Client Stories & Case Studies
Real and representative stories of how Rooted Aspen helps leaders and organizations grow stronger from within.
Real Experiences from Leaders and Organizations
Authentic stories of clarity, alignment, and growth from Rooted Aspen clients.
Finding Clarity in Leadership
Client: Dr. Leslie Neely, Assistant Dean of Transdisciplinary Research and Program Director of Behavior Analysis at the University of Texas at San Antonio
Balancing multiple high-level leadership roles, Dr. Neely sought greater clarity on what made her leadership meaningful and how to align her strengths with her purpose.
Through a single focused session with Rooted Aspen, she engaged in a structured process of reflection and alignment. Using evidence-based tools, she identified the values that most guide her leadership, recognized how her strengths show up across contexts, and developed strategies to ensure her roles reflected both.
The Result: renewed confidence, actionable clarity, and a stronger foundation for sustainable impact.
“In just one session, Shanun helped me to identify what I find valuable about my leadership positions, my strengths, and how to align the two. I’d highly recommend her to anyone seeking to level up their career or to just better understand themselves as a leader."
—Dr. Leslie Neely
Bringing Structure to Ambiguity
Client: Audrey Shen, BCBA, Senior Leader and Nonprofit Founder
With over two decades of experience leading state-wide behavioral health initiatives, Audrey Shen combines hands-on expertise with large-scale systems leadership. As she prepared to launch her new nonprofit to increase voter engagement, she sought to bring clarity and structure to her evolving leadership journey.
Having worked with Shanun across multiple roles and organizations over seven years, Audrey turned to Rooted Aspen for continued coaching and strategic collaboration. Together, they refined her leadership approach, clarified goals, and designed systems that empower her advisory board around shared values.
The Result: a clearer mission, stronger decision-making systems, and the confidence to lead with purpose and agility.
“Shanun is a thoughtful collaborator who consistently brings out the best in those around her. She has a rare talent for bringing structure to ambiguity—helping teams clarify their mission, define values, and build systems that not only drive meaningful work forward but also elevate the team to reach its fullest potential.”
—Audrey Shen
Case Studies
While every organization is unique, many face similar challenges.
These representative stories illustrate how Rooted Aspen’s approach adapts to different contexts—helping leaders and teams align what they believe, say, and do.
Reconnecting Vision and Systems
The Challenge:
A rapidly growing mission-driven organization found that its values lived mostly within its founders. While passionate and visionary, the founders struggled to delegate decisions because others often interpreted those values differently. Every major decision required their input, leaving little bandwidth for strategic focus. Mid-level leaders, afraid of burnout or turnover, began to shield staff from accountability. Team members, unsure of expectations, engaged with lukewarm energy and minimal ownership.
Our Approach:
Rooted Aspen partnered with the leadership team to surface the organization’s implicit values and translate them into explicit behaviors. Together, we clarified what those values looked like in action, mapped gaps between intention and practice, and realigned key systems—performance reviews, communication routines, and decision rights—to reinforce consistency and trust.
The Result:
Decision-making no longer depended on a few founders. Mid-level leaders gained confidence and structure, staff understood how their daily work connected to the mission, and the founders could finally focus on strategy. The culture began to reflect shared ownership rather than dependency—strong roots that supported sustainable growth.
This engagement grew from our Rooted Culture services.
Developing Confident Mid-Level Leaders
The Challenge:
Mid-level leaders often find themselves stuck in the uncomfortable middle—carrying directives from senior leadership while fielding frustration from the front line. Trained to supervise rather than lead, they struggle to connect strategy to daily practice. Without clarity on their true role, they default to putting out fires, protecting their teams from pressure, or simply passing information up and down the chain. Over time, trust erodes, accountability blurs, and both leaders and teams feel depleted.
Our Approach:
Rooted Aspen partnered with this organization to help mid-level leaders redefine what leadership looks like in their context. Through a Rooted Leadership cohort, we explored their unique strengths, clarified expectations, and built practical tools for communication, feedback, and alignment. Leaders practiced connecting organizational priorities to day-to-day decisions and learned how to lead through values rather than directives.
The Result:
Leaders began to step into their influence with clarity and confidence. They moved from managing compliance to cultivating accountability, creating teams that were more engaged, empowered, and aligned. Senior leaders noticed smoother communication, stronger collaboration across departments, and a renewed sense of shared purpose.
This engagement grew from our Rooted Leadership services.
From High Performers to a High-Functioning Team
The Challenge:
A team of talented professionals was known for strong individual performance—but their collaboration was falling apart. Each person managed their own work stream, rarely pausing to see how their efforts connected. Important intersections were missed, leading to redundancy, inefficiency, and client frustration. When mistakes surfaced, defensiveness took over. Instead of addressing misalignment, team members doubled down on their own work, eroding trust and shared accountability.
Our Approach:
Rooted Aspen facilitated a collaborative working session to rebuild connection and alignment. We began by revisiting the organization’s values around teamwork and integrity, helping groups see how those principles applied to their daily interactions. Using behavioral mapping and systems alignment tools, we surfaced where handoffs were breaking down and guided the team in defining new ways of working—clearer intersections, communication rhythms, and shared measure of success.
The Result:
The team left with renewed clarity, trust, and commitment to the collective goal. They established routines that made collaboration easier, decision-making faster, and accountability shared. Most importantly, they rediscovered what it meant to embody their values in action.
This engagement grew from our Rooted Facilitation services.
Aligning Values Through Leadership Transition
The Challenge:
An organization was navigating a major leadership transition. The outgoing CEO had long defined the company’s culture and values, while the incoming CEO brought a fresh perspective and new strategic priorities. Both were deeply committed to the mission—but their interpretations of the organization’s core values differed, creating uncertainty among the leadership team. Without shared clarity, staff felt hesitant and fragmented, unsure whose direction to follow or how their work connected to the bigger picture.
Our Approach:
Rooted Aspen partnered with both the outgoing and incoming leaders to honor the organization’s history while co-creating a shared path forward. Through a Rooted Culture engagement, we revisited the company’s values, translating them from legacy ideals into clearly defined behaviors that reflected the organization’s next chapter. Then, using Rooted Facilitation, we guided a leadership retreat that brought the full team into alignment—clarifying the fiscal-year strategy, key outcomes, how each department contributes to collective success, and how the organization’s values will help get them there.
The Result:
The transition became an opportunity for renewal rather than disruption. The leadership team left with unified language around the organization’s values, a clearly defined strategic vision, and shared ownership of the outcomes ahead. Staff reported increased confidence, trust in the new direction, and a stronger sense of continuity between the organization’s roots and its future growth.
This engagement integrated Rooted Culture and Rooted Facilitation services.