“Gillian is a force of nature. She facilitated our organization’s 5 year strategic planning and organizational restructuring process across four offices and also met a tight deadline to prepare corporate accountability video and training materials for campaigners and lawyers. Her vision, intuition and ability to stimulate energy and creativity were all important for us.”
Daniel King, former Mekong Legal Director, EarthRights International
“During my tenure as board member for Global Witness, I had the honor of having a front row seat to the brilliance of Gillian’s leadership as a CEO in action. Over the course of my nearly 20 years in the non-profit and advocacy sector I’ve never seen a leader that so seamlessly was able to integrate cutting edge strategic thinking, visionary campaign planning, and exponential fundraising capacity – all while building an organizational culture of inclusion and innovation. Gillian is a true force for change, who has the rare ability to lead on multiple dimensions of organizational growth. With a deep commitment to impact and accountability, and a boundless passion and commitment for the work, Gillian in my view sets the standard for true excellence in organizational leadership and development.”
Jessy Tolkan, former Global Witness Board Member
“Gillian Caldwell is truly a rare talent. Her background, smarts, problem-solving skills, commitment to excellence, and, most of all, her understanding of people, makes her a major value-add in a number of leadership situations. Most people with such a big brain and depth of experience have trouble truly being in service of others. But Gillian thrives — leading with not only a big brain, but a big heart and commitment to helping leaders and organizations fulfill their mission and potential.”
James Rucker, Chair and Co-Founder of Color of Change
“Gillian Caldwell is a singularly strategic and knowledgeable professional who is also one of the most well-organized people with whom I’ve ever had the pleasure to collaborate.”
Elizabeth J. Letourneau, Pd.D., Johns Hopkins University
“Gillian embodies the term ‘high performer’. I’ve worked with few others who can simultaneously manage and drive a strategic vision as well as the details of execution. Gillian’s pursuit of excellence is contagious and ignites every team I’ve seen her lead to achieve bigger goals and better results. Gillian is a true partner who knows how to get her hands dirty and stand on the front lines with you if necessary.”
Michael Silberman, former Director, Mobilisation Lab, Greenpeace
“Gillian is the perfect leadership coach: she helps you work through knotty management issues while constantly moving you forward. She never sweats the small stuff, but instead helps you tackle the real challenges. She approaches coaching from her own lived experience of managing teams. This means she is able to bring unique insight and a special level of empathy that leaves you feeling immensely supported no matter how hard the work.”
Rachel Oldroyd, Executive Director, Bureau for Investigative Journalism
“Gillian’s experience as a three-time executive director was exactly the kind of expertise we needed in a consultant. Her rigorous, thorough and thoughtful approach, as well as her commitment to delivering clear, concise materials on a tight deadline made her an absolute pleasure to work with on our strategic planning.”
Janet Haven, Executive Director, Data & Society
“Having known Gillian for years, I am continually impressed by her strategic vision and her ability to translate complex and systemic issues into action-oriented and impactful plans. I have also seen her ability to effectively transform and lead teams and appreciate her ability to coach other leaders.”
Sarah Pray, Director of Advocacy, Economic Justice Program, Open Society Foundations
“Gillian guided me through a tricky professional situation by actively listening, asking the difficult questions and ensuring I came out on the other side stronger. She is committed to coaching her clients to learn in a safe and respectful environment and provides lots of really helpful tools along the way. Her own senior leadership experience makes her fully attuned to the range of challenges one faces when heading organizations and she brings her whole mind and heart into supporting her clients to thrive as social change leaders.”
Executive Coaching Client
“This team retreat was the most useful way we could have spent two days. I was actually dreading the thought of it at this busy time. A lot of what we achieved is because of the great facilitation – you are very intuitive and know when to probe and stop. It was perfect!”
Retreat Participant
“Gillian worked with the Center for Community Change for over a year in many capacities – helping design and manage our process of strategic planning and organizational change, helping conceptualize and co-facilitate all-staff retreats, and evaluating our operations team and guiding them to craft a vision for a new approach to their work. She is a quick study, a skilled facilitator with the added and unique bonus of strategic insight and experience to offer, and she has keen intuitive abilities that are critical to shepherding processes of transformation in organizational cultures. She undoubtedly helped us go further and faster than we would have without her.”
Deepak Bhargava, former Executive Director, Center for Community Change
“Gillian is a dynamo. Her strategic smarts, political saavy, thoroughness and resourcefulness make her a fabulous collaborator and co-conspirator.”
Tia Lessin, Academy Award Nominated Director of Trouble the Water
“Gillian is unique in that she possesses unbelievably varied skill sets. Bertha Philanthropies asked her to work on a strategy to launch the Bertha Foundation’s work on legal reform. Being an attorney herself and a long-time social justice advocate worldwide, she was the ideal candidate to take that on. With her laser beam focus combined with an ability to see the big picture, you can be sure she will deliver a product of the highest quality.”
Rebecca Lichtenfeld, former Media Program Director, Bertha Philanthropies
“Gillian is one of those rare people who can hold forth big vision for the world and also make sure the work happens. A visionary and a planner. A strategist and manager. It’s a rare combination, and I learned a tremendous amount from working with her.”
Natalie Foster, Co-Founder and former Executive Director, Rebuild the Dream
“Gillian has a great deal of credibility as a consultant because she’s led highly successful organizations. She has a broad toolkit, and the personal experience to know when to use what approach; she helped us choose from a range of possible tools and approaches to the strategic planning we engaged her for. I found Gillian particularly sensitive to and enlightened on the human side of change: she intuitively understands that the work we do is hard and complicated and that planning of any kind often comes on top of existing commitments and a full schedule. She helped us anticipate and navigate obstacles, and served as a thoughtful coach for me. I really enjoyed the work we did together; Gillian has a great sense of humor, a palpable sense of commitment, vast stores of energy and the smarts to make these characteristics useful to others. Gillian’s work was invaluable in getting Verité to a place of alignment and transparency beyond any we’d achieved yet.”
Dan Viederman, former CEO, Verité
“Gillian’s professional experience and expertise enables her to focus both on the inside and outside of our organization. Her feedback and advice is candid, supportive, and always on point. Her contributions have been invaluable.”
Molly Murphy, Co-Director, Working Films
