Non-Fulltime Employment

Tony Martignetti
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 Hebdomadal podcast. Oh, I'm glad you're with us. I'd be stricken with purulent synovitis if you infected me with the idea that you missed this week's show. Here's our associate producer Kate with What's Up.

Kate Martignetti
Hey Tony, here's what's up. Non-full-time employment. The next time you have a senior or mid-level job vacancy, you might consider a fractional interim, or advisory professional over hiring someone full-time. Martin Rowinski defines these and weighs the pros and cons for your nonprofit. If you go this route, what do you need in place to make the transition smooth for your team and the person you hire? He also evaluates this from the personal career perspective, if you'd consider leaving full-time employment. Martin is CEO of Boardsi. On Tony's Take 2.

Tony Martignetti
My book launches next week.

Kate Martignetti
Here is Non-Full-Time Employment.

Tony Martignetti
It's a genuine pleasure to welcome the CEO and co-founder of Boardsi, Martin Rowinski. Boardsi is an executive recruitment and board replacement platform. Martin is an executive recruitment expert with more than 25 years of C-level experience. As a thought leader in executive recruitment and leadership, he's been featured in outlets including Forbes, Entrepreneur, Fast Company, and CEO Today. The company is at Boardsi.com, and Martin is on LinkedIn. Martin Rowinski, welcome to Nonprofit Radio.

Martin Rowinski
Thank you. I'm gonna try to follow your energy.

Tony Martignetti
Oh, thank you. I'm glad it's, uh, I'm glad it's infectious. Absolutely. I'm trying to have fun here. We do have fun here. We don't just try, we're, we're succeeding. Um, so we're talking about, uh, non-full-time employment, uh, fractional, advisory, interim. Uh, tell me how you got into this business before, uh, before we Distinguish between fractional advisory and interim. How'd you get into recruitment and executive leadership, C-level recruiting?

Martin Rowinski
Yeah, I'll make it quick. I'll make a long story short. I've done a lot of consulting in my years. And of course, I've helped companies sell, position themselves for a sale. I've helped companies grow. I never really saw the financial benefit because I never had any equity. Did well consulting-wise, but I was basically, you know, not getting any younger. So, I started looking for board positions or advisory roles that would compose of some equity so I can actually get a benefit of helping companies grow. And just found that it was hard to find those positions. Hmm. And just found a niche that we can get into. So, called some of my past co-founders that I worked with before, and here we are.

Tony Martignetti
So, would you distinguish for us between fractional advisory and interim as substitutes for full-time employment?

Martin Rowinski
Yeah, yeah, of course. I mean, first of all, if we're speaking nonprofits, nonprofits face basically many of the same strategic challenges as for profit companies. Technology transformation, fundraising, finance, operations, marketing, cybersecurity, everything. They face the same stuff. Really not much different. But a fractional or interim executive isn't I'm going to start with this, isn't always necessarily a cheaper substitute for a full-time executive. And in many situations, it's a way to access senior-level expertise at precisely the moment the organization needs it. Now, the difference is fractional executive is an experienced executive who assumes an operating leadership function for a portion of their time. Think, you know, fractional CFOs. That was the big one that really kind of kicked it off. But now it's CMOs, COOs, CIOs, even CEOs. And they typically have responsibilities and deliverables, but they're not working full-time. And then you got interim executive, which is usually brought in temporarily to actually fill the actual leadership position, but they're on an interim stage. So, you know, they might— maybe a CEO departed, and during the CEO search, restructuring, merger crisis, or major transitions, they might bring in an interim to help through that time. Now, advisor—

Tony Martignetti
Well, and the interim is more likely to be full-time then?

Martin Rowinski
More likely, unless he's not the right fit. So we can get into details of that too. But yes, the hope, the hope is they can become full-time unless they find somebody better. Maybe the mission, vision, values aren't fit, they find later. So I can get into some details of that. And of course, you got advisors who provide expertise, a perspective, introductions. Right. strategic guidance or specialized knowledge, but generally doesn't own the day-to-day execution. So that's, I would say, the biggest distinction between those 3.

Tony Martignetti
Interesting.

Tony Martignetti
So the advisory, I mean, that's also a paid position.

Martin Rowinski
Correct. Yes.

