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Nonprofit Radio for March 31, 2025: Mental Wellness Among The Chaos

Jennifer Walter: Mental Wellness Among The Chaos

When the chaos is the point, let’s help you avoid getting overwhelmed or checking out. Jennifer Walter, a Swiss sociologist and mental health coach, has strategies to gain agency, recharge and build resilience. You need to be good to yourself first, then you can help others. Her practice is at JenniferWalter.me.

 

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I hope you remember that I wished you happy Saint Patrick’s Day on time, not a week late. I’m quite proud of that. 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 come down with catalepsy if I lapsed into a trance because you told me you missed this week’s show. Here’s our associate producer Kate with what’s on the menu. Hey Tony, I hope our listeners are hungry for. Mental wellness among the chaos. When the chaos is the point, let’s help you avoid getting overwhelmed or checking out. Jennifer Walter, a Swiss sociologist and mental health coach, has strategies to gain agency, recharge, and build resilience. You need to be good to yourself first, then you can help others. Her practice is at Jennifer Walter.me. On Tony’s take 2. Has from the gym semper fi. 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 Outdated donation forms blocking your supporters’ generosity.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 mental wellness among the chaos. It’s a pleasure today to welcome Jennifer Walter. She is a Swiss sociologist, mental health advocate, and equal parts rebel and marshmallow. She admires potty humor. Through her podcast, the scenic route. And her coaching and consulting work, she’s making the world a gentler place one conversation at a time. You’ll find Jennifer on LinkedIn and her practice is at Jennifer Walter.E. Jennifer Walter, welcome to nonprofit Radio. Thank you so much for having me, Tony. We’re gonna make the world a gentler place with this conversation and adding one more to the gentle. Yeah, like, will it ever be gentle? Maybe not, but at least I don’t know, I always say it’s not, it’s not your fault that you found the world as it is, but it’s your fault if it’s still like this when you leave. Oh, very good. We all do have a responsibility. Yeah, I do believe so. Yes, I do believe so. I’m not sure it’s a gentle, but as you said, gentler, yes, yes, make it more gentle. What that means to you, right? But basically, I don’t know, you can sum it up and just be more kind. Be more kind is very good. Yeah, that’s a great, that’s an ideal admonition. We need more of that. Yes, we need more of that on a lot of different levels. Well we’re gonna be working on the personal level, right? So, here in the US, the administration is causing turmoil, chaos. Hellscape, uh, not only here in the US, but, uh, we’ve become very good exporters of all of this. It feels like we are. Hit with a hurricane followed by a tsunami followed on the 3rd day by a wildfire, followed on the 4th day by mudslides. It was a rocky start into 2025. It still is. It still is. So what, what do you, overall, we have, we have a full hour together. We have plenty of time, but just, you know, generally, like how do you make sense of this for, for us? So first and foremost, uh, uh, maybe a disclaimer how a Swiss makes sense of American politics might be different than an American makes sense of American politics. I could use some, we could use some foreign perspective. I, I’m no expert in American policies by far, but what we see here is, is a pattern that we see, um, not just in the United States but also in large parts of Europe, right? This um. This kind of moving towards totalianism and fascism, and whoever shouts the loudest, the first is kind of like wins the race. And um it not and doesn’t matter so much if that what is said is. Kind or smart or reasonable, but you’re just the first to shout at the loudest, so. Yeah. How do we make sense of that? Like. On one hand, it doesn’t, when you speak to historians and philosophists and sociologists, they’re all kind of like, yeah, this is not really like a surprise. Um, when you, when you have people who feel In despair over a lot of things, right? Like you, there’s not enough money at the end of the week to get you to your next paycheck. You’re struggling to pay rent. You don’t know what’s gonna happen, your healthcare costs are through the roof. You don’t know what’s gonna happen to your children. You don’t know what’s gonna happen to the planet like. All these Ideas feed of despair. That paired with. The systems we’re in, who all at the front is surely capitalism. Um, As well, where we’re like, OK, we just need to exploit every resource there is. Pairing that and and and also looking at the decline of. Education of freely available education of uncensored education. The decline of empathy and compassion. We’re kind of like in a recipe for disaster, really. So, and, and this has trickled down to Our listeners, um. In, in, in forms of questionable funding for, for a lot of US nonprofits that do work abroad. Uh, there are individual nonprofits like, uh, National Public Radio, for instance, and Planned Parenthood or being individually targeted, so we’re seeing it at a sort of a, a subset of the community of the nonprofit community level, you know, those doing foreign aid work, but also at a micro level and individual nonprofits. And so this, this makes our, our listeners. Uh, uh, in the nonprofit community generally, um, uncertain, you know, uneasy. No longer, things are not stable like they were just 2.5 months ago, um. And so we take this on to ourselves, you know, we, we, uh, this trickles down, the shit trickles down to the to the, to the people, to the individuals, and we have, we have nowhere else to pass it on to, you know, right, we are the last, but we’re also the first from the bottom up, right? So you have a lot of, you have a lot of advice on the, on the personal level about burnout and let’s start to explore the. The bright thinking that motivated me to invite you to, to come and, and talk to our listeners. Yeah, well, like, for instance, you know, you, yeah, you say that you know you burn out, uh, uh, feeling a burnout is not a personal failure. Can we start there? it’s a natural response. Can we start there? Yeah, for sure, yeah, I think that’s one of the key things to, to realize, right? It’s, it’s not just you. If we look around, we, everyone I talked to and uh they are emotionally overwhelmed or feeling burned out, um. There was just recently, but this is for Switzerland. I don’t know what the US is just today or yesterday was published like the, the happiness, the happiness report, like which countries feel the happiest and yeah, because we’re, we’re recording on International Happiness. Yes, exactly, that makes sense. The reports came out today. Um, Switzerland is, I think the first time ever it’s not in top 10. Which it might surprise people, but if we’re looking here like, yeah, OK, it makes kind of sense. So it’s really systemic, right? This whole overwhelm, especially when it comes to politics, right, we had, I mean, we had Bannon. Like the ex, um, like exact concept of pro he. He was the one who turned like the, the, the phrase flood the stone with shit, right? To have so much, so much coming out that you’re trying to like keep up and keep up and keep up. Which is kind of like almost impossible. So this whole overwhelm. This chaos and crisis, this is design, and this is also what Naomi Klein amplified in her book Shock Doctrine. Although now it’s She might, she argues it’s even a step further, but basically it’s using chaos and crisis to push through. Um, changes because people are too disoriented and to like know what to focus on and to know what to resist. Right, so this is a this is a feature. You you’re you’re citing, uh, yeah, it’s by design. Naomi Klein, you were citing Steve Bannon. Uh, to, um, to flood the zone with shit, so, so it’s, it’s by design to overwhelm us. So this is, that’s important to recognize, yeah. Because you, you, because you can resist by not being overwhelmed. Yes, that would be ultimately the goal if you cancel, right? You, you, if you process information, if there’s, um, if we go with conman, he says, well, you have basically you have system one and system two, right? System one is all the quick, quick thinking you do and the reacting you do and kind of like the ad hoc crisis mode and system two is deep thinking, reflective thinking, critical thinking, so. We hardly, it’s really hard now to go to be like, oh now I do some critical thinking on this, right? Because there’s so much coming out every now, every like every minute of every day. And also, we, I don’t know, we might have to relearn really critical thinking and also engaging with content that is longer than a 22nd reel on TikTok. So kind of like there are many different things that are coming together, um, but yeah. If you So how to kind of like deal with this overwhelm if we know it’s by design. Right, um, and one. One thing is that I find is really crucial is. To say, OK, you know, if it’s a structural point. Hey, what, maybe I don’t really have to keep up with everything. Right? What if, if I only focus on the 2 or 3 issues that are really close to my heart? And that are really and fully aligned with my values. Right, it doesn’t mean that I don’t care about the other things. But I think every listener now has. Their topics that they are feeling deeply passionate for. And maybe just focusing on those instead of trying to like keep up with everything. We don’t want to keep up with the Kardashians, we also don’t want to keep up with everything else that’s going on. And focusing. That’s the reframe doesn’t mean being ignorant, right? It means remaining capable of acting. Right? If you consciously choose which topics are relevant to you, if you don’t chase after every media wave that’s coming at you. But focus on the essentials that was what’s most valuable to you, to your community, you will regain the clarity, you will be able to. Stay focused and do the work, because I think now is really the time where we’re all called to do the work. 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 Mental wellness among the chaos. So we’re not lazy or, or dispassionate or uninterested if, if we’re, if we’re just focusing on two issues or three or maybe even just one, you know, whatever our, whatever we think our capacity is, you know, if it’s just one, you know, maybe it’s USAID funding, that’s it, you know, that’s where I’m putting my, so we’re not lazy or, or uninterested if we’re, if we’re paying less attention. To all the other cacophony that that accompanies that that are are chosen. Yeah, I, I truly believe that, right? If like don’t beat yourself up because you can’t keep up. That’s the intent is that you not be able to keep up. Exactly, that’s true, that’s why it’s important to realize, you know, this is, this is you said, it’s a feature, it’s by design. So if you’re trying not to follow the design and disrupt kind of like that system or that pattern. This is where you kind of like gain some sort of agency back. And of course, If you’re a news outlet that might be harder to do just to focus on one issue, but if you’re, I mean we, we have to like a lot of charities are single issues charities for a reason as well, right? It, you’re narrowed down, you’re focused, you know, you’re, I don’t know, maybe it’s reproductive rights or mental health, climate change, whatever it is. And The fault I, I have to pay tribute to the lineage of that, like the fog goes back to Bell Hooks and Audre Lorde of like this whole. The idea of self-care and self-love, right? That is a radical form of resistance. We need to consciously look after our own well-being, physically as, as well as mentally. We need to recover and reflect and recharge because I know you’re listening who are who are, they know like this is not like a sprint. This is a marathon and it’s, and I probably most likely, most definitely will get worse before it gets better. So we need to act sustainably and with foresight and we need everyone to replenish their batteries and recharge. That’s a smart metaphor. Um, it’s really an analogy. That’s a smart analogy to sing single mission nonprofits, right? We don’t, no, no nonprofit takes on every issue that is, uh, that merits money and time and, and needs improvement. No nonprofit does that. Um, I don’t know, but no, no, no, no, we’re focused, so our missions are focused. So, you know, on the, on the individual level, the analogy goes we should remain ourselves singularly focused, or maybe two issues, you know, whatever, again, whatever your bandwidth can take, but I just think that’s that’s it’s it’s, it’s a very apt analogy for our, for our listeners, um. You just mentioned recharging. You know, what are some, uh, aside from, you know, focus and, and recognizing that. Your focus is your resistance. What can we do to, to recharge, take care of ourselves in in other ways here? Um, So One thing that I also really. That I practice myself, um, and again, this might not work for. Your nonprofit organization on an organizational level, it might not, but it’s kind of like a 40 hour wait period until you like. React to something. Right, because all these controversial, often like emotionally charged topics, like he, he, he put tariffs on Canada then less than 48 hours they were gone again, right? If we would just have waited 48 hours before we would get like really worked up about it, it’s already poof gone again, so. Maybe we don’t need to react. On a personal level to everything that’s happening, so maybe we can give ourselves a briefer might not need to be 48 hours, but maybe we can sleep on it. Or do we really have to do like a TikTok right now? Like, it’s really asking yourself, do I contribute to the frenzy or to the solution? And often it’s just more noise. Um, Something else I really is kind of like goes that goes into this is. Don’t try to not let yourself be controlled by the outrage, right? Um. This is really hard to do, but if, if a topic is super emotionalized and you wanna like say your piece. I always ask myself, OK, who benefits from the fact that I’m now getting super upset, super worked up. And is this. Outrage is this addressing a real problem, or is it just adding to the frenzy? Is it just generating attention? And often it’s the latter. So, and then worst case you’re becoming part of the problem, right? Um, Um, and the big one. And this is, I feel really tough for us as as a as a collective as a society. We need to build resilience and that we can also sit with things that are. Uncertain and unpleasant. Right, for example, hm. Many of these political and social issues, right? They are very complex. They have no quick solutions. Everyone who tries to sell you a quick solution either doesn’t have like a fully developed frontal cortex or is leaning towards fascism. And like these so-called wicked problems, right, climate change, for example, where all the variables are constantly changing. It’s, we need to know that it is OK to feel uncertain. About certain topics, right, that facing up to the uncomfortable. Is Instead of looking for hasty explanations or culprits, is also a really great way to We to practice resilience and be like, oh no, OK, it’s OK, I have to sit with this instead of Oh, get me like a quick fix solution or a distraction. And this is really hard because I feel a lot of us struggle with this at times, right? How often are we like, oh no, this makes me feel uncomfortable. Quick, let me distract myself with something. Whatever this may be, it’s totally individual for everyone, right? And then we’re wondering why we as a collective have A hard time with Uncertainty with sitting with uncertainty or Having these Having people come to power who offer quick solutions. And easy solutions that are often in the binary and never really working out. What about, um, broader, you know, self-care, um, you know, like time away, things that distract you that you enjoy. They’re not, they’re not really distraction, but they distract you from, you know, uh, whether it’s family or needlepoint or, you know, these other, other things that we can do to get ourselves out of the, the, the, uh, the, the news maelstrom. Oh, of course, I’m, I mean, all activities that you do that you feel are truly recharging you. And God, please do them and please do more of them. But at the same time. I talked to other people when I asked them, oh, what’s your hobby? They look at me like. But like I, they have like this theoretical concept of a hobby, but. They’re like, well, when, when, when should I have the time to like follow like a leisurely pursuit of something. And Also, to really go back to maybe some of us really need to learn again how to