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Nonprofit Radio for May 19, 2025: Employee Wellness & Email Deliverability

Mandy Kutschied & Sam Hanley: Employee Wellness

Meet a company where one of the employees is a wellness coach for all the others. Mandy Kutschied and Sam Hanley are with The Fresh Perspective Group. They share practical strategies for employee wellness; ergonomic resources; a 4-day work week; productivity tips; and, talk about the ethics of wellness coaching in the workplace. Sam often hears things she cannot reveal. This is part of our coverage of the 2025 Nonprofit Technology Conference (#25NTC).

Anne Paschkopić: Email Deliverability

This comes up frequently at the Nonprofit Technology Conference, because the rules often change about whether your emails get delivered and how they get treated by email providers. Are you right to only mail to people who’ve recently opened a message from you? No. Is it good practice to make sure everyone has opted in to your list? No. Anne Paschkopić explains why these and other former best practices, are no more. She’s from M + R. This conversation is also from #25NTC.

 

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Welcome to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host and the podfather of your favorite hebdominal podcast. This is show number 740, which means we are a mere 10 shows, 10 weeks away from number 750. Nonprofit radios, unbelievable. 10 weeks away. Oh, I’m glad you’re with us. I’d be stricken with dextroduction if I looked to the right to see that you missed this week’s show. Here’s our associate producer Kate with what’s up this week. Hey, Tony, more conversations from 25 NTC. Employee wellness. Meet a company where one of the employees is a wellness coach for all the others. Mandy Kuthi and Sam Hanley are with the Fresh Perspective Group. They share practical strategies for employee wellness, ergonomic resources, a 4 day work week, productivity tips, and talk about the ethics of wellness coaching in the workplace. Sam often hears things she cannot reveal. Then Email deliverability. This comes up frequently at the nonprofit technology conference because the rules often change about whether your emails get delivered and how they get treated by email providers. Are you right to only mail to people who have recently opened a message from you? Now Is it good practice to make sure everyone has opted into your list? No. Ann Paskaic explains why these and other former best practices are no more. She’s from MNR. On Tony’s take 2. The federal budget, part de. Here is employee wellness. Thank you for being with our 25 NTC coverage. We’re all live at the Bal Baltimore Convention Center. With me now are Mandy Kutchide and Sam Hanley. Mandy is vice president of people at the Fresh Perspective Group. Sam Hanley also at the Fresh Perspective Group as wellness coach. Mandy, Sam, welcome. Thank you so much pleasure, pleasure to have you. How’s your conference going so far? Good. It’s awesome both of our first time here. Have you done both first? Oh, this is a very good conference, isn’t it? I mean so far? Yeah, it’s great. This is our 10th or 11th. Uh, having the podcast here, yeah, capturing interviews, it’s a very good conference. You chose you chose well it’s a good vibe. Um, and your topic is what employee wellness really means and why it matters. Um, Sam, let’s start with you because I don’t know any other companies besides the Fresh Perspective group who I’m just meeting today for my first time, uh, that have a wellness coach. Maybe it’s very common. I don’t know, but, uh, why is it so let’s answer the second part of the, uh, the topic. Why does it matter? Why does it matter? Come a little closer to the mic. Yeah, thank you. Um, I think it’s very rare to have someone as a wellness coach on a team. No, not very common. Um, typically speaking, many orgs have human resources, so it’s even a shift to be more people oriented and so I have a background in counseling and behavior analysis, so my intention is to support the company as a whole. In the culture and how we operate and embed wellness into our culture but also on an individual level level so supporting employees one on one whether that’s just venting or need an emotional release or something’s going on at home because home life and work life are so interwoven together so how can I support our employees as as human beings. OK, um, and, uh, we’re not gonna do this right now, but part of what we’re gonna talk about is what the ethical considerations are when people vent versus talking to their HR director. It’s very different, I imagine. OK, we’re gonna talk about we’ll, we’re gonna get to that. um, Mandy, what, what, why does the you’re a vice president there, officer? Why does the fresh perspective group, um, invest? I mean, you’re paying, uh. Paying salary to Sam and benefits, but she is a benefit. He program is a benefit to the employees so but I don’t mean to answer my own question. Why, why is the fresh perspective group investing in employee wellness to the to the point of hiring someone to do it? Yeah, we think it’s incredible incredibly um critical to our success. So the company itself is a people centric organization that does sales force consulting and manage services for nonprofits who are. Struggling with their technology as we’ve heard throughout the day and we know that what we’re selling is our people the the the keynote speaker this morning 10 minute gap or the sound went out but also she was talking about, um, we, you know, technology part of the, the issue with adoption or how we use it is like the people using it are really designing how it gets used um so what we’re selling is our people, our consultants, obviously they’re great. At tech, but they’re also human beings and we know that in order for them to support the nonprofits that we serve, we need to be supporting them as humans um so that’s really critical and one of the ways we want to do this is by being different in how we structure so I came out of HR I almost 20 years of HR um and there are some legal ramifications and sort of legal things you have to think about when you try to structure support in this way, but we knew that we really wanted to be people centric. Want to build something that was different, that really took care of the whole human and we were going to do that with intention and with care and part of that was having a wellness coach that was focused on the individuals. Yes, yeah. Well, she’s a founding member, so we all founded the company in July. We’re only 8 months old. Yeah, it’s a new venture. Yeah, so she’s been here since the beginning really helping us a people-centric culture through the decades of the practical strategies for employee wellness. Sam, I’m guessing that is more suited for you. I’m just answering. I’m, I’m not, I’m, I’m not committing you to anything. This is from your session description. You looked a little nervous. Practical strategies for employee wellness. You’re committed to this. Yes, OK, um, Mandy and I and I it we’ll we’ll talk to you so when employees are on a big project, so allowing a bit of breathing room afterwards, what does that look like afterwards, what do you, how do you how do you? Looking at what do you what do you say to them? Uh, what is your plan? What does your schedule look like? Is your calendar completely jam packed in full, or do you have space to take lunch? Do you have space to go for a walk? Do you have space to take an afternoon off? Our pay time off policy is very flexible, um, so if you need to take a Friday off, go take a Friday off. We also work 4 days a week, Tuesday to Friday, so we every week have Monday off. Um, so all employees except for myself work 32 hours a week, um, and so having that Monday allows just natural breathing room in our everyday week in itself because it’s embedded in that. So our every all our team members have that day to get appointments done, relax, be by themselves at home. Weekends are always busy doing errands and family functions and events and all that stuff, so just allowing that space and making it sacred so. We all know not to ping anyone on a Monday, um, so after projects making sure that continues to be sacred, but also checking what’s your schedule look like? Is it jam packed? Can we, can we check you is this you emailing to remind people or is it you knocking on, you’re probably not you’re virtual knocking on doors but how do you practically how do you do it? What do you do? Yeah, a one on one or 15 minute call. Your plan, how are you doing checking in? What does your rest look like afterwards? What’s your workload look like? Is it is it manageable? Do we need to support you in finding ways to take things off of your plate? Do you need to lean more on other team members and just giving them the autonomy to make those choices but still being proactive in that check in? What does that look like? Yeah and Sam has um scheduled one on one sessions with everybody who wants to they can opt in or opt out. Most of our folks opt in. Um, she’s so she’s taking that sort of like individual care, but then if she’s hearing something, so for example I think this is a good one, we, when we were launching as a company, there was a lot of heavy lifting from our marketing team right away when you launch a company, right? There’s a website, there’s branding, there’s material, so our marketing team is one person and one consultant, and they were doing a ton to get us ready and so Sam had been meeting with the our director of marketing individually noticed. That you know there was just a lot going on so after the launch um we worked with the marketing director and their supervisor and we said OK we’re gonna get, we’re gonna throw a couple extra days and we’re gonna ask if she has the capacity to take that time off and she did we said great, go like rejuvenate a little bit and recover and restore so you can come back refreshed um and she did, she said, oh, I feel like I can actually come back and like feel excited instead of daunted and drained and. And tired, so it was a it was a good sort of in the moment recovery plan. Now Sam, if you hear from someone that they’re overburdened, maybe they need to they need do you have a link to the CEO do you how do you get the person the help that they need. So in one on ones it’s what does that look like for you? How can I support you in your communication with others to be able to lean on them. Um, do you feel comfortable talking to the CEO or talking to your supervisor in, in getting support, um, I think that’s 1414 now. I was relevant for folks to know how big an organization we’re talking about 5 or 14, so you were saying that uh you’re asking. How comfortable do you feel or then can you be a voice on their behalf if they don’t feel comfortable, but then if they don’t feel comfortable, you’re going on their behalf. They know they came from you. How does that give them greater comfort ultimately everybody knows that it came from them. Yes, I think that plays into the ethical consideration so just really. Staying grounded in the relationship with that person and knowing that I’m only doing anything on their behalf with their consent and having that discussion first so if they want me to speak on their behalf or support them in that way then it’s important that I have their permission and that we do that together. I want it to be. Involved partnership to get help them help them get what they need. What if they aren’t comfortable with you speaking on their behalf, but this remains a challenge for them, and obstacle it’s burdening them, but they’re not comfortable speaking or having you speak on their behalf, then what? That’s that’s difficult. So a part of my job too is looking for themes so on in my one on ones are the themes that are coming up is communication being lost is one team feeling more stressed than another um so then I talked to Mandy and we figure out how can we support this individual, um, theme or this team team as a whole, um, and we yeah. And that’s why I think like in our session we talk a little bit about the evolution of workplace wellness and the history from you know industrial era to post COVID time and a lot of it is around the systems that we set up so there may be individual themes of burnout or um not feeling like there is that sort of self advocacy or self care that you can enact with your supervisor because maybe it’s a lack of emotional intelligence or empathy from. The leadership, so if we’re seeing those themes, then we know our systems need to improve. We need to train our leadership on EQ and emotional empathy and how do they have engaging conversations with their direct reports or is it more around like how we work and how we’ve designed work? Do we need to rethink those systems and structures, um, because sometimes it’s at an individual level, but a lot of times it’s on a systems level. Has this all come up in just 8 months? I mean it’s come up in other organizations for me over the last 18 years, yeah, but we haven’t experienced as much of that, not to any extreme. Yeah, yeah. OK. Um, since we sort of touching on ethics, what about, um, confidentiality? I mean, are you, are you sworn to confidentiality if the person doesn’t want anything revealed? Yes, OK, OK. And then, but your role is to try to aggregate themes, but. That might not be that might not be part of a theme. It might just be individual and the person so like is there a resource of referrals like would you make a referral to a deeper consulting that you can’t do or therapy basically we’re talking about therapy yeah so yeah if there’s deeper concerns or things coming up, yes, it’s referring out to counseling services. Can I support you in finding the appropriate service provider to help you with your mental health? Um, I, I had a thought there, um, I think sometimes at work, you know, you, you have something going on in your life and you go to your manager and so you dump your emotional things that are happening for you to your manager and the manager isn’t always equipped to support that person and so both people are kind of feeling disconnected, not sure where to go from there something’s there’s kind of a bit of a. Elephant in the room and so I’m, I hope that I can be that mediator of come let’s let’s chat get get what you need off your chest and then let’s move forward into that problem solving piece so I can be there for the empathy help you problem solve so you can go to your manager and say hey I’ve had a death at home I I need more space my brain is not in it this week whereas I think like Mandy said um historically there’s just that pressure to perform. Form and get work done no matter what else is happening in your life. So how can I help people move through that process a little bit smoother and still feel heard and supported and know that their workplace has their back even when something else is going on in their personal life. Encourage everyone to take their lunch break away from their screens, um, so, uh, there’s even a couple individuals at work where it it was encouraged to put that into their calendar. They just blocked off for lunch. No one can book a meeting at that time, so that kind of holds us accountable to actually take our lunch, um, rather than meetings just be booked and you then don’t have lunch, you’re not eating, you’re not taking time away from your screen, you’re not getting up and moving your body, um. So in that lunch break going for a walk, uh, we also have every week I post something and it’s often around that physical health so moving our body um snacks, getting exercise water yes. Stretching was an issue. I was she’s very good at reminding me to drink my water. I don’t drink water. I think ergonomic is also in the virtual world there’s a lot of because we’re working at home and we haven’t really thought about ergonomics set up to be physically supportive we’ve talked a little bit about how do we make sure folks have the right level for their computers so they’re not um putting pressure on shoulders and how do they have the right chair and we have a budget for that so we can support standing you got it yeah I have a walking pad, yep. see me in my walking. Oh, it’s just like why is it not a treadmill? It doesn’t go as fast. It’s just walking like a desk you’re walking you’re OK. We had Beth on a couple of years ago because she had just written a book on wellness for nonprofits she had a co-author too. I’m sorry, I don’t remember the co-author’s name, but Um, she was, they were advocating, um, doing walking meetings, physically walking out and you’re you’re in a meeting. Why not, right? Our brain works differently that way, yeah, getting fresh air and the repetitive movement of our body walking there’s real digital screen fatigue happening right now, so it’s like how can you also make sure you’re limiting some of the screen time. Uh, you have any other tip tips so the pad I’m sorry, it’s not what’s it’s OK um what else do I appreciate that you’re sitting on a ball, so you’re just you’re naturally moving your body and it probably feels more comfortable on your body to be that way. I use it at home it’s actually born of an NTC. In previous years they contracted with a furnishings company for the booths back when we had booths 10 by 10. This is your first ATC, but every year before this it’s been 10 by 10 booths, and the company that they use, uh, is expensive. Like a chair is like $300 or maybe I’m exaggerating $200 for the 3 days, right? And then, but I wanted a nicer chair, so I was like a 4 or $500 chair for 3 days. That’s a. That’s that, you know, I, I got my my ball and just blow it up and I’ll spend $0 and I’ll be more comfortable and you’re $500. So it was born of a couple of years, I think last year was the first year. I just got tired of the ergonomic chair expense. So yeah, yeah, OK, so, uh, yeah, it’s movement, right? Is core like centering taking even 5 minutes to step outside, sit on your front step. Breathe in some observing outside what do you see for distance it helps your eyes like you need a yeah just that quick yeah reset, refresh, change of environment for a moment can be really helpful in getting you back and refocused, um, having snacks at your desk, chewing things can be helpful for your nervous system, help regulate just simple little things, yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, that oral sensory feedback, yeah, more crunchy or like like peanut butter is sticky, so you’re, you’re working your oral motor and it can just be helpful to regulate your body so it doesn’t have to be anything major, right? We don’t have to get our 10,000 steps in and we don’t have those types of initiatives at our at our work, um, but. Just getting those small little things 5 minutes away from your desk standing up yeah it can be in your in your 5 NASA says the optimal nap is 22 minutes scientists and they know this 2 longer than they. Longer than that and you’ll feel groggy and a little disorient maybe not disorient groggy when you wake up shorter than that, not restorative. So the optimal nap according to NASA 22 minutes but I’m a proud napper. I love. Yeah, OK. Um, the 4 day work week last year at NTC we had advocates, we had, we had the leader of the 4 day work week. Um, nonprofit. I, I forget what 4 days a week or I forget what it’s called, but he, he and a couple of panelists, including someone from N10. N10 has a 4 day work week here. Patty was on, um. but you chose Mondays off instead of Friday would have been the natural choice, I think for a lot of organizations. Why did you choose Monday? It was really intentional. So the again, the organization that we work in is consulting and we consult with nonprofits and so just the organic cycle of the stuff we do, we felt, um, there’s a lot of Tuesday Thursday meetings with our nonprofit clients so there was like uh inherent Tuesday could be meeting heavy day Wednesday could be. Down work day Thursday could be meeting heavy day. Friday we’re taking that feedback and kind of making changes and Monday we rest. So it just like it worked with I think um for us it worked because of who our clients are. It’s gonna be different exactly yeah you got it, yeah, exactly. It’s also an interesting mind shift too because most people work until Fridays and so you’re getting ready for that weekend naturally with. Community and so then you’re having your fun on the weekend and then you get that Monday oh yeah I have Monday and it feels more productive naturally because that’s what we’re all used to so you can get your chores done you can schedule in your massage um you can get the all the the housework done. OK, an intentional choice to make it to make it and just to be clear we’re talking about a 4 day 32 hour work week, not a 4 day 40 hour work week 2 hours. Yeah, yes, that’s what the campaign is all about. We, we had the panel on, yeah, that’s it. Yeah, OK. OK. Um, you mentioned massage. I’m, I’m a massage, I do, it’s not luxury, it’s it’s part of taking care of myself massage massage advocate as well. Yeah, we have quite a comprehensive benefits. acupuncture, it’s part of the, yeah, we’ve got different levels for folks, right? So depending on what you opt in high deductible, low deductible, but it’s acupuncture, yeah. It’s I I’m I’m from Canada too and so Mandy is from here, um, so we, we, we’re a little bit different anyways, um, so I can’t always speak to what I can’t always speak to that. But I think a lot of Americans consider that a luxury. Like when I’m at the resort for a week, you know, I’ll I’ll get a, I’ll get a spa treatment. I’ll massage, but it can be very, I mean like yeah very yes exactly physical touch that. Muscle movement and it I mean we have uh I have a coworker, we have a coworker at the Fresh perspective group who goes in for medical reasons monthly and because she can’t move her neck otherwise and it’s like she needs that and it is it’s not, it’s not nice to have it’s need to have. And, and, and can I go one bit deeper than physical touch is the human touch. Like this is something I never want a robot to do. I don’t want AI massage as as good as some, some, uh, medical services company may tell me that it is, uh, I don’t want it. I want, I want the human touch. We want to be seen and heard. Um, 4 day work on site counseling. I think we kind of talked about on site. It’s all virtual you can check in any time. I mean if you’re in a crisis, and I, I need to I need to I need to. I very much encourage everyone to book one on one, same day, any time, any length of time that they feel they need. And is there routine check-ins too like do you have a monthly or weekly with everybody or how does that work? Yeah, it’s about monthly for about 45 minutes, yes, yes, yeah, some opt for more and some opt for none some have their own um counseling services outside of the workplace too that they’re very regular and feel very well supported in that way so yeah. Uh, creating a culture of wellness at work. I mean, it comes from the top down. The CEO must be devoted to this, yeah, definitely, and, and again that was very intentional when we were setting up the organization. She was very much, um, a fan of a people centric culture, so I wanted to make this into policy process practice, so things like the 4 day work week, but also, um, when we have a decision and you know. You know we have to prioritize something we tend to prioritize people first and that means our clients but also our employees and then we might prioritize, you know, the tech or the finances and they go hand in hand, but we’re often um we’re really looking at the impact on the person so when we look at our benefits package when we look at our time off policy like all of those things we take up people. First lens too and like is this really improving the wellness of our culture or is it not um so thinking about just those systems are really important um so I’ve been really happy and you’re right from the top down like you have to have the buy in of the CEO or it’s never gonna stick um and I think she’s a huge advocate for wellness which is makes it a lot easier for sure. Uh, have you hired any new team members since the inaugural team? OK, um, so we only have a sample size of one, but what was the reaction when they were told that there’s a wellness, you’re, well, the wellness. Uh, the wellness coach, yeah, we have a wellness coach on on our team. What was the reaction? I think it was a huge draw so, um, part of the recruiting process, everyone we talked to the candidates before we made our final selection we’re all very excited about it. I think at first we had to explain it because it’s not something you see often so there’s a lot of education around this is. Resource for you they’ll be, you know, counseling available they’ll also just be a coach there to help you with your sort of own understanding of all of the dimensions of wellness, um, and it’s a 4 day work week like all those things were huge draws. I think it got us the the the big candidate pool that we saw, uh, and the final candidate that was selected was very excited about it. outstanding and uh productivity. I don’t know you don’t have a, you don’t have a control group. it wasn’t a pre-A and now how do you measure the productivity of the wellness program? It’s a great question, and we talk a little bit about metrics in our in our session tomorrow, um, because you’re right, there’s no control group pre wellness coach and 4 day work week and sort of people centric culture, but I think the metrics you we. And look at and use are a lot of the ones that other places have things like your employee engagement scores so like net promoter um but also just feedback. I know you know feedback is um is often seen as anecdotal but like anecdotal data is still data and so feedback from employees um we we haven’t um launched a net promoter score survey yet but we’ve gathered like you know monthly feedback on different offerings we’ve talked. The the staff, um, but I think turnover is like the biggest thing I look at it’s a lagging metric, um, and nobody has left. Well, always a good thing, right? Like no one’s like, I’m out of here, this isn’t working for me. There’s no exit interview data, yeah, exactly, um, so I think those are just big things to to keep an eye on and then there’s just, you know, participation rates of who’s engaging with the the services we offer, the programs we offer, um, their satisfaction from those programs and all of that that you can measure. Right, Sam, can you leave us with a wellness tip that we haven’t talked about yet? I’ll put you on the spot. You must have a deep repertoire of a tip tip. Yes, yes, your screen or away from screens. OK. Um, Mandy, Mandy, uh, vice president of people at the Fresh Perspective Group. Sam Hanley, wellness coach at the Fresh Perspective Group, Sam, Sam, you go by Sam Andy. That’s yeah that’s our duo name now. It’s the the the team, thank you, thank you very much for sharing. Thank you for having us. Thank you very much. And thank you for being with Tony Martignetti nonprofit radio coverage of 25 NTC, the 2025 nonprofit technology conference, where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits. It’s time for Tony’s Take 2. Thank you, Kate. Very similar to what I said last week. The federal budget process is still ongoing in Washington DC. There are hearings, there are negotiations going on, and there are bad things in the budget for nonprofits. For instance, uh, uh, something that I didn’t mention last week, the, uh, the permission of the authority for the Secretary of the Treasury to singularly denote that a charity is a terrorist supporting organization. Now, you may recall, that sounds familiar, because back in late last year, There was the House resolution. Remember 9495, it was the nonprofit killer bill, a lot of people called it. That’s what 9495 allowed them to do. Now that that didn’t pass in the last Congress, so it’s not called that anymore, but the, the unilateral authority for the Secretary of the Treasury to designate a charity in that way and thereby, you know, canceling the charitable status, that is part of the proposed budget. Um, there are also the, the big funding cuts to, uh, USAID and the State Department for, uh, for foreign funding, um, so, you know, there are, there are bad things in the budget proposed for the nonprofit community. I’m urging you to contact your Congressional representatives, senators, and your House of Representative, House of Representatives representative, your congress people. Uh, let them know how important your work is and how important our nonprofit community is that you don’t want to see it threatened. That you don’t want to see funding cuts. How vital the work is that all the members of the nonprofit community do. Uh, I had said last week, I, I, I had a LinkedIn post last week that had a link for how to find your senators and your congressmen or or congresswoman. Um, you know, it’s