Leonard Noisette, Esq.

Principal, Noisette Consulting

New York, New York

Lenny Noisette has over 40 years of experience helping social justice organizations and their leaders achieve ambitious goals. He was the long-serving Executive Director of the Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem (NDS), a nationally renowned community-based defender office that demonstrated a radically different approach to providing holistic and effective legal services. He more recently headed the Justice team at Open Society Foundations US, where he oversaw grant-making and field engagement activities to reform, and ultimately transform, the country’s criminal legal system. In that work, Lenny and his team sought to confront racially disparate practices and support BIPOC leaders and communities most affected by harmful punitive policies and practices. Through Noisette Consulting, launched in the spring of 2022, Lenny’s leadership coaching and organizational consulting work is grounded in an understanding of the challenges of running and growing nonprofit organizations, the critical importance of effective management and leadership, and the necessity of nurturing the capacity, passion and conviction needed to do both. A lifelong New Yorker, Lenny lives in southeast Queens with his wife where they have raised two sons. In his spare time, he enjoys cooking, watching sports, gardening, and spending time with his granddaughters.