GREAT BIG BEAUTIFUL is the independent consulting

practice of Will Packer.

Will helps organizations that reject today’s cynicism, small-mindedness, and fragmentation and instead fight for a great, big, beautiful tomorrow.

Approach

As an organizer, teacher, and student of leadership (MPA, Harvard; MBA, Wharton), Will blends three theories of change to solve organizational challenges (click on each circle if you want to get nerdy).

Every engagement — whether it is with top-spending political action committees, issue advocacy campaigns, think tanks, philanthropies, or sustainability-focused businesses — starts with careful listening and is a collaborative process of developing and evaluating solutions.

Types of Work

Story

Message development

Survey research design

Speechwriting

Video/creative production

Branding

Strategy

Identity/power mapping

Narrative change

Recruitment and retention

Stress testing and red teaming

Political landscape analysis

Leadership

Organizational change

Leadership coaching

Management training

Team-building and facilitation

Interim team leadership

Client Feedback

Will's Story

Will’s explorations of how to make the world a more fair, just, and fun place share two interwoven threads — persuasive storytelling and leadership development.

Will is most at home solving the puzzle of how to say something so that the right people can really hear it. As a messaging strategist at Avalanche Insights, he made recommendations to major advocacy orgs like NARAL Pro-Choice America, major philanthropies like Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, and to the PACs supporting candidates in battleground states in 2022. He also led the development of the brand story for Vot-ER, which is changing the narrative of what counts as healthcare to include the health of our democracy. His writing has appeared in op-eds, a chapter of a book on civic education, a series of policy papers on the future of New York, and several website relaunches and promotional videos. His essay on school integration policy, Deliberate Speed, was recently selected in an open contest and published by American Institutes for Research.

Ever since he got his start working for Barack Obama in 2008, when the volunteers he empowered turned West Columbus, Ohio 'blue' for the first time since LBJ, Will has brought an organizer's approach to leadership. As a teacher and instructional coach in New York City, he supported thousands of students and dozens of teachers in reaching toward their potential and directed a network-wide civic education program designed to empower graduates with the skills to make change in their communities. Then, combining his instructional and organizing experiences, he helped launch Resistance School 2.0, a free online instructional video platform that taught winning organizing strategies (now part of Arena). Most recently, for Vot-ER, he developed a diverse, remote 25-person organizing team that built the capacity of more than 26,000 healthcare workers to help over 15,000 patients and colleagues get ready to vote in healthcare settings in 2020.

A native of Manhattan, Will received an M.P.A. from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, an M.B.A. from The Wharton School, an M.A. in Teaching Mathematics from Relay Graduate School of Education, and a A.B. in political science from his beloved Brown University. His oldest interest is music — he's released three albums with his band, Night School — and his newest is tennis.