Meet Ivania Gutierrez | Founder & Executive Director of Connecting Community (CC)

We had the good fortune of connecting with Ivania Gutierrez and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Ivania, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
Thank you for having me and for this question to talk about the non-profit organization that I founded and started leading this year. First of all, I’d like to say that see it as an organization instead of a business.Clearly, there’s a business aspect to it because we need resources to operate but the money the organization collects does not go into a personal account but it’s reinvested in the community in the frame of its mission and vision.The organization belongs to the community and I respond to board members who have the community’s best interest at heart. To answer your question, I I’ll say that the thought process behind Connecting Community (CC) is to increase people’s access – especially those who have less access- to information about services they could use in different social areas such as housing, education, mental health, etc

There are 3 elements that lead me to found CC:
The identified need . In my career as public administrator, as a consultant for non profits and in my experience as a community member, I have noticed that there are wonderful other non profits organizations in NC doing amazing things for the community- for example, NC diapers that provides diapers for single moms and underserved communities in general who need that resource- but people, in this case, single moms, especially single moms in rural areas, single moms with language barriers, or single moms who has low digital access, still do not know where to go when in need of free resources.I see this need in communities in rural areas, , people whose first language is not english , people who have no social connections, people who have low digital literacy, families who have kids with disabilities and not social networks support, etc

The experience and c) passion. I have more than 3 years of experience serving the community, organizing events, going to rural areas to do community focus groups and interviewing community leaders to better understand these communities.Outside my career as a public administrator, I am also a group fitness instructor (what is it people people, and especially women and wearing multiple hats?!) ). In 2021, in the middle of the pandemic when we were all desperate for social interactions, I found a grass-roots group called Zumba®Camp. We started out planning small outdoor social gatherings but then ended up organizing massive community events to fundraise and create awareness for other non profits organizations’ missions and vision. Fast forward to today, we have organized more than 12 community Zumba events in different counties in NC (Wake, Harnett, Durham, Johnston, Wayne, etc ). In April 2023 with the collaboration of Fiesta Cristiana and the Town of Apex NC, we also launched an inclusive dance movement program for people in wheelchairs and caregivers called “Ciclo Danza NC”. Please watch the video and pics number 8 of the last event in April 2023.

So once I had identified the needs, and using the experience and passion I had, I felt ready to start Connecting Community. Charlene Reiss, one of the CC board members, helped me apply for our 501(c)3 status and in May we officially received our articles of incorporation and in September, our 501(c)3 status. CC organizes fun and appealing events and spaces where people and communities participate without feeling stigmatized and get access to information about services around housing, health, education, etc. (our framework is based on the Social Determinants of Health) We connect with and provide families and individuals with informational resources. We amplify the visibility of other non profits helping them outreach communities. So far we have done 2 soccer events, 2 live interviews with other organizations, and in 2024 we are planning to host at least 2 big events (for women and young people) and more than 10 informational interviews or site visits to other organizations. Please look at our website more for details about them https://connectingcommunitync.wordpress.com/

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
2. Social impact: how does your business help the community or the world? I like to use the idea of connecting the offer with the demand. By demand I mean groups of individuals who for different reasons/barriers such as low digital literacy, lack of family support and social connections,geographic localization. language, etc, have less access to information about social resources available to them.
On the other side-, we have the offer which are the agencies, non profit organizations and individuals who are providing services that will increase and have an impact on the quality of life of an individual or a family.
So Connecting Community will create fun and inclusive spaces that will connect the offer with the demand . Spaces where people can have access to relevant information about services that impact their quality of life in a fun and appealing way, without feeling stigmatized. If people have better access to information about Housing, education, scholarships to college, that will increase their possibilities to access those services. This will also build those organizations’ capacity by helping them outreach their clients more effectively, amplifying their visibility. CC will document the work with these organizations in a public database available to everyone on our website .
3. Risk taking: how do you think about risk, what role has taking risks played in your life/career?

In a world full of barriers, opportunities and information, rIsks are sometimes the only option we have. When you take a risk, even if you do not succeed, you prove something to yourself or you learn from it.
In 2008, I migrated from Chile, where I am originally from, to Sweden. The cultural clash between Nordic and my latino culture was HUGE. The way of expressing our feelings, the way that relationships were built, the language (my mother language is Spanish), the weather, etc. Everything was so different.