easy to find. You don’t, you don’t need my LinkedIn post. It’s just last week I had done it, but I do urge you to reach out to these folks. I’ve been doing it, I’ve been, my people, uh, the, the, the three that I call, you can only leave messages, it’s unbelievable, and nobody ever picks up. But if that’s, that’s all you can get, that’s fine. They need to hear from All of us how important. The nonprofit community is in the US. And that is Tony’s take too. Kate I remember in high school we had to, one of our assignments was to actually make an email and then send it over to our congressman. So if a high schooler can do it, I think anyone can do it. Uh, absolutely, yes, it’s not hard to, you can reach them by email, by phone, uh, you can go in person because they have offices throughout your state, however you do it. It’s, it’s, yeah, very doable. We’ve got bou but loads more time. Here is email deliverability. Thank you for joining our 25 NTC coverage. We’re live at the Baltimore Convention Center. My guest now is Ann Paska. Very close. Pashka Pitch. There’s an accent over the sea, which is an unusual character. accent is. Yes, it is. Uh, well, it’s actually my wife’s last name. I’m Pasky. She was co-pitched. We’re married now we’re Pask pitch, uh, and she was born in Yugoslavia, which doesn’t exist anymore. OK, yes. Yeah, so I haven’t seen that before. I don’t know if it’s definitely a lot of our friends thought we were joking until they saw it on our legal documents, but it’s, uh, we didn’t wanna pick one over the other. Well, did you decide who goes first? No, we just thought Pakay. I agree. OK, OK, wonderful. Uh, she’s Ann Paskaic, managing production specialist at M. They probably just say, yeah, it’s uh we are a consulting firm, uh, we do digital work, advocacy, audience research, advertising, uh, mostly digital, some PR social media, well, most of that’s online as well, um, we work with nonprofits across the country and across the world. Your topic is email deliverability. Have the rules changed? That’s almost an ironic or sarcastic question, uh, because they have indeed changed. We’re gonna talk about. Uh, you know, so we’ve had this topic over a few times in the past 3 to 4 years, uh, probably because the rules are, are, are changing. So, so the answer to your question is, uh, or maybe it’s a rhetorical question. Yeah, the answer is yes, right? It’s mostly changed. There’s some things that have stayed the same, um, I mean for a given level of same, of course we’re sending emails and. Not just uh mail and phone calls anymore, but some stuff is the same but a lot has changed. For instance, uh, you say in your session topic, are only mail the people who’ve opened recently. Oh no, that’s not true anymore. Now it’s clicked. Only mail to people who have clicked. So where, where do we get started with this? Is this an OK place to start or what? I think this is a great place to start because I think who do you email? How can you tell that they’re consenting is essentially the question, you know, of course you’ve got people who hopefully have opted in um at a minimum you wanna give them the language that says you’re getting emails maybe you have a confirmed opt in, but then once they’re on their list, how can you tell that sort of ongoing consent? I think that my approach to this is, you know, deliverability can be really technical and complicated, but you just have to remember that the people on the other end are humans and you’re trying to read those signals to try and understand what’s going on with the human at the other end. In terms of the opens question, um, of course Apple came out in 2021 with the Apple privacy policy for emails, uh, which basically said it’s common knowledge, it may not be common, it’s not so common, but, but you’re the expert so I glad you thank you for breaking this down for us, but, uh, just in case there are any listeners who didn’t, uh, who didn’t know that, uh, I’m with you. I did not know that Apple came out with this, uh, 4 years ago now. Yeah, so give us the history. No, no, I’m not, I didn’t want you to gloss over. I just want, I didn’t want, I don’t want anybody to be uh disappointed if they didn’t, they weren’t aware of this common knowledge. That’s true, that’s true. I I I assume obviously it’s my. If you were watching your email open rights, if you’re in the part of your industry that does that, you probably saw them go haywire in early 2022 and that is because of this change. So what Apple did is they said essentially You know, when somebody opens an email, the way that we track opens is whether or not they download a tiny little tracking pixel, so essentially an image, and when you download that it sends a bunch of additional information to the CRM that you’re using, whatever, um, where are you, what’s your IP address, what device you’re on. And essentially Apple said, you know, we’re really big on privacy and we think that that’s too much information. So what they did is that anybody who opted into this new policy, which they opt you in by default, so pretty much anybody with an iPhone has opted in, yeah, yeah unless you’re a real nerd and you’re like, I’m gonna go 3 levels down on the menu and turn it off. Um, what they do is they essentially open the emails on your behalf. So instead of like Ann Paska Pitch Malden, Massachusetts, my home’s IP address, if I have an iPhone, then that privacy policy just says, oh this was opened by Apple and you know Pasadena, California or wherever that IP address is, so it is protecting my privacy. On the marketer’s end, instead of getting, well, OK, probably a human person downloaded this tracking pixel and we can see where they are, we can see what their devices, you just get well Apple opened this and because Apple opens that for everybody with an iPhone, just a lot of people, what happened is Openreach just kind of went everywhere. Um, it depends on the email tool you’re using. Some email tools that, you know, this is confusing, we’re gonna separate it out, we’re gonna, we can look at the signals and say. This is a human eye open, um, yeah, you know, like oh it’s Pasadena, California and Apple’s IP that’s a machine, you know, it’s a little more complicated than that, but from our end we were able to be like, oh OK, this is human open, this is machine open. Usually they prioritize looking at those human opens your open rates go down. For everybody else, the CRMs went like, I don’t know, it’s still an open, it’s all the same and so their open rates went up because everybody with an iPhone was quote unquote opening everything, yeah. And then coming back to the like how do you target your emails um before this change we said you know opens are good top of the funnel indication that somebody is probably looking at your email, you know, it’s a bit of a rough it was a it was a rough statistic even then because of course if you have all your images blocked or you’re just on a slow connection and the images don’t load, doesn’t matter if you read the email, it’s not going to download that tracking pixel and track it as an open. And then on the flip side, if you’re one of those people that opens an email in order to delete it, that was tracking as an open, but an open was still kind of a good indicator that at least a human was using that email address and probably looked at your email. OK, right, that that we could say. Yeah, and it was like a good rough estimate. And of course Apple comes out with this change and everybody’s like, well now I don’t know if a humans looked at it, uh, you know, the machine is doing this and I don’t know if somebody’s completely ignoring it, um, so a lot of organizations said, well, I’m not going to take into account Ops anymore because I don’t think it’s a good good success. So we’re talking about the users or the the email the email providers. Uh, neither the, the nonprofits who are sending our email, yeah, yeah, yeah, OK, we’re part of this too. OK, so we don’t know what to. Yeah, yeah, you know, like I’m somebody reading my email. I’m not gonna notice the difference. Inbox providers, they can still get all that information because they have access, you know, if I’m Gmail, I own the inbox, even if you’re looking at it through your Apple iPhone. So they’re still getting the same data. It’s just us as marketers who are using a third party tool that’s, you know, only tracking opens through that little pixel. That’s where our data starts to get weird and our decisions about who to send to has this whole other variable. OK, so let’s drill down on that because that’s what our listeners I think are gonna be most interested in um at least in this around this part of the, this part of the topic, who should I be mailing to or who should I be scrubbing off. Or whatever that’s not the right. Who should I be dropping off our list because they’re not engaged. They’re bringing down our engagement rate. They, they don’t, they don’t open or maybe we, we don’t know if they open or even if we assume they open but they don’t click, they’re still bringing down our engagement rates because because the providers know all this, right? You know, they know what you see, they know if you, if you, if you open it or if you only look at it in your um. The browser, not the like the preview pane yeah yeah if you only see the preview pane you know if you click, you know if you open or open and then click. They know everything they know how far down you scroll. They know how many times you looked at it. They they know if you like after reading it, did you like carefully file it away in a file folder or did you delete it? Did you forward it? Did you, yeah, like all of these things they’re collecting every single data point. And feeding into their machine learning and we’re over here with that for your emails to people’s inboxes or not that’s the subject. OK, so what’s your uh expert advice? Who should we be taking off our list or if you want to approach it in the positive, who should we be mailing to so. I’m gonna say you should actually be emailing people that open and this is not what we thought was gonna happen when Apple came out with this whole machine thing but it turns out um whether you’re looking at just machine and human opens or rather whether you’re able to distinguish between them or they’re just in a big pool, you can’t tell the difference, different tools are different. Opens are still a really good indicator of whether somebody is using that inbox and it turns out that that is good enough for inbox providers um yeah pretty low threshold it it is a pretty inbox, yeah, well, it’s not just somebody owns it, it’s that. So sorry, I’m I’m gonna, I’m I’m gonna do other sidebar. So Apple’s robots will only open emails if one that email is landing in the inbox. So if you have a bad reputation, your email is going to spam, the robot’s not gonna open that essentially they’re like this isn’t good enough. I’m not gonna open it. Probably nobody’s gonna pull this out of spam and look at it. They also only open emails if somebody’s actually using that inbox. So if you, you know, we talked about me changing my name when I got married. I’ve got an Ann Pasky email address. If I don’t use that anymore and I stopped using it, so I stop logging on, then Apple’s gonna stop opening those emails for me, you know, they’ve they’ve they’ve got a lot of server space but it’s not infinite, so they’re not gonna spend it on people who aren’t using their email. So, if you get that machine open, it might not mean that I actually saw it, but it does mean that it 1 landed in my inbox and 2 that I am actively logging into that account. And it turns out, and again like this is not what I thought was going to happen, you know Apple came out, we said you should look at pulling back to just looking at other indicators, but what we saw is that the groups who were like I’m gonna wait, I’m gonna like wait until I see problems uh by targeting these opens that may be humans and may be machines they never had problems um they they saw that continuing to email. Active addresses whether or not those people were actually engaging with their emails in terms of opens kept them in a healthy deliverability spot. OK yeah, alright, so, so encapsulate to summarize that for our listeners who are not technologists but they’re certainly technology users uh into a sentence or two that we can digest. Yes, so if you are targeting your email list based on activity and open is a good indicator of activity. That was very concise. Thank you. I hope it was helpful. Yeah, yeah, it’s, it’s not the only indicator, you know, I think you should also be looking at clicks, you should be looking at things that aren’t deliverability related but are important to your program, whether that’s donors or event attendance or whatever other indicators somebody’s giving you that they’re going to be engaged because Tony, deliverability is not the point, right? It’s a tool, it’s a, it’s a requirement if people aren’t gonna read your emails if they can’t see them, but ultimately most people aren’t running a program where the goal is to deliver emails to the inbox. They’re trying to change the world. They’re trying to like talk to people, yeah, so. That’s why I say like also target people based on recent online actions because that’s what you’re actually going for. It’s not all about the technology and it’s it’s a yes, absolutely. It’s an online but it’s a nonetheless. Um, OK, making sure everyone has opted in. No, that’s not quite true anymore. Now we want double opt in. What, what, what’s the issue here? This is, this is a big one and one that I think is really different in the nonprofit space compared to, you know, obviously a lot of the advice out there is for for profits, you know, assuming you’re you’re selling the shoes or something like that. And this is where I feel like my take is maybe a little controversial but it’s based on what I’ve seen you don’t have to do a confirmed opt in if somebody is, for example, donating. They are putting down their credit card information they’re saying I care about you as an organization and I’m giving you my money and it is OK to just say, hey, thank you as part of that we are opting you into email. Obviously always give people the option to unsubscribe um you know there are some situations where you might want to do a confirmed opt in where it’s something like. Uh, we have an organization that sends, uh, cards to children in the hospital, and a lot of people want to do that, but they don’t actually care about signing up for the email list. So that’s a situation where we might want to do a confirmed opt in or a double opt in. Um, or anywhere where you’re a little bit worried about the quality of names you’re getting. So if you’re having people like sign up at a at an event and they’re typing things into an iPad or even if you’re writing your name on a piece of paper, that’s where you might want to make sure, hey, are you, did you make a typo? Is this really your email address? Did you really mean to sign up and send them that email confirmation that they have to click on to confirm, you know that? That is what a double opt in is, yes. you did not explain that. Yeah, we have jail. Yeah, opt in, confirmed opt in. It just means I put my email in on a form, but then I have to go to my inbox and click that link before I actually start receiving emails. Yeah. We do that all the time exactly a couple times a week. I mean it seems routine, OK, but that’s a double opt in so initially we’ve included you but please confirm. And then you confirm through clicking on an email, yes, yes, and that is kind of the gold standard of opt in, but of course a lot of people don’t do that so you have to kind of gauge what are my quality of names, what’s the likelihood that they’re going to see that one single confirmation email versus maybe the quality of action that brought them onto your list. How does this impact deliverability? the the inbox providers know whether there’s a double opt in? They do not. All they know is what happens when your email gets to the inbox that they own or you know, that they provide for your subscriber, their customer. Um, I guess they do it, yeah, yeah, they’re providing a, yeah, they’re providing a service to the user who is your supporters probably, um, and I feel like it’s important. I’m talking here about, uh, mostly free mail providers like Gmail, Yahoo, Microsoft, you know, Hotmail, AOL, um, when we’re talking about. Uh, like, like a corporate inbox provider, um, meaning like I have a company and our IT team runs the spam filters versus Google running the spam filters. Those rules might be different. Most nonprofits lists are, you know, individual people using those free email boxes. The rules are a little bit different if you’re, um, mostly talking to corporations. Well, now we get to what which email address people have provided. Isn’t the personal, isn’t the personal email more valuable because it’s less likely to change through a person’s life? Yeah, yeah, but I think it also depends on like what context you’re talking in, um, you know, like I I just signed up for your list and I give you my work email because this is a work relationship so uh different organizations are gonna be relating to people in different parts of their lives. Right. Well, I guess it, I guess it depends on the relationship from the user perspective, which, which you gave us the second rate email because you might change your business and then I would lose you. I might, I might, but I don’t know. I’ve been in MR for almost 13 years now, so it’s, it’s pretty good. I just always have. I, I’m not disparaging your joining our list. Thank you. I’m grateful that you joined the list. I’m not disparaging the email you gave us. I’m having an academic discussion about which is, which is more valuable. I would have, I would think that someone’s Gmail or their, their home, their home, their personal account would be uh a more valuable over time. Address that I think all other things equal somebody’s probably gonna be on their personal email address for a longer period of time, but the thing to think about with deliverability is what what does that person want? Look how smart you are back to the top. I’m I’m wildly digressing and to the topic. Well, I can only speak to my area of expertise, so you’re doing great. Thank you for trying to build up. Um, no, but I think it’s a good question because it’s asking what is valuable to you as the sender versus what is valuable to the recipient if, uh, you know, we’re talking about, um, I mean yeah, let’s keep using me as the example. I’m like, OK, I want I want to know when my recording comes out. I want to know what other sessions you’re doing. That’s a work topic. I try to have good work life boundaries, you know, not always perfect, but so I wanna be like I wanna know when that’s coming out at work and you know be able to forward that email straight from my work email to my marketing email. If your email came to my personal inbox I’d be like no I don’t wanna think about work. I’m trying to trying to see when my pizza is delivered. I’m trying to see what my grandma sent me last week kind of thing. So it is, it’s relative. I might get upset I mean not me, but the hypothetical me might get upset if you’re sending work emails to my personal inbox. So I think that is a thing to be balanced. Like, sure, if I leave my job, you can’t email me my work email address anymore, but that’s where I want it. So I digression. Thanks for using yourself as an example all the time. I don’t know. Does your grandma send you stuff online? She’s pretty savvy. She does sometimes. She’s she’s got an Apple watch. Uh, she’s very, she is 92 and pretty savvy. 2. Yeah, I wouldn’t have even thought that old. Wow, 92 in an Apple watch it? Yeah, she does get her email on it? Uh, I mean, I don’t know if she gets her email. She does try to answer her phone on it sometimes and that’s it’s a little hard, but she’s great. She’s trying, yeah, yeah, not afraid. Apple Watch 92 savvy. Yes, let’s get into some nasty acronyms. Uh, we’ve, we’ve talked about these in the past. I was telling you off mic it was either last year or the year before we did email deliverability from uh at an NTC. SPF or DKIM first I live on the beach, so to me SPF is the sun protection factor. I look for at least 30 sometimes I I may transition to 50. I know that’s not what you’re talking about. Uh, let’s acquaint us first with these before we get to the deliverability advantages or disadvantages of each. Yeah well you know what I I’m gonna actually throw a third one in there and that’s D D M A C, OK, yeah, yeah, we’ll take one at a time. What’s our SPF? Gosh, OK, now I feel like you’re quizzing. It is a sender policy framework SPF. So there you go. Alright, yeah, and what’s its relevance to us in in the deliverability subject? Well, I’m gonna, I’m gonna actually bucket these together. I’m not. No, no, so I think that these are, these are really important to understand. They’re very technical. I will say you only need to understand them once, probably, uh, the first time that you set up your email system, and then you only have to change them if you either change your domain name or send your change your sending IP address, which you probably don’t know what your sending IP address is, so TLDR if you move to a different email system. You know, whoever you’re sending from owns that IP address. All of these different frameworks are just different ways to say, hey, I’m sending an email and I’m allowed to do that and I am who I am, so I like using myself as an example. This doesn’t apply I’m not a bulk sender, but if I were a bulk sender. We’ll use MNR. M&R sends a labs post periodically, you know, I write about deliverability you get in your inbox. Um, the SPF DIM and DMmark are all different ways of saying hello, this email is indeed from M&R. I’m not spamming you. I’m not spoofing. I have permission to send, I have permission to use this IP address and these things all line up, um. Part of the reason I’m bundling this together is honestly, I have spent time trying to understand the technical differences between these and what all of them are. And it doesn’t stick in my head because I don’t need it that often. I mean we needed this initially when we set it up set up our email with our provider, yes, yeah, you, you need to talk to your your email provider, your CRM, whatever you wanna call it, and you need to have access to your DNS, which is the back end of your website essentially, yes, exactly, and it is essentially taking different pieces of code from different. Places and pasting them in other places to say what I said that you are a legitimate you’re sending OK so I think it’s bucket. There are a lot of really great resources about these. I, I will be honest, I am not one of them. I can tell you that you need to have it and I can tell you you should check and keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn’t break, but it is. Hopefully you set it and forget it. If we don’t have an IT uh CIO or an IT director manager, who should we check with? You should check with whoever you are sending your email out of. So your Salesforce, your Fonterra, every action, they will have their support team, um, so one of these again, uh, I don’t have a best friend of mine, one of those, they, they will. have to set up for you to provide the code to say you know we own this IP address and you’re allowed to send from it, but they will be able to help you through the other pieces because obviously they they want you to be able to send email successfully out of their system so they will be able to walk you through the technical difficulties or hopefully not difficulties, the technical details, give you the code, tell you where to put it, talk to if you don’t have an IT team, whoever is the best person with access to the back end of your website. Um, and that sort of thing that they’re gonna be a good resource. This is all about proving that you are who you say you have to send this. Name the sender that we’re telling you it’s coming from. It’s both the domain so whatever parts after the at sign of the email address, so MRSS.com for me uh and the IP address that is owned by that email tool that you’re using. OK, OK, um, we can spend more time together if if there’s more you want to say about deliverability that we haven’t talked about yet. Let’s see, I think the one other thing I wanna say is that um it’s really important to pay attention to and that means some sort of monitoring or reporting system. uh I think that it it is it can be tricky, right, because if you’re a small nonprofit, you don’t have a ton of resources, you’re gonna try to not pay attention until there’s a problem. That can be costly because then first of all you, you have a problem that you haven’t noticed for a while um and then it can be harder to fix and then you’re also trying to fix it at the same time you’re trying to figure out how can I tell if I fixed it. So I think it’s worth taking a little bit of. of time and setting up a couple of tools that will let you monitor what your deliverability is. Is it still generally better to have a mail to a smaller list that’s more engaged than a larger list with a lot of unengaged addresses? That’s a that’s a yes no question and I like to say it depends. um I think that what you wanna look at is how many people you’re actually reaching. I’m not gonna say like smaller is always better. I’m, I’m honestly more in that middle part. I wanna try and figure out how many people you can reach to maximize your program without hurting deliverability and kind of find that line and stay just on this side of it, um. Look at your actual numbers oftentimes if you’re sending to a huge list of people, the only big number is how many emails were sent and how many emails were delivered. You wanna look at, you know, we like to look at percentages, but you wanna look at like who in terms of numbers is actually opening or clicking and especially donating or taking action or signing up for your events or whatever that end goal is. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So yeah, so there’s value, you just said this. I’m just reiterating. Uh, there is value in looking at the metrics, some key metrics. I don’t know, once a month or something or maybe more. It depends on how often you’re sending email, but I, I will say not once an email. Um, deliverability can be kind of volatile. So if you’re looking at it once an email is a good way to give yourself a scare and like have a false false positive in terms of there being a problem. Uh, once a month is usually good for most people or once a campaign. Um, and just taking a look at looking at that performance, if you can looking at performance by recipient domain, so dividing up and saying what was the open rate for my gmail.com subscribers, what was the open rate for my Yahoo.com subscribers because all those inbox providers have their own spam filters, so. Even though they use the same kinds of data, their users have different data points, so a decline consistent trend with one provider compared to the others, you might have an issue with that provider web person or IT provider. Rules at that provider. I mean, if you, if it’s noticeable enough that if it’s if it’s enough of a decline that it’s, it bothers you. And if it doesn’t bother you if it’s only a couple of maybe it’s not worth spending time on that. Yes, take a step back, look at your whole program. Yeah, I mean it’s good to look at individual domains because if Gmail thinks you’re you’re absolutely peachy and Yahoo thinks you’re sketchy, why would you do anything about Gmail? Why would you cut back on, you know, maybe main fix that you have is is to send to less engaged people and more sorry less unengaged people and more engaged people and if Gmail says, yeah, no, everybody’s engaged, why would you cut back sending there if the problems with Yahoo. OK, savvy advice overall. Thank you. All right, Ann, Ann, and Pasaic, managing production specialist M and give your grandma my good wishes. I admire 92. I do plan to fundraising, so I work with 70, 80, 90 year olds and I don’t know any 90 year olds with an Apple Watch, so she’s an outlier on, on the good side. On the on the Ambitious. Yeah, in the connected. Thank you. Thank you very much, Ann. Thanks for sharing and thank you for listening as 25 NTC, the 2025 nonprofit technology conference where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting. Next week, healthier productivity from AI with Mika Whitlock and Jason Shim. If you missed any part of this week’s show, I beseech you. Find it at Tony Martignetti.com. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. I’m your associate producer Kate Martignetti. The show social media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein. Thank you for that affirmation, Scotty. Be with us next week for nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great.