Tony Martignetti
Okay. But you'd be like an advisory Chief marketing officer, something like that?

Martin Rowinski
Quite possibly. And sometimes, you know, depending on the structure— I'm sorry, depending on the structure of how they bring on the advisor, it might be structured as, you know, hey, we're going to meet once a week, or we're going to meet once a month, or can we set up a meeting whenever we need that advice? So maybe it's marketing, maybe it's introductions to some people. Fundraising is a big one. Obviously for nonprofits. So advisor might be a great solution because there's a lot more flexibility.

Tony Martignetti
And in the advisory role, it sounds like there could be or there might not be someone who is full-time in that role. Correct. The advisor could be an advisor to that full-time person, like a chief marketing officer, or maybe there isn't a chief marketing officer and they're CMO advisory, I guess, to the CEO then.

Martin Rowinski
Yeah, I mean, maybe, maybe there's a— maybe they don't have a full-time CMO. Maybe they have a part-time person that really helps out. And maybe that part-time person is not even a paid person. They're just working at a nonprofit to help out. But they might be missing a lot of the knowledge that a CMO might have. So you might bring an advisor to help bring this person up to speed and make sure they're doing their job correctly.

Tony Martignetti
Okay, interesting. All right, so, um, well, I want to talk about the, the pros and cons, uh, for, for the nonprofits. You mentioned that fractional or interim might not necessarily be less expensive than a full-time employee, I guess, even including 30% or so for benefits. I would have thought one of the The first advantage is that you'll save budget, but no, not necessarily.

Martin Rowinski
Not necessarily. And I'll also leave a quote for what I was saying when we were determining the difference in the different roles. So you got fractional leaders who help operate. You got interim leaders that help bridge the gap before they go full-time. And you got advisors that help guide. So that, that's really the simplest way to put that, those 3 in a difference. And getting into the details on advantages for nonprofits, one big advantage is access to talent. A nonprofit might not be— might, sorry, might not be able to attract or, like we're talking, afford highly experienced, let's just say, CFO. Technology, maybe leader or marketing executive, like you were mentioning, a CMO. Mm-hmm. And a fractional structure can make that expertise accessible. You also have the benefit of flexibility. Organizations can bring expertise in around a particular growth stage, or maybe they're going through a transformation or a capital gain. Could also be technology implementation or expansion or operational challenges. So you got a lot of flexibility there. You also have speed. An interim, for example, or a fractional leader can sometimes address an immediate leadership gap while the organization conducts a deliberate search for the right permanent executive. So you got that giving yourself time without losing growth or whatever that nonprofit might be going through. And then you got specialization. You aren't necessarily hiring one executive and expecting that the person to solve everything. Different stages can require different expertise, so you can focus on specialized executives. All are partial-time, so you're not hiring a, you know, full C-suite of executives at full-time. Obviously, that can get pretty expensive. Another great benefit is Fresh perspective. Someone who has worked across several organizations may bring patterns, best practices, and lessons that an internal team isn't or hasn't encountered yet. And then, of course, what you're talking about is potentially lower total commitment. Lower cost. The organizations may access senior talent without assuming entire cost structure of another permanent executive position. So those are, I would say, the benefits. But you got to keep a few things in mind. Yeah, please. Fractional leadership isn't always appropriate for every role or every organization. There can be less available— availability than with a full-time executive. A fractional executive may have multiple clients. Sure. Organizational culture can be harder to absorb when someone isn't present every single day. Employees can also become confused about authority if responsibilities haven't been clearly defined. So continuity is another concern. If too much institutional knowledge resides with a temporary executive and there isn't a transition plan, Then the nonprofit can find itself right back where it started.

Tony Martignetti
Okay. Yeah, let's dive into this a little more detail. So, a very good point that culture can be hard to assimilate with someone who's fractional, offsite maybe most of the time because they do have other clients. But by the same token, you can get expertise that, you know, as you said, maybe you can't afford full-time, but you can tap into them for,

Martin Rowinski
you

Tony Martignetti
know, 10, maybe 10, 15 hours a week or something like that. You know, is it— are these, um, are these, are these fractionals typically like limited to, uh, like I had just suggested, uh, a number of hours? How do the— like, how does the fractional— Yeah. Or I'm on call anytime you need me, fractional? What does the arrangement look like there?

