The Women Behind the Work
This month, I was named one of USA TODAY’s Women of the Year. While I am so deeply honored by this recognition, I am humbled as I look back over the past eleven years leading up to this moment by just how many other incredible women have shaped Murmuration and made our work to support community-focused organizations building power across the country possible. So much of the work that builds and sustains organizations is done quietly and happens in moments that go unseen. It’s often uncelebrated, so I want to take this opportunity to share a bit about just a few of the women who have shaped Murmuration for the better and what they mean to me.
In the Early Days
I am deeply grateful to the countless women who advised me, challenged me, and encouraged me in the early days of Murmuration. As they pushed and pulled on my vision for what would eventually evolve into what Murmuration is today, I gained the clarity and confidence to turn my idea into a reality. There are far too many to recognize by name here–but even today, I think back to some of those initial conversations I had, huddled around small cafe tables or in community spaces, and I recognize how formative they were.
Two names that stand out from the earliest years of our official founding are Tracy Gorra and Lily Haskins. When I launched Murmuration in 2014, I was lucky to convince them both–trusted colleagues from prior professional chapters of my life–to take the terrifying leap of leaving their stable jobs to join me as Executive Assistant and Chief of Staff, respectively. In those first few months, I felt responsible for them; their confidence made me push harder, take smarter risks, and focus on building something sustainable for both our partners and them. Lily inspired me to lead with “aggressive humility,” the phrase she used to remind us we must never forget how urgent the need for change is in communities across the country, but that we must also always stay committed to learning, growing, co-creating, and admitting mistakes. When we thought about what technology and data could bring to the work of building community power, we should remember above all that our partners know their communities best - and our job was to make the path forward easier, their work more effective, so that they could shape better futures for themselves. After all these years, while Lily has moved across an ocean, she remains our greatest cheerleader, and Tracy is still by my side today–and her thoughtful care for me, my family, and for everyone who works for Murmuration is one of our greatest organizational resources.
Our Network of Partners
Murmuration’s impact story is inseparable from the efforts and successes of our network of partners across the country. Equipped with our insights, tools, and services, they work in communities across the country–building movements, turning out voters, holding elected officials accountable - to make change possible. They transform our systems and cultures so that everyone in this nation can thrive. Every single door knock, phone call, and email they send represents more than just the individual work of any one partner. Together, they also tell the story of the Murmuration network coming together as a collective force that’s stronger than any one individual effort.
While I admire the work every single one of our partners does day in and day out to move our country forward, there is one in particular who has left an immense mark on me: Ms. Sarah Carpenter, founder of The Memphis Lift. When Ms. Sarah realized her first grandbaby was about to start at the same school that she felt had so badly failed her own children, she decided she’d had enough. Family by family, equipped with Murmuration’s data and tools, she organized her community to demand better from their district, city, and ultimately their state. And throughout it all, she has never lost sight of the idea that building a movement means organizing actual people, with diverse needs beyond just better schools, all deserving of time, respect, and care. She leads with love first and foremost, and proves that you do not have to sacrifice human connection to drive political change.
Our Stewards
One of the great joys of my professional life is the deep and supportive partnership I have with Murmuration’s board of directors. While founding board members Anish Melwani and Brian Johnson (Brian has since concluded his board service) have been by my side as friends, colleagues, advisors, and board members, Murmuration is also incredibly lucky to have three amazing women board members: Brynne Craig, Meg Ansara, and Julie Samuels.
Each one of them has unique strengths that contribute to making Murmuration stronger. Brynne is passionate and patient, refusing to accept anything less than excellence, but also well aware that change takes time. She finds ways to interject humor into every conversation, asks probing questions, thinks expansively about what is possible, and reminds us at every interaction to lead with our partners’ needs in mind first and foremost. Meg, I have known the longest—we first met in our late 20s, seven years before I started Robin Hood–and she has consistently been my closest advisor, coach, and mentor. Meg led both of our strategic planning processes, lending her skills at crafting plans, designing processes, and asking open-ended questions that generate new and impactful ideas. She is skeptical, not cynical, and is consistently reminding us that while there is so much more we want to do, and sometimes the mere idea that all communities in this country could thrive seems so far out of reach, we’ve changed lives and have earned the right to be proud of our accomplishments. And Julie, our newest board member, is smart, strategic, funny, and has built a career at the intersection of technology and civic life. Her commitment not just to her sector, and the incredible organization she founded and still runs today, but to participating in her own community is a model for all of us. Civic engagement isn’t optional–it’s a requirement of a functioning democracy–and Julie makes it clear every day that she is doing her part.
