We were lucky to catch up with Stephani Tucker recently and have shared our conversation below.

Stephani, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Was there a defining moment in your professional career? A moment that changed the trajectory of your career?

I have been in the non-profit sector for 27 years, working my way up the ranks until becoming an Executive Director 10 years ago. At first I was running a national organization on a state level, until I moved to Atlanta and took over a small breast cancer organization. This organization was already amazing. It had an amazing staff, a great reputation and was small enough to be good stewards of the fundraising dollars. So it was a challenge to grow the organization and make it even better. Within the first full year of leading the staff and volunteers, I was able to add events and diversify revenue streams to have the best year on record. But that wasn’t the defining moment. Three years into helming The GA 2- Day Walk for Breast Cancer, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Ironic right? I I had always made it a point to work in non-profit for health related organizations that I had a personal connection to. So when I got diagnosed, I thought it was just the way it was supposed to be. Now I was living the journey that the women I was raising money for was living. And I was able to see first hand the barriers to care that were presented to every woman going through a breast cancer diagnosis. I saw the barriers, the lack of access to equal care, and I experienced the treatment that so many other women had to go through, from the fear of “cancer” to watching my family go through my health scare, to surgery and uncertainty.

Having volunteers and friends take care of my family and me during my journey was a humbling experience that was also defining. Walking through a cancer diagnosis while running a breast cancer organization proved that anyone can be a cancer warrior. I thought I was invincible because I had spent my professional career fighting for others, thinking there was no way I’d ever get sick. And then I did. And my world changed from caution to exploration. Suddenly, knowing that breast cancer can actually get to me, made me start living my best life. Not turning away from adventure and exploration, I started seeing myself as more than a business woman, but as a warrior who stared down death and should use that experience to continue helping others stare it down… and to seek to do the things personally that I had always said I’d do someday. Someday became today, this week, this month.

And sharing my story with others in the area, the fight to grow hair back and to stare down needles every week, made a difference to others. They responded with love and hugs and their own stories. Now I seek out newly diagnosed so we can share our journey and I can get them involved with my organization, which will help them with their journey as well. It was and is a chance to feel amazing everyday and a chance to change the small world I live in.

Stephani, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I originally planned on being a Journalist, but after a few classes in college I realized I just didn’t think I could do a story on someone who was just out of a burning building or an accident. And to add to that, my college mentor had a baby that passed away a few weeks later from leukemia, which prompted me to want to do something to help them. So that lead to my first job in non-profit at The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.

Now, 28 years later, I have worked my way up to the Executive Director level and run a small nonprofit that raises money for breast cancer. I only work for health related nonprofits and only those that I had/have a personal connection to. It’s The Journey provides breast health and breast education programs in the state of Georgia for those who are uninsured or underinsured. With a small staff of 6 full-time employees and a plethora of volunteers, we are able to hosts about 1200 walkers, volunteers and crew members every October to raise over $1M each year for our mission.

After helming this organization for 3.5 years, I was diagnosed with breast cancer myself and was able to spend a year in treatment, talking about my treatment plan, my experience during all of the pieces of treatment and that began a change in our mission- I saw barriers to care that I wouldn’t have seen had I not gone through my own diagnosis. I was and am now also able to discuss first hand all of the treatment available, having gone through diagnosis, surgery, chemotherapy and radiation, and now being in the maintenance stage. I can tell first hand the side effects of each of those treatment options. Not that I wanted to know first hand but having been through what our audience goes through, we are able to focus a bit more on the mission side of our organization, telling stories and breaking down barriers to care.

Have you ever had to pivot?

I’m sure everyone is going to tell Covid stories here, but in reality, hosting fundraising events that require people to socialize was a huge lesson for all of us in the non-profit world. During 2020 and even years following, we have had to learn to pivot in every way possible.

How do you host a walk with 1200 people if you can’t do it in person? We had to learn how to do it on our phones and keep all the benefits for sponsors who had paid to be involved in our event. We had to keep the walkers entertained and keep them engaged in our mission as well. We had to utilize social media as our lifeblood and while we didn’t raise as much money as normal, we were able to keep our audience involved with our mission and still donate 65% of what we raised to our cause.

That experience helped us learn how to pivot in a crisis. A talent that everyone who produces events should know how to do.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

I’ve been lucky enough to manage good teams through out my career. Maintaining high morale to me is pivotal to creating an atmosphere where people want to come to work. I started with hosting weekly Monday Morning ralleys, where we talk about the week ahead and get a grasp on what needs to be done. I hold monthly sometimes weekly check in with staff, not just on a professional level but on a personal level as well.

Our #1 rule is family/personal life first. Which sounds counter-productive in some ways but we make sure that staff takes care of themselves and their family first, no matter what. Someone on staff will cover their entire week if they need it. And I think the biggest thing we do is listen to the staff needs and try to accommodate those. Everyone wants to be treated like a trusted, valuable part of the team, so I address their needs and try to make those happen. We are lucky enough that we don’t have to be in the office 5 days a week and over the summer even less, so we work a hybrid and I give away free Fridays, so they feel heard and appreciated. I’ve always strived to take away the best part of my past working experience and bring it to this organization to make this a place people want to work.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.2daywalk.org
• Linkedin: linkedin.com/stephanitucker

Image Credits
All images taken with personal phone