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Nonprofit Radio for November 1, 2021: Risk Management II

My Guest:

Gene Takagi: Risk Management II

Gene Takagi

Gene Takagi returns to complete our coverage of the risks lurking in your employee relations; facilities; events; and vehicles. Also, what to do to keep those risks at a minimum, so incidents don’t hurt your nonprofit. Gene is our legal contributor and principal at NEO, the Nonprofit & Exempt Organizations Law Group. (Part I was on October 4th.)

 

 

 

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Your Decade Plan For Planned Giving

If you start your Planned Giving fundraising program this year, you won’t believe how much you can achieve by the end of the decade. Here’s your plan for getting there. 

Nonprofit Radio for May 19, 2017: Healthcare Funding Options & Leadership Options

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My Guests:

Chris Labbate: Healthcare Funding Options

You have options today! First, Chris Labbate walks us through fully insured; self funded; level funding & minimum premium, so you understand your choices paying for your employees’ health insurance. Chris is with Marsh & McLennan Agency.

 

 

Gene Takagi: Leadership Options

Gene Takagi

Then, we talk leadership options with Gene Takagi, our legal contributor and principal of NEO, the Nonprofit & Exempt Organizations law group. Co-CEOs anyone? How about holacracy?

 


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Oh, hi there. Hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent on your aptly named host this is show number three hundred forty, the three hundred fiftieth non-profit radio is going to be coming up it’s on july twenty eighth, three fifty music comedy special news i hope you’ll be with me for three fifty i’m sending spies special a pre show special live listener love to the fans of crystal a bat this insurance guy has a big fan base that this guy’s, a rock star who sells insurance live listener love to chris’s special live listeners, and i’m glad you’re with me. I’d suffer with my own militia if you try to soften me up with the idea that you missed today’s show health care funding options today is options day first, kriss la bat walks us through fully insured self-funding level funding and minimum premium. So you understand your choice is paying for your employees health insurance chris’s with marsh and mclennan agency and shared leadership options. We talked leadership options with jean takagi are legal contributor and principle of neo the non-profit and exempt organizations law group co ceos. Anyone? How about holacracy shared leadership on tony’s? Take two. My finger is still wagging, responsive by pursuant full service fund-raising data driven and technology enabled, you’ll raise more money pursuant dot com, and by we be spelling supercool spelling bee fundraisers. We be e spelling dot com for all his fans. And, of course, for everyone else. Here is crystal bat with health care funding options. My privilege to welcome chris lay back to the studio as regional executive vice president at marshall mclennan agency, chris is an authority on employee benefits, including customer driven health plans and alternative funding. He shares his expertise and twenty eight years of industry experience to help you see how innovative employee benefits and hr programs can lower your costs. The company is at mm a hyphen and e dot com crystal bat. Welcome to studio. Thank you, tony. Pleasure to be here. I’m glad you are. Thank you. Read your colleague last week. Mark. So you’re going to shine like mark shine did yes, i know you’re up to it. All right? So we are we’re talking about funding funding options for employee health. Let’s, let’s reassure listeners first, this is not going to be impacted by health care reform that may come or is not going to be impacted seriously, right? Yes, that’s that’s correct? Most likely, the funding options will stay the same. Okay? Because we really can’t predict what’s coming out of congress, but we don’t expect the general ideas around funding that you and i are going to talk about to be impact. Correct, okay. Right? We don’t make the show irrelevant in two weeks after. Okay. All right, so it turns out you don’t have to fully fund. I mean, i think probably the majority are ah, now i know you do have some stats, actually, but i’m thinking small and midsize non-profits probably most of them are just osili insured, fully insured, really insured plan. Correct, but you have options. Correct. So? So in a fully insured plan, you’re just paying a fixed monthly rate that the insurance carrier sets for your organization and if its profitable to them it’s profitable them. If it’s not profitable, they’re taking on the all the risk skin and losing out. Yeah, okay. They probably don’t lose out too often, though. I’m guessing they might lose one year, but they’re probably gonna lose two years in a row over the long term state business. They have to make profit. Okay. Exactly. All right, so i think pretty. Yeah. People are pretty accustomed to that. The fully fully insured and ah it’s easy it’s level payment, i mean, and you know exactly what to expect. Her employees have a set of benefits and it’s all easily defined and of course, insurance, company’s, managing it right. So we’re just talking about the financing of the benefit plans, right? So that’s, often transparent to the employees, don’t get involved with that. So the employer is just paying the fixed costs, and they’re all there are alternatives to the fully insured, called self-funding, which can be explored for more, most organizations, five employees on up. Ok, so even for the smallest organization, correct benny on the state. But, yes, okay, okay, cool. S so this is going to be impacted by state law. Also, correct, yes, all right. Um now, if we are, if we are self-funding then we’re taking on some risk, correct, you’re taking on a portion of the claims risk so that portion you’re going to fund as the claims come in, but what’s often misunderstood about self-funding is that there are insured components built into self-funding so it may not be at the same level that you have. You’re fully insured, fixed rate, right? But you do have insurance components to protect you. Two different suits to specific types. There’s ones called specific insurance to protect you against any one person having a claim over a certain amount. Okay, you decide is the employer and you purchased that coverage of twenty five thousand fifty thousand. If a claim hits that level, the insurance kicks in, and then the second is called aggregate insurance, which is protection that your total claims that going don’t go over certain amount. Okay? All right, so i got you. I got you so you can. There are some. Yes, there are some insurance protections built into self-funding. All right, now you do have some stats about, um um about what? What? The percentages are around. Who’s self-funding. And how it’s. Been changing since nineteen, ninety nine like percentage self-funding vs versus the full, fully, fully insured thank you write. So especially since health care reform has has kicked in there’s been a movement towards self-funding on dh that basically is benefiting employer groups that have a favorable risk of benefits around the country. They’re showing. About sixty one percent of covered workers that have health insurance through their employer are covered under some form of a self-funding plan. Yeah, well, okay, so almost two thirds correct under some form of self self-funding and that’s changed from nineteen, ninety nine that was forty four percent correct. A big change. Okay, okay, um, so if we’re if we’re going to consider this self-funding option, there are some different kinds of costs that we need to be aware of, correct. Right now, we’re just like we have about two minutes before break. So why don’t you just kind of tease out the idea of these different kinds of costs we have to be aware of? And then you’re not going to more detail. Perfect after right after that. So in general there’s, two categories of cost, you have your fixed costs that you’re paying on a monthly basis and you have your variable costs will be, which will be your claims costs as they come in. Ok, fixed, invariable. All right, we’re going to dive into that a little more. We take our break a minute and a half earlier, so and then kristen are going to keep talking, finding out what your options are around, maybe self-funding all are a part of your employee health stay with us, you’re tuned to non-profit radio tony martignetti also hosts a podcast for the chronicle of philanthropy fund-raising fundamentals is a quick ten minute burst of fund-raising insights published once a month. Tony’s guests are expert in crowdfunding, mobile giving event fund-raising direct mail and donor cultivation really all the fund-raising issues that make you wonder, am i doing this right? Is there a better way there is? Find the fund-raising fundamentals archive it. Tony martignetti dot com that’s marketmesuite n e t t i remember there’s a g before the end, thousands of listeners have subscribed on itunes. You can also learn maura, the chronicle website philanthropy dot com fund-raising fundamentals the better way welcome back to big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent with chris sabat when we’re talking about funding options for your employee health now, christine, you do not have lots of letters after your name. Last week we had i says that mention mark your colleague market lots of letters especially easy, like sees after name there’s all your where’s, all your credentials, they’re all just built into yourself. Yes. You know, i’ve been in industry since eighty nine, and i have my master’s in finance and marketing. I’m just really the experience in the industry on the benefits side. Okay, okay. Your bona fide? Yes. Okay. Okay. All right. So let’s. Now, zai promised diving a little more on these. Some of these costs that you have to think about taking on if you were goingto fundez self-funding fixed costs like like what? Like what? So the first fixed costs you would have is your cost to administer the plan. And typically you’re hiring an insurance carrier or a company. It looks like an insurance carrier called a third party administrator to perform all the tasks that that insurance carrier would under a fully insured plan. So paying claims customer service id cards for employees booklets. So from the employees perspective, if they don’t know what the funding is, it looks and feels like a fully insured plan to them. There’s no difference. Okay, so you’re outsourcing this administrative work. Exactly. No need for you to hire people to be doing this for you. Exactly. Cos that’ll do it for you. Yes, at a fraction of the cost of a fully insured plan. Okay. Okay. Um and the what? What else? Fixed costs. There’s this ways that now we now we get into some of the insurance coverage mentioned earlier, protecting us against a really unhealthy employer employee or or or or or aggregate. Go ahead. Absolutely. So so most companies that self-funding will have two types of insurance associated with their plan and their purchasing this protection. And the first is called specific insurance protection against anyone large claim going over a predetermined amount. And as the employees you, you picked that amount, whether it’s twenty five thousand, fifty thousand and as that amount goes up, the premium associating it kind of goes down exactly. Okay? And the second type of coverage is called aggregate insurance. And that’s protection that your total paid claims will not exceed a certain amount. Okay. And that’s, very inexpensive coverage. All right. And so these air part of your fixed costs that you’re going to be absorbing? Yes, if you’re if you’re exploring self-funding, you’ll get a monthly bill with your admin costs and your stoploss costs all printed out per employee, just like you get a fully insured premium bill. Okay, okay. On. And then you had the variable costs, which is basically what you’re going to be paying out for doctor visits. Right, etcetera. That right. Exactly. So the variable cost will be the claim’s paid out for your employee population covered under the plan. And in general, when you’re purchasing your stoploss insurance, the underwriter at the stoploss carrier will determine what they expect. Your claims to be given your employee population and then they’ll determine a maximum exposure. So if your claims go above this maximum amount, the insurance will kick in and cover it. Okay, that maximum exposure is usually set ten to twenty percent higher than your expected claims for your popular do-it-yourself kush. Exactly. Okay, exactly. Now, what about reserves in all this? I mean, if we’re going to be doing that, we have to have money set aside for the payment of claim. Exact. Exactly. So when you first go into self-funding plan in the first few months, you typically will not see any paid claims. Somebody goes to a doctor today. It doesn’t get reported two to three weeks from now when it gets paid. Okay, so there’s a cash flow advantage upfront going into a self funded plan, but on the back and if you ever terminate a self-funding plan, there’ll be claims coming into the third party administrator or the carrier that need to be paid based on service states prior to when you terminated, right? Right. That’s called run out or term a terminal liability. Okay, yeah, while you were self-funding toe at the end mean, you benefited in the beginning, right at the end. Claims are still going to be coming in as you exact your i guess. Or now fully insured. And you ended your your self-funding crackers. But but so that has to be a reserve fund, right? Don’t law must require something like you’ve gotta have ah dedicated account or something with the money. For the old yes, so typically a joint bank account set up with the third party administrator there paying claims out of this account when you had that crash flow advantage at the beginning of the program when your first during out self-funding we recommend that you just bank that money and that’s setting up the reserves for the