Nonprofit Radio for May 12, 2025: Connect Small Donors To Your Major Donor Event & Add Experiential Elements To Your Events

Jenn Lejano & Jess Ray: Connect Small Donors To Your Major Donor Event

Jenn Lejano and Jess Ray show you how to connect folks who would never come to your expensive event, to your expensive event. They’ll help you broaden event support by engaging donors you’re probably leaving on the sidelines, with actionable strategies to engage your entire donor base. Jenn is from Fresh Eyes Digital and Jess is with The Adler Planetarium. This is part of our coverage of the 2025 Nonprofit Technology Conference (#25NTC).

 

Genie Gratto: Add Experiential Elements To Your Events

You can learn from big brands to create buzz and emotional connections around your events, without spending the money they do. You’ll engage your supporters emotionally as you incorporate experiential and interactive features into your events. Genie Gratto is at GWRITES. The resource she shared is here. This conversation is also from #25NTC.

 

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And welcome to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host and the podfather of your favorite hebdominal podcast. Did you notice last week’s show was all AI? This week’s show also has a theme. I, I want you to know that this show is meticulously, scrupulously planned week after week. These things don’t just happen. It’s not random. It’s, it’s carefully plotted week after week. And I’m glad you’re with us. I’d suffer the embarrassment of Catahora if you woke me with the idea that you missed this week’s show. Here’s our associate producer Kate with what’s going on. Hey Tony, we’re all about events today with two conversations from 25 NTC. First, Connect small donors to your major donor event. Jen Le Hanno and Jess Ray show you how to connect folks who would never come to your expensive event to your expensive event. They’ll help you broaden event support by engaging donors you’re probably leaving on the sidelines with actionable strategies to engage your entire donor base. Jen is from Fresh Eyes Digital, and Jess is with the Adler Planetarium. Then Add experiential elements to your events. You can learn from big brands to create buzz and emotional connections around your events without spending the money they do. You’ll engage your supporters emotionally as you incorporate experiential and interactive features into your events. Jenny Grotto is at Grs. On Tony’s take 2. The federal budget Here is connect small donors to your major donor event. inaugurating our coverage of 25 NTC, the 2025 nonprofit Technology Conference with this very interview right now that you are listening to. It’s our first one of the, of the, of the conference. We’re all together in Baltimore at the Baltimore Convention Center. Where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting software and services in technology for nonprofits. My guests now are Jen Lehano. Did I say your name right? I should have asked you off mic. Leno is good. All right. And Jess Ray. Jen is a partner and co-founder at Fresh Eyes Digital. Jess Ray is associate director of individual giving at the Adler Planetarium, which we all know is in Chicago, Illinois. Jen, Jess, I’m sure to get confused, uh, you’re not even you are sitting in alphabetical order if you get, but, uh, my first, my first and last name, right, Jen, Jess, welcome. Thank you, pleasure to have you. Thank you for kicking off our, our coverage of 25 MTC. Your session topic is connect small dollar donors to your major donor event. Uh, let’s start, uh, down the end of the panel of two. Jen, Jen, Jess, exactly. I did that on purpose. Just testing us. Uh, I wish I could, I wish that were true. Uh, OK, Jess, thank you. Um, yeah, uh, this is not even something that I would that I think is on the radar of a lot of event fundraising planners, uh, nonprofits, just like overview, we got plenty of time together, but overview, uh. Well, why did you think we should be doing this? Why did you feel this was a necessary topic? Well, um, first of all, the Adler is really inclusive, so we wanted to make sure that we were, um, bringing everyone into our space, and we also wanted to take advantage of our wonderful partner Tom Skilling who Chicagoans will know and he really connects with people so that was our thought is how do we um. Use him in a way that is both makes sense for him as well for us in taking advantage of our event that otherwise we would ignore. OK um and are you, are you both in Chicago or I am yeah OK and uh is the Adler Planetarium. Uh, a client of specialized digital. Oh, OK, so we have a client, uh, a client consultant relationship. All right, um, why don’t, why don’t you give us your overview. So I think, you know, one of the things when Jen. Really, are you sure? Are you sure it’s Jack? Damn. There’s only 2. I mean, I have 50 50% chances and I blow it every time. I’m not buying lottery tickets for that, Jen, that’s what I said, yeah, um, so you know, one of the things when we were working with the team at Adler, uh, you know, their celestial bash, which is their annual fundraising gala was coming up, and you know one of the things that they talked about was like, you know, how do we do more with our individual donors? We have this event. The ticket price for that. Event is not for individual donors, right? It’s a mid major more on the major side, um, in terms of the ticket price because it’s a fundraising event, it’s a large gala, um, you know, it’s, it’s not something that like your everyday $50 donor is gonna probably attend and our advice actually was ignore your gala. Right, so it was, uh, we shouldn’t actually be making this about the gala or about um the major donor event but we should engage people by using the celebrity Tom Skilling, um, uh, you know, using the gala uh timeline as a deadline for the campaign and we should build an individual giving campaign pre-event that helps drive momentum and drive interest as we’re getting up to that event. So the goal was really actually don’t try to. Great individual donors into your major donor event, but let’s give something for individual donors to get excited about that connects to your event so that was that was kind of how we were approaching it. OK um and and Jess, so connect to the event but not so you’re not inviting. Uh, when you say small dollar donors, which I, you know, I appreciate, you know, a lot of, a lot of folks in our community will say modest donors, like, like you’re insulting them if you say they’re small donors or small dollar donors, but you’re not commenting on their character. They’re not small people. They just make small gifts. I just call it what it is. So, so thank you for saying small dollar donors are not modest. I mean, I don’t mind modest, but small, they make small gifts. They’re not, they’re not small people. All right, so you’re, you’re connecting with the gala, but You’re not inviting the folks to the gala, is that right, Jess? Correct, OK, so explain the connection, but you don’t get an invitation. uh, say, say a little more Jess. So one of the things we also took advantage of was our theme for the gala and which was on Wonder and so Todd does just inspire wonder and all when you interact with him. So we created a special campaign and like Jen said, use the bash event date as the like ground. point to say oh we have a match in place we need to get it in by this date and that’s how we used it to circle around and taking advantage of also um the media that we had around the celestial event because we were honoring Tom to mention to the wider base like our WGN. Post about the campaigns, yeah. I’m sorry. OK. All right, get the word out about it too. So the small dollar donors. Uh, the campaign to the small dollar donors, does it mention the gala or it just says it just uses the gala, very little, so yeah, and that was intentional. So I think like one of the things as consultants that we’ve seen is um nonprofits tend to overemphasize the importance. I’m Jen yeah there we go. You got it you got it this time. Now you can get the lottery ticket, um, yeah, but we have. There’s plenty of time to spoil, um, but so many nonprofits come to us and say, oh, we’re having this event and the event really becomes the central focus for the organization and it is kind of exclusionary to most of their donors, right? And so you know we talked about like could we, how do we get individual donors kind of involved and finally it was like we don’t, right? Like we don’t try to get them involved in the gala but we use all of that energy and. The effort that the nonprofit themselves are putting into the gala to create a campaign that will work for individual donors and so we didn’t talk about the gala a lot in email communications or in social posts things like that um we did talk about how Tom Skilling was being honored at the upcoming gala so that it wasn’t like we were hiding it but um but really I think the advice is I mean we’re kind of flipping this on its head, right? The advice is not for you to like get your small dollar donors involved in your. Major donor event it’s actually to ignore the major donor event and get your small dollar donors uh involved ahead of time and there are things that I think you can do at an event right that could um I mean if we didn’t have time to pull this off this year right? but I think like you could have kind of uh uh you know a thank you wall or something at the event that’s thanking those individual donors the one thing that I think Tom did really beautifully at the event. Was he made sure to call out the campaign because he was really proud of the campaign we we branded it the Tom Skilling great space Challenge, right? And so it was, you know, help raise $35,000 and it’ll be matched dollar for dollar and he posted it on all of his social networks, things like that, right? And then when he was at the event he was like, I am blown away by how many people donated and how many people love Adler and this campaign was a. Amazing. And so at the major donor event he was talking about the individual giving campaign and his impact that he had by running that campaign with Adler was the yeah let’s let’s give a shout to this guy Tom Skilling the Adlers in Chicago I don’t know. It is if anyone is listening, if anyone is listening from Chicago, I’m sure that by right now there’s like screaming because he’s he’s just the most authentic genuine person you’ve ever met. He’s the weatherman from WGM. He’s a weatherman, yeah, he’s been a weatherman for 45 years but he recently retired. OK, so he’s he’s on. Just retired and so we also took advantage of him retiring yeah now he’s spending his time in Hawaii and Chicago, but yeah, so he fled Chicago. I’m sure Tom would not do that. um, so what, um, what did the campaign look like? So give us a little more detail on what, uh, so yeah, I mean, so we um we developed uh the. Campaign plan, uh, the number of emails we were gonna send, uh, recommendations on social posts, and then, um, our amazing designer Thelma Andre who’s here volunteering at NTC, um, she developed the graphics and so she did this kind of, um, cartoonish, uh, you know, because it’s a really fun campaign, uh, the Tom Scaling Great Space Challenge and all of Adler’s, uh, brand colors and guidelines, um, and you know, and again a lot of this really rested on. Tom’s own promotion because he has a very engaged active Facebook following and um and he’s definitely sometimes one of those all caps posters you know like he’s just so enthusiastic and so he promoted the campaign multiple times and was often ready before we were saying like just let me know when I need to put this on Facebook I’ll do it my followers will do anything I know they will um so you know so we developed kind of all of the assets for the uh for the digital campaign. Um, and worked with the Adler team on, on how, how long was the it was just 3 or 4 weeks before the, before the thing. We didn’t want it to be too long. We really wanted to have it in a condensed time frame, which is how we often run a lot of digital campaigns, but, um, and you know, and then with the goal of to meet the matching gift for the 35,000 dollars, yeah, yeah, and you had a donor who was, uh, stepped up to do that we did that match, OK yeah. Um, I mean, what else are you gonna, I know you haven’t done your session yet because the sessions haven’t started. We’re, we’re in the midst of the opening keynote right now. That’s what you’re in the background. Um, what else are you gonna share? We still have time together. What else are you gonna share with your audience? I mean, we actually, we have two sessions that we’re presenting and they’re in the it’s both about the same campaign but from a different angle so we have connecting the small dollar donors um and then also like utilizing a celebrity influencer right? like so how do you make the most out of working with somebody like a Tom Skilling, um, how do you make the right asks, um, how do you prioritize your asks when they have limited time. Um, and so we’re doing two sessions actually kind of related to that campaign. Alright, let’s focus on the dollar donor side, um, and what else, what else is there on the, the small, you know, like actionable strategies is what I’m just reading from your, your session description, actionable strategies for engaging your entire donor base. What, what did you do? This is, is this the first year you did this? Small dollar donor campaign for before I gave up a major event, OK, yeah, yeah. What we really focused on. Was capturing the right tone and messaging so that it related to everyone and donors are donors, but you do speak a little bit differently to your average everyday small dollar donor than you do maybe a major donor or an institutional donor, so making sure that it came through an Adler’s authentic language and audience um. Voice, but as well as it made it made sense that it was coming from Tom Skilling so that was really important to when he’s talking through his Facebook to make sure that it sounded like him, even though it was wrote by the Adler so that was a really big part was to make sure that you’re speaking at the right way to your donors that make them feel like they’re part of it even though they are not attending the event that we had minimize, they know that it’s still happening but they don’t feel left out. When you were uh defining who’s gonna be part of the campaign, what what kind of criteria did you use in querying was it any size gift or what kind of period of time, what what what what were your parameters? We did have a special page that any gifts given towards that, so we ranged from I think $5 to somebody gave a $3000 gift into that campaign. um, so that all counted and then I think yeah Jen said. 23 weeks during that period also counted I means be invited to join the queries uh yeah so it was it was the full file it was the full file minus um the folks that they had already identified as invitees to the to the the everybody right, right, and I think I don’t in years past you had you had done an invite. Kind of out to everybody, right? And and that was the thing that they didn’t want to repeat, right? Because it was like uh it’s very tone deaf. Yeah, like nobody’s gonna buy those tickets, right, they were all digital, so we didn’t do any, we don’t do at this time. But actually when we look at when we crunch the numbers, a lot of them were first time donors that we had garnered through Tom. he has great outreach and engagement. OK, so you, you were able to acquire some new donors. And uh what about the, the overall revenue the arbuilding since 2020 and this was a 35,000 dollars, right? OK. And then didn’t we get you got that one we did we um we also had an anonymous donor reach out that was so um inspired by this campaign to say that they want to make sure we meet that match no matter what and we responded back, well, we’ve actually already met it. Thank you so much. We do still have a gap on our event uh goal and they’re like, how much is it? and said oh it’s about $45 like no problem, and they just sent us a check for $5000 yeah, outstanding. There’s something about planetariums. What is it? How come I love? I grew up with the um uh in New York City, the Hayden’s because we have the sky above us and so can look up s looking up to the sky. It’s a universal thing that brings us all together. Yeah, very well. So you didn’t think much of that movie Don’t look upon. I actually didn’t see that one. Do you know? Do you know? Oh no, it’s a big, it’s a great satire of our current politics and There’s this, there’s this earth threatening asteroid or major outer space object headed to Earth, and there are a lot of people who who don’t want you to know about it, so they just say don’t look up. satire. It’s it’s pure satire. Leonardo DiCaprio is very good. Um, is Amy Adams, I think too. I’m not sure about Amy Adams, but Leonardo DiCaprio is very good. You’ll love it’s a good satire. I’ll have to check it out. Thank you. Don’t look up. Um, alright, anything else that we we still have some time if uh if you do, is there anything more you’re gonna say that uh you haven’t shared don’t hold out on nonprofit radio listeners on the side. I just, you know, I just think it’s, um, I think again it’s like a little bit about approach and just thinking, you know, instead of starting with the question of like how do we bring these people into this big event. Of thinking a little bit more kind of audience first or donor first, right? Like so we know these folks are not gonna buy tickets to this, right? And even though I mean it was an awesome event I got the chance to go and you know you’re walking around the planetarium blah blah blah but yeah, I mean donors just don’t think of right they don’t have the resources or they don’t believe that they have the capacity or they just don’t or they. but don’t have interest, you’re not you’re you’re not one of the top charities. So yeah, they don’t, they love you, but not that, not just not that much. So there’s just, there’s, I mean you were not in that way, yeah, but, but you were realistic about that. These are folks that are not gonna come. Like the odds of them buying a ticket are so small. So let’s, and so Jane, you had the idea of let’s try to do something else like that. How do we engage them and how do we meet them where they are and I think like especially when you’re in kind of and I know Jess can speak to this more right but when you’re in the chaos of um prepping for an event and when it takes up kind of all of the air in the room especially for the entire staff right like it’s it’s all hands on deck for that kind of an event and it’s so critically important in terms of fundraising. Um, that it can be really tough to step back and be like, oh but how are we engaging the folks who are not coming to the event, right? And so I think the planning started early. I mean we started talking about this spring, yeah, like in the in the spring and the event was in September, right? So we started just kind of percolating on like how are we gonna do this and what is a way we can do this it’ll be really effective um and help you with a fundraising goal. It’s not gonna bring in the million dollars of your major donor event right? um but. There is kind of a place for individual donors to be a part of it even if we’re not specifically saying like you know this is our annual gala campaign like we would never call it an annual gala campaign because also nobody gives a shit about that so like you know like it just right right so I think like um but you know the the team at Adler is just I mean first of all they all work incredibly well together and I think have really great lines of communication and I think that ability to kind of be like. You know we don’t wanna we don’t wanna just send out a blanket invite we don’t really know how to do this but we wanna do something and um because I do think like the mission is so inspiring and they’re I mean their assets, their um their voice, their tone. Um, it’s one of the most fun brands that we get to work with, um, because it’s, I mean if you you should follow them on social media, their social media is really fun and incredible, um, but you know they just, it, it’s all very heartfelt and everybody really loves being there and you can kind of see that and feel that in their communications and that’s what we wanted to make sure it came through in the campaign as well to engage those donors authentically is really important with us so we don’t wanna be talking down to anyone. And make them feel that they are welcome in our space even if they aren’t at the event. Yeah, you’re not ignore them for the whatever the two months that lead up to the campaign I mean the gala when when like you said um it’s all, it’s all hands on deck. Everybody’s devoted to it and we’re ignoring what I don’t know, 80% of our file or whatever right exactly that’s exactly what we don’t want to do, right. All right, yeah, and anything else you feel like we’ve I feel like, yeah, I think so. Alright, alright. You’re Jenjano, uh, and co-founder of Fresh Eyes Digital, Chicago-based, and Jess Ray, associate director of individual giving at the Adler Planetarium, also Chicago, of course. Um, so thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Jen. And Jess, you got it right. Thank you, thank you for come back year after year and then like names or something. Thank you very much. Thanks for sharing and thank you for being with Tony Martignetti nonprofit radio coverage of 25 NTC the 2025 nonprofit technology conference where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting. It’s time for Tony’s Take-Two. Thank you, Kate. We’re in the process now in Washington DC that the Trump regime’s uh proposed budget is under consideration and it has to be approved by the Senate and the House, which means it can be amended by the Senate and the House. I’m concerned that there are things in this budget that are very bad for the nonprofit community, including individual members of the nonprofit community. Uh, I wrote on LinkedIn, uh, about this extensively. Uh, by the time you hear this, it’ll be last week’s LinkedIn, uh, long post, about as long it’s like one extra character I could put in. So about the longest you can, it’s the longest you can put in LinkedIn, um, but I’m urging. All of us in the nonprofit community to stand together in support of the community at large, because we all know how important all the work is that all of us do. Throughout the community and standing for individual members, nonprofits that are being targeted, like. Harvard University and the public broadcasting system. My encouragement in that LinkedIn post is to contact your House Representative and your two senators and not just do it once but multiple times, even if you can take 5 minutes a day to call the 3 of them. One at a time, and then on the 4th day, go back to the top of the list and call the 3 of them in the next 3 days. We have to keep up the pressure. The nonprofit community is so much stronger when we stand together united. Again, for the whole community, but also for each of our individual members. Cause when they go after one, and they succeed, they go after a 2nd, they succeed, it’s like a row of dominoes. And you know what happens to the dominoes that are lined up right after the 1st 1 and the second one. If you want, you can take a look at the LinkedIn post from last week, or just Be calling your congress people. Repeatedly To keep up the pressure that the nonprofit community and it’s each of its, each of its members. not be targeted by this budget. That is Tony’s take 2. Kate I don’t have much to add other than everyone has the right to make sure that their voice is heard, and if you like can’t go to protests and you just wanna stay home, stay home and make a phone call. It’s all you gotta do. There are a lot of ways to be involved and, and the lots of different forms of activism. You’re right. We’ve got Boku but loads more time. Here is add experiential elements to your events. Welcome to Tony Martignetti nonprofit radio coverage of 25 NTC, the 2025 nonprofit Technology Conference. We’re together in community at the Baltimore, Maryland Convention Center. Our coverage of 25 NTC is sponsored by Heller Consulting Technology services for nonprofits. With me now is Jeannie Grotto, communications strategist and consultant at GWrights. Jeannie, welcome to nonprofit radio. Well, thank you for having me. It’s good to be here. I’m glad you are. Thank you. Your session topic is add experiential elements to nonprofit events on a budget. And uh why don’t you give me an overview of what, uh, some sense of for our listeners in small and mid-size nonprofits, some sense of what uh what experiential events. Yeah, I mean, you know that’s anything where you can have sort of an interactive. Thing something that you’re doing like something that your audience members are doing that um allows them to really participate in the event in a different way so they’re not just passively engaged in the event they’re being part of it, being part of that event story. um. And we can do this without uh like affectation I mean we can we can weave it into the event. Absolutely. I mean I think um really what you’re trying to do anytime you have an event uh and you this doesn’t have to cost money is really think about the story that you want that event to tell so it’s almost like a three act structure. Right, it’s like act one is leading up to the event and kind of how are you preparing people to come into where you are. Act 2 is really at the event itself and then act 3, which is actually the hardest I think um is following up afterwards and how are you keeping people engaged in the mission. Um, and in the work that you were hoping they would get out of the event. OK. Oh, interesting. Alright, so good, we can weave this into our longer term goals for the event, which is longer term participation not just for an afternoon or exactly exactly and I think that’s the hardest, especially for small nonprofits, I think, um, and medium sized even large ones. I always talk about yeah yeah I mean I talk a lot about and and have been part of teams um where there’s a big event maybe a big annual event and the whole organization ends up in what we call this kind of whirlpool of the event itself um everybody gets sucked into this world. And then all of a sudden like there’s very little other work happening in the organization and so even people that are not used to working on events are working on it and being part of that process and so everybody gets sucked in then you have the event there’s all this adrenaline leading up to that and then you know you’re working really hard at the event. And then everybody hits the wall at the end of the event and everything stops and that is the part that I think is hardest for uh nonprofit staff if you know if you’re a corporation that has regular corporate events you have a whole events team and that’s all they’re doing so they’re used to that cycle of like following up afterward and getting people to. Participate in different ways um I think it’s harder for staffs that are either less experienced at events or just smaller staffs to really do that final push after the event and kind of carry it all the way through but that’s when you get the most bang for your buck with people connecting to your mission. Yeah, yeah, and you might try to unmute, um, see, see, see what happens, see what happens, uh, because since it’s just two of us, unmute our loudspeaker. We’ll see, um, you have some uh advice or strategies that we can learn from big brands in, in, uh, experiential events. Yeah, I mean I think that people, people really do look to big brands and think oh like they’re the ones that can do this so the the examples that I used in my session, um you know for example IKEA has an app that uses augmented reality you can pick out a piece of furniture. You can point your camera at your room, your living room or whatever, say you’ve picked a couch, it’ll put the couch in the middle of the room for you and you can really see what it looks like and um you know what they’re trying to do is engage you in feeling more confident about your purchase and feeling more comfortable with what the product’s really gonna look like um and that is a cool experience too like it’s really cool to be able to kind of place the couch that you haven’t purchased yet, right? Um, yeah, so it’s it’s like there’s a try on room for for furniture exactly and you know I mean it’s, it’s not cheap to develop that software that 3D software. My husband is a 3D software engineer. I know what it takes to get that stuff up and running. It’s hard and um and so that’s not the kind of thing that a nonprofit is gonna do, of course, but again it’s that that like you’re trying to engage people’s emotions and you can do that at kind of any scale. So another example I use. Um, you know, we’ve got to give love to Taylor Swift and so Taylor Swift had, um, worked with Spotify to do this installation right before the Tortured poets department was released and it was this library installation in LA. It was in Glendale somewhere, um, and it was just this thing you stood in line and then you could move through the library. There were little interactive elements. There were places where you could write things down, you could read little lyrics that weren’t released yet, so it was like a little puzzle, yeah, and you. Of course both Spotify and Taylor Swift have huge marketing budgets, but you know you can always have you could put out a set of journals for people to leave messages in at your event that costs the cost of the journals and the pens and you give people prompts to put in those journals and that doesn’t cost anything but it does allow people to have just a little bit of interactivity if it again you know like if that is an appropriate thing tied to your mission. In some way you get, you know, the prompts need to be tied in or whatever, it allows people to have that kind of tactile activity that then they can, you know, really. Feel part of the mission and part of the story. And then just to follow that thread, what what would you end up or pull on the thread or mix my metaphors, um, what would you do with those, those journal prompts that people write no I’m sorry, you’re providing the prompts, I mean the journal entries, well, yeah, you could use them in a number of ways. I mean, obviously you wanna make sure people know how they’re gonna get used before you use them, um, and one of the other pieces that I always recommend is to sort of think through any kind of interactivity or experiential element. Um, in ways that fit different needs, so not everybody is gonna be able to write something down. You might have folks who either can’t see to do that, maybe they, you know, aren’t able to and so figuring out maybe an alternative thing, maybe they can leave some voice memos that you could use or maybe there’s some other way that they can interact with those prompts but again it’s just, you know, that’s the kind of thing where people can come up it’s kind of like. Little activity station they can be part of it if you wanted to use that as user user generated content on social or on websites or things like that that would be one way maybe it’s something where you are even in kind of real time bringing up copies of the journals and having people read pieces of them out loud you know I mean I think like really it’s it’s less about the details of the activity and more about. How can you sort of think very creatively about ways to engage people experientially at the moment in ways that are tied to your mission? So we’ve kind of segued into from big brands to what nonprofits can do. So, I love the journal entry, uh, journal idea not not expensive like you said, but experiential nonetheless. What what other strategies tactics? Yeah, I mean, so there’s kind of three principles that I like people to really think about so one of them is indeed that it needs to be really interactive and so there needs to be something participatory about it. Um, something else that I like people to think about is, um, making it sensory, you know, like not just thinking about sight, um, thinking about sound, thinking about taste, touch, you know, all of the think about all the senses and how to engage those in different ways and you don’t have to engage all of them in any of these things, but that also. Locks a little piece of this which is that you know it provides different things what’s the music you choose like you know if you’re gonna be choosing music to play you know as people are walking up on stage or something like that like how is that gonna fit in to whatever your mission is, whatever your theme is all of that um and you know again it’s um. It’s just part of thoughtful event design, but if you are really thinking about how to tie all of these pieces back to your mission, it can be really helpful. So for example, um, a music example is when we had the Grace Hopper celebration. I used to work for Anita B.org and they have the Grace Hopper celebration every year which is a big, big, big and well funded conference that serves women in tech from around the world and so we. We had to create a playlist of songs that could be used um you know it breaks and things like that and we had a lot of criteria we had to meet to be able to they needed to be empowering they needed to be clean like the lyrics needed to be clean we needed to think about the needs of audience members from all around the world and all different cultures and religious backgrounds and so we had to it took us a long time to make this list of songs. But that was again it was intentional and then you know you know did you Helen Reddy, I am by chance? I think we did. I think we did, although we were it was the International, it was a song of international women in it was it came out in 1977 or something like that. I know we were skewing a little more contemporary, but I think, you know, that one always shows up. So what are you gonna do, yes, Simon and Garfunkel, please. These are all my favorites too, not for the, not for the tech women’s uh women’s tech conference. Alright, um, OK, no, so music, yeah, music. What other like, alright, so I would not have thought of music. What, what other sensory, I mean, aside from we’re gonna get to some hopefully like some activities type things, but, but just general sensory. Uh, visuals, visuals, sounds, I mean we’re probably not thinking about, right? I mean, I think you know if so for example if you’re doing visuals, I mean you know of any kind, you wanna also think about what about the folks who can’t see it, you know, I mean, is there, are there gonna be ways for people to get audio description? Are there gonna be other ways for people to interact with something. Um, is there a tactile element? So one of the ideas that I put in or that we talked about in the session was, um, you know, letting people vote on something, um, with some sort of tactile object. So I think uh like I was talking specifically about, um, in Iowa City there’s a restaurant that like does this coffee bean voting thing during the primary and during the caucus season. And there is something really satisfying and a lot of people with a lot of different abilities can do it where you’re like picking up a coffee bean out of this bowl of coffee beans and then you’re dropping it into this glass jar for each for the candidate that you’re choosing and you’re hearing that and it’s like hitting that pool of coffee beans and you’re hearing it like maybe rattle against. The jar on the way down um and you know and then you’re able to stand there and look at kind of where the levels are on the different candidates and kind of get a sense of where the caucus might go in that part of Johnson County um and you know I think that nonprofits could use an idea like that maybe there’s you know maybe you’re asking folks for input on. You know, 3 policy priorities like what are the ones that you think are most important in the coming year or um you know any other thing like that you know something that where people can kind of give their input in a real tactile way and then also you’ve got. The opportunity to take pictures of that and you’ve got these kind of nice layered looks and you can use those pictures to sort of show that like what people are feeling who came to the event there’s all kinds of ways to sort of spool this out good visuals yeah OK OK. Um, Anything else uh you wanna transition well, the, the, the third thing that, um, that I did not say is sort of the third principle is that, um, is that storytelling aspect of it and like really helping folks feel like part of that story of your events. So what again this. It’s back to that sort of 3 act narrative that we were talking about like where do you want them to come in on that story line? How do you want them to feel part of it and the more emotional connection they have with that story and often these interactive activities can help them build that connection um. The more they have that connection they will again support your mission in so many ways they’ll take action on your policy issues they’ll be more likely to be donors they’ll be more likely to like come back and maybe volunteer they’ll open your emails you know I mean there’s just so many ways in which this stuff ends up paying off in the long haul. Um, how about, um, activities that we can, uh, I’d like to talk maybe some activities before or during and then post and how you can, uh, because the, the post engagement is so important. So maybe one or two that you know during that you’ve seen or recommend, I mean you you can’t recommend because it depends on your mission, your events give us some mind opening uh an example or two, um, so I’m gonna give you one. I’m gonna tell a story that I uh I told the group and I also had shared in one other thing so before I came to this conference the Saturday before I went to a writer’s conference in DC, um, just it was a one day conference it was sponsored, uh, or run by Barrel House magazine, which is their press and a literary magazine, um, they do also put out books and I had never been to the conference before. Um, it’s about 200 people, so it’s much smaller than NTC, and it’s a pretty low budget conference. It was $85 to register and so one of the elements that they have of this is they have editor speed dating, so they have editors from different genres you can print out a few pages of what you have. Everybody got one ticket for a speed date as part of their registration, but. Um, you could purchase more if there was time you could purchase more for $5 a ticket, which gave them a little bit more revenue, um, and so you stood in this line and then they would bring everybody into this auditorium and sign you out to an editor and then they read your piece really quickly and give you some feedback. Well, you know, though I was standing there with an essay that I have worked on a lot and I feel like it’s in pretty good shape, I knew that it needed more work feeling a little. Vulnerable and I know I was not alone in that and I look over on the wall next to the line and there is an 8.5 by 11 sheet of paper and it doesn’t even have the barrel house logo on it. It just had conversations and connections practical advice for writers in their like brand color and it was like you know white text on the red brand color and then down below it just with black text on white it said you are doing great. And right there in that line I’m like, oh look, they see me and now I feel really kind of connected to this magazine. I’m gonna go home and subscribe probably you know and like um and it just it was this like little tiny moment. All it took was somebody thinking about that ahead of time thinking about what the audience was gonna need thinking about ways that we were gonna be interacting and recognizing that all of us standing in that line we’re feeling really vulnerable at that moment and we might need a little encouragement and just leaving it where we could see it. It didn’t take any work at all and almost no money. Incredible, but yeah, it took it took you need to be intentional. Alright, alright, uh, OK, before we leave the uh intro event to get to the post event. Any more advice about how to conceive of what works for you? I mean you, you, you hit it hard, you know, mission, obviously a mission related, maybe part of bigger goals for the um for the event as well as the organization. Anything else that. Yeah, I mean, I, no I mean I think it’s gotta have some sort of, it’s gotta give you an emotional connection yeah that’s like somebody’s got this is your responsibility to come up with correct something experiential for us. No, I mean I yeah this is something that I think any event staff like any team that’s putting together an event should just be thinking about like where are these places that you can kind of set these little intentional. Um, spots for people to engage and for people to be part of this conversation with the organization because that’s really what it is, right? It’s you’re, you’re trying to build a relationship and that’s what brands want the big brands wanna do they wanna build that relationship with you through emotion through connection so that you’ll buy their stuff in this case, you know, we can do the same thing in the nonprofit sector. But do that through different means, but it’s still the same effect. You wanna build emotion and then you wanna use that to leverage to get connection. OK, excellent emotion. Yeah, if you hit someone in the heart, you know, then I think the brain follows, uh, plus they’re saying the next day, oh my God, I went to this fun afternoon. I was, uh, you know, it was, I thought it was gonna be a typical charity lunch, but it turned out they had, you know, whatever and we were doing this all together and. So much fun when I got greeted this way or it could be something at the coat check, you know, whatever it is, right, so let’s go event are we continuing our experiential time? Sure, and the post event is the more challenging for sure because you’ve got people who dispersed. It’s not like you can just sort of set up a table. Um, but some of the ways that you can build that connection and keep that connection going is I know that like we’re moving as a sector away from just sort of sending people home with a bunch of random swag, right? Um, nobody needs little stuff that is just gonna sit around their house or that it’s gonna end up in their kids’ basket of junk, yeah, or more tote bags and things like that, um. But what I would say is that there might be a thoughtful piece of low lift swag that you can send home with people that will let people continue to engage. So for example, examples I talked about yesterday were um. If you’re a literacy organization like sending someone home with a bookmark with maybe some ideas for how they can stay involved on that bookmark maybe they’ll use it maybe they won’t but you know if they’re working with if they’re interested in a literacy organization they’re probably a reader and so you can probably um assume that they will be reading books and they might use it um I also suggested that like another low lift idea was if you’re an environmental organization. Send people out the door with a packet of seeds. It doesn’t have to be like a specially branded packet of seeds. Um, I know TechSoup is here. They’ve got these like beautiful little pots with little seed things embedded in them, yeah they do. It’s lovely, um, but I see, yeah, and seeds exactly grants, exactly, um, but you know it doesn’t even have to be that elaborate. It can just be go to your local hardware store, get a bunch of seed packets, print. Out some labels with your logo and you know sort of a thank you for being part of our our growth or something I don’t know um put that on the packets and hand those to people as they go. Some people will plant them some people will take them home and put them in that drawer, you know, the junk drawer that has the other seed packets like I have that I haven’t planted yet exactly, but at some point I’m gonna open that drawer and I’m gonna take out that seed packet as I’m cleaning out the drawer and be like, oh right. I need to re up my connection with this particular organization, you know, so it’s, it’s ways of sort of leaving things with people after the fact um the other idea that I shared yesterday is, uh, if you’ve got a big keynote speaker that might be, you know, that is of real interest to your audience which is hopefully what you’ve brought in um. Having them maybe do kind of like a behind the scenes or backstage message that’s beyond the keynote that’s sort of like thanks so much and here are ways that you can continue supporting this organization and then emailing that out to folks after the fact so they have or texting it to folks however you’re regularly communicating with people so that they have that too as a little takeaway and just a reminder that you know the organization was thinking beyond the end of the event and you should be too. OK, um, have you ever seen anything where you’re welcome to say no, this is a harebrained idea, like with a male, I mean, everybody was in one place at one time, but, uh, like ship a surprise or mail a surprise or anything like that after event. I have seen a little bit of that, but I actually also suggested to folks that one kind of during the event during the event you could absolutely. Have some sort of letter writing station where you are perhaps having people write letters to policy makers or to you know whatever you know whoever and then you’re mailing those after but you could also have people write letters to themselves that you mail like a month later that again you know by then they’ve forgotten that they wrote the thing and then it comes in and they’ll remember as soon as they see the envelope of course but it’s like this. Just this post touch point that’s like oh yeah get you back to that moment when you were writing that letter to yourself so maybe it’s about asking you, you know, maybe you’re asking people to make some sort of pledge of what they’re gonna do when they get back from the event or get home that evening or you know whatever and then they get it in the mail and they’re reminded to take the action and they’re reminded of the event and they’re reminded of your connection to them and then theirs to you OK. Anything else? What, what else, uh, what other topic, uh, did you cover in the session? I don’t want you to hold out on nonprofit radio listeners. I mean that was, that was the big, the big thing. There were tons and tons of ideas, um, and I did, uh, I did share this in in the collaborative notes, but I would also be happy to share that link to kind of a two-page handout that has all like all the ideas I shared in the, uh, entire session. Um, I’d be happy to or can you just say it now? Uh, it’s, it’s a Google doc. It’s like a PDF on Google, but yeah, but you could absolutely include that in your show notes if you wanted. I mean, I think that, um, I always believe that more ideas out in the sector is better than fewer, so I have no. Right of ownership to any of them and I’m happy to have people take them and use them as inspiration and you know really make their events engaging and exciting and emotionally connected. OK, yeah, we’ll get the link from you and we’ll put it in the show notes for the Google Drive. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you so much for having me. Oh my pleasure. Thank you, Jeannie, for sharing all your ideas. Jeannie Grotto, communication strategist and consultant at Gs. Thanks, Tony. My pleasure and thank you for being with Tony Martignetti Nonprofit radio coverage of the 25, 2025 nonprofit technology conference where our coverage is sponsored by Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits. Next week, 225 NTC conversations that are random, disjointed, and unrelated. Wait. If you missed any part of this week’s show, I beseech you. Find it at Tony Martignetti.com. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. I’m your associate producer Kate Martignetti. The show’s social media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein. Thank you for that affirmation, Scotty. Be with us next week for nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great.

Nonprofit Radio for May 5, 2025: PII In The Age Of AI & Balance AI Ethics And Innovation

Kim Snyder & Shauna Dillavou: PII In The Age Of AI

Artificial Intelligence and big data have transformed privacy risks by enabling malicious, targeted communications to your team that seem authentic because they contain highly accurate information. Kim Snyder and Shauna Dillavou explain the risks your nonprofit faces and what you can do to protect your mission. Kim is from RoundTable Technology and Shauna is CEO of Brightlines. This continues our coverage of the 2025 Nonprofit Technology Conference (#25NTC).

 

Gozi EgbuonuBalance AI Ethics And Innovation

Gozi Egbuonu encourages you to adopt Artificial Intelligence responsibly, in a human-centered approach. First, be thoughtful with the threshold question, “Should we use AI?” If you go ahead: Create a thorough use policy; overcome common challenges like staff training and identifying champions; manage change intentionally; and more. Gozi is with Technology Association of Grantmakers. This is also part of our #25NTC coverage.