Although 80% of Swedish people speak English, a language that is more familiar to me. I quickly found out that the only way for me to find a job in my professional field, (I am a public administrator) was to learn Swedish.
It took me 3 years to learn the language, and eventually I got a job in my field. But, It was not easy at all. I was the only Latina in a group of 9 Swedish . Full disclosure: I remember myself crying every single day on my way back home. Feeling discriminated against, I was also too young to advocate for myself and it was definitely not the happiest experience. Did I ever feel part of the team? No! What I did however was to prove to myself that I was capable of making room for myself in a culture where immersion is a hard thing to do . Now, 12 years later, I definitely know that the woman I became, won’t go back to feeling that way. Risk taken, lesson learned.

In 2012, I moved from Sweden to the US. I quickly learned that maternity was not encouraged like it was in Sweden . Daycares are really expensive which is why you’ll find so many professional women choosing to stay home
When my second child was born, I had to quit my job because spending almost all of my paycheck on daycare didn’t make any sense to me. So I started my own business and even though it was not in my field, it allowed me to take care of my kids at home. My business was called “Chilean charm” and I sold handmade jewelry in farmers markets and events. Let me tell you: being an entrepreneur while breastfeeding your kid at an event on weekends is the hardest thing. You do not have any free time. But again, I proved to myself that I could be a stay home mom and generate some income. Spending hours talking to customers also helped me improve my English and make connections with people from different backgrounds like people who were farmers. Once again, it was a risk taken and a huge lesson learned.

When my kids were old enough to go to school, I knew it was time to go back to my professional field. I wanted to learn how to write grants and that is how I met my current boss in the consultant work I do. I l was happy to learn and be working on my field again. I learned how to help organizations define their goals, evaluate their programs and outreach their clients in a more effective way.
With all the experience i gained and the passion I’ve always had to serve the community, I felt ready to found this non profit where i knew i could put into practice everything i had learned and take the experience I had in my work with communities, my passion to serve and use the privileges i realized i had to serve people who have less opportunities

Summarizing: when you have a conviction and have identified needs, taking risks is the only way/a must/inevitable. It is powerful to see and feel that no matter how we individuals can work hard to overcome those risks/barriers, success is not guaranteed. But risks are worth taking because you always learn from those experiences , you always become more resilient and those experiences shape the human being you become, making yourself an invaluable part of a team and a better role model in a parenting setting .

4. If you are a parent, what do you think is the most important thing you’ve done as a parent in terms of the impact on your children?

I believe integrity is an essential value, and if you say you care about the community, then you need to show it. What does your caring look like? It means actions and not just words . In my case as a group fitness instructor, caring shows as Inclusion and that meant me going through a training process abroad where I learned how to teach a dance class for people in wheelchair and thenadapt that program to suit my NC students, find a palace to offer it and teach “Ciclodanza NC” every Friday in the town of Apex, where I live . Our Ciclodanza NC group now performs at different festivals to create awareness of people with different capabilities and how they also have the right to music and movement. All actions, not just words.
What does it mean in terms of sacrificing your personal time? Caring sometimes requires listening, dedicating tons of hours to the community and finding out what the barriers for the community are.

This is the type of role model I want my kids to see. They need to see that caring does not mean giving likes to stories in social media. They need to see that there is a real world, that there are different realities in the world outside the comfort of our neighborhood
Caring starts by acknowledging those privileges and using them for families and individuals that do not have them: not everyone can afford a safe house to raise their kids in, not everyone has a family where dad and mom are present, the list goes on and on
Caring about others means to give the most important thing one person has in the world, and that is time. It also means showing empathy, putting oneself in their shoes and listening without judgment but curiosity .

As a parent, I take great joy teaching my kids empathy because I think empathy is what this world lacks the most.

