From LDCs to Lifelong Friends

international women’s friendship month

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September 22, 2026

By Megan Ogar Noble, Angelos editor

When I hit the road as a Leadership Development Consultant (LDC) in 2011, I thought I knew what to expect. I expected to gain incredible professional development (I did), see new parts of the country (I did) and become a pro at airport security (I did). What I did not expect were the deep and lifelong friendships I would form with the women I met.

More than 15 years later, the friendships among the women in my LDC cohort are some of my dearest. We were all navigating life post-college together and experiencing this unique role that brought so much growth and learning in a short amount of time. None of us had the same collegiate Kappa Delta experience, but our experience as LDCs bonded us together in a special way.

Our group has maintained that bond by planning a reunion nearly every year since 2012. From Nashville to Phoenix, we’ve met up in destinations all over the country, and I look forward to these trips all year. One year, my now husband even coordinated with one of my LDC sisters to surprise me and propose! On these trips when a stranger inevitably asks us where we’re visiting from and how we all know each other, we (honestly) answer, “We used to work together.” But our friendship is much more than that.

This isn’t just a once-a-year friendship, either. Some 15 years after being co-workers, our group text is one of my most active, and these women are still among the first I go to for advice, to celebrate a win or share big news.

We’ve been there for each other in the joyous moments — graduations, weddings and babies — and we’ve been there for each other in the hardest times, too. Simply, these friendships have shaped my life. And I would never have met them if I hadn’t applied to be an LDC.

It was not just the friendships formed among my fellow LDCs but also the relationships formed with the collegians and alumnae I met during my time as an LDC — women who, still to this day, I connect with on social media, cheer on their success and catch up with from time to time. The LDC experience creates a wide network — I’d be hard pressed to travel to a city or look up a company on LinkedIn and not be able to make a connection with a KD there. In addition to giving me unmatched professional experience, being an LDC showed me how vast our sisterhood is and that our foundation in female friendship is not tied to our college years alone.