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Jeffrey Cookson

Executive Coach & Master Facilitator

Get to know me in three:

My home away from home:
Two places I return to throughout life are Hungary and Puerto Rico. Hungary links to my strongest ethnic identity and as for Puerto Rico – it’s fortunate that we can enjoy the beach while escaping Minnesota’s winter.
What makes LCW special:
Raised in six countries, our core team encompass multiple ethnicities, speaks many languages, and half of us have lived outside our country of origin. Two-thirds of us are women, nearly half are people of color, a quarter identify as LGBTQ, and we have disability representation. We come from a variety of faith backgrounds and have field staff located around the world. All of this provides continuous opportunity to learn from, challenge, and inspire one another.
The challenge that shaped me:
My Dad was a Protestant minister. While growing up, this influenced how I was expected to be and behave. My parents never said anything overtly homophobic, but many other people around me did, so I was certain I couldn’t be me. When I finally came to terms with being gay, the first thing my father did was mail me his copy of Leaves of Grass – how cool is that?

Bio

Jeffrey brings 30 years of experience in organizational effectiveness, intercultural
development, and diversity and inclusion training and consulting in both domestic and international contexts. He excels at helping individuals, organizations, and systems understand and address complex and controversial topics.

Jeffrey’s D&I career began at the University of Minnesota’s Gender and Sexuality Center for Queer and Trans Life. An ethnic Magyar (Hungarian) who grew up in a bilingual household in the US, he previously served as a Global Diversity Inclusion Specialist at MRA-Trusight and held professional academic appointments at the University of Minnesota within Multicultural Affairs. At LCW, Jeffrey routinely uses the Thomas-Kilman Conflict Styles Assessment (TKI) and the Intercultural Conflict Styles Inventory. He is licensed to offer the We Care COLORS training system and is a certified Administrator of the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI).

Jeffrey has conducted hundreds of individual and group feedback sessions for nationals in over a dozen countries in North and South America, the European Union, Asia and the Caribbean. A representative list of clients he has served throughout his career at LCW include Lockheed Martin, Wells Fargo, 3M, Cargill, Caterpillar, and Allstate.

Since 2009 he’s served on the faculty at Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota where he teaches at the graduate level in the Management Program. He earned a Master’s of Fine Arts from the University of Missouri at Kansas City, and today he resides in Minneapolis. He is proud to be Theatrical Director at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, Office of First Year and Orientation Programs.