I’m Stormy
…a person easily moved by life, practical by nature, passionate about people, frequently wonderstruck, and infinitely curious with a deep desire to know. My wide-ranging career path and life journey has focused on four central themes:
Professional Wonderer
I am a futurist and social scientist who studies interactions between people, technology, and social contexts and their implications for inclusion, identity, and organizing. I am particularly interested in the ways we engage others and seek to belong, how we imagine and play with identity possibilities and resonate with new cultural images, and the emergent co-creative potential of groups. As a child of parents from different cultures, who spent years trying to figure out where and with whom I fit in, these topics are not only of interest to me professionally, but are deeply personal, as well. I am also a lifelong student of the phenomenon of wonder. Currently, I explore questions related to these subjects as a research affiliate at Case Western Reserve University, the institution where I graduated with my PhD in organizational behavior.
Facilitator, Educator & Guide
I have been an organizational facilitator, educator, and consultant for over 25 years, creating and leading innovative programs in evolving community, socio-political, regulatory, and economic environments. I have also worked extensively with leadership teams and executives who wish to improve their emotional intelligence, shift relational dynamics, communicate more effectively, and harness the collective intelligence of the people they lead. I have had the privilege of working with leaders in such organizations as the United Nations World Food Programme, Unilever, the US Embassy in Namibia, and many national and regional healthcare, energy, education and social enterprise organizations in the US and abroad.
Entrepreneurial + Possibility Thinker
Not only have I hustled since I was a new college grad–having created or pursued a variety of interesting inventions, businesses, and creative ventures in the years since. I think entrepreneurially, act strategically, and am both grounded in the present and have an eye to the future. I draw on these strengths and experiences to not only bring my own ideas to fruition, but to help others in navigating uncertainty, envisioning possibility, and artfully crafting their next steps.
Explorer
While I grew up in a farming community of 800 people, my curious, but fulfilling life and career path has allowed me to explore the various sides of myself, take big risks and pursue wide-ranging adventures and indulge in the mundane beauty of the everyday. The people I’ve met, the opportunities I’ve been fortunate to encounter, and the experiences I’ve had, have made my life incredibly rich in ways I will be forever grateful for. For example, I’ve lived in Venezuela, Russia, Finland, the Republic of Moldova and Armenia, motorcycled across Vietnam, led global market tours in my home town of Salt Lake City, written a young adult novel about the exotic animal trade (shark finning specifically), collaborated with a bunch of chefs to teach cooking classes through Google+ Hangouts when they were first introduced and with a bunch of artists to create a women’s art center, conducted ethnographic research on a disappearing community, started (and shut down) businesses, trained as a birth doula and reiki practitioner, and spoken to audiences about my passion for cultivating wonder in our lives. As diverse as these experiences are, they are unified by a desire to learn and grow and to experience this beautiful life and world.