THE CHALLENGES
THE CHALLENGES
How do you cause a positive impact in the world?
How do you authentically engage stakeholders and the community?
How does your company give back?
How do you know that what you are doing is making an impact?
Cause IMPACTS is a strategy consulting firm that helps you clarify, create, measure, and amplify the impact you’re making by using robust policy and statistical analysis, coalition building, group facilitation, program design, capacity building training, and program evaluation.
Whether you’re looking to:
• Establish a new initiative to help people and the environment
• Align your efforts with your core mission
• Increase ROI for corporate giving
• Develop innovative programs
• Identify strategic goals and achieve them
• Validate and refine your strategies
• Boost employee engagement, recruitment, & retention
• Engage stakeholders
• Enhance your brand
• Increase your effectiveness and profitability
• Assess and communicate your impact
We recognize that companies, non-profits, government agencies, elected officials, and donors often do not have the capacity, incentive, or strategy to work together to maximize impact. Cause IMPACTS is built on the principle of cross-sector collaboration. We believe that collective impact is the way to create and sustain positive impact.
We help create better ways for you to do more good for more people.
Cause IMPACTS helps create better ways for you to do more good for more people.
ABOUT
Cause IMPACTS
WHO WE ARE
Cause IMPACTS is a woman-owned boutique strategy consulting firm that helps you clarify, create, measure, and amplify the impact you’re making by using robust policy and statistical analysis, coalition building, group facilitation, program design, capacity building training, and program evaluation.
By helping organizations innovatively create, measure, and amplify their programs, Cause Impacts is a catalyst for and creator of positive sustainable social and environmental impact. At Cause Impacts, we help you define and refine your efforts to make a difference in the world.
Cause IMPACTS is:
• Certified Small Business Enterprise (SBE)
• Certified Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE)
• WBENC-Certified Women’s Business Enterprise (WBE)
• Women-Owned Small Business (WOSB)
WHAT WE DO
At Cause IMPACTS, we help you:
• CLARIFY the impact you want to make
• CREATE the best approach to making it
• MEASURE the impact of your efforts
• AMPLIFY those efforts
At Cause IMPACTS, we help you define and refine your efforts to make more of a difference in the world.
A DYNAMIC PROCESS
Cause IMPACTS offers services that bring your social impact projects to life. We help clients create, measure, and communicate social change across sectors so they can maximize collective impact and Cause IMPACTS on the issues they value.
• Policy Research, Analysis & Guidance
• Labor Market Data & Analysis
• Community Engagement
• Strategic Planning
• Program Development
• Employee Engagement
• Program Infrastructure Development
• CSR Program Development
• Strategic Philanthropic Giving
• Professional Development
• Capacity-Building & Training
• Group Facilitation
• Coalition Building
• Impact Assessment & Evaluation
• Annual Reports
• Compliance
• Process Improvements
ISSUE EXPERTISE
• Workforce Development
• Diversity and Inclusion
• Environmental Sustainability
• Economic Development
• Education Equity and Access
At Cause IMPACTS, we are constantly, consistently assessing, measuring, recalibrating, optimizing, and communicating throughout each phase of the consultative relationship to ensure the greatest outcome.
A DIFFERENTIATED APPROACH TO MAKING A DIFFERENCE
Cause IMPACTS is a people-centric, data-driven boutique consulting firm with an individualized approach for every client challenge.
Cross-Sector Collaboration
We break down the silos that exist between sectors in order to motivate social innovation and drive social change. Programs are more successful and sustainable when multiple entities come together and their unique perspectives and expertise are elevated. Our team’s first-hand experience in the private, public, non-profit, and philanthropic sectors fuels a nuanced understanding of the strengths and challenges of each sector, and equips us with the skills and insights to develop cross-sector coalitions and solutions.
Data-Driven Approach
We integrate data and analytics into everything we do to prove that what you are doing is working. We then provide clients with the insights, tools and resources needed to sustain their impact.
Custom Solutions
Every challenge is unique and deserves a solution that is customized to suit your intended audience and programmatic needs. Therefore, we never employ templates in our individualized program design and strategic recommendations.
Value
As a boutique consulting firm, we are nimble in ways that our competitors cannot be. We can provide high-level, customized services and deliverables at a fraction of the cost of large consulting firms.
Equity-Lens
We focus on social justice challenges and have an intimate understanding of the challenges that must be surmounted in order to increase equity. Furthermore, we understand the pervasive racial and socio-economic inequalities that are
SERVICES
Policy Research, Analysis & Reporting. We conduct policy research and provide detailed reports that simplify complex policies and articulate clear, thorough recommendations and actions.