event if it ever happens where you cancel the self-funding plan, okay? And how about knowing? Oh, well, i guess that goes into your expected cost. Me knowing how much to put into this reserve correcting for for a decent sized organization, i don’t know, like ten employees, i mean, could conceivably be half a million dollars or something. I mean, i’m just numbers don’t stop my head, right? You’re going to be more precise, you’re probably gonna say, well, it’s gonna depend on age, right and correct help histories, etcetera and it’s broken out by the underwriters on a monthly basis. So, you know, so when you get your stoploss coverage, they’ll give you a claims factor per employee per month. And that is how you calculate the number of employees times that claims factor gives you your exposure for the expected exclaims focus and that’s the amount that’s got to go in this dedicated reserve for typically yes, now you can’t you can’t be using this money for other purposes correct it, sze designated restricted or something for the self-funding plan? Yes, it should be air marks for the self-funding plants. He had the money available to pay their letting your employees down your absolute, obviously seriously. Okay. Okay. We don’t want people run operating that. Okay, um all right. So we’re talking a lot about self-funding what are what are some of the reasons you that non-profit might actually think about doing it? There’s some advantages? Yeah. There’s some big advantage associate with self-funding the first is there are a bunch of hidden taxes and fully insured plan. So under health care reform, there’s four four and a half percent in taxes that get attacked right onto a fully insured great. Okay, now, health care reform. Today on the day now, we’re recording couple weeks earlier, then this is going to air. So health care reform by that you mean the affordable care act? Correct? Or obamacare? Correct. Okay, not something that may be happening in congress in april of this year in may of this year is that right? That’s correct. So in the affordable care act, there’s a tax on non-profits that are any fully insured krauz any fully insured plan has attacks built into it that gets funded, the funds go right towards offsetting the cost of the affordable care act. Was it attacks on the amount of premium? You correct? Oh, interesting. Okay, right. Forty five percent you sent were correct and there’s also in some states and local taxes that get applied to fully insured plans. So when your self-funding you’re circumventing the state rules and some of these fully insured taxes at a federal level, yeah. Okay. All right. This one advantage. All right? What else are there? Other reasons it we have? Ah, younger, healthier group. You’re going to benefit because you’re paid claims will be much lower then expected or similar to expected. And then you’re paying less than you would under a fully insured plan now wouldn’t and ensure offering full insurance? Wouldn’t they be factoring in that you have a younger, healthier workforce. So health care reform change some of the factors that go in. They do account. For age coverage, tear with a single or family coverage if you’re a smoker or a nonsmoker, but generally you’re paid claims in a small group will not count towards calculating your rate. Wait a minute, we better impact that statement. Hold on, you’re paid claims in a given group will not will not what? I came here if you’re unaffiliated, if you’re in a fully insurance plan small group market? Yes, your claims do not drive your rates typically. Oh, they don’t correct because it’s the law of large numbers, they’re playing, they’re not going to base your rates on your claims. If you’re five people or ten people that’s what healthcare form actually did away with to try to stabilize the small group market just like those of us who are individuals, we go to the exchanges. It’s my premium is not at all based on my history could i mean, i think they might have asked if i’m a smoker. But that’s all yes, that’s one of the factors taken you okay? So we’re getting very small. So that’s at one end of the spectrum, tiny individual. I see what you’re saying. They’re all right there it applies to small groups as well. So i’ll give an example of you if you’re in a fully insured plan, you’re paying fixed rate every month and say your premium comes to one hundred thousand dollars a year. Okay, now, if you wanna self-funding plan, you’re paying your fixed costs, which might be twenty or thirty thousand will estimate and then there’s seventy thousand and projected claims what your claims only coming at ten thousand, you’re only paying ten thousand wonderful insure plan you pay the full hundred thousand still alright, so there’s an opportunity here for a new organization to engage in employee health, health, health and wellness, right? Yes, if you’re going to go fully every, i’m sorry if you’re goingto self-funding you can enjoy some benefits of every every, every two weeks, we have a five k run or, you know, whatever i say, right? I mean it’s perfect segway twenty foot that one of the next advantages. If you have an active wellness program where you’re engaging your employees and getting healthy, that can parlay into fewer claims and under self-funding plan, you benefit directly from that you’re not paying out claims on un employees that don’t go to the doctor. Okay? What size organization do we have to be? Or was it eliminated completely under affordable care act, where they would start looking at our claims history and our wellness programs? If we were going fully insured so it vary state by state eso it khun b fifty employees, one hundred employees and and more. All right, you have to be that size for them to start factoring in your individual act. Your program’s done. But i mean, you could have, like, smoking cessation. You could have, i don’t know. Organization provided fitbits and everybody’s got eight or ten thousand step daily minimum, right? You can have all kinds of programs to try to save yourself. Money. Those air, those air common wellness programs. There’s not innovative thinking, innovative now company and fried. It provided fifty. Now they’re doing that. Yes. Alright. I thought maybe i had some some great insights. Okay, um all right. So i just happened to be a big wellness fan so you could save some money if you doing self insurance. Self-funding self-funding i should say on and there’s a couple there’s. A couple more advantages. Get more transparency. You see, you’re paid claims were under fully insured arrangement. You typically do not especially smaller employers, so you don’t get to see the claims them all employers typically, we’ll not see their claims history because they’re not allowed or that usually carrier policy not to give out paid claims to smaller employers, especially if they’re rates aren’t dictated by plane. So that gives you the ability to better budget for future costs because you have all the information and it helps you design with plan design. So if you know people are over using the emergency room, you might up the co pan the emergency room copay and you might lower the copay on your urgent care centers or tele medicine to try to drive people with lower cost setting. Yes. Okay, so you could drive some behaviors. Okay. I could see that there’s one last one. It gives you the ability to not have to include state mandated benefits in your plan. And that’s, a big benefit for companies who have people across state lines because they can provide one seamless plan designed for all their employees. You say companies. But we non-profit organizations exactly. All right. So different. States have different mandated benefits, correct packages? Correct. Okay, i saw a bit of a little i mean, this is kind of interesting, well, privacy issue coming out of what you were just saying, if you’re self-funding you’re able to see claims history now you know who the unhealthy people are, right? Who’s got bad behaviors, etcetera mean, who wrecked a lot of so the reporting khun b done where’s d identified which just means you’re seeing general information, but it is if you have a smaller the company, you might be able to identify who those people are. S o typically you would want tohave an internal privacy policy, which which follows the hip national privacy standards with a privacy officer and a policy in place to protect that information and only have certain people buy-in certain people given access to the information within your organization. Ok, ok, that actually dovetails with what? What mark and i talked about last week levels of compartmentalization correct categorization, i believe he called. Okay, um, who typically would be looking at this data if we’re going self-funding who looks at this on a monthly basis so typically be somebody in hr maybe. Something in finance and it’s almost it’s, almost always d identified so you know, you’re not going to know who the people are, but they’re looking at it, just seeing what claims were being paid out and budget and future years, and then also the behaviours trying toe like you said, friends instance, if we see emergency rooms being overused, correct plan design, and then we could also just have meetings about listen, people, you know, you’re hurting our you’re hurting the organization by using the as your primary care or something like that, you know, you’re hurting. We’re trying to stay self-funding for for the these reasons because we think it’s better for you then than being fully insured. But you’re making it hard for us to do so right? Get a primary care physician. Yeah, you can have meetings about the right can you talk about? You can talk about that, you can have any things. And you, khun target wellness programs like you reference if you see your population has a history of high blood pressure or a lot of smokers, you can use that information to taylor educational program. Bring people in current, bring people in to talk about hypertension. Manage? Absolutely. Okay. Diabetic diabetes management? Yes. If people are having a lot of diabetes related issues. Okay. Okay. All right. So we still have some time left. What? My voice just cracked still. What? What happened? I asked you what else? What else could we talk about? Some of the some of the negatives with self-funding. So if you’re moving to a self funded arrangement, you have the variable cash outlay potential. So one month your claims can be very favorable. The next month you can have high claims. You do have those reinsurance caps built in protection. Stoploss is you’ve already examined all the jargon. I got tongue now, stoploss but you can still have some variants and some come organisations prefer the fixed costs associated with a fully insured plan. You know what you’re paying your budget for it and that’s your costs for the year where self-funding can vary over the course of twelve months. Okay, um, how does it work? This is a very basic question. But if you if you are self-funding, how does it work in terms of a network of hospitals and doctors? Have you that’s? Good cause. You choose what providers are available to your employees. So when when you hire the third party administrator or insurance carrier to administer the plan there, providing that service for you so you can hire a big insurance company and use their network, you’re renting their network to access those discounts. That’s part of the administrative fees it gets broken out into network rental fee utilization management, he gets into a very a lot, a lot of details broken out, focus. Okay, well, because you can use somebody’s network and not be insured by the exactly you’re taking the risk, you’re just using them to administer the plan. Roger. Okay, i say interesting. Okay, um, what else? We still got a few minutes left, so that zoho your disadvantages of having any of that was that was one big one. The other one is if you ever want to get out of self-funding you have that terminal liability. So if you say i’m canceling my self-funding plan today, you’ll have a couple months of claims to pay out. Still for claims that were incurred prior to your cancellation date. And at the same time, if you’re signing up for a fully insured plan, you’re paying the fully insured rates so it’s like a double payment for a few months to get out of this self-funding plan. I got to get to cool things. I got terminal liability and stoploss yes was going around saying, you sound like a genius, alright stoploss german labbate that’s a term reliability problem on dh that i could touch on to two other quick thing before you do, though dahna the terminal liability i mean, could that could that go on for years? I mean, suppose someone made a claim while you were still self-funding and then they continue to have related issues to that claim like so i don’t know what a surgery that went bad or something, and then years later, they’re still having, like following surgeries to that infection from when you were self-funding what good question so it’s driven by the nhk earl date of the claim? So if i go to a doctor today and i’m self-funding today, it gets paid dahna self-funding plan for that same condition if i go to the doctor next month and next month i’m under a fully insured plan gets paid by the flame. Shirt plan. Oh, so the general liabilities just the run out. They call it from the from the self-funding period when people went to the doctor during that plan here. All right, so it’s not considered like a pre existing condition. Correct? Where the now insurance company, because you’re fully insured kicks is going is going to kick it back to you from what? Your self-funding days doesn’t work like that. Correct? It does not. Does not. Okay. Okay. All right. That’s, some reliability thisyou xero everywhere you’re in our daily lives. Term liability stoploss okay, what else you got? I could do real quickly to other hybrid type products between fully insured and self-funding. So you have some combination once called level funding, and this gives you the fixed costs of a fully insured plan where you paint a rate every month for employees. But at the end of the year, if your claims are favorable, there’s the potential to get a refund of