When we grow from the inside out, everything around us changes.
Hi, I’m Dr. Renee Owen. I help leaders and organizations move from stagnation, fragmentation or unclear communication to coherence, connection, and shared purpose beginning from the inside out.
Organizations I’ve Worked With:
The Inside-Out Approach to Transformative Education
Becoming a Transformative Leader from the Inside Out: A Guide for Educators is written for both emerging and veteran school leaders who want to transform our education system to one where everyone thrives.
The Inside Out Transformative Leadership Model is a journey of development, starting with self-transformation and expanding outward to transform our schools and positively influence society.
My Approach
My coaching and consulting transforms at three levels:
Become the authentic leader you want to be.
Find the perfect balance between an authentic and effective leadership approach, and solve your most pressing issues. First, we diagnose where you are too rigid and where you are too flexible. (Educators sometimes refer to this as tight and loose.). We work together to find the perfect balance — the authentic you, the place within that can do anything and influence everyone around you to be their best selves, while maintaining the structure that will get you where you want to be and who you want to be. Most importantly, you will find the balance and practices that will maintain your personal well-being.
Transform your team!
Lacking team systems that work? No problem.
Has trust eroded, or it was never there? It’s time to change that. Now.
Do meetings feel like a waste of time or stressful? Make your time together precious, productive, and fun.
Discover how your team can work together for optimal performance and enjoyment.
Diagnose the issues: Where is your team too loose? What’s (and who) is lacking control? Where is your team too static, stagnant, and tight? What is out of balance? Within a short time of working together, you will have team systems that flow with ease. Not sure everyone is on the same page? You are going to create the trust necessary to surface what isn’t resonating, get real with one another, and move forward, together.
Evolve your Organization
Ever heard of a TEAL organization? A TEAL organization is highly evolved. If you dream of each individual continually improving and growing, while contributing the collective transformation and evolution of the organization, that sounds like a TEAL organization.
Secure a vision that is the furthest you can imagine and ignite everyone with that vision.
Create a culture of well-being, where people are their authentic, whole selves and supporting one another in that endeavor.
Identify where systems are too loose or too rigid, and create self-organizing, networked systems that really work.
Get ready for innovation and productively to take off — faster than you ever imagined.
My path into leadership was anything but linear.
My lived experience, paired with formal research, has given me a deep understanding of how people and systems grow. Today, I bring all of that into my coaching and consulting work.
I entered leadership on an unconventional path. In my twenties, I founded a project-based charter school in a remote Colorado community, a school that soon became a nationally recognized high-poverty/high-performing model. That experience shaped how I understand learning, holistic systems, and what helps humans thrive.
For more than two decades since, I’ve led public and private schools using a holistic, living-systems approach to close opportunity gaps and uplift the human spirit. My work has taken me from founding Paradox Valley School to serving as Executive Director of Rainbow Community School in Asheville, NC, where I deepened my expertise in whole-child education, transformative leadership, and organizational culture. I’ve been honored as an Ashoka Change Leader, a fellow in the Collaborative for Spirituality in Education, and a fellow in Transformative Educational Leadership, and I later coauthored Changemakers: Educating with Purpose with Ashoka.
As a scholar, I earned my Doctor of Education degree at Columbia University Teachers College, New York, USA, where I studied adult learning and leadership through the lens of transformative learning theory. My scholarly research and writing are primarily in personal and organizational transformation and holistic practices such as social and emotional learning and mindfulness. I serve as Senior Editor for the Holistic Education Review, a journal at the Center for Holistic Education, located at SOU.
My lifelong work is for education to be a vehicle for helping people to thrive. My personal and professional lives intertwine, with relationships, play, and purpose highly valued.
I have learned to trust my natural intuitive abilities. While I love theory, I try not to let my knowledge of academic theory get in the way of allowing insight to shine through.
As your coach, I am your greatest advocate, a savvy strategist, and an honest critic. I will challenge you to dig deep and make the most of your natural talent, compassion, and resilience.
I will help you define your goals, and guide you toward meeting those goals through a combination of inquiry, embodied learning, and action steps.
Professional Background
Education
- Doctor of Education (Ed.D.), Columbia University Teachers College, Organizational Learning & Adult Development
Experience
- 20+ years leading public and private K–12 schools
- Professor, Educational Leadership and Adult Education, Southern Oregon University
- Coach and consultant for corporations, nonprofit organizations.
Certifications & Training
- Nonprofit Executive Management, Duke University
- Presence-based Coaching Certification
- Transformative Educational Leadership
Helping You Lead with Wellbeing In Mind
I am a scholar-practitioner in adult education and leadership. I serve as Associate Professor and Coordinator of the Principal Administrator Licensure program at Southern Oregon University, where I help transform teachers into change-leaders who are prepared to reimagine K–12 education and develop schools into thriving communities.
Regionally in Oregon, I coach leaders with the Southern Oregon Regional Educators Network, promoting safety, significance, and belonging in our public schools.
Internationally, I consult and coach with multinational corporations to develop leaders, improve group communication, and transform culture. I also serve as Board Facilitator for the International Transformative Learning Association, and I am a dynamic governance consultant, helping organizations use sociocracy and other forms of self-organizing governance.