ALLAN MARTINEZ VENEGAS

Having worked for roughly a decade with nonprofits, foundations, governments, and socially-driven businesses in over 10 countries across four continents, Allan brings a unique global perspective to his work at AmplifyDMC.  
 
Allan’s experience has spanned both the globe and many disciplines, seeing him tackle projects ranging from recruiting Ebola treatment staff in Liberia to understanding vaccine hesitancy in Kenya. A credentialed IDEO U instructor, Allan is at heart a teacher, learner, and storyteller, a mix of talents that helps him respond insightfully and passionately to the problems, challenges, and goals our clients have.  
 
When he hears about a challenge facing a nonprofit and says, “I’ve got a framework and a workshop for that,” Allan is tapping into his years of experience with human-centered design. Along with being a project manager for several Amplify clients, Allan has channeled his love for teaching and collaboration into a range of workshops, retreats, and trainings for clients that get nonprofit staff thinking of logic models, outputs, and inputs in story-based, human-centered ways. 

As Allan shares here, “When there’s a problem an organization is facing, it’s not that I have the answers. I have the questions. I'm there to come up with the questions and methods to guide the experts who are in the room to get to the answers.” 
 
This collaborative approach to connecting the worlds of research, design thinking, storytelling, and more has been a perfect fit as Amplify continues to prioritize the “Whole DMC,” integrating our development, management, and communications work for clients.

Ask the Ampster: Can you share a memorable volunteering or fundraising experience you’ve had?

One of my most meaningful volunteering experiences was serving on the international board of directors of Amigos de las Americas, a Houston-based nonprofit that inspires leaders through authentic service and immersion experiences across Latin America. Throughout my 2-year tenure, I worked with incredibly smart and committed people from across the private and nonprofit sectors, and gained very valuable insight and empathy for nonprofit boards that helped shape the work I do with our clients at the executive and board level here in Minnesota.