Your Partners for Transformative Change
Remaining Rooted through Challenging Times
Three-Part Online Training Series for Organizational Leaders
Leadership today is being asked to hold so much; uncertainty, contradiction, exhaustion, grief, and the very real demands of keeping organizations functioning while the people inside them are stretched thin. In moments like these, it becomes tempting to default to performance: louder values statements, more programs, faster pivots. But the leaders our staff and communities actually need are the ones who stay rooted, who seriously equate care with infrastructure, and who are willing to do the structural work that makes wellness possible and not just visible.
This three-part training series is designed for organizational leaders who want to lead through challenging times without losing themselves, their people, or their integrity in the process. Grounded in equity-centered practice and an adaptation of the Waters of Systems Change framework, this training moves from the inner work of values-rooted leadership to the relational work of compassion and psychological safety and to the structural work of organizational wellness. We will create a safe space across all three sessions, and participants will be invited into honest reflection and open sharing, applied skill-building, and a clearer answer to a question that sits at the center of this work:
Whether you are an executive, director, manager, or emerging leader, this training is an invitation to lead with depth. To stay rooted. To care well. To build differently.
Meet the Presenter
Ashley E. Stewart, Ph.D., MSW, LSW
Dr. Ashley E. Stewart (she/her) is Director of Strategic Transformation and an equity and trauma subject matter expert at C4 Innovations. In this role, she provides technical assistance, training, and organizational support to national organizations, boards of directors, and behavioral health organizations on implementing equitable services and supporting staff and provider wellness.
Ashley is an Assistant Professor at Temple University College of Public Health, where she trains interdisciplinary students about theories, frameworks, and translational skills for macro-level change practice. She is an award-winning consultant and has six years of experience in a leadership capacity as an organizational culture change strategist. Her work centers on addressing institutionalized barriers. She works in solidarity with mental and behavioral health providers by supporting institutions, corporations, organizations, and leadership teams to identify ways to reduce harm and determine appropriate steps toward sustainable culture change. In her role, she leads system-level change by partnering with organizations, government agencies, and community-based groups to design person-centered, trauma-informed, and data-driven solutions. Her work focuses on strategic planning, organizational transformation, implementation science, and capacity building, with an emphasis on workplace wellness and productivity.
Ashley focuses on moving away from performative diversification efforts and shifting institutional and organizational culture to be inclusive and innovative. She provides information gathering, training, consultation, and support and lends an understanding and respect for the intricacies inherent in organization-level work. She combines research, evidence-based, and emerging best practices on psychological safety with her interpersonal and collaborative skills. She holds an LSW issued by the state of NJ. Ashley received a Ph.D. from The Ohio State University, College of Social Work and a Master’s degree at Columbia University.
Who Should Take This Course
This training is designed for organizational leaders, including:
- Executive leaders and C-suite staff
- Directors and senior managers
- Mid-level managers and supervisors with organizational influence
- Board members and trustees
- Emerging leaders preparing for greater responsibility
- HR and people-and-culture leaders
- Program leaders in health, human services, behavioral health, recovery-centered, and housing organizations
Learning Objectives
By the end of this training series, participants will be able to:
- Identify what it means to stay rooted in values during organizational and sector challenges, and recognize the difference between values-rooted leadership and performative leadership
- Apply equity-centered frameworks to leadership decisions made under pressure, scarcity, and uncertainty
- Describe the role of compassion, psychological safety, and staff wellness as core leadership competencies, not soft skills
- Recognize signs of secondary trauma, compassion fatigue, and change fatigue in teams, and respond structurally rather than individually
- Apply an adaptation of the Waters of Systems Change framework to assess and strengthen organizational wellness across policies, practices, and resource flows
- Differentiate between tokenized and structural wellness investments
- Develop a personal and organizational plan for sustainable, equity-centered leadership in challenging times
Course Facts
Dates: Fridays–July 10, 17, and 24, 2026
Time: 11-12:30 pm ET
Location: Online via Zoom
Course Type: 3 90-minute live, interactive webinar sessions with discussion, reflection, and application
Topics: Values-rooted leadership, equity-centered practice, psychological safety, compassion, staff wellness, secondary trauma, change fatigue, organizational wellness, Waters of Systems Change, structural change, leadership in challenging times
Practice level: Intermediate to Advanced
Cost: Free
Learn More
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