My research starts with the needs of “practitioners” (i.e., my colleagues in the community and advocacy sphere) as opposed to theoretical questions or grant applications. My overarching approach is to assess how individual leaders can make systemic changes, and then to propose specific interventions to move toward those changes. More specifically, my work fits into 3 concentric circles. The smallest and innermost is sustainability leadership development, largely with a goal of improving the practice, training and effectiveness of environmental leaders by linking the known needs in the field to the growing cadre of training programs. In sustainability, given the urgency and lack of funding, we cannot afford inefficiencies in leadership training yet there are very few resources dedicated to this unique challenge. The audience is sustainability leadership program managers and, to a lesser degree, participants in these programs. My core belief is that the skills needed for sustainability leaders mirror those needed for the success of any true leaders in the modern era. Sustainability leadership is modern leadership.

The second concentric circle, moving from the individual to the community, focuses on communities facing coastal resiliency challenges. As Great Lakes levels fluctuate more chaotically due to climate change, communities are struggling to manage their shorelines for long-term resilience and equity. What is often happening in practice is that wealthier landowners are “armoring” the shorelines to protect against erosion and flooding while public lands and less wealthy areas suffer from increased problems, in part due to these “upstream” decisions. My work focuses specifically on linking the increasingly sophisticated modeling of potential impacts to the on-the-ground needs of communities and individuals. This often takes the form of focus groups, surveys, and direct action on particular projects/areas (e.g., Ox Creek in Benton Harbor, MI). The interventions consistent of support for individual decision makers in terms of assessing options, either at the micro-scale (an individual property) or macro-scale (the building a Great Lakes Coastal Resilience Resource Hub). The ultimate goal is to empower individuals and decision makers to make good choices in the face of uncertainty about the future of the Great Lakes.

The third and widest concentric circle is the application of this approach to restoring the Great Lakes themselves. The driving question is: What changes are needed to our institutions and policies to move us toward a resilient Great Lakes ecosystem and communities? The audience for this is leaders of Great Lakes institutions as well as political decision makers. The premise is that our regulatory regimes and institutional arrangements were designed for a time of simplicity and stability - before the impacts of climate change, invasive species, environmental injustice and other complex issues were truly felt or understood. To address current challenges, we must modernize our systems, policies and institutions, with a fundamental focus on people and justice in addition to ecology.