CNVC Board | Center for Nonviolent Communication

Members of the our Board of Directors govern the organization by articulating the purposes, vision and mission of CNVC as described in our bylaws (last updated August 2020).

They ensure its financial and legal integrity and establish board policies, strategies and objectives, including approving policies proposed by the Administrative Team and others. They also assign priorities and ensure the organization’s capacity to carry out programs by regularly reviewing its work. The Board of Directors provides continuity for the organization and also represents the organization’s point of view through interpretation of its products and services and through advocating for them.

Amal Mekouar

President

Amal Mekouar is a Certified Trainer in Nonviolent Communication, living in Casablanca in Morocco with her husband and 2 daughters. She shares her understanding of NVC in three languages and in different countries and regions of the world (Maghreb countries, West Africa, Lebanon in the Middle East). She has been a pioneer in teaching NVC and setting local NVC associations in Morocco and Ivory Coast where she lived for two years. She was working in Finance when she met NVC in 2006, and shifted to focus her attention to sharing NVC in 2008 with different audiences (organizations, associations, leaders, youths, parents, doctors ...). Her interest in diversity and multi-culturalism led her to organize and facilitate residential multi-cultural trainings.

Amal is also committed to bringing NVC to business leaders and into business organizations through governance and cultural change. Amal is passionate about promoting social change projects in Africa and has been involved in a large initiative with Cocoa farmers in West Africa. She is very interested in representing voices from the Global South and contributing to systemic change. She is currently engaged in Girafrica, a project aiming at training peace ambassadors and certifying trainers in Francophone Africa. Amal earned an MBA and a Bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering from Columbia University. She is a firm believer of the richness of diversity and the power of collective intelligence, and trusts that by tapping into both, we can have more impact. Learn more about Amal. (term expires June 2025)

Kanya Likanasudh

Vice President

Kanya was born in Thailand where she has been a pioneer in applying and teaching Nonviolent Communication for many years. She offers transformational programs in communication, conflict resolution, and coaching across all sectors from hospitals to prisons to farmers cooperatives. In her work as a consultant for businesses and organizations, she loves working with people on their blind spots, to build stronger feedback channels and to support leadership to use their power and privilege in a conscious and effective way. Kanya lived in the US for over 25 years and experienced the pain of being in a marginalized group.

Now that she lives in Thailand and is part of the dominant group, she regularly receives feedback around her unconscious use of power and privilege. This allows her to understand and relate to both worlds. With this awareness, as a Board member, she is deeply committed to hearing and representing voices from the Global South, especially Asia. Kanya is also committed to bringing understanding to the different needs and issues as well as to being a bridge within our community between people with different experiences and perspectives. NVC has changed Kanya’s world from the life of a software engineer in Silicon Valley pursuing the next popular app to a life filled with purpose and meaning. She is forever grateful. Kanya feels humbled and honored to serve on the Board as a way of giving back to our community that has given so much to her. (term expires June 2025)

Kirsten Kristensen

Treasurer

Kirsten feels honored to serve our international community on CNVC’s Board. She trusts that together we can create amazing movements that none of us can do alone and that we can organize ourselves for more impact in how we work towards the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible. When Kirsten met Marshall in 1998, she decided to take every opportunity to study with him and share NVC with others. She found NVC to be the missing link in her work as a family therapist, and in her personal development and spiritual growth. Kirsten’s interest in leadership & organizational structures led her to attend several CNVC board meetings as an observer, starting in 2002 in Hungary where organizing CNVC with circles was talked about for the first time.