rest and to know the difference between Well, I know I’m sleeping and like really resting. So, yeah, whatever you, you know, the activities that you that you hold close that you know are fully recharging you, go do that. And for some, it might really be thinking of, OK. Maybe I start doing only one thing at a time. For example, I. I just uh mentioned this recently um on another podcast and led to a beautiful conversation there. It was very fitting, but For example, when you make your morning coffee. Right? What if you just watch your coffee brew? Instead of, I don’t know, cleaning out the dishwasher, cleaning up the kitchen, doing this and that. Right, these little moments where you, where you really kind of like decompress, breathe. And just be Those can also be small moments of rest. Instead of doing everything at the same time. Watching coffee brewing. Now, I am not personally a coffee drinker. I don’t drink coffee. I know I’m, I’m not making excuses. I was gonna say what I was thinking was. That sounds like uh I don’t know, doesn’t take 6 or 7 or 8 minutes or something for a pot of coffee to brew. So that’s 6 or 7 or 8 minutes that you’re just, you’re doing something that’s probably gonna bring down your heart rate and your blood pressure, right, as long as you breathe in and out, you’re consciously breathing, you’re really like getting in touch with your body. Yeah, sure, 100%. Just don’t spend that time thinking what’s going on in the world? What, what, what headline am I missing? I need my phone. Where, where is it? You know, that’s not the way to spend your 6 to 8 minutes of coffee brewing time. OK, taking, you know, taking a pause, right? just. To the extent we can, um. I saw something where there were families experimenting with locking their phones up during meal times. And, and I, one of the videos, I think the, the woman actually smashed the, the glass jar that the phones were still sealed in. That may have been a, that may have been a comedy thing, but the concept is real that, you know, we can, we can step away. It’s, it’s OK to step away from, from the, uh, you know, from the chaos. Yeah, and it does not make you lazy or ignorant or whatever. I mean, if those stories play in your head, then it would be really interesting to ask yourself, well, why are they playing? Why does me watching my coffee brew make, like, why does that play the story in my head of, oh, you’re lazy. Look at that. Or you’re ignorant or whatever the story is, whatever kind of story that comes up, that would be the interesting question. They’ll be like, why is this story playing? Or even selfish, it’s not selfish to take care of yourself, you know, uh, uh, self-care is not selfish. So I mean I think when you go ahead. I’m sorry, you, you. Just to make the right, like, it’s, it’s always the first thing when you’re on a plane, you put on the life jacket on yourself first. Mm. Take care of yourself before you can take care of others. I, I espouse that widely. Uh, I, I talked to. Listeners and uh folks in nonprofits about that, you know, we all do giving work, but to give and to care for others at whatever level we’re doing it, whether you’re the CEO or you’re doing the house visits, uh, you know, as a nurse’s aide, we’re all caring for others or some other, some other entity like the climate or the oceans beyond ourselves, we’re all giving, but if you’re gonna give and take care of others. You need to take care of yourself first. Yes, that’s not selfish. No, no, absolutely not. It’s really you. You protecting yourself. To To have all these compassion to give towards your cause or your people, your community. And to be able to, to, to give longer, right? To sustain, to really kind of, as I said, we know this is, this, this will not just be over. In a year or 4 years, who knows, right? Um, and it was like, yeah, I said, it probably will get worse before it gets better. So this is really this idea of that this is selfish is really something we have to let go of. It’s time for Tony’s take two. Thank you, Kate. Tales from the gym semper fi. There were these two former Marines who met at the gym and I was over in the corner doing my floor work. And I heard the whole conversation. Uh, it was really, it was, it was kind of touching, the way these two guys bonded instantly over their Marine Corps service. Uh, and they started getting into, you know, the, the, the, the acronyms, of course, uh, MASOC, JSOC, SOI 0311. What were you? 0311? Oh, I was 0311. So I, so I’m thinking, uh, I’m trying to remember these things while I’m doing my, uh, my, my, uh, planks and and my push-ups, and I’m thinking, all right, I gotta remember more so, JSOC, uh, you know. So I went back and looked these things up and uh. JSOC is the Joint Special Operations Command. And Marsak is the Marine Forces Special Operations Command. So these guys worked in some kind of special operations. Um, and SOI is School of Infantry. Which made sense uh with uh 0311 cause 0311, I figured was the, this is something that I remember from the Air Force, the, it’s called uh I figured it was their MOS. It’s a military occupational specialty. I, I forgot what MOS stood for, but we used to just say MOS. It means what, what kind of job you had. It’s a code for what kind of job. So, so they were talking about SOI School of Infantry, and they were 03 11, and that is an infantry. MOS infantry specialist, 0311. So these guys were in infantry, uh, not together, but they, they certainly shared that bond. So it was, it was quite interesting listening to Marstock and JSOC, etc. Um, one of them is named Roy, you know, I like to refer to these folks as like, you know, we met Val, Mrs. Blood and Soil, um, so, you know, I like to have names. One of them was named Roy. The other one, he didn’t get too much airtime in the conversation. So I, I’m sure he said his name, but I didn’t catch it and he, uh, yeah, I missed his name. So I only know Roy as, uh, one of the two. Former Marines. So I, I thank the unnamed Marine and uh and Roy for their service. In JSOC and more so and. SOI And that is Tony’s take too. Kate, Tony We’ve never really talked about it. I don’t think, I mean just you being my uncle, I knew you were in the Air Force, but what is like the one Great takeaway that you took, like one great takeaway that you took from your time in the Air Force, maybe like uh. I don’t know, like a saying or something you just remember like, I don’t know. No, I would say it’s the, it was the teamwork because I had an unusual job. So talking about these guys, Roy and the unnamed Marine, you know, infantry, that’s a very common thing, you know, right, hundreds of thousands of people or at least 10s of thousands are in in infantry. That’s the fighters, those are the fighters. Um, but I was in a specialty, even in the Air Force, something that was unusual. It was Minuteman. Missile operations. Minuteman was a nuclear weapon system. And there weren’t that many people who did that kind of job. I mean, there were, there were probably 1000 or something across 6 spaces or, you know, so it’s a small number. Um, and so, you know, you got to be a very close team cause you did something special, unusual, and, but you did it all together. And on my base, there was probably only Maybe 200 or so people who did out of out of many thousands. So, it’s kind of a camaraderie, I’d say, camaraderie, teamwork around an an unusual kind of job operating Minuteman missiles. That’s really cool. You know, it uh it served its purpose in the Cold War. It was a, yeah, yeah, thank you. We’ve got just about a butt load more time. Here’s the rest of Mental Wellness Among the chaos with Jennifer Walter. Where else would you like to go, Jennifer? What, um, what else would you like folks to know about coping, I don’t know, self-care, whatever, you know, you’re the, you’re the, uh, the, you’re the Swiss expert sociologist. Well, it’s really going back to Being curious. I think true self care also has at this level is component of being curious, right? When you realize, oh. There is this thought creeping in, oh, you’re selfish for doing this, or you’re arrogant or ignorant or. To really be curious and ask yourself, oh, why is this thought coming up? The same with emotions, right? If you, if you do something and it makes you feel anxious, or if it makes you feel angry or resentful to really be like, oh, OK, can I like channel my inner scientist and ask like, oh, why? Why is this coming up now? Why could that be? Interesting. So this is really kind of like where a lot of. Change on a personal level happens if you’re curious enough to, to ask the question, just being like, oh, interesting. Some introspection. Yeah, and a lot of if. Sometimes if people are at the beginning of their journey, they’re like, oh, but how can I like self-reflection feels really hard, like, do I have to. Meditate for an hour a day to have gained like introspection and so. Well, no, sometimes it’s just really Slowing down enough to recognize what thoughts or feelings are coming in. And be curious about them and ask, oh why, why this particular feeling emotion fought right this second. Interesting. What other advice Do you have that we that I haven’t, uh, I haven’t, I haven’t teased out of you yet. Well, let me ask you this. Well, how did you get into this work? How, how did you get into sociological studies and, and, and coaching of others, helping people cope on an individual level? How, how did you get into this work? Oh, Well, I think the sociologist was in me when I was already like very, very young. I was a small kid I was always like, why, why, but why? And I always had this deep sense of justice of like, oh, but this is not fair. Why can they when I cannot or why can cont day and I can, um. So that was kind of that felt very like a logical conclusion to be like, oh, OK, I’m gonna study sociology because that’s basically the question of. Who profits from what we said right at the very beginning, who profits from you being emotionally worked up about this? Right? And so who, like the power dynamics and everything. So that’s, that’s really one of the key questions of sociology, like, OK, who, who profits? And this is, this goes into every aspect of our life, right? If People who uh who identify as women. Growing up, we had all these images of how it also goes for men, how women are supposed to be, how men are supposed to be. And if you feel bad, if you’re made to feel bad about the way you look, Who profits off that? It’s not you. You’re feeling like crap. So. Looking at the systems in place that are trying to tell you there’s something wrong with you. And we need to fix it, and look at that, we also just have the solution to fix XYZ. And that kind of like naturally translated in. Also in in coaching people, right? Because we often are led to believe that we need something outside of ourselves to. To deserve to feel what we want to feel, to get where we want to go, um. And I don’t know, 9 out of 10, 9 out of 10. There’s nothing internal, external, it’s something internal. It’s the internal job you have to do, um. And it’s no I don’t know, yes, you can get. I don’t know, you can get a crystal to help you relax. But ultimately it’s a, it’s a tool or a crotch. And Just the crystal itself will, I don’t know, very unlikely make you feel relaxed. Yeah, confident. Whatever it is, it’s it’s, it’s false, it’s a mistake to look. Outside yourself for. Validation or we mentioned happiness because it’s happiness, World Happiness Day, to, to, to, to need externalities to approve of you. Versus Approving of yourself or or maybe approval is not the right word, but acceptance you need that you need it from outside versus you should be able to find it within you. Well, if you need it. Like externally from an external source. You most likely at some point you will run into this corner of it is never enough. Right, if you need external validation, I don’t know, maybe in the form of, I don’t know, likes to your social media posts, followers, money. Number of friends whatever. I don’t know. Will you ever truly know when when is enough? When is enough external validation? From what I’ve seen so far and read and seen so far, like it, there’s hardly ever enough. Right, if you’re accumulating and accumulating. You will always, this will always wear off, and then you’re right, right back where you started. Then you kind of like need to earn even more money or to have even more followers, and then you feel like, oh, validated again, and then it starts fading again, because you have no internal knowledge of this to back it up. You have no, you haven’t kind of like built this internal muscle to back it up. So you kind of like fade, so it fades out, fizzles out. want to leave us with um some. Final Words of uh of hope. And, and, or even just reminders of how to cope, if, if not, if not overall hope, but Oh, I’m that’s, no, I mean, I am, I am truly hopeful. I’m always like the glass is half full. That’s also why my description is like I’m always, I’m always going to be half marshmallow. I’m, I will believe in the good in people until like the very fucking end. Um But I had this, yeah, it’s really like. Being mindful with our attention. Right? Where does our attention go? and so often we’re not really conscious in choosing where our attention goes. But where our attention goes, our focus goes. And if we can use our attention in a very targeted manner, very focused, we can really strengthen certain topics, highlight certain topics that would otherwise be lost in the flood of information or in the flood of shit when we go back to ban it, right? So really. Yeah, be be reflecting critical enough, OK, that not every breaking news story has to be commented immediately and really not just be outraged for the sake of being outraged. Because like this whole where your attention goes, your focus grows. It’s kind of what we consume, right? What we consume, how we talk about it, the words we use, they build the world we live in. So And what we think. We pass on. And that shapes others. So when you understand that consciously directing your attention is is a very valuable resource. It can have really kind of like put back agency. Into yourself and the work you do, and I think this is really crucial because if you feel hopeless. Reminding yourself of agency and the things you can actually do control, such as your attention. And even if it is no smartphones after 8 o’clock. Then go do that. I want to thank you for uh for saying shit and fuck. But, but we get both from one guest. Usually I, I need scores of guests to get just one of those. Maybe this is the divide. I don’t know. No, it’s, it’s. But you didn’t get any potty humor. True, true, but this is like. I don’t know. Those are things that never really work on command, but they have to be. Yeah, no, I’m not gonna say I’m not gonna say a toilet joke. No, it’s, it’s organic like shit and fuck, you know. But in fairness, my, my son, he’s 5, and he really had, he came home from kindergarten the other day and he really had. The most beautiful, most innocent of potty humor jokes I’ve heard in a long time, and it was truly precious. All right, well, so with that kind of build up, you can’t leave us. So what’s your, what’s his joke? OK, so now bear with me because I have to translate this from Swiss German to English, um, on the go because I’ve never told it in English. Well, so basically, there is a poop walking down the street. Then he meets another poop. He says, hey, you know. What you doing? Oh, I’m just gonna go rob a bank. Oh, that sounds cool. Can I come with? Sure. So two poops walking down the street, they meet another poop. Hey, you look like a good piece of poop. What are you doing? Like, what are you two up to? Well, we’re just gonna go rob a bank. OK. Can I come with? Yeah, you look like a solid piece of poop, you can come with us. So they walk to the next corner, they meet diarrhea. And just like, oh, you two look like fun fellas. What are you doing? And like, oh, we’re just gonna go rob a bank. And then everything’s like, oh, sounds fun. Can I come with? Nah, sorry, this is only for hard guys. OK, 5 year old, humor, but it’s it’s precious. It’s cute, yes, yes. All right, well thank you for translating in from uh from Swiss German. She’s Jennifer Walter. You’ll find her on LinkedIn. You’ll find her practice at jennifer Walter. Me. Jennifer, thank you very much for sharing your thinking, your, your advice, your wisdom. Thank you so much, Tony, for having me. Thank you so much. Next week, nonprofit leadership for current and aspiring. 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. DonorBox, fast, flexible, and friendly fundraising forms for your nonprofit, DonorBox.org. I saw you you out, faked you out with a false. Breath. 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 like 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.