a portion of the terrible claims. Oh, so you benefit if if claims air. Good. Act. Okay. And if claims are are not good. You’ve paid your rate for the year and you walk away. Okay, well, that’s, because you have what you want had some stoploss coverage it’s all built into, like, a fully insured rate. So you have that fixed rate, and then if your claims are favorable there’s something called a settlement done at the end of the year, you know, if you would get money back, but there’s no potential. The additional dellaccio more correct. Okay. And then you have you said in which another hybrid? Yeah. There’s there’s one more call the minimum premium arrangement. And this is sort of like a fully insured rate, but you’re carving out the claims part of it and your funding the claims as they actually come in. So similar to level funded. But you don’t have the wait till the end of the year to get the benefit of favorable claim get, like month the month? Correct. Exactly. Well, okay, so there’s. A lot of issues to think about, and i guess way just have, like, a minute and a half left or so, but i guess this all comes down to risk tolerance. Exactly. Do you do? Do you want to just write off the wrist completely and give it to an insurance company? Or would you like to get some of the benefits of doing it yourself and maybe even having healthier employees? But you’re taking on some of that risk. Correct your risk tolerance and your ability to handle some cash flow changes from one month the month with self-funding and it really comes down to analyzing what would my costs be under a fully sure plan. Total costs. What may cost being herself funded plan at the maximum claims that’s where the stoploss carrier says you would not pay more than that. Yes, you’re a total costs on. Then what would your cost be under the expected where they expect your claims to be? Given your employee population and looking at those numbers will give you a good feel for where he should be. Okay. All right. Crystal bat. Andi. I demoted him because he’s, a crystal bat is a regional executive vice president at marshall mclennan agency. Okay. I wanna thank you very much, chris. Thank you. Tony called my pleasure. Coming up. We have jean takagi and shared leadership options. More options for you first. Pursuant, they’ve got a new webinar. Big surprise. It’s free designing experiences. That inspired donorsearch every brand elicits a feeling, you know this like think disney, starbucks, united airlines and each of your donors has an impression of your organization based on their experience and interactions with you with your brand. On thursday, may twenty fifth, you can join lutheran, our ministries, brad never ary and pursuance senior vice president hillary noon and learn how to create immersive experiences that inspire greater engagement from your donors and potential donors. Brad is going to share how lutheran our explored the journey of a key audience identified opportunities to improve on their experience with his brand, and they put in practice places that are goingto make measurable impact trying to make change. Of course, this will be archived if you can’t make the live session, but if you can, you register at pursuant dot com quick resource is and then webinars we’ll be spelling who needs to engage millennials? Maybe you’re bored has raised that as ah as a possibility or a need. Do you feel it’s important for your sustainability? Perhaps what you waiting for? We be spelling dotcom get started for pete’s sake. Hosta fund-raising spelling bee. This is not your seventh. Grade spelling bee. You know this. Check out the video at we b e spelling dot com and then talk to the ceo alex career. Set something up or just get more information. We be e spelling dot com. Now, time for tony’s. Take two. That damn finger is wagging again. Are you properly registered in each state where you solicit donations? You need to be listen to my admonishing tone. It’s not going to stop. Where are you sending e mails? Sending direct mail hosting events, maybe buying ad space. Do you have a donate? Now button that admonishing tony’s not going away. Each of these things is a solicitation, and it triggers the registration requirements. Charity registration. You need to get it done. I can help you. You could do-it-yourself. You need to be in compliance in each state where you are soliciting donations. My video is that tony martignetti dot com that is the admonishing tony’s. Take two live lesser love. I’ve got a ton here in the united states of america and not too much abroad. Really. So let’s, uh, let’s. Start here in the us of a with tampa, florida. Very loyal, lifeless and live. Out to you special tampa. You’ve been with us for a long, long time. Woodridge in new jersey, swan’s borrow north carolina, new york, new york and brooklyn. New york really got two out of three borrows this week last week. Course we had all five. But brooklyn. I’m glad you’re with us. Manhattan. Thank you so much, but gives he with that westchester that’s. Not bad. North of the city. Poughkeepsie live. Listen, i’d love to you also, white plains neighbors in westchester live. Listen level so to newjersey caldwell, new jersey, hackensack, new jersey. Still no altum pandu jersey, where my mom and dad are sitting right now. Uh, moving ah! Moving way down south san marcos, texas live. Listen, love out to you, san marcos on then coming back to the northeast, stratford, connecticut were all over except on the west coast. I know what west coast person who’s listening but he’s on the line so it doesn’t count. Not this week. And let’s do germany got to live listeners in germany? We cannot see your they’re so concerned about privacy in europe we cannot see your cities in germany nonetheless live. Listen, love guten tag the podcast pleasantries. They got to go, you know that you’re tired of me saying it, but i’m not going to stop the podcast. Pleasantries have to go out to the over twelve thousand, listening in that method pleasantries to you. Thank you for being with us on your schedule on demand, and the affiliate affections were looking to grow that affiliate list. Our outreach director, belly, betty mcardle belly. No, she’s. Not ever. Billy. Betty mcardle is working on that. But for the effect for the affiliate stations that exist right now. Of course i am. And fm stations affections to you. So glad that you’re station includes us on your schedule. Thank you. Jean takagi is with us waiting patiently. He’s the one i was alluding to, um and he is the managing attorney of neo the non-profit and exempt organizations law group in san francisco. He edits the wildly popular non-profit low block dot com and he’s the american bar association’s twenty sixteen outstanding non-profit lawyer he’s at g tack on twitter and i believe he’s calling from an airport. Welcome back, jean takagi. Hi, tony. How are you? I’m very good. Very well, are you, in fact, in an airport? Is that what happened? I’m now at an airport hotel. A little bit better. Okay, where are you? What city you’re in? I’m in los angeles, los angeles. So that’s not far from you for san francisco. Okay. Okay. S a little background noise. I kind of like that. Mixes things up a little bit. Um, if anybody gets difficult while you’re on the phone, you know if you have to drop the phone, you know, and fight somebody off, just explain what you’re doing first before you just dropped the phone. Okay, i’ll make sure i hold them off, ok? All right, well, do what you have to do but inform me first that’s the first your safety is secondary to informing me that’s what? I’m that’s basically, what i’m saying, it makes understood, ok, thank you very much for that. So we’re talking about some shared leadership options. Um what? What brought this to your attention? You know, shared leadership has kind of been a little bit of a hot button issue recently amongst non-profits that are thinking of more equitable practices and in attracting younger people. Millennials, you might refer to the you know, to that group and say that they may not be is ingrained with the hierarchical structure that those of our generation tony, maybe comfortable within used to, and they’re really wanting tio have more of a say early on in their careers, so, you know, shared leadership issues, all sorts of forms are really starting tio to take hold in some practice on dh starting t gain in more popularity so are you seeing this? I guess mostly then in organisations where the leadership is thirtysomething or so well, you’re seeing it from from a lot of younger people, for sure. So living in the san francisco bay area in with silicon valley nearby, and this is not just a non-profit management or organizational structure, this is started in the for-profit world in this sort of spread into some non-profits but yeah, it’s a lot of younger tech companies, like suppose that that sort of kicked it, kicked it off some of experimented with it and left it like medium, but one of my organization that i’m on the board of a compass point non-profit services also experimented with holacracy and while it isn’t continuing in a whole keeping the whole model, we’re keeping aspect of it because you feel it’s really valuable. Okay, now i’m not going to put you in jargon jail because i know we are going to talk about holacracy but you just try to slide by me, and i want you to know that i’m quicker than you. So i i noted it, but you’re you’re you’re pardoned thiss time because where i know we’re going to talk about holacracy alright, so so sort of following from what you’re suggesting i can see the advantages there’s empowerment, there’s, there’s, there’s shared, there’s shared buy-in and empowerment of others. Yeah, and i think that works for leadership development with the team more people having more voices, teo impact what’s happening with the organization, what they’re doing, they become more interested in it that probably helps in recruitment and retention. It helps internal communication and collaboration, and it i think, necessitates cross training because you’re talking and trying to understand what your little part of the organization, how it may impact every other part of your if you’re one of the decision makers, are you’re making decisions as a group? You got to know the other three other parts of the the organization how your decisions are going to impact them. Yeah, i can see that this is not something you embark on overnight, right? Especially in the need for cross training and understanding. What’s going on across the crust of our organization for the thing people are going to be sharing in leadership now. Yeah, absolutely. The other, you know, benefit that has some people. Have been writing about it lately than it actually helps facilitate and succession planning. So we have more people who maybe pull, you know, in the pool of candidates to take over for for a ceo or an executive director. That maybe leaving the organization? Yes. Okay, that’s a good one, right succession plan. We’ve talked about that. Uh, ok, alright. See cem value. Um, but i see some potential downsides to this is going to be a lot more cumbersome for decision making. Yeah. I mean, you can imagine when you have too many chefs in the kitchen. I guess it is the metaphor analogy that people make on dh. So yeah, definitely neo-sage delayed decision making and that khun delay implementation of ideas. So you’re kind of the slow ship that takes forever to turn around. It can result in inefficiencies, and then you may lose opportunities, not acting’s. Quick enough cause confusion at the start. A cz you’re trying to figure out, you know, who’s accountable. How how do we, you know, make a decision? What if we’re split for? For what? If we start tio a form cliques within our organization and then we start to battle or engage in disputes with other factions of the organization. So their their potential bound falls that you have to actually really account for careful. Yeah, potential for open conflict. I mean, one of the things we’re going to talk about his co ceos and, ah, i mean, if the two people don’t agree. I don’t know. Yeah, get factions and jesus, you could start running like our white house. I don’t know. Okay, we’re gonna get to co ceos. All right, um, let’s. See? Well, we may as well go there. Um, what air you saying? Have you seen this? Have you have you seen this one in practice, where there were two ceos? Maybe any of your clients execute this? I mean, i’m just i’m just wondering if you’ve seen it firsthand co ceos, yeah, way have so definitely on. And i think this is actually becoming more of a trend, and i’ve seen it more in the nonprofit sector have limited exposure to for-profit sense since since i left that that world but i think you know, times are getting much more complicated. Management has also become much, much more complicated with, you know, technology changes non-profits are exploring earned income and advocacy and collaborations and employees laws are changing and then non-profit corporate and tax laws are ever changing, and right now there there’s some big, big changes that are planned, of course, on dh. So with all of that complexity, can one person really be the leader through the organization understand all of those those factors and be ableto lead the organization through all of it and that’s kind of why there’s been a little bit of a draw forming co ceos and succession planning is the other thing is, i think there’s supposed to be a huge turnover of executive lake leadership is the baby boomers are starting to age out of their employment, and they’re starting to retire on dh succession is, uh, is a problem if we don’t have adequately trained and experienced people in those roles, and coke co ceo platform’s can really help ease that problem. Ok, but with with all those issues that you mentioned for leaders to deal with, i’m not even sure that to people with their combined skills could manage, you know, can understand all that in the level of depth that that’s necessary. I don’t know, i’m not even sure two people could do it, so yeah, ee don’t know that i’ve ever seen three tio, no, but i’m just wondering if if i’m not sure to really adds that in my sense of