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A new frame on leadership: Reflections with two-time Center alumna Claire Louge
August 21, 2024 — When Claire Louge first came through the doors of the ASU Lodestar Center, “leader” was a label she hesitated to embrace. Her vision of a traditional leader was stern, cerebral, structured. Louge, on the other hand, described herself as a relational person, someone disinclined to develop a hard shell.
With five years tenure at Prevent Child Abuse Arizona, Louge began contemplating what it might be like to walk in a leader’s shoes. And the organization had big shoes to fill—Becky Ruffner, who had served as Prevent Child Abuse Arizona’s founder and executive director since 1989, had announced her intent to retire.
“I didn’t perceive myself as a leader type. I applied to the Center's Leadership Academy because I wanted to answer the question in myself: Is [the executive director role] something I want to go for and do I have what it takes?” Louge explained. “I didn’t know if I would be the right kind of person to lead the organization, and I really loved the organization, so I wanted to make sure that if I was a contender, I had the qualities that were going to make it successful.”
The program gave her space to evaluate her leadership potential, and she cites the one-on-one executive coaching sessions and the Emergenetics strengths-finding assessment as especially valuable in that endeavor. “One of the things the Academy helped me do was identify my own strengths, and identify my own values,” Louge said. “Leaders need to know what they bring to the table, and this experience helped me uncover how to build my strengths to benefit the mission my organization is working to achieve.”
“What the Academy did a lot is opposed to giving you the answer, it really teaches you how to question and how to relate to others,” Louge added. “During that year, I started to enter every meeting I had with the specific question: What would I need to know in this meeting if I was the leader? What would I need to ask?” The tactic was transformative, fueling her desire to expand her perspective and understand the organization at a systems level. “The Academy really helped me think at a higher level and try on that role before I applied.”
Her cohort also helped her prepare for her interview, meeting with her to discuss her approach. She ultimately won the role, competing against candidates with executive director titles and decades more experience. “I owe it in part to my experience at the Academy,” Louge explained. “Not only was I given this new frame of how to see myself… The most important part was the relationships I was able to build with other leaders.”
During her tenure as executive director, Louge has focused on clarifying Prevent Child Abuse Arizona’s role in the child welfare sphere. The statewide nonprofit organization is dedicated to strengthening families and protecting children through collaboration, education and advocacy. “A lot of what we do is training, and we produce professional development opportunities for people who work directly with children and families, to give them the tools they need to build resilience and to strengthen families. That’s how we work to prevent abuse from ever happening in the first place.”
Louge stepped into the role just two months before the pandemic began. In both revenue and community impact, the organization had relied heavily on in-person trainings. “We had to pivot very quickly, but we were able to be very successful. And the knowledge and relationships that I got through the Academy were vital.”
In 2020, as a new executive director, Louge also went on to receive the Nonprofit Executive Leadership Certificate through the Center's Nonprofit Management Institute. The program built on what she learned from the Academy, advancing her management skills and connecting her to other senior-level leaders as she mastered her new role as CEO. “I learned how to stay curious and listen more, how to define alignment with other partners,” she said. “The ASU Lodestar Center helped me think through the critical importance of building relationships, because relationships are really the measure of our strengths and our influence, especially in the nonprofit sector.”
Image: Claire Louge, an alumna of the American Express Leadership Academy and Nonprofit Executive Leadership Certificate, by Jess Robson
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