Leadership is a journey through challenges, uncertainties and moments of growth.
WHAT WE
DO:
We guide purpose-driven leaders, teams, and organizations to realize meaningful social change.
Through a toolkit that includes strategic frameworks, fundraising, capacity building, courses, and performance assessment, our transformative approach puts your organization on the path to sustainability and resiliency.
Our services:
Coaching
Strategic support to clearly see and realize your vision as a leader
Leadership can be lonely. It doesn’t have to be. We support senior leaders in different functions and in organizations of all sizes. We will be your trusted partner helping you embrace opportunities and face challenges head on. Our certified executive coaches will work with you to forge new paths through a time-tested process: we listen to understand your context, support your self-assessment, reinforce your strengths, and help you set goals that support your growth, leaving you with a framework and tools to put new practices into place. We’ll be with you every step of the way, and it might lead somewhere unexpected.
Consulting
Strategic support to be a more innovative, efficient, and transformational organization
You or your organization may need to reset your strategic direction, overcome an internal roadblock, or create a new map to find resources to fuel your work. We will advise on program or revenue generation strategies, facilitate difficult internal discussions, or deliver a plan for effective board engagement. Our methodology helps us identify where intensive support is needed, and then we coordinate with you to map out an engagement that meets your critical needs and budget. We do the heavy lifting – but you are in the driver’s seat. Our toolkit includes leadership assessments, strategic frameworks, and organization culture assessments that help you understand what’s working, what’s not, and how to unpack and leave behind what no longer serves you.
Courses
Agile leadership in a rapidly changing workplace and dynamically changing world
The world of work is changing quickly, calling for agile leaders willing to boldly explore new personal and professional terrain. Connect with us to explore how our Trauma Informed Leadership© seminars can enable you to bring the power of knowledge plus attunement with your unique strengths and experiences to bear on the complexities of leading teams and organizations. Over the course of five sessions, we share theory alongside practical illustrations and methods, culminating in a practicum where you develop a trauma-informed project or organizational plan to integrate seminar learnings into your professional or personal life.
Coaching
Strategic support to clearly see and realize your vision as a leader
Leadership can be lonely. It doesn’t have to be. We support senior leaders in different functions and in organizations of all sizes. We will be your trusted partner helping you embrace opportunities and face challenges head on. Our certified executive coaches will work with you to forge new paths through a time-tested process: we listen to understand your context, support your self-assessment, reinforce your strengths, and help you set goals that support your growth, leaving you with a framework and tools to put new practices into place. We’ll be with you every step of the way, and it might lead somewhere unexpected.
Consulting
Strategic support to be a more innovative, efficient, and transformational organization
You or your organization may need to reset your strategic direction, overcome an internal roadblock, or create a new map to find resources to fuel your work. We will advise on program or revenue generation strategies, facilitate difficult internal discussions, or deliver a plan for effective board engagement. Our methodology helps us identify where intensive support is needed, and then we coordinate with you to map out an engagement that meets your critical needs and budget. We do the heavy lifting – but you are in the driver’s seat. Our toolkit includes leadership assessments, strategic frameworks, and organization culture assessments that help you understand what’s working, what’s not, and how to unpack and leave behind what no longer serves you.
Career Counseling
Agile leadership in a rapidly changing workplace and dynamically changing world
The world of work is changing quickly, calling for agile leaders willing to boldly explore new personal and professional terrain. Connect with us to explore how our Trauma Informed Leadership© seminars can enable you to bring the power of knowledge plus attunement with your unique strengths and experiences to bear on the complexities of leading teams and organizations. Over the course of five sessions, we share theory alongside practical illustrations and methods, culminating in a practicum where you develop a trauma-informed project or organizational plan to integrate seminar learnings into your professional or personal life.
Companies that
trusted us
what people say:
what people say:
“Working with Don and Nicole helped me sharpen the big-picture storytelling and strategic framing behind my work—especially for funders and new audiences. They guided me through developing a theory of change and helped me reimagine how to communicate our mission in a way that’s compelling, clear, and widely resonant. What stood out was their ability to zoom out with me and articulate the deep, systemic relevance of our work, while also supporting me in thinking through team leadership and priorities so I could stay focused on what matters most.”
AJ Schaerer, Trans Advocacy & Care Team
“Downie Street’s facilitated sessions are an art form that has been carefully honed through decades of experience and practice. They make it look easy but it is not.”
Emily Cherniack, New Politics
“They asked thoughtful, strategic questions that pushed my thinking and helped clarify the causal links in our model. Their feedback was both honest and empowering, helping me articulate impact with precision and confidence. They created a space where I could learn, challenge assumptions, and build a framework that reflects both our mission and operational reality.”
Tiffany Green, Uprooted Academy
Working with Nicole & Don helped bring my passion and purpose into alignment. Articulating my vision succinctly and confidently was a struggle before working with Downie Street. Verbalizing the vision led to me being selected for a competitive urban leaders conference. I am proud of my growth and unequivocally know this work will continue to unveil new pathways rooted in my purpose.”
Rashaunda Lanier-Jackson, MURP
“We could not have been more pleased with the sensitivity, thoughtfulness and insights of the Downie Street team. We received very helpful recommendations to improve our governance structure and relationships with funders, employees and clients. We highly recommend them for similar engagements with others.”
Board of Directors, Ubuntu Center for Peace
“I have never felt more assured and confident in my role as a leader in my organization. I find myself using skills and knowledge that I gathered at the Downie Street work sessions in my current position. Downie Street really helped uplift my confidence in designing a new organization and also understanding many aspects of nonprofit business that were necessary for me to have a realistic view of this plan.”
Nakida M
“Nicole and Don are the real deal. Their facilitation of the Guest House Executive Team Retreat was powerful and pushed us forward. Downie Street’s talent for coaching and facilitation is matched only by the size of their hearts.”
Steve Bauer, Guest House of Milwaukee
what people say:
OUR Approach:
We know you have everything you need, the courage, skills, and resilience, to be an effective leader and create positive impact in our world. Our job is to help you ramp up those assets and embrace opportunities for growth.
We can help define your value proposition, design or sharpen a program strategy, create a plan to scale, diversify revenue, or transform your organization’s culture.
We’ll guide you through a step-by-step process to set and achieve your goals, whether it’s building a stronger organization, responding to a funding crisis, resolving internal conflict, or strengthening your leadership team.
HERE IS HOW:
HERE IS HOW:
Listening
We are active listeners who dig in to help you set strategic vision, inspire collaboration, define your value proposition, and more.
Reflection
We give you the space and structure to engage in reflective learning that reveals new insights and crystallizes solutions over time.
Action
We provide you with strategic, actionable steps to drive your organizations forward to greater impact. We do this using our unique scoping and diagnostic process to strengthen individual leaders, as well as our strategic framework tool to set organizations on a path to success.
Trust
We foster trusting relationships, based on honesty, openness, and warmth. We create ‘brave and safe’ spaces by helping you hold and move through difficult discussions that can resolve conflict. With trust comes success.