it, too doesn’t really add that much more value. You could say it doubles, but i’m not even sure that’s enough, so if if i’m right, then why not just stick with one who has a strong team of people directly reporting to him or her it’s an interesting argument, tony, and indefinitely the single ceo structure is the one that were more comfortable with and probably the one that’s going to teach comin in for a long time still. But first, for some organizations, experimenting with two ceo structures can work out. And i think where we’ve seen this practically is where the two leaders share kind of a long term relationship, so they’ve already comfortable with how they work on dh, how they would make decisions together hyre the areas of responsibility, maybe divided so that one person has final decision making over these fears of the operation and the other one over other spheres, and sometimes, you know, in a very simplistic way, some people just refer to it is the internal management and the external management. Yeah, okay, some of that makes me makes me think of mika brzezinski and joe scarborough. I don’t know, okay, all right, let’s go out for a break and when we come back, jean, i’m going to keep talking about the shared leadership options. Stay with us. Like what you’re hearing a non-profit radio tony’s got more on youtube, you’ll find clips from stand up comedy tv spots and exclusive interviews catch guests like seth gordon, craig newmark, the founder of craigslist marquis of eco enterprises, charles best from donors choose dot org’s aria finger do something that worked and they only levine from new york universities heimans center on philanthropy, tony tweets to he finds the best content from the most knowledgeable, interesting people in and around non-profits to share on his stream. If you have valuable info, he wants to re tweet you during the show. You can join the conversation on twitter using hashtag non-profit radio twitter is an easy way to reach tony he’s at tony martignetti narasimhan t i g e n e t t i remember there’s a g before the end he hosts a podcast for the chronicle of philanthropy fund-raising fundamentals is a short monthly show devoted to getting over your fund-raising hartals just like non-profit radio, toni talks to leading thinkers, experts and cool people with great ideas. As one fan said, tony picks their brains and i don’t have to leave my office fund-raising fundamentals was recently dubbed the most helpful non-profit podcast you have ever heard, you can also join the conversation on facebook, where you can ask questions before or after the show. The guests were there, too. Get insider show alerts by email, tony tells you who’s on each week and always includes link so that you can contact guess directly. To sign up, visit the facebook page for tony martignetti dot com. I’m peter shankman, author of zombie loyalists, and you’re listening to tony martignetti non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Welcome back to big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent um, jean, i’m thinking this is goingto take some time to to implement and, uh, before you start to reap benefits from it, if you if you do it’s not you, you’re not going to see this immediately. The advantages? Yeah, you know, i think it’s going to take an investment on depending upon what level of shared leadership you’re talking about co ceos is probably the a fairly simple level, relatively speaking of shared leadership, but yeah, it’s going to require an investment, it may take a failure, teo, actually get it going the way you want it. So there’s definitely a lot of learning. It relies on it, you know, having a shared vision and common values amongst the shared leaders on if you don’t have that established, you really shouldn’t do this. You have to be careful of the amount of money, time and other resource is that you’re going to have to invest because that’s all got to be budgeted in if you don’t incubated and invested and nurture it, it means it’s probably not going to work. We’re also gonna need a lot. Of patients among our staff. Yeah, yeah, i think that’s absolutely, absolutely right. You run the risk of having that go to mom, go to pop kind of run things, right? Good cop, bad cop. Yes, right. Somebody’s, thie other ones said this, but i said no. So i’m coming to you, right? Right? You got to beat that stuff down. All right? Interesting let’s go to one that i want to make sure we spend enough time on this. To me, it sounds like anarchy, but you’ve said your organization you’re on the board of is doing some of this. The pro you call it program autonomy is what is that? So the general idea and they’re different forms of this, but this this is on the other end of the spectrum of complexity. So this is a complex form of shared leadership where each program or each division oven organization is fairly autonomous, so doesn’t all rely upon going to the ceo on the ceo makes the final decision. Each group within the organization which might be divided into programs, will make their own decisions now don’t know, probably be working with the budget that’s been approved by the board on then segregated out into the different programs. So they know what the operating rules are within within their group. But figuring out how to distribute the leadership and that’s the one of the buzzwords, sum, sum. Avoiding drug in jail again, it’s. Really just distributing the leadership amongst the different programs or the different groups within the organization and there’s. One particular type of model that i mentioned earlier, which i should have waited until we got to this segment. That’s called holacracy on dh. That is a particular form of distributed leadership, where the different groups that that are taking on these local decision making authority rolls are called circles. No, james, no, jane. Yeah. Can you still hear me? Yes, i hear you. Okay, last thing we heard you say was holacracy is made up of circles, but you need to explain. Yeah, so you know, generally the way holacracy works is so it’s a form of program autonomy, although again, the circles or self managed groups don’t necessarily have to be divided into a program that could be divided into function. So there might be one for fund-raising for service delivery, for grants, for events, for public communications. So however, you decide you want to divide up the circles, it’s going to be an iterative process where you’re always modifying it. So every month you’re going to consider whether you should have the same circles or different circles, and each individual is actually going to take a role with multiple circles, and in some cases they’ll be the leader of a circle that’s going to help decision making and help facilitate that circle or that group of individuals within that circle to make a decision. And in other circles they may not be see that that leader on dh, so they’ll just be part of the group that makes the decision making, and they might be on three or four, five circles depending upon what their skills are. All right, this is anarchy to me, but you’re saying it works a compass point, it weaves we’ve tried it for maybe a year and a half, and we’ve decided to modify it so we’re keeping aspects of it. But we’re not keeping the whole thing, so you’re anarchists of anarchy. You can’t even follow the anarchic model of program autonomy. Okay, well non-profits pride themselves on their ability to experiment and hopefully do yes, alright, yeah. So who is but who’s orchestrating the overall? I mean, there’s got to be, doesn’t there? Well, i’m i’m answering my question, but better ask it as a question, doesn’t there need to be one or maybe two people if the co ceos overseeing the coordination of all these pola craddick circles yeah, there, you know, so it’s it’s, largely governed by two principles, one is you’ve got the law on the latto has the board of directors on top of the organizational hierarchy and does require a ceo in most states, or or a president that that’s going to be ultimately in. Charge however, they’re going to be a set of rules and systems, and this has to be very transparent and holacracy so you’re not leaving everybody to go. I don’t know who to go, teo, you know, maybe i’ll ask this person so in holacracy there’s a large set of rules that everybody knows and everybody has to abide by, including the ceo and that’s where how the different relationships between the circles are all codified and how the decision making goes from one circle to another. But ultimately again, it would be a non non-profit corporations you have a board of directors and ceo have to oversee the whole thing and can decide how to modify accordingly. Okay, maybe something for listeners toe look at program autonomy, let’s say i wanted to jump to the most complex one because i want to make sure enough time sometimes our talk at the end, our topics at the end get cut off a little bit. I don’t want that to happen with program autonomy and the holacracy pola craddick circles still feels very crystal lee to me, i don’t know dahna all right, let’s, go to we just have about two. Minutes left explain how the ceo and the board might be the leadership share well for small organizations that particularly all volunteer organizations it’s usually all hands on deck, right? The board is completely active in running the programs of the organization as well as just doing their regular board duty. So, you know, you got the ceo because somebody has to be ceo of a corporation that might be called president or chair of the board, but somebody has got to be identified in that way, and what their decision making authority is going to be will depend upon what the board wants to give to that position, but board make decisions board takes actions on lee at meetings or by written consent, so whenever individuals are actually running programs, they’re not running them as board members. They’re running them of volunteers with certain delegated authority. And what the board has to really be careful of is that they’re making sure that they’re delegating authority for somebody to run an event or somebody to run a specific program there delegating with due care, meaning that they’re not quitting somebody who would be totally unqualified and in experience latto lead. Something of importance to the organization because if it is, gets into trouble, you know, the board could be held for violating the produce very duty’s not exercising reasonable care in making that delegation, and they can’t just say, well, that was another board members, i couldn’t tell them what to do. That’s not the case. Yeah, yeah. Ok, i see. I see i see a greater responsibility and risk for for the board under this one, but it makes sense. I mean, they’re taking a more active role in the leadership of the organization. That’s, right? So that’s, that’s very much shared leadership where all board members see themselves as equal, but when they’re exercising roles that are different from meeting at boards and taking actions like approving contracts are approving, you know, the by-laws there acting as volunteers, so they have to realize that they’re wearing a different hat and the authority has to be properly delegated. We’re gonna leave it there. Jim takagi from ah hotel in los angeles managing attorney of neo and you’ll find him at g tak neos, the non-profit and exempt organizations law group. Thanks so much, gene. Thanks. Have a great day. I pleasure. Thank you. Next week, diane lettered returns with your grants team in and out. If you missed any part of today’s show, i’d be seat. You find it on tony martignetti dot com, responsive by pursuing online tools for small and midsize non-profits data driven and technology enabled, and by we be spelling supercool spelling bee fundraisers, we b e spelling, dot com, our creative producers, claire meyerhoff. Sam liebowitz is the line producer. Betty mcardle is our am and fm outreach director. The show’s social media is by susan chavez, and this cool music is by scots. Time you with me next week for non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent go out and be great. What’s not to love about non-profit radio tony gets the best guests check this out from seth godin this’s the first revolution since tv nineteen fifty and henry ford nineteen twenty it’s the revolution of our lifetime here’s a smart, simple idea from craigslist founder craig newmark insights orn presentation or anything? People don’t really need the fancy stuff they need something which is simple and fast. When’s the best time to post on facebook facebook’s andrew noise nose at traffic is at an all time hyre on nine a, m or p m so that’s, when you should be posting your most meaningful post here’s aria finger ceo of do something dot or ge young people are not going to be involved in social change if it’s boring and they don’t see the impact of what they’re doing. So you got to make it fun and applicable to these young people look so otherwise a fifteen and sixteen year old they have better things to do if they have xbox, they have tv, they have their cell phones me dar is the founder of idealist took two or three years for foundation staff to sort of dane toe add an email address their card, it was like it was phone. This email thing is fired-up that’s, why should i give it away? Charles best founded donors choose dot or ge somehow they’ve gotten in touch kind of off line as it were and and no two exchanges of brownies and visits and physical gift mark echo is the founder and ceo of eco enterprises. You may be wearing his hoodies and shirts. Tony talked to him. Yeah, you know, i just i’m a big believer that’s, not what you make in life. It zoho, you know, tell you make people feel this is public radio host majora carter. Innovation is in the power of understanding that you don’t just put money on a situation expected to hell. You put money in a situation and invested and expected to grow and savvy advice for success from eric sabiston. What separates those who achieve from those who do not is in direct proportion to one’s ability to ask others for help. The smartest experts and leading thinkers air on tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent.