Martin Rowinski
Yeah. So, advisors are typically more on a need basis. Fractional is going to be a little bit more structured. And if you want to really benefit from a fractional, you do want to create a structure, especially because they most likely have other clients. Right. Most likely have a schedule. So expecting them to, you know, get an email and say, hey, we really need you tomorrow, most likely is not going to be the way you're going to win. So you got to create a structure where, you know, the 20% or 30% of a full-time employee is on schedule and you know when to expect them. In addition to that, be prepared so that if you do have any questions or need to address any issues that this fractional leader can help out with, they're aware of it. And not only, you know, oh, hit them with it right off the bat, but be prepared and send an email out prior to knowing when they're going to be working with you. Send an email out with, hey, here are the challenges we're working with, giving them some time to prepare. So you're getting the most out of them on their limited time.

Tony Martignetti
Okay. Okay. And then, you know, you were alluding also to the reporting structures. So let's, you know, this is a C-suite person. Let's take a different example, Chief Development Officer at a nonprofit, CDO. You know, if they're fractional or if they're any of these, you know, fractional advisory, Well, interim seems a little clearer. I mean, an interim person is probably taking leadership of the team. So the reporting would be through that person. But fractional or advisory, it could be difficult. Like the people who are working on the team with the person and for the person are not going to have universal access like they would if it was a full-time— Yeah. Supervisor that they had. So that can be— I mean, these challenges are all overcomeable. They just have to be planned for. Like, it's set number of days or certain, you know, maybe it's every Tuesday, Wednesday, or it's Tuesday morning and Wednesday afternoons. And what are the hours? You know, these are the times that we'll schedule the meetings that you need me in. Right. We'll schedule you. I need you to schedule around those hours, things like that. I mean, these things are all overcomeable, right?

Martin Rowinski
They are. And I think the other biggest thing is, since we're obviously focused on nonprofits, is you have to make sure that a fractional or interim executive— even interims are important here. Well, even advisors, they need to understand that nonprofit operate with a different ecosystem involving mission, donors, boards, volunteers, employees, community stakeholders, restricted funding, grants, and often intense public accountability. Some of those things don't fall into a for-profit, but they do fall into nonprofit, and that actually is a big difference And whoever you're bringing in needs to be aware of that and understand those responsibilities.

Tony Martignetti
Yeah, you're going to hire somebody who's got nonprofit business experience. I mean, these are businesses. I say this routinely. They just happen to be nonprofit businesses. They fall under a different tax code section of the— or different code of the Internal Revenue— a different section of the Internal Revenue Code. But they are businesses. They're operated like businesses. They have—

Martin Rowinski
Yep.

Tony Martignetti
Leadership and management, and they have short-term, midterm, and long-term needs and goals. So we're definitely running businesses, but you're right, there are peculiarities. I think, I don't know if it's fair to say mostly around fundraising. Yeah. Like you were alluding to, you know, restricted grants, et cetera, and endowment and things. But whatever the differences are, there are a lot of commonalities. But yeah, you want to make sure you're getting somebody who's got a background in what it is

Martin Rowinski
and

Tony Martignetti
what we're trying to get done here.

Martin Rowinski
Yeah. And also, I mean, think about this. You're working with a nonprofit, and depending on the size of the nonprofit, it could be a smaller nonprofit that works within that city or that county, and you're talking about a community. And now if you're bringing this person from a whole different state, how are they going to plug into that community? They need to also understand the community? Who are they working with? So that's why I say it's very important in a nonprofit, you're not only hiring competency, but you're hiring for competency plus mission alignment, plus stakeholder awareness, and awareness of the community. Who are they working with?

Tony Martignetti
Yeah, yeah. All essential. Okay. Yeah. Anything else you want us to know on the organization side before we move on to— I want to talk about making the transition from full-time to something different. But anything more you want to know, or you want us to know about pros and cons? What are we gaining? What are we losing? What are we sacrificing?

Martin Rowinski
I think I said it all.

Tony Martignetti
Okay, you said it all. Okay, good. Okay. Okay. So, I mean, I would think the most common use case for these different roles is somebody just left. Either we asked them to leave or they left on their own. Maybe our succession plan was not as robust as it should have been, or maybe it was and it collapsed or whatever. So, Boardsi is one way of finding these non-full-time employees, right? That's what Boardsi is all about.

