Gayle Northrop

Gayle is a consultant, coach and educator, and president of Northrop Nonprofit Consulting, a firm specialising in strategic planning, organisation development and leadership development for social impact organisations worldwide. With broad international experience, particularly in African countries, Gayle has dedicated her career to helping drive positive social change through strengthened systems, improved service delivery and more effective measurement and communication of impact. Since its inception in 2001, Northrop Nonprofit Consulting has worked with nonprofits and businesses across the legal spectrum, including Human Rights Watch, Red Bull, Virgin Unite, Homeboy Industries and The Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project.

At UCLA Anderson, Gayle is a Continuing Lecturer and Senior Faculty Advisor for Impact@Anderson. She teaches social entrepreneurship in the MBA programmes, serves as faculty advisor for international nonprofit projects, and leads a global immersion course on Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation in South Africa. Gayle also teaches a course entitled “Social Entrepreneurship: Sector Agnostic Models of Impact” to undergraduate students eager to explore ways to blend purpose and profit in their careers and in their lives.

Gayle is former Associate Director and current board member of Spark Health Africa, an organisation working to strengthen African health systems for better maternal and child health outcomes. She is Senior Advisor to the Bertha Centre where she works on strategy, programme design and a multiyear initiative driving social innovation in health in the Global South.