Hope: Our Response–Ability
Hope is not just the communal promise we have made for the love of Rhode Island. It is the practice in which we must consistently engage to lead the way forward into a flourishing future for all of us.
In Rhode Island, hope is our seal—an anchor that steadies us in uncertain waters and reflects our shared civic identity. In a time when hope can be mistaken for wishful thinking or dismissed as naïve, we invite a different understanding: hope as our response-ability—a practiced capacity to face reality with courage, stay connected across difference, and choose action over withdrawal.
Like leadership, hope is relational. It lives within and between us, strengthened through conversation, connection, and shared purpose. No one person has all the answers, but together we carry forward the relationships and moments that remind us we don’t lead alone. Hope is a choice we make again and again—to ask better questions, listen deeply, stay in relationship, and use our strengths in service of something larger than ourselves.
Leadership Rhode Island weaves relationships across sectors, industries, generations, and communities into an impact network built on trust and belonging — two conditions essential for people to lead with courage and invest in a community’s future. Leaders who are connected to one another are more likely to invest locally, solve collectively, and stay committed to Rhode Island’s future. By intentionally cultivating these networks over decades, we reinforce the connective tissue and the civic laboratory for practicing hope at scale.
Building Our Relational Infrastructure
Trust accelerates decision-making. Belonging retains talent.
Both deepen over time, enabling Rhode Island to respond, adapt and lead, together.
Leaders Strengthen Our Civic & Economic Health
A statewide impact network spanning six generations anchors hope. Interconnected, trusted leaders form the connective tissue where information flows, movement happens, and resilience strengthens.
Increase in Network Density Sparks Innovation
Connections don’t just exist — they compound as a force multiplier. In five months, the 2025 Phi II Class’s connections expanded from 102 to 1,783 — a 15.5x increase in network density and nearly 18x growth in average connections per person.
Leadership in Action Projects Accelerate Collaboration
Cross-sector teams turn relationships into results—reducing silos, advancing solutions to complex community challenges, and stewarding Rhode Island’s problem-solving engine.
Practicing Hope
Hope is a capability we build and practice.
In Rhode Island, hope has always meant action. It has meant stepping forward when the path was uncertain, lifting one another when burdens were heavy, and standing tall even in the smallest of places. In 2026, we claim hope as more than a motto. We claim it as our response-ability.
As Rhode Island navigates complexity and change, LRI is more committed than ever to anchoring hope: aligning to shared purpose and values, nurturing dialogue, centering humanity, holding dynamic tensions, orienting to strengths, and reaching across silos. Because hope is credible when leadership is experienced as service, and loving Rhode Island is a responsibility we rise to, together.
ANCHOR HOPE
ANCHOR HOPE
Align
Align to Shared Purpose and Values
Nurture
Nurture Dialogue
Center
Center Humanity
Hold
Hold Dynamic Tensions
Orient
Orient to Strengths
Reach
Reach Across Silos
Align to Shared Purpose and Values
Hope begins with clarity about why we are here and alignment to shared values especially when pressure rises.
Nurture Dialogue
Hope grows where courageous conversations are facilitated and complexity can be explored with curiosity and kindness.
Center Humanity
Hope strengthens when leaders connect with the whole person—not just their job function.
Hold Dynamic Tensions
Leadership requires paradoxical thinking. Hope helps us remain grounded within tension as we generate movement forward.
Orient Strengths
Hope becomes believable when people can contribute through their strengths, and know they matter.
Reach Across Silos
Hope scales and is sustained through connections and relationships that outlast any single person or moment in time.
PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Core Program
Building leaders, strengthening Rhode Island communities.
Senior Fellows
Deepening knowledge, building civic impact.
Alumni Engagement
LRI alumni leading Rhode Island forward for 45 years.
Making Rhode Island Stronger
ACROSS CAREER STAGES
Individuals are equipped to leverage their strengths, resulting in higher engagement, stronger performance and a deeper sense of purpose.
ACROSS SECTORS
Organizations across sectors are building inclusive cultures while aligning strengths, increasing productivity and improving wellbeing.
ACROSS INDUSTRIES
Trainings across industries and over time, strengthen talent pipelines, improve collaboration, and increase industry resiliency.
Hope is Active
Built with collective agency. Sustained by shared leadership.