Martin Rowinski
That's what we do.

Tony Martignetti
Right. Are there other places you can— I mean, are these just— do you just go out on LinkedIn or do you use the traditional hiring platforms but just say that we're only looking for interim or fractional? Or how do you— besides the Pinnacle, of course, is Boardsi. But if you— if for some reason you're not, you're not connected with Boardsi or you want to look at alternatives, what else might you do to find these folks?

Martin Rowinski
So yes, you can go— definitely you can go fishing in, um, in LinkedIn. LinkedIn's a big one. You'll find a lot of, uh, nonprofits advertising their job under the job positions. Um, I would say the biggest problem with any job board is you're literally fishing in a pond of a lot of executives The benefit of working with BoardZ is you're fishing in a pond where our network of executives understands that our network is strictly joined from the executive side, knowing that they are joining not to find a full-time position, but to find a board position, advisory role, And that is exactly what they're expecting. So when we present a nonprofit or for-profit company and say, hey, this looks like a great fit for you, they're not, well, I'm looking for full-time. So it's a lot easier for us to fill those seats than it is for somebody. Plus time commitment, right? Do you want to have a time commitment of launching one of your employees to go on LinkedIn and start you know, sorting through all the different people that are applying? And what if nobody's applying? Are you going to start messaging executives that you think are going to be a good fit, or do you just want to leave it in our hands and we'll send executives to you that said, yeah, I definitely would like to interview for that position? So, okay, there's that.

Tony Martignetti
Yeah, yeah. All right, fair. Um, let's talk some about, uh, if we're on the Well, actually, the interim. Interim could end up being— interim could be like you're auditioning for the full-time job, unless maybe at the outset you say, I do not want the job. So don't consider me. I guess that could be good or bad for the nonprofit. Yeah. They might be losing a potential good employee, and they might want an interim who's interested in the job. But then if you're interested in the job, are you performing the way you would perform if you got the full-time job? Or are you performing because you're auditioning? And, but you're not going to turn out to be what the— you're not going to be the same person in full-time employment as you were in the audition. How do we— that's interesting, I think. How do we sort through that?

Martin Rowinski
I mean, that's a great question. It reminds me of old days of dating. You act like you're a gentleman, then you get married, and all of a sudden you stop opening the door for your wife.

Tony Martignetti
Yeah, the charm. You can't keep up this level of charm. Right.

Martin Rowinski
Well, I don't think there's an answer to that. Obviously, the hope is that the executive is who he is and always will be. I think you want to look for somebody that's transparent. You want to look for certain signals. And if that is the right person, one thing that I would always check is what is that person's personal mission, vision, and values. Now, if those 3, align with the nonprofit's mission, vision, and values, then at least you know you're in sync. And the hope there is that whatever they do in their interim is what they're going to do all the time, because that is their— that is how they run their personal life. They believe in the mission, vision, values of the nonprofit. So why would they not continue doing the great work?

Tony Martignetti
Okay. All right. Yeah, you're hoping they're transparent, right? Unless they say upfront, I don't want the job.

Martin Rowinski
Correct.

Tony Martignetti
I'll do it until you get somebody. I'll even help you hire somebody, maybe.

Martin Rowinski
Yeah,

Tony Martignetti
that could be valuable too, right? A fractional, a fractional or interim or advisory. They, they could actually maybe help you with the, with the search. Not in terms of finding candidates, but screening candidates. Because these are— you're hiring someone who's got deep expertise in the field, otherwise you wouldn't bring them on for either— in either of these roles. They could be valuable in helping you screen and interview and select the full-time person.

