As VP of Innovation at NFP was my pleasure to empower our people to rethink the way we do business. Engaging staff requires the empathy to find mutually beneficial ways to encourage collaboration. We built products and processes, created incentives, influenced culture, and coordinated between all departments and levels of leadership. It’s a daunting challenge when you consider each piece individually, especially when you couple that with building a community of startups and clients. However, the work becomes simple when following the simple mission of making the lives of people better.

Our work at NFP incorporated insights from 30+ corporations. As CEO & Founder of ValorUp, an executive leadership coaching & training firm focused on inclusive innovation, I know that one size does not fit all. At ValorUp our goal is to support leaders in developing the perspective and knowledge to make decisions aligned with both their values and those of their organization.

This focus was born out of my time as Program Director on the Techstars Corporate Development team and founding member of the Techstars Product team. There I ran the first non-accelerator experiments. It was my job to develop & test corporate innovation structures with the likes of Mayo Clinic and various departments of the U.S. Government. This role expanded to building out and scaling a full product suite around corporate innovation and startup collaboration globally with partners including Google. Our goal was to prepare corporations to engage with startups by first teaching them to innovate themselves.

I believe large organizations are integral to providing opportunities to startups, whether as clients, a distribution channel, a strategic investor, or an exit. When these entities partner well everyone benefits.

I engage with startups for various accelerator and incubator programs globally – Founders Institute, DivInc, Impact Hub, Techstars, Patriot Bootcamp, etc. I do it because I like it. As an added benefit, it’s actually part of my job. As the VP running the NFP Innovation Lab, I actively create network connections and source startups for partnership while keeping inclusivity in mind.

Creating partnerships was a main area of focus for me as the Techstars++ Program Director on the Corporate Development Team. When I joined Techstars was 50 people strong and a startup itself in many ways. I founded and ran 6 business development/partnership programs to help startups navigate the heavily regulated industries of healthcare & US government. Corporations received training on how to work with startups & were matched with vetted startups in their key areas of interest. In the process, I took part in actively managing the portfolio of 1,000+ startups.

However, all of that was made possible by my work on the Board of Directors for the Center for Racial Justice in Education out of NYC. Exploring inequity brought me to economic development work and ultimately to startups. My first role with entrepreneurs was at a USAID incubator, Idea Tu Empresa, as part of Technoserve. My job was to train founders in a former narcotraffic area of the Peruvian Amazon to create farming co-operatives and small businesses around the supply chains of coffee and cocoa. From there I ran an incubator in NYC, training men and women who had been formerly incarcerated to transform their hustle and their lives.

Training founders to consider ethics and responsibility, on top of profits and the legality, leads to stronger, more sustainable businesses.