Meet Sagdrina Brown Jalal | Founder and Lead Facilitator, SageD Consulting

We had the good fortune of connecting with Sagdrina Brown Jalal and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Sagdrina, what was your thought process behind starting your own business?
In 2022, I launched SageD Consulting, a Black-women-led, community-centered space for leaders to lead with authenticity and intention. Because our strength is reflected in our combined talents and treasures, we refer to ourselves as a collective – officially, The SageD Collective.

In December of 2019, I was the founding Executive Director of the Georgia Farmers Market Association (GFMA). I hosted the national Community Food Systems Conference in my hometown of Savannah that featured powerful leaders such as Michael Twitty, Sallie Ann Robinson, and Rachel Willis. The reviews from the hundreds of diverse attendees consistently showed tremendous value for the space my team and I created. The sessions were carefully curated to build on the collective skills and talents of each participant. Facilitators and speakers were selected based on their knowledge, experience, and brilliance.

Despite the tremendous success of the conference, I struggled to pay the bills. I used my personal savings to pay the hotel fees of our speakers while I waited for donations that had been promised months prior. Saddened and in shock by the lack of support by the very institutions that are supposed to support organizations like GFMA, I ended up leaving the organization to pursue other opportunities.

Leaving GFMA broke my heart. Leaving knowing that the work was far from finished was devastating. Leaving with almost $25,000 due to me personally (with no clear repayment plan in sight) was incomprehensible.

How did this happen to me? Because philanthropy doesn’t trust Black women.

Not even to do work in our own communities. Not even to do work that we’ve been doing successfully without support from traditional funding sources. Not even when we have personally funded the work all along.

Fundamentally, this is why I started SageD Consulting. SageD Consulting houses a Collective of partners for consulting, support, and strategic community-building. Our Collective serves as a model for intentional, non-hierarchical community impact work. With our mission being laser-focused on supporting impact-driven leadership, especially the leadership of Black women, while also pursuing community-building and equitable innovation, we have been very strategic and deliberate about effecting positive change.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
As a graduate of the University of Georgia with a degree in Education, my work thrives at the intersection of community and innovation. I have served as the founding Executive Director for the Georgia Farmers Market Association, a board member for the national Farmers Market Coalition, a Well-Being Impact Area Advisor for the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta, and an advisor for Tuskegee University’s Organic Farming Project. In 2022, I collaborated with Black growers and farmers market leaders to curate the Anti-Racist Farmers Market Toolkit that is now utilized by farmers market leaders across the country.

My commitment to equitable local communities started at birth. I am the daughter of the late civil rights attorney Sage Brown (who I am named after); a decorated Vietnam veteran who was hand-picked by civil rights leaders to desegregate Chatham County Public Schools. My father was a fixture in the Savannah community and started one of the first Black law firms in the city. He played a key role in the establishment of the Ralph McGill Civil Rights Museum in Savannah, where he is also featured.

My mother was committed to educating youth; serving as both an administrator (most recently at Bloomingdale Elementary School) and a lead Sunday school teacher at Mount Olive Holiness Church. Both of my parents graduated from Savannah State College.

As a mother of three incredible children, the foundation of expanding impact by quilting family into the community continues through me. I raised my family in Atlanta and am now a proud empty nester. I am an avid cook, a hobbyist floral arranger and a tinker of tinctures. I love to share my home with friends and neighbors who frolic through my garden and sample the Gullah Geechee dishes of my childhood.

You’d be surprised how effectively folks can work together when a delicious, homemade meal is shared. Healing happens.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I love floral arranging, so a trip to The Sidewalk Garden, a Black-owned flower and plant shop in my neighborhood of Kirkwood, is a must. We could also stop by some of my favorite restaurants and shops in Kirkwood, such as Urban Pie, Perc, and Dom Beijos.

Next, we could take a trip to The Lola, a women’s coworking space in Midtown where some of the dopest social impact leaders and entrepreneurs in Atlanta work. We could enjoy a delicious wrap from Tassili’s Raw Reality before heading to end our day with a sunset hike up Arabia Mountain.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I think of my mother (Ma’dear), grandmothers (Ma Meena and Lula Belle), and dear friends who have ascended to the ancestral realm. I also think of current freedom fighters, those that I have the privilege of working alongside, and those whom I admire from a distance. These women are forces who have served me, shaped my thinking, and co-authored my steps.

Website: https://www.sagedconsulting.com

Instagram: @sagdrina

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sagdrinajalal