Food Secure Nation Episode 9: Creating Agency

In this episode of Food Secure Nation, Dr. Phil Knight and Gerry Brisson welcome Claire Babineaux-Fontenot, CEO of Feeding America, for a conversation about leadership, dignity, and the evolution of the national hunger-relief movement. As Claire prepares transition from her role leading the nation’s largest hunger-relief network, she reflects the leadership lessons, cultural shifts, and strategic decisions that helped reshape how the Feeding America network understands its mission.

At the heart of the conversation is a simple but transformative idea: the charitable food system does not exist to serve institutions—it exists to serve people experiencing hunger. Claire describes how, early in her tenure, she challenged two competing assumptions within large systems: that national organizations should either direct the work of local partners or simply serve them. Instead, she reframed from the mission around a shared commitment—food banks, national leaders, partners, and communities working together as co-equals in service to families facing hunger.

This shift helped reorient the network’s thinking toward the lived experience of people facing food insecurity. Rather than treating individuals experiencing hunger as passive recipients of charity, Claire and the network began recognizing them as experts in their own experience. By elevating lived expertise—listening to people not just as storytellers but as guides for decision-making—the network began asking better questions and designing better solutions.

One example came during the development of Feeding America’s first federated Network Strategic Framework. While leaders discussed how the system should improve data collection, a participant with lived experience challenged the group with a simple insight: if data truly serves people facing hunger, then it should help them answer the most immediate question—Where can I find food? That moment reshaped the conversation and demonstrated how centering lived experience can sharpen strategy and reveal blind spots that institutions alone might miss.

Claire also reflects on a powerful moment during the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, where she brought individuals with lived experience as her “entourage.” When offered a seat among dignitaries at the front of the room, she chose instead to sit in the back with the individuals whose voices had helped shape national policy. In that moment, as one woman realized the President of the United States was speaking words drawn from her own story, Claire witnessed what true agency looks like—when people experiencing hunger are not spoken for but heard.

Throughout the conversation, Claire emphasizes that meaningful change in complex social systems requires both humility and courage. Leaders must be willing to evolve, to acknowledge past assumptions, and to build systems that invite participation rather than impose solutions. When people experiencing hunger are seen as partners in solving the problem—not as problems to be solved—the path to lasting progress becomes clearer.

As the episode concludes, Knight and Brisson reflect on Claire’s legacy: a leadership style rooted in compassion, curiosity, and truth-telling. By helping the hunger-relief network refocus on dignity, agency, and collaboration, Claire’s influence continues to shape how communities across the country work together to build a more food secure nation.