 

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Welcome to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host and the podfather of your favorite hebdominal podcast. Oh, I’m glad you’re with us. I’d turned dromatropic if you unnerved me with the idea that you missed this week’s show. Here’s our associate producer Kate to introduce it. Hey, Tony. Our 25 NTC coverage continues with. PII in the age of AI. Artificial intelligence and big data have transformed privacy risks by enabling malicious targeted communications to your team that seem authentic because they contain highly accurate information. Kim Snyder and Shawna Deleu explain the risks your nonprofit faces and what you can do to protect your mission. Kim is from Round Table Technology, and Shawna is CEO of Bright Lines. Then Balance AI ethics and innovation. Gozi Egbuonu encourages you to adopt artificial intelligence responsibly in a human-centered approach. First, be thoughtful with the threshold question. Should we use AI? If you go ahead, create a thorough use policy, overcome common challenges like staff training and identifying champions, manage change intentionally, and more. Gozi is with Technology Association of Grantmakers. On Tony’s take 2. Tales from the gym in addition to my gratitudes. Here is PII in the age of AI. Hello and welcome to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio coverage of 25 NTC, the nonprofit Technology Conference. We’re all together at the Baltimore Convention Center, where our coverage of 25 NTC is sponsored by Heller Consulting Technology services for nonprofits. Our subject right now is PII in the age of AI. Personally identifiable information in the age of artificial intelligence, safeguarding privacy in a data powered world plus we’re adding in the topic. Alright, already the show’s over. I wanna thank you all for coming. Uh, we’re, we’re here all week. Uh, be sure to tip your servers, um, and we’re adding in the topic a little more privacy please. Colin, diving into data privacy. All right, because, uh, our guests, um. Ask to combine topics which made a lot of sense. Um, but, uh, before I introduce the guest, well, now, let’s do it this way. So we have, uh, stand by there. We have, uh, first is, uh, Kim Snyder. Kim Snyder, um. I gotta take a deep breath. I do, uh, Kim’s title. I’m gonna hyperventilate trying to get enough air to oxygen in. I’m only 140 pounds. I don’t carry enough in my lungs to carry this, to carry this title of virtual digital privacy Project and program officer. You know Joshua Pesca is thanked for that word salad of it’s all nouns. It’s all it’s all one adjective. 12 nouns. Joshua, you’re, you’re out. Anyway, and then CEO doesn’t get any easier. OK. Also with us, uh we have a special guest who’s gonna give a couple of syllables. Uh, let me introduce Miles. Miles, say hello. Hi everyone, it’s Miles with Fundraise up. Thanks Tony. My pleasure. Miles is sponsoring the hub next door at Fundraise Up, so I, I thought I’d give him a little. He asked to give a shout out, so I said sure. And uh they’re giving away free socks. That’s what fundraise Up is all about socks and what else do you do at fundraise. Right, so we help nonprofits raise more money with AI and we do that by not using any identifiable information and are completely compliant across the globe. All right, that’s what a segue and not even reversal incredible. All right, you’ve overstayed your welcome. That’s enough. OK. OK. OK, thank you, Miles. No, thank you. I, he was, I, I did invite him after he pleaded. OK. So we are talking about PII. So Miles, a perfect segue, beautiful segue into personally identifiable information. Uh, Amy, we’re gonna do the overview, so I’m gonna ask Kim. Virtual digital data, virtual digital privacy project and program officer. I’m gonna ask Kim Snyder. No, I’m gonna, no, I’m hitting it hard. Uh, so for an overview, why, why do we, why do we combine these two topics? What are our issues around personally identifiable information and, uh, and artificial intelligence? Kim Snyder. So they both center on the issue of personally identifiable information. So on the one hand we’re talking about what kinds of regulations exist, how do you manage your data I’m too far away. Don’t whisper, Kim. Everybody hears you. Oh, go ahead. I’m waiting. Um, now you, you edit this, don’t count on too many edits. Oh dear, OK, alright, so, um, we’re talking about personally identifiable information which for quite a while for the last couple of NTCs have been talking about this here and. For quite a while it’s been about more about regulation this year I have to say it’s about having our data out there and vulnerability and so looking at data management and how do you start to take stock of your data so that it is less vulnerable and the person the people whose data it belongs to is also less vulnerable and the other topic which I’m here with my co-facilitator um. Uh, Shawna is with all the amens and I’m here. I’m just like I’m a man, yeah, in the, yeah, so, so talking about how that what constitutes personally identifiable information, how much that’s expanded in recent years and Shawna, what’s what’s your bright lines, how are you related to. Yeah, yeah, so Bright Lines, I founded it 4 years ago. We are a doxing prevention company for folks who don’t maybe know what doxing means. Yeah, it’s define it please. When folks will use your personal information or sensitive information, they’ll post it publicly, essentially posting your documents, that’s where doxing comes from with the intent to incite others to do you harm. So there’s like a malevolence there, right? I don’t usually consider it doxing if someone posts like. A relatively available email address from like a professional setting. I do consider it doxing when it’s your personal email address and the intent is to ask others. It could be your birthday, it could be, could be your wife’s or my man right here, yeah. the PII PII is an expanded. No, I never, no, no, actually I came out of US intelligence community. I was there as a much younger person and in a different age in the United States and in terms of our national security. It was really progressive national security person, um. The whole community, yeah, the I I’ll just say the I mean the intelligence community, yeah, yeah, I don’t usually get too granular with that um but the. Was it in the session description it would have said OK yeah we can talk about that. OK, well, I, I’m not sure I’m, I’m pretty sure, but there again it’s one thing when it’s like out on the airwaves. First is when it’s in like a session thing yeah and at at the time when I was there I was detailed out to the DEA this might have been what you read, to train them on finding their targets on the US side of the border of drug trafficking organizations so we were using these same techniques. I was training them in these like techniques to find people. We reverse engineered that now four years ago after the 2020 election when. Folks were going after Ruby Freeman and Shay Moss for just passing a piece of gum while tallying ballots in Georgia they have a penthouse in Manhattan now have the keys to that penthouses. Um, OK, interesting. So reverse engineer I see reverse engineered your, uh your prior prior work. All right. um, so referring to your session description, uh, how AI and big data are transforming privacy risks by enabling aggregation. So your concern is that the, the. Attempts at uh. Spamming people, not spamming but spoofing, fishing, they can, it can be so granular and so accurate that they, they look more and more real. This is a part of our problem, right? OK, and people and agencies, people are using artificial intelligence to gather this information and then and then put it together and collate and then threaten. So they will, so I think we could probably tag team on this. Do you wanna do the production part? So what we see is them gathering data. There’s a lot of data that’s out there about all of us, and I will. If there’s one point folks take away from me talking today in addition to my hype madness, it’s that this is not your fault. Our clients come to us and they say, oh, if I just hadn’t shared so much on public on social media publicly when I was younger and it’s like no no this had nothing to do with you. Your public records are being scraped by data brokers every day. If you own a property, if you’ve ever registered to vote someplace, if you have a driver’s license, which you have to have if you wanna get on an airplane, that data is being sold or scraped. So that’s the data that’s the source data for data brokers. So yeah, sometimes for free, for a, yep, OK, but publicly available, you don’t need to be, not an agency there’s no kind of like legal process to gather it exactly. This is why law enforcement officers, like certain law enforcement agencies now go around legal process and we’ll just buy data from data brokers. Oh, so much easier than defending a subpoena. to prove it to a judge to prove it to a judge and then if this if they move to quash the subpoena, you have to defend it. Exactly. So AI can now gather data from various sources, so it could be used to scrape these sites. It can then be used to connect data. Let me share a story. We got a phone call like a very concerned client. They had just received a phone call themselves from someone who claimed to have. Photos of theirs compromising photos from an old Snapchat account and on the call they described a photo that this that our client knew they’d taken right it was a photo of a room they were describing a room and the clients like, I remember that room. I remember that poster that they’re describing. I think I might have posted it on Instagram one point it was public, but how did they get my number? How do they know where I work and. My response was like, this is a scam. Someone scraped, someone bought a scra of LinkedIn. Maybe they connected that to your phone number. Maybe you have your phone number connected to LinkedIn because you use it from MFA for multi-factor authentication. They connected that to a handle on Instagram, probably using your face, a facial recognition. And then they just made this phone call and talked to you about your employer finding out about these photos, which was a bluff because your employer’s name is listed on your LinkedIn profile. It’s terrifying for her. And Kim has taken it a step further. So you can stitch all this together, right? and you can process all this data at speeds that never were possible before, but you can also use generative tools to create things so you can. Easily mimic a style of someone so you can also so you part of that data that you grab off of LinkedIn or social is somebody’s writing style so you can, you know, generative AI is really great tone and style and also events. So if you’re posting about events and things happening you could get. An email from your purportedly from your executive director or a colleague referencing that event and things that happened and people who were at that meeting it depends on how public the data is and then you know that can be used as a basis for a you know phishing email um that is a lot more convincing phone call yeah or a phone call this person that called our client was a human but they don’t have to be we’ve seen cases where EDs are being impersonated. And it’s video and it’s audio of them that is so convincing to the people that they’re reaching out to and this is it’s trivially easy to do right in our session in fact we had which one is the real Kim and there were two videos of me and one of them was not me um it was AI me but that cost me $29. To take that, so it’s not inaccessible. These tools used to be it used to be like really hard to do this or 25 cents and it’s like a photo in 3 seconds of audio, and they can make those videos, yeah, and you can have me say you don’t even need me saying the alphabet or or Kim’s title for Christ’s sake or half of Kim’s title. I did say you could swear. I didn’t say you could take the name of the Lord. There’s a difference. There’s a difference. There are boundaries even on nonprofit, there are boundaries. This is Chris. I’ve, uh, I’ve gotten, I’ve gotten these, uh. Dear Tony, I know I could have called you at my number or or written to you at my address accurately, uh, but I chose this method instead. So now I know they’ve got my email and my phone and my address, uh, included a picture of my home, which they probably got from Google Maps or, or right, and, uh, I, I some kind of bitcoin bitcoin scam. But how did that make you feel uh the first one I was a little like. Yeah, I was a little nervous, but, but I’ve gotten, uh, we all have gotten Bitcoin scams in the past, but this one had, like, you know, like you’re concerned that amount of information a lot of, yeah, yeah, it had the right and uh I, you know, I, I ignored it with some trepidation and then like a day or two later I got another one and you know I knew I was just kept coming. It was bullshit. Yeah, I saw one of those from one of our threat intelligence partners, someone who swims in this every day, and it terrified him and his wife. Yeah, because it’s so it’s so close to you. It’s why receiving one of those phone calls or back in the, I would say back in the day I got really energized around Gamergate started to try to support the folks who are being targeted by Gamergate. This is back in 2015, and they would describe what it was like to have like, you know, I sleep with my phone next to my bed. And or under my pillow and to have that be the stream of all of this like directed hate messages like you should kill yourself or I’m gonna do this to you or I’m going to do this to your parents or whatever the case might be. It’s so proximate that technology removes what feels like barriers between you and everyone else, and the issue with doxing so terrifying is that you don’t know who it is. It could be anybody. How do you walk down the street? How do you like sleep in your home, not terrified? You don’t know. I never thought about that. Who’s coming after you? Thank you. I never thought you bet new nightmare unlocked. Yeah, no, no, you know how, but Tony, so you get these things because you’re you’re killing me. It’s supposed to be reassuring us here on nonprofit radio. Well, you’re terrifying. We’ll get to that. We will get to that party eventually we’re we’re great parties, but, but, OK, so you’re, you know, more public person, uh, you, you know, nonprofit radio, so, so you. Get these things it’s a little unsettling and unnerving for you, right? yeah like so imagine how like a nonprofit staff person who happens to be working in an organization that may be more targeted by malicious actors, OK, so one is so your staff member starts to experience this and this may this could freak people out, right? So that’s who we’re thinking about. Um, and kind of raising the awareness, OK, yeah, I mean these are folks already dealing with some level of cortisol at a on a regular basis because of work because of their mission. I think we’ve spent enough time on motivation, and let’s let’s, uh, let’s let’s transition, uh, not subtly very abruptly to what the hell do we do? What do we do it already. Is it already too late? It’s never too late. I’m sure you’re not gonna say it’s too late. No, I wouldn’t be here. Yeah, well, I also believe it and I’ve had those moments. Listen, I live in DC and DC DC Health Link had their data leaked and taken a number of years ago and my child who had not even turned a year old had her social security number lost in that breach and I was like, oh man, she’s not a year old, you know, like how is this? This is the world we live in, right? And I turned to my partner and I was like, this is just, I don’t even know why we bother. And she’s like, you can’t, you of all people can’t have that feeling. It’s OK that you do right now, but you have to keep going. No, there are plenty of ways to ameliorate it. Yes, let’s get, let’s get into them. So what we’re with you. Why don’t we start? Go ahead and then we’ll go to Kim. Yeah, I think you can think about this so the individual as the vector to threat to the organization that can be reputational financial threats to the organization could make it hard to fundraise if you don’t support that person very well. Um, you, you would harm your reputation, say, or, um, it could make you look illegitimate to your funders, right? So if you can think about where the risks are to the organization, that’s one set of what to do, right, action items, and I might leave that with you and speak more to the personal. So when it comes to protecting yourself as an individual, there are plenty of ways that you can work to remove your data online was referring to Kim, not me. Oh yeah, no, Tony’s not gonna take that part no Kim’s got that, um, Kim. I won’t try your title um when it comes to the individual, listen, all of us have data out there again it’s not our fault we have lived a life, right? Like we’ve done things it’s, I think it’s a betrayal of trust in our own local governments that they sell this data and no one’s ever asked us for consent they’ve never informed us, etc. etc. etc. OK, so what do you do? You can sign up for one of those services that removes your data from data brokers we consider that like um. Like taking Advil, right? Like it’s like kind of taking care of some of the pain and some of the symptoms. What we also recommend is like looking back to the source data itself. So if you own a property that you live in, we always recommend that people consider moving it into a revocable trust that they don’t name for themselves. You’ve seen too many estate attorneys call it the Tony Martignetti revocable trust. Exactly exactly a different a different name to the revocable trust. That’s it. So now the ownership is obscured its data that’s already out there from prest. This is the argument that our interstate attorney always gives us and we have to educate them on this. They’ll say, oh, but it’s your name’s gonna be on the document granting it to the trust, but your name was there before on tax documents. The way data brokers work is that they’re constantly pulling this data down and renewing their data set. So when the new data comes down at this address, they want the most accurate, the most recent. they’ll overwrite it. So it may be that you lived at that address at one time but you don’t any longer and if someone’s looking for that address, it’s not your name on it. So it will get overwritten, especially over time. What we’ve seen wildly enough is that when that piece comes out, it’s like a house of cards. When you pull that property record out the rest of it tends to fall apart. We see our clients less and less on ownership is kind of a uh. a core or a hub to to other data yeah absolutely yeah I think there’s some connections happening there with like app user data that’s also on an ISP that’s connected to the house, etc. etc. is there other pieces about that location um that create profiles anything else we can do on an individual level besides the uh property ownership. Another big vector is voter data and I know that’s probably not popular in this audience because a lot of folks believe a lot in the voter file and voter data and using it and I, we often see voter data on getting used mm. Getting bought and getting scraped and so we will recommend that folks apply for programs in their states called address confidentiality programs or safe at home programs they’re always set up in with uh survivors of intimate partner violence in mind but a lot of the programs are pretty expansive, so if folks are concerned about stalking or harassment they can also apply and that then gives them a proxy address in some states like in New York across all agencies. So the DMV is now not going to sell your home address and your name. They’re going to sell your your name and your proxy address together. And and shout out the names of those programs that you would look for at your state. Address confidentiality program or safe at home. If you’re interested, the National Network to End Domestic Violence NNEDV.org has a comprehensive up to-date list of those programs. OK, awesome. Kim, uh, before we turn to Kim, uh I think you’re the perfect question perfect question answered. Person, you’re a person, you’re a person. You’re neither a question nor an answer. You’re you’re just a person with a lot of answers. Um, I read once, it’s so hard to unforget, you know, to unlearn things that, uh, the value of, of stolen data is really in the future is more financial like so that the bad actor can act without you tying it to a specific event. So my credit card, let’s say a credit card number is compromised, it’s of more value if it’s 3 years old than if it’s just a couple of weeks it was just stolen a couple weeks ago. Is that true or is that incorrect? I can see that. I can see that being true. Maybe we’ve gotten a little bit better banks and credit cards have gotten better about just reissuing new cards. Websites tend to push you to change your password when they’ve alerted you that there’s a breach, so I, I think. The private companies more so in government agencies but private companies I think have caught on to that a little bit and I think there is some truth if it’s not for financial means but really someone trying to go after you, we call that a ideologically motivated attacker. What we saw you used the word vector before I did, yeah this is my background so they um. What we found with uh a university, a client that’s a university, their students were being targeted. Some of these outside groups showed up to student houses over the summer. The students had already graduated. We’ve gotten some of their address stuff removed. The addresses weren’t available in connection to their names online any longer. So what we think happened was that those addresses that was screenshot and saved. That can happen, yeah, so it’s not a perfect fix. However, what if you have one as an intelligence officer, if you have one data point, so you have that screenshot, but then you have all these other things telling you that Shawna Dilla no longer lives at that screenshot address, you might show up there, but you’re not gonna spend a lot of time on it because you can’t verify it. You can’t confirm it with another source. Makes sense? Yes, thank you, thank you. All right, Kim, let’s turn to you on the organizational level. What, uh, what can we do, uh, there to. Protect ourselves from what’s already out there. How do we help nonprofits and small and midsize are our listeners. Alright, so for many years the the kind of mantra has been to verify, verify, verify verify. I thank you very much, that’s Kim Snyder and Shawna. No, I’m joking. She’s like I’m we’re out of time. No, we’re out of time. Are we out of time? No, I’m only child I fall for jokes very easily. I wish I had known. I wish I had so many. I had so many more. I had so many more in mind for you specifically talking about a targeted attack. Oh my, talk about a vector vector I was coming right at you. I could have written that you’re you’re putting this on the airwaves. You know how vulnerable you are. Oh man, I got all kinds of advantages. All right, I’m sorry, I interrupted you. What was I talking about dying. Go ahead. OK I’m sorry. OK, so we used to talk in cybersecurity world about, you know, verification verify, verify, verify that was the mantra, right? So now we kind of reshape that so that it’s vet and verify so have kind of multiple ways of verifying especially incoming requests. Anything kind of trust your spider sense is what I’d say if something seems a little bit off like what what are we talking about? So if you receive an email, if an email comes and it, you know, it comes from your development director who’s saying who’s referencing something that you just went to the panel or if it comes from accounting, write a check if any money is involved. And it wasn’t like completely expected even if it was a little expected actually I’ve seen I’ve seen this happen where people got into um nonprofit systems and using AI can scan what’s going on very quickly. And then target things that are about to happen from kind of things that are OK, so, so I would, so the instinct instinct, OK, use your, use your instinct but also make it a policy, make it a process that you just follow uncomplicated process for verifying like any financial transaction needs to be verified even if it’s expected, yeah, so yeah, so you wanna walk through that. You just get much, much more deliberate. About verification and and who is it coming from and you don’t want to. Confirming, did you send this email or not replying to the email, but my phone yeah exactly yeah you you send this email about this rush transaction or or routine transaction. Do it in a different format right different channel, yeah, so you know, and even though the instinct may be email back quickly but no right um but then what you do also is create a culture in your organization where that’s OK to do where it’s OK to take that extra 30 seconds minute to you know verify to ask someone for their time to say I just wanna check, did you send this to me? Um, and in that way it’s OK even if it’s because he’s actually director you can say, did you send this to me? I just wanna make sure and so that that’s an OK thing to do. In fact, that’s a good thing to do. Now we can’t they have to be boundaries around this because we can’t do it for every, every message we get so you mentioned. financial financial transactions and no no no not nervous at all financial no no no financial transactions, any kind of initiated correspondence where they’re asking you for something or for some information. I saw a scam recently where the uh an an old employee was trying to be reinstated and wanted to go around HR to IT to get their accounts reset up like I’m I’m coming back and it was like using the person’s middle name so it’s already a little bit fishy but. They went all the way up to the CTO of the of the company and said hey so and so and these people were friends on LinkedIn and like had shared messages back and forth so the attacker knew this was a personal relationship. hey so and so I’m trying to get reinstated. They’re telling me you need to go to HR, but like I but I can do this. I just need to get my account access back up and online and the CTO is like no. Oh bro, you gotta go through HR. I can’t do anything because they had those controls in place, but small and let’s be fair, small and medium sized organizations don’t, so I’ll just take care of it now or we don’t have a, we don’t have a we don’t have any clear guidelines that we give to people for all requests we need to go to HR. I thought of another. Potentially nefarious request you send your logo. Could you, could you, I need a I need a high def for the logo, you know, the, the, the, the JPEG I have is, is not good. I need a high definition logo that could be that could be to produce a check that could be to make a spoof a spare a spoof website, um, OK, I mean, but it seems innocuous send a logo, yeah, it’s very easy to spoof a website, right? So you know, you know, check. Also check where it’s coming from, right? So you know I’ve had an organization where there were two spoofed, um, there’s spoofs on both ends a spoof of the funder, a spoof of the the grantee. Can you tell us more about that story? It’s a really good one. So yeah, so they, they got into an organization’s, um, you know, Microsoft environment. I asked the questions here whoops. Go ahead. Uh oh, off the mic. 3 like 30, go ahead. So, um, Anyway, that’s late in the day. And I’m thirsty. Yeah, late in the day it’s not it’s, it’s well it’s almost 3 o’clock. You’ve been going since then nonstop. Um, anyway, all right. So the organization had someone get into their systems for a very short time, but in that short time they were able to tease out some information again this is AI can help with this kind of analysis short you know canal is a lot of data that it can grab very quickly and um identified some upcoming financial transactions which were rather large and so um in order to kind of trick. The person to sending to the wrong place, they set up fake websites, fake websites for the foundation, fake websites for the grantee, and domains not websites domains, and so then they had emails coming back and forth you could hardly see the difference and so the, the, the real people, the real people were communicating with the bad actor on both sides and the money. And he got sent to the wrong place, OK. Yeah, that was, that was actually no they did great, but, but it was that was a happy ending, but not necessarily. We started with Shawna, so we’re gonna end with Kim. give us oh no we did OK well I’m not