The BOLD Podcast

BOLD is grateful to call Janice Weiss of Mayerson Academy a BOLD faculty member.  As Senior Manager Strengths-Based Initiatives, Janice collaborates with organizations and businesses to infuse workplace cultures with a strengths-based mindset, sharing hands-on character-strength tools uniquely designed to inspire authentic employee well-being and everyday associate engagement. She’s a serial entrepreneur who launched a fruit and vegetable-themed cookie company called Yucky Cookies in her third year of law school in Philadelphia. While Janice’s “sweet dreams” eventually crumbled, it allowed her to pivot from law into a marketing career that combined over fifteen years of classic consumer product management in Fortune 100 companies with nine years of employee engagement and internal branding work at Macy’s Inc. Originally from New York, Janice brought her family to Cincinnati almost twenty years ago, falling in love with everything Cincy from the moment they arrived. Driven by her signature strengths of fairness and gratitude, Janice’s personal passion is to fight for social justice and, in the words of Dr. Neal Mayerson, “help tip humanity towards its better nature.”

Jenni Frazer is group vice president in the Bank’s Supervision, Credit Risk, and Statistics Department. In this role, she leads supervisory programs at the largest and most complex banking firms in the Fourth Federal Reserve District and serves as deputy regional officer at the Bank’s Cincinnati Branch.  Frazer joined the Bank in 2001 as an associate examiner. Prior to joining the Cleveland Fed, she served as a credit administration manager and assistant vice president for a community bank.  She holds a BS in business from Wright State University, an MBA with a focus in finance from the University of Dayton, and a credit risk certification from the Risk Management Association. Frazer is a 2017 graduate of the United Way of Greater Cincinnati Board Orientation and Leadership Development (BOLD) program.  She now serves on the BOLD steering committee as the mentoring and placement chairperson.

As Senior Manager of Strengths Based Initiatives, Philip works to strengthen workplaces, universities and neighborhoods across Cincinnati and beyond. He focuses primarily on Mayerson Academy’s Strong Cincinnati Institute, which engages cohorts of local organizations in using strengths-based practices to transform workplace cultures and unleash the potential of people in order to increase performance. In addition, Philip also provides consultation on topics such as organizational development, adult learning, leadership development, public and private partnerships, educational product development, design thinking and workforce development. Before joining Mayerson Academy, Philip led marketing and development efforts at McGraw Hill Education/Cengage Learning as the Market Development Team Leader and Marketing Manager. Philip earned his MBA from the University of Toledo.

Philip is a member of the BOLD faculty.

Do you know what it takes to lead on a nonprofit board?  Have you ever wondered if there is a community of practicing nonprofit board leaders?  The BOLD Blog was created by Leadership Council for Nonprofits and the BOLD program for conversations dedicated to the practice and experiences of nonprofit board leaders. We wanted to create a community of practice around nonprofit board leadership. This podcast will provide you with knowledge, experience, and resources to become a board leader.  We will interview BOLD faculty members, program participants, current board leaders, and nonprofits that have benefitted from using BOLD as a resource for finding board leaders.

The Board Orientation + Leadership Development program has been around for nearly 30 years and trained over 1,500 professionals for nonprofit board service. For those who want to serve, this program can help you to become a board leader. Our board leadership program will educate and empower you to serve the nonprofit community as a nonprofit board member. For nonprofits, our program will make it easier than ever before for you to recruit diverse, educated board members. Upon program completion, BOLD graduates become a part of the candidate pool.  There are hundreds of board seats that go unfilled each year. Your community needs your leadership. I hope you find the conversations that follow to be enriching. And don’t forget to be BOLD.