Special Episode: Coronavirus & Team Care

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Susan Comfort & Mo Abdullah: Coronavirus & Team Care
Susan Comfort & Mo Abdullah can help your team prevent burnout, increase effectiveness and resilience and stay healthy, productive and joyful. Even today. Susan is founder of Nonprofit Wellness and Mo is founder of Culture Energized. (Part of our virtual #20NTC coverage)

 

 

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View Full Transcript
Transcript for 484b_tony_martignetti_nonprofit_radio_20200413.mp3

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[00:00:55.57] spk_0:
welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 20 NTC. The 2020 non profit Technology Conference. As you know, the conference had to be canceled, but we are persevering virtually throughout through Zoom were sponsored at 20 and T C by Cougar Mountain Software Benali Fund. Is there complete accounting solution made for nonprofits? Tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Manton for a free trial with me now our Susan Comfort and Mo Abdullah. Susan is founder at non profit Wellness and Mo is founder of culture. Energized Susan. No. Welcome.

[00:00:57.27] spk_3:
Thank you

[00:00:57.70] spk_4:
for having us.

[00:01:43.84] spk_0:
Thank you. Thanks for working this out virtually. Um and I know that you’re each well and safe Susan in D. C. And Mo in Denver. I’m glad to know that everybody’s well and families were good. Um, your mom, your NTC topic was team care, not self care, building resilience, resiliency in an era of burnout. But we’re gonna convert this into, ah, special episode of non profit radio and thank you for your willingness to do that. So I’m gonna get it out quicker to our audience. And, uh, we’re gonna talk about team care in the era of Corona virus pandemic. Um, mothers there. Why don’t you get us started? I mean, we can, in fact keep the team together, keep the team energized and efficient and functioning well, even though our work lives, Air totally upended.

[00:02:35.67] spk_4:
Yeah, it can be done, but it takes intentionality, right? So and also understanding that it’s going to look different. So it can’t be business as usual when we moved to remote working. Let’s understand that there’s kids at home, right that need homeschooling that, um, talk about acceptability. And does everyone have Internet but then would have access to a computer to do meetings? So if you just say all right and what was really working from home and don’t put intentional, inclusive practice, this is in place. That’s what makes it a little bit more challenging, but it can be done. There

[00:02:40.41] spk_3:
are a

[00:02:40.50] spk_4:
lot of businesses that are doing it carefully and have been doing it successfully for a really long time.

[00:03:05.24] spk_0:
Susan is revealing that they’re not only Children at home, but they’re also pets. I’ve been doing off almost 30 of these interviews. I’ve had, uh, had a child walked by, thankfully clothed, but I’m ready for the naked. I’m ready for the naked two year old coming across the screen in minutes. You know,

[00:03:05.58] spk_3:
we’re ready to

[00:03:06.66] spk_0:
do enough of these, and it’s bound to happen

[00:03:38.24] spk_3:
from podcast of video right away. I agree with with Milo that it takes intentionality to build team when team can’t be together. And frankly, nonprofits have dealt with this for a long time with distributed workforces. When nonprofits have folks strewn across the country of the world when nonprofits can’t afford, um, expensive office space anymore, they go, Virtual said. Non profits have actually been pioneering this kind of team building in a way, because we’re always low budget, we’re always scrapping. Girl is traveling for far flung, um, creations have had to figure it out, of course, to and governments. But the nonprofit sector is sort of uniquely suited to figure this out.

[00:04:19.24] spk_0:
We’re recording on Wednesday, April 1st, so I’m gonna assume that organizations have already figured out the Internet access problem. You know, if there were people who didn’t have Internet access, I’m gonna assume by now that they do. But there could still be a mo was saying there. Ah, that could still be technology issues even going even now, three weeks into, um, being at home. Do you think or are we? Are We passed the technology issues, too?

[00:06:32.24] spk_3:
There are always gonna be technology issues, right? And I think, what Low and I moan I met when we worked for Play Works, which is a recess organization working most of the kids in schools. But what we learned is that the social emotional capability or the emotional intelligence that people have is really nurtured interactively through personal person contact. That does not have to mean touching contact that could mean words that are expressed, you know, spoken or written, or even a high five, you know, or an elbow bump or a cheer were, You know these things don’t have to happen in person. So when you think about team care and the importance of sure everybody has to take care of their cells, But in the nonprofit sector, we’re really bad at taking care of ourselves. We’re really good at taking care of other people or the world over not so good at taking care of ourselves. So telling a non profit worker that they need to up their self care is not gonna be ineffective strategy figuring out how we can systemically create tools and systems that effect team care where we can all take care of each other. That’s what’s gonna be the game changer for non profits, because it will encourage our own self care, hold accountability to others and build the team in the process. Because you know what happens when we talk about wellness, we make ourselves vulnerable. I’m telling you what’s going on with my body or my mental health, and that makes me vulnerable in some way. I can keep myself safe, but it’s still telling you what’s going on with my body was just personal. So if I’m making myself vulnerable, what bring a Brown says is that then inspires empathy. Because you have a body, you understand, you know what I could be going through and then that builds. Trust on what most workplaces are challenged by is a lack of trust, and so if you can figure out howto build trust, then you’ll have better automatically team care because you’ll give each other the benefit of the doubt. You’ll trust each other to have each other’s back. You’ll know that most doing the best she can, etcetera, but you’re it’s not gonna have that trust if everyone is off fighting their own battles in their own little zoom worlds or computer boxes.

[00:07:08.75] spk_0:
All right, so, Moe, why don’t we, uh why don’t you get us started with some intentionality around team care? You both have talked about the intentionality. Let’s get into some details that people can raise as discussion items in there are in in there. I was gonna stay in their offices in their in their meetings, Or they can implement themselves if they’re if they’re the CEO. You know what started with some concrete ideas, please?

[00:08:01.34] spk_4:
Yeah, well, I think one of the first things to recognize is that communication is going to look different, right? When you’re in person, personal person conversations, you can read body language. You can see it was really stressed out. But overall computer screen, that’s really, really challenging to do so. One of the first things you have to do is you have to set the New Lord. Um, and one of those norms should be around respecting boundaries, allowing, uh, you’re always to block out, um, parts of their calendar to get done. So maybe they block out stuff on the calendar saying, I’m gonna be home schooling my kids or I need to take a walk during this time and respecting those boundaries. Another thing is sending a gnome around. How many meetings did people have per day when we start moving to remorse? Working Everyone was over. Communicate. Everyone’s meeting is super duper important. But then you end up having people sitting down for 4 to 5 hours, meeting after meeting after meeting and after two. You’re really no longer productive. So really setting some boundaries around how many meetings were having and respecting people’s of boundaries as faras blocking out time.

