A Fond Farewell to a Superstar

After 14 years at the helm of Ploughshares Fund, Executive Director Naila Bolus is leaving us to become president of another national non-profit organization based in Boston.

We are thrilled for her, but sad to see her go. Naila has been an outstanding leader, providing vision and funding that has grown our organization into one of the most admired foundations in the field. During her tenure, our staff and budget tripled, our endowment soared from $5 million to $32 million and she became a key force bringing new funds and resources into the nuclear policy community.

When she recruited me to become the organization’s president in 2008, I was excited to work with her and impressed with the organization that she had helped take from a local foundation to a major force helping to shape US nuclear policy. Together, we’ve opened a Washington DC office and led a remarkable campaign that resulted in the ratification of the New START treaty – shrinking the deployed strategic nuclear arsenals of the U.S. and Russia by a third – and created a new model of “impact philanthropy” that has brought Ploughshares Fund to a new level.

I have known Naila since the late 1980s when I was one of the Armed Services Committee staff she would lobby on our way to the House floor, insisting that we absolutely had to support this or that amendment cutting nuclear weapons. She was impressive then and she only grew in talent, vision and drive. Naila Bolus is one of the most remarkable people I have ever met. I am proud to have been her partner for these four years.

I have no doubt that with the strong staff and incredible board that we have, Ploughshares Fund will continue Naila’s legacy of thoughtful grant making and strategic advocacy for years to come.

All of us at Ploughshares Fund love Naila and wish her only the very best as she moves to the next phase of her professional career. Please join me in thanking Naila and sharing your own memories of her on our tribute page at www.ploughshares.org/naila.