Nonprofit Radio, June 1, 2012: Insurance Is Indicated & Spinning Your Event Theme

Big Nonprofit Ideas for the Other 95%

Listen live or archive:

My Guests:

William Henry
William Henry: Insurance Is Indicated

You need insurance when you have volunteers who are out representing your charity and using your name. You also need it as protection from employee lawsuits. William Henry is executive director of Volunteers Insurance Service. He and I talk insurance, and we’ll also look into another risk management tool: disaster planning.

 

Nancy Levin
Nancy Levin: Spinning Your Event Theme

Nancy Levin is director of development and external affairs at My Sister’s Place. Her conference topic at last year’s National Philanthropy Day in Westchester county, NY encourages you to plan your events with a theme that engages and informs your audiences and leaves them with a call to action.

 
 


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Hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio your aptly named host this week is always we’re talking about big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I very much hope you were with me last week. I’d be devastated if i found that you’ve missed charity transition. We talked about making a career transition into charities, but julia bonham’s strategies will also help those who work in non-profits and they’re looking to make a change. She’s, an executive coach and principle of career change for good also go offline. Maria simple is the prospect finder, and of course, you know her as our prospect research contributor, she had tips for conducting offline research, use your board committees network in your community and host cultivation events. The best prospect research comes from face to face meetings with people you want to know better this week insurance is indicated you need insurance when you have volunteers who are out representing your charity and using your name, you also needed as protection from employees lawsuits. William henry is executive director of volunteers insurance service. He and i will talk insurance and will also look into another risk management tool disaster planning. Also spinning your event theme. Nancy levin is director of development and external affairs at my sister’s place in westchester county, new york. Her conference topic at last year’s national philanthropic day in westchester, encouraged you to plan your events with a theme that engages in, informs your audience and these them with a call to action, and i’ll have that interview for you. Between the guests, of course. Tony’s take to a second look at something that’s important to me, my block post from a couple of weeks ago. What i believe, use hashtag non-profit radio to join the conversation with us on twitter. Hope you’ll be there with us, and i hope you’ll stay with us right now. We take a break, and when we return, insurance is indicated. Stay with me. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. Schnoll are you suffering from aches and pains? Has traditional medicine let you down? Are you tired of taking toxic medications, then come to the double diamond wellness center and learn how our natural methods can help you to hell? Call us now at to one to seven to one eight, one eight three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three or find us on the web at www dot double diamond wellness dot com. We look forward to serving you. Is your marriage in trouble? Are you considering divorce? Hello, i’m lawrence bloom, a family law attorney in new york and new jersey. No one is happier than the day their divorce is final. My firm can help you. We take the nasty out of the divorce process and make people happy. Police call a set to one, two, nine six four three five zero two for a free consultation. That’s a lawrence h bloom two, one, two, nine, six, four, three, five zero two. We make people happy. Hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com welcome back to big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. My guest now is william henry he’s, the executive director of volunteers insurance service association, based in woodbridge, virginia. V s is a risk purchasing group that makes insurance programs and risk management services available to private sector non-profit organizations that engage volunteers and i’m glad that his practice brings into the show. William henry, welcome. Good morning, tony it’s a pleasure to have you. How are you? I’m very well think volunteers are essential to a well running non-profit. What? Why are there risks, though, around having volunteers working with us? Upleaf well, volunteers can be subject teo physical risks. They could be injured. Sometimes. We, uh, cia claim in our program that involves a volunteer falling that’s. Probably the most frequent calls. Sometimes there are vehicle accidents. Volunteers can be injured using tools. They can have a back injury, lifting things those kinds of claims. But then also, volunteers do represent the organization and the things that they say about the organization can effect non-profit and might represent a risk. Okay, so there’s so there’s physical problem possibilities. Like possible liabilities, i guess. Physical like car. Accidents and you’re saying people falling and things like that correct, but then there’s also, while while the volunteers they’re using your name and they’re out talking about u does, that latter part is what i think we’re going to focus mostly on does that only apply during certain times? Like when you know that they’re talking about you? Or suppose they say something unfortunate and we’ll get into what that might be, but they’re at a cocktail party and they drop your name, and then they say something that’s inappropriate could apply there, too. Certainly. And in fact, in the world of social media, there really aren’t any time boundaries anymore. Eso volunteers as well as employees could be bringing up your name when their own facebook or they’re tweeting something and it’s something that employers really need to be aware off. Okay, so yeah, on dh since the volunteers they’re using your name, they could be doing things that are inappropriate, like political advocacy. Exactly what’s the problem there well and that’s. Certainly, tommy right now, getting into the election right. These in the irs has strict rules about what tax exempt organizations can do in the area. Of political advocacy and if a volunteer makes the mistake of speaking on behalf of the organization in a way that seems to favor a particular political candidate, that could actually jeopardize the tax exempt status of the organization there volunteering for. And we have talked about that in detail with our legal contributors, jean takagi and emily chan, if you go back a few weeks, you’ll find a show second half of the show, all about political speech, political advocacy, what the boundaries are. So we’ve talked about the details of where the boundaries are, but if so, if a volunteer exceeds the boundaries you’re saying, then the charity could be just as liable as if an employer and employee did it exactly. The volunteers regarded as an agent of the nonprofit organization in a case like that. And does that apply even if there isn’t anything in writing like just the executive director? Okay, take a small charity executive director asks a volunteer to help with fund-raising or maybe the host an event, and then the person says something inappropriate. It doesn’t have to be a written relationship, or now it doesn’t have to be a written relationship. No, it could be orel. Okay, and then you’re still so the volunteers then still acting as an agent, which is ah, a legal capacity, right? It would depend on what the irs is able to prove and how aggressively they would try. Okay, so how are we going to first constrain our volunteers? How do we set the rules? Well, you know, i think that the way to address most risks that go with volunteer engagement on employee relations, for that matter is training and creating an understanding up front in your orientation time period with volunteers, for example, it’s a good time to let them know what your expectations are and what they can and cannot do or say on behalf of the organization, um, it’s a good time for that matter to go over with, um, their performance standards as a volunteer and, uh, what they’re accountable for, um, volunteers just because they’re not paid, uh, doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be accountable for their performance and a disciplined if necessary. You know, i think a lot of times charities just so grateful to have the help that they don’t want to imposed rules or are certainly even discipline, exactly. But, you know, for the best volunteers, in my view, are going to be more impressed by the fact that the non-profit has thought through its processes, to the extent that they do have procedures in place and standards that they expect, rather than just leaving the volunteer to their own devices. This is very much like conversations we’ve had with with other guests talking about board management on dh, setting expectations correctly around for board members who are also volunteers. They just happen to be senior volunteers. But obviously your suggestion is that applies toe all volunteers that’s, right? Yeah, okay, we’re going to take a break, and when we come back, we’ll talk more about social media and volunteers and some of the other areas that are potential risks, aside from just political advocacy, so stay with us. They didn’t think dick tooting getting ding, ding, ding ding. You’re listening to the talking, alternate network waiting to get in. Nothing. Cubine are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Hi, this is psychic medium. Betsy cohen, host of the show. The power of intuition. Join me at talking alternative dot com mondays at eleven a. M call in for a free psychic reading learned how to tune into your intuition to feel better and to create your optimum life. I’m here to guide you and to assist you in creating life that you deserve. Listen. Every monday at eleven a, m on talking alternative dot com. Are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics, politically expressed, i and montgomery taylor and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Lively conversation. Top trends, sound advice, that’s. Tony martignetti, yeah, that’s. Tony martignetti non-profit radio. And i’m travis frazier from united way of new york city, and i’m michelle walls from the us fund for unicef. And i’m your aptly named host. And with me is william henry. We’re talking about insurance and risk management. William. What? What are some other ways that volunteers can put your your charity at risk, by my things that they say, not again? Not so much the physical, like car accidents. But aside from political advocacy, what we mentioned, social media briefly earlier. This is an area where we’ve already seen with respect to paid employees, cem clashes between employer and employee. Many employers don’t understand that the national labor relations act protects what they call concerted activity that relates to working conditions. So employees complaining on facebook, for example, about working conditions where they are that might be protected. And if they’re terminated the ceo, he might be the next person that let’s let’s take a volunteer on so that stick of volunteers right now, right? We will get to employees and practices around that. Well, how else could a volunteer get you in trouble? Well, in that same scenario with volunteers on social media, okay, just when the volunteers brought onboard, i think they need to understand that the same as with employees. Thie organization will protect its reputation that employees or volunteers rather are not. Teo blogged about the organization without, uh, going through whatever channels you you established have a director of communications for the agency. Then everything should be coordinated through that person. If the volunteer is going to comment on ina blogged about your activities. Okay? And where do we draw the line? Between what? The volunteer. Is saying personally on his or her own blawg versus what what he’s saying about he or she is saying about the charity? I mean, is it just if the charity’s name is used, then they’re speaking as an agent of the charity? Is, is it like that simple? Well, one thing that you one way that you could look at it is that, uh, the communications that you would have that charity would have with its clients are privileged information that you would not that you would certainly want to restrict public access to so the volunteer should be that should be put on notice that anything that’s said about the relationship between the agency and its clients should be considered privileged information and not used in social media. No public comment, ok? And i know this is all very gets all very fact sensitive. Andi, i know you’re not an attorney also, so i’m not trying to put you on the spot to answer legal questions. Just, you know, to the extent you’re you’re aware, i just want i want people to be generally aware that, um, there’s there’s risk around volunteers, volunteers are outstanding, but need to be a little cautious, right? And it’s a good thing also for any organization to remind volunteers that it could be a dangerous world out there and online publishing that whether or not the organization is reflected in a bad light, there’s the danger of defamation and you just don’t want volunteers to get in trouble just you wouldn’t want employees to get in trouble, okay? And the stuff that we’re talking about there is insurance, i presume, that can protect the charity from these risks. Well, general liability insurance, yes covers personal injury, which can be defamation as well as bodily injury and property down ok, that you just don’t want it to get to that point. It all comes back to good communication helping the volunteer understand the mission of the organization it’s priorities and, uh, the areas in which they need to go through channels, right? And as you said, that might be a director of communications, but in a smaller agencies doesn’t have that, it might just be the executive director it could be, or the coordinator of volunteers and everybody’s so busy but shouldn’t ever be so busy that you can’t take time to make. Certain that volunteer understands his or her responsibilities and the channels to go through and speaking for the organisation much better to prevent a problem than let one emerge and then have to invoke your general liability insurance policy exactly because people look att things so differently that the supervisor of volunteers or the executive director might never even i suspect that a volunteer would in good faith say something they shouldn’t say. So that’s. Why, with any volunteer involvement, think through what the task is established standards for the volunteer and make sure that they’re communicated and the volunteers accountable for them. Excellent. Thank you. Let’s move to employees. What is generally what are some of the risks around employees? Will the whole area of employment practices liability just continues to expand? We mentioned the facebook postings that are protected by the national labor relations act. Retaliation is a large on growing area of concern in two thousand ten. I believe it wass it past race discrimination is the most frequent cause of charges brought by the sea. And what kind of what kind of complaints are we talking about? Their retaliation was well, the employees would say that. Uh, he or she was wrongly terminated or given on unwanted assignment, or even just moved to a different office for reasons that i are based in retaliation because they exercise their rights. Which is why, uh if if employees is performing poorly, then the record really needs to be documented down to the last detail so that retaliation can’t be used as a pretense. Um, the americans with disabilities act also continues to expand in terms of employer liability. The focus now clearly is on what the employer will do to accommodate the disability and not what the employees or the applicant does to prove that they do have a disability. Okay, so you’ve seen the shift in in claims there has been, in the most recent regulations implementing the d a that’s clear. Okay, interesting to you. You make the point that this doesn’t have to be ah, firing a termination. It could just be a sze yu said, moved to a different office or maybe not promoted an employee not promoted, right? I mean, what are other ways that charities are accused of retaliating? Or maybe, you know, in some case, they actually do retaliate that that we need to be careful about. Well, another scenario is where an employee will follow-up testify on behalf or come to the defense in some way of a fellow employee who is in trouble for something and that’s natural to do it. If you believe your your friend is in the right, you’re going to want to try to protect them. So that’s fine, but the employer that needs to be aware that this is a possible cause for a retaliation claim if there’s an adverse action against that employees later. Exactly so again, your point