Jessamyn Shams-Lau

Jessamyn is an advocate for redistribution of power in philanthropy, nonprofit workforce wellbeing, feminine leadership – and quality therapy for everyone. After realizing she’s far from alone in her frustration with the status quo of power hoarding in philanthropy, Jessamyn co-wrote and illustrated the book, ‘Unicorns Unite: How Nonprofits & Foundations Can Build EPIC Partnerships’, with Jane Leu and Vu Le.

During a decade leading the Peery Foundation, Jessamyn co-created and shared the Peery Foundation’s Grantee-Centric approach to philanthropy as Executive Director/Co-CEO. Along the way she also created a social innovation university curriculum that is still taught at both undergraduate and graduate levels, and has been an advisor to Intrinsic Labs, The Wellbeing Project, GrantAdvisor, and Ashoka U, as well as an Executive Committee member of Big Bang Philanthropy Group.