The Future Is Female
Meet Lish Costigan The OisF’s NEW Rider Leadership Program Director
With her expansive knowledge, her depth of professional experience and unbridled passion for community engagement, Lish Costigan, The OisF’s NEW Rider Leadership Program Director is reinventing the participatory experience for rising leaders in Monmouth and Ocean County.
As a traveler, scholar and proud Jersey Girl, Lish is a present, dedicated mother to three young children and she is also responsible for overseeing a $1 billion dollar market in the Financial Services Organization at Ernst & Young. With her calm, approachable demeanor, paired with her enthusiasm and laser-focused attention to detail, Lish balances it all with kindness and an infectious sense of humor- making her a uniquely qualified candidate to serve as The OisF’s Rider Leadership Program Director.
“In her first year as director, Lish has exceeded our expectations of what this program can offer and she is just getting started.” Alli Scaduto, Founder of The OisF expressed, “Her deliberate efforts in developing our leadership programming, her ardent preparations arranging powerful women to engage our leaders, the work that has gone into developing thought-provoking Leadership Labs have all opened a door for a fresh dialogue about what is possible and how our girls can actually achieve their big, beautiful dreams.”
“By far, the best part of building this program is getting to know the girls and their families. No contest.” Costigan elaborated, “The participants went through an application process to get into the program, so they shared their own leadership skills and aspirations of what they wanted to get out of the program ahead of time. I loved reading through them and getting a sense of who each of the girls are as individuals. It’s such a wonderful age group to work with because they are passionate and intentional about what they want to accomplish.”
Building upon the program’s solid foundation, developed by Flow Leadership Academy, Lish has expanded and evolved The Leadership Program through developing a dynamic curriculum that focuses on practical, applicable approaches to leadership while exposing Riders to female thought leaders, and high-achieving female professionals.
“More than anything, I see the program as a way to provide the participants with the structure and an extended network to put their own inspiration to work in a way that has broader impact.” Lish explained, “They are coming to the table with their own goals, so putting them together with a cohort of other young women who want to impact positive change is a game changer. In our Leadership Labs, we talk a lot about going back to basics – what makes a project succeed or fail? How to break goals into manageable chunks. How to fill in gaps where you don’t yet have experience in a certain area. These young women know the answers as a collective group. We are just there to frame it in a way that sticks so they can apply it more broadly across their future experiences. And I’m confident that those building blocks partnered with their own positive inertia will continue to help them succeed as leaders.”
“Reviving and nurturing the leader within these impressive young women is a crucial element in drawing The OisF closer to our mission of building a community united in preventing abuse. If a girl enters this program and leaves more empowered, more confident, with a greater sense of themselves and the goals they have for their future – then we have succeeded in helping that girl become a young woman who is more certain of her innate value.” Alli continued, “Time will tell the story of this program’s impact. But we firmly believe that it is remarkable women like Lish Costigan and community-oriented programs like The Rider Leadership Program that create ripples that inevitably make waves of positive change for a future that is most certainly FEMALE. “
