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AI for Impact @ NYU SPS

Human-Centered AI Leadership for the Age of Intelligent Systems

We are entering a new era in which leadership, communication, governance, and decision-making are increasingly shaped by AI. The challenge is no longer whether organizations will adopt AI. The challenge is whether leaders can integrate it responsibly while strengthening human judgment, institutional trust, and meaningful impact.

Designed and taught by Professor Elizabeth (Liz) Ngonzi · NYU School of Professional Studies

 

The Real Challenge Is Human, Not Technical

Every organization is now an AI organization. The question is whether its leaders are ready.

Workforce Transformation

Every sector is being reshaped by AI-enabled systems and workflows. Leaders who understand both the capabilities and the limits of these systems will define the next era of organizational performance.

Leadership and Decision-Making

AI can accelerate analysis, surface patterns, and generate options. But strategic judgment, ethical reasoning, and accountability remain irreducibly human. Leaders must learn to use AI to strengthen these capacities, not outsource them.

Trust, Governance and Human Judgment

As AI accelerates, the institutions and leaders who earn trust will be those who pair powerful tools with rigorous oversight, ethical governance, and a genuine commitment to human-centered outcomes.

Moving Beyond AI Literacy

AI literacy is the floor, not the ceiling. The goal is human-centered AI leadership.

AI User

Adopting AI tools for individual productivity and task completion.

AI Collaborator

Working alongside AI systems to enhance thinking, communication, and output.

AI Creator

Designing AI-assisted workflows, content, and learning experiences.

AI Systems Thinker

Understanding how AI shapes organizational dynamics, culture, and decision environments.

Human-Centered AI Leader

Designing environments where human intelligence and AI work together responsibly and at scale.

The future belongs to leaders who can design environments where human intelligence and AI work together responsibly.

The 1+1+AI=10™ Methodology

A framework for exponential human-centered impact through the combination of individual expertise, collective intelligence, and AI-powered amplification.

1

Individual Expertise

Your lived experience, domain knowledge, professional judgment, and personal perspective. This is the irreplaceable foundation..

1

Collective Intelligence

The insight that emerges when diverse perspectives converge through structured collaboration. Shared thinking produces what no individual can alone

AI

AI-Powered Amplification

AI as a synthesis engine, thought partner, and communication accelerator. Not a replacement for human thinking, but a powerful amplifier of it.

10

Exponential Impact

The combination of human judgment, collaborative intelligence, and AI amplification produces outcomes that are greater, faster, and more meaningful than any single element alone.

1 + 1 + AI = 10™ This methodology is the operating principle behind every AI for Impact experience.

The SHINE™ Storytelling Framework

A strategic framework for leadership communication, stakeholder engagement, and AI-enhanced storytelling.

S — Story

Start with a clear, human-centered story that makes the stakes and context unmistakable.

H — Hook

Use a focused question, tension, or moment that earns attention and invites people into the conversation.

I — Impact

Show concrete, real-world change in decisions, systems, or lives, not just ideas or tools.

N — Narrative Flow

Structure communication so audiences can move logically from problem to insight to action.

E — Engagement

Provide next steps, prompts, or tools that help people apply insights in their own context.

Participants use SHINE™ to clarify ideas, strengthen communication, align stakeholders, and create ethical and compelling narratives.

Learn With AI, Not Just About AI

AI for Impact is highly participatory, hands-on, multimodal, and deeply practical.

What You Will Do

  • Work with AI tools in real time to develop leadership communications
  • Apply the SHINE™ storytelling framework and the 1+1+AI=10™ Methodology to your own organizational challenges
  • Explore AI‑assisted synthesis and strategic thinking using source‑grounded environments (for example, NotebookLM)
  • Create multimodal content with presentation and design tools (for example, Gamma, Canva, and Adobe Firefly)
  • Engage in collaborative intelligence exercises with peers
  • Participate in stakeholder engagement simulations
  • Experiment with conversational AI for research and decision support

The Learning Philosophy

AI for Impact is not a technology course. It is a leadership development experience that uses AI as a medium for learning. Participants do not just study AI. They work with it, question it, and develop the judgment to use it well.

