The Founders of Radical Advocacy and the board members of of Radical Advocacy are passionate about getting advocates engaged and involved with their favorite cause, and propelling it forward. Each board member knows intimately the struggle non-profits and advocates go through everyday. They are truly Radical Advocates!

Radical Advocacy Board

Mark Stephan – President, Founder

Mark Stephan is a passionate person who looks at problems and solves them—and this is how Radvocacy™ was conceived. For seven years, Mark served with non-profit and local faith-based organizations while living in Istanbul, Turkey. There, he started his own software company, Calcedon, to exemplify the “Business as Mission” model: a business built upon ethics with the goal of promoting strong values in the business transactions of its community, ultimately solving the riddle of how it is possible for an industry to serve selflessly, lead ethically, and do great business too. In 2008, Mark moved back to Austin, TX, bringing his company with him, and in late 2009, a church in Austin asked Mark to solve the funding complications of sending 100 Christian volunteers around the world. That solution was Radvocacy™. Ever since, Mark has been meticulously fine-tuning the Radvocacy™ model, looking forward to the day when it will impact the world by revolutionizing the methods of fundraising which are used by churches and non-profit organizations.

Mark graduated with a B.A. in Liberal Arts from Purdue University with five majors: History, Anthropology, Classics, English, and Creative Writing, while teaching himself software development and advanced computer science in his free time. After university, Mark gave up his pursuit of a Masters Degree in History in order to focus on advocating for the causes he cared about, and in pursuit of this goal, Mark got a job at Trilogy Software in Austin. After working there for two years, Mark was able to move to Istanbul to do the work he loved, bringing new vision, energy, and light to the Turkish job market.

Mark has a passionate vision and a practical understanding of non-profits as well as a wealth of business, project management, and technological experience to get Radvocacy™ off the ground and running strong. His company, Calcedon, specializes in taking start-ups from conception to reality, giving them the necessary gumption to achieve the change they seek to bring about in society. Calcedon and Mark come highly endorsed by their customers.

JK Knox – Board Member

J K Knox’s passion is equipping others to fulfill their unique calling. He serves with the International Turkey Network, the Antioch Network, and on several other boards dedicated to ‘blessing the nations.’

A cornerstone of his work has been building partnerships between the emerging national ministries, ex-patriot workers, and the global community involved in Turkey. Today his work focuses upon study, research, writing, and training on leadership matters. Most recently he has focused on non-western,  leadership development in both service sector/NGO world and corporate contexts.

He has degrees from the University of Texas, Abilene Christian University, and Phoenix Seminary with graduate work in Business, Biblical Studies, and  cross-cultural leadership.

Chris Rassam – Board Member

Chris currently serves as designated President and CEO/President and board member of Prolific Business Solutions, and acts as Radical Advocacy’s expert on Payment Processing. He has a proven track record of leading companies from a growth and development phase to becoming efficiently operated and profitable within a short period of time. Chris brings over 12 years of experience in the financial and merchant services industry.

Prior to Prolific Chris served in management of affiliated companies of Chase Paymentech and First Data Merchant Services, responsible for managing over thousands of accounts which consisted of hospitality, retail and restaurant chains. Prior to the financial and merchant services industry, he was involved as an entrepreneur and served as a board member of multiple restaurants. Prior to that Chris was a real estate consultant, being the youngest consultant at 18 and selling millions of dollars in real estate. He holds a bachelor of Business Administration degree in Finance from Walsh College.

James Higginbotham – Board Member

James is the President of LaunchAny, an Austin-based services company focused on providing software strategy and development to startups and small businesses. He has been providing professional software development services for over 15 years. He is also the co-author of Using Enterprise Java (Que Publishing), published in 1997.
LaunchAny (formerly Blue Jazz Consulting) is focused on guiding startups from idea to revenue using Ruby and Rails and Java-based technologies. Based in Austin, TX, LaunchAny brings experienced professionals and a history of successful projects to the community.
James has a passion for helping non-profits, including writing and coaching leaders for years. He combines his experience of volunteer management and business leadership to create a practical, people-centered approach to volunteer leadership. James has published two books on volunteer management, along with the VolunteerCentered.com website that is dedicated to volunteer management.

 

For a list of all of our Board members, please contact us.