[00:08:34.14] spk_0:
Why don’t we feel, what with this question, why do we feel like we need to have more meetings when were distributed just because we’re no longer physically close? So we were trying to compensate. So now all of a sudden, we gotta have meetings with people, you know. We used to just meet monthly or weekly. Now we gotta meet Ellie is it will be overcome

[00:08:47.18] spk_3:
and singing

[00:08:48.88] spk_4:
a lot of people. It’s a trust thing, right? Like if I don’t see you, how do I know that you’re working? Um, we need to have meetings. A lot of people think that

[00:08:57.29] spk_3:
people

[00:08:57.64] spk_4:
would communicate right is being able to see someone face to face. But the cool thing about remote working is that there’s things that exist, like flak, using chat, using email’s on and also understanding what our meetings for right. If it’s just to tell people stuff, it’s just big enough mint. You can do that. I’m a different platform. Meeting should be around creating discussion accident questions until knowing that religion a point you’re making. What, What is the purpose of meetings? Who are we having it? Um, you know, just keeping get at a decent time. So we don’t want to be having meetings for two hours. Every meeting. Some evenings are just for 30 minutes with the central people, and sometimes it’s a larger discussion that you need tohave, which make a little bit longer

[00:09:52.84] spk_0:
motion. One of those boundaries include the use of texting while we’re all remote, like texting is forbidden. Nor is only for emergencies or something of that are you?

[00:09:58.24] spk_3:
Let me be a cultural thing. That’s not something that one person can dictate what the Norma’s like. That’s gonna be a culture for every we get a lot of culture right Culture energizes most company finds about building a culture of well being. The culture is different everywhere. It’s just the way things are done here, right? So if texting is part of your normal work culture, it should be now as well. But we can’t say what the boundaries should be for any workplace, because that’s up to the workplace to set. But the the actual process of creating those boundaries is a perfect way to build trust. So what you just said, tony, is what the boss should be asking their employees. They should say, Hey, you know, while we’re on this Corona virus worked from home rotation, should we be texting? And then his employees will say, Hell, no or please yes or whatever. But the point is that we’re talking about our presence is we’re talking about our limitations, and we’re deciding as a group what that culture should be. Not the boss listening to this non profit radio podcast and saying more, Susan said we shouldn’t tax or we should definitely just depends on with it.

[00:11:06.90] spk_0:
I was trying to box you in, put you in an awkward position. I just did. And you, uh, you got out. Okay, That was my

[00:11:12.69] spk_3:
concrete things folks could do to that. Okay, even when we’re not in crisis.

[00:11:17.33] spk_0:
All right, go ahead. Well, let’s stick with the current. Uh, let’s try to keep it relevant. Oh, the crisis that we are. Okay, What else? What else have you got? Susan,

[00:11:26.54] spk_3:
The important thing is again. It’s not that we should never talk about self care. It’s that we should talk about it within the context of we’re gonna support each other. So what I like to say and behind me is even is that red and blue makes purple. Like when we talk about physical health and mental health.

[00:11:42.60] spk_0:
Now wait, Susan, everybody, everybody is not going to see the video.

[00:11:46.59] spk_3:
But this way is when you, when you talk about

[00:11:48.82] spk_0:
physician, described it

[00:13:18.12] spk_3:
mental health. Then that creates team health. Because, like I said, we make ourselves vulnerable. So if we just ask each other, not just how are you doing or what’s getting in the way, but like focused action initiative answers or questions like, How are you taking care of your mental health or what do you do that works to get you moving during the day. And if workers team members answer these questions with each other, you magical things happen right once. One, they’re focused on action on non things that work. It’s got appreciative inquiry. What’s working about right now? You can keep that going more easily than starting anew. Habit. Appreciative inquiry. Sharing about yourself like, Hey, I like to go from a TRO. Walks. Well, maybe there’s somebody else on the team that likes to go for nature walks. Well, then you could schedule your next call on a nature walk you over there and your team member over there. Maybe there’s somebody who likes to ride bikes. Well, now you know who to go to when you need a new bike shop, right? You find out all of these similarities about how people take care of themselves, and that builds that trust. And Moe was just talking about We have all these dumb meetings and we were already bad of meetings and nonprofits to begin with. Now we’re having done long meetings online. This is a terrible situation, but it’s because we’re not trusting that people are working. But if we can build the trust so that folks have authentic communication with each other. No, I’m not gonna be at that meeting is after home school my kids. But I will be online for two hours after bedtime to get your memo done right. They’re with honesty and with of compassion.

[00:13:43.88] spk_0:
Yeah, mo this this idea of vulnerability building trust it’s This has come up in a couple of NTC conversations that I’ve had people feel that being vulnerable makes is a sign of weakness. You’re you’re revealing some flaw or fall to our shortcoming that you’ve got. But it’s I think it’s 100 degrees from that. Being vulnerable is a sign of strength.

[00:14:50.90] spk_4:
Exactly, you know, in it And it it’s so powerful when leadership does it first right. You allow people to be able to make mistakes and follow your lead. And so as a leader, one of the first things if you haven’t already done it already do a team building exercise. And in that people the exercise understand how the people like to be communicated towards and as a leader also share some of the challenges that you have and also some of the things that worked really well for you and allow your team to follow the lead. So I know for me when it comes to meetings, one signals past, like, 40 minutes. I need to be able to take a break like it’s gonna be really, really tough for me and for other people, it could be, Hey, I am really shy and speaking up. Even though that might be a group norm to speak up, that might be really challenging for me to do that. Is it okay if we can utilize the chat box? Um, at some point, doing during our meeting and just creating a little bit more dialogue and getting people comfortable because once everyone knows how you communicate in the communication is going to be 10 times better and you’re not gonna get mad at people because

[00:15:06.37] spk_3:
you

[00:15:06.56] spk_4:
were so that they are, you know, not replying to emails or not speaking up for not being engaged. Instead, you can have a little bit more empathy and be able to move.

[00:15:18.42] spk_0:
Is there a team building exercise? You can suggest you can explain in just a couple of minutes.

[00:15:25.52] spk_4:
Yeah. Um, you can go on Google this thing called the leadership company

[00:15:30.79] spk_0:
Leadership Leadership Compass.

[00:15:32.84] spk_4:
Yeah, there’s a leadership compass, which

[00:15:34.95] spk_0:
is kind of

[00:16:03.57] spk_4:
like How do you take lead their people that need a lot of information? They’re more technological. They, like details, is looking better. Our creative thinkers. And so you do have a discussion with your team around where you follow on the leadership compass, Um, kind of one of the strengths and weaknesses of that. And then in the stroke of your work, what does that mean for for meetings or for one on one time, we’re getting things done. So that’s what Do you have siblings?

[00:16:05.72] spk_3:
Yeah, Thanks. On my website non profit comfort dot com, I have a whole page of icebreakers that don’t suck that I like to facilitate. Moe knows

[00:16:15.69] spk_0:
that the most you can say about them is that they don’t suck. Is that this longest endorsement? You can

[00:16:20.20] spk_3:
hear you if you really want. One of my favorite icebreaker is a check in question. It’s very simple. You don’t need any equipment. You don’t need any prep. They could be short. That could be long. They could be deep. That could be fun. Checking questions beginning of a meeting house. People build familiarity and commonalities and therefore trust

[00:16:37.08] spk_0:
like what’s an example of what’s example of a checking question

[00:17:21.41] spk_3:
Check in question Could be. What did you do to support your physical health today? Something really is. You know, people can share as much or as little as they want. It could be. What superhero would you be or what’s your superpower? What tattoo do you have or what’s a country you wanted is It could be any of those things, but I like focusing them on wellness because then again, people are making themselves vulnerable. They’re finding commonalities, and they can build more team support that way. So they’re icebreakers you can do and you can’t even focus them around wellness or someone care or diversity or inclusion or any topic you want. It’s the structure of the ice breaker that people get stuck on. And that’s where, like most said, you know, if you just try some or read Cem overviews and then make it your own or make your make the topic or the subject matter your own, you can really use the structure of the ice breaker to get people out of their comfort zone and get some new ways and relating in new ways.

[00:17:37.23] spk_0:
Okay, Okay, Susan, let’s stay with you. Other ideas that, uh, folks can implement while we’re in this roaring in the midst, This

[00:18:47.84] spk_3:
this is a more advanced one. And so I would only say this for teams that have already started down the road of diversity afternoon inclusion work like the work that motives. So we have. Ah, we developed a thing called a stressor scorecard, which is basically a list of identities and circumstances in life that brings stress. So some of them are identities, like being woman or being a person of color. Being a member of the LGBT community as a circumstance stressor might be, I’m going through a divorce or have a food intolerance or I have a terrible commute, right self circumstance that could change. But when we go through these circumstances or we have these identities that bring us stress in life, it’s important to realize it ourselves and also share that with each other in some way. So the stressor scorecard is a little bit of, um away to spark discussion. It can be a simple eyes like what is your score or what causes you stress where it could be a deeper discussion. Like Why do these things cause of stress? And how can we support each other? Because this is the stress we bring to the office. It’s not the stress that we experience it work from deadlines and too much work or even changing the world, which with no profit Cesaire already stressful jobs, world changing jobs, right? We’re talking about the stress that you bring

[00:19:09.09] spk_0:
with you. Where is there? Someplace just on. I realized this little more things further along group, but but we may as well just pursue it just to get the resource with stressor. Scorecard. Does it exist somewhere?

[00:19:16.04] spk_3:
It’s on my Web site. Non profit comfort dot com.

[00:19:23.17] spk_0:
Okay, okay, let’s bring it back to the more basic, though, Uh, you got another. Another tip for team team care.

[00:19:55.49] spk_3:
There’s so many. I think that the important thing is that you figure out a system for keeping it up like we’re in crisis right now because we’re in the midst of a cove, it state shelter, home place that is going to pass at some point and we’re gonna be back in some sort of new normal. Yes, the world will have changed fundamentally, but we’re gonna go back to some sort of new normal, And we need to figure out what systems changed more permanently. So, for example, workplaces should have some sort of committee or task force that’s focused on culture or wellness or health. And if you don’t have one yet, you should create one. It’s easy. It’s free. You can put a budget on it or just reallocate some of your budget for food or retreats or meetings to that group and the naked detect decide what the snacks are. They can decide. Um, you know what to do. It retreats or what? The wellness

[00:20:28.59] spk_0:
well, or what? To be what it is now. Yeah, well, or we could all have a common treat. Maybe, uh, you know, everybody brings their favorite cookie or something. All right, we got it

[00:20:34.85] spk_3:
yourself. You

[00:20:35.11] spk_0:
gotta gotta wrap it up. No, I’m gonna give you the closing words a little. Ah, little more encouragement, Mo.

[00:21:40.03] spk_4:
Yeah, I think, uh, end with keep the positivity going, but you have to build in a lot of different practices to keep positivity, Whether that is having shout out as part of your normal routine when you get on there having ice burgers, Um, just keep the positivity going just because it is a very, very stressful time. And so if you’re not building in those positive practices, a lot of times, you’re not gonna know when your team is feeling stressed out. It was they’re stressed out. That’s gonna lower productivity on and just make the working experience, you know, kind of dreadful. So, manager of a group of people working those practices, not every time that you need to meet face to face, but it doesn’t always have to be works. It could be a simple Hey, I saw you have 10 minutes on the calendar. Let me check in with you. How you doing today? Um, one thing that I just But I just learned that you do make sure you’re practicing wellness. So having, um, work related communications with also having personal check ins, I think it’s gonna be really impactful and keeping us all light and energized as you move through this crisis.

