Latonya Slack, JD, CPC
Executive Coach, Senior Consultant, Facilitator
Latonya Slack specializes in facilitating and assisting senior level leaders and organizations with visioning, planning, navigating critical decisions and creating effective strategies for success. Specializing in modalities that promote intuitive leadership combined with energetic healing and balancing, Latonya works with clients with a holistic approach. For seven years, she served as Senior Program Officer for California Democracy supporting civic engagement, community organizing, voter engagement, and capacity building with the James Irvine Foundation. While at the foundation, she served as secretary, vice chair, and chair of Southern California Grantmakers board of directors. Prior to working in philanthropy, she was Executive Director of the California Black Women’s Health Project, where she created a comprehensive policy advocacy program, a mental health initiative, and the Advocate Training Program, which trains lay community members as health policy advocates. She has also worked for the Service Employees International Union as a community political organizer, engaging community, religious, labor and health organizations on health care justice issues.
After graduating from UCLA School of Law, she worked with the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles as a Consumer Law Advocate and, through AmeriCorps Legal Corps’ Youth Empowerment Project, assisted South Los Angeles community groups with forming nonprofit organizations. Latonya is a graduate of Brown University with a concentration in Biomedical Ethics. She is a 2006 German Marshall Fund American Marshall Memorial Fellow and is currently a board member of the California Association of Nonprofits, California NonProfits Insurance Services and Forward Together. She has served on numerous boards and commissions including the Liberty Hill Foundation, the El Pueblo/Olvera Street Commission, Funders’ Committee for Civic Participation, and the Steering Committee for MLK Hospital. She is also a former Senior Lecturer at Claremont McKenna College, facilitating a project entitled “Behind the Veil: Women, Race, and Leadership in the Nonprofit Social Justice Sector”.
Latonya is a trained facilitator, a certified Innerlight Method Energy Therapy Practitioner, energy leadership master practitioner and certified professional coach. Her certifications and trainings include Institute for Professional Excellence in Coaching, Interaction Institute for Social Change – Essential Facilitation, Fundamentals of Facilitation for Racial Justice Work, The Masterful Trainer; Open Space Technology; and The Art of Transformational Consulting with Robert Gass. Latonya is an affiliate with Change Elemental and a Haas Jr Foundation Flexible Leadership Awards Plan Consultant.
The Science Behind Our Practice
Our work is grounded in established methodologies and models of human and organizational behavior, including, but not limited to the following:
Emotional Intelligence
The competencies of emotional intelligence (self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and relationship management) account for an individual’s ability to understand their own and others’ emotions and use that information to guide decision-making and action. Research has shown that leaders who master the competencies of emotional intelligence have a distinct advantage.
Positivity & Resilience
The incredible developments in neuroscience research over the last several decades have enabled a greater understanding of how practices that promote positivity and resilience—both individually and organizationally—have a significant and lasting impact on our capacity for creative thinking, productivity, efficiency, empathy, focus and more.
Intentional Change
Developed by Richard Boyatzis, the Intentional Change Model underpins successful leadership development programs by supporting an individual or group in intentionally moving through five stages of change that close the gap between a current “real” self and a clearly articulated “ideal” self.
Appreciative Inquiry
Appreciative Inquiry, developed by David Cooper Rider, is a strengths-based model of analysis, decision-making and strategic change that clarifies the assets and motivations that are an organization’s strengths in order to build or rebuild an organization based on what is working rather than trying to fix what doesn’t.
Resistance and Cycle of Change
People are at their most creative in their resistance. The Gestalt cycle of change maps the critical stages of change that all members of a group must experience in order to optimize success and minimize resistance. Disruption of the cycle manifests in very specific levels of resistance that can be effectively mitigated through intentional responses.
Mindfulness
Mindfulness is the awareness that one develops through paying attention to the present moment through your five senses without judgment. In addition to relieving stress and building resilience, even a simple mindfulness practice can significantly expand your range of options in any given moment. Incorporating mindfulness into any process of change or development supports an individual or group by rewiring the brain for more intentional responses and behaviors.
Dynamic Inquiry
Dynamic Inquiry, developed by Annie McKee and the Teleos Leadership Institute, is a method of discovery that uncovers an organization’s emotional reality–what people care about, what is working well, and what’s getting in the way. The purpose of the inquiry is twofold: 1) to identify underlying issues related to culture and leadership that are helping or hindering implementation of a strategy; and 2) to build ownership and commitment to the mission, vision, strategy, ideal culture and leadership framework among key stakeholders.