Kirsten’s main project has been creating the association LIVKOM, which serves as the foundation for NVC work in Denmark and abroad. LIVKOM (Life-Enriching Communication) has supported many projects including winning funding for 10 projects since 2009 and involved NVC trainers to deliver them. In 2006, she created her own publishing house when the big publishers were not willing to bring out more of Marshall’s books in Danish. She has brought 9 titles to the Danish audience. Over the years, Kirsten has shared NVC in many countries from North to South, West to East, including Healing and Reconciliation with NVC in Nepal in 2014 and 2016, a project she found very meaningful. Kirsten is ready to do playful work and have serious fun with CNVC. Learn more about Kirsten. (term expires June 2025)

Manasi Saxena

Secretary

Manasi is brings experience as a Founder, Director, and Board member of enCOMPASSion, a growing nonprofit grounded in Nonviolent Communication. Since 2016, through enCOMPASSion, she has been part of organizing multiple international events for the NVC India community, and offering trainings to a number of organisations, including small Indian NGOs like Mazil and Katkatha, and larger international bodies such as the U.N. Refugee Agency and more recently Peace Corps, Nepal.

In 2020, owing to the violence in New Delhi and the Covid-19 migrant crisis in India, Manasi felt a strong urgency towards contributing to people who had lost their homes and livelihoods, and reoriented enCOMPASSion as a community in service of other communities.

Since March 2020, Manasi has been immersed in multiple relief projects: from the Delhi communal riots (which included managing volunteers and the flow of resources in a very chaotic space, contending with complex official relationships between the powers-that-be, and in one instance a hands-on mediation), to Covid relief work (where we reached 27,000+ individuals with ration relief), a smaller blanket relief project during Winter 2020-2021 (reaching 6,500 persons), and most recently, emergency empathy circles with Project Empathy, in collaboration with Connext Coaching.

Manasi's experiences in the field and with NVC have led me to an intuitive sense that my purpose is to serve as a “living bridge”, between people and resources, between intentions and systems, across communities. Contributing to the transition of CNVC into an organisation that can serve more globally, in service of the world where everybody’s needs matter that Marshall was pointing us to would be a deeply meaningful use of my energy, skills, and resources. (term expires October 2024)

Farrah Carlier

Board Member

Farrah is Belgian of Indian origin and lives in Belgium. She graduated as a translator and discovered NVC in 1999. Farrah met Marshall Rosenberg for the first time in Switzerland during a 10-day international workshop in 2004. Later she served as an interpreter several times on Marshall’s intensive trainings in French-speaking Europe.

Farrah remains immensely grateful to life and to those who enabled her to be "exposed" in this way to Marshall's radiance, his wisdom and quality of presence. In 2011 she joined the Francophone assessors’ team A-Certif and is committed ever since to contribute to the creation of a global community of NVC Ambassadors. As a member of the CNVC Board, she trusts and relies on our collective intelligence when decisions need to be made on a global level. Learn more about Farrah. (term expires June 2025)

Ted Rau

Board Member

Born and raised in Germany, I earned a Ph.D. in Linguistics in Tübingen and worked in academia before moving to the United States. My five children are between 8 and 17. I am transgender (FTM) and identify as queer and transitioned in 2017. Social justice, longing for more equality, and our future affected by climate change are on my mind a lot.

I care deeply about Nonviolent Communication, awareness of NVC in the world, and regenerative, non-coercive social systems in general. I've been studying NVC since 2010 in a weekly study group that focused on core NVC concepts & practice, as well as the writings of Miki Kashtan. In my teaching, needs consciousness is always embedded within governance-focused classes and facilitation.

I live in a cohousing community with 70 neighbors in Massachusetts (United States) that practices NVC and restorative practices. In 2016, I co-founded Sociocracy For All, a global multi-lingual, multi-sector membership nonprofit organization based in the U.S. Its governance is distributed, with approximately 25 people in paid roles (mostly part-time) and 200 volunteer members in decision-making groups. Currently, I serve as the Executive Director.

I published two books on governance, "Many Voices One Song. Sharing Power with Sociocracy" (2018) and "Who Decides Who Decides. How to start a group so everyone can have a voice" (2021). Both books explicitly draw from NVC in its interface of inner transformation, communication, and decision-making. In my client work, my experience lies in different sectors like nonprofits, activism, business, communities, and schools. I support organizations in implementing distributed governance and decision making with accountability and feedback. I've worked in and with international for-purpose organizations that are structurally similar to CNVC. (term expires October 2024)