documentation is critical, right? And another thing is, with the workforce being so mobile, if employers have hourly employees nonexempt employees wait, hold on. I have to. I want to keep you out of jargon jail on tony martignetti non-profit video. We have jog in jail. What doesn’t? What is a nonexempt? Employees exempt from what? What does that mean? If they are paid by the hour, generally speaking rather than a salaried employees, so that their limited to forty hours per week, if, uh, or they have to be paid overtime. Okay. And the time boundaries are just going away so that if the supervisor is sending an email or a text to an hourly employees at ten o’clock at night effectively, they’ve put them back on the clock and they might be liable for paying overtime and sometimes, you know, months can go by before the employee says, hey, by the way, you owe me over time and it can really accumulate. So you want to be very careful about respecting with work hours that an hourly employees supposed to be working and i go beyond those and we’re going to talk shortly about mobile devices, we’ll get to that that that that may or may not be issued by the by the charity, but very interesting about the work hours. Okay, um, you mentioned facebook there’s something called facebook fired-up facebook firings, right? Yeah, we’ll talk about those that actually happened to ah non-profit organization. In september of two thousand eleven, it was a buffalo, new york non-profit one of the employees had posted a comment on facebook complaining about another employee and about working conditions, and then four other employees also commented on that posting. Now they it all occurred outside of working hours. The employees were using their own computers and the employer fired all five of them on the basis that their comments amounted. Teo harassment of the employee who was the target of the comments and that was in violation of the organization stated policy against harassment. But the judge in the case in l r b and national labor relations board administrative law judge rule that those comments were within the scope of a protected activity because they dealt with terms and conditions of employment. So and he ordered those employees reinstated. And there have been over one hundred cases brought before the national labor relations board in the last two years involving exactly these kinds of situations. Facebook firing i’m with william henry he’s with me and he’s, executive director of volunteers insurance service association. William what is the earl? Where can people find find you it’s? Ah, www dot seema world that see, i am a world dot com. Okay, thank you. What? What can we do? Insurance wise to protect against these employees? Retaliation claims well, the directors and officers liability insurance policy response to claims of wrongful termination or these kinds of employment practices against the organization. Ok, so that would be the officers, part of directors and officers policy correct. Is that right? Okay, is that is that? Is this very typical coverage or is this something that charity has toe specifically ask about? Well, the the broadly written directors and officers policy for nonprofit organizations would include employment practices liability, but you always want to make sure you know, that you get a standard policy that has it and not a policy that doesn’t, because under the directors and officers, liability claims, two thirds at least our employment practices related, actually, wrongful termination. Okay, okay. But as we talked about, that could be other forms of retaliation to correct. All right, let’s, talk a little about the mobile devices than others issues around a charity that issues ipads, our phones or any any, any tablet or phone what’s the what’s. The problems there, um, if if the charity issues that equipment, the employees for the volunteer, for that matter needs to know that it belongs to the organization. And therefore so do any message is sent using that equipment any messages at at any time of day, right at any. Whether that whether it’s during working hours or not, if their scent on equipment that charity owns, the charity needs to protect its right. Teo read those messages that anytime reid so if so, if i’m issued ah, phone and i text my children i don’t have children but this’s a hypothetical so let’s go crazy. So i text my daughter while i’m on vacation. The charity has a right to read those those texts that i send and the ones that i received back from her right now, i don’t want to create the impression that this is something charities should do, or this is an orwellian nightmare. All right, but if if there are messages that might be damaging to the organization in some way, the organization should protect its right, and this can be done just with the employee manual, the employees or the volunteer read those those conditions then, you know, messages can be intercepted. Khun b read it any time, and then they have to sign that they acknowledge that. Okay, you know, many, many people feel, are under the mistaken impression that they have a right to privacy just because the message was private and not work related, but that’s not true if they’re using equipment issued by the organization? Yes. That low expectation of privacy. Okay. So, so communication up front setting the expectations so that there aren’t any ugly surprises later. Okay? Seems with the volunteers. Exactly. Should the volunteers just jumping back for a second? Should they be signing the rules around around their their work for the charity to yes, i think it goes back to the performance standards for the volunteer the orientation period, letting them know what they’re responsible for, what they can and cannot do. Okay, whether it’s the use of organization equipment or working with clients or anything else involved with their work, have them signed those rules. So everybody knows that they have been read and understood. Okay, let’s, talk a little about the disaster planning. We have just about two minutes before we have to. We have to wrap up. Um, how do you how does a charity approach disaster planning? It sounds don’t very daunting. Well, it doesn’t have to be. Um, thie organization should get its best people together, and best people might include someone across town or someone in a linked in group who has been through the process before and start with the question, what could possibly go wrong and think about, uh, you know, scenarios such ranging from, uh, employer, employee or volunteer injuries too back-up volunteer injuring a client or perhaps even a client, injuring a volunteer and just through let let your imagination go, you know, uncle mentioned the second mile foundation in state college, pennsylvania, okay, and we have just about a minute before we have to go, so if they had the first exercise and years ago, they might have come across the possibility that ah, volunteer even the founder of the organization could be charged with injuring the children in their care. But to get to that point, i don’t really have to be willing to consider anything, so because if it can’t be discussed, it can’t be managed. And you mentioned using linkedin and people in your community maybe who were in other charities, but within your organization, i would think boardmember should be involved in this boardmember sze, veteran volunteers, they’re very good and that’s a good way to say to that veteran volunteer we value your experience in your knowledge, newer volunteers for that fresh perspective and your senior staff people and get together and come up with at least twenty five, because there are that many at least risk scenarios and then determine how severe would it be? If this happens, how often is this likely to happen and create a nexus there between the severity and the frequency? That’s, the approach that we suggest, william, we have to leave it there. William henry is executive director of volunteers insurance service association. You’ll find him at cma cma, world dot com william, thanks very much for being a guest. Thank you, tony it’s. Been a pleasure. Right now. We take a break, and when we return, tony’s take two. Dafs you’re listening to the talking alternative network. Geever are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics politically expressed. I am montgomery taylor, and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Dahna hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com welcome back, it’s. Time for tony’s. Take two at roughly thirty two minutes into the hour. This is important enough to me that i want to mention it again. Two weeks ago, my blogged was what i believe. I believe there are two things that are the reasons that i do this show and do all the the work and produce all the content that i do for charities. The first is that small and midsize charities need to improve. I believe they need to be better at delivering services and measuring their their outcomes from those services better at fund-raising compliance of all types could be financial, legal, exploiting technology managing donors. And, second, that small and midsize charities deserve the help that they need to improve. And i feel that they deserve it because everybody in charities is working very hard already. I know people want to be better have their organization improved, but i also know that small midsize shops can’t do it on their own. So i help these. I hope i do that’s my intention that’s. Why i produced the show. A tribe log. I have the podcast fund-raising fundamentals for the chronicle of philanthropy. I do a lot of speaking it’s all because of those those two beliefs, and those are my motivations. You’ll find that post called what i believe on my block at tony martignetti dot com, and that is tony’s take two for friday, june first twenty foot twenty twelve twenty second show of the year. Now i have a pre recorded interview with nancy levin from philanthropy day in westchester county, new york, spinning your event theme here’s that interview my guest now is nancy levin, she’s director of development and external affairs for my sister’s place, and her conference topic is when an event is not just an event before, during and after spinning your theme. Nancy eleven welcome, thank you very much and thanks for inviting me to join you today, it’s a pleasure, what are what are non-profits not doing with events that you would like them to be doing? One of the things that my sister’s place has found over the last five years is that when we’re putting together a special event, that the idea behind the event is not just to put people in a room to raise money and to get corporate tables. On dh have a silent auction obviously we’re always going to meet our financial goals, but it’s really to look at the year of programming and what issue we would like to bring to our many publix that they might not be familiar with otherwise. So, for example, in today’s workshop, what we talked about was the issue of human trafficking, human trafficking is to the community now what domestic violence was to the community forty years ago. People don’t speak about it and don’t understand it in the ways that they now understand the issues of intimate partner abuse. In two thousand seven, new york state passed a law many laws involving human trafficking, and my sister’s place was appointed to be the human trafficking service provider for the lower hudson valley region. At that point, we began in earnest to really look at how are we going to engage the issue of human trafficking, the service provision to victims of human trafficking and the resource development needed teo fund human trafficking programming into the work of our agency and toward that, and we really made our two thousand nine two thousand ten program year from a resource development. And external affairs perspective the year of human trafficking. Okay, but how does this all relate to events? You’re absolutely and we’ve run two large public events, one event in the fall, and that is a luncheon, and we run a large benefit in the spring. Between those two events we bring in about eight hundred thousand dollars, which of the total of one point, eight million dollars a year, is of significant piece of the private philanthropy of our agency. What we did was we looked at our fault luncheon and said, how is it that we would like to deliver the message message about the issue of human trafficking and educate our our attendees about it and also for them to have a call to action? We feel very strongly that people should leave an event for mice from my sister’s place, knowing and having something to do that they would not have known about or done otherwise. And so, while every non-profit organization has a very significant mission and helps to enhance the quality of life for the community, my sister’s place specifically looks at issues and says, this is not something that people necessarily know about. And we want to engage them, we want to inform them, and we want them to walk out and say that they want to be part of the solution in making permanent change in the way our society thinks about about different issues. All right, so as we’re planning our event, how do we plan to engage people so that they do become informed? Absolutely. The first component part that really is most significant in the success of any event is the leadership development, having strong co chairs and a committee as anybody that’s listening to non-profit radio nose is going to contribute immeasurably to your ability to be financially successful. A lot of people may not know that’s why you’re here toe help them explain that i don’t understand some may of surely, but a lot of people may not. They may not have done a lot of event programming when you have a special event, while you might be the best of them planner in the entire world and the most organized person and you could even be the best fundraiser around, but without having partners on your lace side, which is your volunteer side to help you. To make that event come to fruition and to bring their friends and associates not justus attendees, but as investors to the event, you might meet the financial success, but you will not meet your program goals, and you will not develop the future leadership and philanthropist to the agency. So how do we recruit the right people to be the chair and co chair, the natural first place to go to recruit your co chairs and your leadership is to your board of directors to to ask your board, can they help to identify people that will find this issue that you’re addressing compelling? Find your agency compelling people that you want to put on the committee so that they start to learn about the work so that they start to bring people in on more informal with a lower risk basis? Chairs for your events have to be able to make the commitment to significantly fund-raising and support your event. So when you’re thinking about someone they might be, you might be thinking about thie district attorney or the deputy district attorney that’s dealing with your issue. However, the reality is that that person, while they might be so knowledgeable they might not be the appropriate fund-raising vice chair or chair for your event. They probably are a very good speaker for your event. They can substantively helpyou. But in terms of leadership, what you want is somebody that wants to be knowing. But that also has capacity to bring in people from the outside and to also be personally supportive in the most meaningful way that’s appropriate for them. All right, now we’ve recruited our co chairs. Now, do you have a preference for is it better to have two people? Is co chairs or one chair is sufficient? If there is a presence that question, try todo well, we try to do is to always have somebody from our board of directors that has agreed to serve in a chair’s position. We also at my sister’s place have an honorary board of directors. So we also have a member of our honorary board to serve as a co chair. And then we have one outside set of co chairs people that are either involved corporately in the work of the agency. So, for example, we’re fortunate to have avon is a significant corporate partner and swiss re the reinsurance company is a corporate partner, so we might reach out to one of them and ask them if they would serve as a co chair. Or lexisnexis is a very significant partner of my sister’s place, and we have ah, human trafficking fellowship with lexisnexis. So we’ll ask for them to be able to be engaged. His leadership. How do we divide responsibilities across all these cochairs honorary co chairs? How did the job’s sort out? Sure. Well, we do is we hold the first meeting with all of the co chairs where we do it overviewing of the event we talk about the program, we talk about the venue, we talk about the leadership and building the committee for the event and we talk about the financial goals and in terms of the financial goals right from the very outset, we put together what we call a gift pyramid, and that is how many gifts is it going to take at each level? Two attained the financial goals that we have, and we really, really pushed the issue of the gift pyramid at