Burnell is a social impact executive with over 17 years of experience in philanthropy, education, consulting, and state & local government. If it involves a complex problem that needs to be solved, I’m willing to help – especially if it means increasing access and opportunity for others.
Background
Burnell Holland is the Founder and CEO of Gilded Knight Consulting, a social impact and management consulting agency that is focused on helping organizations and leaders reach their full potential. Before transitioning into entrepreneurship, Burnell served as Deputy Director of the My Brother’s Keeper Alliance, an initiative of The Obama Foundation designed to improve life outcomes for all of our nation’s boys and young men of color. In this role, he was primarily responsible for managing the development and implementation of a national grant competition focused on the investment of over $5 million to support evidence-based programming in the areas of youth violence prevention and effective mentoring practices.
Prior to joining My Brother’s Keeper Alliance, Burnell served as Chief of Staff in the DC Public Schools (DCPS) Office of Innovation and Research. In this role, he managed the day-to-day operation of the district’s Empowering Males of Color initiative, a bold effort by Mayor Muriel Bowser and former Chancellor Kaya Henderson to improve educational and life outcomes for African American and Latino males. Burnell also spent several years working in the district’s Office of Family and Public Engagement managing outreach campaigns, operations, and staff recruiting.
During the early stages of his career, Burnell developed experience as a public affairs consultant and campaign field operative while working in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is an alumnus of the Coro Center for Civic Leadership’s Fellows Program in Public Affairs. While serving as a Coro Fellow, he helped elect the first Chinese American State Senator in the history of California. He later staffed the Speaker Pro Tempore of the California Assembly and went on to serve as a Senior Project Manager with Barbary Coast Consulting, a leading public affairs firm in the Bay Area.
Burnell holds a Bachelor’s Degree from Boston College, a Master of Public Administration degree from Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and an Executive Masters in Leadership from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. If there is a complex problem that needs to be solved, he is usually right in the middle of it – especially if it means increasing access and opportunity for others.
