Leading Narrative Through Transformation — Lindsay Rothfeld

Nearpod / Renaissance 2018–2023 Internal & external comms Brand & narrative strategy Cross-functional leadership

Keeping one company
feeling like one company
through constant change

From hypergrowth to COVID to two acquisitions — I owned how Nearpod communicated, aligned, and stayed human through five years of transformation.

My role

Narrative & communications lead

Scope

Brand, internal comms, community, culture

Context

Hypergrowth, COVID, 2 acquisitions

company size during tenure

35%

lift in internal event engagement

1,200+

student contest entries

functions aligned across

01 — The situation

Five years. Four defining moments. One company that had to hold together.

Over the course of my time at Nearpod, the company more than doubled in size, navigated COVID and a sudden shift to remote work, acquired and integrated Flocabulary, and was later acquired by Renaissance. Each of these moments introduced new complexity — new products, new teams, new audiences, and new ways of describing value.

My role at the intersection of brand, internal comms, and community meant I owned how the company showed up during its most defining moments. The challenge wasn't just keeping up with change. It was making sure that through all of it, employees and customers still experienced one coherent company — not a series of announcements.

What was at risk without intentional alignment

Teams growing quickly without shared context or language
Multiple acquisitions introducing overlapping — and sometimes contradictory — identities
Employees needing clarity during COVID, acquisition, and org changes all at once
Brand, product, and culture evolving faster than messaging could keep up
Customers feeling the disconnect between what we said and what they experienced

02 — What I did

Communication as infrastructure, not just output.

Led communications during high-stakes company moments

I owned internal and external communications through Nearpod's acquisition by Renaissance, the Flocabulary integration, COVID-19 response, and ongoing organizational changes. This wasn't just writing announcements — it was shaping how the company talked about itself when the stakes were highest.

Executive messaging and company-wide announcements

Department head briefings and talking points

Customer and partner communications

PR coordination and narrative alignment

Built the internal communication infrastructure

Beyond individual moments, I built systems for ongoing alignment — hosting and structuring the AMA segment of weekly all-hands, creating employee-facing content to reinforce priorities and wins, and equipping leaders with tools to communicate effectively with their teams. The goal was to make communication feel like a shared responsibility, not a top-down broadcast.

Defined and scaled the company narrative across brand touchpoints

I led the redevelopment of the foundational pages that became narrative anchors across the company — About Us, Careers, and Community — and conducted a broader audit of corporate messaging to ensure consistency, value alignment, and a clear post-acquisition story. These weren't just marketing pages. They were the reference point every team worked from.

Bridged brand values and employee experience

I worked to ensure what we said as a company matched what employees actually experienced — partnering with HR on culture and EVP initiatives, serving on internal committees post-acquisition, and designing engagement rituals that connected people to the brand. The #NearpodWednesday ritual started internally and became an external campaign. That's what alignment looks like when it works.

35% increase in engagement in internal events

Recurring rituals that connected employees to brand identity

Led DEI and community-driven initiatives

I played an active role in embedding inclusivity into both internal and external experiences — serving on the Racial Justice task force, producing content for cultural observances, and leading a student-facing Black History Month Rap Contest that drove 1,200+ entries, thousands of social impressions, and local news coverage. I also rebuilt and diversified the ambassador community post-merger to reflect a broader, more inclusive educator base.

Acted as a connective layer across functions

I functioned as an internal consultant across leadership, product, marketing, and HR — surfacing success stories, aligning messaging across teams, and ensuring consistency between brand, product, and culture. The goal was always the same: make sure the story we told externally was one employees could recognize from the inside.

03 — What changed

The company still felt like one company.

Aligned communication through every high-change moment

Hypergrowth, COVID, Flocabulary acquisition, Renaissance acquisition — each navigated with a clear, consistent narrative

35%

lift in internal event engagement through redesigned all-hands and communication rituals

1,200+

student entries in the Black History Month Rap Contest, with local news coverage and thousands of social impressions

Stronger trust

Employee clarity and confidence during acquisition and COVID transitions — measured through engagement and participation

One narrative that scaled with the company

Foundational messaging across website, product, and internal channels — built to hold as the company continued to grow and change

04 — Why this matters

In periods of rapid change, story is the thing that holds.

Companies in hypergrowth or acquisition mode tend to focus on operations: headcount, systems, integration timelines. But the thing employees and customers actually feel is whether the story makes sense. Whether they're being talked to honestly. Whether the company they signed up for is still recognizable.

This work ensured that as Nearpod doubled in size, went through COVID, and changed hands twice, it still felt like one company — with one story people could believe in. That coherence isn't cosmetic. It's what keeps retention high, trust intact, and the brand credible when everything else is moving fast.

What this work demonstrates

Internal & external communications Narrative & positioning strategy Acquisition communications Cross-functional leadership Employee engagement & culture Brand architecture DEI programming Organizational storytelling