Labor Market Data & Analysis. We provide and analyze real time labor market data to help you make sense of complex data and arrive at actionable insights.
Strategic Planning. We guide groups through engaging strategic planning exercises that result in a clear vision for the future, actionable objectives and tactics, and an articulated mission that can guide decision making into the future.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Program Development that ensures your current CSR strategies align with your core business, addresses your company’s internal challenges and causes measurable positive impacts.
Group Facilitation & Coalition Building that is engaging, ensures all voices are heard, and builds consensus while moving strategy forward.
Employee Engagement to help you attract, retain, and engage employees. We develop programs that get employees to collaborate, enhance company culture, and build community.
Impact Assessment & Evaluation that measures the impact of your initiatives and recommends improvements to increase their effectiveness. We provide you with the tools and resources needed to continue to measure and sustain the impact over time.
Community Engagement Strategies & Campaigns that provide insight into community needs, activate your community, build institutional capacity and strengthen your ability to create lasting collective impact.
Training & Capacity Building for every age range, group size, and education level. Every training provides participants with tools they can take with them to continue to master the content.
Strategic Philanthropic Giving. We help clients increase their impact on issues they are passionate about by developing Strategic Giving Portfolios and collective impact initiatives that create lasting change.
Cause IMPACTS helps create better ways for you to do more good for more people.
SERVICE SPOTLIGHT: AT THE INTERSECTION
INNOVATIVE WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMS THAT MAKE DEEP SOCIAL IMPACT
We make it easy to integrate social responsibility into your organization’s existing activities. Cause IMPACTS specializes in developing innovative workforce programs that double as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives.
CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR) A broad-based movement in business that encourages companies to take responsibility for the impact of their activities on customers, employees, communities, and the environment.
WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT
• Employee attraction, engagement, & retention
• Employee diversity
• Apprenticeship strategies
• Leadership development
• Professional development
• Upskilling & training
Workforce Development and CSR are not traditionally connected, yet Cause IMPACTS has a proven record of developing strategic programs that address the needs of both.
Workforce Development and CSR are not traditionally connected. Yet Cause IMPACTS has a proven record of developing strategies that address the needs of both.
SERVICE SPOTLIGHT: TRAINING
Cause IMPACTS provides a variety of trainings and capacity building approaches to meet the needs of clients. We are equipped to provide largeseminar-style trainings in a conference setting, small cohort trainings over time, or one-time trainings for individuals or groups.
We pride ourselves in being able to train our clients to do the work that we are typically hired to do and provide tools and templates so that they are not dependent on consultants. We are facilitators, researchers, policy analysts, community organizers, teachers, and strategists who thrive when asked to teach others and provide frameworks with which to drive change.
SOME OF OUR MOST FREQUENTLY REQUESTED TRAININGS:
• Community Engagement 101 - Tools and Tactics for Creating an Outreach Campaign
• Project Management 101 and 102
• Coalition Building & Facilitation
• Program Design 101
• Strategic Planning 101 and Cohort Series
• Board Development- How to Make Your Board a Working Board
• Community Ambassador Training
• How to Develop and Maintain a Regional Initiative
• Development 101
• Grant Writing 101
• RFP Writing and Responding 101 and 102
• Meeting Facilitation 101
We pride ourselves in being able to train our clients to do the work that we are hired to do and provide tools and templates so that they are not dependent on consultants.
SERVICE SPOTLIGHT: THE ROI OF GOOD
CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSINBILITY STRATEGIES SHOULD BE GOOD FOR THE BUSINESS AND BE INTEGRAL TO THE COMPANY’S CORE BUSIENSS.
THE TEAM
THE TEAM
Our team’s first-hand experience in the private, public, non-profit, and academic sectors provides us with a nuanced understanding of the strengths and challenges of each sector and equips us with the skills and insights needed to cause impacts. Here are some of our staff bios.
JESSICA DAUGHERTY, MPP Founder & Principal
Jessica is a campaign strategist and policy analyst whose career is fixated on driving social change in increasingly impactful ways. She has helped dozens of companies, non profit organizations, public agencies, elected officials, and funders develop innovative solutions that help them create social change, measure and evaluate their programmatic impact, and communicate its value.