Martin Rowinski
Absolutely. And I think it's important too, like, you know, because we're talking about— at the end of the day, we're talking about most likely a nonprofit that is about to make a transition. Like you said, somebody didn't work out, or they, you know, retired, or they're leaving. Their— maybe their mission, vision, values changed, and they no longer believe in that nonprofit, and they are wise enough to say, you know what, it's time for me to go. So to consider that transition, I think this is the framework that I would use as a nonprofit. Mm-hmm. Start with the problem, not the title. Instead of saying things like, we need a fractional COO, maybe the better question is, what are we trying to accomplish? Maybe the real issue is poor systems, fundraising strategy, or financial controls, declining donor engagement, technology. I mean, it could be a lot of different problems, but— Mm-hmm. What are we trying to accomplish? And then determine this: What expertise is required? How much executive capacity is actually needed? For how long? Who owns the outcome? What authority will this person have? And how will success be measured? Those are the questions you really want to answer before you go and start working on the transition. And then decide whether that solution should be full-time, fractional, interim, or an advisor, or maybe a combination of, of those. Maybe you bring on an advisor and a fractional, or maybe you bring on an interim and an advisor. There could be a combination. Yeah. So boards need to be particularly clear about the authority. This, this is probably the most important part in this transition. And this could be literally one of the strongest points given as you're doing that transition. When bringing in nontraditional executive talent, the organization needs to establish clear governance boundaries. What does the executive report— or sorry, who does the executive report to? Very important. What decision can they make independently? What requires CEO approval? What requires board approval? Who manages the employees? What information can be accessed or can they access? And what happens when their engagement ends? So flexibility without clarity creates confusion. So before the person starts, Everyone needs to understand their mandate, authority, accountability, and exit plan, or no exit plan.

Kate Martignetti
It's time for Tony's Take 2.

Tony Martignetti
Thank you, Kate. The time is coming. It's very exciting. My book, Planned Giving Accelerated, launches next week, the 15th of September. So next week's show actually is going to be devoted to my book. I haven't had a show without a guest for 12, 13 years or so. It was one time I did it back when I was in the New York City studio, and it's been a long time, uh, because the show is not about me. I'm just the host. I pick the brains of other experts for your benefit and, and learning, but I'm going to make an exception.

Tony Martignetti
Next week I'm going to talk about my book, Planned Giving Accelerated: The Cut Through the Shit, No-Nonsense, Practical, Step-by-Step Guide to Launch Legacy Fundraising at Your Small to Mid-Sized Nonprofit Simply in One Week. Starting with bequests. The title may be longer than the book. Did You Need a Nap? So I'll be talking about that next week.

Tony Martignetti
And the marketing is going gangbusters. I've got a launch team of 55 people who have agreed to write a review and do a LinkedIn post of the book. So they all have an advanced reader copy. It's called ARC. Yeah. And all these, and all these fancy publishing terms now. So they, you know, they have the ARCs and they are reading and they'll each do those posts and reviews in the next week or so from when I'm recording right now. Yeah, very exciting. The time is coming. And I'll talk a lot about the book. Next week. And that is this week's Tony's Take Two. Kate— oh, wait, wait. If you

Tony Martignetti
want to join the book waitlist, you can do that at plannedgivingaccelerated.com. You'll get all the announcements when the book is ready and available for sale wherever fine books are sold. Which means Amazon and Barnes& Noble. And that is Tony's Take 2.

Kate Martignetti
Kate, you should talk about your book. It's not like this is your podcast or anything, you know, Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio. Tony Martignetti should be talking about the book written by Tony Martignetti.

Tony Martignetti
Thank you for giving me permission.

Kate Martignetti
All about Tony Martignetti.

Tony Martignetti
Associate producer. No, it's not. Well, it will be. It will be next week. It'll be all about Tony Martignetti. So I— but I think 3 times Oh no, sorry, 2 times. 2 times in 16 years. I don't think that's too much. I don't think that's too much. 2 times out of 805 or 806 shows. That's not, that's not bad.

Kate Martignetti
That's not enough.

Tony Martignetti
Very gracious.

Kate Martignetti
We've got just about a buttload more time. Here's the rest of Non-full-time employment with Martin Rowinski.

Tony Martignetti
You make several good points there. We don't want to just jump into filling the position without thinking about what the different implications are of that position. What, you know, as you identified, what are they responsible for? It's who do they report to? And what are we trying to accomplish with, you know, maybe it's not a one-for-one hire. Maybe the person who was in the job, you know, with this job title had skills that were beyond what the job title would typically include, and those skills are valuable. And if we just hire to fill a role, we may not be getting the full value that we had. Or On the other hand, maybe the role doesn't really encompass everything that it could be. You know, maybe we can consolidate. Maybe there's some gaps that we could fill with a differently defined role than what the person had who is no longer with us.