[00:21:59.02] spk_0:
All right. Thank you. That’s more. Abdullah, founder of culture, energized and with our Susan Comfort founder of non profit Wellness. I want to thank both of you. Thanks so much for sharing. And we’re gonna get this out shortly. Week or no more than two weeks. A special episode. So mode, Susan, thank you very, very much. Thank you. Stay safe.

Nonprofit Radio for June 1, 2018: Tech Mindfulness & Fringe Benefits Trigger UBIT

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Gene Takagi:
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Tax law now requires your nonprofit to pay unrelated business income tax on parking and commuting expenses you provide for your employees. Our legal contributor, Gene Takagi, shepherds you through the new land. He’s principal of NEO, the Nonprofit & Exempt Organizations law firm.

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Board relations. Fundraising. Volunteer management. Prospect research. Legal compliance. Accounting. Finance. Investments. Donor relations. Public relations. Marketing. Technology. Social media.

Every nonprofit struggles with these issues. Big nonprofits hire experts. The other 95% listen to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio. Trusted experts and leading thinkers join me each week to tackle the tough issues. If you have big dreams but a small budget, you have a home at Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio.

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Hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent i’m your aptly named host oh, i’m glad you’re with me. I’d be forced to endure the pain of zoho iq andthe assis if you stung me with the idea that you missed today’s show tech mindfulness our non-profit technology conference panel wants you to avoid technology burnout or overcome it if you’re already there, they have mindfulness advice for your entire office, your teams and you. They are beth cantor carry rice from carry rice consulting and miko whitlock of mindful techie and fringe benefits trigger you b i t tax law now requires your non-profit to pay unrelated business income tax on parking and commuting expenses you provide for your employees. Our legal contributor, jean takagi shepherds you through the new land he’s, principal of neo the non-profit and exempt organizations law firm i’m tony, take two, show your gratitude. We’re sponsored by pursuant full service fund-raising data driven and technology enabled tony dahna slash pursuant radio by wagner, cpas guiding you beyond the numbers wagner, cps, dot com and by tell us turning credit card processing into your passive revenue. Stream tony dahna slash tony tello’s here’s our panel on tech mindfulness welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntc you know what that is? It’s the two thousand eighteen non-profit technology conference coming to you from the convention center in new orleans. This interview, along with all our eighteen, ninety si interviews, is sponsored by network for good, easy to use donorsearch and fund-raising software for non-profits my guests right now are beth cantor carry rice and miko whitlock welcome all three of you. Thanks for having us. Our pleasure, my pleasure. Thank you very much. Carrie with cantor is master trainer, speaker, author, blogger and her latest book is the happy, healthy non-profit carry rice is principal at carry rice consulting, and miko whitlock is founder and ceo of mindful tiki. All right, your workshop topic is had a conker technology distraction and burn out and be more present for yourself, team and organization. All right, that’s pretty lofty presents. I feel like starting right in the middle. Carrie, we’re not so president so often, are we? Well, we broke up our session into our presence for ourselves, our presence for our team and our presence. For our overall organization, that was my focus was really about what are we doing to make it possible for those of us who aren’t members of the paid staff necessarily to remain present for the organization in a way, that’s not pushing them past their use of technology in a mindful way that to their own benefit as well as for the organization. Okay, so so each of you, i guess, has has ah, part of this three tiered presentation. Is that correct? Yes. Okay. So then carry is the organization, right? Isn’t in the organization. Okay, the host needs some notes to keep this straight. And beth was yours. Climb the we the wean? Yes, ourselves that we being of teams or internal organization staff working together. Okay. And, miko, what is your part of this? The eye, the individual? Oh, you’re the individual. Okay. Okay. So how do beth and carry distinguish the two? The two years of years the organization so you’re outside the organization, extra marries outside the organization and remaining being present. And you’re here in the internal. Okay. Got it. Yeah, i do. Alright. So far. I hope i don’t lose it. I got it? Okay. We’re also trying to overcome tech burnout. You’re we’re all concerned about tech burn out what’s the trouble here, rico? Well, the trouble is twofold. So one is what i described his intention deficit disorder, where we have a lack of clarity about what it is. We’re actually focus on it in a particular moment. I don’t think that’s a crazy coin. I mean, i think that’s out there is an attention deficit disorder. Intention? Oh, intention. Attention. Oh, well, i’m glad i okay. Intention. Definite deficit disorder. I’d yes idea. Okay. I made that clear. Yes. And so part of the work i do is around people to take a step back and really reflect on what it is that you’re trying to do in particular the context of a non profit organization, what’s your role. And what are you pushing in terms of the actual mission and the outcomes for this one aspect of it? The other aspect of it is that we have to recognize that the technology is designed in such a way that is intentionally draining our attention. Right? So is, you know, we have push notifications that are set up by default, for example. For social media, for our mobile devices. And we have to understand that that’s intentional. But they’re also ways for us to control that we can turn off those modifications. We canoe certain absent applications to regain our attention, to be more present. But those are sort of two aspects of it lack of intention and then also the intentional effort by companies to actually take and hold and keep our attention. Attention. Okay, thank you. And welcome back to non-profit radio. Thank you. And i talked in twenty sixteen and the other person on the panel who i spoke to in twenty sixteen was best cancer. We’re talking about your was then your new book? Yes. Ok. Healthy non-profit healthy non-profit, which is still you can still get it. It’s. Not like it’s out of print or anything. But in twenty sixteen, it was new. And your co author wass lisa sherman. He’s a sherman. Is she here? Not this year, but this year. Okay. And how is this work today? Different than what we talked about in twenty sixteen and happy, healthy number off it. Well, if we go back to that radio program in your archives, we talked about self care and taking care of ourselves and talk on a culture of well being. So this is a subset of it on dh specifically how staff working together can be highly productive unless distract less distracted and get their works done. And i think what we’re faced with is something called collaborative overload, which is back to back meetings, too many emails, too many platforms, and that keeps us from getting things done. So a lot of what i talked about is how could you be more intentional about your work together to combat this distraction? Okay, we’re cement wristing phrases that lack of intention intension deficit disorder, collaborative overload. Carrie, did you come with the special phrase? Welcome to non-profit a radio is very ous a newcomer. Welcome, i always surround myself with the best, so you’re you’re non-profit radio. Exactly. I’m a non-profit radio way with you and beth in mikko doesn’t get much better than that. Um, well, i come from a world where my branding is called empathetic non-profit management, which is basically that all the stakeholders of the organisation should be treating each other the same way that we treat the recipients. Of the services that we provide so the empathy that we have towards the poppies or the homeless people, we provide the same level of empathy tours, donors towards board members towards members that we’re looking at each of those groups through that same empathetic lens. And so by doing that, and then combining that with technology it’s about changing the expectation of what we do internally on our team or what we do is individuals based on the work that meeko is suggesting that we’re saying, well, maybe that doesn’t all apply to the external stakeholders who aren’t actually getting paid to do the work that we’re doing as professional does not okay, there’s a lot here, we’re gonna unpack it. I’m the remedial person on the panel, okay? Because you all have been thinking about this for years, or at least, you know, it’s, right? I mean, years or at least months in collaborating around this on the newcomer. Well, same way. Okay. Right. Well, ok. I want everyone thinking out of an average. Okay, on average are so you’re quick learner. So bring me along. Yeah. Be respectful. Okay. Uh, it’s. Time for a break. Pursuing they have a new paper, the digital donation revolution how do you keep up in our one click to buy amazon world? Can you use more revenue? A loaded question? The paper has five online fund-raising tactics proven to work and save money proven tactics you will find the digital donation revolution on the non-profit radio listener landing page. Tony dahna slash pursuing radio now back to tech mindfulness look, i don’t know where should we go? I want to start with the i’d like to start with the i actually down the end. Okay, i will start the individual. This the lack of intention this is all around helping us to stay focused right now so that we can be more mission successful ways all it’s all for the good of the of the of the social yes, there’s the societal good. But if we don’t bring it down to the if we don’t start with the individual, we can’t be maximally efficient in helping change the world. Yes, my yeah. Is that a decent contacts i put in an early yes, and so it it starts. I use a framework to people to sort of have ah place to go when they get distracted, right? So distraction is inevitable. So we’re talking about is getting a tool, a framework that they can walk through. It starts with understanding your why or your purpose. So why you showing up? Why are you committed to the work that you’re doing and then understanding based on your based on your wine, your purpose? What your actual goals? And you might have many goals that you’re focused on any point in time. And once you identify what your goals are, you actually prioritize because he recognized that with multitasking were actually mohr effectively be focused on a few things, that we’re not very good. Multi taskers, actually, are we even though we think we are what there’s actually wait, i thought we were not. Are we? Am i wrong? Well, you could say i’m wrong, i’m wrong. Why? In the technical sense, one way you could talk to this is not only me and nico, am i wrong about them? I’m walking about multitasking, i thought we were not really, truly you can’t really multi task exactly on what it when you’re doing two different task, your brain is just switching back between. The two on every time it switch treyz delays, and it also uses up brain cells and raises quarters all of cortisol levels that raises cortisol levels. So i was right. Okay, how come nobody said i was right? I am going to tell you that i think you’re right. It depends on the way to find monisha audiocasting so silent when i know for me i was seeking information that wasn’t next time, i’ll give it to him as long as it’s deserved. I mean, of course, it’s wrong if i’m wrong say, i’m wrong, but if i’m right jump on it, you know, it doesn’t happen that often. There you go, give credit where credit is, tio. Yeah, i actually like transitioning between projects, it’s just that for me i have to set aside an amount of time that works best for me to make those transition and that time is probably more than ninety second i s actually it is more than ninety seconds. Another thing about multi tasking is it takes you several seconds to re find yourself. We acquaint yourself with the task that you left, but you’re not going back to that could take his lorts nine or ten seconds for more, you know, when you’re like bouncing just quickly. I mean, it could take it could take ten minutes if you were writing something, you know, if it is a bigger piece or something. All right, because it’s not just the switching cost is also the cost of actually getting back to the place where you left off, right, and then take some time, they sort of speed up again, right? Right. Okay. Okay. All right. So good. We’re focusing on the on the you know what? I have a question for you, though. Sure. How does the eye how does what you’re describing relate to what carries part of this is she’s here you’re talking about carrie, talk about the individual as off site worker or as a as a consultant to the organization, but you’re also talking about individual. How do your how do your topics today differ? Well, i was so that they overlap, and so when we talk about why we’re talking about obviously, the individual right organizations are not just things they’re made up of people and the same thing when we talk about boards and other external stakeholders, we’re talking about people and individually way have to be able to show oppa’s out best cells so that collectively, when we come together, we can maximize our collective right, carrie okay, carrie where’s the overlap, right? So if someone were following amigos presentation yesterday about thie ability to say yes and to be able to say no with intentionality, then i want a board member who feels comfortable saying no to me because then when they say yes to me, i know they really mean it because i know that they have the skill set to say my schedule is too busy to be doing that right now or it doesn’t fit into my why of why i’m involved with this organization specifically. Okay. Okay. Um, i saw you nodding. You wanted you wanted anything with beth that’s about this promise not to swear this time you can go back, tio? No, it was twenty sixteen. Or was it fund-raising day in new york city, so, like twenty, fourteen or something? My boys just cracked fourteen and the two thousand thirteen thirteen remember better than okay. Two thousand thirteen fund-raising