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Darian Rodriguez Heyman is an accomplished nonprofit consultant, social entrepreneur, philanthropic advisor, keynote speaker, and best-selling author. For over two decades, he has supported mission-led leaders and organizations with fundraising, board, and strategy work—increasingly including leveraging AI—through his boutique consultancy, “Helping People Help,” where he hand-picks experts for customized consulting teams based on the unique needs of his clients. That built on his five-year tenure as Executive Director of Craigslist Foundation, where he founded their hugely popular Nonprofit Boot Camp and grew it to the largest nonprofit gathering in San Francisco Bay Area history after only one year. He has supported social impact initiatives in Silicon Valley, like The Big Lift, a coordinated effort to support San Mateo County students to achieve reading proficiency by the end of third grade. In addition to supporting nonprofits with strategic planning, board governance, fundraising, and responsible AI adoption, Heyman provides personal executive coaching to chief executives of nonprofits, philanthropists, grantmakers, and mission-led companies. His style is rooted in what he’s heard mission-led leaders need more than anything else: tactical, practical tips and tools. He is passionate about capacity building, especially when it comes to emerging leaders and leaders of color. Beyond his coaching and consulting practice, he is also an active thought leader in social impact. In addition to keynoting alongside Steve Wozniak, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, and Ralph Nader, he authored the best-selling Nonprofit Fundraising 101 and edited the best-selling Nonprofit Management 101 (now in second edition, with a new foreword from CNN’s Van Jones), which has been hailed as the bible of nonprofit leadership. His next book, AI for Nonprofits, featuring practical tips and tools from 55 industry experts, is coming out soon! Heyman is a bi-racial, cis-man, husband, father, and animal-lover.

Heyman’s passion for equity, particularly around race and gender, is embedded in his business practices, the projects he chooses, and how he builds his teams. He is passionate about many causes and has led or supported a very wide range of issues over his 25-year career—including racial equity, immigrant rights, housing and homelessness, LGBTQIA+, reproductive justice, restoring the public’s trust in the media, combating the digital divide, and protecting free speech. Through his work in Dayton, Ohio, he’s personally distributed more than $20M in grants to Black-led and -serving nonprofits through his philanthropic advising practice, which helped catalyze over $200M of additional funding. He was conscious to listen to and empower local leaders in the Black community to ensure the investments were aligned with their priorities. He worked with the UN to develop the SDGs for both gender equality and climate change, and led the environmental education, menstrual hygiene, and clean water work of Numi Foundation as their part-time Executive Director for almost a decade. He co-founded GenderSmart (now 2X Global), an effort to funnel billions to women-led and -serving businesses. As he staffs teams, he thoughtfully ensures relevant content area and cultural expertise, for example, bringing together indigenous leaders in maternal health with deep roots in ancestral wisdom to consult on building an American Indian Birthing Center. As a coach, the bulk of his clients are women of color who serve as nonprofit EDs, and he is passionate about supporting them to thrive as leaders. Heyman’s value of racial+ equity pervades his approach to consulting and coaching.

Heyman creates customized packages for clients, depending on the scope and services delivered. As general guides, for projects around $10-15K, he may deliver a webinar or produce a custom online training, create a custom chatbot/GPT, analyze a client’s social media presence, serve as a guest speaker or facilitator at a board meeting, deliver a local keynote, or provide several months of executive coaching. For $15-40K, he may work with a client and their board to implement a range of useful board development infrastructure to clarify roles and responsibilities, create consensus around recruitment priorities, and ensure streamlined meetings where all updates and FYIs are communicated in the first 5-10 minutes, thereby freeing up lots of time for dialogue and problem solving, while engaging the board much more deeply in fundraising. In this price range, he may also MC a conference or provide one year of executive coaching. For $40K and above, Heyman may produce a strategic and/or fundraising plan to clarify a nonprofit, foundation, or mission-led company’s approach, plus a very wide range of other options as needed. He always takes the time to speak with potential clients before preparing a proposal, which enables him to clearly understand their needs and prescribe a detailed scope of work to advance their goals.