Selected tools are chosen based on your goals, drawn from categories including conversational AI for ideation and drafting, source‑grounded environments for research and verification, visual storytelling tools for slides and campaign assets, audience insight tools for stakeholder feedback, and accessibility and translation tools for multilingual engagement. The focus is always on leadership capability, not tool proficiency.

The measure of success is not what participants know about AI. It is what they can do with it, and what they choose not to do.

AI for Impact: Part I

Boost Your Marketability and Organizational Growth

A one-day onsite intensive at NYU School of Professional Studies, designed for professionals and leaders across sectors who want to develop practical AI fluency, strengthen their communication, and lead more effectively in an AI-accelerated world.

What You Will Develop

AI Confidence

Move from uncertainty to fluency. Understand what AI can and cannot do, and develop the judgment to use it well.

Leadership Communication

Apply the SHINE™ framework to craft clearer, more compelling, and more human communications.

Strategic Storytelling

Use AI to develop narratives that align stakeholders, build trust, and drive action.

Practical AI Workflows

Build repeatable AI-assisted processes for research, synthesis, content creation, and communication.

Responsible Experimentation

Develop the habits and judgment to experiment with AI ethically and effectively.

Stakeholder Engagement

Design AI-enhanced approaches to stakeholder communication and organizational alignment.

Who This Is For

AI for Impact Part I is designed for current and emerging leaders across sectors including nonprofit, government, corporate, education, and social impact who want to develop practical AI leadership skills in a rigorous, human-centered environment.

One day. Practical. Transformative.

Image generated with Gamma.app

Student Success & Impact

90%

of participants rated the AI for Impact course as highly relevant and impactful for their professional development.

"A meaningful and energizing class—I left inspired to apply AI ethically and responsibly."

"A game changer. I walked away with tools I could immediately apply to my professional practice."

"The frameworks helped me think differently about storytelling. AI became less intimidating and more empowering."

"Earlier this year, I completed the AI for Impact course taught by Elizabeth (Liz) Ngonzi at NYU School of Professional Studies, and it opened up a whole new layer of curiosity around storytelling and brand experiences.

I joined to explore how generative AI could meaningfully enhance human connection. I left inspired by its potential to expand creativity, accessibility, and inclusion - without replacing the magic only humans bring.

Thank you, Professor Ngonzi - grateful for the spark and excited for what’s next!"


Student Project Showcase

Real Impact, Real Solutions: Explore six practical AI solutions designed and prototyped by the Summer 2025 cohort during a single-day intensive, spanning education, safety, organizational culture, operations, accessibility, and everyday life.

A multimedia STEM campaign with original video and song to inspire underrepresented youth in science and technology—showing how AI can support inclusive education and talent pipelines.

An AI-powered chatbot for campus safety officers featuring mental health resources and incident reporting—modeling how conversational AI can support safety, wellbeing, and frontline staff in any institution.

A cultural competency AI tool for cross-cultural communication in organizations, relevant to global companies, public agencies, and member-based institutions.

An AI integration proposal for private-sector operations and employee engagement that leaders could adapt for unions, associations, or public institutions navigating workforce change.

An AI-assisted app concept for children with unique language processing needs, illustrating how AI can support accessibility and personalized support.

An AI-enhanced meal-planning tool for busy families, demonstrating how everyday-use apps can model user-centered, responsible AI design.

Next session: OCTOBER 2, 2026 – Washington Square Campus, NYU SPS.

Advanced Lab: Part II

Building and Applying Custom AI Agents

Launched March 27, 2026

An advanced hands-on lab for professionals who are ready to move beyond AI tool use and begin designing their own AI collaborators, tailored to their organizational context, values, and leadership goals.

Prerequisite: Completion of AI for Impact Part I, or equivalent experience with generative AI tools (e.g., ChatGPT, Canva AI, Claude)

What Participants Build

Custom AI Collaborators

Design human-centered AI agents that reflect your voice, values, and organizational context.

Institutional Assistants

Build AI tools that serve your organization's specific knowledge, workflows, and stakeholders.

Leadership Copilots

Create AI thought partners for strategic planning, communication, and decision support.

Storytelling Assistants

Develop AI collaborators that help you apply SHINE™ and craft compelling narratives.

Knowledge Companions

Build AI systems that synthesize, organize, and surface institutional knowledge.