day n y c and best drop the f bomb, but she promised not to do now because i have affiliate stations that are governed by the fcc way, we can’t use the seven, we can’t use the seven words that george carlin had a lot of fun with, okay, okay, in any case, the whole context or yeah, long term listeners will remember best dropping everything twice in the same, the same discussion that certainly new visitors can go to your archives. Thirteen was only on one time that year, you find cantor at twenty martignetti dot com get the twenty thirteen appearance from fund-raising day in new york city. Okay, with that contact. Well, there’s something you want to add to the discussion. So, yeah, i think the collaborative overload is made up of four, four things the four piece and they’re not bad words. I don’t get what you don’t sow planning, planning priorities, being president and then people. So our relationships, interaction with staff and how we work together, communicate and collaborate on projects can lead to burn out in stress and certainly having, you know, just for example, let’s say my phone’s here, right? Yeah. This is like techno fear in ce and a bunch of people are doing this at a staff meeting it’s getting in the way of getting things done. We’re not giving each other our full attention and intentionality. I even considered that maybe you have a word for this cycle of insulting, well talking techno fear with techno parents? Yeah, insulting technology. A little offended you? No, i’m not talking in a meeting and people were picking up their phones. I’d rather they walk out this way. I think they’re going to the bathroom and i’m not tracking their time, so they’re gone for fifteen minutes do-it-yourself trouble may i’d rather they leave and come back and do it while i’m talking. But here’s the thing and it’s a lot of what i talked about in terms of the week. We have to be intentional about the way we’re working together. So if there are work and we’re being explicit at a meeting, we’re not checking our phones during the meeting or a technology unless it’s supporting the technology or else it’s a device free meeting. Okay, all right, so waken new can help with policies. Ground rules were also are also trying. Teo set norms that have to do with acknowledging riel life happening. So for me, some having someone come into a staff meeting and say, i’m waiting to find out if my father’s okay in the hospital. So i’m going to be looking at my phone during the meaning of exception exactly, but sat having that norm set so that someone is sneaking away to look at their phone and distracted from the meeting, but to be able to share with the members of the team. This is why i’m distracted right now i’m doing the best i can than everybody else khun give that person support and make them more successful. I agree, and then the knot intentionality around it. Here’s the reason why? Okay, okay were rough about halfway through and we we’ve talked around way talked about this. Why this is important. I want to spend time on strategies. What is our listeners? They’re in small and midsize non-profits how can they apply this work to them? Or if they are an outsider? Or maybe even a virtual employees carry reitman might you’re you’re part of this. I told myself i also applied a virtual employees. Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, i don’t want to drill down through yeah, yeah, and specifically, when it comes to technology wellness with external stakeholders, my rule is simplicity is that sometimes the complicated solutions like using, for example, slack for us to keep track of our conversations for a lot of people who don’t work in a corporation or in an office or in a non-profit they don’t know anything about that program, so coming up with a simpler solution and saying, oh, let’s, just use google chat or let’s, just use text messaging or something like that it’s a simpler solution for an external stakeholder than an internal stakeholder like the teams that that’s talking about where you can actually say, okay, everybody needs to get up to speed on this particular technology, but it’s really hard to do that when it’s someone who is a donor or a boardmember or an external consultant or someone who’s working off site, so you’d probably rather i didn’t say we’re willing it down for the lowest common denominator. I prefer not to use that phrase whenever possible, but i will i’ll stick with simplicity because that people keep it simple, silly, i won’t say stupid keep it simple, silly. Okay, good enough. Miko, how about cem cem, drill down tto strategies. Teo, you know, overcome this tech burnout. So the first thing i will say is that not every solution is a digital technology solution. And so starting with just taking time to really get clear about your intentions and as i was saying, establishing norms in terms of policies around how you actually meet and how technology is involved or not in those meetings and using the time at the beginning of the meeting just run through really quickly. Hey, guys, this is what we agreed to. No cellphone today. Is everyone okay with that and running through it that way? Don’t think i was out, and that would be the time to raise your hand and say my father’s in the hospital. I do. I’m doing the best i can. Okay. Okay, so but if you’re looking for a technology solution, there are a number of aps out there that are really cool that really help you too be clear about their intention and to help you not to spend as much time on your device is doing things that aren’t moving your mission. Or your wife forward. So i think a moment for example, moment is an app that you can download for the iphone and for android moment, yes, moments ok? And it simply keeps track of how often you’re actually using your phone and how often you’re actually using different aps. And so you can look at the data that you’re getting from this and actually haven’t awareness. Oh, i’m spending two hours a day on facebook. I’m spending three hours, you know, looking at instagram like us five hours out of my day. Maybe i could be spending that time doing something else so that simple awareness could be oh, really begins to instigate a shift in behavior. Okay, okay. Strategy strategy for the we the team one one one that’s real popular’s tohave an email charter which includes things like what is your policy around after hours emails which can cause a lot of stress. It’s not so much the amount of time it’s this sense that you’re on call all the time it’s just it’s just the just the existence of it. Right? So having a really formal policy about, you know, for normal business email, i mean emergencies and disaster relief and all that it’s an exception way. Don’t expect youto at reply to your email right away between seven p m and seven a m sometimes it takes, you know, making sure that the senior leadership understands this and is modeling that behaviour as well. Yes, i know it does not. If not c e o on down buy-in none of these strategies, they’re going to be our gonna be adopted, right? Exactly those exceptions ceo is allowed to look at her phone during the meetings. The whole thing crumbles, right? I mean, we got nothing to bases, all right? And that came up in our session as well. Someone asked that my ceo’s looking at the phone all the time and what i know there’s so many things i want to implement, but i can’t and i ask that person well, do you manage a team? She said, my senior management won’t listen to me and i said, you managed to team and i said, yeah, just your team listen to you well, most the time they said we’ll create that culture on your team exact change. You can change the way we roll yet. Okay, okay. That came out and came out on the previous conversation today to try to think about what the the context of that was. Oh, it was trying to get buy-in from above, actually way. Label them buy-in bitches. Bitches is okay. All right, all right, all right. It is ok. Carrie and laura, i think they’re very good team. They’re very good together that used to be at the humane society of us. And anyway, we dump them two buy-in bitches, but one of them said, if you can’t, you can’t make them get get the buy-in above. Then manage what you can on your on your team. So same same idea and then show it off to you know, when your boss sees how productive your name is being, they say what’s the secret why’s your morale so good, why is your productivity so good? And then you’re able to say, because we we managed expectations, we set norms and you’re actually you’re managing up and there was another, another instance that came up with in this case, it was a consultant, mike. My clients expect me to respond to them right away. How do i address? That expectation and it’s kind of well, you. If you reply, you set up the expectations. We know you break the norms. Yes. You know, when that you teach people how to treat you essentially you notice that the boundaries early? Yeah, yeah. Beth is right the first time if you respond immediately, that’s that’s the rule and that becomes, however, if you reply with or if you maybe make make a call instead of replying with email, you know, i don’t i don’t do after hours. I don’t do after eight p m e mails or whatever. I mean, i you know, i have my own life. You said the boundaries of the expectations early and i ninety nine people out of a hundred going to respect that, i think. And i read it it’s in my consulting contracts, actually, that i only do work between norvig snusz hours. Okay, well, you’re the mindful technique. You if your story miss up and get off that shot his mic off. Great, but but i saw kivi, larry miller speak recently if bloom khan and she was talking about the types of roles where we want to be responsive to our members in real time, and so having there be certain members of your staff who have a different work schedule where they’re in the office only twenty five hours a week and then they’re available evenings and weekends fifteen hours a week to be checking so that if someone posts and says, oh my gosh, what do i do about my dog there’s someone who can respond in real time and say, we can’t help you with that? Why don’t you try calling this emergency number but that they don’t have to work full time in the office if they’re going to be available during alternative hours? That’s something that they actually negotiate with their workplace and the expectations air managed and that it actually works really well? Kibby it was an example that give you gave, and i thought that was it great way of thinking of it when we do want to be able to be responsive during weird times, that’s also has implications across time zones yes, yeah, likewise world where the people on the west coast what’s the expectation and carrying your you know, maybe you’re a consultant to a virtual employees on the west coast. Are you? Are you expected to be up and working at six a? M or do you work the hours of your zone? There are policies that cuts both ways, right? But what are what is our policy? That’s when it gets back to the normal? No, we need to go with the norms are what the ground rules are. Yeah. What’s bloom con it’s a balloon khanna blew the bloomerang unconference they do a column around here? Yeah, yeah. Bloomerang does an educational conference, which i know a lot of other vendors do as well so that their their clients are actually getting a lot of information as well as using excellent products, you know, across the board. Okay, that j lo j love involving bloomerang, i guess founded bloomerang. Actually, i think he’s been on the show. A lot of good people now and even more good people. Like i said, i only i only surround myself with the best company. All right, you can place carrie. You still got a couple minutes left. Let’s. Go back to yumiko. You got another another strategy. Tip tool. Best practice? Yes. So you can take control when you come to digital vices like your tablets in your mobile devices, you can actually take control so the defaults might be set to push notifications to you. For example, every time you get an email every time someone likes a post on facebook, but you can actually adjust those setting so that you’re not getting pained every time. Is it really necessary to get a get a email every time somebody likes a post your comments on it? Is it really? That is a really essential? Is it essential? I don’t, i think not. Right? Well, israel, i imagine that could be circumstances where i might be the case. If you’re managing social media on behalf of her brand, maybe it does make sense if you’re monitoring comments, but as an individual, maybe not if it’s, especially if it’s getting in the way of you getting meaningful work. Okay. Okay. Excellent. So look at those defaults. Yes, because the platforms want you engaged. Exactly. Uh, that’s how they make their money? Yes, yes. Yeah. Linked in with the with the what is like that you can you can vote somebody with you. Give somebody a endorsement. Endorsement? Yes, with the endorsement. Oh. My god, it’s rampant? What do i mean? That first of all, they’re meaningless. It’s just an engagement hook. Yes, i think. All right, we don’t need to be notified. I’m obviously i’m sure you’re sharing my bias. Uh, sorry. Okay, but its host. No, no smiling. Now, you don’t think it is all right. Listeners are accustomed to this he’s rants. Okay, another strategy. Ground of something else we can do within the organization. Uh, what? What could we do? Root. Nice reflection. Okay, right out. How are your liberation? Okay, so, uh, because the stress and burnout is what i call fired-up leadership, our fire drill culture, which is basically oh, my god. The grants to tomorrow. All hands in the conference room let’s, get this done and and kind of if there are fired rell’s, you know which happened? It’s having the discipline toe push the pause button and figure out, is there a bigger systems issue or something we can address toe? So we don’t have this fire drill next time. Yeah. Weekly fire drills latto program. No, no one. And it pulls people off their work. It creates a lot of stress. And if the leader has that fire drill, leadership, culture, it’s, the shrill voice. It just causes a lot of stress. Yeah, and that’s, not productive, it’s giving me. I got a chill. I mean, i got a i got a physiological reaction, just as you were, and i didn’t even do it. And full fire drill voice. She didn’t run around or anything. I think it is all my fault. Okay, excellent. Zoho what about you said you call that routinized reflection? Yes. Ok. Ok. What about what about in the organization? Dahna dahna i don’t know. A collective time together. Devoted collective time. That’s not devoted to work. Well, i was kind of other reflection or something. Well, well, two