About Caldwell Collaborative

The Founder and Talent

Claire Caldwell, energetic, masterful, confident young woman in black turtleneck with short cropped blonde hair

Hi, I'm Claire Caldwell. The founder and talent behind Caldwell Collaborative.

I've spent the last 11 years leading winning communications campaigns, managing teams and navigating organizations through big change.

I've worked to pass legislation, turn out the vote, organize workers, shift cultural narratives, raise brand awareness and sell products through B2C product marketing. I've hired and mentored dozens of managers, strategists, designers and product developers.

I've supported organizations to maximize success and minimize collateral losses during times of change in mission, leadership, teams and growth. And I've stewarded consensus-building in the C-suite and across coalitions.

My career spans a wide range of sectors from non-profit to corporate, government to labor, philanthropy to spirituality and faith-based organizations.

In my experience, the three biggest reasons institutions falter and fail to make impact are:

1. Internal misalignment + inertia
2. Insufficient infrastructure to scale
3. Talent gaps + specialization needs

I created Caldwell Collaborative as a response to these challenges.

Because my experience has shown me that external perspective and facilitation is often the most effective route to internal alignment. Because it’s never too late to reinforce your infrastructure — whether building from ground up or doing clean up. Because, as a small shop, I can offer flexibility and bespoke solutions that meet your talent needs and free up your team to do what they do best.

Creation of Values

After 10+ years of working to protect reproductive healthcare access, secure labor rights for care workers, pass non-discrimination protections for transgender and queer people, and shift national conversations on issues including immigration and halting family separation, criminal and civil justice reform, ending prescription price gouging and the war on drugs…

And some time before I founded Caldwell Collaborative...

I was in deep burn out.

I stepped away from social justice movement spaces, and from the machinery of corporate public relations to figure out what happened, and what next.

The answer to what next: Caldwell Collaborative.

I founded this consultancy because I wanted to do the work of change-making differently.

The answer to what happened is more involved and has informed the values by which I now live and work:

Walking the talk

I have to myself embody sustainability, diversity, justice and creativity practices...

...if I want to contribute to building a world that is sustainable, diverse, just and creative. (The irony of a person mobilizing for workers rights as she herself burns out from overwork.) This philosophy is grounded in the study of emergent strategy. And in the observation of emergent strategy concepts at play in workplaces I've been a part of. The culture of institutions is crafted by individual daily actions. That means, as individuals we need to get in right alignment with the values we purport to support before we can expect to see them manifest in the world around us. I am eager to collaborate with partners who are equally committed to not only working toward their values, but also living out of them.

Process and product

I know now the most successful teams prioritize both.

There have been times in my career when I was more focused on product, and experienced friction to implementation because I failed to get team buy-in. There have been times in my career when I was more focused on process, and experienced stagnancy in production and failure to launch. Emphasis on process helps teams create boundaries wherein wellness and joy, agency and accountability, functional collaboration and learning can flourish. Emphasis on product helps drive a sense of accomplishment, impact, innovation and iteration. Teams and the communities they serve benefit from both.

Honoring the space between

Genius emerges from the space between.

Some of my best work and most creative ideas bubble up from below in the moments when I'm "off the clock" – exercising, resting, daydreaming, meditating. Creating time for unconscious puzzling is a smart life practice and organizational development strategy.

Purpose not urgency

We can build sustainable habits, workplaces and cultures while maintaining a sense of purpose and joy.

Urgent everything, all of the time is very 2019. But I have also seen individuals, teams and organizations over-correct in the opposite direction, checking out entirely in an effort to minimize the false sense of urgency that leads to burn out. In checking out, I've seen workers and teams also inadvertently divest from their purpose and the drive that fuels it. This may solve the urgency problem, but it doesn't make work more enjoyable or sustainable. To build sustainable and inspired habits, workplaces and cultures, we need to divest from urgency while re-investing in purpose.

Kindness over cancellation

I do not subscribe to cancel culture.

Working in social justice movement spaces, I’ve witnessed cancel campaigns rip organizations and coalitions apart. I do not subscribe. To effect change, we must develop tolerance for disagreement, difference and diversity of perspective. To effect change we have to acknowledge that there is room for growth and allow for people and institutions to tussle toward that growth. Cancel culture is antithetical to the hope and ambition of positive change. And it’s a societal scale manifestation of dysfunctional inter-relational dynamics that start in everyday interactions. I believe in teamwork grounded in kindness, respect, active presence, honesty and humility. And I want to work with teams that strive to embody the same.

Get in touch today!