Martin Rowinski
I agree.

Tony Martignetti
For whatever reason. I made it sound like they died. They didn't die. I mean, they could have died. That would be sudden. That would probably be sudden. Hopefully they didn't die. But yeah, you got to evaluate how this role fits. And what is the real role? You don't necessarily do a one-to-one for what you had and try to replicate that exact person in what you're looking for. You do have a lot of flexibility. All right. All right. Yeah. Let's transition over, Martin, to an individual. Suppose our listeners are interested themselves in maybe being fractional or advisory or interim. What would they— what kind of qualifications would they need to bring so that they can make a transition? Maybe they're a little tired of full-time employment and they'd like to explore something with more flexibility. For themselves and for their family.

Martin Rowinski
Yeah, we work with executives who are still full-time employed and they're just looking to add value outside of their full-time employment. Maybe it's their next step that they're, you know, they're already seeing that eventually they're going to retire and maybe this will be what they want to do next is be on a board or do fractional work. But we also work with retired executives who are just looking to fill their time. They're not— they're retired, but they're not dead, um, if you know what I mean.

Tony Martignetti
Yeah, well, hopefully, yeah, hopefully they're not— they're not— they're not dead professionally. All right, but so what do we need to— what do we need to bring that, uh, that we could be potentially successful at, at something that's not full-time?

Martin Rowinski
Yeah, so I think there's, there's a few key factors. One, and by the way, Boardzite provides all everything I'm gonna say right now, our platform consists of, for our executives that are part of our network, consists of education courses. So we actually have education courses that are board-specific to make sure that our executives can provide and give impact to whatever position they come on to. We also do branding, executive branding, personal branding, however you want to frame it. We publish their biography on another website that we own. And we give them opportunity to become thought leaders by writing articles that are specific to their industry, their expertise. That way they're a little bit more distinguished and build themselves as a thought leader. Those 2 things, on top of their expertise and experience and everything else that they've built over years, are what's going to make them stand out in the crowd and make them an actual executive that can bring impact Onto the board or whatever position they take on and help the company actually succeed.

Tony Martignetti
And have I been saying is it is it board si? Have I been

Martin Rowinski
saying I say board si? Some people say board z. I always laugh and say tomato tomato potato potato same thing.

Tony Martignetti
All right, well let's let's make sure everybody understands it's B O A R D S I

Martin Rowinski
correct.

Tony Martignetti
And and I'll say later I'll say it again now since maybe I created some confusion. It said

Martin Rowinski
you're good

Tony Martignetti
B O A R D S I board si board c.

Martin Rowinski
Okay. Thank you.

Tony Martignetti
All right. So, you need to— all right. So, I understand what Board C does. I'll keep saying Board C if it doesn't bother you.

Martin Rowinski
I'm good. All right.

Tony Martignetti
I understand what they do. But what do we— what do I— I mean, probably if I just have 2 years in a finance role and I've never been a CFO, I've been, you know, an accounts payable manager or something, I'm probably not suited to be a fractional CFO. So like, what kind of years of experience do I need to bring? How do I gauge if this is— if I even have what it takes yet?

Martin Rowinski
Yeah, typically we work with C-suite executives in our network, but if somebody's looking at it and they're being smart about it, knowing that that's their trajectory, They'll start early with us. They'll gain the education courses that will prepare them to be ready to serve on boards. Um, they'll also gain the authority in becoming a thought leader,

Tony Martignetti
right? And right,

Martin Rowinski
getting a head start on those things, I say, is the best thing you could do in your career.

Tony Martignetti
Okay, being a thought leader. Yeah. And, and you know that sometimes that phrase scares people, like, oh, I have to If I don't have 150,000 connections on LinkedIn, then I'm not a thought leader. It's just, you know, if we're going to start with LinkedIn, because it's a professional network, although I kind of— my own little aside, my own little editorial— I think it's declining away from—

Martin Rowinski
I agree.

Tony Martignetti
I'm seeing more and more non-professional content on LinkedIn. In another couple of years, there may be another LinkedIn that That is, is the professional network. But in any case, it's what we have so far, uh, at this, yeah, this far along. Uh,

Martin Rowinski
closest thing to it.

