Interview with a Partner: Nicole Brueggeman at the St. Louis City Senior Fund

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Interview with a Partner: Nicole Brueggeman at the St. Louis City Senior Fund

Having a plan to address ambiguity and uncertainty is hard in the best of times. When we started our work with the St. Louis City Senior Fund, everything facing service providers working with older adults was uncertain and changing. Federal and state cuts, as well as policy changes, were shifting long-established traditions in how organizations were supported and operated. The continued aging of the St. Louis region meant the level of need was also increasing. And on top of those changes, the May 16, 2026 tornado impacted hundreds of older adults and their families, destabilizing networks of care and putting providers in the position of disaster response. 

About six months after our work together, we sat down with Nicole L. Brueggeman, MSW, LCSW, MA, the Executive Director of the St. Louis City Senior Fund, to talk about the collaborative co-creation work that led to a plan to strengthen infrastructure for aging services. You can read more about this project here.  

PDB: Why did the co-creation process appeal to you? 

NB: At the time, I was new to the Senior Fund. I didn’t yet understand the network that supports aging services, but I knew enough to know the network was about to change — and I thought, there’s no better way than to bring everyone together and create that change themselves. In the face of the unknown and ambiguity, our power lies in what we do. And the thing we can do is work together. The genesis of this project was to bring people together and get to work. 

I had familiarity with the co-design process from my past work, so I understood the power that it could have to have no agenda and no pre-defined solutions. I had no idea what would come out of this process when we started. This was really hard, because there was a belief that there was a hidden agenda for future direction that wasn’t there. I didn’t have a crystal ball that said, “here’s what you need to do because you’re going to lose $X in funding over X years.” We didn’t (and still don’t) know what’s coming or when, so we had better be prepared. The outcomes of this process helped us be specific about what we needed and what it would look like to move forward, and that was empowering. 

PDB: The Design Team was a central partner in this work. Can you talk about their role and how you formed the design team? 

NB: It was really the Design Team that had to wrestle with all the feedback from providers. They could see that the open house sessions went great, but then they had to start somewhere — doing the hard work of future-thinking, aligning, writing, and culling ideas. 

When we first started thinking about the Design Team, I really wanted to do a cross-sector team, and my whole gut told me to do that. But you all (PDB) pushed me to put people around the table who are most impacted by the coming changes. And because this was a partnership with Marillac Mission Fund, we knew we needed to include regional leaders in aging services. The Design Team really recognized that the geographic boundary gets in our way. Aging doesn’t stop at Skinker [the City limits], and many providers go from the county to the city. The Design Team brought people who could think regionally, and that really shaped the concepts. 

PDB: What was the co-creation process like for you, as a partner, participant, and convenor? 

NB: People were very engaged in the process, which made it really compelling for me to keep the momentum going — to make sure we had spaces booked, to spend the time with you all (PDB), and to really stay in the conversation of what we’re hearing, what do we keep, what do we shift. 

One of the big breakthroughs for me was being reminded about finding a coalition of the willing. Change can start with the people who are ready to go. There was a definite coalition of the willing in this process, and we quickly found them. 

PDB: What advice would you give other sectors or organizations who are thinking about using co-design to bring together their groups? 

NB: When you give people the opportunity to create, and you show them a blank page, many people do not know what to do with that. In our everyday lives, most people do not have the opportunity of thinking about big ideas. As leaders, and people working on teams, we have to condition ourselves to think that ambiguity is an opportunity for creation of something that hasn’t been done before. It’s a gift! But for a lot of people, it’s a scary gift to open — it’s daunting, and it competes with the daily to-dos. 

I wish we could all have a skunkworks where we could dedicate focused time and energy to building new things, but the world doesn’t work like that. So we have to do the future-thinking while we’re working on other things. It can’t be either/or — it has to be both/and. You can create the future and exist in the present! It’s a skill and a privilege that we need right now, and the co-creation process allows us to do both. 

I learned from this. People have to respond to something, but they don’t want you to create for them. If you draw something, it isn’t their authentic thing. But without starting somewhere, people get paralysis. Co-design as a process helps bring uncertainty into the place where it’s OK to put something down on the paper — it doesn’t have to be the thing that stays on the paper! 

We need leaders who can work in ambiguity, especially right now, and this process helps make that ambiguity navigable for more people. 

PDB: What were some of the moments in the process that really helped people wrestle with the ambiguity and uncertainty in this process? 

NB: One time that stood out to me was at the first convening for members of the network. We made a timeline that laid out all the funding and policy changes we knew about, and had it out on a table. People were able to look at it and say, “Oh my god, this piece impacts me.” We drew light connections — dotted lines of what impacts might come to organizations — and people were able to solidify those lines. This was eye-opening for some of them, and it was a moment where they engaged with other people. The timeline was presented as something fluid — we didn’t know it would all happen, but was a reflection of what we’d heard and what we’re seeing. The best case scenario is none of it happens…but the worst case is it all happens and we have nothing to work with. That moment was a starting point for people to walk with us into the unknown. Some people dipped in their toe, some their foot, some their leg, and a few jumped in with their whole body! 

The culture of the open houses helped create a feeling and a perception that this process was open, authentic, and not agenda-driven. In each of the three open house sessions, people could come and go, share their experiences and reactions, and it created a culture that felt authentic. 

PDB: What’s the role of funders in navigating through these large-scale changes that are impacting individual organizations, as well as whole ecosystems of services that people depend on? 

NB: Our board really understands that our role as a funder is also to be a leader. We need to be future-focused, understanding the environment and the landscape. While we may not call it co-design with our board, we talk about knowing what’s coming down the pike, what we should be prepared for. The board realizes that we can’t do everything we need to be ready for — and it’s not a matter of not trying. The world is changing, and there’s compromise in the role of the funder now. Organizations both want us to tell them what to do, and they don’t want that. Right now, we’re called on to lead. 

PDB: Are there any outcomes so far from this work you want to update people on? 

NB: Action is critical. We can’t do pilots for pilots sake. This project wasn’t an exercise. If you put in the time and energy, you have to take action. That was important from the board’s perspective. We ended this project in October, and in November we had plans to move things forward — with clarity about what the plan was. We can’t take all the action recommended in the report, but we’re taking steps. 

For others who might do this work, this is the most important step. Don’t just do a process like this to do it, to say you did something cool or innovative or energetic. You have to be prepared to take action, or don’t do the work at all. That’s the most inauthentic thing you can do to people. 

I’ve also been making presentations to other organization’s boards — about how we’re using this work to make investment decisions. We’ve had other funders come to the table to get on board, and we’ve seen the energy we’re creating with the charge. I’ve been invited into funder spaces to talk about the process, what’s on the horizon with the pilots, and what’s coming next. The co-creation project was really getting the seed planted. I now have tangible things that I can go to cross-sector partners with, and invite them into the change for the whole region. 

Keep up with the St. Louis City Senior Fund and all their work at their website here.