About Sharon Newport
Organizational Transformation & Culture Consultant · Facilitator · Executive Coach · Speaker
I didn’t set out to do this work.
I set out to tell stories that could
help change our world.
I trained as a professional actor, and for a while, that’s exactly what I did. Then somewhere between the stage and the screen, I fell in love with documentaries and transitioned into production. I moved back home to DC and worked on projects I was proud of, although it came at a cost. I eventually burned out.
When I finally stepped away, I landed in a world I knew almost nothing about: nonprofit associations. Within six months, I was promoted to Director of Communications and found myself, for the first time, in a boardroom.
I wasn’t expecting it, but that experience transformed me.
Over the next decade, I moved through senior leadership roles — VP of Operations, Executive Director, COO, Interim CEO — steering complex organizations through structural transformation, financial strain, cultural upheaval, and the early months of a global pandemic. It was during that time I started asking a different set of questions: not just what needed to change, but how to lead change well.
That question led me to Georgetown University’s Organizational Development program, and to the field of Organizational Development, an applied behavioral science that has helped me merge my skills and my gifts towards helping leaders and systems change.
I stepped away from my executive role in early 2021 and have been partnering with senior leaders ever since. Every skill I’d built, as an actor learning to read a room and hold the space, as a producer managing complexity, as an executive leading through the unknown, turned out to be exactly what this work requires.
Now, I’m telling stories in new ways and I am helping my clients change our world.
“I help my clients have the conversations they’ve never had before,
to create the changes they’ve never done before.”
“Working with Sharon Newport has been one of the most pleasurable and transformative professional experiences of my tenure as CEO.”
Sharon brings a rare combination of strategic rigor and human-centered insight. She is unafraid to surface the hard truths that leadership must confront, yet she does so in a way that builds trust rather than erodes it. She strengthens the leadership muscle of the organization so that better decisions become sustainable, not situational.
Working with Sharon Newport is both a pleasure and a catalyst for transformation. She doesn’t just help organizations move forward—she helps leaders evolve. I am deeply grateful for her partnership and would recommend her without hesitation.
Donte P. ShannonFASAE, CAE
Chief Executive Officer, Industrial Designers Society of America
The Experience Behind the Work
- 15+ years inside complex nonprofit associations Including roles as Vice President of Operations, Executive Director, COO, and Interim CEO. I am a Certified Association Executive (CAE) through the American Society of Association Executives.
- Adjunct Faculty, Georgetown University I teach Leadership and Organizational Development in the same program I graduated from, in their Institute of Transformational Leadership, as well as courses in the School of Continuing Studies.
- Organizational Development Practitioner OD is a process-oriented, outcome focused, applied behavioral science about how people and systems change with lenses for equity and inclusion. It is the foundation of everything I offer.
- Certified Practitioner in The Key Polarity Indicator™ A practical and transformational tool that helps individuals and teams expand their impact by increasing their capacity to lead from a Both/And perspective.
- Professionally Trained in Somatics “Soma” is Greek for “body”. My expertise is neuroscience-informed, identity-centered, and in support of leaders embodying their values and commitments, as well as addressing racialized trauma. My training includes Embodied Transformation from Strozzi Institute, Leadership Embodiment from Wendy Palmer, and Somatic Abolitionism from Resmaa Menakem. This work shapes how I show up, how I support leaders to be with what is, and transform with greater access to ease.
- Ongoing Coaching and Study with Ruth King Founder of the Mindful of Race Institute, Ruth King is one of the leading voices on race, mindfulness, and collective healing. My in-depth and ongoing coaching with her deepens my reflection about my racial conditioning and my commitment to uplifting our collective potential.
