Community Leadership + Volunteering
AIGA National Board of Directors
Secretary // July 2021 – Present
The board of directors is an elected body that holds the institution in trust for AIGA members past, present, and future, with a guiding principle of leaving the institution stronger at the end of each director's term than it was at the beginning.
Chair, AIGA Design Operations + Management Community // Aug 2021 – Present
Launching January 2022
Board members of AIGA are committed to a variety of obligations and responsibilities including committee leadership. I am leading the formation and roadmap of AIGA’s Design Operations + Management Community - to empower design orgs to drive their teams towards professional success, career growth and practice excellence. Acting on the Design POV research and Design Futures, DOMC supports the fundamental mission of AIGA to advance design as a professional craft, strategic advantage, and vital cultural force.
Presidents Council Chair // Aug 2019 – June 2021
As Presidents Council Chair, I worked with AIGA chapter leaders by providing guidance on chapter issues, empowerment for developing leadership, and institutional knowledge from years of service in both local and national roles—all with the goal of helping set chapters up for long-term success. This is a voting position on the AIGA national board of directors.
As one of the more experienced leaders in AIGA, I acted as a bridge between the local, regional, and national levels of the organization. I support and advise the chapter leaders, the initiative leaders, the national board, and AIGA staff while being a conduit of information through various communication channels, monthly calls, and the national leadership retreat.
Additionally, I worked with national staff on initiatives like creating a leadership knowledge base, expanding chapter leader training to include nonprofit governance, and advocate for and support World Trust anti-bias training for all chapter leadership.
Main responsibilities:
Use prior experience as a chapter president to advise current chapter leaders on best practices in nonprofit governance and strategic vision
Serve as a resource for presidents when needed, listening for concerns and acting as evangelist regarding upcoming issues
Nurture cross-chapter and cross-regional connections among presidents
Gather chapter president perspectives and feedback, as well as outstanding offerings and results from chapter activities, to share with the AIGA National Board and staff
Facilitate chapter development through remote check-ins, national training events, Slack monitoring, via chapter websites/email comms as well as 1:1 discussions
Works closely with the director of chapter development to ensure that issues are being addressed, and relevant information is being communicated between chapters and the national office
Establish a theme, shape programming, and work with AIGA staff year-round to plan and organize the annual Leadership Retreat, a yearly 3-day convention of chapter leaders from all 75 chapters
Monthly responsibilities:
Set the agenda, curate, and chair monthly calls with chapter leaders
Attend all AIGA National Board meetings and Board Community Committee meetings and advocate for the local chapters, while gathering national perspectives and feedback to share with chapter leaders
Yearly commitment:
Establish a theme, shape programming, and work with AIGA staff year-round to plan and organize the annual Leadership Retreat, a yearly 3-day convention of chapter leaders from all 75 chapters
AIGA Design For Democracy
Design for Democracy is based on the premise that good design makes your choices clear. Started in 1998, AIGA’s oldest initiative has the mission to apply design tools and thinking to increase civic participation by making interactions between the government and its citizens more understandable, efficient, and trustworthy.
Chair // Feb 2020 – Present
Led two national campaigns for Get Out the Vote — both campaigns call for AIGA members across the country to design and contribute original designs to our open source library of design available to organizations to download and use to get out the vote
Devised and led the general audience campaign for Get Out the Vote
From Dec 2019 til Nov 2020, I provided advice, support and resource advocacy to the organizers of the Get Out the Vote Empowering the Women’s Vote campaign — a separate campaign commemorating the centennial anniversary of women’s suffrage // See a full write up here: www.moreactionthanartifact.design/aiga-get-out-the-vote-2020
Worked with national staff to organize webinars / programming to supplement 2020 Get Out the Vote activities, and promoted local chapter GOTV activities
Created and devised a strategic plan to transform the Design for Democracy initiative to better support AIGA’s mission and values
Cochair Activities // Dec 2017 – Feb 2020
Advised and led the 2018 Get Out the Vote initiative which was created in partnership with Nonprofit VOTE, and supported the implementation of the grant from the National Endowment of the Arts
Advised on main direction of the project, functioning as a knowledge expert, providing background on past related research
Focused on chaperoning chosen chapters and their engagement with partnering nonprofits to concept and strategize local programming and enhance the communication of their project internally and externally
Helped execute a call for members to design and contribute original designs to our open source library ahead of the 2018 election
See the full write-up here: moreactionthanartifact.design/aiga-get-out-the-vote-2016
Committee Member // Feb 2016 – Dec 2016
Collaborated and contributed to the 2016 Get Out the Vote initiative and its traditional call for posters from members
Worked with committee to create a Design for Democracy toolkit for chapter leaders to use for programming ideas and direction
Created an online toolkit to replace the standard PDF - including design, copy, structure and programming of the website
Presented the toolkit to national leadership
Helped promote the traveling exhibit
AIGA National Committees
AIGA EMERGE 2.0 // Facilitator and Brand Design Lead // Sep 2017 — Sep 2019
In July 2017, AIGA EMERGE and AIGA's Diversity & Inclusion Task Force partnered to grow and expand EMERGE programming to reach new and existing audience with a focus on diversity and inclusion. EMERGE 2.0 provided inclusive strategies that enable underrepresented groups and give all emerging designers the opportunity to flourish. The unified effort would culminate in AIGA's 2018 EMERGE Awareness Week taking place across all chapters Sep 24 - Oct 3 2018.
