ALLISON GRAPPONE PORTFOLIO
I'M A FIXER
(The good kind)
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I'm a leader, strategist, and project manager who cares about the end result:
Invigorated stakeholders
Intelligent processes
Improved value from each customer touchpoint
Recent
Client Feedback
Discover what recent clients have to say about their experience working with me. Their testimonials showcase the quality and dedication of my services.
Executive Director at Clean Energy NH​
"Allison's assistance in crafting our new strategic plan was absolutely essential. She equipped us with tools that will endure well beyond her brief engagement with Clean Energy NH and which help guide our decision making regularly. I'd encourage anyone who is seeking services like those that Allison provides to give her a call and have a conversation!"
President & CEO NH Community Loan Fund
"Strategic planning with Allison is like watching an artist at work. From the start she customized her approach to support and guide our strategic planning process in two critical ways: she made sure we felt value every step of the way, not just when we put the final touches on our strategic plan; and she made sure the strategic plan itself captured a set of information that would provide clear focus and guidance to all stakeholders seeking strategic direction over the coming years. Her facilitation is thoughtful, inclusive, and mature."
Executive Director at Educational Passages​
"I highly recommend Allison as a strategic planning consultant. Throughout our work together, Allison was thoroughly prepared and adaptive to evolving needs and feedback, and consistently responsive in communication. The thoughtful approach and professionalism made a significant impact on the success of our planning process, which has laid a strong foundation for our organization's growth.I highly recommend Allison as a strategic planning consultant. Throughout our work together, Allison was thoroughly prepared and adaptive to evolving needs and feedback, and consistently responsive in communication. The thoughtful approach and professionalism made a significant impact on the success of our planning process, which has laid a strong foundation for our organization's growth."
Director of Conservation & Climate at North County Land Trust
"I was fortunate our organization hired Allison to lead our Strategic Planning Process. She was very approachable, presented each session in a clear and structured way while also allowing us to guide the process. I appreciated her approach which cuts out a lot of the aspects of traditional strategic planning that people find tiresome and a waste of time and instead dives deeper into the aspects that will truly be meaningful to the staff and board. We opted to take advantage of her services add on where she spent three months of implementation time, with the staff only, to help us take the abstract document and put it into practice as well as familiarize ourselves with using tools that would help us evaluate and prioritize our work. I highly recommend that option.
Allison is an astute, caring, sincere, and honest person who truly wants to see each client succeed. She even followed up with me months later-- just to check in! If you have need for organizational consulting or leadership coaching, I would highly recommend Allison Grappone."
In-house Strategic Planning,
when you just want to do it on your own.
RESUME & PORTFOLIO
PRIOR TO AGG CONSULTING
SCRUMMASTER & PRODUCT OWNER
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Apr '15-Dec '17
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Ran multiple Scrum teams, running 2-week iterations of producing shippable increments
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100% client satisfaction
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Developed process documentation to support on-boarding of new team members
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100+ hours coaching agile
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Was promoted to Director of Operations to support and oversee client-facing team
DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS
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Jan '18 - Dec '18
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Supported 8 team members who executed $2.5 million in annual client work
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Teams succeeded in delivering shippable product increments for clients every two weeks
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Gross margins consistently hit quarterly goals
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Grew operations department by 50%
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Became an Ascendle Partner
VP MARKETING
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Jan '19 - April '20
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Built company's first comprehensive marketing strategy
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Developed monthly marketing program to address messaging and visible expert challenges
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Increased visible experts from 1 to 11 in 6 months
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Facilitated publication of 60 content pieces in 1 year
Publications While at Ascendle
Software
Business Growth
Mind the Product
Cost of Software Innovation Guide
Cost of Software Innovation Calculator
MY STARTUP: NEARBY REGISTRY
HAVING A VISION
AND DOING SOMETHING ABOUT IT
One day I heard how the gift registry industry was worth $13 billion (in 2009). I knew 100% of that went to chain stores. That's not all bad because chain stores employ people. However, I grew up working for our family business and walking the streets of Concord, NH, lined with ma and pa shops. I thought they should get a piece of that nuptial pie.
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The original idea morphed into a business which supported local businesses in a broader way, by providing an online marketplace for them to sell goods, services and nonprofit donations.
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I thought about the idea for two years. And in January 2011 I entered a business plan contest, won the contest, quit my day job and got to work. A little simple math estimates I spent >12,000 hours building the business before I sold it.
BEING SWAMPED
AND STAYING AFLOAT
Project Management is all about knowing your desired outcome, having a pulse on every element that could affect that outcome and making adjustments, moves, decisions and corrections when appropriate.
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While running NEARBY that meant I needed to be spatially and viscerally aware of our product, service, relevancy, cashflow, and marketing, among other things.