Over the past fifteen years, she has worked on the front-lines driving grassroots social change, in boardrooms helping businesses develop strategic ways to give back that are good for their brand and bottom lines, and in coalitions forging consensus that can enhance collective impact. She has extensive experience developing programs for public, private, and non-profit entities. She is equally comfortable facilitating large cross-sector workgroups, developing a grassroots community program, and doing extensive statistical analysis. This breadth of experience and skill allows Jessica to see projects from a birds-eye view and innovate programs that others may not see.
Jessica earned a Masters of Public Policy from the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs and Bachelors in Global Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara. She lives with her husband and two sons in Inglewood, California. Jessica is also fluent in Spanish.
We have first-hand experience in the private, public, nonprofit, and academic sectors which provides a nuanced understanding of each sector.
THE TEAM
OUR TEAM (cont.)
CHRISTINA SANCHEZ, MPP Senior Consultant
Christina has worked with over thirty organizations to lead trainings and/or launch new initiatives. She brings over ten years of experience as an educator, non-profit Director, community organizer, and policy analyst. She started her career as a Social Studies and English as a Second Language (ESL) teacher in the Los Angeles Unified School District. She served as the Director of Programs for A Place Called Home, a community and youth center in South Central Los Angeles. And she launched parent organizing efforts across the state of California. These roles required strong management and facilitation skills as well as utilization of a diverse set of teaching strategies to meet the unique needs of each audience. While working on her Masters in Public Policy and Urban Planning at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and School of Design, she supported citywide initiatives and worked alongside Mayor’s Office staff in the cities of Boston, Chicago, and Los Angeles. That work involved convening community members, nonprofit leaders, philanthropic partners, and public officials. As a consultant, she has helped organization leaders articulate their priorities, spread the Theory of Change philosophy, and set short- and long-term goals. She has designed customized professional development programs for educators, organizers, and front-line staff who work with youth and low-income communities. She has helped start-up organizations prepare to scale by helping them codify their program models and uniformly train staff. Christina is also fluent in Spanish.
NATALIE LEHMAN Senior Researcher
Natalie is passionate about building sustainable, equitable, and thriving communities by developing leaders, improving policies, and increasing advocacy efforts within the private, public, and non-profit sectors. Natalie has worked with higher education institutions to build workforce development programs and implement policy changes that support under-served and underrepresented student populations to achieve their educational goals. Natalie has a Master’s in Organizational Leadership and Learning from Pepperdine University and excels at supporting organiations in developing strategic plans and building internal capacity.
THE TEAM
OUR TEAM (cont.)
STEVE CARDENAS
Lead Consultant, Design & Marketing
Steve is a creative marketing professional with a degree in Broadcasting, Film & Communications from Boston University and a Certification in Direct Marketing from Bentley College. Steve specializes in developing high impact branded, targeted marketing and creative executions for social impact companies and initiatives.
In the public sector he worked at the Department of Employment & Training in Boston where he lead the development of Employment Network, a marketingbased back-to-work initiative for people on Welfare and Unemployment Assistance. In the private sector, he worked with two of the world’s largest marketing and advertising organizations - Ogilvy & Mather and McCann Erickson, where he spearheaded high impact marketing initiatives for Fortune 500 companies.
Mr. Cardenas believes “the principles of great marketing are consistent... it’s the strategies and tactics that evolve.” Mr. Cardenas is also fluent in Spanish.
CLIENTS
Our clients include companies, non-profit organizations, government agencies, foundations, and philanthropists who want to positively impact the world while advancing their organizational mission and brand.
SOME OF OUR CLIENTS INCLUDE:
• Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro)
• Rock the Vote
• National Urban League
• The Honest Company
• Mitú
• California American Water
• Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, Unite LA
• Ventura County Workforce Development Board
• City of Los Angeles Education and Workforce Development Department
• Summit Public Schools
• The Partnership for Los Angeles Schools
• Da Vinci Schools
• Goodwill of Southern CA
• GRYD Foundation
• Mending Kids
• New Earth
• The Alliance for Children’s Rights
“For California American Water, Cause Impacts took the time to listen to our needs, clarify the challenge at hand, develop tools and assessments to address the challenge, and recommend process improvements for the future.
Job Well Done!”
CLIENTS
CASE STUDY: mitú
Strategic Workforce Development & Corporate Social Responsibility for Digital Media Tech Company
Client Need
Mitú is a digital communications and technology agency that engages their audience through a Latino/a point of view across multiple platforms. Mitú hired Cause IMPACTS because they were concerned by the lack of diverse employees entering the creative industries and wanted to increase their attraction of young multicultural talent in order to sustain their growing business.
