Music City Leadership Cooperative Nashville, Tennessee
Downtown Nashville skyline and the Cumberland River bridges at golden hour

Nashville grows when its leaders grow together.

The Music City Leadership Cooperative is a Nashville nonprofit. We bring local leaders together, help them grow stronger in the work they’re already doing, and connect them with one another — because this city changes when its people know and trust each other.

See our initiatives Partner with us

A cooperative, on purpose

Music City Leadership Cooperative exists to serve Nashville by creating meaningful and productive relationships between experienced leaders, passionate local advocates, and community stakeholders, all working together toward one common goal. MCLC is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in Nashville.

That word cooperative is the whole idea. We don’t compete with the churches, nonprofits, and neighborhood leaders already serving this city, and we don’t build something new beside them. We can do more together than any of us can apart — because a leader who isn’t alone goes further, and so does everyone they lead. Here is how we work:

  1. 1

    Convene

    We bring Nashville leaders — people who would rarely meet on their own — around one table, and we make sure they know where the need in this city actually is. A shared picture of Nashville is where shared work begins.

  2. 2

    Equip

    We strengthen the leaders and organizations already doing the work, with practical training that gives them real skills: starting and growing a business, leading a congregation through change, showing up for a young person week after week. The capacity stays with them, in their neighborhood, long after a class ends.

  3. 3

    Connect

    We connect leaders to each other, to mentors, and to the resources behind them — and out of those connections, joint work grows: shared cohorts, shared mentors, congregations and partners carrying an initiative together instead of each carrying a piece alone.

Our initiatives

Three pieces of work, all of them rooted here in Nashville and carried with local partners — congregations, businesses, and neighbors — not by MCLC alone.

An instructor teaching a room of adults in a business-starting workshop
LaunchPad walks new business owners through what they have, what they need, and the plan that joins the two.

LaunchPad

Business development for new entrepreneurs

LaunchPad is a cohort course for people with a business idea and the determination to build it. Over seven weekly classes, participants work through the fundamentals — what they already have, what they still need, and how to turn both into a real plan with real numbers and real timelines.

  • Seven weekly classes, one cohort at a time
  • Recruited first through Nashville congregations
  • Run in partnership with the Center for Community Transformation at Fresno Pacific University
  • Referrals welcomed from congregations and community partners

The first cohort is forming now. If you’re carrying a business idea — or your congregation knows someone who is — we want to hear from you.

Ask about LaunchPad
A diverse small group seated in a circle inside a church, in discussion
Congregations learn in cohorts — no church works through change alone.

Charity for Change

A cohort for congregations

Charity for Change walks churches through a shared season of learning and action, in the company of other congregations doing the same work. Each church sends a covenant pair — two committed people, staff or lay — who carry the work home and lead it there.

  • Congregations join and learn as a cohort
  • Each church is represented by a covenant pair
  • A shared season of learning and action for the whole cohort

The next cohort forms for January. If your congregation is weighing it, now is the time to start the conversation.

Ask about Charity for Change
A mentor sitting with a young person, listening as they talk through a plan
Mentoring is the long game: one trusted adult, showing up consistently.

Mentoring Partnerships

Trusted adults for young people

Young people don’t need another program nearly as much as they need a person. MCLC recruits and supports mentors through its congregation and community partnerships, and matches them with young people who benefit from one steady, trusted adult in their corner.

  • Mentors recruited through partner congregations
  • Mentors supported as they build steady, trusted relationships

Interested in mentoring? The first step is a conversation, not a commitment.

Ask about mentoring

Leadership

The people of MCLC, drawn from the congregations, businesses, and neighborhoods it serves.

  • DeJuan RichardsonDeJuan Richardson
  • Cheryl “Lynne” Walker
  • Grace TrussellGrace Trussell
  • Linda Thompson
  • Gretchell JordanGretchell Jordan
  • Carmen Turks

Contact

Questions about an initiative, a partnership, or getting involved — the inbox below is read by our team, and we answer.