5. What is the most important factor behind your success / the success of your brand?

Our passion and our conviction of living in a more inclusive world where we all feel we all belong and where people help each other because there’s empathy all around. We do not believe in the concept of charity where if I give money to the “underserved ” that’s going to solve the “problem”.
We believe we all are responsible for a system level change. We are all responsible for the barriers a family or an individual experiences and we are responsible for the actions needed to overcome those barriers. The changes that need to happen so that each family thrives are not the responsibility of that specific family alone. There are things that need to happen at a system level and like I said, we are all responsible
We believe in the values of collaboration, a relational versus transactional curiosity versus judgemental, an abundance mindset versus scarcity and building capacity to encourage those values.

So far, in our short period of operation as an organization all core members -who right now are our volunteers and board members- have had the chance to discuss what those values are and mean. It’s been so powerful to see how we are all on the same page, share the same values and are determined to embed them in everything we do.
Furthermore, when we have presented these values externally, letting community members know about them , we have had great support from people who share those values. We have supporters from different backgrounds, and people who have donated a lot of time to the organization. For an emergent organization that so far only has big heart and not much economical resources, this level of engagement has been a big success
Also being a small a new organization has allowed us to focus on setting a strong foundation so we can grow more organically and sustainable.
After the pandemic, we learned that your happiness depends on mine and vice versa. We are all in this together and for our organization to be successful, we need to engage more people. We know there are plenty of people who care out there. So we invite all of you to join our organization Connecting Community. This is truly an organization for the community.

6. How to know whether to keep going or to give up?
This is a great question to consider. In the past I have kept doing things to prove to someone else that I could . Now, I want to do things because it brings me joy, because of the happiness I feel when I am doing it, not because I need to prove something to someone else
One of the things that makes me happy is to feel I could bring other people’s voices to the table, especially the ones that go unheard because I know what it feels like. I have been in that place too.
Finding our reason, our why and passion for the community,using an equity lens, has led me and our team to understand where to put our efforts so we can successfully follow that passion. There is so much value in that journey! That value sometimes goes unseen or unappreciated unless you decide to stop, look back and see how much you’ve grown. Society, especially competitive ones, tends to focus and appreciate the end result of a process and forgets to see or enjoy the process. We forget to see the journey, to enjoy the ride. Appreciating the value of what we’ve learned along the journey gives us great joy and it prompts us to keep going.
7. Work life balance: how has your balance changed over time? How do you think about the balance?

I am a pleaser. when I was younger- and honestly I’m still guilty of this todayI wanted to make everyone happy: my parents, my friends, my boss.Balance now for me is making room to take care of myself and my family. I’m aware that how someone defines balance is a very personal issue and will vary from one person to another T
Something else that’s important for me to remember is that life is not black and white but is a beautiful journey full of grays and colors. In a world where everything can be so extreme, where people think they own the truth, finding balance also shows as the ability to listen with curiosity and understanding instead of judging, something that’s not easy and at least for me, it intentionally request to leave our egos behind and understand that reality is something we all construct, communicate and move on.

8. What makes you happy? Why?
To serve, to help ,to support.
To listen and learn from other people’s experiences and cultures.
Everyone has a story and is the result of their situations. Everyone can teach you something, I love to listen with curiosity and not judgment. I feel I can connect with that person because we are all human beings, we all have feelings that are more alike than different. Connecting with people from that perspective is what makes me happy. Joy can be found in receiving but also in giving.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Eat LUNA ROTISSERIE AND EMPANADAS Durham Drink Pittsboro
Hang out Downtown Raleigh

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
Special thanks to Paula Grabill for helping me review my English writing, as this is not my first language. Paula is a professional interpreter and also board member of Connecting Community. Gisela Perez Photography LLC for capturing those amazing moments with her art. Charlene Reiss who helped me to found the organization and to get our first grant, Sharon Munoz, Alfredo Ordaz, especially my partner in life Francisco Chiuminatto who takes care of the kids, cooks and covers my back.  uff the list is long, please apologize in advance for the ones I did not mention. Our organization is really small now so we heavily rely on our amazing volunteers and individual donors so kudos for all of them. Our first grant founder NC CEAL. 

Website: https://connectingcommunitync.wordpress.com/

Instagram: connectingnc

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ivaniagutierrez1/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61551246391241

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@zumbacampandCC

Image Credits
Gisela Perez Photography LLC