Over a 9 month period, a diverse team of AIGA leadership across the country,used virtual tools to coordinate our teams to collaborate towards a solid 30/60/90 strategic plan to empower chapters to engage their communities in EMERGE Awareness week.
We started with 28 chapter leaders during 2 virtual workshops that concluded in December 2017, followed by 5 months of virtual collaboration and delivery by development teams to reinvent the brand and create the playbook to share out to every AIGA chapter.
Facilitated the foundation workshops and directed and advised my assigned group’s activities before, during, in-between both workshops
Led team to distill the insights found, and formulate ideas into 30/60/90 day plans to populate the EMERGE Awareness Week (and general programming) playbook
Lead the Brand team to create a new brand, brand assets, templates and digital brand guide to inform chapters on how to execute the new EMERGE brand for better organizational alignment
Between Jan and Jun 2018, we met weekly via Zoom to share progress and collaborate towards a cohesive, purposeful and powerful new brand to support our chapters and leadership. As brand team lead I provided the framework, platform and guidance for our team while collaborating with the other team leads to align all of our efforts around our unified purpose.
AIGA 2017 National Leadership Retreat Planning Committee // Host City Organizer + Creative Lead // Sep 2016 — Jun 2017
AIGA’s leadership retreat is an annual convention that brings leaders from each chapter together to celebrate chapter successes, grow the leadership community and build the leadership skills of chapter board members to set them up for success running their chapter in their local communities. In 2017, Dallas hosted over 200 chapter leaders from across the country for 3 days in downtown Dallas. Starting in 2016, I worked with AIGA national staff and the AIGA DFW board to plan and organize the retreat. My part included:
Remote collaboration with the AIGA staff on a monthly basis from September to March; weekly from April to June.
Designing all retreat materials and sourcing and creative directing their production locally
Creating, designing and writing content for the online guide to Dallas
Finding and recruiting the opening session inspiration keynote speaker
Finding, pricing and recruiting options for closing party entertainment, last minute (2 weeksbefore the event)
AIGA DFW Board of Directors
President // Jun 2013 – Jun 2016
Vice President // Dec 2011 – Jun 2013
Communications Director // May 2011 – Aug 2013
When I joined the AIGA DFW board in May 2011, I came on as Communication Director, and was tasked to help grow our reach and engagement through our event communications as well as to create a system of communications tools and processes to support the numerous events our board concepted and orchestrated during our 2011-2012 season. Within 6 months of joining the board, I was elected to Vice President and served both roles until Summer 2013 after recruiting more board members.
During the first two years of my tenure on the AIGA DFW board, we grew our membership from 150 - 225 by creating more focused programming born from membership interviews and affinity leadership. During my presidential term, we grew that membership to between 375-390 members and our bank balance from $7,000 to $20,000.
Highlights:
Chaired AIGA DFW’s Design Weeks for 2012 and 2013 — both of which we were able to secure venues for free, being given access to prepare and use each venue for the full month; our 2012
Design Week had 12 events over 5 days, our 2013 Design Week had 23 events over 6 days
During my first year on the board, we grew our event count from 3-4 events per year to 2-3 events per month
Organized and led chapter leadership retreat / quarterlies during my second year as vice president until my last year as president - this included securing donated locations from community connections, writing / assembling preparation materials, day-of retreat materials and activities and that year’s onboarding kit for new and continuing board members
Spearheaded and led AIGA DFW’s inclusion into GOOD magazine’s GOOD Ideas for Cities; a program that brought citizens together to brainstorm and execute plans to fix / address problems in Dallas — GOOD helped to bring the organizations that needed help, and AIGA DFW brought the teams together to create proposals — which were presented after 2 months of collaboration
Created programming and fostered partnerships that celebrated and brought the local design community together and grew awareness of AIGA DFW and its mission and values within the broader Dallas community
Chaired : 2011 Kick Off Party, 2011 Creative Flea, 2012 DFW Women In Design Exhibition and Interview Series, 2012 Design Week, 2012 DFW Design For Good + GOOD Ideas For Cities, 2012 Kick Off Party, 2012-13 CD/AM (creative director breakfasts), 2012-15 Seasoned Pros Series (Volume 1, 2 & 3), 2012-14 Pecha Kucha(s), 2013 Creative Flea, 2013 Design Week, 2014 Mentor Matchmaking, 2014 DFW Texas Show Chair, 2014-16 Womens Leadership Initiative, 2015 Kick Off Party