Maya Townsend
Most large change programmes fail in the gap between the org chart and the way work actually moves. Decisions land on paper, but the informal network of brokers, connectors, and trusted experts has not been engaged, so adoption stalls. Leaders need a way to see that hidden system and act on it before the strategy hits the wall.
Maya Townsend helps leaders read the hidden networks inside their organisations and use that map to land change that would otherwise stall.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Maya Townsend
- She brings organisation network analysis into the room as a working tool, not a slide. Leaders leave knowing which specific people inside their business carry influence that the org chart hides.
- She has co-edited the OD Network’s Handbook for Strategic HR (AMACOM, 2012), giving her work a peer-reviewed foundation that most change speakers cannot point to.
- She advises Gartner on change management and organisation network practice, which means her frameworks have been pressure-tested with the analyst body that many of her clients buy research from.
- She is one of three US-certified Lewis Method of Deep Democracy trainers, so when polarised teams are stuck on a decision she has a specific method for moving them, not a general facilitation style.
- She works the seam between strategy and adoption. Clients booking her are usually past the point of needing a diagnosis and want someone who can name the next intervention.
Biography highlights
- Founder and lead consultant, Partnering Resources, an organisation development practice focused on networks, collaboration, and change.
- Co-editor, Handbook for Strategic HR: Best Practices in Organization Development from the OD Network (AMACOM, 2012).
- Chapter author, “Organization Network Dynamics and Analysis,” in the NTL Handbook of Organization Development and Change.
- Adviser to Gartner on change management and organisation network practice.
- Contributor to strategy+business, People + Strategy, Nonprofit Quarterly, CIO, and Inc.com.
- MS in Organization Development (with distinction), American University / NTL Institute; certified Lewis Method of Deep Democracy trainer, one of three in the United States.
Biography
Every large organisation has two structures. There is the one on the chart, and there is the network of relationships that actually moves information, decisions, and trust. Townsend’s work starts from the second one.
She runs Partnering Resources, the change and organisation development practice she founded, where she uses organisation network analysis to show leaders the brokers, connectors, and quiet experts their formal hierarchy hides. The diagnosis is concrete: specific names, specific gaps, specific places where a transformation is going to fail unless someone intervenes.
The intellectual base behind this work is unusually deep for a speaker in her field. She co-edited the OD Network’s Handbook for Strategic HR with AMACOM, contributed the chapter on network dynamics to the NTL Handbook of Organization Development and Change, and writes regularly for strategy+business, People + Strategy, and CIO. Gartner uses her as an adviser on change management and network practice.
What that produces in a keynote setting is a practitioner who can move from the science of how organisations actually behave to the next concrete move a leadership team should make on Monday morning. She has presented at Gartner and Inc. 500 or 5000 events, taught networked leadership at Boston University and Northeastern, and is one of three Lewis Method of Deep Democracy trainers certified in the United States, which she draws on when teams are polarised and stuck.
Key speaking topics
- Organisation network analysis
- Change leadership in complex systems
- Collaboration across silos and ecosystems
- Conflict and polarisation in leadership teams
- Talent and influence mapping
- Strategy adoption and organisational resilience
Ideal for
- CEOs and transformation leads landing a strategy that depends on cross-functional adoption.
- Heads of strategy, OD, and change running enterprise change programmes that have stalled at the middle.
- Senior HR and talent leaders identifying who actually carries influence in a high-potential population.
- Leadership teams stuck on a polarised decision and looking for a method, not a facilitation pep talk.
Audience outcomes
- A working picture of the informal networks inside their own organisation, and where those networks are blocking or accelerating strategy.
- Specific moves to identify the brokers and connectors who decide whether a change effort lands.
- A sharper read on why past change programmes stalled, anchored in network evidence rather than personality.
- A method for engaging conflict in leadership teams that turns disagreement into a decision rather than a stalemate.