Who We Are

  • We are a loose and emerging collective of individuals who are working together to shift practice in philanthropy to more effectively support leadership transitions.

  • Through our journey, we witnessed grantees moving through leadership transitions without capacity building support or the financial resources they required. 

  • It has become clear to us that when these transitions are approached with comprehensive and effective support, they have the power to invigorate and empower the organization as a whole and support the vibrancy of new leaders. Support is necessary before, during, and after transitions.

How We Work

  • Our work was shaped from the beginning by the knowledge and experience of our advisory group and a cohort of nonprofit leaders going through leadership transitions.

  • We heard directly from Black, Brown, and LGBTQIA+ leaders about the numerous challenges nonprofit leaders face when transitioning into or out of their roles. These include a lack of funding to build capacity and infrastructure, and a fundamental lack of trust. Funders often see transitions as risky and destabilizing rather than a normal part of an organization’s life cycle. 

  • We connected the dots between the racialized leadership gap in the sector, the systemic challenges, and the lack of focused support and resources for nonprofit leaders.

  • We saw an opening for a programmatic and cultural shift in philanthropy.

Thank you to our initial Nonprofit
Advisory Committee:
Chitra Aiyar
Daroneisha Duncan
Devon Turner
Elsa Bañuelos
Ofelia Bello


Thank you to current and past consultants who have supported this work!
Chitra Aiyar
Ingrid Benedict
Hana Sun
Cathy Dang
Krystal Portalatin

  • Bipasha Ray

    COORDINATOR

    Bipasha Ray is a human rights and social justice advocate with a passion for supporting the resilience and capacity of activists and movements working towards a more just and equitable society. She enjoys working with equity-minded philanthropies and nonprofits to design human-centered leadership and organizational development and fellowship programs. She has a particular interest in sustainable leadership transition support after running and learning from the New Executives Fund at the Open Society Foundations. Bipasha combines nearly 20 years of experience in political philanthropy, fiscal sponsorships, human rights, journalism, and policy research at Panorama Global, the Open Society Foundations, and The Associated Press.


  • Liz Sak

    EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CRICKET ISLAND FOUNDATION

    Liz Sak became the second Executive Director of the Cricket Island Foundation in 2008, overseeing all aspects of the Foundation’s management including finance, program development, grantmaking, and field-building. As a result of listening to CIF grantees, Liz began to reach out to colleagues to try to amplify what they were learning about funding leadership transitions.

Supporters

Are you interested in funding this work to shift practice in philanthropy?