
“You cannot calendar well being. You cannot calendar healing in a workplace. Accountability speaks to the idea that if I'm not breathing, I'm dying. Consistent investment in healing and well being and growth in your organization day to day, not calendared because that says that it's not actually a priority. If it were a priority, it wouldn't be on a calendar. If staff appreciation were a priority, you wouldn't have one staff appreciation day a year.”
Additional quotes:
“Storytelling for us is a way of breathing, meaning that on the inhale we draw in the sediment, the nutrient of meaning from the world around us, from the people in our lives, we're drawing in meaning which orients us to the moment, this is the meaning of this moment.”
“You can walk into a workplace in the morning and feel the mood of the day.”
“The storytelling that says the way we treat each other in our staff meeting is intimately tied to how we are going to treat each other in the hallways, and in the break room, in the cafeteria, at our desks, in our offices, and how we treat each other via email communications and phone calls and how we treat our clients, how we treat the community.”
“Change and transition is, of course, the nature of life. It's happening in every moment. The question is how do we relate to it?”
To connect with Dr. Jaiya:
Website
Instagram
YouTube
Books
Also mentioned: Podcast episode with J.S. Park
Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Over the past 15 years, Stephen Newland has worked in finance roles at a variety of organizations including nonprofits, startups, early-stage companies, and Fortune 500. Stephen believes in making finance simple & actionable!
When he’s not heads down in a spreadsheet, he loves to spend time with his wife and daughter at a local coffee shop or watching his favorite Cincinnati sports teams!
Connect with Stephen:
Nonprofit discount list
Website
LinkedIn
Main Quote:
Once we've got good financial information, how do we turn it into very simple and actionable insights to drive the organization forward? The foundation of that is a forecast. I'm such a believer in it because I have seen it do wonders for organizations.
Additional Quotes:
The absolute best finance people are essentially the Rosetta Stone for financial statements and they can take the financial statements and create a story with it and say, ‘here's what the organization is doing.’
Leaving well is providing the space for whoever comes behind me or behind you to step in and have the freedom and flexibility to put their spin on the organization.
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
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This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Amanda Misiko Andere leads with love and disruption. She has spent over twenty years working in the nonprofit and public sector as a leader committed to racial and housing justice through advocacy for systemic change.
Prior to joining Funders Together to End Homelessness as their CEO, she served as the CEO of Wider Opportunities for Women, a national advocacy organization. Currently, she serves as board chair of the United Philanthropy Forum and board member of Equity in the Center, Bainum Family Foundation, Philanthropy DMV, and Leadership Fairfax.
Amanda is a founding member and on the leadership team for the National Racial Equity Working Group on Homelessness and Housing and the National Coalition for Housing Justice. She also serves on the Leadership Council for the DC Partnership to End Homelessness and is a volunteer advisor for Fairfax County on their racial equity task force.
Previously she served as an adjunct professor at George Mason University teaching Nonprofit Management, Executive Director of FACETS, and Vice President of Cornerstones; who have similar missions of preventing and ending homelessness and breaking the cycle of poverty.
Main quote:
There can be comfort with change and transition because you discover things about yourself, your body, the people around you. It is truly the life learning mechanism to get you to a place of truer self to get us to justice and liberation.
Additional Quotes:
My purpose wasn't necessarily to lead the organization into its next iteration. I was very clear that my purpose was to lead a search and a process that was equitable and just and full of love and disruption. And to set things in place for this black woman leader to not only be successful and impactful, but transformational.
Leaving well means being absolutely aware of who you are in the moment and where you need to be and not be, and how to affect change for justice and liberation in a way that's uniquely given to you by whoever you believe in, God, world, the universe.
Learn more about Funders Together
To connect with Amanda:
X
Instagram
LinkedIn
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Lacey Kempinski is a former in-house fundraiser, turned Mom, turned consultant. After more than a decade of in-house fundraising, Motherhood changed the trajectory of Lacey’s career. In 2018, when she was due back to work after her second parental leave, Lacey took a leap and founded Balanced Good.
She’s on a mission to better support parents and organizations in the non-profit sector. Balanced Good provides parental leave coverage – from the day-to-day hands-on work to big picture transition planning – Balanced Good believes that a supported transition to parenthood will benefit both our sector and the parents working in it.
Lacey has a bold vision that all parental leaves are viewed as a celebrated life milestone and not a feared employment gap.
She loves continuing to immerse herself in all things fundraising. While also balancing that with LEGO building, endless folding of laundry, and a love for hiking, canoeing, and all things outdoors.
