Tanesha Williams was born and primarily raised in eastern North Carolina, about 20 minutes away from Atlantic Beach in a small military town called Havelock, with some side trips to South Carolina and Jamaica (she lived in Jamaica for a year with her maternal grandmother while her mother was stationed in Okinawa, Japan). Both of her parents were Marines. She attended East Carolina University for her undergrad and obtained a Bachelor’s in English (minor in Communications). After taking a year off and working in Public Relations for a small historical society, she went to North Carolina State University for a master’s in organizational communication. While pursuing that degree, she worked at the Child Care Services Association (now Early Years) in the WAGE$ Project department. In 2015, she moved to Georgia after getting engaged to her husband and worked for a few months at the Georgia Division of Family and Children Services before pursuing another master’s in project management in 2016. In 2019, she started her own business focused on executive assistance, project management, and system development and has partnered with over twelve companies over the last five years. Tanesha is an administrative and project management professional with over 7 years of experience in marketing and education for non-profit organizations and small businesses. She loves to learn new things and will always be a lifelong student. Tanesha is married to her husband and has three children (a bonus boy, 16; a bonus girl, 15; and a girl, 4). Now Tanesha is lending her talents to improving the administrative processes at Change Matrix.
What drew you to CM?
The values of Change Matrix align with my own regarding working to benefit children and families, and so does the project-based approach used to do the work. For most of my career, I’ve worked with non-profits or small businesses focused on equity, inclusivity, and cultural affirmation in the fields of education, marketing, and community services. The fact that Change Matrix takes a project-based approach where you seek to improve systems strategically, develop a plan, and implement it while providing support during the whole process is ideally how I approach my own work. I believe in the work the organization is doing, and I’m excited that I can lend my own experience and skills to support this very important work and the ones doing it.
What is your role at CM?
I am the Executive Assistant for Rachele and Elizabeth, the partners. My role within the organization aligns with my need to help others and to make a difference in the world that my children will one day inherit.
Which project/assignment/task are you most excited about?
I am excited about creating processes and systems to help the partners better manage their time and workload to ensure they can focus on the projects themselves.
Why did you choose equity work?
I am an African American female who has experienced various forms of discrimination on many levels, from education to the workforce. In my previous roles, I have worked for non-profit and minority and women-owned businesses that focused on increasing diversity, inclusion, and cultural affirmation in marketing and education, so equity has always been a cornerstone of my life.
More personally, I have three beautiful black children that I hope will inherit a more equitable and inclusive world where they are valued for who they are as a person, not their gender or ethnicity.
