For Rosalind Zavras, helping organizations make a difference has never been just a career, it has been a calling. Her journey began in high school, writing grant proposals for the Georgia Institute of Technology. Coming from a military family rooted in service, she was drawn to organizations working to improve lives and strengthen communities. That passion led her from serving as a U.S. Foreign Service Officer in Ecuador and Canada to supporting nonprofit operations, finance, fundraising, and logistics around the world.
Along the way, Rosalind discovered consulting. Rather than helping just one nonprofit, she realized she could multiply her impact by helping many organizations become stronger. "I loved consulting because I could help so many nonprofits instead of just one," she says.
After the birth of her son, Rosalind decided to build a business of her own. She founded Aropa Consulting with the belief that organizations doing important work deserve partners who understand both their mission and the realities of running a successful organization. The company's name comes from the Anutan people of the Solomon Islands, where "aropa" represents equitable sharing through cooperation and empathy, values that continue to guide the firm's work today.
Aropa now partners with nonprofits, foundations, governments, and community organizations across the United States and internationally, helping clients strengthen strategy, fundraising, operations, technology, and leadership. Equity isn't treated as a separate initiative. Instead, it is woven into every engagement to help organizations build stronger, more sustainable futures.
Like many entrepreneurs, Rosalind quickly discovered that building a business required a different set of skills than delivering excellent work. "The biggest challenge is the chicken or the egg," she says. "Do you bring people on to build growth, or do you build first and then hire?" As the company expanded, she found support through the Community Economic Development Fund (CEDF). After connecting with Connecticut's entrepreneurial ecosystem, she received both financing and ongoing business advising, support she credits with helping her become a stronger leader.
For the past three years, her CEDF Business Advisor has encouraged her to think beyond the day-to-day responsibilities of running projects. "He always told me, 'You have to get off the factory floor,'" Rosalind says. "If you're on the factory floor, who's running the business?" That advice changed how she leads. Rather than trying to do everything herself, Rosalind focused on building systems, developing her team, and thinking strategically about Aropa's future. Today, she finds herself sharing that same lesson with her newest business partner, Diana Essex-Lettieri, President of Aropa Consulting.
CEDF also changed the way she viewed borrowing. "I felt bad that I needed a loan," she says. "But CEDF never treated it that way. They treated it as an investment in my business." That shift in perspective stayed with her. "In many Black and Brown communities, there's this feeling that if you need help, you've done something wrong," she says. "CEDF helped me realize that's not true. Every successful business has people supporting it."
The company's growth reflects that support. Rosalind's original vision for Aropa was ambitious, but the firm has exceeded even her early expectations. Today, Aropa has grown into a thriving consulting practice with a multidisciplinary team serving nonprofits, foundations, governments, and community organizations across the United States and internationally.
As a Certified B Corporation, Aropa measures success not only by its own growth but by the impact its clients create. Whether helping organizations secure grants, strengthen operations, or expand services, the firm's work enables nonprofits and community organizations to serve more people and build stronger communities.
Looking ahead, Rosalind is focused on developing the next generation of leaders within Aropa while continuing to grow the firm's reach across the United States and internationally. For her, success has never been measured solely by revenue or size. It's about helping mission-driven organizations build the capacity to do even more good. With support from CEDF, Aropa Consulting has grown into a trusted partner for organizations creating lasting change, proving that when you strengthen the organizations serving communities, everyone benefits.