Susan Misra’s life purpose is to work with advocates and activists to actualize their visions and values of justice and equity in their relationships, structures, and work today. She has over 20 years of experience in developing equitable, sustainable organizations and networks for movement building. For funders, Susan has designed, managed, and evaluated capacity building and grantmaking initiatives on a range of topics such as strengthening senior leadership and fundraising of grassroots organizations, diversifying audiences and increasing the financial resilience of arts organizations, and developing equitable and sustainable business models for intermediaries. For nonprofits, Susan has worked with over 250 organizations and networks on complex strategic planning, leadership development (including executive coaching, shared leadership, leadership teams, and board development), organizational restructuring and culture change, and financial sustainability. For both funders and nonprofits, Susan leads inclusive, participatory, and analytically rigorous processes.
Susan is also a thought leader who generates innovative ideas and works with others to turn them into reality. For complex and emergent systems change, Susan developed the “Systems Grantmaking Resource Guide,” has coached philanthropists on investing in movement building, co-wrote “Influencing Complex Systems Change,” and worked with community leaders on equitable systems change. For shared leadership, Susan has modeled shared leadership as a CoDirector at Change Elemental, co-wrote “Doing More with More: Putting Shared Leadership into Practice” and “Emergent Coaching: Becoming Nimble in Complex Times,” and has guided many networks and organizations on developing leaderful cultures and structures. For strengthening organizations, Susan helped develop the Core Capacity Assessment Tool as an Associate Director at TCC Group, advised on integrating equity and networked ways of working into the Organizational Mapping Tool, and is co-writing a forthcoming publication on capacities for building community power that advance equitable systems and inner transformation.
Susan received a Master’s in Public Policy from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a B.S. in Psychology from Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon. She has been trained in transformational consulting, emergent and peer coaching, and diversity and equity facilitation. When not working, you can find Susan volunteering her time on local economic justice and political campaigns and reading revolutionary young adult fiction.