things too quick. Tips. Okay, so so there’s the five wise, which is an exercise. When the fire drill happens, sit down with the team, do a twenty minute brainstorm. Why did this happen? Oh, because we didn’t have the grant on the calendar. So why did that happen? Oh, well, we don’t have a grantspace started before you drilling down, asking why? Why? Why? Why so that’s a really good practice? We actually find out the root cause we’re right through all the symptoms, right? If your record and try to fix it, thie other one is because we have bad time management tools were not using time management tools or headline management, right? Well, saliva flying there that’s mine. You know, sex on that time i was on the table didn’t hurt anybody. Okay? And the other thing is having look ahead. Rituals and ah, latto non-profits do this many don’t just like looking at you probably do this because you’re scheduling what’s coming up the next quarter, the next month, one organization that i know they have stopped days and stop days are they don’t have any internal meetings that one day a month, it’s actually a development team, and they work on getting that deep thinking done the creative planning, finishing up the proposal they didn’t right so it’s not filled with all the meetings and deadlines and stress. Carrie, i’m gonna give you the last shot. Unbelievably, this is we’re almost done last last tool tip strategy tech. I mean, idea what what you got both of my tools would be empathy and empathy. It would be self empathy. It would be taking a moment and assessing yourself and looking at all the expectations you have for yourself and others have for yourself and then empathizing and really thinking about what you’re actually going through. And then every other stakeholder you work with just walking a mile in their shoes and just imagining what’s challenging them. And how can you make it easier for them as well? The empathetic, empathetic also. Thankyou. All three. Very much. This one flew. Flew. Sometimes i gotta pull teeth. This one. Not like that. Okay, they are beth cancer, master trainer, speaker, author, blogger carry rice principal carry race consulting mika whitlock, founder and ceo mindful techie. And you are with non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntc this interview sponsored by network for good, easy to use dahna management and fund-raising software for non-profits. Thank you so much for being with us. Need to take a break, wagner. Cps before they go beyond the numbers, they cover the essentials for you. Nine ninety and your audit. Check them out at wagner cps dot com. You get to know them in one dimension on the screen. Then go three d real life. Pick up the phone. Talk to the partner. You huge tomb. Or of course, you can use the contact page on the site. If you prefer. I like to talk to people. I like to get on the phone with you. Very nice guy. Not going to let you down. Wittner, cpas, dot com they will take care of you and your auditing. The end accounting needs. Jean takagi is coming up now. It’s, time for tony’s. Take two. I hit this last week, the ninety six year old secretary um i didn’t know who writes this crap. I didn’t hit the ninety six year old secretary she’s already dead. But i did mention this last week and i should write this. I need an intern to blame. She this woman gave eight million dollars to two non-profits in her will had very unassuming lifestyle all of our old life. Nobody knew that she was anywhere near ah millionaire, you know, able to give away eight million dollars in her will. Ah, my takeaway from this is in the video, the little teases i want you to show gratitude toe all your donors. She was not a donor, but she could have been. And she if she had been, she would have been very modest. So that’s sort of a tease. Take a look at the video at twenty martignetti dot com leinheiser love we got we got we got tons where’s it going to it’s going tio let’s start with cambodia and ottawa, canada you’ve been with us a few times. Ottawa welcome back. Germany, gooden tog gergen, india i’m sorry. I can’t i don’t know. How to say hello in indian but the live listener love goes to you brooklyn, new york that is not foreign att least not in my in my book, maybe from people in queens. It is taipei, taiwan ni hao where’s our china. No one in no one checking in from china today. Um, bring it back to the u s, tampa, florida, brooklyn, new york, multiple new york, new york get the to get the two borrows know staten island, queens bronx not checking in today. San francisco, california is with us washington, d c and new bern, new bern, north carolina. The live love goes toe all each and every live listener and the podcast pleasantries that the vast majority of our audience over twelve thousand listeners each week the podcast pleasantries to you. Whatever. However you fit it into your schedule, you binge listen. Six hours on a time on on sundays, pleasantries to the podcast listeners and the affiliate affections to our am and fm station listeners throughout the country. I’m grateful that your station carries us in your schedule and i’m grateful that you are listening. Analog analog will never die. I don’t care what anybody says analog is not going to die am and fm listeners affections to you now it’s. Time for fringe benefits trigger you b i t i i i can hear his heart beating it’s racing. He knows he’s coming in and he’s jean takagi he is managing attorney of neo the non-profit and exempt organizations law group in san francisco. Of course he’s, our legal contributor he edits the non-profit the popular non-profit law blogged dot com you should you should be bookmarking that are subscribing to that non-profit law block dot com he’s the american bar association’s twenty sixteen outstanding non-profit lawyer he’s at g tak welcome back, team takagi. Thank you, tony, how are you? Hey, you’re coming in booming. I love it. I’m doing very well. Thank you. Thank you, it’s. Good to talk to you, it’s. Been it’s been some time? I think it’s it feels like it’s been too long. I don’t know what has been but it feels like it. Welcome back. Thank you so much. Great to be back, tony. Thank you. So we’re talking about ah, cem cem tax law changes one specifically regarding is narrow category of fringe benefits and you be i tv. Ah, unrelated business income tax. We haven’t even talked about this for quite some time years. So remind us what unrelated business income tax is. Please? Sure. I mean it’s a great starting point. Because, um, a lot of folks have never had to deal with it before. And i are going all of a sudden have to have to have to deal with it now. But generally speaking, the unrelated business tax is on income tax that’s imposed on unrelated business trade income, which is income from a trader business that’s regularly carried on. So basically, with the same frequency and continuity is for-profit would do it. And that’s not substantially related to the organization’s advancement of its own charitable or other five a onesie three purpose unrelated business taxable income. That’s what? What? The income tax is going to hit now that people call it. You bit right, cubine? Yeah. Cubine for unrelated business tax. The acronym? Yeah. I’m wondering why it’s not a bit. Because it’s it’s unrelated to not eun it’s, not eun related. So i was. As i was thinking about this, i may adopt a bit you can stick with. You but if you want to be a dinosaur but the trend is moving now because one data point creates trend. It’s now moving toward a bit. Okay, so, quite roll off the tongue is nicely, but it really doesn’t. I think it’s coming is better because it’s unrelated itt’s a it’s, a sin tactically, grammatically, you know. Ah, naturalistic. All right, um all right. So, wait. So we have taxes on we have in minor ways or in, in narrow ways has put it that way in narrow ways on tax exempt organizations because the irs says that they’re primarily tax exempt, right? That what’s up. Yeah, well, i think what they are, they’re tax exempt on income from donations and on income from related activities that those air activities that substantially contribute to advancement of their their charitable purposes, and we never look at how their profits are deployed. So if, for example, a social services organization runs the coffee shop that had nothing to do with job training or anything like that, it was just ah, they bought a franchise coffee shop and they were making money. But using all the profits to go back into the social service stuff. That’s still unrelated, so any earnings coming out of that business would be taxable. Okay, um, and this gets to the three pronged test you mentioned it’s, trader business regularly carried on and, uh, not substantially related to the organization’s exempt purpose. That’s. Right. Ok, ok, we may. We may come back to these because i want to i want to get to the crux of this thing, and then i wanted tear it apart a little bit. I have a lot questions about why, why we’re getting, why, why this is being imposed on us. It doesn’t seem to fit, so you’re going to help you, khun, help all of us out. Hopefully, other people are questioning this, too. Although it’s, too late, it’s not like this is a proposal, i mean, it’s, it’s. A done deal. You have to deal with this thing so so if you have a bit liability, then you have to calculate how much tax you owe to the irs each year. Is that right? That’s? Right? So you’re gonna have to pay now, it’s a flat rate of twenty one percent attack on your puppet and you have to file. Thank you, john. Thank you for that thousand dollars arm or of of the unrelated business taxable income you’re going to have to file form nine, ninety with the irs, so that goes along with your regular form nine ninety siri’s filing, and this is important because this is going to hit churches as well that otherwise don’t have to file nine nineties, but if they’ve got unrelated business taxable income of a thousand dollars or more now they’ve got a file in nine ninety and paid twenty one percent tax on it. Oh, very yes, very interested, right. Churches are exempt from the nine ninety requirement, but now they’re going to file this nine ninety t assume t is for tony handup pick up. Okay? Yes. Interesting churches were swept into the nine. Ninety requirement under this. All right, what? They’ve always say if they if they had over a thousand dollars about unrelated. They always had to file this. But we’re creating new sources of this. We’re gonna have a lot more organizations and that’s. Why it’s important for churches to be aware of it now as well. Interesting. Yes. All right. Let’s, let’s. Get to the crux of it. What is the new source? What are the new sources that we are here talking about today? New sources of of it. So this all stems from what’s known as the tax cuts and jobs act on dh that’s basically congress’s new tax act. So i think most of us and we on an earlier show we talked about the tax reform act that hit and started to apply as of january first of this year two thousand eighteen. So under this tack fact there’s several provisions that affected non-profit on tax exempt organizations and one of these had to do their several that applied to to the labbate unrelated business income tax. But one particular thank you. Thank you very much. When in particular that’s. Quite distressing. Is that now a qualified transportation fringe benefits that’s provided by an employer to an employee is going to be taxable so it’s not any income that the non-profit is receiving it’s, actually, for most of them, an expense that they’re paying for a fringe benefit for their employees. Um and all of a sudden now they didn’t have to last year, but starting this year, they have to pay tax on giving a qualified transportation prince benefit to an employee. Okay, now it sounds like you’re you’re ah, you’re consistent with my thinking because you just drive. It is distressing, and i didn’t see how it was income because typically pre-tax income, but all right, so let’s, let’s define what is a i guess the acronym is q t fbi? What is a qualified but i’ve drug in jail, so, you know, i’m not could put myself in jargon jail. What is a qualified transportation fringe benefit now that is going to trigger a bit under the tax law, so it would include things like any employer provided shuttles to work transit passes that that you might give teo your employees so that they can take the metro or whatever hyre transit that that they have to get, get to work and workplace parking. Zaf employers air providing any of these things to their employees? Not that they’re getting any income from it, but the expenses that they pay out. You’re gonna actually have to pay an additional tax on that now. Yeah, i can’t believe this. Well, it’s dis incentivizing mass transit because they’re going to get tax, the organization that gives you money toward your transit pass or pay, but gives you the transit pass directly. Uh, this is like it’s, like the global warming and climate change enhancement act. Dis incentivizing that’s a lot of levels. I can’t believe the dis incentivizing mass transit usage by taxing the benefit. Ah non-profit employer giving it to employees it’s ludicrous. So i’ll give you a little bit of their ration. Now, if you call this a restless since jean so calm of the calming voice as i’m ranting. All right, go ahead. Yes. Give us the rational please. They’ve taken this away as a deduction from for-profit sa’s. Well, so before a for-profit employer that provided thes qualified transportation bridge benefits, upleaf shuttles and transit classes, workplace parking could deduct it. Yeah, before they pay income taxes on their net income, that kind of made sense, right? You know, it’s an expense to run your business and you’re trying to do do a good thing. Yeah, trying to attract attract labour that may come from a distance, so you’re helping them pay for or offset the cost of their commute? Yep. Then durand non-profits for-profit do not get teo. They lost that deduction. They lost that as of this year. So that’s part of the text you no cuts in jobs act so that that’s one area of new revenue for the government is despite the tax cuts. This is one area new revenue that businesses can’t deduct this and non-profits have to be taxed on it. So it’s kind of ridiculous, but this sweeps end a ton of charities, small charities included and churches that have no unrelated businesses they’ve never had to understand. You bet or a bit because i’ve never had any unresolved business better elearning income so that they would never file the nine, ninety they would never worry about paying this type of income tax, and all of a sudden they’re not making any more income, but they have been providing parting to their