CLI Leadership

CLI is a community of civil leaders operating in different sectors.

Adriana Santamaria

IMAGINATION CATALYST
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adriana@civicleadershipinstitute.com

Adriana is a designer, entrepreneur, and educator focused on social impact with 15 years of experience. She is committed to reframing society’s most pressing challenges into opportunities that create long-lasting value. She believes that strengthening communities’ relationships and capabilities can help people challenge systemic inequality. The social change she explores is deeply rooted in her Colombian identity and grounded in peacebuilding. As a designer, she takes a decolonial approach to her practice, focusing on designing and facilitating participatory processes that embrace the knowledge of those with lived experience and allow them to better connect to their agency and power. She has worked in local contexts in Colombia, the USA, Mexico, and Finland, engaging with organisations and grassroots communities. Her experience extends over design strategy, co-design, futures thinking, community building, communication design, storytelling, and visual thinking.

Adriana has contributed to social-driven and peacebuilding projects for organisations like Humanity United, Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz (JEP) in collaboration with the Swiss Embassy in Colombia, Global Action Against Mass Atrocity Crimes (GAAMAC), Fondo Acción, and Startup Refugees.

She is an industrial designer from Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, specialised in multimedia design at Universidad Nacional de Colombia. She holds an MBA in Design Strategy from California College of the Arts in San Francisco.

She supports CLI’s interventions on strategy.

Teambuilding embodies a culture of belonging that fosters a genuine desire among individuals to contribute meaningfully to the creation of value for all members.
There is nothing important for a leader than the knowledge and assurance that all their hard work today leads to a secure future for the organization.
CLI works with organisations in developing and implementing leadership development programmes.
CLI works with organisations in developing and implementing leadership development programmes.
Does your board know what it is doing? Is your board fully aware of its leadership responsibilities within the organization.
Civic Leadership Experts take their time to provide mentorship to leaders and practitioners in the civic space.