the first committee meeting because committee members and leadership always air excited to get to know each other, and while we’re thrilled for people’s enthusiasm to get to know each other and and to get to know the work of the agency, we want to keep people’s eye on the ball. So it’s always a very fine balance between allowing them that opportunity to have this experience be one that’s enhancing of the totality of their life, but to be very focused and maintain our professional objectives. Should we be talking about fund-raising objectives and the and the gift pyramid at the recruitment stage, where we’re just inviting people to be the co chair so that they understand what the expectations are? Or yes, when we recruit leadership, we always give them what the expectation is of them as leadership in what the financial goals of the event, or it’s at the committee meeting that we really defined, how is it that we get there? And and what can each of us do in the many walks of life that we each walk in to help us to get to that place? Okay, now so where we’ve recruited our leadership, we’re now how how is the organization supporting them as as they are? Going out and doing their fund-raising work, my sister’s place spends a good deal of time and energy on putting together our materials for recruitment and for the implementation of the event itself. We immediately create branding and image ing for the event we work with a designer on dh. I happen to be looking at her across the room right now, because she’s here we work with the designer and we put together a zay, said the branding for it with the invitation covered and then out of the invitation cover comes to save the date and a few different a few different monograms that we can pull off of the invitation itself that will be able to use on printed materials, whether it be no cords or flyers or sponsorship forms, et cetera. We get the printed information in a form and present each committee member and each leadership member a package for them to be ableto work with both individuals, corporations and anybody else that they might be able to speak with on our behalf is my sister’s place also going out with the volunteers to help them in the fund-raising we work with volunteers in the way that they believe will be most effective for them and oftentimes a volunteer might say that they really want this support and they and they don’t even really necessarily want to be a spokesperson. They would like to just make the introduction and bring us in to do the presentation of the agency and of the event itself and of the benefits of becoming engaged in a sponsor of the event. We try to follow the lead of where people take us. We don’t ever want to presuppose a certain way to make something happen. What we want to do is have many different tools in our tool kit to be ableto effectuate them being most successful and feeling good about their experience. Nancy levin is director of development and external affairs at my sister’s place, and we’re talking about your event management and theming your events. Her conference topic is when an event is not just an event before, during and after spinning your theme. So now as you and the volunteer leadership are going out, or maybe they’re going alone but a sze yu said, however, there most comfortable information is coming in questions air coming in. From potential potential attendees, potential table purchasers. What i really want to get the details of the the support that you give to thee, the volunteers who does all this follow-up to the meetings, we work with the volunteer to provide the follow-up information that they may want to do the follow-up individually, or they may ask us to do the follow-up they might say, we’ve made the introduction that you take it from there, you run with it, we have what we have, what we call a moves management system, which is that we have a list of prospects, we have a list of people that we believe will be we’ll find this enticing, and we very strategically moved through the list and divide people up and make sure that every stone is uncovered so that we maximize our ability for resource development. What we will do is sit in a weekly development meeting, and we will. I have a small staff of people, and we will look through every name and update one another with any activity. That’s gone on. Have they called? Have they researched? Have they have they ran any names by us to make sure? That there’s no conflict. And then we will make sure that those person, those people in question, will be receiving a phone call with a request for a meeting, a package in the mail. An email with a link to our eve i tte version or ari sponsorship version. Because of all the many modes that we all work in these days, a combination of social media, website, e blast and then traditional hard materials. We have so many ways, as we all know, since we receive all these many modes from other people to be able to create a cocoon of of opportunity for people to really know that this is going to be ever present in there, you know, in their communications modes over the next couple of months. Talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Hi, this is psychic medium. Betsy cohen, host of the show. The power of intuition. Join me at talking alternative dot com mondays at eleven a. M call in for a free second reading. Learn how to tune into your intuition to feel better and to create your optimum life. I’m here to guide you and to assist you in creating life that you deserve. Listen every monday at eleven a, m on talking alternative dot com. Hi, i’m carol ward from the body mind wellness program. Listen to my show for ideas and information to help you live a healthier life in body, mind and spirit, you’ll hear from terrific guests who are experts in the areas of health, wellness and creativity. So join me every thursday at eleven a, m eastern standard time on talking alternative dot com professionals serving community. Hi, this is nancy taito from speaks. Been radio speaks. Been. Radio is an exploration of the world of communication, how it happens in how to make it better, because the quality of your communication has a direct impact on the quality of your life. Tune in monday’s at two pm on talking alternative dot com, where i’ll be interviewing experts from business, academia, the arts and new thought. Join me mondays at two p m and get all your communications questions answered on speaks been radio. This is tony martignetti, aptly named host of tony martignetti non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Technology fund-raising compliance. Social media, small and medium non-profits have needs in all these areas. My guests are expert in all these areas and mohr. Tony martignetti non-profit radio friday’s one to two eastern on talking alternative broadcasting. Talking. Um oh, yes, oh, now this is an ongoing process. Volunteers were out meeting, that is so then there soliciting and information is going out from my sister’s place to support them as questions develop what’s one more thing that we should be thinking about that you think is key before the event before the event. We really need to spend a lot of focus on program because you don’t want to just get the room filled with three hundred people, god willing, you want to be able to have three hundred people in the room that are going to be moved by the eric their experience. So in addition to all of the recruitment components, what we’re looking at is how do we create the most compelling evening? Well, you create a compelling event by looking at what’s going to bring people to the information that you want in a way that they will be able to hear it best when people sit down in a room, they’re going to have an attention span for you for about forty five minutes, forty five minutes of between getting their dinner and their their appetizer, their main course, etcetera and getting their program in so what you what we do at my sister’s place is we start off we really we to answer your first question, we try to keep speakers to a minimum. We have one person that serves as the emcee through the evening that kind of guide you because the more transitions you have, the more time it’s taking and then more people have to keep switching their focus on and off from from people speak differently. People’s inflections or different you want to keep them on the track of where they’re engaged, but not asking them to remain engaged in all different style with all different style speakers. So we try and keep this speaker number to a minimum. If we are honoring somebody, we have an honoree. We have the personages introducing an awarding the honoree and we have an m c and then we have some kind of program components are these? Are these speakers all timed, including the honoree? That was exactly how much time here because every speaker is timed and the timing is on. Ly is good as the paper. You put it on because as i experienced today when you know we did a presentation here at the conference today, and the conference was running fifteen minutes behind, so that meant that our presentation either had to be fifteen minutes shorter or it had to the conference had to keep going fifteen minutes, you know, every every speaker was going to be fifteen minutes late. So what you have to know is that when you create these timelines and what we call them is a chronology of the evening that you created in the ideal fashion and you accept or know that you’re going to have to be malleable, you’re not going to take a cane and pull your speaker off the stage because they’re not sticking with the time constraints in the chronology, but you have to have realistic expectations for what people are going to do, even given the instructions that you give them. Andi, i think, nancy, i just want to make clear to the audience that this applies in really in any kind of event, absolutely. This doesn’t have to be a gala with hundreds of people where there was a big cocktail hour in our sitting in the waldorf astoria thing, this could be just you. Know this could just be patient. This could just be twenty five or fifty people at a luncheon as well, right? Absolutely. One person throws the timing off by two to three minutes. You’ve got two to three people doing that you’re already fifteen minutes behind, so you always have to be mindful of that as the professional, but at the same time, you want to really be able to share with your people. Oftentimes i asked people to share their presentation, so i time what their presentations going to bay and if it really is so far afield and look, obviously i can’t go to senator gillibrand and say to her chief of staff, i want to read her speech, and if the speeches you knows ten minutes longer than i wanted to be, i can gently say to her chief of staff, will we really would you know, we’re really hoping to move the programme in this direction and in this timing, and we want the senator to have the opportunity to be able to and you try and make it feel like it’s, you’re doing something for the other person, not that you’re being critical of the way they’re presenting that you’re giving them an opportunity. A supposed tio you’re taking away from their presentation. So suppose we have a lot of people we want to honor. Is it a mistake to have? I guess you could have. I mean, you could have too many honorees, and then the night is going to drag beyond the forty five minutes of attention that people have. Not only is it going to drag, but it also has not might not give the due to the honorees that you want them to have what we have done when we do group different groups of honorees. So if we’re honoring community groups a junior league, um ah on employee group inc ah, nde es a church based social action committee. What we will do is from the podium we will speak about each one will put a little thirty second short about each group together thirty second short video about each group together we’ll speak about them from the podium. We’ll speak about what they’ve done on behalf of our agency and we’ll ask them to stand at their seats and we acknowledge them and we take pictures with them before. The event starts at a predetermined place that’s set up for photography and do pictures and award presentation so that we’re not moving three or four or five people up to the stage to potentially speak and tio then take up another half hour in programming and wee wee, when we first did this, we were quite concerned that the honorees would feel offended that we weren’t giving them. Ugh, this really wasn’t an honoring us really was kind of paying tribute, which essentially is true, but what was the reaction? Every honoree was perfectly fine and comfortable, and i’m talking about everybody from a ceo to a big corporation. Teo, a junior league president, we have never met resistance from it. They understand that people you know, around on tight time frames, we have to recognize the change in our world and that people have limited attention span and limited time and that while they want to be supportive, they want to be supportive in the way that they can do it. That fits in with their lifestyle that fits in with their their personal, you know, their own personal attention spans and limited abilities. So what we want to do is really keep that at the forefront when we’re figuring out how to program nancy, would you have just about two minutes left about post event? Well, what what’s your advice around extinction, that theme on din the important follow-up to the event absolutely post event again, when we think of our theme post event, what we’re looking for is what’s going to come out of this event from both the fund-raising in a programmatic perspective. So after our human trafficking programs in both the fall in the spring are human trafficking fund-raising events, we were able to do a film screening at the jacob burns film center, we were able to do a number of round tables at different peoples there’s other events weigh many events, we call the many events, and then we’re able to create other small fund-raising opportunities to do that, and then you start to also really build and have evolving leadership for your agency because they become more deeply engaged in the issue. It’s also another way of bringing people back to something closer. I’m not as large an event, but but cracked its great follow-up because now you can spend more. Time talking about the agency and its work and it’s much more compelling, interesting than an email or a letter follow-up correct, absolutely. And you’ve gotten good response to them tow those many events? Yes, absolutely are round tables have been so well attended that the notion of a round tables that you have twelve people when you have twenty two people that want to come it’s, not a round table it’s a small event. So we really have been very focused on getting captains from communities to host individual round tables. So now here you are creating leaderships from different areas for your agency so that you start to have point people in different communities that you can call upon for a variety of different things and that your board of directors does not always become the only go to place for your agency. When you’re looking for people to become ambassadors, you want your event to raise money, to build awareness of an issue and build the next group of ambassadors for your agency out there in the larger community. And i believe if you accomplish those goals, you can feel really good about spinning your theme to make a successful event and a successful fund-raising operation nance, eleven, is director of development and external affairs at my sister’s place. Her conference topic at national philanthropy day is when an event is not just an event before, during and after spending your theme. Yeah, yes, thank you very much for being here. Thank you so much, tony. I’m so appreciative of having the opportunity and please do go to our website www dot msp and why dot or third more about the agency and more about how we do our business. Have a great day, nancy and happy birthday also, thank you very much. My thanks to nancy levin and the folks at westchester county association of fund-raising professionals and also william henry for both being guests today. Next week, i’ll be at the fund-raising day conference hosted by association fund-raising professionals in new york city chapter that’s their big fund-raising day we’re a media sponsor will be on the exhibit floor, and i’ll be doing lots of interviews for the show. So next week i’m going to rebroadcast a vintage show from august got women donors. My guests were on willbe michelle walsh from the us fund. For unicef and travis fraser from united way of new york city, we talk about successful initiatives to expand your female donor base and that was recorded at last year’s fund-raising day. Also, maria simple return with loving linked in our prospect research contributor has strategies for using linked in to find people and organizations who could be your next employee board members, donors or sponsors. We’re all over the social networks. 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Avoid Planned Giving Schemes

