Introduction
Organizations often reach moments when the path forward cannot be solved through technical expertise alone. They require thoughtful conversation, collective learning, and new ways of seeing the systems they are working within.
I partner with foundations, nonprofits, public leaders, and mission-driven organizations to facilitate meaningful dialogue and conduct engaged research that informs action.
Some clients invite me to design and facilitate key conversations or leadership gatherings. Others engage me to study complex questions alongside communities and practitioners.
In many projects, facilitation and research unfold together. Thoughtful inquiry generates insight, and structured conversation helps people use those insights to move forward.
My role is to help groups make sense of experience, surface wisdom already present in the room, and design pathways and appropriate metrics toward more equitable and effective systems.
Are you ready to create lasting positive change in your career and personal life?
I am here to help and look forward to meeting you. Our insightful work today will spur your impactful actions tomorrow.
I facilitate spaces where leaders and stakeholders can think together about complex challenges.
This includes:
• leadership retreats and strategy sessions
• multi-stakeholder convenings
• community engagement processes
• co-design workshops
• ongoing leadership learning communities
• program and initiative design processes
My facilitation approach integrates deep listening, systems thinking, and somatic
awareness.
I attend to both the content of the conversation and the relational dynamics shaping how people participate. Groups leave with greater clarity, stronger relationships, and concrete next steps for action.
Many organizations want to understand complex questions but do not want research that sits on a shelf.
I design research processes that generate insight while strengthening the people and communities involved in the work. These projects may include:
• participatory evaluation
• developmental evaluation
• community-based research
• design research for new programs or initiatives
• studies that center lived experience as expertise
My approach treats research as a collective learning process, not simply data collection. Participants often contribute to shaping questions, interpreting findings, and developing recommendations.
My work draws from developmental science, social work, systems thinking, and community-engaged research traditions. I approach facilitation and research with three commitments.
Careful Process
The structure of a meeting or research process matters. Design choices influence
whether participants feel safe, heard, and able to contribute their knowledge. I design processes that allow reflection, conversation, and creative thinking to unfold productively.
Cultural Grounding
Every group brings cultural histories, identities, and power dynamics into the room. I attend carefully to these dynamics so collaboration can move beyond surface agreement toward authentic dialogue.
Collective Meaning-Making
Organizations often hold important knowledge across many people and roles.
Facilitation and research help bring those insights together so groups can recognize
patterns, identify possibilities, and make informed decisions.
Envisioning BIPOC Leadership Futures
At the Early Childhood Leaders of Color R.E.S.T. Conference, I co-designed and facilitated a learning session focused on imagining new models of BIPOC leadership solidarity.
Participants reflected on experiences navigating cultural dominant organizational culture and explored the ancestral, cultural, and community knowledge shaping their leadership.
Through storytelling and creative foresight activities, including drawing, collage, and narrative reflection, participants imagined what BIPOC leadership solidarity might look like in the year 2035.
The session helped participants articulate new leadership possibilities rooted in cultural wealth and collective care. Conference organizers later expressed interest in extending the work into a curriculum for leadership development.
Centering Community Voice in Philanthropic Strategy
A national early childhood foundation sought to create a new funding stream grounded in equity and community knowledge.
Over nine months, I partnered with the foundation to identify participants representing educators, families, researchers, and policymakers. We designed a two-day convening that intentionally addressed power dynamics while creating space for collaborative design.
Through structured dialogue and small-group activities, participants generated priorities for the new funding initiative, including stronger family voice, flexible experimentation, and community-driven innovation.
The foundation used these insights to launch a new funding stream informed directly by community perspectives.
Reimagining the Child Care Ecosystem Through Design Research
In collaboration with IDEO.org, I contributed design research for a project exploring what a transformed child care ecosystem could look like.
The work involved investigating structural barriers within the current child care system and helping generate insights that could inform a future-focused advocacy and organizing tool. Drawing on interviews, collaborative analysis, and design sessions, our team translated research findings into a virtual prototype representing a reimagined child care ecosystem.
The prototype was designed to help advocates, organizers, and policy leaders visualize how child care systems might better support families, providers, and communities.
Through this work, I helped bridge research, systems thinking, and design practice to support new ways of imagining—and communicating—possibilities for early childhood systems change.
I bring more than twenty years of experience as a social worker working at the intersection of research, practice, and systems change.
My work includes:
• Certified professional facilitator
• Community-engaged and participatory research across multiple national projects
• Evaluation leadership for large-scale initiatives in early childhood systems and family support
• Design and facilitation of learning communities, leadership programs, and multi-stakeholder convenings
Across these roles, I have collaborated with foundations, community organizations, researchers, and public leaders to design processes that generate both insight and action.
Each project begins with a conversation about your goals, the questions you want to explore, and the people who need to be involved.
From there, we design a facilitation or research process that fits your context.
Engagements may include:
• Single convenings or retreats
• Multi-session design processes
• Research or evaluation projects
• Longer-term learning partnerships
Project fees depend on scope and complexity.
Inquiries
Organizations interested in facilitation, design research, or evaluation partnerships are welcome to get in touch to discuss potential collaborations.
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