Cause IMPACTS’ Solution
In response to this need, Cause IMPACTS developed the mitú ACCELERATOR internship program and curriculum which introduces aspiring multicultural storytellers to the digital field by exposing them to every aspect of mitú’s production and business cycle.
Cause IMPACTS engaged existing mitú employees to become the program’s trainers and mentors for incoming interns. Furthermore, Cause IMPACTS leveraged public funding and corporate sponsorship dollars from entities such as Aeromexico to cover the program implementation costs and support low-income interns. The ACCELERATOR program provides a pipeline of diverse youth who can sustain the workforce of the future, trains new employees, engages existing employees, and provides fresh digital content, all while enhancing the brand and giving back to youth.
Key Services Provided
• Workforce Development Program Creation
• Corporate Social Responsibility Strategy
• Training and Curriculum Development
• Employee Engagement
• Policy Analysis
• Cross-Sector Partnership Development
“Cause IMPACTS approached the project with the passion and enthusiasm necessary to help us achieve the program’s mission. They were professional, timely, and effective, making themselves readily available to our team to address any questions or concerns. Additionally, they were able to utilize their connections in the field to ensure that multiple actors in the private, public, and nonprofit sectors worked together to accomplish program success.”
~ Raul Celaya SVP Content Operations and Production
CLIENTS
CASE STUDY: Los Angeles County Metro
LA Metro’s Youth Education Initiative
Client Need
Job opportunities in the national transportation industry are increasing, but the pool of qualified applicants is not. At Metro, more than 28% of the current workforce—over 3,000 employees–are eligible for retirement, and 46% will be eligible for retirement within the next five years. Metro hired Cause IMPACTS to evaluate the feasibility of providing a countywide educational and career-training program that targets middle and high school aged youth with an emphasis on at-risk youth. The goal was to expose, educate, and employ a younger workforce to prepare them for the jobs that these looming retirements will create while also giving back to the Los Angeles County Community.
Cause IMPACTS’ Solution
Cause IMPACTS developed the E3 Initiative that provides various ways to Expose, Educate, and Employ (E3) the Next Generation into the Transportation Industry by teaching them transferrable STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math) industry skills. Cause IMPACTS conducted a study for Metro to assess the feasibility of developing an innovative Transportation School that trains young people about the upward mobility careers in the industry. Cause IMPACTS then developed various educational programs that Metro can use to expose youth to the transportation industry, educate youth about transferrable industry skills, and ultimately employ youth into upward mobility industry jobs. Programs included: a teacher externship program; school fieldtrip program; project based learning partnerships with high schools; and transportation curriculum for classrooms. Finally, Cause IMPACTS conducted an assessment of existing entry level jobs at the agency and recommended methods to increase opportunities for youth. These programs were developed across sectors with representatives including K-12 education partners, private companies, public agencies, and college partners.
Key Services Provided
• Program Development
• Policy Analysis and Research
• Workforce Development and Youth Apprenticeship Strategies
• Strategic Planning and Group Facilitation
“The E3 Initiative will dramatically accelerate educational achievement and upward mobility of at-risk students while also meeting the needs of the transportation industry and Metro’s workforce needs. We want to create the workforce of tomorrow through this innovative education-industry partnership.”
– Phil Washington Metro CEO
CLIENTS
CASE STUDY: The Honest Company
Corporate Social Responsibility Strategy that Connects Honest to its Core Mission and the Community
Client Need
The Honest Company is well-known as a socially responsible company that gives back in various ways. The Honest Company was interested in increasing its impact in the Southern California region by becoming active in environmental advocacy. Cause IMPACTS was hired to assess how the Honest Company could cause greater impacts by delving into advocacy work and what that program could entail.
Cause IMPACTS’ Solution Cause IMPACTS conducted policy research and identified a number of policies that Honest could use to elevate their impact. Then, Cause IMPACTS developed a pilot program to build Honest’s advocacy efforts by changing bleach-cleaning policies in Community College Child Development Care Centers. The program positively impacts young children and teachers at the centers and also teaches hundreds of college students who are taking Child Development courses about green cleaning.
Taking on this issue gave Honest a strategic advantage over industry competitors, introduced Honest products to more people, donated overflow inventory, and created a new narrative of businesses engaging in advocacy for the benefit of young children and families. Furthermore, the project expanded Honest’s Whole Child strategic philanthropic giving portfolio by identifying non-profit organizations with which to partner and enhance impact.
Key Services Provided
• Corporate Social Responsibility Strategy
• Policy Analysis
• Cross Sector Partnership Development
• Training
CAUSE IMPACTS CORPORATE DETAILS