Main quote:
Leaving well to me is thoughtful. It's intentional. And it's critical for the missions that we serve to continue to grow, make impact, and create the change we want to see in our sector and the world.
Additional Quotes:
As an employer, just asking, how can I support you? What can we push forward? And how can we fill your role and get things done while you are focused on your number one priority. Isn't that powerful? How good would it feel if somebody asked you that when you were navigating these hard, hard pieces in life?
Our program goes through what needs to be done. Who is going to do it? What should be prioritized? What can be given grace and extended timelines? How can we push forward mission critical work and de-prioritize non critical work? And then how can we do all of these things thoughtfully to ensure that employees, not just the employee going on leave, but employees all around are satisfied? That’s good staff retention. And we're being thoughtful about the humans that work in our sector.
To connect with Lacey visit the Balanced Good website.
LinkedIn: Lacey Kempinski
LinkedIn: Balanced Good
Instagram
Whether you are preparing for your own parental leave or a team member's, this handy workbook will help you walk through the steps to create a solid plan for the next! Parental Leave Planning Workbook
US Surgeon General's announcement: Mental Health and Wellbeing of Working Parents
Parental Leave in a Day Program: Helping employers and employees make a thoughtful plan as the navigate preparing for parental leave.
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Take the Transition Readiness assessment
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Camille E. Acey is a mom, a community organizer, a former tech support leader, and founder of the conscious nonprofit closures consultancy The Wind Down. As part of this work, she currently facilitates the Practices of Composting and Hospicing community under the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s Emerging Futures initiative. She was a co-founder of the Collective for Liberation, Ecology, and Technology (CoLET), a radical feminist tech collective. She also served as an advisor to The Ada Initiative, an advocacy group for women in open tech/culture, and was board chair for Whose Knowledge?, a global feminist NGO focused on elevating marginalized voices.
Main quote:
Any chance I get when I can leave something and just say I'm not going to take on this kind of stuff for a while, I think is also really good. Not having to jump into whatever is next. And a sense of pride and not much regret. Letting go of that kind of stuff. I've definitely stepped away from things and then been so impressed by what the people that come afterwards have done, things that would have never occurred to me.
Additional Quotes:
I would like people to begin with the end in mind. I think that's really critical. One of the things I'm trying to push forward is to get foundations thinking about this, fiscal sponsors thinking about this. As part of the work of the wind down, I offer a free hotline for anyone who's closing or in discernment around closing.
To connect with Camille:
Website
Newsletter
Blog Post: A Good Day To Die: Some Reasons To Call It Quits
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To take the Workplace Transition Archetype Quiz
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Kamilah specializes in interim solutions, serving as a successful interim executive to nonprofit organizations with budgets of $10+ million. She is a nonprofit executive consultant with two decades of experience in the areas of organizational and relationship effectiveness; change management; interim leadership solutions; and program design/project management, both domestically and internationally with NGOs and Foundations focused on advancing humanitarian and conservation/environmental efforts. She is currently Founder & CEO of Katalyst Consulting Group.
Her firm works selectively with nonprofit organizations who are serious about advancing equity. She also recently served in a senior leadership role with the Jane Goodall Institute where she led the U.S. operations of the organization’s global humanitarian program and led efforts to grow programmatic scale and impact with a focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion; identified and built partnerships to amplify underrepresented voices in the space of conservation and youth activism; diversified the funding portfolio; and provided strategic direction to a high-performing remote team. Kamilah has strategically and successfully managed within complex global organizations to repair and strengthen critical board, cross-department, and founder relationships and interests resulting in heightened trust, engagement, and collaboration.
Kamilah has successfully led and stabilized internal teams during several CEO and Executive Director transitions and is known for her innate ability to heal fractured teams and lead from a space of humanity. Specializing in supporting nonprofits and foundations, she also has experience working with and leading projects with DoSomething.org, New York Cares, National Urban Fellows, Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce’s Southern California Leadership Network, Thomas J. Watson Foundation, and Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation.
Kamilah was a World Economic Forum US Stakeholder Council Member for the Trillion Tree Initiative, an NGO Representative to the United Nations, an NYU Public Service Leadership Fellow, a National Urban Fellow, and a National Wildlife Federation Leadership Fellow. She holds a Master’s Degree in Public Administration (City University of New York, Baruch College) and a Bachelor of Science in Business Management (University of Maryland, College Park).
