Tri-Sector Leader, Social Impact Strategist, and Founder

Named one of "America's Leaders of Change by the National Urban Fellow's Program, Qaadirah Abdur-Rahim doesn't just witness change. She engineers it. Across a 29-year career spanning military service, nonprofit leadership, city government, and corporate strategy, Qaadirah has built a singular reputation: the leader who turns purpose into infrastructure, and infrastructure into change.

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The Journey ​

Her foundation was forged in uniform. As a United States Air Force veteran, Qaadirah served nearly eight years in the Air Force Reserve, rising from Airman Basic to Senior Airman. In the aftermath of September 11th, she was activated to the Air Force Port Mortuary at Dover Air Force Base, where she helped bring home and honor those lost in the attack on the Pentagon — work that earned her the Air Force Achievement Medal, and that quietly shaped the accountability and reverence for human dignity at the center of everything she's built since.

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That foundation has taken many forms. As co-founder of Future Foundation and first-generation college graduate, Qaadirah grew a single after-school program into a multi-million-dollar organization serving over 30,000 students across metro Atlanta — driving 400% revenue growth and raising graduation rates from 50% to 78% at one served school along the way.

 

As Atlanta's Chief Equity Officer, she built the city's inaugural Office of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion — equity work designed to outlast any single administration.

 

As Head of Community Strategy at BlackRock, she drove a 350% increase in community engagement, doubled employee volunteerism, and built a playbook with the potential to scale across 27 global markets.

That same instinct — for turning belief into infrastructure — is what led her to found ROAR, an AI-powered narrative platform built on a simple, urgent belief: we are living in a story war. Fear-driven narratives are fracturing communities, and eroding trust. Leaders who can tell honest, human, purpose-driven stories aren't just strategically ahead. They're a counterforce.

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Through ROAR's Brand Brief methodology and Narrative Accelerator Workshops, Qaadirah is equipping a new generation of changemakers with personal narrative intelligence — the self-knowledge, courage, and clarity to lead from a place of genuine humanity. It's the hardest work there is. It's also her life's work.

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