Stakeholder Engagement Tools

Design AI-assisted approaches to community engagement, outreach, and communication.

Image generated with Gamma.app

The Approach

This is not a technical programming course. Participants do not need coding experience. The focus is on values-aligned design, human oversight, governance, and practical organizational application.

Every AI collaborator built in this lab is designed with human oversight at its center. Participants learn to ask not just what their AI can do, but what it should do, and how to ensure it remains accountable to human judgment.

Who This Is For

Policy & Public Leadership

Design AI strategies that strengthen democratic governance, public trust, and service delivery—supporting policy analysis, communication, and stakeholder engagement with human judgment at the center.

Business Leaders & Senior Executives

Develop AI strategies that foster innovation, competitive advantage, and responsible governance within your organization, from board reporting to customer and workforce initiatives.

Healthcare & Education Professionals

Apply custom AI agents to improve personalized learning, streamline administrative tasks, and enhance patient or student outcomes while preserving professional standards and care.

Hospitality & Event Management

Leverage AI for personalized guest experiences, dynamic pricing, and efficient operations—while using agents to support service teams, marketing, and real-time decision-making.

Students & Emerging Professionals

Future-proof your career by learning how to integrate ethical, human-centered AI into projects and roles across sectors, positioning yourself as a forward-thinking talent.

Nonprofit & Philanthropy Professionals

Gain AI tools and agents to optimize fundraising, enhance program delivery, and design campaigns that drive measurable social impact aligned with your mission and values.

As Liz wrote in AI for Humanity: Human‑Centered Strategies for Innovation and Impact—a global public‑benefit anthology and interactive platform she originated and architected, launched at Davos 2026 in collaboration with the American Society for AI (ASFAI)—the question isn’t just whether we’ll use AI; it’s how we design systems that amplify human capacity and position leaders for the future.

The AI for Impact series is NYU's contribution to that future. By combining technical fluency with ethical grounding, these courses prepare professionals not just to keep pace with change, but to shape it—leading organizational transformation and advancing their careers responsibly, inclusively, and creatively.

Upcoming session: NOVEMBER 20, 2026 – Washington Square Campus, NYU SPS.

Designing Human + AI Decision Environments

One of the most important leadership capabilities of the next decade is the ability to design environments where human intelligence and AI work together with clarity, accountability, and purpose.

The Core Principle

AI should strengthen human judgment, not weaken it. The most effective AI implementations are those designed with intentional human oversight, clear governance structures, and a genuine understanding of where human judgment is irreplaceable.

What This Requires

Human Oversight

Maintaining clear lines of human accountability in every AI-assisted process.

Ethical Governance

Establishing principles and practices that ensure AI serves organizational values.

Contextual Intelligence

Understanding that AI lacks the contextual, relational, and ethical judgment that humans bring.

Institutional Accountability

Ensuring that AI-assisted decisions remain traceable, explainable, and subject to human review.

AI as Collaborator, Not Authority

In well-designed human + AI decision environments, AI functions as an amplifier of human capability. It surfaces information, generates options, synthesizes complexity, and accelerates analysis. But the judgment, the values, and the accountability remain with the humans in the room.

Collaborative Intelligence

Human Oversight

Ethical Governance

Institutional Accountability

Values Alignment

Strategic Leadership

Contextual Judgment

Responsible Implementation

Beyond the Classroom

AI for Impact is part of a broader ecosystem of human-centered AI leadership, learning, and thought leadership.

LizNgonzi.AI

Liz's broader platform for human-centered AI strategy, executive advising, and thought leadership.

Liz works with organizations, institutions, and leadership teams to design human-centered AI strategies, governance frameworks, and learning experiences.

AI for Humanity: Human-Centered Strategies for Innovation and Impact

A global, public‑benefit anthology and interactive platform featuring 40+ contributors from academia, industry, government, and civil society — originated and architected by Liz and launched at Davos 2026 in collaboration with the American Society for AI (ASFAI).

Read more…

Grounded in the 1+1+AI=10™ methodology and SHINE™ framework, it explores AI across four domains: Ethics & Responsible AI, Education & Workforce Transformation, Policy & Governance, and Finance & Technology Innovation. Liz serves as Originator, Editor-in-Chief, and Founding Platform Architect.