Tony Martignetti
Yeah. Yeah. Um, so, so you just, you know, you just publish, you know, do a post one, like, just be consistent once a week, once a week, a couple hundred words, uh, about something that's going on in your, in, in your office or, you know, a lesson that could be learned, a lesson you just learned. Nothing wrong with admitting that you don't know everything and you just learned something.

Martin Rowinski
Absolutely.

Tony Martignetti
You just figured something out. Um, you know, so, you know, you don't want to be intimidated by the phrase thought leader, like a leader. I have to be a, you know, it's just, it's just a consistency and, uh, and a demonstration that, you know, you know what you're talking about, but you don't have to have even 5,000 followers on LinkedIn, connections on LinkedIn. It's just a consistency that, you know, people, people will get to Your content will still emerge. You know, you don't want to be scared by the idea of having a thought leader. Just, just talk to people, you know, just, just share what you're learning and what you're experiencing and what, what a lesson might be from it for others. That's, that's a thought leadership post. All right.

Martin Rowinski
I agree.

Tony Martignetti
A little, a little encouragement, a little encouragement. All right. If suppose, I mean, if we're thinking about going Um, having multiple clients doing, you know, now we need to be able to manage a business. Now I'm away from BoardC. Maybe BoardC manages, does this for clients, but, but we're getting away from the BoardC model now, the BoardC platform. If I'm thinking about being full-time or fractional or something, you know, now I need to be able to manage clients. I got to balance client obligations. I've got to think about my billing rate, how, or even What my revenue model looks like. How do I charge? Do we charge by the hour? Do I charge a retainer basis per month, per quarter? So, you got to be familiar with— you got to think through these things. You're running a business now.

Martin Rowinski
Yep, you do.

Tony Martignetti
Okay.

Martin Rowinski
Yeah, you have to know what you're doing and what you're getting into, 100%.

Tony Martignetti
Okay. All right. Where else would you like to go? We still have some time together. Where else would you like to go in the non-full-time employment conversation?

Martin Rowinski
I would say probably one other thing that's important is don't look— don't look— don't overlook confidentiality and risk. Fractional executives can potentially work with multiple organizations. Let's remember that part. So nonprofits should think about Confidentiality, because data access. Maybe there's a conflict of interest. Who are they working with? What are the other companies? Intellectual property, insurance, competitive or donor-sensitive information.

Tony Martignetti
Yeah.

Martin Rowinski
Those are other things to really think about because the organization's legal counsel should appropriately structure the relationship, particularly where the executive will have meaningful operational authority. So again, think about that. Also, interim leadership has another benefit that people overlook, by the way. And I know we were talking about what's better, and again, it all comes down to what the organization is looking for. But a nonprofit doesn't necessarily need to rush, and you mentioned this a little bit earlier, they don't need to rush to permanently hire. When a senior executive unexpectedly leaves or they're let go, whatever may have happened, boards can feel the pressure to fill the seat immediately. But an interim executive can create that breathing room. And one of the most expensive leadership mistakes an organization can make is turning an urgent vacancy into a rushed permanent hire and pay for it later.

Tony Martignetti
Yeah, that's rough. That is Yeah, then you've made a mistake and now you've brought somebody in and now it's embarrassing for the person who hired them, whether it's the CEO or whoever else, because that person has to admit that they made a mistake because after just 2 or 3 months, it's clear, or maybe even just 2 or 3 weeks, you know, in some cases, it's clear we made a mistake and now we gotta unwind that and then still— Yeah. Find something to— some suitable model and person to take the responsibilities. All right. All right. Thank you, Martin. Very good. Martin Rowinski, CEO and co-founder of BoardSi, or BoardSi. It's boardsi.com. That's the key. You can connect with Martin on LinkedIn. Martin, thank you very much.

Martin Rowinski
Thank you. This was great.

Kate Martignetti
Next week,

Tony Martignetti
the Martignetti 3-step, 1-week planned giving launch. I stepped in there.

Kate Martignetti
Sorry. If you missed any part of this week's show,

Tony Martignetti
I beseech you, find it at tonymartignetti.com.

Kate Martignetti
Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. I'm your associate producer, Kate Martignetti. The show's social media is by Susan Chavez. Marc Silverman is our web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein.

Tony Martignetti
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.