Gayle Northrop is Adjunct Faculty at the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business (UCT GSB), faculty at UCLA Anderson School of Management in Los Angeles, and President of Northrop Nonprofit Consulting, a firm specialising in strategic planning, organisational development and leadership development for nonprofits and social enterprises worldwide. 

At the GSB, Gayle works with the Bertha Centre for Social Innovation & Entrepreneurship on strategy, partnership development and social innovation, focusing on health and systems entrepreneurship. Also through the GSB, Gayle helped launch and was Associate Director of Spark Health Africa, a nonprofit organisation seeking to enhance the capacity of teams and individuals within Ministries of Health to think differently about their work, solve their own problems, and identify and take ownership of health systems changes.

Over the years, Gayle has helped design, teach in, and expand a variety of management development programmes, including programmes for child development agencies, HIV/AIDS organisations, health care executives, and African health care leaders. In 2010, she helped pilot and launch the Management Development Institute (MDI) for African Health Care Leaders which has since expanded from East Africa to South Africa (run by the GSB), West Africa and most recently Lusophone Africa.

At UCLA Anderson, Gayle teaches social entrepreneurship to MBA and undergraduate students, a course on Social Impact Consulting, and a highly popular MBA global immersion course on Social Entrepreneurship & Innovation in South Africa. She speaks frequently on the topics of nonprofit management and governance, strategic planning, change management, and business as a force for social good. Gayle received her MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Management and holds a BA degree in Communication and American Studies from Stanford University. She serves on multiple boards of directors, including Spark Health Africa and PATA (Paediatric and Adolescent AIDS Treatment for Africa).