Lizann is an organization development consultant working with nonprofit boards and community groups on strategic planning, board development, organizational assessment and capacity-building, workshops, retreat facilitation, leadership coaching, staff development, founder and executive transitions, strakeholder engagement processes, community needs assessment, fundraising strategies for small organizations, and peer learning circles for nonprofit directors and philanthropic funders. My clients include groups in Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Washington DC.
Prior work included 15 years in public policy and state and national coalitions advocating for health and human services, including time on the staff of U.S. Senator Jacob K. Javits (R-NY). I have served on and chaired numerous nonprofit boards (including their executive, governance, and fundraising committees), and was the Board co-chair of GoodWeave International, a human rights organization using market-based strategies to end child labor in the overseas textile industry and ensuring that inspection of supply chains was fully independent.
I hold a Masters in Organization and Management from Antioch University New England, specializing in organization development and change, team-building, systems thinking, and facilitation. I am a nationally certified Core Capacity Assessment facilitator for the TCC Group in New York; former curriculum advisor to Benchmarks for Better Vermont (a federally-funded, statewide capacity-building initiative for nonprofits in Vermont); and former adjunct faculty at Marlboro College Graduate School and Antioch University New England.
Since 2012 I have worked with High 5 Adventure Center, a leadership development program through experiential education. Projects have included three cycles of strategic planning, a capital campaign case statement, organizational growth and succession planning, leadership coaching, and staff facilitation. A long-term thread has been supporting the expansion of Edge of Leadership, High 5's youth social-emotional learning program that has grown from a 1-week summer workshop to a formal part of the curriculum across the entire Keene, NH school system. (see www.high5adventure.org and www.edgeofleadership.org). Classroom curriculum and formal program evaluation was developed using a Theory of Change model.
High 5 continues to expand and deepen its programs - leadership training, social-emotional team development, professional development for teachers and adventure education practitioners, and design-build of innovative challenge courses across New England and the Mid-Atlantic.
My role as a strategic planning, visioning, and organization development facilitator continues to grow into a new phase as the scale of High 5's rapid growth and innovation bring new communication, leadership, and decision-making structures.
The project encompassed the full hiring process of developing a communications and advertising strategy, creating search materials, screening candidates, supporting the design and implementation of the interview process, and the nomination of the final candidate - a great match for the organization.