Episode 166: Finding and Building Mutually Beneficial Mentorship with Project Potluck & One Step Closer
Traditional views of mentorship have us believe that only mentors have something valuable to offer mentees. In this episode, we sit down with Kathleen Casanova, the director of Project Potluck, and Cynthia Billops, the VP of Operations, Membership and Belonging at One Step Closer (OSC), to consider how we can shift mentorship for the better. We discuss…
💞 How mentorship can be rewarding for mentees AND mentors
💞 Why mentorship is critical for BIPOC founders in our industry
💞 Where you can find mentorship
💞 Plus, they share about their Mentor to Champion Skills Training for improving mentorship skills!
🔗 Stay connected with other food founders like yourself through our Food Biz Wiz® Facebook group at this link! Let me know what you think about this episode by sending me a DM through my Instagram page, @itsalliball!
MEET KATHLEEN CASANOVA:
Kathleen joined Project Potluck as the Founding Executive Director in March of 2022. In her role she works with the Board of Directors to fulfill their important mission to help BIPOC people build successful companies and careers in the Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) industry.
Prior to joining Project Potluck, Kathleen spent more than a decade working in and with nonprofits and universities across the country as a fundraiser, talent consultant and DEI program manager. In 2018, Kathleen decided to pursue her lifelong dream of working with food (she’s been throwing dinner parties since she was nine) and entered the CPG space as a recruiter for emerging brands. She soon fell in love with the industry and also saw the need for support and resources for other professionals and entrepreneurs of Color in the field. She’s thrilled to be working with Project Potluck to help ensure a more colorful and flavorful industry.
Check out Project Potluck at the link here!
MEET CYNTHIA BILLOPS:
Cynthia is VP of Operations, Membership & Belonging at One Step Closer & J.E.D.I Collaborative. She is a business strategy and operations expert who has spent the last few decades planning, designing and launching complex IT, Web and SaaS services. She earned her Doctorate in Educational Leadership from Mills College – focusing on small group interactions and the importance of each individual’s contribution to optimal success. She is an inspired, “human-first” leader of people, projects and organizations and a practiced facilitator – using inclusive practices to build and sustain equitable, diverse, transparent work cultures and has guided multiple leadership teams through periods of great change, accelerating growth and expansion within the constraints of broader economic and environmental challenges.
She has experience as Founder, ED, Director, advisor, and board member; for start-ups, nonprofits and for-profit organizations. Her unique understanding of the challenges (and opportunities) faced by developing organizations combined with her determination to ensure open doors and “on-ramps to opportunity” for persons living in and coming from systemically marginalized communities; help her collaboratively create systems and processes that lead to sustainable growth, better staff retention and higher profits due to optimization and efficiency gains.
Connect with OSC and the J.E.D.I. Collaborative at the link here! You can also find our episode on the J.E.D.I. Collaborative here.
SPONSORED BY: OUR RETAIL ROADMAP! 🗺
As Kathleen and Cynthia mention, having someone share their insider knowledge can make a world of difference to an emerging brand. I want to share my buyer expertise so that you know what it takes to get ON the retail shelf - be it a physical or digital shelf - AND have high sales once you're there! Find my free, nine-step guide to building a brand that flies off the shelf by clicking here so that you’re planning for each next step NOW!