Our Team

Lisa Smith-Executive Director

Working remotely for the past 10 years as a founder and CEO of a post production captioning company, Lisa is also a writer who is passionate about effecting positive change. Through various volunteer opportunities and projects, she became aware of the issues that lower income single mothers face. After watching these women that she respected and admired achieve so much while still raising children; she was inspired to find ways to empower and enable others to do the same. In addition to a background in journalism and business, she consults and advises startup entrepreneurs, running an accelerator for female founders. She has an MBA in Management and Strategy from Western Governors University and an undergraduate degree from Columbia University in Political Science and English Literature.

Lisa loves anything creative, and is passionate about supporting the arts. She tries to stay fit with running, hiking, biking and yoga. She loves to garden, read and cook, experimenting with ingredients from around the world. She is an avid traveller and the proud aunt of 15 nieces and nephews.

B. Nichole Navar-Director of Outreach

B. Nichole Navar is a digital marketing professional. As an account manager, she helps her clients navigate the digital landscape by structuring customer journeys, product roadmaps, CRM programs, and virtual events. She found her way into the digital space after earning her MBA from Pepperdine University. 

Prior to attending graduate school, Nichole worked in marketing within the nonprofit healthcare sector and as a digital arts instructor for summer and after school enrichment programs. 

Because she understands the value of education and skills development, Nichole has taken a great interest in Enable Mothers and the opportunities it can help generate for the women that enroll in the program. 

Outside of marketing and education, Nichole is passionate about the arts, travel, and cooking. She has organized art shows in Los Angeles and frequents museums, galleries, and art events. She has an intermediate understanding of Spanish, can travel through Italy without completely embarrassing herself, but fully admits that her French is atrocious.

Lauren Butler-Director Of Creative Content

 A graduate of Marymount Manhattan College in New York City, Lauren Butler comes to us with over 20 years of experience in motion picture and television production where she has worked on more than 25 feature films, and over 150 individual television episodes. During this time she has worn many hats. She has supervised and booked crews, overseen budgets, coordinated equipment purchases and rentals, facilitated cast and crew travel, and handled insurance. 

She helped to establish the "Madam Secretary" exhibit at the National Museum of American Diplomacy in Washington, D.C. Prior to relocating to New York, she tutored underserved children in Chicago.  She enjoys reading, traveling, writing, and spending time with her family and friends. As the parent of a young daughter, she has a deep personal understanding of the struggles and challenges working mothers face. She is thrilled to have the opportunity to help other women provide for their families, while maintaining a presence in their children’s lives.

Thristina Kanka-Director of Volunteer Support

Thristina is from Denver, Colorado. She grew up with an innate desire to help others that she retained into adulthood. Thristina is drawn to public service, especially for those that are underrepresented. She served in Peace Corps Comoros. She taught at a high school on the southern part of the island of Ngazidja (Grand Comore) in a hillside village that overlooked the Indian Ocean. During her Peace Corps service, she merged her love for public service, education and travel, with a passion for gender equality work. She served as Peace Corps Comoros’ Gender and Development liaison and joined Peace Corps headquarters in March of 2020. She quickly saw the disparity in the gender gap in the community where she lived and worked for two years, and tried, on a daily basis, to fill that gap with small actions.  After working with the community to make certain females were included in its English club, their efforts resulted in a 280% increase in female participation. Serving in the Peace Corps is her proudest accomplishment, and she’ll insist that  her community and host family in Comoros gave her more than she could give them in return.

Thristina returned to the U.S. with even more of a passion to continue working in public service. She now has a clear understanding that doing so is about assisting in equalizing circumstances; and facilitating access to the resources needed to succeed. 

In her years leading up to Peace Corps service, Thristina volunteered regularly while working and pursuing a degree in Speech Therapy and her Bachelors degree in Film Studies. In her down time, Thristina likes to read, write, hike, excessively capitalize words, and enjoy Thai food with a great Australian show. 

Lisa Nelson-Director of Operations

Lisa Nelson, single mother of two, is no stranger to hard work.  When her daughters were aged one and five, her significant relationship dissolved due to her partner’s substance dependency and found herself providing for her daughters singlehandedly.  Realizing that doing the job of both parents could best be done by working at home, Lisa took a substantial income reduction from her job in global investment banking and set herself up as a home-based transcriptionist so that she could pay attention to her daughters.  For 18 years she worked for TruTranscripts, a major transcription company, serving the pharmaceutical, finance and publishing industries, where she was asked to join the management team, supporting senior management and sometimes running the company alone.  Lisa simultaneously served her own clientele of market research firms and broadcast networks.   Working around her children’s schedules, she typically worked from 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m., taking breaks for her kids’ schedule and needs.   

Prior to becoming a mom, Lisa worked for many years in the music industry, managing celebrated recording artists, songwriters, and producers, a career that spanned 20 years.  She later became the Administrative Assistant to the Director of Operators of Chase Investment Services, and then moved to Chase Global Investment Banking as Executive Secretary.

Lisa holds a Bachelor of Music Degree, Electronic  Composition Emphasis, from Northern Illinois University, and loves playing the violin for sound healing and meditation groups.  She has authored a book which will soon be complete for publication, enjoys hiking and exercise, and most of all, enjoys spending time with her close friends and now-adult daughters.