Leading a ground-up transformation is hard. Coming into an organization and doing it as an outsider is even harder. The challenge of forging relationships, understanding the community, and fostering a change in culture and mission is difficult enough when the stakeholders know you. That challenge when you’re a newcomer? Monumental. Yet that’s exactly where this episode’s guest found herself.
In this episode, we’re talking with Dr. Cynthia Croom, Executive Director of the Metro Action Commission (MAC) in Nashville, Tennessee. Dr. Croom was charged with turning MAC around, and transforming the organization to “break the cycle of poverty in our community.” Cynthia and all the people in the organization had to reinvent their services and programs, collaborate in new ways, and most importantly – grow their capacity to sustain long-term innovation and change.