She is also a mother to two young children, a photographer and, through Katalyst, leads executive women’s leadership retreats and a nonprofit consulting mastermind community centering the needs of Black and other women of color.
Main quote:
I think the biggest soapbox that I'm on these days is understanding that we can operate outside of the ways we've done business and that it's okay, that it's fun. You get to be an innovator of creating this new pathway of working in this ecosystem that's outside of the way that we think it's supposed to be and that it's always been done.
Additional Quotes:
Find or build your community. I don't care who that is. I don't care if it's a handful of friends that are doing the same thing. I don't care if you're paying for a membership. I don't care if it's your church group. You need to have people around you that are going to be understanding of where you are, that are on the journey with you, that have been there and done that. That's make or break for the speed at which you can succeed in your consulting practice.
To connect with Kamilah:
LinkedIn
Visit Katalyst Community
For a free trial to the Katalyst Community
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To take the Workplace Transition Archetype Quiz
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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After nearly fifteen years of fundraising for arts and education organizations, Katie Mendez launched Built to Raise in 2023, providing interim director of development and short-term fractional fundraising services specifically for small and mid-sized nonprofits. She is an artist on the side, loves to explore the world, and her favorite way to spend an afternoon is snuggling on the couch with a kid, a dog, and a cup of hot tea.
Main Quote: With my work, I'm not there to form relationships with your donors. That's not my job. My job is to help sustain the operations, make sure things aren't falling through the cracks, make sure that the team that's there is connecting and talking to the right people and asking people for their support. But it's not about me connecting with donors.
Additional Quote: Leaving well looks like making sure that when you're gone, because eventually you will leave, eventually you will transition on to something else, that the mission is greater. And I think especially in nonprofit work. It's just really centering that idea.
To connect with Katie:
Website
LinkedIn
Best place to find your next nonprofit partner
To take the Workplace Transition Archetype Quiz
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Kemi Ilesanmi is a cultural strategist, coach, and connector with over 25yrs of experience in the arts sector. She has been executive director at The Laundromat Project (The LP), and previously Creative Capital Foundation and Walker Art Center. A graduate of Smith College and NYU, she also serves on several boards and advisory councils. In December 2022, she “left well” after 10yrs at The LP and traveled the world for a year with her husband. Now back in Brooklyn, she sees the world with fresh eyes and renewed hope.
Main quote:
Leaving well means to me a sense of satisfaction, a sense of joy, a sense of doing one's best to leave in a state of respect and intention with the communities and people that you are involved with.
Additional Quotes:
I really wanted to expose [my team] to all of the parts of doing this work because I wanted to make excellent leaders of color for the field. And not just for my organization. My thinking around that was that I was feeding the field. I was strengthening the field by making them well rounded leaders at my organization.
Learning how to navigate our own emotions as well as the needs and demands outside of us was a big learning that we carry through. And was a really important muscle and skill set that we learned as an organization, because it always allowed us to say yes to other things.
To connect with Kemi:
Website
LinkedIn
The Art of Gathering
The Art World Podcast Episode
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To take the Workplace Transition Archetype Quiz
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Nonprofit leaders often have too much on their plates, and not enough time or capacity to effectively choose what task or projects are important vs. urgent vs. should be delegated. In this episode, I’m sharing the well-known concept of the Eisenhower Matrix and how it can be applied to workplace transitions. Listen in to learn how to identify which tasks associated with leaving can be postponed, prioritized as urgent, or left entirely for someone else to do.
To share your thoughts with me on this episode, please leave me an audio message on SpeakPipe!
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To take the Workplace Transition Archetype Quiz
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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Rita Sever has worked as an HR Director, and HR consultant and a trainer. She has worked with social justice organizations throughout the country. Rita has an MA in Organizational Psychology and is a certified professional coach. Rita has taught “HR in a Nonprofit” to graduate students at University of San Francisco and Sonoma State University in California. Rita has also written two books: Supervision Matters and Leading for Justice.
Rita is a fan of Matt the Electrician (musician), loves a good book and her favorite way to spend an afternoon is playing a low-competition game with family and/or friends.
Main quote: Tying the job responsibilities to the mission, vision, and values grounds the job description and helps people understand why it matters.
Additional Quote: Be as intentional as you can, as a whole organization, of enlivening your values to support the culture.
To purchase Rita’s book, visit either Amazon or Bookshop.
To connect with Rita:
Website
Instagram
LinkedIn
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To take the Workplace Transition Archetype Quiz
To learn more about Leaving Well
This podcast is produced by Sarah Hartley
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