Elizabeth Gray, CEO of National Audubon Society

Dr. Elizabeth Gray serves as Audubon’s Chief Executive Officer, leading the organization toward its vision of a future where birds thrive. A champion of science-based conservation and a renowned expert in global conservation and climate change, she joined Audubon in March 2021 as President and Chief Conservation Officer and was named CEO later that year—the first woman since Audubon’s founding in 1905 to hold the role. She leads more than 800 staff working across the Americas to alter the course of climate change and habitat loss. Since her arrival, she has led a landmark $826 million campaign, the groundbreaking release of the Migratory Bird Explorer, and the unifying Flight Plan strategy, reinforcing Audubon’s commitment to hemispheric conservation through the power of birds. Under Elizabeth’s leadership, Audubon has embraced a multicultural, multigenerational approach, ensuring its work reflects and engages all the communities connected to conservation across the Western Hemisphere.

Prior to Audubon, she most recently served as Global Managing Director of The Nature Conservancy’s (TNC) Climate Change program, where she played a key role in securing a $100 million philanthropic gift—one of the largest in TNC’s history—and managed the natural climate solutions initiative it funded. A proven fundraiser, she has secured six-, seven-, and nine-figure gifts to advance conservation and climate solutions. Trained as an ornithologist, she has spent 30+ years as a conservationist, spending considerable time in the field nationally and abroad. She also led two of TNC’s most notable impact capital projects, the $130 million Cumberland Forest Impact Investment Fund, which supported sustainable forestry in the Appalachians, and a groundbreaking urban conservation program in Washington, D.C. She holds a PhD in ecology from the University of Washington and an AB with highest honors in psychology from Harvard University.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Raft M and T Bank presents CEOs you should know,
powered by iHeart Media. Let's meet Elizabeth Gray. She is
the CEO for the National Autobon Society, which is an
environmental nonprofit organization dedicated to conservation of birds and their
habitats throughout the Americas. Here's Elizabeth to talk about their
mission and vision.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
So the mission of National Autumn Society is to protect
birds and the places they need today and tomorrow. Our
vision is to bend the verd curve. One of three
verds that used to be in our skies when I
was a kid, now gone vanished. You know, you're not
going to hear those songs anymore. We're not going to
see those colors anymore. And strikingly as well, two thirds

(00:41):
of the verbs that remain are actually threatened by climate impacts.
And so what's happened is the number of birds has
declined significantly. It's on this downward spiral. And so we
say that our vision is to bend the verd curve,
meaning to halt and ultimately wrote the reverse the decline
differents across the Americas.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
You can hear the whole conversation at this station's website.
Slash CEO. Our community partner, M and T Bank supports
CEOs you should know as part of their ongoing commitment
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(01:22):
local businesses thrive because when businesses succeed, our communities succeed.