Robb School Memorial Fund
Donate now to support the families and community affected by the tragedy at Robb Elementary School. All donations will be held locally at First State Bank of Uvalde through the Robb School Memorial Fund. LEARN MORE >
Robb School Memorial Fund
Donate now to support the families and community affected by the tragedy at Robb Elementary School. All donations will be held locally at First State Bank of Uvalde through the Robb School Memorial Fund. LEARN MORE >
Suzanne Smith, MBA | Founder & CEO, Social Impact Architects
Join nonprofit futurist and professor Suzanne Smith as she dives into mega-trends changing the nonprofit space locally and abroad:
Catherine Ashton | Founder & CEO, Giant Squid Group, LLC
Syndey Stoudmire | Director of Partnerships, Giant Squid Group, LLC
As nonprofit leaders and fundraisers, we strive for systemic change and unwavering work towards our mission, vision, and goals. But the systems in which we work can distract (and even detract) from working in alignment with our values. The end result is a fundraising, leadership, and organizational culture that is performative, reactive, and transactional — not intentional and relational. This master class explores how when we work in integrity with our core values, we foster more robust fundraising, stronger leadership, and a more resilient organization that’s able to enact transformative change. During the workshop, participants explore why it can be a radical organizational and personal shift to move away from the fundraising “hustle,” and how white supremacy culture characteristics (perfectionism, urgency, quantity over quality, and more) can make this culture shift even more challenging.
Dhriti Stocks, PhD, CFRE | Senior Director of Development, Girl Scouts of Northeast Texas
This master class will cover positive change management — how to effectively manage change within your organization, develop shared language, and ensure successful change in leadership from the top down and the bottom up. If you are an individual interested in moving your organization to the next level, this presentation is for you. Attendees will have the opportunity to learn about the four-room change model, explore their immunities to change, and learn about the importance of adaptive leadership in changing times. Attendees in this Master Class will learn:
Colton Strawser, PhD, CFRE | President, Colton Strawser Consulting
Increasingly, nonprofits are being called upon by their stakeholders to provide “proof” that their programs are successful. In addition, organizations must demonstrate need and share how their program will address this clearly defined need. While most nonprofit leaders agree that collecting data and measuring success is important, the ability to clearly define needs and document tangible outcomes remains elusive for many organizations. Building on an established program planning framework, participants will learn how to:
Jennifer Richardson | Founder & CEO, Spark Coaching & Consulting
A brand advocacy program helps an organization re-engage its current resources and expand its existing resources. Equipping nonprofits with the resources and knowledge of how to develop brand advocacy programs can change the trajectory of your organization. This master class will equip and empower nonprofits with a low-cost marketing strategy built around using their current resources. Brand advocacy programs help organizations expand brand awareness at a cost that is a fraction of traditional advertising. Participants in this session will learn how to:
KEYNOTE ADDRESS
Tuesday, February 28 | 9:15-9:35 AM
Tracy Spears, CSP | Founder, Exceptional Leaders Lab
KEYNOTE ADDRESS
Tuesday, February 28 | 9:35-9:55 AM
Froswa’ Booker-Drew, PhD | President & Founder, Soulstice Consultancy and R2 Foundation
KEYNOTE ADDRESS
Tuesday, February 28 | 9:55-10:15 AM
Krissie Marty | Associate Artistic Director and Director of Community Collaborations, Forklift Danceworks
Francis Rodriguez | Choreographer & Teaching Artist, Forklift Danceworks
Phillipa Williams | Founder & Executive Director, ilooklikeLOVE, Inc.
The builder can’t be left behind. If a founder’s passion and purpose becomes disengaged from the work, it can create a functional yet disabled (or dying) individual and organization. As we move into the next dimension of service in Texas, it is critical that we provide a safe space where personal reconstruction for founders can begin. This session is an interactive deep-dive designed to ignite and facilitate the process of individual core value assessment for nonprofit founders having served and survived a pandemic culture. Designed as a framework for personal value rebuilding, participants will complete a Core Health Assessment that answers four questions:
Paulina Artieda | Executive Director, The New Philanthropists
Mando Rayo | Co-Founder & Managing Director, The New Philanthropists
The New Philanthropists (TNP) is an organization that focuses on helping nonprofit boards become more diverse, equitable and inclusive. TNP invites you to this engaging session that focuses on the current state of nonprofit boards, why better boards matter, redefining recruitment processes and the preliminary questions to ask, actions to take and planning to activate in order to begin your journey into building a more representative board of the community your organization serves.
