Giving the community a LIFT: How local nonprofit leaders are building bonds and working together

On a sidewalk canvas in the Gas South District in Duluth, colorful scenes began to emerge as chalk artists of all ages competed to create works of temporary art.

The first Draw the District: A Chalk Arts Festival was underway, and soon, roaming community judges would select the winners. Families and neighbors came to watch their creations take shape and to enjoy the artist market, food trucks and other performances happening around them.

It was a vibrant atmosphere in early March that brought the community together — born from a conversation over a cup of coffee just a few months prior.

The Executive Director of the Sugarloaf Community Improvement District, Alyssa Davis, and Laura Ballance, the executive director of the nonprofit The Hudgens Center for Art and Learning in Duluth, were discussing ways they could collaborate.

“We were talking about what each of us could bring and who else we could bring to the table to really make it impactful as a benefit and engagement opportunity — something enriching and fun and a healthy creative outlet for the community,” Ballance said.

They immediately brought in Chris Cannon, the executive director of Create Gwinnett, a nonprofit that works to elevate arts and creativity as an economic driver in Gwinnett County, to help too.

As part of its mission, Sugarloaf CID coordinates infrastructure and beautification projects funded by commercial property owners in and around the Gas South District. The Hudgens Center is a nonprofit arts center that focuses on visual and fine arts education, exhibitions and therapeutic arts outreach.

Their collaboration grew from a program the three directors were in together — a year-long executive leadership coaching group offered through the Community Foundation for Northeast Georgia called Leadership Impact for Transformation (LIFT). 

LIFT’s guided exercises and weekly conversations facilitated by Linnea Miller have each cohort focus on interpersonal dynamics, communication styles and voice.

“LIFT is grounded in a belief that if we invest in leaders, they will run more effective and sustainable organizations,” Miller said. “They will be able to achieve greater impact in their missions, which will make them more attractive for donors to invest in.”

Cannon said he initially was skeptical about joining the program. In addition to his work as a full-time potter, he started with Create Gwinnett about a year and a half ago and is navigating the organization through a rebuilding phase that demands much of his time and attention. Other leadership programs he’s done didn’t provide the payoff they promised, and with very little free time, he needed to know it would be worth it. He was hoping LIFT would help him network with other community organizations. 

It turned out to be so much more. 

“The value has been just exponential,” Cannon said. “[Linnea is] just a master of understanding how people interact with each other and figuring out how to do that in a better way. So much of the conversation and the work through the program is focused on how we’re interacting with the world around us, but really, the end of every tool or concept that she’s presenting, it comes back to yourself. It’s self-reflection and just understanding how you’re doing it and how you’re operating. It’s been a really enlightening experience.”

Davis said LIFT was a reflective experience, helping her understand her own voice and how she processes things and how that relates to others’ perspectives. 

“We get so caught up in our day-to-day, and this program has been really helpful to take a step back and think about how we work together,” she said. “It makes you more empathetic in how you treat other people.”

Ballance found that LIFT stretched her understanding of what leadership training could be, how she communicates both within her organization and outside it, and how other nonprofit leaders share more similarities than differences.

“It’s become such an intimate group,” Ballance said. “[We got into] some very mindful, thought-provoking items that live well outside that typical circle of professional development, but doing so with other nonprofit leaders and getting to know them better too — it’s been a fantastic opportunity.”

Because of their proximity to each other and organizational missions that aligned in certain areas, all three leaders had been in each other’s orbit, but the relationships had been professional. 

The LIFT experience changed that.

“There’s a certain rawness to interpersonal conversations that you typically don’t get in the business community,” Cannon said. “Over the course of this program, we developed a level of trust with each other that we would have gotten in no other way, because we understand and see each other in very different lights.”

“It’s created a platform for us to really effectively communicate and engage with each other, and bring some of these loftier ideas into reality through collaboration,” Ballance said.

Each leader said the benefits of LIFT extend beyond the partnerships formed through the cohort. They’re bringing the lessons learned back to their teams.

Davis, who is the first full-time director of Sugarloaf CID and has only one other employee, said LIFT has made their day-to-day interactions more fruitful. 

“It’s been helpful for personal introspection, my voice relating to others and developing leadership in another person,” Davis said.

“I think each one of us suffers from imposter syndrome on some level,” Ballance said, “and just talking about these things more openly and candidly, and knowing that they don’t have to be scary things to talk about, really has brought our team closer where we’re trusting each other more.”

For Cannon, the program allowed him to take a step back “to really gain some renewed comfort in the way that I’m interacting with people.”

Each of them sees future collaborations — including bringing back the chalk art festival. They have already partnered together on public art installations and decorative crosswalks in the district.

Beyond funding, LIFT is just one of many ways CFNEG connects organizations and builds stronger nonprofit leaders.

“They are the glue that brings the nonprofit community together and makes these things possible where we don’t exist in silos,” Ballance said.

While creations like the chalk art may be temporary, the bonds and community CFNEG is helping form are anything but. 

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LIFT is a yearlong leadership development program designed to foster deeper self-awareness, stronger communication and meaningful connection among nonprofit leaders. 

While the guided coaching and cohort experience span one year, the relationships and collaboration it sparks often continue well beyond the program itself. To learn more about joining the next LIFT cohort, contact Linnea Miller at linnea@longtableconsulting.com