Bringing the joy
Making your meeting facilitation sparkle and your policies work for you. Upping your skills and the care you bring to mundane processes. Helping you design and run a retreat, facilitating a meeting so everyone can participate fully or identifying the things holding your business back. These are some of the many things I can do for/with you.
Tiny projects and big projects are all welcome.
I have experience and skills specific to worker-owned cooperatives and consumer cooperatives, but I will work with any business, non-profit, or organizing group doing good in the world.
Let’s Get Going
Facilitation
Do you want to make your meetings less boring, more productive and just plain better? I design day long retreats to build community and expand skill bases. I can also train your team to use tools and strategies to make regular meetings more fun, productive and human oriented. And if you really want to dig in, strategic planning doesn’t have to be terrible.
Cooperative COnversions
I can help you make a conversion happen whether you’re retiring after years of building your business or you just started out and want to create your business in the cooperative model. We’ll work on skills, build policies, write bylaws and understand financial statements.
Conundrums
Conflict in the workplace, dealing with feelings at work, power imbalances, founders syndrome, community fissures and anytime you need a person with different experiences to be a sounding board to help you see the path forward, I’m happy to help.
Systems & Structures
I can help you design policies that center the experience of the humans, troubleshoot dysfunctional systems, and build decision making structures that work for everyone. You can integrate DEI into everything, but have you done the work yet?
“Annie was adept at working with our group and keeping the laughter going while helping us dig into the questions we had regarding how to improve our facilitation skills in a school setting. The workshop was crafted to our needs and I appreciated the way that Annie listened to the participants and helped us build a small community during the workshop. Annie was skilled at breaking down the complex ideas into small parts that were easier to work with. We walked away with some new tricks and, more importantly, a renewed sense that building community was essential for us as a team. My only regret is that we did not invite Annie back later in the year to follow up and help us reflect. I think that would have been a valuable place to dig in deeper.”
—Mary P., teacher, Somerville, MA
“Annie has worked as an advisor to Bread & Roses Digital since 2021, guiding us in our transition to a worker cooperative. Their real world experience and expertise on conversions, governance and accountability come through not just their experience with Real Pickles, but through the breadth of examples from their work supporting other cooperatives. Annie has brought kindness, patience, humor, and a real commitment to equity to every conversation. We’re so grateful for their guidance, and would wholly recommend them!”
—Lance T., Bread and Roses Digital
“Collaborating with Annie was a joyful and educational experience. The depth of their technical knowledge and toolset was made even more impactful through the human-centered lens that informed what we did with the information. They encouraged participants to go deeper, in order to understand the roots of conflict and power, without forcing or requiring anyone to go beyond what felt safe. Annie expertly balances a strong political framework alongside what is actually happening amongst a group of people, in order to help everyone move forward."
—Daniel P., formerly U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives
Testimonials
I am a former worker-owner on a mission to help others build the workplaces they want — filled with care, understanding, shared power, and vision.
I am and have been a lot of things. A canoe enthusiast and recent convert to dragon boat racing. A goofy camp counselor. An environmental and classroom educator of middle schoolers. A musician. A lover of cats and dogs.
I spent 12 years working at Real Pickles Cooperative where I was part of the team that led the business conversion from an LLC to a worker-owned cooperative. Over that time, I was a Production Assistant, HR Manager, IT Manager, Production Manager and the founding board president for five years and dealt with all of the challenges that exist in those domains.
I have a deep and long appreciation for the work of bell hooks and Paolo Freire and base the work I do with all humans on their foundations. You may know it better as popular education. I also use a DEI lens in all of the work that I do, centering the experiences of those who have been de-centered for far too long.