Shelly is a dynamic, entrepreneurial executive with diverse experience leading consumer centric organizations in the US, Europe, and Canada.  She currently works as the Director of Sales, Business Channel Lead at SONY Pictures Entertainment where she has been for 16 years.  Shelly graduated from BOLD 1 in 2019 and serves on the BOLD Steering Committee and World Affairs Council Advisory board.

https://globalcincinnati.org/

Improving refugee and immigrant lives, a tidbit at a time.  Heartfelt Tidbits provides support to refugees and recent immigrants living in Southwestern Ohio by facilitating integration and self-sufficiency through our innovative education, cultural and employment-enhancing programming.  Transitioning to American life is multifaceted and not easily achieved for refugees and recent immigrants.  That's why Heartfelt Tidbits provides the ‘long welcome’ to clients who have arrived in the Cincinnati area. With the support of over 110 passionate volunteers and in partnership with over 75 community organizations, Heartfelt Tidbits enhances refugee and recent immigrant integration through a variety of innovative programs.  These programs include English and citizenship classes, connecting clients to neighborhood resources, facilitating art and sewing programs, creating community gardening projects, and promoting youth empowerment.  Much of their work focuses on women who are particularly vulnerable due to limited language skills and isolation. Their sewing and art programs focus on economic self-sufficiency and the building of community among refugee and immigrant women.  All of their programs are grounded in our firm belief in the importance of alleviating refugee and immigrant isolation, which takes a toll on both physical and mental health.

Colleen Houston’s mission in life is to help people discover their creative genius and connect with their communities through art. She believes that “everyone who has ever been a child is an artist”—and that by tapping into our creative energy, we can deepen empathy, strengthen social bonds, tackle tough issues, and unleash the potential of individuals and communities alike.

She was 18 years old when she joined ArtWorks as a Youth Apprentice. Her first project was turning a chair someone had tossed out in the trash into a work of art someone would buy. (The person who bought that chair still has it!) She returned to ArtWorks a few years later, after earning a degree in Public and Social Art at Warren Wilson College, to become both a Teaching Artist and Lead Artist. Since then, as Chief Programming Officer, she’s helped launch ArtWorks award-winning mural program producing 200 public murals in 37 Cincinnati neighborhoods and seven nearby cities. The murals were instrumental in Cincinnati’s win for the 2010 City Livability Award by the U.S. Conference of Mayors (VIDEO). Colleen has also mentored Waco, Texas, and other cities on creating civic mural programs. She was appointed ArtWorks’ Chief Executive Officer and Artistic Director in April 2020.

Colleen graduated from BOLD in the fall of 2020.

In 2014, Megan was pregnant with her second child and learned diapers are not covered by food stamps or WIC. She read stories about babies being left in the same diaper for days, disposable diapers being reused, and the infections children get from a lack of clean diapers. As a parent, she couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to not be able to provide for the basic needs of your babies, and tried to find a diaper bank in Cincinnati to volunteer with. When nothing turned up, an idea took shape, and Megan envisioned an organization that could work with social service agencies in Cincinnati to make sure every baby in the city she loves had clean diapers. In the fall of 2015, Megan attended the Unpolished Conference for entrepreneurs at Crossroads Church in Oakley, and it proved to be the spark she needed to stop ignoring the call she felt to start a diaper bank. Just a few days after the conference, Megan had an amazing team in place ready to throw their support and talents into starting Sweet Cheeks Diaper Bank, and she’s been working hard to create a thriving program for families in need ever since. In February of 2017, Megan made the move to Sweet Cheeks full time.

Megan graduated from BOLD in the fall of 2020 & is on faculty with the program.

Maurice was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and he grew up in the English Woods neighborhood. He is a 2004 graduate of Jacobs High School. Maurice received a BA in Organizational Leadership from the University of Cincinnati in 2016 and a MS in Organizational Leadership with graduate certificates in Human Resource Management and Nonprofit Leadership in 2018. Maurice works as Program Director for UpSpring, the only local nonprofit that exclusively served the needs of youth experiencing homelessness.  Maurice serves as the President/Founder of the Cincinnati Youth Collaborative Young Professionals Board. Maurice also serves as a board member for the Know Theatre of Cincinnati, Cincinnati College Preparatory Academy – a public charter school, and the University of Cincinnati College of Arts and Sciences Alumni Activity Board.

In his free time, Maurice volunteers his time on the previously mentioned boards to serve his community.

Bella is a BOLD graduate and BOLD Mentor on the Steering Committee.  She works as an Early Childhood Resource Coordinator at Learning Grove, serves on the advisory board of Public Allies, and the board of Southwest Ohio Association for the Education of Young Children.