Skip to content Skip to footer
Close

Galvanizing Africa Consult

GAC is a Kenya-based Organizational Development and Executive Leadership Coaching firm, founded in 2021 by Janet Mawiyoo. She brings 30+ years in the development sector, including 17 years while leading the Kenya Community Development Foundation (KCDF). 

Janet brings unique contextual knowledge and lived-in expertise: as a grant-maker, a grant recipient, a nonprofit governance expert, and a specialist in African philanthropy and nonprofit asset development. 

In a continent where international funding still plays a big role, Janet’s experience has also shown her that lasting change happens when funders are willing to play their role in an empowering and less domineering way. Such an approach allows voices and perspectives from the ground, to be heard and taken into account when making decisions of not only what to fund, but how to fund.

GAC invests in supporting sustainable organizational change processes that are sensitive to the needs and desired outcomes, as identified by those most affected by the change. GAC therefore prioritizes building an owned change process from the onset, and bringing in all the stakeholders early enough, so that the understanding and buy-in of proposed change happens at every stage. By the end of agreed interventions, the teams and people driving change are usually ready and well equipped to carry it forward themselves.

To achieve this, GAC keeps an eye on the following five things, in every assignment:

  • Co-creation — in planning and executing with those affected by a problem leads to better outcomes.
  • People — are the center of all processes that we engage with, from start to finish.
  • Trust — is the foundation of everything we do.
  • Integrity — is a non-negotiable value that we hold dear.
  • Ownership — by the people driving change is a critical outcome we seek to achieve in any process.

Organizational Development (OD) Consulting

GAC sees OD as an intentional, and planned way of supporting organizations, to achieve their desired organization-wide changes, so that they can be successful in meeting their set goals. This is out of the recognition that any growing organization will at different times struggle with various angles of their growth, such as managing changes, building a vision oriented team, strengthening governance, building an appropriate organizational culture despite many inevitable local and global changes, just to mention a few. 

GAC works with organizations that are committed to achieving their mission, by supporting them to overcome these challenges, and become effective organizations that are relevant to the people they are serving.

GAC also works with reflective funders, who aim at being more relevant and sensitive to the changing environments, while also ensuring they are not heavy handed in how they work with their partners. Such funders remain alive to the needs and perspectives from the communities served ultimately by the non-profits they support.

Some highlights of OD assignments that GAC has been involved in, include:

  • In 2023, GAC supported Comic Relief in undertaking a Learning Evaluation of their Organizational Strengthening Framework, co-funded by the Foreign, Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO) in assessing how well it had implemented the work with partners. 
  • GAC is part of an Africa based team of system-change coaches, who offer coaching services to the leadership teams of several Africa-based NGOs who are exploring a systems approach to their work, supported by Co-Impact. This work is aimed at achieving change at scale, which is more effective in tackling poverty challenges. 
  • In 2025-2026, GAC supported TrustAfrica in a process to review their governance practices and frameworks over the years, as they were coming to celebrate 20 years of their existence. Such milestones make it necessary to rethink some of the ways of working by any organization. 
  • In 2026, GAC supported Women for Women International in reviewing their organizational culture after adopting the Power Journey in 2020. 

Executive Leadership Coaching

Janet is a Certified Executive Leadership Coach. This grew from her belief that a lot of things rise and fall with leadership. She therefore carries out one-on-one and team coaching sessions with leaders and especially those from the civil society sector, who are seeking to improve on their leadership styles, or those going through various challenges. This work benefits a lot from her over 20 years of lived-in experience, in leading at the top, both local and international organizations. 

Janet also applies coaching skills in her OD assignments, as part of helping her clients appreciate their role in achieving the change they want to see. She coaches partners interested in taking a systems change approach to their development interventions, and is one of the coaches for the Amujae Initiative, run by the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Center for Women and Development. The initiative focuses on building top women leaders across the continent, particularly those running for political office.

Program, Philanthropy and Funder Advisory

GAC through the lived experience of its Team Lead, Janet, has been able to advise funders on more effective, contextually grounded, community-led ways of working. This has included helping funders rethink rigid program design and reporting requirements, build more equitable and trust-based relationships with grantee partners, and look into funding approaches that are responsive to the realities of the communities they serve. 

Some highlights of program, philanthropy and funder advisory assignments that GAC has been involved in, include:

  • GAC has been part of the RINGO team (Re-Imagining the International NGO), a systems change approach social lab committed to supporting INGOs to reflect on their relevance and ways of working, in the current aid sector around the world (2022-2026). 
  • GAC was part of a diverse team of specialists contracted through NIRAS (a Swedish consulting firm) in 2023-2025 to support the Ford Foundation to undertake a longitudinal evaluation of its BUILD program. This work aimed at understanding the value of flexible funding to their partners. Emerging lessons are influencing how funders are working with their partners.

Private Sector and Corporate Giving Advisory

Through Janet’s personal engagement, GAC helps corporates and philanthropic givers support the CSO sector in a more impactful and sustainable manner. By helping them understand the challenges non-profits face in working with vulnerable communities, she has enabled many private sector partners to approach their giving with greater intentionality and a longer term lens, resulting in more impactful programming. 

Some highlights of private sector and corporate giving advisory assignments that GAC has been involved in, include:

  • Janet is part of the Board of Directors of both the I&M Foundation and the Isuzu Foundation. These roles allow her to share her expertise in a corporate environment, as these companies seek to make a lasting impact through their giving back initiatives.
  • Janet is often invited on speaking engagements in the philanthropy space such as the East African Philanthropy Network Annual Conference, the African Philanthropy Network Bi-annual Conference, among others.
  • Janet recently joined the Board of Global Fund for Community Foundations (GFCF), an organization working globally to build community philanthropy as an essential element of people-led development. She also serves on the Board of Adapo, the investment arm of Kenya Community Development Foundation (KCDF). 
  • Janet previously served on several Boards including TrustAfrica, a Pan-African Foundation working to strengthen African agency in addressing the continent’s most pressing challenges, and Accountable Now, a global non-profit platform that works to make civil society organizations more accountable, transparent, and effective. 

Janet in a workshop in Uganda with a group of organisations co-funded by Comic Relief and the FCDO, who were reflecting about their experiences in organization strengthening efforts. She was backed by Catherine Wanjohi (extreme right standing) and Catherine Mugambo from CivSource (second from left front row).