About us
It’s all about people
Creative Crisis Leadership
We are a non-profit dedicated to igniting collective action and improvised leadership in crisis. Because people and communities who lead themselves out of a crisis recover faster and come out better – physically, emotionally and financially.
Our vision
Wherever, whenever community crisis occurs, we want people to
- Take action to help themselves, and not be victims.
- Take action to help others, and not be bystanders.
- Take collective action, and create a more robust effort.
- Take effective collective action by improvising leadership, and creating Vision, Direction, Progress, Unity, and Inclusiveness.
Our mission
We empower individuals and communities to take action and help themselves in a crisis, by spreading the confidence, skills, and mindsets of improvised crisis leadership.
Our methods
- Support spontaneous leaders who are working to organize collective action with their micro-communities.
- Create learning experiences that community organizations can deliver to take local leadership and collective action from none to good-enough.
- Convert research results into effective coaching and learning experiences that will accomplish our mission and realize our vision.
Our core team
Susanne Jul, PhD
Susanne is our founder and driving force. Her expertise spans research and practice ranging from disaster management to software engineering to theatre to user experience design. She is driven by twin loves of drawing clarity from confusion, and helping people to help themselves.

Garett Dworman, PhD
Garett is our director of programs. Over his career he travelled from cognitive science and AI programming, through decision theory and information technology, to user experience research and design. He is driven by a love of finding solutions to problems that people face in their lives.

Partners and advisors
Zeno Franco, PhD
Zeno works with us on research in the areas of human behavior and crisis management. His expertise is in research related to clinical psychology, community engagement, the psychology of crisis response, and heroic action. He is driven by a love of understanding human behavior and crisis response, and a professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin.
Aaron Vanek
Aaron works with us in designing immersive learning experiences. His expertise is in interactive game design, live-action roleplay, teaching, and film and video production and exhibition. He is driven by a love of the learning power of games, and is on the staff of The Game Academy.
Current development efforts

Building a non-profit
We have our vision and services pretty well defined and pilot tested. Now, we’re working on business plans, and developing the social networks that make up a non-profit.
When we have enough resources to take on back office administration ourselves, we’ll file for 501(c)(3) status. In the meantime, we are operating under fiscal sponsorship of Social Good Fund.

100,000 x $10?
We are playing with the crazy idea of an ambitious campaign to gather 100,000 donations of $10. This money will fund our immediate services, and enable our future.
We will kick off some sort of campaign as soon as we are ready to honor every donation with the respect, appreciation, and transparency it deserves.
From our blog
Tell us what you think!
We are getting ready to make our venture public. That includes launching this website. Before we do so, you…

Aaron Vanek
Aaron Vanek has nearly 30 years experience playing and creating games, primarily liveaction and table-top…

Zeno E. Franco, PhD
Zeno Franco brings a background in clinical psychology, community engagement, the psychology…
Get involved

Volunteer
We are ready for a solid business plan, but need someone to guide us through business strategy planning.

Volunteer
We need a solid fundraising plan, and could use someone to guide us through strategic planning for fundraising.

Volunteer
Most of our initiatives involve engaging other people. We need someone to help us set up and manage a CRM.