LeahGrace Kayler
Founding Principal
Nikki Kagan
Principal
Karen Nell Smith
Senior Consultant
Karen Nell Smith
Senior Consultant
Karen Nell is a highly skilled facilitator with over 25 years of experience who specializes in moving groups through situations of conflict to productive outcomes and creative opportunities. Her strengths lie in working with groups to articulate and understand issues, establish healthy dialogue, gain consensus, set goals, and develop strategies that move the group to action with a new understanding of organizational leadership, communication, and collaboration. While much of her work is with communities of faith and other non-profits, Karen Nell has been part of the Kagan Associates team since 1992, bringing her expertise to the corporate world in this way. As Program Director for The Brookfield Institute, which she co-founded in 2006, Karen Nell collaborates with others working at the intersection of healing of the person, the community and the earth. She is also a co-creator and lead consultant of "Walking in the Way," a program of conflict transformation and peace-building for communities of faith throughout New England.
Karen Nell received her undergraduate degree from Mary Washington College, holds a Master of Divinity from Andover Newton Theological School, and received her Doctor of Ministry at Hartford Seminary, with an emphasis on conflict transformation and interfaith dialogue. She also holds certificates in mediation and conflict transformation from the Lombard Mennonite Peace Center and in trauma healing through Eastern Mennonite University's Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resiliency program (STAR 1), and has been a member of the Hartford Seminary’s Building Abrahamic Partnerships facilitation team. She is ordained in the United Church of Christ presently serving as part-time pastor of the Congregational Church of Christ, UCC, in North Leominster, MA.