Shifting Power from the Inside Out shares one organization’s journey towards:

• Increasing representation of community members amongst leadership and staff.
• Developing specific internal practices to ensure that immigrant women are encouraged to step up — and that US born women take a back seat — in organizational leadership.
• Encouraging frank discussions about race, class and power.
• Ending practices of white supremacy that limit the leadership of people of color.
• Shifting towards a model of collaboration and authentic shared leadership.

The report, produced collaboratively by Mujeres Unidas y Activas (MUA) and RoadMap, offers a new framework for community-based organizations on the evolution from member-based to member-led organizational structure, culture and practice.

At a time when political leaders in the U.S. are using rhetoric and policy to terrorize and silence immigrant communities, Shifting Power demonstrates how we can back immigrant women as the leaders our movements need.

You can download the Executive Summary, the full report, and the infographic at the bottom of this page.

Videos

We released a series of 6 short, fully bilingual videos featuring immigrant women and allies sharing what they’ve learned in the leadership development process.  Our goal is for these videos to be utilized as teaching tools and testimonies to inspire immigrant leaders and their allies to collaborate more effectively.  They can be accessed from the top left corner of the image below, or on the RoadMap Consulting Vimeo page.

Infographic

Acknowledgements

The writing and publication of this report and the related videos were generously supported by the Evelyn and Walter Haas Jr. Fund, Hidden Leaf Foundation, Resonance Network, RoadMap, and individual donors.  Many of the tools referenced in the report were adapted from the visionary work of allied organizations and practitioners including the Social Transformation Project, VISIONS Inc, The Midwest Academy, and Rita Sever.

We are deeply grateful for the capacity-building support provided to our organization over the last five years by funders who take a flexible and supportive approach, including the James and Gretchen Sandler Philanthropic Fund, Blue Shield of California Foundation, Evelyn and Walter Haas Jr. Fund, Hidden Leaf Foundation, NoVo Foundation, Movement to End Violence, NextGen Fund, Y&H Soda Foundation, and Akonadi Foundation. We’d also like to highlight the critical support provided by the San Francisco Office of Economic and Workforce Development’s Nonprofit Resiliency Fund, the San Francisco Department on the Status of Women, and the San Francisco District Attorney Victim Services Division.

For more information, contact:

Erika Estrada — erika@mujeresunidas.net
Jess St. Louis — jess@roadmapconsulting.org