Each of these women has a storied career, leaving their mark on their communities and our democracy, and every day I am inspired by their seemingly insatiable appetite for impact. They are Murmuration’s stewards, shaping our strategy and advising our team on the thorniest of operational issues. And they are the first people I call when I am struggling to see the path ahead; I would not be the leader I am today without their good guidance and friendship, and Murmuration could not have the impact we strive for without their commitment to community power.
Our Leaders
One of my leadership goals at Murmuration is to always hire people who are different from me—who know subject areas I don’t, and can tackle problems in ways I cannot. They see opportunities and pitfalls that I would miss, they tell me when I’m wrong, or shortsighted, and they challenge me—and our team more broadly–to think bigger. To that end, I’ve been incredibly fortunate to work alongside a team of brilliant and thoughtful women over the years who have expanded the boundaries of what Murmuration is and how we approach our work. I’ve worked with hundreds of Murmuration team members over the past eleven years, and while each one of them plays an essential role in moving our work forward, I want to recognize a few key leaders who are leading Murmuration towards what’s next.
Our Chief Research Officer, Sarah Stamper, is a neuroscientist by training, and is fixated on bringing humanity into our data, overseeing our breakthroughs on building probabilistic issue and turnout models for communities as small as five thousand people, while also leading our efforts to listen to people at scale through Civic Pulse and Community Voices. She’s passionate, hardworking, and insatiable when it comes to impact. She pushes me—and everyone on our team—to be more aggressive, more ambitious, more committed to our vision for America.
Our Chief Technology Officer, Heidi Williams, joined Murmuration in 2025 and brings with her a deep understanding of what it takes to build and scale quality products. She is calm and thoughtful; she cares deeply about culture and feels a great sense of responsibility to counter prevailing narratives of what it takes to succeed in tech–building and leading an exceedingly talented team that understands the importance of balancing speed with care, aggressively pushing forward while never losing sight of the needs of our partners.
Our Senior Vice President of Operations, Shana Owens, joined our team just a few months ago. On paper, she oversees our Legal, People, and Finance functions, but in practice, she is also our internal convener, our process and systems thinker, our daily checklist, and our longer-term planner. Managing across our broader leadership team, Shana puts structure to ideas, holds us accountable to cross-functional deadlines, and makes it possible for us to live up to our stated guiding principle that we are stronger together.
Our Vice President of Communications & Marketing, Madeline Grimes, brings everything we do to life. Her aesthetic, attention to detail, and way with words make it possible for us to tell the complex stories of our work, our partners, and our vision for America. Our work is only possible because funders and community-focused organizations understand what we are trying to accomplish and believe in what’s possible. Madeline is our storyteller in chief, manager of our brand, and director of our external presence. And as I have started to take on a more external role myself, my gratitude for her protection and support grows every step of the way.
Our Vice President of Engineering, Hannah Lewbel, joined the team in August of 2025, and her approach to engineering—and the connective tissue between engineering and product—is game-changing. Hannah is soft spoken, thoughtful, and wildly ambitious when it comes to the potential for technology to have an impact for good. For me, where the closest thing I have to engineering experience is that my father used to be one, her patience and willingness to have deep non-technical conversations about what’s possible, and then go translate that into actual work-product, is freeing and inspiring. And having her reporting directly to Heidi gives me a true technical dream team–women I know will listen and iterate with me at the strategic altitude where I live, and then translate and iterate more with the incredible teams they are building to turn ideas into reality into community power.
Thank You
I want to end by saying something that sounds far too simple for the weight of meaning it carries for me: thank you. Thank you to all the women in my life, named here or otherwise, who helped make me who I am, supported me on my journey, and made everything I have accomplished possible. And to all the women who are leading the work of creating the foundations and conditions for change across our country, driven by the belief that America can one day be a place where everyone can thrive, I remain humbled and inspired by you.