employees. Yeah, park and now i’m in transit. If they don’t file the night nineteen, they don’t pay the tax and they could get it, you know, with interest and penalties as well. What’s the rationale for equalizing corporate and non the corporate and nonprofit sectors. Why? Just because one loses a deduction, which also is a disincentive, teo mass transit and commuting it’s equally. But, you know, removing that deduction for for the corporate community is unequal disincentive tio teo taxing it on the non-profits but where’s, the what’s, the reason for having two equivalent make these two equivalent way if we remove the deduction for corporations and we have to, we have to tax it on the on the non-profit sides like they’re competing. What? What? What? What’s the rationale for trying teo equalize thes yeah, it’s a good question, tony, and i don’t know that i have a policy answer just no that’s, basically, that their explanation is to put everybody on the same playing field. But this doesn’t make sense. Non-profits inc organizations, because they’re doing public good, that businesses aren’t required to do so. I don’t get it either. All right, thank you. Let’s. Take a break, gene. Tell us moughniyah lll have a talisman eal ly elementary school is receiving a monthly donation from tello’s for the credit card processing of a company one of our parents owns likely the easiest donation source we have ever secured. End quote, monthly passive revenue that’s what? Tell us we’ll get you the easiest donation source ever think of people who are close to your organization? Who owned businesses who would be willing to switch their credit card processing. That’s what it’s all about. You get passive revenue indefinitely. Start with the video at tony dot m a slash tony. Tell us now, let’s. Go back to fringe benefits that trigger labbate with jeanty jeanty. That could be like you could be a deejay. Or so our rapid jeanty. You like it? Jean d’you did a rap for us once. Didn’t you think you write a rap ones? I’ve written a few you well, i only labbate really perform. Yeah, you did one. You have many. But you performed one on the show like jean t gene t the gene gene t the law machine. Remember, jean, you could be ging t the legal of machine. Remember rum? What was that with chuck barris? Oh. Gosh! Oh, gosh. Oh, don’t got anything geever gene, gene, the dancing machine. Oh, yeah, i remember him. You’re going to be your gene gene the law machine. Gene gene, the law machine gt. All right, jean jean don’t think i’m going to forget this either. Gene gene, the la mission. All right, gene t i love it. Um, okay, so you’re you’re is as dismayed as as i am i i just i cannot see them. Well, i’ve ranted i can’t see the rationale for the equivalent ing equalizing the corporate and nonprofit sector dis incentivizing mass transit. All right. And then so let’s go through. I mean, how does this work in the in the three pronged test? Trader a. You bit a bit of it. I made a mistake. Labbate is has been, um um created when it’s something that’s ah non-profits carrying on a trader business that’s regularly carried on and not substantial related to the organization’s exempt purpose. I mean that this is not even doing this for-profit it. So, it’s not it’s a trader of business. This is not a profit. This is a fringe benefit, employees. How does this fit? And there’s no. Income generated either so it doesn’t fit. They just threw it in because there’s a system of taxing non-profit that has nothing to do with prince benefits, but they found a way to teo just stick it in, and it doesn’t fit your right so that part of the problem, although in one aspect what you said was true, you know, this is the law now, there’s, not much we can do about it, but in another part we can actually do something about it. So while the basic laws are there, there’s just a lot of open questions and a lot of misunderstandings and ambiguities and no way to understand exactly where it applies and where it doesn’t apply in certain circumstances and a whole bunch of organizations, including the national council non-profits the american institute of e p, a american society of association executives are calling on the treasury department, the irs to say, hey, don’t implement these, you know, laws yet because we have no clear guidance and we don’t have a way to tax plan for this because we don’t understand where it applies and where it doesn’t apply, and you’re saying it already takes effect. As of two thousand eighteen, the laws were rushed through without understanding. There are no regulations yet, so treasury hasn’t built regulations yet, right? So how do they enforce something where nobody understands exactly what it means? Our eddie, these organizations challenging the existence of this prevision or they’re just asking questions about it. Do you know? Well, they’re asking for a delay and implementation until there are regulations that are promulgated and regulations require comments. And so it takes a while to get done. But there are so many open questions, i don’t know that they can change the law in and of itself on left congress to become the law, but the regulations that are underneath it and we can discuss some of the open questions that are out there, they’re asking people to comment to the irs directly. And you, khun, you know, if you googled irs comment and tax forms ah, and you put the form nine ninety it’s it’s on ly basically email form nine ninety and say delay. You know, uh, imposing any liability on us until you tell us exactly what the rules are you all right? Now we will get to some. Of the questions i do want to make it clear that we’re not talking about employee’s losing the income exclusion for these benefits, right? That that remains intact. That’s that’s, right? So employees that get these fringe benefits don’t have to pay tax on it. So it’s pre-tax you’re not losing your pre-tax benefits up to two hundred sixty bucks a month for commuting and two sixty month for parking. That’s not right, that’s not employers that are paying for it are now being advised by some of their accountants. It doesn’t fit into their budget additional tax cut that benefits. Yeah, because the tax rate is twenty one percent, right? Correct. So twenty percent of two, sixty is fifty two. So this is costing if you’re giving your if e-giving the max for either commuting or parking, of course will be one hundred for if you’re doing a max for unemployed e you know, this could be roughly fifty bucks to one hundred bucks per employee in tax. Well, it will be over a year, you know, five hundred twenty bucks expand on this. All right? I was just doing it by the month. Oh, yeah, right. Yeah, exactly. One hundred sixty bucks per person? Yeah. Additional tax on the non-profit. So if you have ten employees that you’re doing it for that over five thousand on dh that’s, a modest size non-profit right? All right, um okay, so you have to. So what? What’s what’s your guidance before we get to the questions? What do you recommend? Non-profits do gene be the voice of reason while i’m ranting, please? Well, first you got to understand how many employees you’re actually providing these fringe benefits to and do do you think that they are covered by the tack? So there are these open questions that that we haven’t started to talk about yet, but open questions. So if you’re providing parking transit passes or shuttle bus service is tio any of your employees consider how much tax you may have to pay on it, then you’re gonna have to figure it out in your budget. Can you continue to provide all of these fringe benefits and pay the tax, or do you actually have to do something else? And one of the other things he might do is take away the fringe benefits and just pay employees the income. For them to do with themselves now, that’s not a very attractive option toe a lot of employees. So it’s more than just the money you’re gonna have to think about in doing this. But those discussions have to be had now and comment to the irs and say we can’t we don’t even know how to plan for this until you tell us what the rules no. Yeah, because giving them giving it to the employees of straight income obviously raises their income tax liability. Exactly. All right? Okay. Any any, any more guidance how to proceed or that that exhausted? But i think that’s all the guidance i can give now, but the one area that we’re really uncertain about it, the whole parking area, okay? What’s going to pass the question and stuff on shuttle buses, which not too many small non-profits would do it’s pretty clear, but parking is like it’s just so full of opening that we don’t know what that means. Like suppose you suppose you offer parking too. Ah, guests of your office, you have a parking lot next to your building. My boys just cracked like i’m a fourteen year old building. On dure employees use that, too. What? What? What does that mean? Yeah, that that’s. One of the questions that we have is if the parking is available for anybody for free, then presumably allowing your employees to use it to shouldn’t count. But what if there are a limited number of spaces? So so we know that really, the general public is not using those bases. Or what if the spaces say employee parking only. So those are some of the questions that we have about parking. And what if you know what if the building is is owned by the employers? That doesn’t cost them anything to provide the parking. How do you figure out what the cost is? And how much do you pay tax on it? A lot. A lot of open questions. Okay. Uh, yeah. Um all right. So should we suppose were in that situation. Suppose we do. We we have a parking lot. We owned the building and the lot. Um, we should be talking to our tax adviser. Yeah, but times are tax adviser, and you ask for help again. Delay implementation of the rules. The irs should tell us in treasury. Department should tell us exactly when it applies and when it doesn’t apply, and right now they’re not saying anything because they happened figured it out yet either. So ah, and one more area i wanted to touch on sometimes it the charity isn’t really even providing the benefit themselves because it’s subject to this salary reduction, so basically the employees saying reduce my salary by two hundred bucks and, uh uh, you know, because i want to use that for parking is a pre-tax benefit, so the charity isn’t even paying for it, but the irs seems to have told us at least unofficial coyness when when officials, you know, told attendees at a big conference a couple months ago that the irs would impose you bit on these payments. Employers are made, you know, it’s coming from the boys themselves, it’s over jean okay, committed to this and and what aren’t there some some towns that require ah pra vision of transit benefits? And so aren’t there circumstances where employers might be doing it? Because it’s required by law? Yeah, and that’s so it’s not really a fringe benefit? Is it it’s a required benefit that you have? To give in new york city, washington, d c san francisco shot out. I’ll tell those cities and then the non-profits there you you’ve got some issues. Those are places that require require the benefit is a pre-tax salary reduction. Oh, come on. I mean that. Well, yes, clearly this has not been thought through, but that has to be an exception. That’s that’s not a fringe benefit. That’s ah that’s following the law that’s a legal requirement wrecks that are going to make that clear. But right now, we’ve just got the word of one official that says yes, they’re going to oppose you bit on it. And so that’s the best guidance we have right now. But we have no official guidance labbate gene of it. Um, did we know this was in the in the tax law? I know the thing was enormous. Nobody in congress read it. That was notorious. It was too big to read. It was rushed through. Didn’t have those the hearings that air routine and major tax revisions. Do we know this was buried in there? We well, only those who are paying a lot of attention. I knew it was in there. But it wasn’t the biggest problem that charity, you know, we’re facing. There are other issues with bill, so this particular provisions didn’t get a lot of attention until more recently. Ok, i see. Yeah, there were. There were concerns about. Taxes on large endowments, which we did get on the very high end right there. Remember, there was discussion about whether churches would be exempt from the the politicking. That’s, not the right word, what’s. The help me actually election nearing election, hearing that that still is a big concern for a lot of people that it’s been put into another bill again that that the irs can’t enforce against five twenty three’s, not just churches, engaging an election year. Oh, that’s in a bill that’s in the bill now it’s in the bill. Next. Oh, so and they’re certain factions of congress that continue to slip it into all sorts of bills because there’s a very strong republican platform buy-in that that is to really destroy, and i think that was president trump’s words destroy the johnson amendment, which is the part of five a onesie three that says five, twenty three can’t engage in election hearings, can’t, you know, become partisan political actors? Yeah, right, the johnson amendment yes, we’ve heard a lot about that. All right? Um, we got like, we’ve got to wrap it up so jean, i don’t know if the next time i talk to you will be ah, we’ll be the four hundredth show on july twenty seventh. Maybe we’ll get you in june. We’ll try. I’m not sure, but thank you very much for today and i look forward to talking again. That’s so do i, tony. Very excited. Teo, join you on the four hundred show as well. Cool. Congratulations, creek. Preliminary. Congrats. Thank you again. He’s at g tak e ta ke subscribed to this thing for pete’s sake. Non-profit law block. Dot com read it subscribed to it next week. Henry tim’s with his new book, new power. If you missed any part of today’s show, i beseech you, find it on tony martignetti dot com were supported by pursuant online tools for small and midsize non-profits data driven and technology enabled. Tony dahna slash pursuant radio weather. Cps, guiding you beyond the numbers. Wagner, cps, dot com and tell us. Credit card in payment processing, your passive revenue stream. Tony dot mm slash tony tell us. A creative producer is claire meyerhoff. Sam liebowitz is the line producer, shows social media is by susan chavez, and this music is by scott stein with me next week for non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent go out and be glory. You’re listening to the talking alternative network e-giving geever e-giving hello, this is bruce chamois, coast of the web design and technology coach. 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