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Joanna Louise Sparber
Impact strategist, community builder, facilitator and systems change thinker. Committed to making a positive impact.
Professional Background
Joanna Louise Sparber is a respected leader in social impact strategy, community development, and ecosystem building with over 14 years of experience in designing and facilitating pioneering partnerships and programmes. With a rich professional journey, Joanna has established herself as an influential figure in both the private and not-for-profit sectors. Her deep understanding of social impact initiatives has led her to collaborate with a diverse range of organizations, mobilizing multi-stakeholder groups to drive meaningful change.
Previously, Joanna served as the Global Director of Impact at The Conduit, a role in which she was instrumental as part of the founding team. She played a pivotal part in shaping the organization’s social impact strategies and thought leadership initiatives. In addition to steering the strategic direction of the community, she led the editorial programme and communication teams, ensuring that the organization’s vision aligned with the needs of its members and the broader community.
Beyond The Conduit, Joanna was the Deputy Head of the Forum of Young Global Leaders (YGL) at the World Economic Forum. This prestigious role required her to oversee the strategic direction of the YGL community, playing a critical role in its long-term growth and establishing strategic partnerships aimed at enhancing global impact and financial sustainability. During her tenure, Joanna also led the executive education leadership portfolio and served as Head of the Foundation Communities for Europe and Eurasia, overseeing renowned initiatives like the Global Shapers Community and the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship.
In her current capacity as a consultant, Joanna works closely with a variety of clients, including high-impact start-ups, esteemed academic institutions, and Fortune 500 companies. Her consultancy focuses on crafting social impact strategies, stakeholder engagement plans, and external affairs strategies that empower organizations to create lasting positive changes in their communities.
Education and Achievements
Joanna’s educational background is as distinguished as her professional experiences. She holds a Master of Arts (MA) in Fine and Decorative Art from the prestigious Sotheby’s Art Institute, which has provided her with a strong foundation in art and design, complementing her skills in strategic thinking and community engagement. Additionally, she has a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Modern History from the renowned University of Nottingham, equipping her with a broad understanding of historical contexts which she applies in her work developing social impact strategies.
Joanna has consistently demonstrated a commitment to furthering her expertise and contributing to her field. Her achievements have not only involved leadership roles but also include founding her own consultancy, Sparber Consulting Ltd. This venture signifies her dedication to fostering innovation and collaboration, spearheading initiatives that focus on social responsibility and creating positive societal outcomes.
Notable Experiences
Throughout her career, Joanna has held various leadership and consultancy positions that have honed her expertise in social impact and community building. She has worked as a Strategy Consultant for Bloomberg Media, particularly focusing on the Bloomberg New Economy Catalyst Community. In this role, she was responsible for providing strategic counsel and developing programs that bridge the gap between economic growth and social justice.
At the World Economic Forum, her diverse roles ranged from Community Lead in East Asia, Africa, Latin America, to overseeing arts and culture engagement. Her extensive experience across different geographic landscapes enables her to address complex global challenges with an in-depth understanding of multicultural dynamics, making her an invaluable asset to organizations looking to make a global impact.
Joanna also began her professional journey in the arts by serving as the Gallery Director at Michael Goedhuis Ltd, where her keen eye for fine and decorative art flourished. This early experience paved the way for her unique approach to stakeholder engagement, emphasizing the importance of aesthetic and cultural appreciation in social programs.
Her versatile beginnings also included a role as a Medical Secretary at the NHS, where she developed administrative skills and an understanding of health sector dynamics. Such diverse experiences contribute to her multifaceted approach as a consultant, allowing her to integrate operational efficiencies with impactful social strategies.
Achievements
Throughout her extensive career, Joanna has achieved numerous accolades and milestones that underline her commitment to social impact. As a leader, her remarkable ability to mobilize stakeholder groups towards common goals has been a hallmark of her work. She has successfully designed and implemented initiatives that resonate with diverse audiences, leading to tangible changes in various communities.
In her role at The Conduit, her contributions to social impact strategies helped establish the organization as a thought leader in the space of community engagement and social entrepreneurship. Moreover, her strategic foresight at the World Economic Forum contributed to the long-term success and sustainability of the Young Global Leaders community, enabling women and leaders from emerging economies to shape global agendas.
Joanna’s consultancy work has also led to successful collaborations and projects that span various sectors, proving her ability to adapt and innovate in a rapidly changing world. She has been recognized for her efforts in bringing together multi-stakeholder groups to foster dialogue, inspire innovation, and create pathways for actionable change in the social impact arena.
Through her education, professional experiences, and consultancy, Joanna Louise Sparber has established herself as an exemplary leader in the field of social impact and community development. Her journey continues to inspire others as she focuses on enabling organizations to enact meaningful change, ensuring that her fingerprints are left on numerous successful initiatives across sectors.
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Clay works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Clay offers several powerful features including:
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
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- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Clay is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Clay is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Clay as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Clay offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Clay takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Clay encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Clay work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Clay is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Clay is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Clay is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Clay offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Clay offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Clay for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Clay accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Clay offers extensive integration capabilities. Clay introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Clay supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Clay also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
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Clay is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Clay stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Clay excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Clay is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Clay offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Clay's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Clay has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Clay is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Clay beneficial.
Clay offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Clay offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Clay's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Clay offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Clay focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Clay also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Clay offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Clay isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Clay instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Clay is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Clay can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Clay is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Clay's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Clay has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Clay a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Clay's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Clay's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Clay has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Clay's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Clay as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Clay eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.