Jeanette Holdbrook

Jeanette Holdbrook specializes in helping human services practitioners transform their programs to better serve families through evidence-informed decision making and accessible analytic methods. With experience conducting formative and implementation research in workforce development and public assistance programs, she has led program redesigns, quality improvement efforts, and the development of practitioner-friendly tools for programs across the country.

Holdbrook is the deputy project director for the TANF and Child Support Moving Forward project and the lead for the project’s Family Input Study. She led the study team’s partnership with an expert workgroup to develop a toolkit to support Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) and child support practitioners in meaningfully engaging with families to improve their programs. Holdbrook will oversee rapid-cycle testing of the toolkit with TANF and child support programs and subsequent revisions to the toolkit.

Since 2017, Holdbrook has coached state and local TANF programs, workforce development programs, and community-based organizations to redesign and modernize services. She currently leads a project for the Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services TANF program to build leadership capacity, better align policy and service delivery, implement the Goal4 It!^TM coaching model, and develop performance measures. She led a four-year project with Philadelphia Works to redesign Philadelphia’s TANF employment and training program and has recently partnered with North Carolina to develop and implement an electronic TANF application. She has also designed and facilitated trainings for program leaders and staff on rapid-cycle learning and testing, data collection methods, and leadership.

With seven years of experience working in public health-focused nonprofit organizations in Philadelphia, including coordinating a nutrition education program for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program recipients, Holdbrook is passionate about improving service delivery, processes, and policies to better meet families’ needs. She holds a master’s in public administration from Rutgers University.