Interview with Rosetta Lai, AALead

Yesterday I met with Rosetta Lai, the Executive Director of Asian American LEAD. AALEAD’s overarching goal is to increase the opportunities and ability of low-income Asian American children to move out of poverty and become successful, self-sufficient adults. Rosetta joined AALEAD after 20 years in the corporate sector in organizational development roles with Motorola, NCS/Pearson and SRA/IBM. Rosetta has always been active in Asian American non-profit organizations — she served as the President of the Organization of Chinese Americans (OCA), Chicago Chapter in the 1980s and was the National President of the Organization of Chinese American Women (OCAW) from 2003-2008.

Rosetta knew she wanted to move into the nonprofit sector and was recruited to AALEAD as their Vice President for Development 4 years ago. She is now leading the organization as Executive Director. Rosetta shared advice for experienced business professionals who want to make a transition into the nonprofit sector:

1. Motivation is a key factor to make a successful transition. Compensation is a huge hurdle in the nonprofit sector so you have to be really motivated to do the work.

2. You have to be prepared to do everything for yourself. There are no secretaries and corporate processes to support you. This is particularly challenging with technology and she is looking to build an IT infrastructure for their organization. Be prepared to deal with day-to-day inconveniences that you didn’t face in the corporate world.

3. The reward is there. She gets tremendous emotional satisfaction from her work at AALEAD. They are a direct service organization so they can see results from their work. She has also been able to bring to bear her experience in a meaningful way.

Thanks to Rosetta for her great advice!