About The Leadership Breakfast Series

Looking to get to the next level in your nonprofit career? At YNPN Twin Cities' Leadership Breakfast series, nonprofit leaders will share with you exactly how they did it, what they learned and what they're looking for in a rising nonprofit leader.

A little bit about Avi Viswanathan, Program Director at Nexus Community Partners:

Avi serves as Program Director for the Nexus Community Engagement Institute (CEI) which seeks to build an equitable and just society by advancing the practice of community engagement. Avi came to Nexus with ten years of professional experience working in non-profits, the public sector, and philanthropy. In each of those positions he has sought to embed strong community engagement principles in order to best support communities in solving the problems they face. 

Ave joined Nexus in the fall of 2016 as the Program Director for the Nexus Community Engagement Institute (CEI). The CEI works to strengthen communities through the advancement of equity-based community engagement. They work with institutions across sectors to increase meaningful engagement with the communities those institutions serve.

Prior to joining Nexus, Avi was a Ron McKinley Philanthropy Fellow with the Bush Foundation. Avi has also held the positions of campaign director for HIRE Minnesota and field representative for US Senator Al Franken. Avi currently sits on the board of the Headwaters Foundation for Justice and previously sat on the board of NARAL Pro-Choice Minnesota and the Dayton’s Bluff Community Council. Avi holds a Juris Doctor degree from Suffolk University, a Bachelor of Science from Georgia Tech, and a certificate in Decision Analysis from the London School of Economics. By night, he lives with his wife and three children in the Dayton’s Bluff neighborhood in Saint Paul. He enjoys cooking, coaching soccer, and winning trivia competitions.

Leadership Breakfast Registration Lottery

Registration for this event will be open from Wednesday February 14 - Monday February 19. We allow as many people to sign up for the event as possible, and from there we choose 25 participants at random, while also holding space for young nonprofit professionals who identify as a person of color. We do this to keep these events intimate while ensuring everyone has a fair chance to attend a Leadership Breakfast event. If you registered for the lottery and identify as a person of color, you can email [email protected] to let us know to place your name in the correct lottery.

Our facilitator will reach out to all participants by Wednesday February 21 letting everyone know whether or not they received a spot through the lottery. Lottery winners will be asked to submit a question for our speaker in order to confirm their space. Unconfirmed spaces will be given to members of the wait list.

What you need to know:

• Our media sponsor, Pollen, will be at the event with a photographer and writer on hand.
• There will be a YNPN member on site to facilitate and help you get the most out of these discussions.