Leadership Rhode Island

Save the Date! 📆 The Board Matchmaking & Networking Event is back on Wednesday, December 4th from 5:30 pm - 7:30 pm! Whether you're eager to join a board or your organization is seeking passionate, dedicated members, this is your chance. In collaboration with United Way of Rhode Island, Social Enterprise Greenhouse, Papitto Opportunity Connection Foundation, and The Capellan Group, we’ll explore the dynamic landscape of Rhode Island’s nonprofit sector. Engage in inspiring discussions on pressing issues like education, health, environmental conservation, social justice, and more, all aimed at igniting servant leadership that will transform Rhode Island's future. Mark your calendars! 📆 We hope to see you there!

Happy 5th LRI-versary Samantha Bergbauer and Chris Donovan! 🎉 From leading our Transform RI Scholarship implementation to curating the Statewide Scavenger Hunt, you've deepened LRI's community-based initiatives with creativity and heart. Cheers to five years! 🙌

She has her eyes on everything at LRI, and ensures that our team never misses a beat. What would we do without you Joanne? Happy 10th LRI-versary as our fearless Office Manager! Thank you for your knowledge, dedication, and unwavering support to all of us. We are so grateful to have you on our team!

Leadership Rhode Island’s Core Program is the point in time when I honed in my leadership abilities. They were always there, but each session day I leaned into what felt comfortable and most especially on what didn’t. I discovered then that I will always lead with my heart first, that my experiences shaped how I showed up in professional and personal settings and I felt confident to step in that truth. I no longer felt the pressure to conform or fit in, I was excited to stand out in my own way! #ButNotForLRI, It probably would’ve taken me much longer to discover that part of me. The one that I humbly know has touched so many people in our interactions over the years and that I continue to stand in, more boldly than ever! I challenge Idrees (Lanre) Ajakaiye, Holly Ferrara, Vanessa Volz, Greg Garvin and Gloria L. Johnson to share their #ButNotForLRI experiences!

Thank you Priscilla Gonzalez-Santos for challenging me to share my #ButNotForLRI story! Leadership Rhode Island is responsible for many transformative experiences in my life: 1. When I attended the Leadership Rhode Island Core Program in 2008, fresh out of college and off the farm, I realized that though I was now "tied" to a group of amazing leaders in Rhode Island, I was also severed from the small New Hampshire farming community in which I grew up and had many generations of roots with. I experienced both the fear of being disconnected in the world and the challenge to grow roots in a new home and community. 2. In 2015, encouraged by Leadership Rhode Island, I took the CliftonStrengths assessment and discovered my Top 5 Strengths. This critical point of self-reflection has helped me lean into and leverage my strengths to take new leaps in my career and personal life. 3. From 2016-2019, when I felt like we were at risk of no longer being able to have civil disagreements with one another in this country, it was the #PublickOccurances hosted by Leadership Rhode Island & The Providence Journal, and MC'd by Mike Ritz (former ED of LRI), that instilled hope. 4. In 2020, at the outset of the COVID pandemic, I was inspired by Leadership Rhode Island to attend a National Leadership Network discussion on impacts of the pandemic in our personal lives. I shared my feeling of vulnerability and disconnection from community, place and family. After the discussion, Mike Ritz immediately called me and offered words of encouragement and compassion, something I was tremendously grateful for and touched by. I felt like someone here in my new home cared about me and was looking out for me. 5. Lastly, in 2021 when Michelle Carr, newly-appointed ED at Leadership Rhode Island, reached out to invite me to join the Board of Governors of Leadership Rhode Island, I was thrilled, given all of the above, to give back to an organization that gave so much to me. Michelle has also afforded me the opportunity to share my Place-Based Belonging story and passion with the Core Program and at the Association of Leadership Programs National Conference in 2024. #ButNotForLRI, I would still be that off-the-farm "kid", floundering about in a new world without a sense of place and belonging. For that, I am forever grateful!

Help us wish the Happiest Birthday to our wonderful Executive Director, Michelle Carr! We are so extremely lucky to have you! Thank you for all that you do to guide us in the most positive direction to transform organizations, individuals, and communities. We are so grateful for you Michelle!