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SAL | Collaboration and Connection

Type: Internal Initiative / Organizational Development Led by: Claire Fisher Moffett (Director of Strategic Planning and Operations) Status: 🟢 Active - Meeting series in progress

What This Is

A facilitated process to define SAL team norms, meeting rhythms, and how we’ll use the new shared space. Claire is leading a series of meetings to translate shared values into practical ways of working.

Participants

Core Group (invited to meetings):

  • Abigail Stewart-Kahn (astewar2@stanford.edu)
  • Joshua Weiss (josh.weiss@stanford.edu)
  • Nicole Henderson (NHenderson@stanford.edu)
  • Sarahi C Espinoza Salamanca (ssalamanca@stanford.edu)
  • Kristen Pilner Blair (kpilner@stanford.edu)
  • Reuben Mark Thiessen (reubent@stanford.edu)
  • Ana Saavedra (anamar@stanford.edu)
  • Isabel Sacks (isacks@stanford.edu)
  • Daniel Lucas Guimaraes (dguimara@stanford.edu)

CC’d (leadership):

  • Isabelle Hau (ihau@stanford.edu) - Executive Director
  • Alissa Anderson (alissa.anderson@stanford.edu)

Meeting Arc

Meeting 1: Reflection (Completed - Jan 8, 2026)

Focus: What makes effective teams?

Key Themes Surfaced:

  1. Clear purpose and goals - knowing what we’re building, who it’s for, success criteria
  2. Role clarity with flexibility - clear ownership + mutual support
  3. Strong communication systems - shared playbooks, visibility, aligned messaging
  4. Trust and respect - understanding expertise, context, each other as people
  5. Accountability and pride - “we made this” shared ownership
  6. Iteration and reflection - working in cycles, time to pause/learn/adjust
  7. Intentional use of urgency - knowing when to move fast vs slow down
  8. Identity and belonging - connection to work and each other

Note: Reuben had conflict, didn’t attend

Meeting 2: Designing How We Work (Upcoming)

Focus: Team norms

Will define what we want:

  • More of
  • Less of
  • To shift

Across: meetings, async collaboration, communication, decision-making, focus time

Outcome: Draft set of shared norms grounded in real behaviors

Meeting 3: Meetings, Rhythm & Our New Space (Upcoming)

Focus: How we gather

Will align on:

  • Types and purposes of meetings
  • Weekly and monthly rhythms
  • What belongs async vs in-person
  • How physical space supports collaboration, deep work, connection

Outcome: Meeting ecosystem + principles for space use

Relevance to Reuben

This directly connects to Goal 4: Sustainable Leadership Practices and the Accelerator Studio’s team values. Outcomes from this process should inform how AS operates within the broader SAL context.

Watch for alignment/tension with AS’s own team values:

  1. Serious Play
  2. Perpetual Trust Fall
  3. Best Idea Wins
  4. Cards on the Table

Notes

  • Full notes from Meeting 1 linked in Claire’s Jan 21 email
  • Claire welcomes async feedback via email

Last Updated: Jan 21, 2026

Source: reference/sal-collaboration-connection.md