Felicia Bell, BA, MPA | Member Experience Specialist, Communities In Schools of Central Texas
Amanda Miller | Impact Officer, Communities in Schools of Central Texas
As nonprofits, we strive to center our clients in the work we do, passing resources, time, energy and effort forward to the communities we serve. Critical collaboration takes time, energy, and effort – when we ‘waste’ precious time talking about the issues at hand, we worry that we aren’t doing enough fast enough. This deep-dive session is built as a modeled structure for critical collaboration and decision-making shared around a value system or goal. First, participants will learn the framework for critical collaboration, then walk through a dynamic scenario where they will practice the framework in small groups. Participants will walk away with these tangible strategies:
Jessica Davison | Director of Learning, Analytics and Compliance, United Way of Greater Houston
Nonprofits in the social service sector often have a wealth of data at their fingertips, including data tied directly to the services they provide, fundraising efforts and communities they support. Through a participatory approach, this deep-dive session will outline the steps to a successful data conversation that moves into action with different audiences and stakeholders. From small or grassroots to multi-million-dollar organizations, there is opportunity to reexamine and redefine what we do with data after it is collected. Through data conversations, we can leverage a collective perspective sharing approach to identify and implement actions that deliver greater impact. Participants will gain the following from attending this session:
Rebecca Rodriguez | Principal Consultant, For the Philanthropist
The theme of this session is to inspire, re-energize, and re-engage leadership/front-line staff and those associated with an organization. Attendees will be provided actionable, valuable information on the five operational points. Attendees will get a brief overview of the lifecycle of a nonprofit: each stage will be identified and stage one – start-up will be the focus of this presentation. Attendees will hear and learn about what makes the start-up stage of the nonprofit cycle great, which sometimes does not feel so great and can be excruciatingly painful (the bad and the ugly). Topics include:
Natalie Rodgers | Co-Founder & DEI Consultant, The Acacia Company
This session will allow participants to workshop how to create an intentional and sustainable DEI strategy for their organization based on The Acacia Company’s framework of the Stages of DEI Development. The framework includes elements such as: insights about an organization’s current state, how to evolve through the stages, mindset to have for each stage, metrics and measures of success to track, where to invest resources, projects and initiatives to start, what to watch out for as you progress, and most importantly, how to center equity at every stage. You will leave with resources, tips, and actions specific to nonprofits that will help you advance DEI and run your organizations more efficiently and sustainably. In this session, attendees will:
Daisy Han, EdM, MA | CEO, Embracing Equity
Rashi Jawade, Esq | Chief Strategy Officer, Embracing Equity
In this interactive session, you will get to experience for yourself what a culture of belonging feels like. Participants will walk away from this session with ways of working that support and hold each team member compassionately accountable to our culture and our values for diversity, equity, and inclusion. We will be learning by doing and you will leave this session with concrete ways to apply this knowledge to your unique context and community. Attendees will gain:
Dulari Gandhi | CEO, D. Gandhi Communications
This breakout session will help organizations create strategic communications that support brand awareness and fundraising by positioning their organizations in the best possible light, with the most accurate data, and with brand discipline. The session will include an overview of strengths-based communications that appeal to funders, an opportunity for attendees to think critically about their own organizations’ communications capacity and processes, and an overview of tools and guidelines to help organizations move forward with a refreshed vision of communications goals and objectives.
Nick Nelson | Senior Vice President, Edelman
Keith Shaw, MS, SHRM-SCP | Chief Engagement Officer, Leadership and Personal Development Academy
Leadership is more important today than ever. Everything rises and falls on leadership, so connection and influence have a direct impact on organizational success and the retention of our valuable workforce. In this session, attendees are educated regarding key fundamentals of leadership, the importance of being intentional about growth, how their personal development ties to their responsibilities as a leader and the 10 Influential Behaviors of Extraordinary Leadership are revealed as methods that accelerate connection, trust, confidence and engagement. These components are brought to life with stories, statistics and examples from real life experiences, and accompanied with challenges for the attendees to reflect upon and take action. Participants will leave with:
Jessica Gruber | Founder, Buzzworks Creations
We often think our supporters are rational thinkers, but they aren’t – they are emotional thinkers. A story secures that emotional connection between you, your volunteers, donors, foundations, and clients. They are the core of our communication to paramount our mission, values, who we are, and how we work and integrate with our community. And it’s the narrative of these stories that keep supporters returning for more — to make them want to be a part of your world. To make them want to be part of the change. In this session, attendees will gain the following:
Jennifer Alexander, PhD | Associate Professor, University of Texas at San Antonio
Kandyce Fernandez, PhD | Assistant Professor, University of Texas at San Antonio
Robbie Robinchau | Assistant Professor, The Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University
Elizabeth Searing, PhD, CNP | Assistant Professor, University of Texas at Dallas
Alyssa Studer | CONNECT Program Manager, RGK Center for Philanthropy & Community Service, LBJ School of Public Affairs, The University of Texas at Austin
Kenneth Taylor | Assistant Professor of the Practice, Texas A&M University
This presentation discusses ways that nonprofit community members can engage with universities to access resources and build nonprofit capacity. We have assembled representatives from four different universities to talk about different approaches that the audience may not have heard about, such as research fellowships, service-learning projects, and executive and continuing education. Attendees will gain knowledge of the many different ways that universities can assist in providing skill development and capacity building beyond the traditional paths of volunteers and interns. This includes not only knowledge of what those options are, but also whom they could contact, potential timelines, and how to manage expectations and relationships.
