By: Matthew Kayser

Some people are born to build. For Suzanne Baker Brown, launching transformative spaces, whether spiritual retreats, leadership initiatives, or nonprofits, is more than a gift. It’s a calling. And it’s that same entrepreneurial spirit, steeped in faith and fortified by decades of corporate leadership, consulting, and ministry, that led to the creation of Stepping Stones Network, a faith-based nonprofit aimed at offering hope and healing to women and children affected by commercial sexual exploitation.

Brown is the kind of leader who often begins without having all the answers. She listens to her instincts, leans on her faith, and surrounds herself with people who share her compassion for those who’ve been left behind by society. “I’m a launcher,” she says plainly. “And when I hear the same message enough times, I start to pay attention.”

That message began to surface around 2009. At the time, Brown was touring the U.S. and abroad, hosting Spiritual Spa® retreats and women’s leadership events, ministries focused on healing emotional and spiritual wounds, including sexual trauma. As she traveled, one topic seemed to keep coming up: sex trafficking. She’d hear it in casual conversation, see it portrayed in the media, and meet women whose lives had been shaped by it. “It was everywhere,” she recalls. “And I realized this is not someone else’s problem. This is ours.”

Then, something closer to home made the calling feel even more urgent. A personal encounter with a mother from Chicago’s south side, who shared that her desperation to support her young child had once pushed her to consider selling her body, had a profound impact. “That moment deeply affected me,” Brown says. “It changed how I understood love and survival. It made it personal.”

At first, Brown assumed Stepping Stones Network would be a residential recovery program for adult women. But when the first calls came in, nearly every woman in need of help had children. This was particularly alarming to Brown, as she had come across a study suggesting that a significant percentage of daughters of women sold for sex may also be at risk. “We kept trying to refer the families elsewhere, but we couldn’t find a program in the U.S. that allowed moms to stay with their kids,” said Brown. “We soon realized we’d have to build it ourselves.”

And build they did.

In 2019, Stepping Stones launched its Moms & Kids Program in a communal residential setting, a single house in Gurnee, Illinois, that served four families. Within days, the first participant gave birth to a baby girl. The house quickly filled. But then, just a few months later, COVID-19 hit.

It was a challenging moment. “Having multiple traumatized families with young kids living together, with 24/7 staff, proved to be more stressful than healing,” Brown admits. “We learned a lot. And we understood we needed a new model.”

For three days, she sat with the question: What now? The answer came clearly: each family needed their own space in what she describes as fortunate timing. Within days of that revelation, a local partner called out of the blue, offering an amount of money that would aid in rental assistance.

With that, Stepping Stones Network shifted to an independent living model, placing families in apartments in several Chicagoland counties and providing them with a deeply relational, long-term support program that includes therapeutic programming, parenting classes, education and job preparation, addiction recovery, spiritual care, and life skills coaching.

This relational model, Brown says, is what makes Stepping Stones Network distinct and effective. “Most agencies offer services. We offer family,” she explains. “We’re in their homes. We’re going to their doctor’s appointments. We’re building a life together.” Many participants describe the program as the family they didn’t have. Some staff members have even become stand-in mothers and grandmothers.

It’s not a quick fix. The program spans two to four years, supporting participants through six developmental stages designed to interrupt generational cycles of abuse and poverty. Between 2022 and 2023, Stepping Stones scaled rapidly, thanks to three multi-year federal grants and a wave of donations.

Still, Brown sees herself more as an architect than a long-term manager. A launcher as she is, she states, “I see a vision, I build the foundation, and then I figure out who’s supposed to carry it forward.”

Brown continues to play a pivotal role within the heart of Stepping Stones Network, shaping its culture through her pioneering Relationship Driven Leadership® framework—an approach she crafted as a cornerstone of her training and coaching philosophy. This innovative model is built on the relational disciplines of intentionality, generosity, humility, humanity, and integrity, promoting interactions rooted in meaningful connection and principled action.

Whether employees, volunteers, contractors, part-time or full-time, the contribution and voice of all staff members are highly valued. And just as the participants are treated as family, so are the staff. Every staff meeting begins with sharing the ‘extreme highs and lows’ of life. Appreciation budgets ensure even part-time volunteers feel seen. Longtime volunteers often run major departments. “It’s not just about clocking hours,” says Brown. “We don’t staff individuals looking for a job; we invite people to participate in their calling.”

That same care shows in their outcomes. Since launching its independent housing model, Stepping Stones Network has helped many individuals and families begin the slow but powerful work of rebuilding their lives. In the past year alone, many families have been able to meet the program’s ‘Get Safe, Stay Safe’ benchmark. As a result, moms are finding stable housing and enrolling in college and trade schools. Children’s trauma scores are dropping. Cycles appear to be breaking. “We believe healing happens in hospitable relationships,” says Brown. “And we’ve built a model that shows that that’s true.”

For a woman who’s spent her life building, from brands and ministries to nonprofits and networks, this latest launch might just be her most important yet.