Shawna, your mic is down but that she still gets through. She talks and laughs so loud you hear her over Kim’s mic. No, I didn’t, I did not but one more thing before, before we unless we’re totally out of time, um, don’t shoot the messenger. So create a culture. This is another thing that’s any size nonprofit can do where if something happens, if you click on that thing, if you did that thing that you feel like uh. That was really dumb, right? Make it OK to report that and you don’t get in trouble and there’s no shame and blame because it happens so but yeah the the no blame kind of we encourage you to. You know, say it, yeah, call yourself out, yeah, and there’s no punishment, you know, some organizations like they don’t want bad news at the top, so. All right, we’re gonna leave it there, OK? All right. That’s Kim Snyder. Virtual digital privacy project and program officer Roundtable Technology and Shana Dela Vu, CEO CEO Bright lines. Thank you, Kim. Thank you, Shawna. It’s a pleasure. Shawna laughed her ass off. I’m a good sense of humor. All right, I love it. Uh, and thank you for being with a, uh, well, whimsical, I’m not sure it covers it. Raucous maybe, uh, at one point, uh, uh, uh, anarchical because, uh, there was a question that I did not answer. Uh, session. Uh, thank you for being with us at uh 25 NTC for this episode sponsored by Heller Consulting. Technology services for nonprofits, virtual digital privacy project and program officers. It’s time for Tony’s Take-2. Thank you, Kate. A new tales from the gym episode just happened this morning, this very morning. I was minding my own business as I do on the elliptical. And overheard two women talking. One lives here permanently, and the other one who said her name. Sandra Lynn, uh, she lives in North Carolina, but not here in Emerald Isle. She lives, uh. In the Raleigh area, like that’s about 3.5 hours, 4 hours away, roughly. And she was lamenting, Sandra Lan was that uh that she can’t live here full time, house prices are high. And she also still has, uh, her mother and her father-in-law, so her husband’s father are still both alive, and so she needs to stay in that area, but she was, you know, looking forward to retiring here sometime but lamenting that she couldn’t live here now. And that got me thinking as I was on my. 6th or 7th uh interval on the elliptical. I do 88 episode 8, Not episodes. What did I just say? 8 intervals. I do 7 intervals of a minute, take a minute in between, and then the last interval is 2.5 minutes. I was toward the end and it got me thinking, listening to Sandra Lynn. That, uh, I’m grateful that I do live here full time, permanent. This is my home. And that, you know, it’s that there are other people who don’t live here who wish they could, you know, so, uh, you know, I, I add, I have, I have a long list of gratitudes, but I don’t specifically say grateful that I live here in Emerald Isle full time. So I’m gonna add that to my gratitudes that I do every, I guess I’ve told you every 2-3 times a week. I’m adding. Gratitude that I live here in Emerald Isle full time in this beautiful place and I have the ocean across the street. Uh, your own gratitudes. I hope you’re, I hope you’re doing your gratitudes out loud, at least a couple of times a week. That is Tony’s take too. Kate. You do sets. Uh, well, sets are for, yeah, no, that’s different intervals. Intervals on an elliptical, you do a minute hard and then a minute resting. And then a minute hard and a minute resting, it’s called high intensity interval training, HIIT high intensity. It just means you do intervals of things like you sprint, yeah, I don’t run, I’m on elliptical, but you might sprint and then walk, and then sprint and then walk and sprint and walk. Those are called intervals. Sets are like you do 3 sets of 10 if you’re, if you’re on a weight machine or something like that, or maybe pushups, might be 3 sets of 10 or something like that. I don’t know, they seem, there seems to be a different, well, I think the interval is because you’re still active, you’re just resting in between the high intensity intervals. Gotcha. That makes sense? Yes, and I am grateful that you have a beach house. Yeah, because you get to, yeah, you get to visit and uh laze around and uh. What is the word I’m looking for, uh, not schmooze, but, uh, you get to, uh, I don’t know. I can pretend that it’s my beach house. Yeah. You can for a week, yes, but then, then I’m very happy to say goodbye. After a week. Love you too. We’ve got bou but loads more time. Here is balance AI ethics and innovation. Hello and welcome to Tony Martignetti nonprofit Radio coverage of 25 NTC, the 2025 nonprofit Technology Conference, where our coverage is sponsored by Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits. With me now is Gozi Egwanu. Gozi is director of programs at the Technology Association of Grant Makers. Gozi, welcome to nonprofit Radio. Awesome. Thank you for having me, Tony. Pleasure. You’re welcome. Your session is AI strategy for nonprofits, navigate ethics and innovation. We have plenty of time together, but can you give me a high level view of the the topic and the session that you did? Sure. So the session was really, um, and was really spearheaded by Beth Cantor, uh, and it basically provides uh a balcony view of where we are in the sector in terms of AI adoption, ethical responsible AI adoption, the nonprofit and philanthropy sector. And so, uh, we really start with what we found in the Technology Association of Grantmakers state of Philanthropy tech survey that we did in 2024. In that survey we found what many grant makers are currently doing with AI as far as you know are they testing are they experimenting? Has anyone rolled it out enterprise level, which is, you know, at the organization wide level and what we found is that. And which mirrors quite what we’re seeing in the nonprofit world is that most folks are not using AI in terms of, you know, anything that’s crazy, you know, innovative at this moment it’s really just kind of, you know, meeting summaries, you know, taking notes, that sort of thing, um, and so and but in addition to that we found that while 81% of folks are using AI, uh, sorry, while, uh, oh sorry, 81% are using AI but only 30% have AI use policies, so. You’re using it but you don’t have any guard rails you have no way to tell your teams or your staff, hey, this is what we don’t put into the AI this is what we do put in so you’re really running the risk of having your information potentially used in a way or trained uh an AI model that, um, you know, could potentially put your members at risk, your grantees at risk, whatever the case is for your organization and so. With that little bit of an overview it basically came down to the importance of AI experimentation and really do starting slow starting at the very base level working with your teams to kind of talk through should we use AI if we did use AI what would that be for? So thinking about the use cases, the business, um, the business use like what what would be the business case for it and then you know assembling a nice team of folks, you know, as advisers or experimenters and champions at your organization. Uh, to really kind of help you all start doing that experimentation in a safe and low kind of like low risk way, um, and then from there really defining whether or not AI is your, your next move and then once you do have decide that AI is the next move you wanna move into that next level of the AI maturity which Beth, you know, covers really um really well uh you know you go from that exploration to discovery and then you move into experimentation and ultimately enterprise eventually. Um, but what we’re finding is that most folks are not there yet. They’re still very much experimentation early stage, very early stage, um, and, uh, you get to kind of get to see a case study of it through the work that Lawan did at her organization United Way Worldwide. OK, well, we don’t have with us, but you can provide a lot of context, lot of, lot of detail, I just said you could talk. All right, um, are, are we, do you know the you might not be part of what you surveyed, but was there even intentionality around should we, should the should we use question or did it just kinda happen because people started, people started hearing about it using chat GPT. Well, you know, with one of the questions that we did on the survey, we found that like there’s quite a few folks that are using it in what we call shadow use or shadow AI, which is basically you’re using AI but your organization doesn’t know what you’re using. I see. Alright, so that’s not intentionality at the organization level. No, no, no, I would say not, not. Uh yeah, so we really want to encourage the intentionality which is don’t start using the AI unless you all have that collective organizational conversation of is this something that we should be doing? Is it useful? Is there a business case to go with it? Is it relevant? Does it make sense? Is it safe for our organization? does it align with our ethics? And then consider going into experiments. OK, let’s explore that question a little bit uh now in 2025 because I, I suspect at 26 NTC we won’t be asking the threshold question, should we, should we use? So what, what, what belongs in the conversation if we’re, if, uh if we’re at the stage where Well, uh, individuals may be using it, but we don’t know. Or if nobody’s using it and we’re trying to decide enterprise wide, you know, is there not, we’re not even at the is there a use case like but should we, should we explore it? What goes into that conversation? Sure, um. Again that you know, really thinking about the business case. So when you’re having that conversation about should we use AI, then you have to think about what would be the specific usage of it, right? So say you’re the finance team and you’re considering using AI, what would be the benefit of using AI versus doing the doing the the work flow or process that you currently have and you’re thinking of having AI do? so you really. Kind of have to have that conversation like an in-depth conversation about the process that you’re doing right now. Is there anything wrong with it? Are we losing anything? Could we gain, uh, productivity, time in our days and our schedules if we were to move to using AI to do this one process or this one, this one work flow? Then at that point you think about, OK, maybe we do get a benefit out of it now that we get a benefit out of it. What are some of the things that we have to be concerned about now that we have a benefit is it that now we don’t wanna make sure we wanna make sure that any financial information that could be sensitive to any of our donors or their their personal information, do we not want to have that being able to be, you know, used in the AI model or whatever system that we’re using so you know, you, you start with here’s how we do. Things here’s how AI could potentially benefit and then you move into that conversation. OK, if we did, what are some of the risks and concerns really thinking through all of them as much as you can, we know that you can’t think for every single possibility, but as much as you can kind of write it out and map it out as a group with several folks in the room, the better that you are at being able to say yes or no on moving on with AI as that. Potential new solution. OK, and a part of what goes into this intentionality is a usage, a use policy, your, your, you know, you want us to be thinking about ethical uses. OK, uh, what, what are the, what are, what are the ethical concerns? How can you, how can we talk through those? Well, you know, one of the key ethical concerns is that we know that most AI models that exist now, including open AI, were trained on the internet, and we know the internet can be, uh, wildly biased, wildly biased, filled with lots of terrible things. Not only biased but misinformed, misinformed wrong yeah complete nonsense in a lot of cases, um, and so if you’re using these open AI sources that have been trained on the internet, then you have to be really careful about deciding to use it against, say your theory of change. So if you’re an organization that is er. Be uh vulnerable populations groups that are already kind of under attack, whatever the case is, do you want to have AI making or informing your decisions related to work that you’re doing with these vulnerable groups? More than likely no because the AI may choose to do things that are more in line with the group that is. Biased that may have you know may be unethical and so you want to make sure that whatever you’re using the AI to do that it isn’t putting the organizations and the people that you support and serve in harm’s way so really thinking through, hey, if we’re gonna use it in this way, maybe we need to use it in a way that does not put these groups in harm. Maybe we just focus on using it internally like folks do for the meeting. Notes because that’s a very low risk thing whereas if you’re you know input you know uh decisions about whether or not to continue funding an organization or trying to measure or not whether or not their impact is aligning with your organization’s missions and values some of those those questions are not as clear cut as yes or no, whereas an AI that is trained on purely just wanting to see impact, purely wanting to see a return on investment, which is not always the case of what happens in philanthropy. Then you really have to take, take a step back and say is this the most ethical decision to go forward? Could we be putting organizations in harm? Now you can control what a model is trained on, yes, but that requires something proprietary, right? You have, you have to pay a developer to, uh, to create that. I get I don’t know it’s called a small language model. I don’t know what it’s called, but something that’s trained only on your own data, but your own website, maybe your own documents that you that you provided, but that, that requires a fee and a and a developer. Exactly, it it can it can cost, it can be expensive. The other option is if you don’t want to go the route of creating your own AI you do a paid version because we know the free versions of AI specifically I’ll talk about open AI there’s not a whole lot of freedom or flexibility in turning off the settings to prevent it from training the model on the data that you input. And so in that case you definitely need a use policy because some folks would probably just be like I really need to you know analyze all of this data on all of the groups that we served in this, you know, community that is already really, you know, under attack or potentially in in harm’s way and then now you’re putting that information into the AI to have it, you know, into the free AI to start doing it’s now. and now the AI has all of these people’s information and can now use it to provide it to other people who may look them up or want to find data on. That’s you’ve you’ve shared data that it’s gone. I mean it’s yeah yeah yeah there’s no control. So yes, enormous intentionality, care, um. And what if we don’t have a, you know, we don’t have a, a chief technology officer, chief information officer, you know, it’s an executive director, CEO, and, and maybe decent sized staff. I don’t know, 35, 40 people, but they still don’t have a chief technology officer. How do we, how do we uh ensure the intentionality and care that you’re, that you want us to? Yes, um, there’s a couple of ways, and I think oh good, I think at the core of it you don’t have to have a CTO and even yourself you don’t have to be a technologist. I would never classify myself as a technologist, but we can, there’s ways to find training. There’s plenty of training and 10 it has fantastic training for AI certifications for professionals in in the nonprofit sector, um, and I’d love to share that and 10 and tag are teaming up and we will be offering one for philanthropy professionals very soon. And so these are opportunities, a very, you know, relatively easy ways for people who don’t have that technical background to learn about the AI itself, get themselves familiar familiarized with, you know, what they need to be doing to protect themselves and their staff, ways that they can start to experiment in a safe, you know, safe space, um, so and there’s plenty of also free tools, free education. I will, you know, even I, even though I’ve talked. About OpenAI a lot. OpenAI just announced their OpenAI Academy which has all free resources and tools for learning how to utilize AI for anyone and so there are plenty of free resources out there and people online, you know, uh, there’s plenty of folks on LinkedIn that I see on a regular basis that are sharing information and providing some guidance for nonprofit leaders as well as, uh, folks. That are just not technically inclined so there’s ways that you can kind of upskill and train yourself to understand how to use AI even if you don’t have that technical experience in house. Say a little more about this partnership, can you uh and it’s technical association of grant pardon mechology Association of grants thank you um. Yeah, so I don’t have a whole lot of details to share, but essentially if you’ve, if you’ve used any of the great training and certification resources on the N10 website, we are essentially trying to make a parallel version of that same professional certification for nonprofit leaders using AI for. Our foundation leaders and so uh you can expect really a kind of a similar learning process but however it’ll be tailored to some of the different functions and needs that we find at the philanthropy you know at foundations versus what you would see at a traditional nonprofit. OK, so I’m sorry, it’s intended for professionals I should say. Um, Alright, what, so thank you. You know, that’s important ethical considerations, um, anything more on ethics because, uh, then I I want to talk about the policy, what belongs in your use policy, but is there more about ethical concerns? OK, OK, OK, enormous. I mean if you, if, if you’re exposing your data. And, and it’s gone. It’s, it’s out there like you said, right, um, our use policy that, uh, only 13, 30% have, although 80% are using AI. What goes into this use policy? The use policy essentially just outlines what you and your team should be thinking about before you ever use any AI, so. It’s kind of that no go or go kind of conversation so if it’s sensitive data, if it’s information related to any of your members that you just wouldn’t want anyone to have outside of your organizational members probably wouldn’t want to put it into an AI system so it just kind of outlines, you know, essentially guardrails for for teams and and staff to understand how to best utilize it. And I think some folks are also, you know, thinking about the environmental impacts of using AI are really now making sure that their data use policy or the AI policies are also, you know, having folks be ethical about how they’re using when they’re using AI right? so you know if it’s to do something that could take you probably about the same time that the AI does, don’t use the AI um if you’re just, you know, just tossing anything, any old thing and they’re asking questions all day probably also not a very useful. Use good use of AI you really wanna think about AI very strategically and intentionally, right? You wanna make sure that if you’re going to the AI, it’s for something that you know it’s gonna save you significant amounts of time. One of the things that I often will use AI for is drafting, you know, large descriptions for events. That takes me sometimes hours if I give it to AI, I can do it for me in seconds and the key to descriptions of events, yes, like, so we have webinars events that we have on our website, yeah, so you know I, I, I, I don’t wanna sit there talking about all the learning that you’re gonna get out of it and the objectives and this and that and so AI, I’ve trained, I have like a GPT that is based on kind of like my voice that I provide it like hey here’s the prompt, here’s what I’m kind of looking for. It provides me a draft and then I use that draft and I manipulate it how I want. Um, and so you really wanna make sure that you know when you’re prompting the AI or you’re using the AI, it’s they’ve measured it. I think one prompt uses as much energy. I think it’s like an entire city like it’s crazy. It’s like like it, I, I don’t use my quote me on that, but it’s enormous. There’s quite a bit of energy, and I can actually actually share a link to um one of the stats that came out about it. There’s a researcher that’s been sharing a lot about it, um, and she was just interviewed by, uh, I believe it was Doctor Joy Bullumwini on, uh, by the, um, the. AI justice uh group that she she leads, um, and so there’s a lot of it there’s a lot of energy being used so if you’re gonna use it, you wanna make sure that it’s for something that you don’t need to, you wanna learn prompting good prompting, so you can get what you need out of it and then you can make, you can, you know, refine it and make it better. Sometimes you may have to go back in and ask the AI to refine, you know, what it did, but you really do wanna keep it to a minimum. You don’t wanna be using AI. Constantly because the energy use and the impact on the environment is extreme extreme that gets over to the ethical concerns as well exactly because it’s yeah so yeah you’re you’re just really um basically telling your teams here’s the here’s what we expect out of you when you’re using AI and these are the things that could result in consequences if you don’t follow this policy OK um. What else, anything more about the policy, what, what, what belongs in there? Um, You know, I think the the key things is like you know making your team’s aware of the types of AI that are provisioned because that’s another thing some organizations have taken the decision to block certain AIs that they don’t want you using or even turning off certain AI functions in their uh current tech stack. So, uh, you wanna make sure that it’s really outlined very clearly the types of AI that are in use and also it may, you may wanna include something in there about how you, uh, communicate your use of AI to your teams or other people outside of your organization so. Kind of a, a nice, nice little bucket of what’s internal external, and then also where can you go if AI and where should you not go disclosures to the public um why would there be some uh some platforms or that are that are ruled out? Well, because You know, one of the things that I’ve seen some members talking about within, you know, the tag space is that there are some AI that do not allow you or some systems that do not allow you to turn off the AI function meaning that you don’t have any control of how that AI is taking your data that you have in that tech stack or that tech tool. Oh, you don’t have control no yeah and in in fact there was actually a conversation about a specifically a DAF uh platform that actually. Made this clear to many many many of our members who use it and so that is something that you really have to be concerned about is do you have any level of control if you don’t have any level of control and how the AI is using your data in that system there are organizations that would likely say this is a this is not a system that we would allow you to use. OK, it’s a good example. Um what else uh came out of the session? We still have a couple more minutes together. What else did you talk about in the session that uh that you can share with us? You know, one of the great things that we did was we did these scenarios, um, that Beth Beth put together about, you know, what are some of the things that you would say if you’re in a situation when where, you know, say for instance, uh, your organization is really excited about using AI they wanna jump head first and they just wanna start using AI without, you know, and and they they basically just want you to start rolling it out and get your teams on board. Um, and so in that scenario we really talked through all of the processes, you know, first of all, that first conversation that we talked about, like, should we even use AI that didn’t happen, so that needed to happen. The other part is also, you know, how fast do we wanna roll things out? What are some of the different change management principles that we should be thinking about as a team that could make AI adoption more beneficial and successful so really, you know, starting slow but really starting at the very beginning of like should we or should we not like that should be your because truthfully many organizations do not need AI. It’s true. I mean, it’s just the reality. Some organizations will never probably need to use AI, and then there’s a whole lot of them that probably will. So that question of like, should we do it has to happen first, um, and I think if you’re doing it on your own as a rogue, stop, do it on your own time. You want to practice on it, do it after after hours on a weekend. Exactly, exactly, not on our computers, not on our sisters. Yeah, yeah, if you, and that’s actually one of the things that, um, you know, we’ve seen a lot of our members and foundations, and I think Beth has also seen with, you know, some of the work she’s done in the in the sector is that a lot of foundations are now trying to just get to the staff and say, hey, look, we know that you’re using, can you just tell us and try to make that trust, build that trust with each other and I think that’s gonna be really a good way to help prevent a lot of the issues. Alright, let us know, but then stop. No, there’s no repercussion for reporting yourself, but only, well, only after what you report after the report date, you’re liable. All right, stop it. Exactly. OK, going rogue. All right, um, anything else? Uh oh, questions, any, uh, provocative or memorable questions that came. From the audience I’m trying to think. Um, No, well, you know, the one that had come up was just, uh, you know, there was a, there was someone at the front that had asked about, you know, AI hallucinates, and I was, and, you know, should you hallucinates, yeah, and she and the, the person was basically saying, you know, be careful using it as an organization because it could give you answers that are just factually wrong and so you know our response was like yeah you’re right AI does hallucinate but that’s why it’s incredibly important and I. And I didn’t even say this myself, but at the beginning, which is if you use AI, you always wanna make sure that it’s for something that you have a certain level or high level of expertise or knowledge about. So you know if I’m asking you to write descriptions for me, I know about the event details so that I’m not just gonna let the AI write a description and let it go and put it on the website. Yeah, that sounds good. I’m gonna put it no you review it, you make sure that. The details it’s including are correct. If there’s any statistics or numbers that are being used, you can go and verify those data. So if you’re ever using AI for anything, you should always have a human in the loop. There should be someone that’s able to verify the information, especially if you’re someone that’s not knowledgeable in that specific thing that you ask AI to do. You need someone who is either that or it’s gonna be written at such a high level that it’s maybe that has no value. Exactly, exactly. All right, how about we leave, are you OK leaving it there? Oh, you feel like we covered this? I think we did. OK. All right. All right. Go the Abuno. Euanu Gozi Ebo. Director of programs at Technology Association of Grant Makers. Gozi, thank you very much for sharing all that. Thank you for having me, Tony. My pleasure and thank you for being with Tony Martignetti nonprofit radio coverage of 25 NTC where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits. Next week, 225 NTC conversations to help your fundraising events. If you missed any part of this week’s show, I beseech you. Find it at Tony Martignetti.com. And now the donor box is gone, I miss our alliteration fast, flexible, friendly fundraising forms. Uh, I miss that. All right, well, I am grateful to Donor Box though for 2 years of sponsorship, very grateful, grateful. There’s another gratitude. I’m grateful to Donor Box. Now that they’re not a sponsor anymore, I’m grateful to them. No, I, I’ve been grateful. I just haven’t said it. OK. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. I’m your associate producer Kate Martignetti. The show social media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein. Thank you for that affirmation, Scotty. Be with us next week for nonprofit radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great.

