Tynesia Boyea-Robinson

Tynesia Boyea-Robinson

At Living Cities, Tynesia worked with cities across the country to ensure that investment led to measurable impact.

Tynesia Boyea-Robinson exemplifies cross-sector leadership. In her previous role at Living Cities, Tynesia worked with cities across the country to ensure that investment led to measurable impact. Tynesia’s experience as an entrepreneur, Six Sigma blackbelt, and technologist uniquely positions her to catalyze a results-driven era of social change.

For example, through effective cross-sector partnerships, Tynesia helped establish the Social Innovation Fund and the Workforce Investment and Opportunity Act. As founding Executive Director of Year Up National Capital Region (NCR) and President and CEO of Reliance Methods, she demonstrated that business and community goals could powerfully align towards mutual outcomes. Under her leadership, Year Up NCR raised $20M, was recognized by President Obama, and continues to place thousands of low-income young adults in careers with family sustaining wages. Through Reliance Methods, she helps Fortune 500 clients like the Carlyle Group, Marriott, and others source productive talent through unconventional practices. Earlier in her career, Tynesia was a leader within several business units at General Electric. From transforming the entire company to leverage technology for online sales to leading an international mortgage bank acquisition, her experience at GE groomed her to achieve outcomes regardless of industry.

Tynesia has been a featured speaker for a broad array of audiences including South by Southwest and the White House Council for Community Solutions. She has published several articles, which have been featured in the Washington Post, Forbes and in Leap of Reason: Managing to Outcomes in an Era of Scarcity. Her work was also highlighted in the New York Times bestseller A Year Up as well as in the Harvard Business School case study Year Up: A Social Entrepreneur Builds High Performance. She serves on numerous boards and committees, including for Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy.

Boyea-Robinson received her MBA from Harvard Business School and has a dual degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Duke University. She and her college sweetheart, Keith, are committed to indoctrinating their children, Dylan and Sydney, with a love of Duke basketball and all things geeky and sci-fi.

Tynesia Boyea-Robinson

Contributing Articles

Video: Preparing and Connecting Communities to Employment

What stood out to you in this video? What do you think is missing? Add your thoughts in the comment section of this blog. Panelists: Sara Lawrence, Senior Manager, Economic Development , RTI International Vivienne Lee, Director of Strategic Partnerships, REDF Brad Missal, Director of IT, Intersections Jason Perkins-Cohen, Director of the Mayor’s Office of Employment Development, City of Baltimore Four experts discuss employment …

Pay for Success: To Invest or Not to Invest? Assessing Collaboration

When things go wrong in a PFS project—and they most likely will—it’s the quality of the partners’ collaboration that determines whether the project stays on track toward better outcomes for low-income people. We’ve launched our Pay for Success: To Invest or Not to Invest? series to walk others through how we decide which Pay for Success (PFS) projects to consider investing in. …

What We Are Learning About Catalyzing Impact Investing in Dallas

The Dallas Impact Investing Collaborative (DIIC) is on a very intentional journey to learn about how to invest differently in social change. Here are a few reflections on how this group could be a model for mobilizing local funding communities around impact investing. Last week I had the honor of announcing the Dallas Impact Investing Collaborative’s GrowSouth Sidecar fund. This …

Want Your Business to Make Mo’ Money? Start Valuing Values

By changing the way the world does business, we can fundamentally change the world. More and more, leaders at the cutting edge of social change are blurring the lines between “public” and “private” sectors. And many of these leaders are proving that you can do well BY doing good. In 2013 I wrote a series of blogs that articulate my …

What We Can Learn From Bob’s General Store

It’s time for a capitalist renaissance in which companies reconnect with their communities and return to a culture of “business commons.” More and more, leaders at the cutting edge of social change are blurring the lines between “public” and “private” sectors. And many of these leaders are proving that you can do well BY doing good. In 2013 I wrote …

If I Build It…

Values-Driven Entrepreneurs find ways to do well BY doing good. With enough proof-points, they can change the way the world does business. More and more, leaders at the cutting edge of social change are blurring the lines between “public” and “private” sectors. And many of these leaders are proving that you can do well BY doing good. In 2013 I …

Yes, You Can Do Good AND Do Well. Here’s One Way!

More and more, leaders at the cutting edge of social change are blurring the lines between “public” and “private” sectors. They believe you can do good and do well – and are proving it’s possible. I’m Tynesia Boyea-Robinson, and back in 2012 I did something CRAZY. Or, I did something that most people told me was crazy, but ended up …

Getting Back to the Purpose of Collective Impact

Ranting about the shortcomings of collective impact is like yelling at the oven because of failed biscuits. Collective impact is a tool that requires hard work to wield effectively. This post originally appeared on the Collective Impact Forum on May 23, 2016. My Aunt Janice’s biscuits are legendary. They are fluffy, buttery and light. Whenever we visit her in Alabama, we stop …

What Does It Take To Achieve Collective Impact? (May Edition)

Using data to achieve collective impact continues to be a challenge for the Living Cities Collective Impact team. The Collective Impact team at Living Cities is serious about learning in public. We set aside time intentionally every month–sometimes multiple times a month–to reflect on what’s happening in our collective impact portfolio and figure out how we can do our work better. This is …

The Evolution of Collective Impact in Detroit

After five years as part of The Integration Initiative, the Detroit Corridor Initiative will move forward by working with Living Cities on their capital strategies. The Integration Initiative—or “TII”—began in 2010 as a pioneering approach to community development. Living Cities designed TII, a precursor to the collective impact model, to support “bold, promising approaches that have the potential to transform …

What Does It Take To Achieve Collective Impact? (March Edition)

A new blog series shares what Living Cities’ Collective Impact team is learning about how to best support practitioners and implement the principles of collective impact. The Collective Impact team at Living Cities is serious about learning in public. We set aside time intentionally every month–sometimes multiple times a month–to reflect on what’s happening in our collective impact portfolio and figure out how …

Lessons on Supporting Cohorts to Get Low-Income Youth into Good Jobs

Three lessons on how funders can support cohorts to help low-income youth get on a path to self-sufficiency. A big indicator of a good quality of life is a steady, well-paying job. It’s not everything, but securing a good job can help to dramatically improve someone’s life. That’s why Living Cities’ Collective Impact portfolio has, in the last few years, actively invested …

Contributing Resources

Just Change Tools

Explore the stories and lessons learned from Just Change with these additional tools and resources. Just Change is a collection of stories and case studies to evolve the way we think about and approach systemic causes of inequities facing low-income communities, particularly communities of color. Below you can find all of the resources mentioned in the book to help you …

Collective Impact Element Dashboard

In our effort to apply a more transparent and disciplined process to supporting our Integration Initiative site partners in cities, we developed this dashboard as a tool to capture progress and prioritize resources based on where those partners are in their work. This dashboard incorporates the three elements of what Living Cities thinks it takes to create dramatically better results …

Data-Driven Feedback Loop Examples

This resource provides a series of templates/options for developing data-driven feedback loops that are proven to help you change behavior and create collective impact. At Living Cities, we think of the use of data for collective impact as a continuous “feedback loop” that helps you change behavior and create systemic change in communities. The goal of this data-driven feedback loop …

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