Q. Olivia Rivers | CEO, The Bridge Over Troubled Waters, Inc.
While it is easy for us to point out all the things that make the generations different, it is imperative to overcome the challenges that this may present in the workplace to ensure full engagement. In this session, generational diversity will be the focus with an in-depth discussion on the benefits of promoting a generationally diverse organization, and the unfortunate consequences of not implementing these spaces. Participants will engage in conversation on the future of the job market, identify ways to curate an environment that is multigenerational, and partake in generational activities that can be leaders in the real world.
Ann Ranson | President, Bottom Line 3 Marketing, Inc.
As nonprofit and community leaders you face many challenges including open positions, turnover, and lack of engagement, all of which diminish your ability to deliver on your mission. Yet those you serve need you at your best and building a culture of hope is the right foundation from which to do that. Those attending this program will learn about the simple, yet effective ways to create, activate, and maintain a strategy of hope that can ripple through your organization, building momentum as it goes. A HOPE strategy is something you can do right now, but will improve engagement. Attendees will:
Noel Landuyt, PhD | Director & Adjunct Assistant Professor, Steve Hicks School of Social Work, The University of Texas at Austin
Sarah Jane Rehnborg | Principal Investigator for Index of Volunteer Engagement, RGK Center for Philanthropy & Community Service, The University of Texas at Austin
This session is for leaders seeking knowledge about the connection between organizational strategies to engage the community and mission impact. Results of a recently relaunched national Index of Volunteer Engagement (a research-based organizational self-assessment tool) will be shared and discussed with participants. Attendees will gain an academic perspective and analysis of a new national dataset of nonprofits taking a research-based tool to measure how effectively their organization engages volunteers. It will allow attendees to re-engage with their own work through the lens of learning what researchers currently see happening in the field.
Karen Ranus | Trauma Informed Program Administrator, Travis County Sheriff’s Office
Mission-driven nonprofit professionals continue to push themselves to meet the needs of their communities, and burnout is on the rise. In this session, we’ll look at selfcare from as innovative, upstream solution to addressing the long-term health and wellness of nonprofit teams. We’ll explore stress and its impact. Along with simple ways for individuals and teams to manage stress with a special focus on understanding the power of self-care as a tool for both personal and professional success.
Xavier Henderson, EdM | Chief Development Officer, For Oak Cliff
Courtney Thomas, EdM, MA | Manager of Community Encouragement, For Oak Cliff
Taylor Toynes, EdM | CEO, For Oak Cliff
Staci Williams, EdD | Director of Education, For Oak Cliff
Take a deep dive into For Oak Cliff’s mission to end systemic oppression in the South Oak Cliff neighborhoods of Dallas, by creating a culture of education through arts, advocacy, and community building. For Oak Cliff, as a Black-led nonprofit, helps uplift the community through place-based work and partnerships. For individuals interested in models of place-based work with a focus on ending systemic oppression and driving liberation within a nonprofit structure. Participants will:
Katelyn Lowrey | Director of Consulting and Learning & Leadership, Mission Capital
Nonprofit infrastructure is a critical part of our social sector in Texas, providing the systems, structures, and backbone support that nonprofits need to be resilient and sustainable. In 2022, Mission Capital partnered with national firm the Building Movement Project to support a national survey of nonprofit infrastructure needs, with a special focus here in Central Texas. This data can play a crucial role across Texas, and in Central Texas specifically, helping funders and intermediaries understand the critical backbone support nonprofits need and helping nonprofits advocate for the services they deserve. In this interactive presentation, Mission Capital will share findings from national and regional survey data and how findings will impact our programs and services in the coming year.
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