Durham Habitat Announces Lexie Vaughn as New CEO

April 12, 2020

Vaughn assumed leadership role effective April 27 

DURHAM, NC (April 13, 2020) Habitat for Humanity of Durham’s Board of Directors is pleased to announce that Lexie Vaughn will be the organization’s next Chief Executive Officer following a comprehensive nationwide search.

Vaughn has held senior leadership positions in the corporate, government, and nonprofit sectors around the world for 20 years. Accomplished in organizational leadership, strategy development and implementation, and community engagement, she has moved fluidly between borders throughout her career.

Vaughn will assume day-to-day operations on April 27, succeeding Blake Strayhorn – Durham Habitat’s previous Executive Director – who stepped down last November after a seven year tenure. The search was led by a committee of Board members in collaboration with the recruitment firm Armstrong McGuire.

“There’s no more exciting landscape right now than Durham, and the critical role that Durham Habitat plays in it is more important than ever” said Vaugn. “I look forward to building on the phenomenal work that has made Durham Habitat an integral thread in our community fabric.”

Durham Habitat has been building and repairing affordable homes in Durham since 1985. In its 35-year history, they have built and sold more than 425 new affordable homes and repaired nearly 500 existing homes for low-income neighbors. They engage more than 7,000 volunteers in Durham each year.

Rick Brown, the Chair of Durham Habitat’s Board of Directors, shared that “we are very excited to have Lexie lead the Durham Habitat team. The Search Committee and full Board worked very hard during this important process. We’ve kept the best interest of Durham Habitat at heart throughout and I am confident Lexie is the right individual to lead Habitat during its next phase of positively impacting the Durham community.”

Vaughn earned her MBA in General Management from the Kenan-Flagler School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is a proud resident of Durham, NC.


About Lexie Vaughn

Originally from Cleveland, OH, Lexie Vaughn has been a truly global citizen, having lived and worked in 10 different countries before choosing Durham, NC as her permanent home. After completing a Bachelor’s Degree with a triple major, she served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Honduras. Convinced that mission-based organizations could have greater impact by borrowing effective management principles from the business world, she transitioned seamlessly from the Peace Corps to a Sales and Marketing position at IBM.

Lexie attended business school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she was a Consortium for Graduate Study in Management Fellow, a Sara Lee Scholar, the recipient of a Kenan-Flagler Entrepreneurship Grant, and a co-founder of the Students for Responsible Business chapter. From there, she was recruited into international banking by Citibank and ultimately became the President of Citibank Honduras, where she had served 15 years earlier as a Peace Corps Volunteer.

9/11 was a transformative event for Lexie. She left international banking and returned to the USA, back to her original nonprofit work aspirations. Accomplished in leadership, strategy, operations, and capacity-building, Lexie has applied her skills in a range of mission-based endeavors, including: community development, art museums, entrepreneurship, environmental conservation, and back to the Peace Corps, this time as a Country Director. Her experience in the corporate, nonprofit, and government sectors gives her rich perspective and a solid understanding of how each sector works, what motivates them, and how to collaborate universally.