Love in Action
Projects
Customized Love in Action Projects put respect, compassion, and inclusion at the center of each need.
Each year, we work with leaders and teams in select organizations facing unique challenges to bring love and humanity to their point of need for extraordinary results.
The challenges are real.
So is the impact of love.
Are you facing a tough challenge?
Are conflicts getting in the way of mission delivery?
Is your team struggling with burnout or disengagement?
Is a threatening environment attacking your values?
Schedule a time to talk with Renee about your needs and discover how a customized approach to activating love can transform your situation.
Check out Example Love in Action Projects.
Challenge: Animosity between school district and union leaders leads to strikes and poor working relationships
Love builds strong union-management working relationships and avoids strikes. Twice.
AHW helped two different groups of school district leaders and teachers’ union leaders build strong, respectful relationships while honoring their unique roles in the bargaining process, which all parties agreed was a universally terrible experience. They completed negotiations positively, and in one case early, avoided striking, did not harm each other as people, and set themselves up for positive collaboration and problem-solving in the years ahead.
Did we mention we did this with two different school districts?
“Working with [AHW] to build relationships with the district administration has positively impacted the relationship between the union and upper administration. The collective bargaining agreement is now viewed as a joint document, and we frequently refer to our collaborative work. While we still tend to have some miscommunication, we can reset after recognizing that our motivations are solution-oriented. When a concern arises, we bring it forward and work to find a solution. Before our work with you, this was not the case.” -Teacher’s Union President for local school district
Challenge: Overwhelm, fear, and confusion plague IT organization.
Love brings thriving to an IT Department.
AHW partnered with leaders of a major municipal IT department to understand the gap between the pain their staff was experiencing and the better way they aspired to work. We laid out a step-by-step path for them to transform. This took into account their workload challenges, dynamic authorizing environment, pandemic exhaustion, and history of painful change to set them on the path to a culture where everyone felt safe, and had more clarity, courage, wholeness, spaciousness, simplicity, and hope. Employees embraced opportunities to process experiences, build community, and engage in culture change shifting their norms and expectations for their behaviors and organizational practices to be human-centered.
"We have proven it to be untrue…that an IT organization can't do human-centered culture work," said Edward, Race and Social Justice Manager. "This has allowed people to have more faith and courage in dealing with issues."
“There's now more readiness and willingness to engage in this type of work. People don't always think of an IT organization as engaging in human-centered, culture work and we have proven that to be untrue." — Leah, IT Workforce Development Lead
“Invitation to Thrive has allowed people to have more faith and courage in dealing with tough issues.” - leader in the IT organization
Challenge: Social workers were struggling in isolation with burnout and grief while trying to serve the vulnerable.
Love supports those who care for others.
We engaged with overworked and understaffed social service agencies and social workers to address trauma and grief, not through individualized strategies where everyone is on their own (“good luck”) but by crafting cultures and small group experiences of collaborative well-being as practical expressions of Love in their workplaces and care for each other.
“This is by far one of my favorite meetings.” - from a social services employee “This was a very effective all-staff meeting. Looking forward to more like this in the future.” - California social services team member “Thank you for having that session, it was awesome! It's really nice to know that our department cares about our well-being, especially during this time.” - social services worker
Challenge: Elected city officials faced divisions between them and traumatizing behaviors from the public.
Love brings unity in divided times.
We supported elected city officials with more loving ways of solving problems, collaborating, and addressing stress to work together effectively for constituents in this highly charged political environment.
They needed tools and mutual support to cope with offensive attacks from the public that are protected speech. They needed new ways of working together based on interpersonal respect and collegiality.
City council members as well as department heads went away inspired and equipped with proven tools and strategies for collective health to help them persist in their difficult work.
And most importantly, they strengthened commitments to each other across political divides modeling a better way of working for their communities.
“The mayor and the council left feeling great!” - Chief Policy Analyst
“These strategies were so important to us to help us face the difficult environment and personal attacks we have to endure. This was just what I had in mind and hoped for.” - City Council Member
Challenge: Two law firms merge and forge a new brand based on “care”, seeking a message to unify them.
Love inspires British Attorneys.
Sometimes what’s needed is a loving jolt! Our founder, Renee Smith, keynoted the leadership conference for a British law firm, aligning senior leader values and priorities with Love to bring an inspired message they are still talking about more than two years later. Renee worked extensively in advance with leaders to ensure the message was on point and had lasting impacts.
“Your keynote turned out to be one of the most memorable (and continues to be talked about even with the passage of time!) Culture is such an important thing and your keynote was such a powerful reminder of the impact we can all make on a daily basis. Thank you!” - James O’Loughlin, People Director at Moore Barlow