Transform your leadership and your impact in just 5 minutes per week. Join Maya and thousands of underrepresented social impact leaders for practical tips and insights on leadership, power, and social impact centering women of the global majority.
The engine behind the mission (+ your Jan 8 workshop is live)
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The Engine Behind the Mission (and your January workshop is live!) β±οΈ Reading time: 5 minutes Welcome to my weekly newsletter where I share insights and advice from my experience as a woman of color leader championing values-driven leadership and preparing for the future of social impact. In today's letter:
π 1. The Engine Behind the MissionMost nonprofits don't struggle because their mission is unclear. They struggle because the engine behind the mission was never grounded in their reality. That's the central argument of The Engine Behind the Mission by Charles Kojo Vandyck β a book written for organisations across the Global Majority navigating shrinking resources, burnout, and inherited systems that don't fit. When Charles first asked me to write the foreword, I hesitated. I'd spent decades watching local expertise sidelined while imported models are celebrated. But this book is different. It directly names that problem and offers something rare: practical, culturally grounded frameworks for reimagining how organisations actually work. One framework that changed how I see organisational burnout: The Organisational DrumbeatMany organisations don't struggle because people lack commitment. They struggle because different parts move at different speeds. β Programmes respond in days. So staff spend their energy absorbing the gaps between those rhythms. The solution isn't more pressure β it's alignment. Charles' Organisational Drumbeat framework helps you name the dominant rhythm of the work, then redesign approvals, decision rights, and expectations to match it. When pace is aligned, burnout drops without asking people to "try harder." Once you see the rhythm, you can't unsee it. The book also introduces:
Strong, locally rooted systems aren't bureaucracy β they're liberation work. π Get the book: https://amzn.to/4q5Qcnvβ π± Go deeper: Charles will join us as a guest speaker inside Flourish Fellowship, where we'll unpack these frameworks live and explore what organisational sovereignty looks like in practice. π 2. Still Time to Enter: $15 Coaching Session RaffleI mentioned this last week, but it's too meaningful not to share again. A collective of social impact coaches including myself and led by Julia Firestone, are raising funds for Palestinian children through PCRF β and you could win a coaching session for just a $15 donation. Every contribution matters. Every entry counts. All proceeds go directly to children who need it. To enter: π Donate: give.pcrf.net/coachesforpcrf If you win and don't need the session, you can gift it to someone who does. πΏ 3. Still Looking for My Co-FounderThe search continues β and I've made peace with that. βFearless is looking for a co-founder with startup or entrepreneurial experience who loves operations, thinks in systems, and leads from values rather than metrics. I've stopped treating this like a deadline-driven hiring process. The right partnership is worth waiting for, worth getting right. If you know someone who might be a fit, I'm grateful for introductions. And if you've been considering it yourself, let's talk! π 4. Workshop #1 is LIVE - Save Your Spot!From Reactive to Strategic: Your 2026 Leadership Reset π Thursday, January 8, 2026β If 2025 felt like constant reacting β crises, urgency, emotional labor, "do more with less" β that wasn't a personal failure. It was a nervous system response to sustained pressure. And most leadership spaces never name that. This FREE 90-minute interactive workshop is for women of color and marginalized leaders who want to shift from survival mode into strategic, grounded leadership β without hustle culture or burnout. You'll leave with: β³ Your 2025 nervous system pattern (fight/flight/freeze/fawn/grounded) This space is especially for leaders in social impact, nonprofit, humanitarian, and mission-driven work β particularly those navigating systems that were never built with them in mind. All are welcome. π Register here: https://lu.ma/wnbqrqtpβ Spots are capped to keep the experience grounded and participatory. You don't need more willpower. You need a plan your nervous system can actually sustain. If someone you know has been carrying too much this year, please share this with them. Leadership doesn't have to be lonely. 𧑠A word as we close out the yearThe end of December holds a lot. Maybe you're feeling the quiet relief of a year ending. Maybe you're navigating grief β personal or collective. Maybe you're in the middle of celebration, or exhaustion, or both at once. All of it is valid. All of it is real. Whatever you're carrying right now, I hope you're finding moments to rest. To notice what held you through this year. To honor what you let go of, and what's still asking for your attention. You've done enough. You are enough. And if 2025 asked more of you than you had to give β you're not alone in that. Many of us are feeling it too. As you move into the new year, I hope you do it with a little more gentleness toward yourself. A little more clarity about what truly matters. And a little more trust that you don't have to have it all figured out. That's what we're building together β spaces where we can lead from wholeness, not hustle. I'm grateful you're here. Warmly, P.S. Flourish Fellowship opens February 1st β a space designed exactly for this kind of supported, grounded leadership. Last chance to join as co-creator: Dec 31 If something in this letter landed for you, you might be exactly who we're gathering for. Did a friend forward you this email? Subscribe. Don't want to hear from me again? Unsubscribe. Something less permanent? Update your email preferences. |
Fearless
Transform your leadership and your impact in just 5 minutes per week. Join Maya and thousands of underrepresented social impact leaders for practical tips and insights on leadership, power, and social impact centering women of the global majority.
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