civic engagement | coalition building | fundraising | strategic communications
Brandi Fisher, Founder and CEO
Brandi Fisher has spent her entire career working in the field of civic and community engagement. She is the engine that drives Thought Partners’ ability to “fill a room”–whether it’s a ballroom or a church basement.
Brandi always has her eye on strengthening relationships within communities to advance a cause. She has used this approach in her fundraising, coalition building, and advocacy at the local, regional and national levels while addressing topics as diverse as Social Security reform, racial justice, mental health, and public education.
As the executive director of the MainStream Coalition, Brandi grew the nonprofit from a small civic organization to a leader in voter engagement and advocacy in Kansas.
She championed relational organizing, leading to the creation of the nationally recognized, data-driven, relational organizing tool, Voter to Voter, which gives nonprofits and community organizations the ability to effectively implement and evaluate their Get Out the Vote efforts.
Prior to her work in advocacy and voter engagement, where she mobilized grassroots support from communities throughout Kansas, she directed major giving programs, capital campaigns, grant writing, event planning and membership growth and development. Brandi has her Masters in Public Administration from the University of Kansas.
Mark Wiebe, Partner and CCO
As a writer, Mark has spent his life using words to inspire change. As a consultant, he works with individuals and organizations to help them clarify their thoughts so they can spur people to take action.
After receiving his Master of Arts in English from Southern Illinois University, Mark launched a 14-year career as a journalist with The Kansas City Star, where he earned awards for his reporting and column-writing. He later brought his communications skills to the nonprofit and government sectors as Director of Public Policy for Wyandot Behavioral Health Network.
At Wyandot, Mark led the nonprofit’s advocacy campaigns, building a grassroots infrastructure to help clients and their families use their experiences with mental illness to demonstrate how strong mental health policies at local, state, and federal levels can change lives.
While there, he co-led a successful statewide campaign to amend the Kansas Constitution to protect the voting rights of people with mental illness; led advocacy trainings for consumers of mental health services; taught Mental Health First Aid courses; wrote grants to advance Wyandot’s advocacy efforts; and completed the Sunflower Foundation’s year-long Advocacy Fellows program.
For the last six years, Mark has worked as a communications consultant, where he developed communications strategy, managed social media, drafted press releases, managed media engagements, and wrote speeches, while returning to his journalism roots as a freelance contributor to The Journal, a quarterly publication of the Kansas Leadership Center.