Nonprofit Radio for April 28, 2025: #25NTC & The Human Factors Driving Your CRM Success

Amy Sample Ward#25NTC

We launch our 25NTC coverage with the CEO of NTEN, which hosts the Nonprofit Technology Conference, sharing the numbers and the experience of this year’s Conference, earlier this month in Baltimore, Maryland. They’re Amy Sample Ward, and they’re also Nonprofit Radio’s technology contributor.

 

Rubin Singh: The Human Factors Driving Your CRM Success

Don’t blame your tech first when it feels like your CRM database is letting you down. Human beings, the tech users, have responsibilities that precede, and must align with, your technology. Rubin Singh returns to enlighten us about business processes; inclusive design; personal and professional growth; and more human factors that impact the success of your CRM database. He’s founder and CEO of OneTenth Consulting.

 

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And welcome to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host and the podfather of your favorite hebdominal podcast. We’re kicking off our 25 NTC coverage this week. These two segments are both from 25 NTC. It was a wonderful conference. I think the best. Uh, this was, I believe, the 11th year that I’ve hosted nonprofit radio, uh, in a studio at the nonprofit technology conference, and I think this was the best one. You’ll hear Amy and I talk about that. So excited, legitimately, you know, some people say, uh, I’m excited. No, I’m excited that we are launching, inaugurating, kicking off our 25 NTC coverage this week. Oh, I’m glad you’re with us. I’d suffer the effects of ramidenia if you pained me with the idea that you missed this week’s show. Here’s our associate producer Kate with what’s coming. Hey Tony, this week it’s 25 NTC. The CEO of N10, which hosts the nonprofit technology conference, shares the numbers and the experience of this year’s nonprofit technology conference last week in Baltimore, Maryland. They are Amy Sample Ward, and they are also nonprofit Radio’s technology contributor. Then the human factors driving your CRM success. Don’t blame your tech first when it feels like your CRM database is letting you down. Human beings, the tech users, have responsibilities that proceed and must align with your technology. Rubin Singh returns to enlighten us about business processes, inclusive design, personal and professional growth, and more human factors that impact the success of your CRM database. He’s founder and CEO of 10th Consulting. On Tony’s take 2. Tales from the gym. Meet Roy. We’re sponsored by DonorBox. Outdated donation forms blocking your supporters’ generosity. DonorBox, fast, flexible, and friendly fundraising forms for your nonprofit, DonorBox.org. Here is 25 NTC. Hello and welcome to Tony Martignetti nonprofit Radio coverage. Oh wait, I should do what Amy loves. Hello and welcome to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host and the podfather of your favorite hebdominal podcast. What a genuine pleasure to welcome. The CEO of N10, the host of the 2025 nonprofit technology conference, Amy Sample Ward, welcome. Thank you. I don’t know that I’ve ever gotten to see in person witness live the Podfather intro. So yeah, exactly, it doesn’t have the same power, you know. Uh, so, uh, we’re here at 25 NTC. We’re at the uh Baltimore Convention Center. Oh, I, I should have said that our coverage here is sponsored by Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits. Very grateful to Heller Consulting. How’s the conference going? CEO. It’s going great from community perspective, you know, I think we didn’t really know what to expect in this moment right from the community perspective, yes, I mean you know there’s always special things um there’s always opportunities to continue refining. Uh, but you know, from the, from the community side and kind of what we spend so much time focusing on, you know, the community experience, we just, you know, would anyone actually. Feel like coming when they woke up Wednesday morning would be, you know, like are is anyone even gonna be in a space to have conversations or wanna go to a session, you know, and we’re not trying to pretend that everything is fine and normal or that those things exist, you know. I like we’re certainly embracing that and yet we’re trying to embrace it within a reality of well we’ve all planned for this conference to be here so so it is still a a structured thing and and how porous can we make it in real time together to also meet whatever needs are emerging by maybe going to a session that was already planned and you know the speaker had prepared but from that conversation came something. Oh my gosh, we, we need a space, we need to keep talking about this right now and what do we do, right? So I’ve heard a couple of stories like that anecdotally that I’ve got I’ve learned so much I need to learn more now and you realized what I didn’t know and I I need to connect with that person or, you know, um, I heard it from an audience, uh, like talking to somebody who was sitting next to the person who was talking to me and then also to this for. Speaker, I, you know, I need to connect with, I forget whether it’s him or her or whatever. It doesn’t matter. Um, I need to learn more from this person. Alright, let’s let’s, uh, you know, I always like to ask you the numbers you know how many folks are with us here in real life in Baltimore, Maryland. I don’t know that I actually have the accurate numbers. We, we’re. Uh, 1800 registrants overall, but given how many shifts are happening, I don’t know exactly, and, well, I’ll finish my first sentence and then I’ll add a second so I don’t know how many folks are necessarily in person because we don’t. Require if you’re in person you have access to the virtual and so folks that couldn’t come for whatever reason didn’t necessarily have to tell us that so we don’t totally know or they could have even come one day and then gone virtual another day that’s right so I don’t totally know how many folks are in the room. I know that I think catering told us that over 1600. Silverware were used at lunch today. So just for lunch today I guess that yeah I know I only used one and I used one upstairs even so it’s a proxy for right so that’s how many people ate lunch I guess. OK, um, talking about the conference experience, uh, we’re gonna bring in someone who was a previous guest Aia Aria Ma, come on, come on, Arya. you can share my mic, just share my mic. Yeah, let’s make it easier. Um, because this is her first NTC, and I, I, she was saying, she was saying things that I think you would want to hear as CEO. So I said, if you want to come back, well, it’s not gonna be quite that long, but, uh, yeah, it’s not gonna be quite that long, but thank you. Uh, if you wanna talk to the CEO, let Amy know that, that, uh, what, how you feel about your first NTC. So this is Ama. Um, her company, uh, are, are you just, you say your company, so I don’t have to look back two pages. OK, I’m, I’m the principal consultant founder of Lunara, so I do consulting with environmental conservation nonprofits. Um, first of all, thank you. This has been amazing. I’m actually from Baltimore, so just jot down from Boston, do a quick family trip, and the people here, I feel. Like NDC really has curated an amazing group of people where it’s not really about networking but really connecting and knowledge sharing the accessibility here it really feels like the staff are here looking out for the for the participants and it’s just been an amazing time connecting with people the bird like the feathers of a bird table conversations, the comfy chairs like this is I’ve been to a lot of conferences. And it’s definitely one of a kind. So thank you so much for curating an amazing team, curating amazing people who come here. It’s been a really great time for me. All right, thank you so much for being thank you for being one of those amazing people that is here, right? Thank you. I so appreciate that. Of course, of course, lots more NTCs in your future. OK, good. Thank you. Thanks for coming back. Glad you did. I, yeah, a little treat for you. I knew I knew you would want to hear something. Thank you. You’re welcome. Um, So, oh, I turned up for that was turned it up for our, yeah, OK, um, alright, so we have about 1800 people. Well let’s call it 1800 between friends, just as a round number. That’s good. OK yeah, we, I mean, I think there were like 12 people who just showed up and registered on site yesterday, so. Yeah, the number is a moving. When we talked a couple of weeks ago, you said people just show up. I was amazed at that. OK, it happens. OK. There’s always room at the NTC, you know. Yeah, well, we’ll add another chair. What did Ari just say? There’s a staff. Thank you for the staff, looking, looking out for all of us. Yes, of course. We’re accommodating. We’re, we, I’m a member, so I’m not staff, but I’m, I’m part of the N10 the N10 community. I don’t want to call it the the NTC people call you NTC. Yeah, I know Amy. She runs NTC in a way they, they, yeah, um. The commons experiment, yeah, I mean, I hope like we could talk about it for a minute. I’m just gonna preempt your intro and say for people who run conferences as part of the larger work of your organization, right, not that not that you’re an event planner, but people who are listening to the show and have organizations that have conferences as a part of your programming. Would love to learn what you are testing because we, as I said the other day you know there’s that like analogy or whatever like oh I pulled the band-aid off and just you know tried something we we found every band-aid and we pulled them all off at once and tested everything is is different this year. There is not an exhibit hall with pipe and drape and 10 by 10 squares that you have to walk through, uh, hallway hallways of corridors of, uh, it’s an open space, open plan. The studio here is set up right behind all the chairs that are facing the stage where the main stage where all the keynotes are and the awards were given. Um, we’re by the food station. Well, the food is here. It’s just the the hall is open. There’s not anything dividing us. Yeah, we sold no exhibit booth packages. Uh, and I admire it, I admire the attempt at change. Look, even if you, I’m not, you’re gonna decide as a team what you’re gonna do, but even if you went back to 10 by 10 cubes, uh, pipe and drape next year, I would still admire the 2025 experiment because you are trying something that radically different. You’re not bound by what every other conference does and what you. Uh, what N10 has done year after year after year for 24 years, this is our 25th, your 25th NTC. So you’re not bound by, by your own history even. I just, I admire the outward look, the fresh look, even if you go back to the way it was last year, I still will never stop admiring what you did this year. Thank you for saying that. I mean, I think. It in some ways was was and is a huge risk to say we don’t we’re not even selling packages that would equate to hundreds of thousands of dollars of revenue um so if anyone’s listening and would like to write a check, please let me know um. But it just didn’t feel like that hard of a choice for us because it feels like every year all we want is to get closer and closer to an experience for as many people as possible to be in community and we, you know, getting rid of the booths was just one thing there’s also, you know, sessions are working in different ways and there’s. More furniture in this room that is not from the convention center, you know, it’s not rounds with chairs. We actually rented every piece of furniture from a local furniture company, um, just to, I can say the name that’s my show, not the Freeman Company. We’re not we’re not using that. We actually have put on an entire, you know, 1800 person conference in a convention center without a decorator, um, so we. Did everything ourselves so that we could control and make it just how we wanted it to be. You rented how many chairs you found a source for all these, all the everything, yes, every, every vendor is local, every maker is local. Yeah, you have a little shop. There’s there’s a market, local, local vendors that yesterday I saw cutting boards, uh, I see art, uh, that’s all I saw, but there’s a market over there, local, local vendors love it. You, you also do something smart that I learned, uh, one of your team members told me. That uh you you have your staff retreat in the city where or one of your annual retreats in the city where next year’s NTC is gonna be that’s very smart that way all everybody has walked the building we’ve all stood there and said, do we think this is really where badge printing could go? Do we really think this is. Because we also make basically every decision as a team for the conference, so you know there’s no one person on staff whose job is the conference and they get to make the decisions we we do it together or we say who wants to be in this decision, you know I think we’ve even talked about some of the the way Zen10 works um on the show before but. Yeah, so it feels good to have everybody be there, which means this late summer, early fall we’ll all party in Detroit and see what 26 NTC is gonna look like. OK, 26 NDC NTC in Detroit. Uh, no, it’s very smart and you’ve walked out. in the hotels we can make a couple of restaurant suggestions if somebody comes up because we, yeah, yeah, we went to that place. Yeah, very savvy, very savvy. I admire it. I don’t know. I just feel like I would never have thought of that. Like if I was a CEO I would, I wouldn’t need somebody else to suggest that. I think I never would have thought of that. Can I ask you a question? Do I get, is that allowed on nonprofit radio? OK, OK. I had an anarchist in the previous, uh, OK, I was gonna ask you, you know, I know, I mean with 160 plus sessions every year you have a hard job of only doing 30 or so interviews or or 20 or whatever the number is, right? Yeah, yeah, because it’s that’s only a fraction of how many sessions you could have um chosen from. But even still, I’m curious from the interviews you’ve had from, from a day and a half or so. This is content different this year? Like, is there, is there trends or or interesting notes surfacing because of the time we’re in, because of the moment we’re in the moment of under this administration, the the shifts of of the sector, but also even just like this weird moment around AI and the moment around, you know, all of those different pieces, is there something that you’ve seen? Artificial intelligence, yes, more panels on artificial intelligence. I, I requested more so we’ll have a couple more um. Yeah, I, that’s that’s what I was thinking it’s artificial intelligence, um, you know, the, the political environment, it comes out a little bit, but, uh, first of all, a lot of our, well, yeah, no, it comes out you know of course beyond the fundraising, uh, I was gonna say the fundraising panels have mentioned it, you know, but, but, um. Uh, also in the tech, uh, we just had a panel on personally identifiable information, how to preserve that, um, and including from government intrusion and subpoena, um, so you know that would not have been a topic last year would have been a thought, a possibility, um, so yeah, I’d say those mostly the AI and then the the the political and the, um, data, data protection, data protection, yeah, yeah. Um, Is uh is is Max here? Max stage managing? No, he hasn’t for a number of years a few years yes, yes, and I didn’t see Or Louise here. No, she, it’s not her spring break. Oregon already had spring break, so she is very mad to miss her first. TC. Oh, is this the first one? I think so many years at least, or yeah, I think so. She’s about to be 9. That’s right, yeah, yeah, I guess she missed Denver too because that was she was in school then, but yeah, so those are the only two that she’s ever missed, yes, even as a little babe, yeah, so we don’t have like a family photo booth photo from this, yeah, she has them like up on her, on her, you know, cork board in her bedroom. Yeah, I know he has all the NTG. In like the photo, you know, yeah, parent, yes. Um, How’s, uh, you know? How, how are things, uh, how’s the team, how’s the team doing? Thank you for asking. Um. I, I’m just looking because they’re in that room. That’s our, that’s our staff office so that we can see if there’s any issues, but that’s where everybody’s working the halls on fire or something. You’ll see it’s like a uh um called um smoke towers or fire towers. So, so we’re on, we’re we’re down on the floor, but up maybe 40 ft or something there’s windows and that you’re saying that’s the it’s like in the mall, you know, where the security is behind the one-way glass up above, yeah, that’s, yeah, so staffs up there’s too high, we can’t see in you know staff is OK, I think. Like Any any organizations group of staff, you know, there’s. A staff person dealing with this other issue that’s not work related and somebody you know caring for a relative and somebody trying to help their kid that’s having this struggle is that you know so. Uh, the team is OK. We’re a great team and folks have just been like. Even reflecting in real time like God we’re just like showing up for each other so strong and we feel so like happy to get to show up for each other these these few days together but also try to hold that like you know behind that or underneath that or around that. Life is hard for everyone right now in so many ways that have nothing to do with putting on a conference or or replying to your work emails or you know it’s just like everyone is always carrying these these other things that they’re thinking about um and we know and we’ve and we’ve heard from community members as we do every year that. We want the NTC to be a place where like you can set all those burdens down like it’s OK to talk about all of that stuff you know this is not like a perfect professional face you know like what does that mean? What what is my professional? I don’t know. You know, but also I think it’s a little bit hard for staff to feel like they get to do that too when we’re working so hard to create that space for the community because we’re also like on radio and calling catering and you know we’re like doing all these other logistic pieces so in some ways the staff like miss out on the on the best opportunity to do that that we have every year because we we’re we’re kind of behind the scenes but usually on Friday. Less logistics are happening because it’s the final day of the conference and then you know all but one or two people will get to be at the general session and listen to the keynote and everybody will get to like just go to a bird’s table at lunch or go you know people will really get to kind of come out and and. Enjoy it for a little bit. And when does the team depart on Saturday? Yeah, we fly out on Saturday. Oh yeah, we’ll, I mean Friday, Friday afternoon. Oh yeah, our stuff is getting palletized and taken away at 3 p.m. tomorrow. Oh yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, yes, and like we have volunteers, we have, you know, we have um. I mean it’s end 10. We have a spreadsheet, you know, and every storage bin is numbered and we know what goes in bin number 1 and bin number 2 and you know you just look at the spreadsheet and everybody knows what has to go. I see. Of course we have a spreadsheet for that. Yeah, wonderful, um. Yeah, I would say, and I’ve told others this, uh, this is, this is, I think this is the 11th, uh, NTC that nonprofit radio has come to, yeah, uh, I think it’s the best. I do, I do, you’re just saying that because I’m sitting here and I’ll push you off the yoga ball. I said it to somebody else. No, it’s, yeah, you know, you know, uh, no, I really do admire the open plan. I love. It’s, yeah, it’s just a better feeling, you know it’s not a congested feeling we’re not confined to a 10 by 10 cell. Right and like just from an attendee’s perspective, you know, we didn’t want to shrink it down to only a room of 1800 chairs in theater seating or something, you know, like there’s all this open space. Do you wanna just sit on the floor and build Lego? Go for it, you know, you wanna drag a chair away from a table and talk to somebody else? Go for it. Right, we, we, it’s called a pre-con when before you have an event we have a meeting with, you know, the head of every part of the facility, right, uh, like here’s the security, right, like, you know, one rep from every part of the building comes and you have this precon meeting. And they are like, OK, who are you? it’s like just the day before or a couple of days before or is this we do we do it, no, no, no, we do it Monday so you’re on site, you’re like ready to go. You’re starting to load in and usually events that do this like send one rep from N10 right? we send all of us, all 16 of us show up because each of us are here, right? And you’re supposed to say like, you know, is there any info about your attendees? Is there anything the team should know, you know, and we say. If our attendees want a chair move, that chair is moving. Right, you’re not radioing me for like an approval. If attendees walk up to you and say the water is out, you’re refilling the water, right? Like this community is making the space. Our job was just to make sure water stored in there 16 of us right that you can take direction from, yes, and I mean if they say we’d like a whole another part of the building and could you bring catering there that please don’t do without our approval. Right, but we really want to have a, a place that is just open. Make it. Do put the chair where you want it to be, right? Like Ryan, bring your penguins and set them up. Apparently everybody’s like putting in the chat who gets to take them home, you know, like that feels like a gift to ourselves and hopefully a contribution that’s additive to the sector to to have a space that’s like that or that tries to say. What does it look like? We’re, we’re not a trade show. We’ve never been an actual trade show, but what does it look like to say, yeah, there’s no booths, just talk to each other. And honestly like there are some providers who are here for the very first time and they’re like what? What am I doing? What, what am I supposed to do, right? So we need to do a better job of setting people up whether they’re a provider or a sponsor or just, you know, attendee what to expect, what do you, what does it mean to just walk into this huge room and pick, pick a velvet couch to sit on and talk to somebody, you know, but just walk up yeah um. I, I, I just heard someone’s heels. I, I looked because I thought I heard pickle. I thought it was pickleball, but there is pickleball here. We have there’s pickle ball. There’s ping pong. Oh yes, and the pickle ball tournament yesterday, you know, it ended in, I’m not gonna say controversy, um, but it was heated because E0’s very own Carl came in 2nd place and he desperately would like that trophy. Is there a rule about employees? No, no, no, no, but Carl keeps he has spent a year reminding everyone that last year in pickleball he lost in the first round, but to the eventual winner. Right, it’s just, it’s just like, you know, the, the drama of a bracket process and so he wanted to redeem himself this year, right? He made it all the way to section. Yes, right, Carl. Alright, alright, and Carl is celebrating, I think, 18 years as an N0 staff person. He’s our IT director. He started as an AmeriCorps Vista. That’s incredible. Yeah, is he the longest? He’s the longest. And then how many years are you since membership I’ve been, I’ve been, I started at the NTC like the, you know, two days before 11 NTC was my first day as membership directors, um, and, and Ailey’s right behind me at 13. 0, she’s she’s outstanding. She curated this table that we’re sitting at. Uh, she got the chairs that we’re sitting on, um, she chose this spot for you all to be able to see everybody coming in visibility. Yes, it’s very nice. Yeah, Ali on her game, her thank you. All right, I know you’re busy. Thank you, CEO. I hope Aria was a nice surprise. It was such a gift. Thank you for doing that. I so appreciate it. I’m gonna tell the whole team with our at our daily debrief, um, and. And I look forward to the next time Gene and I get to be on the show and I have slept in some reasonable amount of hours prior to talking into the microphone, but I really value you being here and creating a digital platform for so many of our community members to get to share, you know, all of their smarts beyond these walls. So thanks for thanks for the collaboration. Yeah, lots more. OK. Amy Semple Ward, they’re the CEO of N10. They’re our technology contributor here at uh nonprofit Radio. Thank you. Um, and thank you for correcting me, parent, parent, yeah, yeah, you’re right. I mean, I know you’re right, but thank you for the, thank you for the correction. I’m, I’m a trainable boomer. You’re very trainable. We’ll leave it there. Thank you also for being uh with with uh nonprofit Radio’s coverage of 25 NTC where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits. It’s time for a break. Imagine a fundraising partner that not only helps you raise more money, but also supports you in retaining your donors. A partner that helps you raise funds both online and on location so you can grow your impact faster. That’s Donor Box, a comprehensive suite of tools, services and resources that gives fundraisers just like you, a custom solution to tackle your unique challenges. Helping you achieve the growth and sustainability your organization needs. Helping you, help others. Visit donorbox.org to learn more. Now it’s time for the human factors driving your CRM success. Welcome to Tony Martignetti nonprofit radio coverage of 25 NTC, the 2025 nonprofit Technology Conference. We’re at the Baltimore Convention Center, where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits. My guest now is Ruben Singh. He is founder and CEO of 1/10 Consulting. Ruben, welcome back to nonprofit Radio. Thanks for having me, Tony. Good to see you again. This is, I think your 3rd, maybe 4th, 4th you’re counting, you’re more accurate than I am. Um, your session this year is the human factors driving nonprofit CRM success. Uh, I don’t know, I wonder, do you see people often or organizations often blaming technology when the problem is more team and human? Yeah, that’s exactly the the premise of it, Tony. I, I, um, uh, I’ve I’ve often found myself as a consultant coming into situations where Um, you know, the client we’re working with at the prospect we’re speaking with says, ah, we need Salesforce or we need, you know, uh, this particular solution or virtuous or something else, um, and, uh, you know, because they’ve had a bad experience with the technology that they were with, uh, and so, uh, as I’ve seen this so much throughout my career, um, and then you know you start peeling back the layers of the onions. And then you see, oh well, you know, the business processes are not fully defined. There’s not, you know, a plan for adoption, there’s not a plan for governance, uh, and so what I’ve realized is that, um, often times, uh, where the, the, the failures happen have really has nothing to do with the technology at all. So yes, that’s exactly what the premises of this uh of this um workshop. So the symptom I don’t know, cycling through, uh, platforms like, oh we need Salesforce, and then they have Salesforce for 3 or 4 years and then they realize, oh, no, Salesforce wasn’t really the solution. Now we need we need the Microsoft platform, right? Does it happen like that? That’s definitely a part of it. I think there’s also, you know, just there’s always this sense of urgency um as new technology comes along. Um, that uh we don’t, if we don’t innovate, we’re gonna fall behind, um, and we’re seeing a lot with, you know, AI now as well. Um, it’s, it’s no different, you know, everyone say well if you’re not using AI for your solutions, uh, you know, you’re, you’re gonna be left behind, you’re gonna, your organization’s gonna fail when really. Um, that is, that is really forcing organizations to adopt certain things that they’re not, they may not be ready for their, their processes may not be in place, their data might not be ready. So, um, so just like we’re seeing right now with, you know, the latest trend of technology, um, feel the organizations we work with just feel compelled to to to rush into whatever the particular trend is, um, and sometimes there’s business pressure also. Uh, you know, if this particular system failed, you know, new, new CTO comes in and says, ah, I need to prove myself or I need to get something going, so oftentimes they try to get the, the, the cart before the horse. You mentioned business processes a couple of times. What what kind of processes should we, so now we’re getting to what the human factors are that you need to have in place for the technology to be successful for the CRM. Well, what kinds of business processes are you looking for? Sure. Well, um, first, are they defined, are they documented? You’d be surprised how many nonprofits I walk into where, you know, they could be operating just fine, um, but there’s no nothing really documented and that’s fine, that’s where, you know, consultants like ourselves who would come in and help, uh, understand them, review them, define them. Um, and then there’s some that are just, uh, not very, uh, as you as you learn more about their business processes, you see that there’s, um, just inefficiencies, uh, that are there as well. So what kinds of business processes are we talking about? Just some examples. Yeah, um, fundraising, for example, so check come, you know, stack of checks come in, you know, what are the different processes to get that data entered into the system, or it might be donor advised funds, you know, what is the process around that? Or you know, we have a uh uh a series of files that need to be uploaded or it could be an application. process for programs uh that that might be so it it it could be um the grant distribution process what’s the reviews and applications that process who needs to review, who needs to approve before a grant might be approved. So, um, so there’s really a cross grant making fundraising program delivery um there’s there’s all kinds of steps that needed to happen and we ultimately want the the system, the technology to make it work as efficiently as possible. So we we we heavily rely on business processes to make sure that we’re. Um, that we’re creating things that ultimately makes the systems more efficient. So the technology is supporting the business processes not not we’re not relying on the technology for the business process, but it’s, it’s supplementing what our processes are. That’s exactly it. I would, I would add one more thing to that, you know, in addition to the technology supporting the business process, it also has to support the strategy. So that’s kind of one of the other points that we’re gonna be talking about later on today. Um, is to make sure that there’s a clear strategy. What is it that as an organization you’re trying to solve, um, how do you know that you’re successful? What are those markers or indicators to confirm that you’ve, that you’ve, you’re successful because we want again the technology to support that, uh, we want the technology to be able to track and report and monitor to make sure you’re meeting your goals, so. Uh, as a technologist, it’s a little bit tricky sometimes because they, they, you know, the clients often expect us to come in with a technical solution and, you know, code this and configure that, but we, we like to kind of step back and say, you know, what is it that you’re trying to solve? What’s your strategy? How do things work? Where can we create some efficiencies, then we start building. OK. Yeah, it’s it’s, it’s often important to have that consultant perspective to take a step back because you’re, you’re probably often. Uh, at 110th Consulting, and I’m, I’m gonna ask you to remind listeners why it’s 110. I think I remember, but we’ll get to that, we’ll get to that shortly. Um, you know, you’re, you’re often, um, confronted with, you know, we need, we need new technology. That is not our, that’s not our feedback. Amy. It is, it is feedback. OK. OK. There we go. Thank you. Oh, can you just try it with a lower volume? We’re uh we’re we’re, you can tell we’re live here at we’re, we’re just turning on the loudspeaker because the plenary session just ended, so we have a we have a loudspeaker and it was feeding back. OK, so that was us, that was us. Tala. All right, we’re accountable. I’m accountable. I feedback. It’s time for Tony’s Take too. Thank you, Kate. We’ve got a new tale from the gym introducing you to Roy. Uh, I met Roy by. Same way I hear about lots of people, uh, overhearing other people talking about Roy, uh, after he had left. And I know who he is. I’ve, I’ve seen him around. Uh, I’d say Roy is probably early to mid 70s. And the, the thing that the uh the two guys talking about Roy were focused on. Was that, um, well, he talks a lot, I agree. Uh, and he doesn’t put the weights away after he uses this one machine that he focuses on a lot, spends a lot of time on, and, and he actually grunts a lot when he’s on this bench press type machine. Uh, I had not noticed that he doesn’t take the weights off like you’re supposed to, but these two, guys did, uh, as well as talking about how chatty he is, and, you know, that he, he like, uh, just spends too much time in between his sets. Talking to other people. Maybe even annoying other people, uh, they did, they didn’t say that, but. They didn’t like how much he talks, and they don’t like that he doesn’t put the weights away. So I was, uh, so I was keeping an eye on Roy, you know, after I saw, I saw him again, and, um, word must have got to him about the weight part. Uh, he didn’t, he didn’t talk any less, still very chatty between sets. But he did start putting his weights away after he was done, takes them off the machine, puts them back on the rack where they get stored. So that’s good. So Roy did uh improve his bad gym behavior. Now, how did he get wind of the idea? That he’s not. Practicing good gym etiquette, I don’t know. Uh, I, I, I had nothing to do with it. I just stay out and listen and, and I happened to watch well, cause I heard about Roy once I learned his name, so then I was paying more attention, and that’s when I saw that he, he, uh, exercised good gym etiquette. So, but how he came to change his ways, I don’t know. I swear I had nothing to do with it. So that’s Roy at the gym, uh, along with many of our other characters I’ve introduced you to, uh, through the, through the many months. Roy at the gym, the community gym where I work out, uh, 44 times a week. And that is Tony’s take 2. OK. Are you sure you haven’t spoken to Roy before? Because he sounds familiar. I don’t think so. You might be, you might be thinking of Rob, Rob. There was Rob. He was the Marine Corps. Remember Semper Fi? He was talking to a another former Marine, and they ended their conversation with Semper Fi, the the Marine Corps motto. You might be thinking of Rob. I, I’ve seen Roy, but I never knew his name. OK. Hm. A lot of our names that are short. Well, it’s a couple. Try to keep track of all the characters at the community gym where I go, try to, maybe we should start a database. We should do, maybe we should start a CRM database. We said. We’ve got Fuku butlers more time. Here’s the rest of the human factors driving your CRM success with Rubin Singh. So you’re often confronted with our technology sucks, you know, we need this platform is not working for us. Nobody, I don’t know, nobody ever seemed to have learned it right. It doesn’t, it doesn’t work with what we’re doing, what we’re trying to do, and but you need to step back and say that there may very well be something deeper than your platform. OK. Absolutely, and you know there there’s there’s that and and I’d say also there’s been times if I’m being totally honest, Tony, where I’ve don’t don’t don’t be disingenuous, don’t lie to no I can’t do that, um, but, uh, you know, I’ve I’ve been part of teams early, early in my career where, um, you know, we have, we’ve completed the project. We have finished on time, we’ve finished on budget, we checked all the boxes for all the requirements that we met, but at the end of the project, at the end of the go live, honestly I, I felt kind of uncomfortable. I felt uneasy. I felt sick to my stomach because I knew that despite all the things that we’ve done for the technology, the nonprofit is not set up for success in the long run. Uh, some of the ways that I sense that were, um, they, you know, maybe all the users were really excited about the technology, but maybe the leadership was not fully on board, so they may not have, um, you know, they have not modified their processes, how they’re gonna do reporting, how they’re going to measure progress, how they’re going to measure performance, um, if they’re not really bought into the system, um, the whole thing’s going to fail. Um, also another key thing is governance. For leadership, the leadership buy-in is essential, uh, I think we may have talked about, or if it wasn’t you, it was another NTC how to get that leadership. It’s, if, if, if the leadership isn’t committed, leaders who are listening, CEOs, uh, executive directors listening, if you’re not completely committed, I mean your teams, your teams know that they figure it out and their commitment, uh, uh, is gonna be equivalent to yours for sure. If you could spend tens of $1000 on a on a new CRM system, if not more, but if you as a leader are gonna say, OK, you know, fundraising meeting, you know, fundraising, you know, check-in is going to be on Monday and everybody bring your spreadsheets, um, forget, you can forget the investment that you made in that CRM system, you’ve lost adoption right there holistic look remind us why your your company is one. Yeah, you know, well, um, you know, we’ve exclusively worked with nonprofits and, and very early in our, in our startup phase, uh, we worked with a lot of, um, uh, faith-based organizations, um, and, uh, it was, it was funny that as I was working with different organizations whether it was a synagogue or a church or a mosque or or cordura. Um, they all seem to have this 10% concept, this giving back of 10%, uh, to back to the community, back to causes, back to the good of, of the whole, um, and I thought that, you know, despite all these different faith traditions being so different, there was something that was, uh, you was a common thread amongst many of them, and so that’s kind of where 1/10 the consulting came from, yeah. I had it close. I thought it was, I thought it was giving I was giving back, but giving back 1/10. Yes, exactly, exactly, um, you, you, uh, your session description talks about inclusive design as a as a means to. Achieve the the CRM success that we’re looking for. Uh, say, say more about the design process, inclusivity. Yeah, well, well, we feel strongly that any technology that is meant for everyone should uh include as many people as possible as part of the design, otherwise, um, there’s gonna be blind spots. Um, uh, you know, this might seem, uh, you know, unrelated, but I was reading some stories about how when Um, uh, there’s crash test dummies, um, were being used, um, to test the safety of vehicles. They were based on a male body of 5′ 970 pounds and, um, the, and as is the 2011 University of Virginia study that showed that women were much more likely to be harmed or hurt in an accident. Um, than men were and 47% more it was like a pretty ridiculous number, so, um, just makes you wonder like when, when these vehicles and safety were designed and assessed, were they really thinking about different body types, different people? Well, the same thing applies to, you know, technology, um, the story I often give people is, um, you know, even my own parents, my, my elderly, uh, you know, parents, you know, from an immigrant community when they signed up for the COVID vaccine. Um, it was a process that was clearly not designed for immigrants and it was not designed for elderly, um, you know, it was, it was a the application form was very, uh, cumbersome. There was a lot of information you had to have, have prepared you cited this in a year or two in the past, yeah, the online form was not, uh, well, not user friendly for 70 or 80 year old, yeah, yeah, and so. Um, and, and so like, and then you, you also hear that uh well the immigrant communities are not signing up for the vaccine and, and it’s a public health problem. So, um, you know we feel that CRM is the same day is the same way that um it often times I walk into a room for a design session and I have the IT professionals there or because they’re the ones who can give us the quickest answers, um, or we have the people who are like the quote unquote super users who are the most technically proficient. Um, but you know, to me, if we really want to have inclusive design, we really want to see what who who’s not at the table. Let’s maybe have people of different ages, different technical proficiency, different, you know, socioeconomic, different uh parts on the company hierarchy because if this system is really designed for everybody, we need to get as many different thoughts, ideas, perspectives involved, um, to me, uh, often times if we overlook that, um, it, it, it ends up being a gap that we have to fix later. Um, you, uh, you also cite, um, this being valuable for uh professional growth. How is that? Yeah, and this is something, uh, as I get older, Tony, I’ve been reflecting on on a lot and uh I’ve been, um, I’ve I’ve felt this in my professional career and I’ve I’ve had the um privilege to uh teach as an adjunct professor close by here at University of Maryland Baltimore County. And it’s something I often tell my students, it’s like, um, you know, if, if you really want to be good consultants in this space, um. You know, we, we often times focus on the, the, the credentials or the certifications and you know we go crazy with the certifications and, and you know so we can present that and say, ah this is, you know, this is who we are but in my experience what’s been most useful and also has been useful to to the success of our projects is really being an expert in the industry that you’re working with, being passionate about the industries that you’re working in. Um, so for for us we tend to have a focus on the social justice sector, um, and it’s, you know, in my tradition, in my blood, and my, in my, uh, upbringing to be working with these types of organizations and really understanding the ins and outs of, of these organizations, and I feel like that’s been able to, um, uh, it’s it’s been something I’ve been uh able to bring to my projects, bring to my implementations, um, and the love and care that we give our clients and. It’s, it’s been very helpful so it’s something I, I encourage folks to, um, you know, to, to work on becoming experts work on becoming um keeping up to date with what’s going on in the industry so if you’re a nonprofit technology consultant being fully aware with the challenges with grant making or you know how government funding might be affected these days or you know taking an opinion on how AI can help or harm uh nonprofits. Uh, taking an opinion on data privacy and where it fits, so, uh, what I’ve seen is that what our clients need is not just, just people who are experts at the technology, but experts at the industry that they’re working in. And what about professional growth for for folks in nonprofits as they’re looking at their own businesses? I mean this is sort of a broadening exercise where folks are learning. there as you’re you’re suggesting for consultants, the folks nonprofits learning outside their own areas of expertise. Yes, yes, absolutely, um, an example of that is, you know, uh, to me I realize that, you know, equity and and technology is, is, is ultimately, you know, uh, it’s super important for inclusive design and inclusive systems, um, so for me that meant, um, I was gonna become a. A certified DEI practitioner, um, so I went and, you know, went through the classes, got my certification, and, and that was something that I, I wanted to make sure that was part of who, who I was. So while you might think that this might not be part of your part of your, um, technical credential, um, this might not be part of your technical credential, um, it, it having that business credential or having that expertise was super important, um. Another example could be change management. Um, so if, if you feel that change management, excuse me, change management is something that you’re passionate about, by all means become a certified credential change management professional because it’s only going to make all your projects, uh, more successful. Get you outside your comfort zone. Yeah, I mean I think there’s I think there’s value in that. I’ve I’ve seen it professionally, um. Just, you know, challenging, challenging yourself, you know, outside outside your normal boundaries and and and it really applies to any industry, so as I tell my students, if you’re a The technology is everywhere, so you know if you wanna do fashion tech, become an expert in the fashion side of it a sports tech, become an expert in the sports side of it doesn’t really matter, um, but it’s really just about, you know, what my clients over 27 years of of of this work, um, they don’t really care how many salesforce certifications I have. They don’t really care about, you know, what they, what they care about is do I understand them? Do I understand their business, do I, you know, what, what else do I bring to the table? There’s lots of tech consultants out there, but what else do you bring to the table? So it sounds like we’re in your backyard, uh NTC. You teach at University of Maryland Baltimore County. Yes, yes, yes, just uh uh right right outside 20 minutes from here, so it’s nice, we’ll see you again next year. I don’t do you know where next year’s is? I believe Detroit, but, uh, wherever it’s gonna be, I’ll be there. We’ll be together. Um, what else, what else are you gonna share on this topic that, uh, you and I haven’t talked about yet? Um, we are gonna, I think the one other thing, and, um, it’s not something I talked about, you know, a few years ago, but it’s just so much more relevant now is, um, you know, again as far as the, the human factors that that uh affect CRM, it’s also uh looking at um, you know, how bias and discrimination can make their way into the systems, um, so whether it is algorithms that are built, whether it’s AI models, um, and, uh, making sure that we have. Checks and balances in place to ensure that the data is um not toxic in any ways or or the data is not skewing results in a in a way that could um hurt or harm communities. I think one example I if I can give a specific is, you know, if you are a nonprofit that uses an algorithm for recruitment volunteer recruitment or application reviews, um, you know, making sure that those do not, uh, uh, create skewed results, making sure that. There’s a checks and balances process to make sure that that that the results are not discriminatory, that they’re fair, they’re unbiased, um, and that’s something that, um, organizations are really grappling with how do we do that? So I have some, some models that I’m gonna be sharing as well today that I’m pretty excited about on on how you can create some checks and balances. Yeah, um, I mean it’s uh I wish I wish I had my diagram I could bring up here too. Yeah, but um, yeah, yeah, um, but it’s basically just um being intentional about, OK, you know, if again starting with strategy, so let’s say it’s a volunteer recruitment plan and you say, you know, I and I had a lot of this well we want to increase our, our diversity in our recruit in our volunteer pool so you know it’s, it’s basically setting some measures for that. um, we wanna have 20% of, of this particular demographic or 40% of this and then it’s really just um creating some checks and balances just like in any. Um, in any implementation of of technology there’s gonna be a, a testing phase, there’s gonna be a data validation phase. So what what I’m proposing is we also have a a a a a bias detection phase. We also have a, um, you know, um, uh, a sort of um discrimination and bias, uh, check that we essentially do so in that case we will just like we have parameters to say these are the percentages we’re looking for, what are the results for it? So, um, so it’s, it’s not rocket science, but, but it’s really just making sure that when we build our test plans out that we’re also checking for bias and discrimination. I know a lot of work on LinkedIn. Have you written a book? Um, in the works, Tony, in the works you mentioned it or maybe I’m just that you ought to write a book. OK, uh, you’re working on a book, um, early stages, yes. But um but yeah, now there’s I’ve I’ve kind of captured a lot of thoughts um over the years about this and you know these are things that were just kind of things I uh thought about, you know, like uh you know this doesn’t feel right or this could be done in a more equitable way or this is this is not really doing good. Even though we’re calling it tech for good, um, and then, you know, being in communities like this at N10 and NTC, uh, made me realize, oh, I’m not the only one who thinks like this. There’s others who who are who have also found some weird stuff in out there in the implementation world and and I think, um, you know, as a consultant who, who now has started my own practice, um, I realized, you know, I don’t have to just continue being part of the problem, you know, I can. Uh, I can try to shift some things and, and, um, share my stories to, to make sure that we, we, we, we collectively do better. OK, now, you know, I imagine you’re, you’re part of a minority faith community in the United States. How does that inform your practice or or how does it open your eyes to the inequities that that we were you know, you’re doing more to fight than I am. I bring voice to them, but you’re actually doing. Well, well bringing to it is is very important, so I appreciate that you do that, Tony. Um, uh, yes, as part of the sick tradition I think um it’s it’s a few things. um, I mean it really does fuel a lot of my work, um, you know, the sick tradition is a very um deep in in community service and in justice and in collective liberation, so it it really is a fuel for, you know, the, the, the focus on the social justice sector. Um, but I would say, yeah, absolutely, you know, being a visible minority does, uh, help me have, uh, that the radar is always on. Um, you know, and, um, I, I’m, I’m very aware, hyper aware of of things that just don’t feel right or that that that that don’t sit well with me, whether it’s happening to me or someone else, um, so you know, early on in my career I was, you know, thinking to myself, ah, you know, I’m just learning the ropes, let me just follow along what everybody else is doing and you know, different practices that might happen in in implementations themselves and technology implementations. I’ll just go along with it. It’s fine, um, but now I, I didn’t it right, yeah, so now I kind of sense that, you know, I feel that agency that I can, you know, I can, I can speak my mind, I can step forward and say, yeah, you know, this, this persona building exercise we’re doing for marketing, you know, of, you know, guessing what. Different races and demographics might feel about our work. Yeah, it doesn’t, that’s not great. That’s there’s other ways to to get that information that doesn’t sit here and, and, you know, enable stereotypes, uh, you know, we can use archetypes, we can, you know, we can ask people directly why they could come to our nonprofit or don’t come. So there’s there’s alternatives out there, you know, the tried and true methods are not always the best, um, they’re not always the most equitable, so you know, let’s let’s brainstorm other alternatives. Did finding that agency come from starting your own business or before then? I think it was a combination of being in circles of other technologists of color that, you know, where I, I felt very empowered and said, ah, you know, we’re not the only ones, you know, like other people feel this way and collectively. You know, there’s things we can do better, um, and then yes, starting the company and I I recognize that comes with privilege, um, and not everybody can speak out the way that they want to, but, but definitely starting starting my own practice and being very transparent with my customers about, hey, this is who we are, this is what we’re about. If we see something that doesn’t feel right or that the data that you’re requesting from your clients is is overreaching, we’re gonna, we’re gonna raise our hand and and you know what I thought might have deterred. Customers is actually um uh had customers gravitate towards us. They want to be held accountable. Yeah, yeah. Well, I’m glad you found your voice it’s always good to see you, thank you very much. Thanks so much. My pleasure. Singer and CEO. Thank you for joining us for our. 2025 nonprofit technology conference coverage in the Baltimore Convention Center and thanks to Heller Consulting technology services for nonprofits for sponsoring nonprofit radio at 25 NTC. Next week, more from 25 NTC PII in the age of AI. If you missed any part of this week’s show, I beseech you. Find it at Tony Martignetti.com. We’re sponsored by DonorBox. Outdated donation forms blocking your supporters’ generosity. Donor box, fast, flexible, and friendly fundraising forms for your nonprofit, Donorbox.org. I’m gonna miss that alliteration. Donor box is going away this week. Fast, flexible, friendly, fundraising forms. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. I’m your associate producer Kate Martignetti. The show’s social media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein. Thank you for that affirmation, Scotty. Be with us next week for nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great.

Nonprofit Radio for April 21, 2025: Wake Up Excited, Go To Bed Fulfilled

Eric Saperston: Wake Up Excited, Go To Bed Fulfilled

That’s what Eric Saperston wants for you. In this archive show from October 17, 2022, he returns after many years to share his wisdom borne of research over cups of coffee with some of the most successful folks on the planet. Plus there’s his book, “Live In Wonder.” We can always use Eric’s inspiration and empowerment.

