who we are

Nita Baum is the founder of bfree and was born and raised in Queens, NYC to Indian immigrant parents. She draws on 20+ years as an educator, facilitator, healer, and leadership coach. She founded b*free to cultivate Healing Leadership to grow leaders and teams’ wellbeing and creative potential to transform Workplaces to Healingspaces. Nita feels most whole when she is in service, able to express herself creatively and hold space for healing. Nita’s entrepreneurial experience includes founding 2 social impact for-profits and a nonprofit. Her training and practice spans neuroscience, psychosomatic + trauma healing modalities, leadership development, conflict resolution, DEI, and creative and embodied healing practices from music to movement. 

Kelli is a talent and equity specialist and has a professional executive coaching practice with a special focus on leadership coaching with an equity, diversity, inclusion lens and on helping nonprofit/education leaders of color to refine and develop their leadership competencies and management practices. She is a graduate of The Equity Lab’s Nexus Fellowship and sits on its Board. Kelli draws on over 25 years of experience focused on serving youth, communities, and urban education systems in Minneapolis, Washington, D.C., and New York City.

Eva Perrotta is a Registered Somatic Movement Educator and Therapist and has a diverse background of health and healing modalities to her credit. She is a craniosacral therapist, and has extensive training in the subtle manipulation of the craniosacral system. This skilled touch is enhanced by her training in Body Mind Centering ®, shiatsu and studies of viceral manipulation. For many years, Evaworked as a choreographer and dancer before taking a parallel road into healing work.

Jillian Hubbard is an independent consultant specializing in equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI), organization development, and talent development. With over 10 years of experience in consulting, facilitation, and training, she supports organizations and leaders in their efforts to create more equitable, inclusive environments and increase their effectiveness by empowering their human capital. Jillian’s career spans a range of sectors, including education, nonprofit, corporate, and government.

Danielle Davis is the founder of Liberated Development, which illuminates barriers and boundaries in thinking, creates space for teams and leaders to think outside of traditional solution boxes, and pushes for solutions-orientated thinking that centers personal identity and life experience. Her 15-year career in strategic planning, training design/delivery, and talent development in the education and nonprofit sectors has focused on organizational climate and culture, with a unique concentration on the influence of identity, wellness and race.

Prashant was a traditional business strategy consultant, living in Manhattan. Bringing forth strategic insight to Fortune 500 C-Levels, he felt satisfaction in excellent work with great colleagues. He also felt the pain of money minus meaning and values. With the guidance of world-class teachers, he immersed in deep exploration and relentless practices of effectiveness and fulfillment (what he calls sharpening the axe and rehydrating the soul, respectively).

Gabe, founder of Developmental Design, is a leadership coach and organizational consultant, with a specialty in diversity and inclusion efforts. He is the co-author of Compassionate Conversations: How to Speak and Listen from the Heart. His work takes us to the intersection of social justice and purpose driven enterprises, design thinking, human psychology and group dynamics. Freedom and Fairness is an initiative within Gabe's work to apply Integral Theory, zen training, and adult developmental psychology to the theory and practice of group facilitation in the context of DEI and intergroup conflict.

Julie’s work at the intersection of leadership, personal development, community engagement and social change spans over 20 years across the private, public and non-profit sectors. As a coach and facilitator, Julie supports individuals and groups to improve self and situational awareness in times of rapid growth and transition. She brings an equity lens and liberatory approach to her leadership coaching. She cultivates a sense of belonging and supports people to show up in their lives with radical presence.

Boyuan Gao is the cofounder and principal of Project Inkblot. In the past 15 years, her work has spanned organizations impacting youth development, juvenile justice, HIV/AIDS, homelessness, environmental justice, music journalism, education, digital media, technology, women's entrepreneurship, politics and more. In past lives she was an editor-in-chief, marketer, community organizer, artist and entrepreneur. Boyuan likes to collage and watch comedy specials on Netflix in her spare time, and lives in Brooklyn with her fiance and cat. She has a B.S. in Social Thought & Political Economy from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Jahan Mantin is the co-founder of Project Inkblot, a media, service and program design consultancy that uses a Design for Diversity™ approach to build inclusive campaigns for organizations and companies. Jahan has led a number of high profile campaigns, including a women-driven initiative focused on low-income, immigrant women of color entrepreneurs for the City of New York.

Shayan Aghourlikhani advises, facilitates and coaches leaders, teams and individuals in service of their growth and development, healing and wellbeing. His client-partners include global wellbeing entrepreneurs, philanthropists, nonprofits, venture capitalists, Indigenous leaders and founders of healing centers. Current projects include the development of holistic healing and wellbeing plans and leading and fundraising for a wellbeing, music and Indigenous community center in the Yawanawa Territory of the Brazilian Amazon.

Rob Jackson founded Black Sage Coaching (BSC) with a goal of aligning one’s inner wisdom with actions, intentions, principles, values, and beliefs for powerful transformation. BSC was created out of a necessity to help individuals and groups feel empowered in expressing vulnerability, trusting intuition and developing visionary leadership in a safe, contained, and supportive environment. With over 20 years of experience building the worlds first nonprofit dedicated to the development, practice and preservation of Hip Hop Therapy, Rob has gained a unique perspective around cultivating innovative strategies towards healing, in addition to navigating complex systems, interpersonal dynamics and overcoming challenges on an executive level.

Mubuso, an advisor to b*free, is focused on ensuring that children and adults everywhere have opportunity to get a great education and experience intellectual freedom. He has supported the development of education and youth development initiatives in Africa and North America. Mubuso has worked in a variety of sectors, including international development, the power industry, and retail and commercial banking. He is the founder of the BOOST Fellowship, an initiative in Zimbabwe that helps young people make a successful transition from the classroom to the workplace.

Eduardo Placer is the CEO and Founder of Fearless Communicators, a dynamic public speaking coaching business. He is a global facilitator that has led workshops with groups at Google, Bank of America- Merrill Lynch, Top Tal, and the Wharton School of Business. Private clients include CEO’s of start up companies, UN Diplomats and social activists. He has a BA in English from the University of Pennsylvania and an MFA in Acting from the University of California, San Diego.

Bryan Gilbert Santiago is a creative producer and writer with extensive experience in multi-media projects. He has 6 years of experience with digital marketing and social media strategic planning. As a producer, Santiago has managed various projects from video, photography and design projects to launching digital media campaigns. His motivation in all mediums is the art of storytelling.