GARRETT LANDRY

Chief Executive Officer

Areas of Expertise

  • Public education

  • Nonprofit management

  • Government (local, state and federal)

  • Strategic planning

  • Philanthropy

  • Collective impact

  • Rural economic development

  • Change management

  • Human capital talent management

  • Executive coaching and organizational effectiveness

Garrett, a New Orleans native, has over a decade of experience in leading macro-level systems change within large public entities and in the nonprofit sector in Texas and across the United States, working alongside C-level state agency leaders, school district superintendents, and business and nonprofit leaders to develop strategic plans/initiatives, while ensuring that bold and ambitious goals are tactfully implemented to achieve results that improve their most critical systems.

Having been a key part of leadership teams within organizations working to transform complex systems, as well as leading and scaling statewide initiatives as a third party provider to local and state agencies, Garrett brings an important perspective to the table having an intimate understanding of both the internal and external inputs that are necessary to successfully envision, implement, and continuously improve strategic plans/initiatives. Garrett continues to improve his capabilities in leading impactful work, having been trained by Bain and Company, a leading global consulting firm, on their Results Delivery framework, while also working (and learning) directly alongside some of the more innovative system's leaders in the public and private sectors. 

Loretta Landry

President

Areas of Expertise

  • Anti-poverty

  • Food security and federal nutrition programs

  • Federal benefits optimization

  • Government (local, state and federal)

  • Healthcare

  • Reproductive health and contraceptive access

  • Philanthropy

  • Nonprofit management

  • Collective Impact

  • Human-centered design

Loretta, a San Antonio native, offers a diversified background spanning more than 15 years driving impact in the anti-poverty movement, within the Texas Legislature, Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, and private industry.

She operates at the forefront of community engagement and has a track record of making significant contributions to regional and national campaign strategy teams. Representing under-invested communities and implementing large-scale impact projects, Loretta excels in public negotiations, coalition building, identifying community-driven solutions and project design, project-based management, legislative strategy and has built and led numerous community involvement programs from the ground-up resulting in the launch and implementation of many innovative community program solutions on the macro-level from universal school breakfast to all methods contraceptive access for all women.

Catherine Jaynes

Senior Advisor

Catherine Jaynes, Ph.D. supports Steady State Impact’s work on strategy, program development, execution, and evaluation. She also leads the COVID Collaborative’s initiative to support COVID Bereaved Children. She most recently was a Partner at Cicero Group, leading their social impact practice and Dallas office. As the Founding Director of the Presidential Leadership Scholars and the Director of Research and Evaluation at the George W. Bush Institute, Catherine developed and executed national and international programs as well as led the measurement and evaluation of the Institute’s programs. Catherine’s expertise extended beyond evaluation and included hands-on research of measurement strategies and policy development. This builds upon the work Catherine did as Chief of Staff to the State Superintendent of Education for the District of Columbia, Senior Researchers for the National Academies of Science, and Deputy Assistant Secretary for the U.S. Department of Education.

Areas of Expertise:

  • Public Policy

  • Evaluation and Measurement

  • Non-Profit Strategy

  • Strategic Planning

  • Philanthropic Giving

  • Organizational Effectiveness

  • Executive Coaching

  • K-12 Education

Mercedes Aquilini

Director

Areas of Expertise

  • Strategic planning

  • Evaluation and measurement

  • Nonprofit strategy

  • Higher education

  • K-12 education

  • Workforce development

  • Change management

  • Market research

  • Innovation development

  • Equitable outcomes

Mercedes, a Seattle native, has diverse experience in supporting nonprofits, public entities, and corporate partners to design and implement strategic plans that lead to sustained impact. With a background in both management consulting and internal strategic roles, Mercedes understands what it takes to make a strategic plan become a reality.

Mercedes excels at helping organizations understand, measure, and convey their impact, having designed and conducted numerous large-scale studies that culminated in poignant impact reports. Examples of her work include analyzing the impact of COVID-19 on childcare for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, creating a measurement and evaluation framework for the Resilient Schools Support Program at the Texas Education Agency, and leading the five-year strategic planning process for Western Governors University. 

Laura Worline

Client Engagement & Growth Manager

Areas of Expertise

  • Inclusive Student Bridge Programming

  • Nonprofit Program Management

  • Government and Foundation Grant Management

  • Stakeholder Engagement

  • Workforce Innovation

  • Career Coaching and Client laddering

  • Case Management

  • Criminal Record Expungement and Reentry

  • Refugee Education Programs

Laura, a Kalamazoo Michigan native, has experience in pilot program creation and execution revolving around equity access to education, barrier removal for BIPOC students and ALICE population, ex-offender career support, and criminal record expungement. Several of these programs have been recognized by the federal office of child support and enforcement, the Michigan Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity, and Michigan's legislature as restorative NCP programs to move State/Nation wide. Laura’s student success pilot programs were implemented into a D1 University’s programming, with her holistic student success coaching model still being in circulation at several Universities. Laura was a key player in Michigans first expungement program in existence, with hosting the largest Expungement fair to date in Michigan. A partnership between multiple community partners (government, nonprofit, and community groups). Laura also has engaged in workforce education programming surrounding refugee career readiness, noncustodial parent career coaching, and ALICE population trade exposure.

Having played an important role in the creation of educational support programs, as well as in marginalized community workforce innovation/reform pilots, Laura has a strong sense of stakeholder engagement, pipeline creation, and capacity building. Laura brings vital skills of community building, implementation of plan to program, and a strong desire to executing impactful work across sectors.