Meet Catherine Pederson
CEO & Nonprofit Consultant
Relational Leader | Strategic Thinker | Data-Driven | Developer | Strength-Based | Speaker
Education And Experience
Catherine's Experience:
Catherine has over 17 years of experience empowering people to make a difference in their community. She is the CEO of Loving Venti, LLC, a Nonprofit Consultant, and an Adjunct Lecturer at UW-Milwaukee in the Helen Bader School of Nonprofit Management. Her experience with small-to-medium sized nonprofits committed to our community includes serving as the Executive Director of Wisconsin Inmate Education Association, whose mission is to transform our prison system from the inside out by educating inmates to become peer counselors and serving as the Executive Director of Friedens Community Ministries, the largest food pantry network in Milwaukee.
Catherine's Education:
Ph.D. in Leadership for the advancement of Learning and Service, Cardinal Stritch University (2021)
M.A. in Christian Studies with an emphasis in Leadership, Trinity International University (2011)
Inspiration
What inspired Catherine to work with nonprofits?
“I’ve always felt called to serve organizations with community-oriented missions, so the nonprofit sector was a natural fit. Nonprofits require both strategic viewpoints and pragmatic solutions, and I enjoy bringing both elements to helping nonprofits continuously develop and achieve their goals.”
Fun Facts about Catherine
“I listen to around 52 books a year using Libby and Hoopla (both free… check them out)… with a ratio of one non-fiction book (generally about leadership, faith, learning styles, biographies, etc…) to one fiction book (over the last few years I have focused on minority authors and historical fiction). I work to travel… I drive used cars, buy many of my clothes second-hand, and don’t buy many extras… but what I save goes right into traveling nationally and internationally with my family. My favorite locations have been Paris, DR Congo, Israel, New York, and Arizona.”
What led to Catherine Starting Loving Venti?
“Over the past 17 years, I have started, worked for, and overseen several small to medium-sized nonprofits. When I first started out, I didn’t know how to operate a nonprofit business. I searched for resources but they were mostly geared for large, existing nonprofits, not for the needs of the organization I was trying to establish. We had a young and inexperienced team with few financial resources, but we were united with a passion for making a difference that would rival any large nonprofit. We did eventually figure it out, but it seemed like we were spending more time learning how to run an organization than we were serving the people we were called to serve.”