Becoming Community-Led with Carolyn Daly

What does it really mean to be community-led?

In the nonprofit sector, “community-led” has become a popular phrase, but what does it actually look like when an organization is willing to transfer real decision-making power to the people closest to the work?

In this episode of Nonprofit Nation, Julia Campbell talks with Carolyn Daly, Executive Director of Nuya’, a nonprofit partnering with Indigenous Maya women in Guatemala to improve health, education, and economic opportunity through community-led solutions. Carolyn has spent the past 13 years working alongside local women leaders as programs have increasingly been designed, led, and sustained by the communities they serve. She is now helping lead a long-term transition of executive leadership to Nuya’s Indigenous Guatemalan leadership team. 

Carolyn shares how this experience has challenged her assumptions about leadership, philanthropy, growth, and sustainability and what nonprofit leaders may need to unlearn and let go of in order to make meaningful community ownership possible.

We also dig into a question that many nonprofits and funders wrestle with: Does bigger actually mean better? Carolyn shares what a failed program experiment in Guatemala taught her about the idea of “enough,” and why sustainability and lasting impact may require organizations to rethink their relationship with growth. 

In this episode, we discuss:

•  What “community-led” really means beyond simply asking for community input 
•  The difference between community participation and community power
•  What it takes to develop local leadership over many years—not just within a grant cycle 
•  Why transferring leadership is about much more than changing someone's title 
•  What Carolyn has had to unlearn about leadership and power
•  How boards, staff, and organizational structures need to evolve when leadership is being transferred 
•  The important work of community leadership that philanthropy often doesn't see or fund 
•  Why leadership development can be difficult to fit into traditional funder metrics 
•  The importance of patient and unrestricted funding
•  What happens when funder priorities don't align with what a community actually needs 
•  Who should define what “impact” means: funders, nonprofits, or the communities being served? 
•  Why nonprofits and funders often equate growth with impact
•  What a failed program experiment in Guatemala taught Carolyn about knowing when “enough” is enough
•  Rethinking sustainability beyond simply having enough money to keep an organization running 
•  Whether a nonprofit leader's success can eventually mean becoming less necessary
•  One uncomfortable question nonprofit leaders and funders should be willing to ask if they genuinely want to become more community-led

About Carolyn Daly

Carolyn Daly is the Executive Director of Nuya’, a nonprofit that partners with Indigenous Maya women in Guatemala to improve health, education, and economic opportunity through community-led solutions.

She is currently helping lead a long-term transition of executive leadership to Nuya’s Indigenous Guatemalan leadership team. Over the past 13 years, Carolyn has worked alongside local women leaders to build programs that are increasingly designed, led, and sustained by the communities they serve.

Carolyn writes about philanthropy, nonprofit leadership, and community-led development, exploring questions around growth, sustainability, and how philanthropy can better support local leadership. Before joining Nuya’, she served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guatemala. 

Short Description

What does it really mean to become community-led? Carolyn Daly of Nuya’ joins Julia to explore transferring power, not just titles, to Indigenous Guatemalan leaders, the challenges philanthropy creates for community-led work, and why nonprofit leaders should question wheth