 

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Welcome to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host and the podfather of your favorite hebdominal podcast. Oh, I’m glad you’re with us. I’d be forced to endure the pain of dextroclination if I saw that you missed this week’s show. Here’s our associate producer, Kate, to tell you what’s up. Hey Tony, I’ll be happy to. Wake up excited, go to bed fulfilled. That’s what Eric Saperston wants for you. In this archive show from October 17, 2022, he returns after many years to share his wisdom, born of research over cups of coffee with some of the most successful folks on the planet. Plus, there’s his book, Live in Wonder. We can always use Eric’s inspiration and empowering. On Tony’s take two. I’m at NTC. We’re sponsored by DonorBox. Outdated donation forms blocking your supporters’ generosity. Donor box, fast, flexible, and friendly fundraising forms for your nonprofit, Donorbox.org. Here is, wake up excited, go to bed fulfilled. It is a genuine pleasure to welcome back Eric Saperston to the show. He is an award-winning winning filmmaker, bestselling author, executive coach, keynote speaker, and host of the new series Three Things. You may have seen him on the Today Show, CNN or Headline News, or in the New York Times, National Geographic, or The Wall Street Journal. He continues to interview world leaders, tycoons, visionaries, and pioneers to understand the common traits that make them successful. He’s at Eric Saperton and at Eric Saperton.com. Eric, welcome back to nonprofit radio. Yay, Tony, what a pleasure to be uh back with you, my friend. 10 years. That’s some people would call that a decade. 10 it was, it was February 2012, last time you were on, we met at the thing called the NextGen Charity Conference in New York City. Uh, and I’ve been following you, uh, since I’ve got your film. We’re gonna talk about, you’ve, uh, you’ve been living a life of wonder, we’re gonna get to that book called Living Wonder. Um, but I, I’ve got to ask you about wake up excited, go to bed fulfilled. give us some, some, you know, we have a full hour together, so no need to, no need to squeeze it all in here, but like high level, how can we wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled? Well, what a great question. I think for me, first and foremost, you know, I grew up, um, my father, before I was born, had a stroke. He was 28 years old, and he had a stroke. Before that, he was playing minor league baseball for the White Sox. He was a top CE you know, executive. My mom was a stay at home mother, and at 28, my dad went into the doctor, found out he was uh bleeding in the arteries. They had to do a surgery on him, and he came out paralyzed on the entire left side of his body. And my mom, who was a stay at home mother, became the breadwinner for our family. My dad crippled, uh, was really, uh, in dire straits and, and depressed and had a real hard go. And then 4 years later, I wasn’t planned. I had an, I have an older brother and a sister that are 6 and 7 years old. Yeah, but even though my dad was paralyzed, uh, he still had some things functioning and so I, I, I 100% paralysis. I was born as a, as a surprise, uh, and, and came into the world with a father that was crippled, a father that was jaded, a father that was angry and upset for not, uh, you know, and rightfully so. He had, he was a, he was an athlete and a participator in life, and all of a sudden he was regulated to have to really, uh, crawl through the world, and it wasn’t a pleasurable experience for him. And one of the great lessons that I learned from growing up like that is around suffering, and there’s all kinds of suffering. There’s suffering that’s thrust upon you like being paralyzed, and then there’s internal suffering, mental suffering, and one of my personal missions is to is to reduce suffering and increase joy in people’s lives. And I, I looked at my dad, who was, was struggling, and I thought, well, he’s, he’s, he’s got a lot of wisdom, and he’s very smart, and I’m grateful to be a son, and he’s not waking up excited and going to bed fulfilled. And that’s something that called to me. I, I wanted to do that, and so I, out of college, I realized that uh I wanted to to learn how to to do that. And not knowing it myself cause it wasn’t modeled for me, that’s when I came up with this idea of traveling around the country and calling up the most passionate and successful people in the world, and asking them out for a cup of coffee, so I can learn from them how to wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled. And so I’ve learned a tremendous amount and, and uh I think that’s one of the reasons why people bring me out now to give speeches and coach executives and do all the things is to help people uh do that. I think the world right now is For me, from where I’m sitting, and when I look at most people, I see most people going to bed exhausted and waking up tired. And then they put that on repeat over and over and all of a sudden, uh, you know, a week goes into a month and a month goes into a year, and all of a sudden, before you know it, it’s been a decade. Of, of doing that. And I think that’s a tragedy. I think that life is such a beautiful gift, and that we’re here to live it. And I think it’s important to wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled and live every day like it’s your last. And a big part of that, you ask me, what can you do to do that? I would say three things in particular. One, I would say that it’s all about our language, that we use our language, uh, and the stories that we tell to shape and create and design our our life. And most people are using disempowering language, uh, to describe their life, and they’re getting disempowering results. And if we use empowering language, we can have a better shot at creating empowered results. So we play a game called Up the Language and elevate the story, and the higher we can tell, the better story that we can tell about our lives, the better our lives becomes. So that’s number one. Number 2, on what it takes to wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled, I would say it’s all about being really clear about uh the standards, guiding principles, values, definitions, and commitments of who we are. One of the metaphors I like to use is that, uh, again, when I look around the world today, I see a lot of rudderless boats. And we all know what happens to a boat without a rudder, you know, people have become rudderless boats, and when a boat doesn’t have a rudder, that it drifts. It’s at the whim of the elements. It, uh, the news can impact it, uh, a story can impact it and people are being spun around. That’s why I think people are going to bed exhausted and waking up tired is because they’re unclear about what it is that they stand for and what I’ve learned from talking to The most successful people in the world is that they’re clear, and they weren’t clear when they became successful. They got clear on the way because that became the rudder of their boat, and they became the captain of their vessel, and they were able to carve through all kinds of scenarios to be who they. They are because they know what their definition of success is. They know what their vision is. They know what their mission is. They know what the values that push and drive them to do what they do. They know their commitments. And I think one of the things that I’m seeing as I’m coaching all these executives around the world is that no matter how successful the executive has become. People need a good checkup. They need an opportunity to kind of re-evaluate who am I, what am I, what do I care about, what’s important to me, and get really clear about that. And with that comes confidence, self-esteem, uh, velocity, ease, and power. And the third thing I would say that uh helps people wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled is. Definitely one of the big ahas for me after studying the common traits of extraordinary people now for, uh, many, many years. Uh, one of the big epiphanies was that the people who wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled and live extraordinary lives for decades are people that have maintained, celebrated, and share their sense of wonder with the world. That we have become a society that has become cynical and jaded and bored and disillusioned, and all that is because somebody has sold out their sense of wonder. Wonder is a birthright that all of us have. Every single child on this planet was born with a sense of wonder. It is our first value. Uh, it is about being curious and innovative and exploratory. And living life as an adventure, and some people are born with it and keep it, and nurture it, and celebrate it, and go on to live extraordinary lives, and other people let like a, you know, get punched in the gut and let the wind get knocked out of them. Let the wonder get knocked out of them, and then they become cynical and jaded and depressed and all those kind of things. So I think this world right now. Uh, one of my big invitations is for everyone to do whatever it takes to reclaim their sense of wonder, that childlike curiosity, that awe, that playfulness, and approach life from that place, it brings vitality, life force, and aliveness. Which I guess ultimately, uh, to answer your question, if you put all those together and a few other things, I think you have a greater chance of waking up excited and going to bed fulfilled. You make my synesthesia kick in. I, I, I get, I, I get some tears listening to you, especially the last, the, the 3rd, especially the 3rd, living, living in wonder that reclaiming that childhood curiosity, sense of sense of wonder, um. I, I, I have to share with you that I’ve been sharing your, I’m, I’m gonna call, well, I’m gonna call it a mantra. Maybe it’s not your mantra, but the mantra, wake up excited, go to bed fulfilled. Um, in, in my work, I am often talking to people who are. 70 and over because I’m doing planned giving fundraising for my clients who are nonprofits and they’re the, the people who leave the leave the the nonprofits in their wills and their trust and their life insurance, you know, they’re typically over 70 or so. So I shared this mantra with two women. And they both, they both wanted to write it down. 11 was 84, and the other, I told it to her on her 99th birthday. I was with her just a couple of weeks ago, celebrating her 99th birthday. And I, I told her about the, the, um, So the the aspiration to, uh, to wake up excited, go to bed fulfilled, and both of them, and she wrote it down. This is how a 99 year old remembers things. She would write it down, she just think about it and the 84 year old, that was a phone conversation, but same thing, she, she wanted to write it down so it’s, it’s inspirational to folks who are, uh, over 84 and over and including a 99 year old that I shared it with. So it’s, it is, uh, it’s such a beautiful aspiration. You know, it really came to me, uh, organically. I was, uh, you know, I, you, you mentioned that I made a movie and out of college for those folks I guess that that don’t know about it, you know, I, I, I graduated from college and My, I, I, I had gone to college not planning to go to college. I really was, that wasn’t really in my, uh, focus yet. I ended up going to school and then not only did I go to school, uh, I, I excelled. I became a student body president and a fraternity president, a resident advisor. I ran the volunteer center, a big advocate. I’ve been volunteering for a long time. Where did you go to school? shout out your alma mater San Diego State, SDSU San Diego State University. And uh and Grossmont College before that. I went to a community college, like I said, I did, I didn’t plan to go to college. I went to a community college first, then went to San Diego State, and volunteering was has been a part of my soul for a long time. It was when I was a kid volunteering. Uh, I volunteered for the Special Olympics. Uh, I ran the volunteer center. I ended up getting invited to run with the Olympic torch because I was a volunteer, uh, and volunteerism led me to being a speaker at the AmeriCorps conference, you know, for, for the Martin Luther King National Conference on Service. Then I ended up meeting Coretta Scott King, and then I ended up meeting the director of the FBI Bill Sessions, and then he introduced me to Governor Richards, and Governor Richards introduced me to Henry Winkler, the Fonz, and then that led to a development deal with Walt Disney Studios, and then it turned our journey. We were traveling, I was I kind of jumped ahead, but I was, I was in college graduating. Yeah, we’re gonna talk about van life. We’re gonna get, we’re gonna get the van, but no doubt about it. I, I, I, I, I, I think people like to say I was van life before van life was a hashtag, before we even had hashtags. Right before there was such a thing as a hashtag. It was a pound sign. It used to be a pound sign. It was a butcher, you would get a pound, like 33 pounds, and then that got converted to a hashtag and now I guess is just LB, but yes, when, when Pos was represented by today’s hashtag, you were, you were living van life. I was, I was indeed. So I guess for the for the just to recap the movie. So the movie where I, I graduated college, I took, and instead of getting a job because I, I felt like I achieved a lot in college and I wasn’t so ready to go, uh, get a corporate job or go to graduate school, I decided that I was gonna take a year off. And follow the Grateful Dead and work of ski season in Aspen. So I took my golden retriever jack. I bought a, I bought, I bought an old Volkswagen bus, uh, and the two of us set off across the country. Before I left, my mentor in school challenged me and he said, hey Eric, what can you do to make the trip more meaningful? I mean, I get you’re gonna go party and play, but you’re already good at that. What can you do that would provide value on this journey to yourself and others along the way? And he really dropped a great question that changed the trajectory of my life. And so I thought about it, and I thought about my life, and I thought about how my father was crippled, and I grew up in a house like I did, and I thought about wanting to, to wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled, and what that would look like, and how can I do that? And then I read this quote that said, to know the road ahead. Ask those coming back. And that quote stuck with me, and I realized that if I wanted to live an extraordinary life, the quickest and best way that I could do that would be to go to talk to people who are already living extraordinary lives and study the common traits, motivating factors, and guiding principles that enable them, enable everyday people to, to produce extraordinary results. And so, I, I had this vision that I’d call people and then then I set off on this cross country adventure, not knowing if anybody would say yes or that I could do it, but at least it gave my, my, my journey a sense of purpose. So I set off across the country and maybe some of you might have seen me and not remembered cause how I funded my trip is I would pull into rest areas with my Coleman stove, and I’d set up my dog and my bus and I’d jam jammed some tunes, and I sold, uh, what I called back then sexy, kind, grilled cheese sandwiches, made with love for $1 off my Coleman stove for gas money and dog food. And people would walk up to me and just tilt their head like a dog that’s confused and just like, what are you doing? And I would tell them that I graduated from school and I’m traveling around the country and I’m calling up the most powerful people in the world and taking them out for a cup of coffee and how I’m funding my travels is by selling sexy kind grilled cheese sandwiches. How many sandwiches would you like? And uh some people called the cops, uh, some people, uh, you know, turned the other way and other people thought what I was doing was cool and they started buying my sandwiches and then not only did they buy my sandwiches, some people, they would give me $5 because they thought what I was doing was cool or $10 or $20 and Uh, a few times I even got some $50 bill once, uh, $50 bills for two pieces of bread and some cheese, which is, uh, pretty incredible to get $50 grilled cheese sandwiches. I guess that’s, that’s that’s what a college right, that’s that’s what a college education is all about learning how to market $50 grilled cheese sandwiches. It’s time for a break. Imagine a fundraising partner that not only helps you raise more money, but also supports you in retaining your donors. A partner that helps you raise funds both online and on location so you can grow your impact faster. That’s Donor Box, a comprehensive suite of tools, services, and resources that gives fundraisers just like you, a custom solution to tackle your unique challenges, helping you achieve the growth and sustainability your organization needs, helping you, help others. Visit donorbox.org to learn more. Now back to wake up excited, go to bed fulfilled. So I got a chance to get to talk to, you know, travel and make some money, and then people were giving me, uh, when they found out what I was doing, they gave me names and numbers, even the people that they knew, oh my God, what you’re doing is cool. We, you know, I was telling them I’m bridging a gap between young people and wise elders and And uh do you know any wise elders? And then people would say, oh, you know who you need to meet is, you know, Max Cleland. He’s a Georgia Secretary of State and triple amputee and a war hero. I mean he’d be great, or you can go, oh my cousins, Bernie Marcus, the founder of Home Depot, you could, you could meet him. He’s really great and oh my, my, my, my sister-in-law is Kathy Thornton, who’s a United States astronaut, the first woman in space, and you should meet her. And so all of a sudden I got names and numbers of people, plus I was cold calling people and and uh calling corporations and calling all types of folks and saying, can I take you out for coffee? and then lo and behold, I was interviewing some of the most extraordinary people on the planet and then was encouraged, what what what are you doing? And then, uh, realized that we were capturing the living oral history of extraordinary people. And then we were encouraged to get a video camera and document our travels, and then we went across the country for 4 years, shot over 500 hours of footage, interviewed over 200 of the most extraordinary people from Billy Crystal to Jerry Garcia to Jimmy Carter to Maya Angelou to on and on and on, and met all these incredible people, documented, uh, their wisdom and experience. And then ended up making a feature film that uh we got a deal with Disney and then that movie we sold our short we made a short film first and uh we sold it at Sundance Film Festival and then our feature won South by Southwest and then off to the races we went and we had a hit on our hands that were in theaters all across the country that sold out shows. Oh, you have it right there. I got so we’re really blessed. my DVD Winner of the audience Award at the Atlanta, uh, Film and Video Festival 2001. Winner of the most memorable Film Award, South by Southwest Film Festival 2003. You gotta get your, you gotta get your copy of, uh, the DVD. I’m holding it up for we’re only folks are only hearing us, but I’m holding up my copy for, uh, for Eric. The Journey. The film is the journey. The Journey film, yeah, it’s so you can, you can, you can get access to that at uh Linonder.com or Ericsapperston.com. Yeah, the movie turned out, you know, it was in Barnes and Noble’s and Hollywood Video and uh Netflix and all that, and it really it it’s impacted people all all around the world and it’s, it’s been a real blessing. There was a little bubble gum and shoestring operation. Uh, you know, the little book, the Little Engine That Could, uh, I think I can, I think I can. I think our movie was like that and then it ended up, uh, really, um, inspiring and, and impacting a lot of people. And why I brought up the movie in the first place was that you were sharing with me how you shared. Um, wake up excited and go to bed with these really incredible clients of yours, and the impact it had, and I was saying that that phrase came organically, uh, to me. I was, I had done this travel. I, we, I picked up three other travelers and we went around the country interviewing people and it’s the story of our own dynamic and what it was like following a dream and and and being on this adventure and meeting all these iconic people. And then there was a moment where I was uh in a, we were camping. Uh, in the snow up in Oregon. And I just looked at the camera. Kathleen, our cinematographer, puts the camera on me, and it’s towards the end of our journey, uh, before we went home to even watch footage and figure out how to make it into a movie. This was well before that. This was just while we were still on the road, and Kathleen put the camera in front of me and and started asking me, you know, things that I’ve learned from taking this adventure. And I just looked at the camera and said, I just have one question to ask people, and that is, are you waking up excited and going to bed fulfilled? If you are, you’re doing the deal, and if not, what are you waiting for? And that became the last line of the movie, uh, and I’ve been living it ever since. And asking people that question everywhere I go, cause the question is so powerful to me, cause it’s either one or the other. Somebody looks at that question and goes, either I am waking up excited and going to bed fulfilled, and that’s a celebratory life. And other people ask themselves that question, and they’re like, dang it, I’m not. And if you’re not, then it’s time to set a course to make that happen. Life is such an unpredictable thing. We just learned from inside the pandemic. And everyone, it’s our birthright. I believe it’s our birthright to wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled. We have control over a lot of things in our life. The, the, the folks we surround ourselves with, the choices we make personally and professionally, um, our, our, our thinking, you know, you, you, you captured with, uh, you know, our language using empowering language, but our thinking about ourselves or the way we talk about ourselves and You know, these are things that we all have control over and including those big decisions in life, you know, you, you can make the life that, that you aspire to, but you just have to be conscious in, in, in lots of things. Yeah, I think, uh, being conscious is important. I mean, conscious is a big word, a scary word, uh, you know, an out there woo word, but I think ultimately what it means is being present. Yeah. Being present, just being thoughtful about your, your decisions, your choices, your actions. Again, the folks you surround yourself with, I think, I think the folks you surround yourself with, you know, are, uh, uh, do you, do you, do you spend your, uh, your time with folks who are, who lift you up, who challenge you, who you, whose company you enjoy, or is it more folks that, you know, are troubled that bring you down, that are, that are needy. Uh, you know, there may be some folks in your life that you don’t have a choice about, but a lot of, a lot of folks in your life, you do have a choice about. And, and I think about the people you surround yourself with and spend time with. I agree with you. I think the principal, the principle there is like attracts like. So, uh, let’s say I’m a cynical, jaded, uh, frustrated person. And, and, and of course I’m thinking, you know, I need to hang out with more uplifting, powerful, inspiring people, but the uplifting, inspiring, powerful people aren’t gonna wanna hang out with you. Yeah, yeah, because you’re that person is is is is is taking energy instead of contributing energy. So it’s really comes down to who we’re being in the world. And to, to, to step up our game. I mean, both personally and professionally. I think one of the things that I’m doing now as a, as, you know, as a coach, we specialize in coaching executives to achieve meaningful impact and amplify their personal and professional narratives. Mhm. And to amplify our narratives, that’s what we’re talking about here is amplifying. The the higher our narrative can go up, the more joyous and fulfilled our lives are. People are, people are, it’s amazing to me, it’s just incredible. Even top executives are using language that’s off-putting. You know, in our world right now in corporate America, we’ve become a culture that’s talking about inclusion, empathy, belonging, psychological safety, organizational health, all these things are important to create a very powerful culture, and most organizations and their executives are using language that is outdated. They’re using language that’s disempowering. They’re using language that’s aggressive. They’re using language that actually makes people recoil, and they’re good people. The people that I’m talking to are good people. They’ve got great ideas and a powerful vision, and they want to do good in the world, yet the language they’re using is actually sending people further away. And if we start like what Eric, give us an example or two of, of this disempowering uh type language. Great. Uh, here’s here we talk about distinctions a lot. One of the distinctions that we talk about that’s super powerful as a leader. Is, are people talking from the I versus the you? Mm. Most people, what do you think? I or you? What do most people do? Uh, I’m talking about, so there’s a leader, it could be a leader, leader in an organization, gets up and starts talking to his people or her people about what’s going on in the organization. Is that leader using I language or you language? Uh, I, I, I, I think they’re probably using more I language. I, I would like to hear more we language. You can use we language. That would be a nice evolution. Uh, I would say just from, from our research and what we see is that most executives, it’s you, right, all you, yeah, you see, I see what, yeah, yeah, yeah, people are eing all over each other. You people, you’re doing it, yeah, yeah, you know what you need to do. You need to follow this. You need to, you need to, you need to, you need to, you need to, you need to, you need to, and then even if it’s good, even. If it’s well intended, they’re using the word you on people, and people get frustrated. They get, they, they get it, they feel attacked, they feel confronted. They feel like you’re judging them. The, the, the word you is challenging, way better for an executive to turn around and say, hey, this was my experience. This is what I need. This is what I would like to see happen. This is what I want. And that way I get to tell my story and you get to be enrolled in my story. You could possibility in my story. What about inclusive we language? We we together. Even better, even better. OK. Even better. Um, but it’s careful, we is a difficult one because we can be a crutch. People can use the word we when they really mean you. And it’s it’s different to get it can get a little dangerous. OK, you have to be sincere about doing things together, moving ahead together, together, yeah, be be sincere, be genuine about that. All right. um Here’s another one, people say, you know, people say you know a lot. People will be in a conversation to go, we, we learned this, we, we learned this the other day when we were, we were interviewing an IT guy. Yeah, to work with us. We took him to dinner and we had a piece of pizza and then he was sitting there, we just learned, we just, we just learned, you know, we were just thinking about this distinction, came up with this distinction around I versus you and then uh my, my lady and I were at dinner with this guy and he starts telling this story to us. He’s like, hey, you know, when you’re in Vegas. And then you’re out partying all night, and then, you know, you drink too much, and then you pass out, and then you find yourself in a hotel room with a black eye, and there’s two dudes there that you don’t know, and then your wallet’s gone, you know what I’m talking about. And Sarah and I are just so we, we, we, we actually, we actually don’t know what you’re talking about. I can’t say I’ve had that experience to, to know, no I. Uh, it happened in Seattle once, but never in Las Vegas, right, not for Las Vegas, only in Seattle, but what, what happens in Seattle stays in Seattle, so we don’t talk about it. All right, but you get what I’m saying, so that’s just one example, but there’s so many examples around and also just, you know, another one is that executives and in all of our lives, most people are talking about what they don’t want to have happen. We spend an awful lot of time talking about what we don’t want. I don’t want us to screw up. I don’t want us to miss the deadline. I don’t want us to da da da. And most people are always talking about what they don’t want. And to me, that’s language in the off position, talking about what you don’t want. Powerful, inspired, conscious leaders are talking about what they want. They’re actually speaking their possibility into the world. They’re inviting people to go where they want, that’s what a leader is, is to lead us towards where we wanna go together instead of talking about what we don’t want. Most people are talking about what we don’t want. We’re coaching executives to talk about what they do want. 10 years ago, I, I asked you what what it was that, what was the number one thing that distinguished those who were successful from those who were not successful. And uh, I’m gonna ask the same thing, not as a quiz, but I’m just curious if, if over time this this may have evolved because you’ve done hundreds of interviews since we talked 10 years ago. Um, what, what do you think is the number one thing that, uh, distinguishes those who are successful from those who are, who are not? Uh, I’m remembering our conversation from 10 years ago. Uh, I’m remembering that question, and I’m remembering the answer that I gave them. So I’ll give the answer I gave them and then see if a new one pops up now. But the answer I gave up then was, uh, when you asked me what separates those who achieve from those who do not. My answer back then was, Uh, based on an interview that I had with the president of Coca-Cola, Donald Keogh, who was arguably the most successful, uh, CEO in the world with one of the most recognizable brands in the world, and I had asked him that question, and I said, hey, you know, Mr. Keo, what separates those who achieve from those who do not? And like many of the guests, he looked at me and said, well, Eric, what do you think it is before, before he’d answer, he’d ask me. And then I’m thinking, well, it’s having a vision, uh, uh, finishing what you start, having good communication skills, I rattled off a few answers, and he goes, oh, those are all part of the soup that, you know, makes it all possible. But what I think, and then again, just the most powerful recognizable uh uh CEO uh of in the world at that time, one of them. looked at me and he said, Eric, what separates those who achieve from those who do not. is in direct proportion to one’s ability to ask others. For help. We think asking for help is a sign of weakness, and it’s actually a sign of strength. And that our vulnerability and willingness to learn and enroll people into a vision is what makes visions come true. It’s time for Tony’s Take two. Thank you, Kate. I’m at NTC, the nonprofit technology conference. On the floor, they don’t call it the exhibit floor, they call it the hub this year, capturing lots of interviews for future nonprofit radio episodes. Uh, we’re all in Baltimore together, of course, the nonprofit technology conference is sponsored, hosted by N10. You heard Amy Sample Ward talk about this, uh, the conference a couple of weeks ago with the Baltimore Convention Center. And I’ve got interviews coming up on uh email deliverability, um, email marketing. Multiple Panelists talking about different fundraising topics, something about events, experiential events, and it’s like 19 or so, uh, panels. So that is, uh, you know, if we do to a show, that’s 9, 10 weeks of NTC shows brought to you, brought to you, brought to you in living color audio by Tony Martignetti nonprofit Radio. So that’s where I am this week, the whole week, um, and we’ll start, yeah, we’ll start with the shows uh next week. That’s Tony’s take 2, Kate. I’m not there with you, so have lots of fun and meet lots of cool people. Thank you very much. What you mean we’ll have more fun because you’re not there? How are those two things connected? You’re not there and you’re not here. I mean, you’re not here and have fun to hear it live. Oh well, you’re in school though. We’ll have to wait, I guess. You have uh educational obligations that are constraining your time. No, that’s true. All right, maybe next year we’ll get you out of school. I don’t know. All right. Mhm. We’ve got Booco butt loads more time. Here’s the rest of Wake up excited, Go to bed fulfilled with Eric Saperston. That is what you said 10 years ago. I’ve remembered it. I’ve, I’ve used it from time to time, uh, and, and you brought vulnerability in too. I, I absolutely agree that vulnerability in a leader is a sign of strength, a sign of confidence that they’re willing to expose themselves, uh, and perhaps their organizations vulnerability, uh, to others, rather than wrapping up tight and appearing invincible and All knowing, which is, which is, uh, an, uh, uh, an, an unachievable state. Um, so, has it, has it evolved? Do you, do you feel now that was Mr. Keo’s answer and you adopted it? Do you think it’s, it’s changed? Do you, do you personally see something different through all the, through all these, uh, through this decade since? You know, I think now what I think, I think that is no doubt. I think you just said some really great things there one I mean asking for help is great. I think vulnerability. I think we wanna, we wanna follow people who are accessible, approachable, that they’re that I, I, I, I, I can relate to them. Genuine. I, I think that, yeah, and, and. Yeah, I, I, I was, I was with somebody yesterday who was talking about his executive teams, and he’s like, man, I love those people. I, I would do anything for him. I wanna, you know, and it was that and I know why they wanna do that, it’s cause the people there are right there with them. They’re, they’re not better than they’re they’re willing to do the work, they’re willing to get dirty with them, they’re willing to admit their own foibles and their own mistakes, and they’re willing to, and I think creating a culture of vulnerability like that breeds more vulnerability. It inspires more vulnerability and it creates community. Um, I think my answer now, uh, What separates those who achieve from those who do not now are leaders that genuinely care about the people they’re serving. They really care. Care about your health, your vitality, your wellness, your happiness, uh, and really, yeah, are willing to listen. I guess that would be that I guess that that’s my answer. People, what separates those who achieve from those who do not is one’s ability to listen well. And then you’ll hear people’s, uh, uh, you’ll, you’re here, you’re here, you’ll hear other people’s, uh, vulnerabilities, other people’s needs, and I think the genuine, uh, excelling leader can, uh, um, I, I, I wanna say something strong that accommodate, can, can