The International Social Impact Institute®

Founded by Elizabeth (Liz) Ngonzi in 2020, The ISII became an early platform for leadership innovation, executive education, stakeholder engagement, and experimentation with collaborative intelligence and human-centered AI. -

Read more…

Originally launched to support organizations and leaders navigating digital transformation, storytelling, and innovation across sectors, The ISII became an early environment for experimenting with human-centered AI and AI-powered learning experiences well before these approaches entered the mainstream. Today, The ISII continues as a foundational part of the broader Liz Ngonzi + AI ecosystem, helping shape leadership, learning, and AI-powered initiatives across the platform.

Professor Elizabeth (Liz) Ngonzi

Global Human-Centered AI Strategist · Executive Educator · Platform Architect · Leadership Advisor · Adjunct Assistant Professor, NYU SPS

Elizabeth (Liz) Ngonzi is a global human-centered AI strategist, executive educator, platform architect, and Adjunct Assistant Professor at NYU whose work focuses on how artificial intelligence can strengthen human judgment, leadership, governance, and decision-making in real-world contexts. She advises boards, executive teams, and institutions on moving AI from experimentation into accountable, system-level adoption — improving decision quality, strengthening governance, and increasing strategic clarity.

Professor Ngonzi serves on the Board of Directors of the American Society for Artificial Intelligence (ASFAI) as Founding Chair of the Ethics & Responsible AI Committee. She is the Originator, Editor-in-Chief, and Founding Platform Architect of AI for Humanity: Human-Centered Strategies for Innovation and Impact — a global, public-benefit platform and living anthology launched during Davos 2026, bringing together 40+ contributors across leadership, governance, education, policy, finance, and technology.

At NYU, she has taught since 2009 and has been at the forefront of integrating generative AI into professional education. Recipient of the NYU SPS Teaching Excellence Award (2021), her AI for Impact course series equips professionals to apply AI-powered storytelling, leadership strategy, stakeholder engagement, and custom AI agents across nonprofit, corporate, public, academic, and international contexts. Her teaching is grounded in her proprietary 1+1+AI=10™ methodology and SHINE™ Storytelling Framework.

Through her broader work as Founder and CEO of The International Social Impact Institute® (The ISII), she has supported executive education and leadership initiatives reaching more than 40,000 participants across six continents — including more than 12,000 professionals supported with generative AI knowledge and applications since 2023. Her work includes engagements with S&P Global, Gamma, the Mensa Foundation, Compliance Week, CASE, Miami University, and USAID, among others. Her perspectives on AI, leadership, and governance have been featured in global media and industry publications.

30+

Years

Technology, Leadership & Transformation Experience

20+

Years

Teaching, Training & Curriculum Development

17+

Years

Teaching at NYU

40,000+

Professionals Trained Globally

Since 2020

12,000+

AI Learners

Since 2023

1,000+

Leaders Coached

Since 2020

160+

Strategic Partnerships

Developed Across Sectors and Geographies


Areas of Focus

  • Technology Transformation: More than three decades of experience helping organizations adopt, implement, and navigate major technology shifts.
  • Teaching & Curriculum Innovation: More than two decades designing and delivering learning experiences across universities, executive education programs, professional communities, and global institutions.
  • Human-Centered AI Leadership: A focus on responsible AI adoption that strengthens human judgment, ethics, leadership, and institutional capability.
  • Innovation & Entrepreneurship: A track record of building new courses, platforms, convenings, organizations, and learning ecosystems in response to emerging societal and technological change.


Liz is especially energized by opportunities to help build new educational models, rooted in the belief that students should not only learn existing frameworks, but develop the judgment, creativity, and courage to build new ones.

The Future of AI Depends on Human Judgment

AI for Impact prepares leaders not simply to adapt to AI, but to shape how it is integrated into organizations, institutions, and society responsibly.

The future will belong to leaders who can combine human wisdom, collaborative intelligence, and AI-powered amplification to create meaningful, ethical, and scalable impact.

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Copyright 2026 · Elizabeth Ngonzi LLC

AI for Impact at NYU SPS · Professor Elizabeth (Liz) Ngonzi · The International Social Impact Institute® · LizNgonzi.AI