Abel R. Cano is a Leadership Trainer and Coach with a background in community organizing. Abel believes we will achieve a just and peaceful world when we collectively empower ourselves and others to practice authentic leadership that consistently chooses to act from a place of love over fear. Abel works to develop the next generation of social movement leaders through the teaching core practices and principles of community organizing. Abel is a Boston native, and also grew up in Hawaii and Indiana.
Abel served as the Boston Field Organizer and Statewide Constituency Organizer for Massachusetts in President Obama’s 2012 campaign. Abel led the grassroots campaign to elect Boston’s first Asian-American woman to City Council At-Large as Field Director in 2013.
Abel is Co-Founder of the thriving non-profit arts and technology organization EMW: Art | Technology | Community in Cambridge. Abel taught masters level Organizing and Public Narrative courses at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government with Professor Marshall Ganz. Abel has travelled around the world to teach Organizing and Public Narrative workshops alongside Marshall Ganz and others as part of the Leading Change Network.
Abel is Founder and ED of ARC Leadership Institute, an organization dedicated to developing progressive leadership capacity through training and coaching for social change agents at non-profits and universities. Abel Cano has trained leaders at the Harvard Kennedy School, Open Society Foundation, Harvard School of Public Health, National Health Service UK, Oxfam International, United Teen Empowerment Center, Brown University and 350.org among others.