support those, support those needs. Here those vulnerabilities, work with them, help people. Uh, excel in their strengths and build up their build up their weaknesses, the weak areas and In a, as a guy who studies communication, I think there’s 3 things that want to happen in every communication exchange with someone. That people want to be #1, they want to be seen, 2, they wanna be heard, and 3, they wanna be appreciated. And if we can do those three things in any communication exchange, we’re winning. And I think being a good listener enables that to happen. I get a chance to really see somebody, and we talked about being present, that’s a big one. Just being able to be with people. Be with people wherever they are, look them in the eyes, being able to have empathy and compassion and and and understanding, and really hear people, hear people’s stories, even the ones that are different than yours. Even with people that that you disagree with, can you still listen and hear them and let them so be able to be seen, so you get a chance to really listen and hear them heard, you get to really take in what they’re saying, even if you don’t agree, even if you don’t think it’s the right path, even if you’re not into it, but still give people dignity and respect for sharing, and then appreciate them, value them, understand them, be grateful for them. And then even if it’s like as a leader, people come and tell me, oh, you know, here’s a great idea, then, you know, it may not be the idea that I think is the right time at this moment. And here’s another, you know, great distinction that people are using, right? You know about communication distinctions around language. Most people use the word but a lot. If you go and study people right now, a lot of people are using the word but. And they’re using the word but all the time, even when they’re comparing two ideas they actually believe in. And so for me, most people that are leading right now, when I talk about language being off-putting, some leaders gonna hear somebody’s great idea that they think is awesome, and they’re gonna go, yeah, yeah, yeah, but, and then they’re gonna pivot. All that does is diminish what that person just said, shut them down and make it feel like they’re not as important. And now let me tell you what I think is important. The whole idea of improvisational comedy, it’s based on the principle yes and. Yes, yep. Yes and, way better than no but. Most people out there are no buts. If you’re a no but and you’re listening to this right now, I invite you to give up. No but and start becoming a yes and. it doesn’t cost you anything and it’s more inclusive, it’s more honoring, and it builds community. No but just does the opposite. So if I listen to somebody pitch an idea to me that’s not really what I think is the right time for me, I’m gonna be like, wow, that’s fascinating. And, and then I’m gonna pivot versus no but, let me tell you what my idea is. And it’s and you talked about humility, you know, we talked about vulnerability. Another thing of humility, right? That goes with asking for help, but it’s also just willingness to, to not always have all the answers. We don’t have to pretend that we have all the answers. And so for us, uh, being humble, somebody pitches me an idea and I don’t think it’s a great idea at the time that they pitch it, but two weeks from now, their idea could come into full focus and it was a great idea. One of my guiding principles I like to play with is uh I like to remind myself this phrase, could be good. Could be bad Too early to tell. OK Yeah it’s, it’s open minded, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s possibility related. there’s something this this could be, it could be fantastic, but, you know, we just don’t know yet. I dare say, living in wonder. Let’s talk about what a beautiful. I want to talk about the book, Li in Wonder, Quests, Quotes, and Questions to jumpstart your journey. First, just reading the title, I happen to love alliteration. Uh, this show I have Tony’s take two. if you get jargony, we have jargon jail. I love alliteration. You’re not, you’re not a jargon. I’m not worried about that at all for you, but I do put folks occasionally in jargon jail. I love alliteration. So quest quotes and questions to jumpstart your journey, that’s a great subtitle of the book for me. Um, Living Wonder. What, what, uh, uh, I know the book is available at uh Ericsapperston.com, but what are gonna, what are people gonna learn about Living Wonder? These handwritten pages. What are we gonna get? Uh, thank you so much. You put people in jargon jail. Uh, I’ve been really blessed. Uh, my, my neighbors, Woody Harrelson, and, uh, we spend a lot of time doing all kinds of fun shenanigans, and he’s one of the funniest and smartest people I know, and he’s an incredible storyteller and a phenomenal joke teller, and it’s a privilege to be uh around him and our friends and they’re always cracking jokes and telling great stories, and it’s, it’s, it’s. It’s almost nerve-wracking to be around such high, uh, quality, um, uh, presenters and performers. Uh, the, the image I have is, is when I was, you know, jumping, jumping rope, there’s like, you know, that rhythm, there’s a rope and everyone’s talking and sharing a joke and then and then it’s going and then all of a sudden, you know, oh, I want to tell a joke and then kind of jump in and if if I tell a good joke, you know, the, the, the, the rope’s still going and, you know, and I didn’t miss a beat. Other times you jump in and now all of a sudden joke doesn’t really go well and then everyone kind of just is like, you know, and it’s so it’s so loud in a room like that because everyone’s so good at telling jokes so it’s just like aww and then all of a sudden you, you put people in jargon jail, uh, Woody likes to put people in joke probation. All of a sudden he looks and I and I get there, you know it’s like Eric, uh, joke probation and all of a sudden I’m, you know, I, I, I get joke probation a lot. You brought the, you brought the crowd down. Yeah, I sometimes, you know, it’s it’s it’s, it’s a high risk game, but, you know, for the times, you know, it’s like being a professional baseball player. You strike out a lot, but every once in a while, you know, you hit the ball and people, people invite you back to dinner. You you can offer Woody joke jail. Well, I thought, you know, my favorite thing is to put him, and he’s so good at it, and every once in a while he flubs and I get to all of a sudden go, oh, joke probation for you. And uh it’s, it’s really fun. It’s it’s it’s uh one of the things that one of the principles that that I’ve really come to live by is a rising tide lifts all boats, and being around, I, you know, I live on a farm now. Uh, with, uh, a bunch of people that that live on the farm. We have 280 acres out here and it’s just extraordinary. In Hawaii, we want folks you know that you live in Hawaii. I do. And, and, and just being in community has taught me so much. I, I, I, I grew up in a condo in uh San Diego and and uh moved to Atlanta and I’ve lived in Venice Beach, California, and I’ve Uh, I, I, I’ve been relatively isolated, even though I’ve been, you know, popular or created things. I, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve lived in big cities where, you know, I might know a neighbor or two, but for the most part I’ve, I’ve, you know, been, been more independent. Now I live in a place where I am, uh, with people, and that has been another big growth for me is to, to one live where we’re planting food. Uh, in feeding people and, uh, eating food from the land and learning about sustainability and regeneration and soil, and, uh, some really healthy practices and what it’s like to to be in community and and how communities as well as organizations and not for profits and families thrive is by contribution. Uh, we become a society of consumers. Uh, most people like to take, you know, what’s in it for me, and really thriving communities, thriving organizations, thriving families are, are, are shifting that. They’re upping the language and elevating the story to instead of what’s in it for me, they’re asking themselves, hey, how can I contribute? How can I make this better? What can I do to provide value? And that has been a a secret sauce for sure. To answer your question about the the book Living Wonder, uh, that came, that came to me because of my travels, I was, um, I didn’t have it early on. When you met me, I was really, um, coming off of meeting all these extraordinary people and getting invited to give speeches for Nike and Coke and General Mills and UPS and ADP and United Way and all these, and I was doing opening and closing keynotes in front of, you know, big audiences, and I was uh I think one of my, my talents is that I, you know, I can look at everyone that I’ve interviewed, and I can tell you at least 1, probably 2 or 3 lessons that that person taught me, and I could go give a speech, and I can interview the executives at a company, find out what values are important to them, go. In my arsenal of stories of people who I’ve met and then shuffle the deck, pull out, uh, a picture of this person and a picture of this person and a picture of this person, and then that’s my speech. I can share these really great stories that will relate to the organizational culture and inspire them to even do better. When I would be done with these speeches, uh, you know, the audience would be really gracious, and, um, they would, they would engage in questions with me, and they would, you know, ask me different things about the movie or what I shared about what not. And every once in a while there’d be somebody who would Raise their hand and and say, hey, Eric, you know, I really get that you’re, you know, you did this cool thing, you met all these cool people and you’re able to share all these great stories and lessons from leadership lessons and communication distinctions from all these wise people that you’ve met, and you’re doing a great job of it, and I loved it and uh I’m just curious, you got to go on this adventure. And you did something that most people never get to do, and you got access to all these big brains, uh, and extraordinary people. What did you deduce that was, that was the commonality? I, I, I, I know that you can tell me a story about Jimmy Carter when you met Spike Lee or whoever it is, but I wanna know what, what did you learn? And for years, I would be up there going, you know what? I don’t know that I have that answer yet, and it was a little awkward cause I wanted to have an answer, but I didn’t have it, and it took about 6 or 7 years after the journey. There’s a great, uh, there’s a great line by Khalil, the poet Khalil Gabron, who said, as the mountain to the climber. Is clearest from the plane. As the mountain to the climber is clearest from the plane. What that means to me is that when I was on the mountain, traveling, all I could see was what was in front of me, and I only had the perspective of what was in my immediate surroundings. And things became clear when I got to leave the mountain and be on the plane and look back up and see where I traveled. And I think that’s for all of us. We get a chance to, you know, in the moment, we can only do the best we can in the moment. A lot of wisdom, a lot of clarity, a lot of understanding comes after the experience is over, then we get a chance to kind of look back at where we traveled, then that’s where we get to deduce some really great takeaways. And so for me, it took a while. It took me 6 years of being on the plane. And back at the mountain and then all of a sudden, I was on a surf trip to Costa Rica, and I had an epiphany, and the epiphany was that the thing, the greatest commonality, the greatest aha, the thing that all these extraordinary people, whether they were a world renowned architect, a world renowned horse trainer, they were a president of the United States, they were a CEO that took an idea from a garage to being super successful. The common or a rock star, all the commonalities that these folks had in common. The number one thing is that they still were Excited and open and willing, and innovative, and exploratory about life. They were just willing to, like, they they showed up in a meeting and they’re like, I don’t know, let’s try that. Let’s figure this out. What do you think? And it was just, it was this big light bulb that went on going, wow, there is this idea that we were all born with a sense of wonder. It’s the thing that is our life force. People who live in wonder have their light turned on. And it’s bright, and we like to be around those people. It’s contagious, it’s uplifting, it’s inspiring to be around people that are still learning and growing. And then there’s a whole bunch of other people who are like, know it alls, and let me tell you how that’s not gonna work, and, you know, that’s never gonna happen, and blah blah blah, and they’re talking even that what I’m saying, the the example I just gave, those are people talking about what they don’t want. It’s never gonna happen, it’s not gonna work. Those are people talking about what they don’t want. It’s the negative part versus talking about, hey, I’m not, I’m not coming from some fairy dust land, making anything, making a movie, writing a book, doing a speech, it takes work and it, it, it’s not like I just get to go poof, just cause I’m using inspiring language, things happen. Man, it’s still hard. I get to go into a meeting instead of going, this isn’t gonna work. I can go to a meeting and say, hey, you guys are all very smart. Can you all look at this idea and share with me anything that you think might be in the way of our success. And then we get to explore those things that might be in the way so we can turn those into the on position, but instead of going, oh, that’s not gonna work, and let me tell you why it’s not gonna work, or people that go to a meeting and say, you know what, yeah, uh, you know what the problem is. I don’t care about what the problem is. I wanna know what the solution is, and let’s figure it out, and then maybe we won’t even maybe not even work, but at least we’re focused on the solution, and then if we discover it’s not it, it’ll reveal something else that’ll take us on another adventure that’ll bring us closer to the thing we want anyway. So this whole idea about wonder is that the people who are waking up excited and going to bed fulfilled are people who are living in wonder. and wonder, the thing about wonder is that it’s not something that needs to be taught. It just needs to be remembered. We just have to get quiet enough to remember what it was like when the world didn’t take away our joy. We got to reclaim our power instead of, you know, all the cynics and all the people that said you couldn’t do it, or all the people that were mean spirited, and all the people that hurt our feelings, just be able to go, OK, well, I’m not gonna let you win. I’m gonna reclaim that sense of wonder. I’m gonna go back out in nature. And I’m gonna sit and look at the sunset, or I’m gonna go look at the birds, or I’m gonna go look at a stream going by and remember how magnificent this place is. I’m gonna stand up. I’m gonna just, right now, I’m gonna stand up and put my arms up in the air and lean back a little bit and go, whoa, and remember that I’m floating on a ball that’s rotating through space right now. We are sitting on a ball rotating through space and we’re, it’s incredible or that even right now, you and I are talking through Zoom technology. This is crazy. I can see you, you can see me. You’re in, you’re in the Carolinas. I’m in Maui, Hawaii, and we’re having this conversation. This is incredible. I like to think about, man, I, I, I send a, a, a, a, a, a, a piece of mail to somebody and all of a sudden, within a couple of days or weeks it arrives somewhere. That’s incredible. I get to get on a plane and space for 55 cents for 55 cents, that piece of mail. I, I think one of the things about wonder, a close, if, if you want to get access to wonder in your life. Really start pushing and leaning in, not pushing, but leaning into more gratitude. Being grateful Being grateful for being grateful for it all, being grateful for technology, being grateful for your friends, being grateful for your wife, being grateful for your husband, being grateful for your employment, being grateful to be of service, being grateful that you have all four arms and legs that you can use, be grateful for your ability to communicate, be grateful, be grateful for it all. Gratitude brings direct access to a sense of wonder, a sense of awe, a sense of marvel, a sense of astonishment. So you ask what the what the book will do. So, the book came out of this epiphany of going, OK, I just realized that the people that are extraordinary in this world have maintained, celebrated, and share their sense of wonder with each with each other in the world. And that’s powerful, and then I realized, oh my gosh, I now have a responsibility. Uh, I just, you, I went on this quest, I went on this adventure. I went to the top of the hill. I figured out this idea of, wow, wonder is something. I went and checked in. I went back and interviewed my guests and checked in because I didn’t, if I go back through all the transcripts, there wasn’t wonder really talked about. One, because I didn’t have that in my lexicon to even talk about it. And two, and this is the real fascinating part, is that the people that I were the people that I was interviewing. They didn’t bring up wonder. Because it wasn’t a success strategy. It was who they were being. Mm. They weren’t using wonder as a way to be successful, they were just being wondrous. That’s just innately who they were, and it was just how they rolled through the world, and then I got to go back and check in. I remember talking to um Steven Tyler from, you know, the band Aerosmith, and I, and I leaned into his ear, and I, and I said, uh, you know, I, I, uh, you know, I, I’m, I’m just curious, you know, I’m I’m exploring the you know the idea of uh the important uh role Wonder plays in all of our lives. And he looked around and and just looked back at me and uh with sparkly eyes and just said, oh, I could write a whole book about that. And it is true, and I went and talked to all these incredible people, and they said, oh my gosh, you’re right, Eric. Wonder has been a major part of who I am in the world. I thank you, cause I didn’t even think about that as part of my thing. It’s just who I’m being, and my invitation is definitely to to to to to reclaim your sense of wonder, so that you can attract more wondrous people in your life. I’d like to give you a chance to drop some more names so that folks have, uh, have an even wider, you’ve already talked about Jerry Garcia and Steven Tyler and Jimmy Carter, uh, and Henry Winkler, uh, I, I’d like folks to get a sense of, you know, you’re, you, of your, the breath of your, the breath of your, uh, your, your interviews, your, your folks that you’ve you’ve tapped the minds of. Uh, let’s see. I just interviewed Daniel Pink, who is an amazing author. He was a speechwriter for, um, Al Gore with left politics and then started writing really incredible books. He wrote a book called Drive, uh, he’s got a new book out, uh, um. Around regret, he’s very powerful uh just interviewed him, just interviewed, uh, Pat Simmons, uh, from from the band The Doobie Brothers. Uh, that was great. He’s the guy that wrote, uh, O Blackwater, keep on keep on shining on old Black, yeah, OK, yes, a couple more. Drop a couple more. Uh, I, well, I just, I just interviewed him just so I just interviewed him. He was just inducted into the Music Hall of Fame. Uh, they were just on their 50th anniversary tour, and, uh, and I asked uh Pat Simmons, I said, uh, what are 3 things you’ve learned about songwriting? And uh Pat said, uh, 3 things I’ve learned about songwriting. Uh, #1, Uh, keep it simple. Uh, #2, Uh, write about what you know, uh, your own experience, basically. And number 3, don’t bore us, get to the chorus. Uh, it’s brilliant. OK, who else have I, who else have I interviewed? Um, go ahead. I, we interviewed, just interviewed Diana Nyad, who’s a world record swimmer. She’s incredible, um. And let’s see, I’ve interviewed uh the founder of the Ritz-Carlton, I’ve interviewed the chairman of UPS. I’ve interviewed, um, Oh yeah, very good. How about going back, uh, going back to, uh, your, your, your 4 years in the van. Uh let’s see who comes to mind there? I know Jimmy Carter was part of that, part of that cadre. Jimmy Jimmy Carter was incredible. I interviewed, uh. Uh, back then, Governor Ann Richards, who was incredible from Texas, uh, uh, I interviewed Ken Kesey who wrote One Flew Over a Cuckoo’s Nest, and, uh, Merry Prankster. I interviewed Billy Frank Junior, the head of the Indian Fisheries Commission. Uh, I interviewed Hazel Wolf, who was a 98 year old environmental activist, uh, poet Maya Angelou, um, Yeah, that’s a pretty good list. It’s been incredible. I’ve I’ve interviewed so many people and, and those are all iconic names, you know, but I’ve also interviewed farmers and I’ve interviewed teachers and I’ve interviewed a lot of people that you’ve never heard of, um, and, uh, yeah, and and I and and I also interviewed, you know, thousands of young people when I was on my journey, the whole premise of the journey film was to bridge a gap between young people and elders. So I interviewed all kinds of young people from all, you know, every area of of life and would would interview them and ask them what they were struggling with and then figure out, you know, what that was and then I’d go to the top of the food chain and go, hey, my, this is something my friends are struggling with. Do you have an answer for that? And that’s how we, we bridge the gap between those that wanna learn and those that want to teach. I don’t think I, I fully answered, uh, your question about the book, you know, you, you’re you were saying what, what, what does the reader get from the live and wonder book and. I, you know, the, what the, what the reader gets one, the epiphany of, of living wonder that that was that that was the origins of why I felt inspired to write the book. And then the book is about the reader and you know less about me, more about the other is one of my principles and it was the book’s less about me, more about the other, more about the reader. I tell you a little bit about my story in the beginning. Uh, it’s quest quotes and questions to jumpstart your journey. The quest part of the Live and Wonder book is I realized that I could write a, I can write a book about my story and my life and all that I learned, and that’s cool. Or I can write a book that is less about me, more about the other, and it gives people who read the book. Chance to take their own journey, and that was more compelling to me. Instead of me writing and telling you about my journey, I wanted to inspire people to take their own journey. And so the books, the opening part of the quest is for anyone that’s reading the book to pick 5 people in their life. That are people that they respect and admire, and are looking at that person’s life going, man, I want more of that, you know, and and it could be anything. It could be, I just got married and I’m newlywed, and, you know, Bill and and Nancy Schmidt down the road have been married for 60 years, and they’re as cute as a button, and I want somebody to write that person’s name down and then go interview that person. Have you and your couple go interview that wise person to find out the values they live by, the struggles they’ve endured, and what advice and counsel they give you to better prepare yourself to model their behavior. If you want to become a CEO, go interview 5 CEOs, and I wouldn’t just go interview anybody. I’d go interview really successful, happy, uplifting, whatever it is that you want to emulate and go talk to them. If you want to build a boat, uh, go talk to boat builders, whatever. So pick 5 people in your life that you admire and respect that you want more of. And instead of sitting back, coming up with, uh, you know, I can’t do it. I don’t know how to do it. I don’t have the credentials. I’m not sure, blah, blah, blah blah blah, be more empowered and go, look, this is what I want. I’m not sure how to get there. I’ve never done it before. OK, I’m gonna go look in my world, whether it could be your neighbor or somebody famous, doesn’t matter to me. Pick 5 people in your life that you want more of that in your world and have the courage to ask them out for a cup of coffee and learn. And so that’s the first part is that everyone gets a chance to pick people in life that they admire. That’s the quest. The quotes are all these quotes that I’ve used to keep my own heart and mind open. So I shared those quotes. They’re really inspiring and uplifting to people. And then the the third part is the questions, and they’re all they’re they’re all the questions that I used to interview my guests. So you can use those same questions to interview somebody or you can come up with your own. People use the book to actually go do all kinds of amazing things that we’ve gotten stories from all around the world where people actually go take the book, they pick somebody, they say, I just got this book, they go interview that person and their life changes. It’s been phenomenal. And it’s been, uh, it’s been a really uh uh uh a pleasure to have written a book that has impacted so many people. So I, I, I, if it’s something that’s that’s calling to anybody that’s listening, it’s, it’s a. Yeah, it’s it’s it’s, it’s based on similar to my movie. It’s based on the principle to know the road ahead, ask those coming back. Then anything you want to learn about anything is an inspired conversation and a cup of coffee away. And it’s, it’s jumpstart your journey. I mean, you had the journey, you had the journey, the film, you had your journey, it’s quest quotes and questions to jumpstart your journey. Could you, uh, could you share one of your that’s, that’s me that that’s me using your in a good way, I hope. Yeah, that’s me, you or somebody in your journey, yeah. What’s, what’s one of your quotes? You, you have a bunch of, you said you have a number of quotes that you live by. Can you share one of your quotes with us? Oh, You want, you want a personal quote that I’ve written or a quote from the book? Which one are you asking? Oh, well, I was looking for one from the book. Those are, those are personal quotes though, aren’t they in the book? No, those are other people that you’ve you’ve used. OK. I, I want folks to be inspired about the book. Can you share a quote from the book? Uh, I can. Here, let me, uh, OK, well, while you do that, cause I put you on the spot, now you gotta go, actually, yeah, he’s going to his book. What what what better source for quotes from the book than uh than the book. And uh yeah, we go ahead. Yeah, I’m thinking about which uh I think this is, this is my favorite. OK. Uh, I think this has to do with, uh, 11 of the things that I learned on the journey. I How important it is to be yourself. And that most people Uh, that’s, that’s a challenge. Most, most people are so highly influenced. Uh, by other people’s impression of who they are, that they would sell out their sense of wonder, their authenticity, their sense of adventure, all kinds of things to conform, uh, to what other people think. And the people who get up excited, go to bed fulfilled, live extraordinary lives are more committed to their principles. They’re more committed to their values. They’re more committed to who they are and what they say they’re gonna do in this world, and they can’t please everybody. It’s one of the common things that there’s no doubt you cannot please everybody. And when I set off to travel the country in my van selling grilled cheese sandwiches and asking that I was gonna call up people and take them out for coffee, for a long time, I had to be ostracized and judged. And uh ridiculed and had to endure people’s uh uh projection onto me. It wasn’t, it doesn’t feel good. It doesn’t feel good to be to to have that happen. And if I allowed my self-esteem to be contingent upon what other people thought of me, I’m done. And so having the courage to speak my possibility into the world is something that I invite everybody to have. It’s, it’s to be able to just be you unapologetically and to trust the process being you. And this is one of my favorite, this is how we opened the book, um, there’s an author, super uber successful author, Doctor Wayne Dyer, who, that was another one of my interviews. Uh, I came out to visit him. He lived here in Maui, and uh I came out to to visit him, and then I ended up staying, uh, and moving from Venice Beach to Maui after that visit. But he, he’s extraordinary, he passed away, but he was extraordinary, and he said this, uh, about Oprah Winfrey, and this is how I open up the Lin Wonder book. Uh, many years ago, Oprah Winfrey was interviewed about her life. Many years ago, Oprah Winfrey was interviewed about her life and asked whether she had known that she would become one of the most powerful women in the world. She explained to the reporter that when she was a little girl, someone asked her. What she wanted to do with her life. She answered by saying that she didn’t know. She just liked talking to people. The person quickly retorted, well, You can’t make a living doing that. We can learn a lot from uh. The negative, the, the, the negative, uh, the down, the Debbie downers, uh, around us and to uh ignore them and And move ahead with our own journeys. Uh, you know, you, you seem to like 3s. What what is this series, 3 things. Three things, you know, I, after somebody who has interviewed people for the majority of my, my life and certainly my, my, uh, career. And had made a movie, you know, I would interview people and spend days interviewing them and then have to go back and watch all that footage. Uh, I was looking for a way to, to capture the living world history of extraordinary people and do it in a succinct and refreshing way. And what we came up with was This idea of three things. And I didn’t realize that at the time, it was really Again, a real just uh organic unfolding. I, I, I, I’m a storyteller, and I study stories, and I ask people to share their stories, and I think about the, the, the basic tenets of storytelling. The basic tenets of storytelling is uh a setup, a conflict, a resolution. A beginning, a middle, and an end. And if we adhere to that structure, we’re telling a good story. And knowing that, I thought, well, why don’t I help that along? I’ll ask people to share with me a three things question so that they frame it with, here’s number 1, here’s number 2, and here’s number 3. And it turns out that that is a magical formula, that we are able to tap into some of the most iconic minds and ask them what their three things are, and they nail it out of the park, and they share 3 incredible insightful messages, and they’re sticky, and they’re powerful, and they’re uplifting. And that’s what we’ve created. So we’ve created a new series called Three Things, uh, with Eric Zapperston, and I’m interviewing iconic legends and uh we’re, we’re capturing that now and we’re we’re cataloging a whole bunch of those and I think we’re gonna begin releasing those, uh, in early 2023. So many folks are where we can see this. Uh, I, you know what, right now we’re we’re in negotiations with a few folks, uh, uh, with some agents and managers to figure out the, the, the outlet of where it’s gonna ultimately be. What I’d like to do is, if anybody has been inspired by what’s happening, uh, today on our chat and we want to be connected to the Three Things series, to come to Ericsapperston.com and sign up for our newsletter. Uh, our, our fans will get it first. OK. OK. And the reason I say you, you seem to like 3 3s because you, you have the series 3 things. Uh, I asked you how to live in one, how, how to wake up excited and go to bed fulfilled, and you cited 3 things. Uh, you have a game called 3 Things. Uh, we do. You wanna, you wanna, you wanna tease the game this is all at uh Eric Saperton.com or and or live in Wonder.com. Uh, but I, I, the power connected, I connected to the game from this Eric Saperton site, but I think it goes over to Living Wonder, but a game called Three Things, and then, and then we’ll wrap it up. What, what’s the three things that you, you’ve been so sweet. I’m, I’m so, I’m so grateful to be asked to be on the podcast with you. I’m grateful for our friendship. I’m grateful that we got a chance to meet 10 years ago and that, uh, we get to still be in a relationship and check in with each other now and, and, um, you know, thank, thank you for including me into your world and, and. Uh, one of my favorite sayings is when you drink the water, uh, remember who dug the well. So thank you for digging such a huge well and being of service to so many organizations, uh, Tony, you’re, you’re, you’re a bright light in this world. That’s very thoughtful. Thank you. And uh to, to give you back some of uh a phrase that you used, I think you are contagious, uplifting, and inspiring. He’s Eric Saperton. All right, so you can learn about uh the series 3 things. For that, you go to Eric Saperton.com. Uh, the book Living Wonder, Quests, quotes and questions to jumpstart your journey. Also Eric Saperton.com, uh, for the game, 3 things. I believe that’s at Lionder.com, but you can get to one from the other. Uh, the movie, The Journey, that’s at uh Eric Saperton.com, I believe. You gotta get the DVD The Journey. So, Uh, Eric, what a pleasure to be connected for all these years and to, uh, Have another, uh, an even much longer conversation than uh than our 10 or 12 minutes we did in uh in 2012. It’s a real joy, a real pleasure. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you for what you’re doing. Thank you for sharing yourself, your ideas. Thank you. Thank you, thank you. Um, uh, let’s not wait another 10 years for us to connect. No, we’ll not. You’ll, you’ll be on, you’ll, I’ll have you back because I think people are gonna enjoy hearing from you. Well, what if I, you know if anybody out there, anybody that’s been listening, thank you so much, uh, thank you for the role you play, uh, in the nonprofit world. I think you are champions, uh, and, uh. Light workers and uh uh change agents and um I just I I I applaud all y’all, just thank you for for for contributing and and making the world a better place, and if there’s anything I can ever do, whether it be uh coaching uh you or coaching your executives or giving a virtual talk or a talk in person to your organization. Uh, please call on me, and I’d love to, to help and uh be a part of your journey. Eric Saperton at Eric Saperton and Ericsapperston.com. Next week, we’ll kick off our 25 NTC coverage with Amy Sample Ward. If you missed any part of this week’s show. I beseech you. Find it at Tony Martignetti.com. We’re sponsored by Donor Box. Outdated donation forms blocking your supporters’ generosity. Donor box, fast, flexible, and friendly fundraising forms for your nonprofit, DonorBox.org. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. I’m your associate producer Kate Martignetti. The show’s social media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our web guide, and this music is by Scott Stein. Thank you for that affirmation, Scotty. Be with us next week for nonprofit Radio, big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great.