We partnered with Girl Scouts Greater Chicago Northwest Indiana on the search for a Chief External Affairs Officer. Girl Scouts of Greater Chicago and Northwest Indiana is a youth organization that aims to build girls of courage, confidence, and character, who make the world a better place.

Our work resulted in the recruitment of Anna Edwards to the role.

Edwards has focused her career on raising money for progressive causes, organizations, and leaders. As a fundraiser, she has solicited six and seven figure donations from corporate, individual, and foundation donors. She has managed development staff, boards of directors, and served as an officer and member of senior management.

In Chicago, she worked for United Way of Metro Chicago and The Chicago Council on Global Affairs. In Washington DC, she worked for Center for American Progress, America Votes, Progressive Majority, and consulted for a variety of electoral organizations and campaigns. Before she moved from the east coast to Chicago, she spent a year abroad working for the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs working in emerging democracies in the Middle East and North Africa.

What Edwards loves most about her nonprofit work is coaching staff to become confident fundraisers who will help make “good trouble” and communities more equitable. She’s known for leaning on data and the science of fundraising more than the art of fundraising and her ability to organize people and systems to deliver results.

Edwards serves on the board of Friends of Burley and is a 2022 Leadership Greater Chicago Fellow.

Edwards earned her Bachelor’s degree in American Studies at Scripps College and encourages high school girls to attend women’s colleges.