Karissa Parks

Karissa Parks serves as the Senior Marketing Manager here at Leadr. 

Karissa is a graduate of Johnson University and has previously worked at Cru, The NASCAR Foundation, and BMWL before coming to Leadr. As an ambitious enneagram 3, Karissa is driven to work for a meaningful mission, and her passion for working alongside others to help them achieve their full potential led her to her current role. As Partnerships Manager, she has the honor of building relationships with other organizations and planning events that celebrate organizations who are invested in people development. 

She is married to her husband Adam and lives in Orlando where they planted Eastside Christian Church in January 2020. They have a little girl named Brighton and a Golden Retriever, Chipper.

Why I'm Passionate About Leadr

At Leadr, we all have a story of a poor management experience that led to our passion for people development and desire to work at Leadr. We call these our Nigel stories.

Nigel is a fictitious character we’ve worked with or for in the past with unhealthy leadership tendencies. We all have those tendencies within ourselves, and they can emerge unintentionally, impacting those around us. 

We are all Nigels, or know a Nigel, and Nigel is why Leadr exists. Here’s Karissa’s Nigel story. What's yours?

The worst part of my Nigel story is that my Nigel is actually a really good person. I think she was kind and generous and very caring - she just did not know how to lead me, at all. My Nigel thought leading someone was turning them into themselves. At least that is what I think she was trying to do? But I was never going to be her. I was not wired that way. 

At Leadr, I serve on a team that is complementary in skills, giftings, temperament, and demeanor. My manager now capitalizes on what makes me different from her - to her, those are my strengths and not my weaknesses. She helps me level up in the areas that I need to grow through our weekly 1:1’s. She is kind, generous, and caring, but she is also developing me and encourages me to bring all of myself to work every single day. My new manager is passionate about helping me become who I was created to be, not just replicating herself. And because I’m being led and developed, not managed - I am the best employee I have ever been.