About

Dr. Laurel Lary, Ed.D.‍ Principal Consultant & Strategist

Dr. Laurel Lary is an organizational leader with three decades of experience — from team and site leadership to county-wide operational roles — complemented by work in economic development and civic leadership as an elected Governing Board Director. She has successfully led major change initiatives, managed multi-million-dollar project and program budgets, and spent the last decade focused on career education and workforce development. This depth of operational experience — further solidified by her consulting practice — uniquely positions her to guide the human, organizational, and process side of complex change, including the AI workforce transition, with strategic clarity and high-trust implementation.

Education & Certifications

  • Ed.D., New York University - Leadership & Innovation

  • M.A., California Lutheran University - Educational Leadership

  • B.A., University of California, Santa Barbara - English

  • Led education/training programs, site leadership, talent pipelines, and curriculum development

  • Certifications: Monitoring & Evaluation: Project Management for the UN, Govt, and NGO’s (NYU, 2025); CA Special District Governance (2024); CA Administrative Services Credential (CTC).

Our Focus

Lary Strategy Partners guides leaders through complex, multi-phase change. Our focus is the human side of organizational transformation — including process optimization and AI transition — converting uncertainty and risk into high-trust implementation and lasting organizational impact. We don't provide AI technical guidance; we partner with the people leading it. Our engagements follow a structured, phased approach with intentional stakeholder engagement strategies designed to build commitment and ensure lasting results.

A Boutique, Personalized Practice

As a boutique firm, we deliver tailored, hands-on service built around your unique challenges. Dr. Lary provides direct access to senior expertise — no layers, no templates, no junior staff — just strategic partnership for your most critical work. When engagements call for specialized expertise, Dr. Lary draws on a trusted network of vetted collaborators, carefully selected for each project to ensure the right fit without adding unnecessary overhead.

Lary Strategy Partners works with private sector organizations, public agencies, and nonprofits navigating meaningful change — where a strategic partner can make all the difference, but without dedicated internal change management capacity. While Dr. Lary is based in Ventura County, California, and maintains a regional presence across Ventura, Santa Barbara, and northern Los Angeles County, she works with organizations nationally through hybrid engagements that combine on-site presence with remote support.

Project Experience Includes:

  • Data-Informed Strategy and Process Optimization

  • Budget-Driven Program Redesign and Rescaling

  • New Workflow and Process Design

  • Strategic Workforce Planning and Development

  • Multi-Stakeholder Initiative Leadership

  • Cross-Sector Partnership and Alignment Strategy

"What set Dr. Lary apart was her ability to bring partner agencies along through a significant program transformation — reframing a challenging fiscal realignment as an opportunity for capacity building, and delivering results that were both financially sound and relationally intact." 

— Dr. César Morales, County Superintendent of Schools, Ventura County Office of Education

"Laurie helped us articulate a clear picture of what we hoped to achieve and the importance of doing it, helped us get the right capable partners engaged, and led effective two-way communication throughout that helped keep us all informed of the latest activities.  Through it all, Laurie was positive, highly professional, and extremely effective." 

— Jaime Fall, Workforce and Economic Strategies Director, Economic Development Collaborative