STRENGTHS-BASED WORKFORCE
Leveraging Strengths through Multi-year Partnerships
In workplaces, hope is a performance variable—especially in uncertainty. People look to leaders for hope—because hope determines whether we engage or withdraw. Through lasting multi-year partnerships, LRI develops a strengths-based, durable workforce in every sector.
RHODE ISLAND'S LEADERSHIP PIPELINE
Investing Intentionally in our Early Career Talent
LRI launched Pathways and Propel as long-term investments in Rhode Island’s leadership bench. Together, these programs strengthen talent retention and access to cross-sector relationships. When we cultivate emerging leaders early — and connect them intentionally — we build a workforce that is collaborative, resilient, and prepared to lead Rhode Island forward. When emerging leaders feel supported, connected and hopeful, they are more likely to stay and lead with hope themselves.
RHODE ISLAND'S LEADERSHIP PIPELINE
Investing Intentionally in our Early Career Talent
LRI launched Pathways and Propel as long-term investments to Rhode Island’s leadership bench. Together these programs strengthen talent retention and access to cross-sector relationships. When we cultivate emerging leaders early — and connect them intentionally — we build a workforce that is collaborative, resilient, and prepared to lead Rhode Island forward. When emerging leaders feel supported, connected and hopeful, they are more likely to stay and lead with hope themselves.
ACTIVATING OUR ALUMNI NETWORK
Building Social Trust Across Difference
73 cross-sector leaders, ages 19-87 and representing LRI cohorts across decades, were activated through a trust-building workshop with Civity. The workshop was filmed and featured on PBSNewsHour: America at a Crossroads with Judy Woodruff, Leadership Atlanta alum herself, demonstrating how LRI alumni continue to lead with courage, connection, and commitment to community. Hope scales when it becomes “we” sustained over time.
For the Love of Rhode Island
COLLABORATIVE LEADERSHIP
Core program leaders and Senior Fellows collaborated with 17 community partners to strengthen housing stability and support healthy aging.
CIVIC DIALOGUE
Alumni convened through Bread & Salt dinners, fostering belonging and deeper civic dialogue.
BOARD MATCHMAKING
Community members matched with nonprofit boards statewide – strengthning governance and advancing volunteerism.
Hope is Relational
Rhode Island is small enough for proximity to matter and large enough for impact to ripple. Our strength has always been rooted in people who care fiercely about their communities. Hope means investing in the relationships and networks that make become the infrastructure for experimentation and systems change.
Restoring the Village in Woonsocket
Woonsocket High School student Mariam Kaba’s $1 million-dollar idea creates lasting impact by activating Leadership Rhode Island’s network and collaborating with trusted community partners. Mariam was the inaugural recipient of the Transform Rhode Island Scholarship (TRIS), supported by Papitto Opportunity Connection, to give Rhode Island’s youth a voice – one big idea at a time.
Championing Rhode Island and Our Shared Humanity
Inspired by our shared humanity, 63 leaders engaged in a Public Service Announcement (PSA) video production at Centreville Bank Stadium (home of Rhode Island FC) to explore what anchors and connects us as a community.
Invest in Leadership
Every thriving state shares one common asset: strong, interconnected leadership. In a small state like Rhode Island, networks matter. The distance between people is short. The impact is amplified. One relationship can unlock opportunity. One collaboration creates the waves that carry change forward.
The ocean never stands still. Neither do we.
Invest in Leadership
Every thriving state shares one common asset: strong, interconnected leadership. In a small state like Rhode Island, networks matter. The distance between people is short. The impact is amplified. One relationship can unlock opportunity. One collaboration creates the waves that carry change forward.
The ocean never stands still. Neither do we.
Individual Agency
Hope builds the energy and belief that I (we) can make a difference, and the clarity to find pathways forward, even amidst uncertainty.
Organizational Strength
Hope for the future creates cultures of engagement and contribution. It’s not optional morale – it’s a core expectation people have of leadership and it’s connected to workplaces where people feel seen, valued, and needed.
Community Impact
Hope is consistently linked to broader wellbeing – sustained when we lead together, with our shared humanity, in service to our communities.
Alumni
Connect, collaborate, and lead. Our alumni bring experience, ideas, and action to transform communities and inspire the next generation of leaders.
Donors
Fuel Rhode Island’s civic infrastructure. Your support powers programs, strengthens networks, and creates opportunities that shape communities for the long term.
Partners
Leadership Rhode Island’s impact work is made possible through the generous support of our alumni, donors, and sponsors from the private, public, and nonprofit sectors.
Thank you to our partners
