Power, Equity, Bias and AI: A Workshop for Nonprofit Leaders
Description
Reimagine power and leadership, centre equity, challenge bias, and apply AI for real accountability.
Join Jeff Couillard, Nitu Sultana and Christian Ortiz for a half-day experiential workshop designed for nonprofit leaders ready to move beyond surface-level equity work into real structural change.
This virtual session brings together three powerful approaches:
Nitu will introduce Volunteer Calgary's new Equity Volunteer Engagement Framework, a practical approach to redesigning volunteer engagement to be more inclusive and impactful.
With Jeff you will explore the Right Use of Power framework, helping you examine how power shows up in your leadership, relationships, and decision-making. You’ll explore how harm is often reproduced through everyday practices that feel normal but exclude communities by design.
Christian will lead a live demo and hands-on training with Justice AI, built on the Decolonial Intelligence Algorithmic (DIA) Framework. You’ll see how bias is embedded in technology and learn how to actively interrupt it using AI as a tool for accountability, not harm.
In collaboration with Volunteer Calgary’s Equity Commons initiative, this workshop centers accessibility and challenges how nonprofit systems engage, include, or accidentally exclude different communities.
This workshop will be online via Zoom.
What You’ll Gain
A clear understanding of how power and bias operate in leadership and systems
Practical tools to recognize and shift harmful patterns in real time
Hands-on experience using Justice AI to identify and interrupt bias
Strategies to make your programs and volunteer spaces more accessible
Concrete ways to move from intention to accountability in your organization
One month of complimentary access to Justice AI GPT and to The Co., a learning community for impact-conscious leaders (a $100 value)
Free access to the VolunteerConnector platform and all of the Equity Commons resources and workshops
Who Should Attend
Nonprofit leaders, volunteer program managers, and community builders committed to advancing accessibility, equity, and meaningful inclusion in their work.
Why Attend
Most equity training stops at awareness. This workshop goes further. You’ll leave with practical tools, real-world applications, and a clear path to change how your organization solves for bias issues.
Lineup
Christian Ortiz
Oye, mira. I’m Christian Ortiz, also known as ZacaTechO, an Afro-Indigenous Decolonial Social Scientist, technologist, and the founder and CEO of MOD ATLAS MEDIA and Justice AI GPT. I created the Decolonial Intelligence Algorithmic (DIA) Framework™ and Justice AI GPT, the first Decolonial AI Framework that confronts AI bias at its root by dismantling Racial Empire Logic, patriarchy, and epistemicide inside machine learning systems and operationalized a real solution to AI bias. My work doesn’t treat “ethics” as a patch after harm occurs like other LLMs; JAI rebuilds the logic of AI through Indigenous and Afro-diasporic epistemologies, where governance, memory, and accountability come first. Justice AI GPT is trained on the world's first Decolonial dataset. My lineage holds roots in the Chichimeca of Zacatecas and Durango, and in Borikén, and I carry that responsibility into every system I design. I bring over two decades of experience in digital transformation, blending strategy, storytelling, and systems design to build technology that serves collective liberation.
Jeff Couillard
I help organizations build leaderful teams - teams where power is used wisely, trust is practiced daily, and people are equipped to navigate the real tensions of modern work. My work sits at the intersection of leadership development, team facilitation, and organizational culture. I’ve had the privilege of supporting leaders at TC Energy, the City of Calgary and the Calgary Fire Department, Electronic Arts, Bayer, Hull Services, and other mission-driven organizations across sectors. I design and deliver learning experiences that are practical, participatory, and immediately operational - whether through executive workshops, keynote speaking, immersive team sessions, or long-term leadership development programs. My approach is grounded in the Right Use of Power, deep coaching practice, and over a decade of work in addiction and mental health, where clarity, compassion, and accountability are non-negotiable.
Nitu Sultana
Hi, I’m Nitu (she/her/they/them), and I lead The Equity Commons at Volunteer Calgary. My work is shaped by my lived experience as a newcomer and years in equity-focused nonprofit practice. I’ve seen how volunteering can foster belonging - and how invisible barriers can exclude people who want to contribute. The Equity Commons is a community-led initiative focused on moving from awareness to practical, anti-racist, and belonging-centred change.
Tickets for good, not greed Humanitix dedicates 100% of profits from booking fees to charity