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The electronic tools I used and personal exercises I did to maintain energy and level-headed decision-making abilities were a priceless benefit from my time as an entrepreneur.
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The most significant methodology I was introduced to during this venture was agile web development and project management. Agile forces smart teamwork, eliminates 'spinning your wheels' and allows for real-time changes as a product is being developed.
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It's easy to get weighed down by the intensity of a startup but I found that by sticking to agile methodologies I was able to maintain priorities and feel accomplished at the end of every day. I am very happy to continue the use of Agile, and related Scrum, in my current work with Ascendle. I am well versed in the JIRA suite to manage agile development projects (and this tool can also be used for general project management as well).
For more information about my skills, check out my LinkedIn profile or get in touch directly.
My startup was featured on MSNBC.
Click the video link!
5 MINUTES OF FAME
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EXAMPLES OF TOOLS CREATED
TO SOLVE PROBLEMS
VISION - STRATEGY - EXECUTION - IMPROVEMENT
Civic Duty
The State of New Hampshire is allowing Granite Staters to vote absentee if they are concerned about Covid at the polls.
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My sister and I put together a video to explain, step-by-step, how to vote absentee.
BIOMASS MINDMAP
PROGRAM DASHBOARD
A PLANNING TOOL I DEVELOPED TO SUPPORT THE ORGANIZATION'S 5-YEAR STRATEGIC PLAN
The Northern Forest Center does not shy away from long-term thinking while tackling an abundance of program types.
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When the organization started their 5-year strategic planning process I developed a Program Dashboard to help the team define the goals they were setting and help communicate their plan for achieving those goals to the Board and their funders.
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The tool brought a new level of organization, strategic thinking and teamwork to the non-profit.
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This is a tool they still use today, seven years later.
"Yes, we do still use it, and while we’ve adapted it some over the years it still hews pretty closely to your original. It has served us and our board very well." - My former boss Joe Short
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"You could also show off our Scorecard (which has evolved quite a lot, but we’re still using it for sure, and people remain impressed by it as a performance tracking tool)" - My colleague Kelly Short (not related to Joe Short)
LEGISLATIVE PROCESS MAP
AN EDUCATIONAL TOOL I CREATED TO HELP CONSTITUENTS AMPLIFY THEIR VOICE WITH THE STATE LEGISLATURE
While working with biomass stakeholders in New Hampshire it became clear that policy changes would be required to move some of their initiatives forward. The legislative process felt unclear to many.
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I interviewed law makers, lawyers and lobbyists to get a clear picture of the New Hampshire Legislative process and created this map to guide constituents.
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Why is this important? If constituents don't know how to effectively voice their concerns and their solutions, legislators will not know what their constituents need to improve their communities.
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It turns out, others needed this tool too! Link to file.
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"A colleague who works in philanthropy in Boston visited with me yesterday and saw Allison’s Legislative Step-by-Step Graphic on my wall. She found it fascinating and was wondering whether there is any way for her to obtain a copy. I constantly receive compliments on the graphic."
-Melina Hill Walker, Program Director, Endowment for Health
April 8, 2017
THE PROGRAM I STARTED, MANAGED AND GREW TO SUPPORT A HEALTHY RURAL NORTHERN FOREST ECONOMY.
The Northern Forest Center works across four states in the Northeast. I was brought in to develop their biomass programming.
The organization had little knowledge of the variables affecting the biomass ecosystem in the region, or the breadth of those variables.
I introduced a mind mapping tool to the organization which helped inventory and acknowledge the existing people, organizations, policies, funding resources, educational opportunities, infrastructure, biomass projects and community benefits within the four-state region.
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This tool led to our team securing grants, developing long-term partnerships and establishing the Modern Wood Heating program.
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Why is this important? Combatting the toll of fossil fuels while supporting rural economies and relationships across the Northern Forest region. "Every dollar we spend on wood pellets stays in the Northern Forest economy, creating jobs in forestry, logging, pellet manufacturing, and trucking." - Northern Forest Center
MARKETING SYSTEMS DIAGRAM
A SLIDE INCLUDED IN MY STARTUP'S PITCH DECK,
WHICH WON ME $25,000
Pitching a company that has $0 in funding, 0 hours of startup experience and no product is... a challenge. But that didn't stop me!
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I had an idea that I was passionate about, I wanted to see if others thought the idea and business plan were viable. Did my systems diagram for capturing customers make sense? Was it logical to assume the more storefronts I signed on, the more customers they would drive to our site?
So, I pitched it to a New Hampshire startup contest and I won! This was the starter cash and the confidence boost I needed to put in five energetic and committed years to proving the model.