Avoid courtesy of Thomas Hawk on Flickr.
This is related to my post two weeks ago, “It’s Planned Giving, Not Product Giving.” I said some financial product salespeople don’t have your program’s best interests at heart when they offer to “help.”

Occasionally, those offering specious help come bearing innovative, cutting-edge programs. Most of the ones I’ve seen have life insurance at their core.

Their hallmark is a paper or slide with a score of arrows connecting six or eight boxes. There’s a box for the donor and one each for your charity, the life insurance policy, the trust that owns the policy, the trustees of the trust and the AAA-rated company selling the policy. Arrows are shooting in and out of boxes and around corners.

They’re always convoluted. I ask three times how the programs work, and I can’t regurgitate the explanations 30 minutes later.

A lot of times the plans’ advocates aren’t salespeople, but well-meaning board members or committed donors.

I’ve been in Planned Giving since 1997, as a program director and consultant. I’ve never passed on one of these as something to offer donors. They might be appropriate for huge charities with highly mature programs, though I’m skeptical.

How do you protect your charity and your donors–without sounding ungracious–when offered what I’m describing? Ask two questions.

  1. What other nonprofits are executing the program?
  2. Is there a private letter ruling from the IRS?

I confidently predict the answers you’ll hear.

  1. A and B are looking at it.” – That’s meaningless. You’re looking at it too. In their next pitch meeting, you’ll be “C.”
  2. No” – Without IRS’s imprimatur, I recommend you pass on the ground-breaking innovation.

I don’t feel like a curmudgeon, though you may think I sound like one. In 15 years I’ve seen a lot of bad practices seeking refuge under the Planned Giving umbrella.

Protect your charity from dubious ideas that don’t add value for donors.