I am the Principal Consultant at Lindley French Consulting, providing senior operating leadership to small businesses, non-profits, and political organizations without the cost of a full-time hire. I specialize in building finance, HR, and IT infrastructure from the ground up, managing organizational transitions, and keeping complex, multi-team operations running smoothly.
Prior to launching my practice, I served as Operations Director at the Chicago Reader as part of the Reader Institute for Community Journalism. I helped manage the circulation of over 63,000 weekly papers by working closely with our print vendors and partner businesses.
Earlier in my career, I spent five years as Director of Operations at a Chicago-based law firm. Joining as the firm’s first employee, I scaled the firm to a team of 65 and managed the operational, IT, and personnel integrations following both a law firm merger and a litigation practice acquisition.
My background also includes key operational roles in government and political campaigns. I served as Acting Director of Scheduling for Illinois Governor JB Pritzker during his transition into office, managed day-to-day headquarters execution as Deputy Director of Operations for his gubernatorial campaign, and coordinated major donor events and logistics as Midwest Finance Associate for Hillary for America’s 2016 presidential campaign raising over $52 million.
I hold an MBA from the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business and a BA in Political Science from Northwestern University.
What I believe about operations
Every organization’s ops needs are specific to it. The job isn’t to install a template, it’s to build the financial systems, HR infrastructure, and governance a given organization actually needs to grow, and to hand it off in a state the team can run independently.