Shifra Bronznick specializes in launching new initiatives, fostering collaborations, and helping nonprofit organizations and leaders have a more powerful impact She is establishing a new action research lab, in partnership with Auburn, designed to synthesize knowledge from diverse disciplines and apply it to social change challenges.
Shifra was Founder and President of Advancing Women Professionals and the Jewish Community, recognized annually by the philanthropic guide, Slingshot as one of the most effective innovators in the field. She is the co-author, with Didi Goldenhar and Marty Linsky, of Leveling the Playing Field. As a principal investigator for action research projects at the Nathan Cummings Foundation, her work, including the influential report Visioning Justice, has resulted in the establishment of a Jewish social justice “roundtable” coalition comprised of dozens of significant organizations in the field. Shifra has been chosen three times by The Forward as one of the fifty most influential Jews, she received the Leading Lights award from the Future Work Institute and is a Ford Foundation Public Voice Fellow.
Shifra has consulted to a wide range of organizations including Catalyst, The Fresh Air Fund, the Op-Ed Project, Hebrew Union College-JIR, Building Movement Project, IKAR, American Jewish World Service, the National Council for Research on Women, the Charles H. Revson Foundation, the Medicare Rights Center, Women Donors Network, and Auburn.
The leadership strategist to the White House Project for a decade, Shifra designed its National Women’s Leadership Summits as well as “Women Rule,” launched with O, the Oprah magazine to benefit women social entrepreneurs. Previously Shifra served as Executive Vice-President of Swig, Weiler & Arnow Mgt. Co., Inc., one of the premier commercial real estate firms in New York.
Shifra has been a senior fellow at the NYU Research Center for Leadership in Action at the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, where she teaches strategic leadership for the Executive Masters in Public Administration program.