Tag Archives: nonprofit data

Nonprofit Radio for May 15, 2023: Engagement And Stewardship For Increased Giving & Data Maturity

 

Brenna Holmes & Alyssa AckermanEngagement And Stewardship For Increased Giving

As our #23NTC coverage continues, Brenna Holmes and Alyssa Ackerman deliver systems and ideas that treat your donors right. They help you understand the value of multichannel touches that move the needle on donor retention and value. They’re from Mission Wired.

 

 

 

 

Joanne JanData Maturity

Also from #23NTC, how data strategy and practices impact your ability to meet your mission. Plus a free resource to gauge your data maturity. Joanne Jan is from data.org.

 

 

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[00:01:43.26] spk_0:
And welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio. Big non profit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host of your favorite abdominal podcast. Oh, I’m glad you’re with me. I’d be forced to endure the pain of dextrose inclination if I saw that you missed this week’s show engagement and stewardship for increased giving. As our 23 NTC coverage continues, Brenna Homes and Alyssa Ackerman deliver systems and ideas that treat your donors right? They help you understand the value of multi channel touches that move the needle on donor retention and value. They’re both from mission wired and data maturity. Also from 23 NTC. How data strategy and practices impact your ability to meet your mission? Plus a free resource to gauge your data maturity. Joanne Jan is from data dot org. Antonis take to it is what it is is what I made it. No, no, we’re done with that. We’re sponsored by Donor box with intuitive fundraising software from donor box. Your donors give four times faster helping you help others. Donor box dot org. Here is engagement and stewardship for increased giving.

[00:01:49.59] spk_1:
Welcome back to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage. Of 23 N T C 2023 nonprofit technology conference

[00:01:57.42] spk_0:
where we are sponsored by Heller

[00:02:12.89] spk_1:
consulting, technology strategy and implementation for nonprofits. It’s my pleasure to welcome back Brenna Homes and to welcome Alyssa Ackerman to nonprofit radio. Brenna is principal and senior vice president of Mission Wired and Alyssa is senior account director also at Mission Wired Brenna. Welcome back.

[00:02:25.08] spk_2:
Welcome.

[00:02:48.80] spk_1:
Thank you very much. Your topic this year, engagement and stewardship tactics that drive increased giving, writing the fundraising track. I’m sure part of fundraising track. Correct, Brennan, why don’t you kick us off? Just kind of give us a 30,000 ft view of wide. You believe that we need this session 23

[00:03:21.36] spk_2:
N D C. Um I mean, fundraising is harder and harder nowadays, right? It’s a very competitive market. There’s a lot of organizations out there vying for donor dollars. Um And while new generations of donors are coming up, the way they respond and the way they give is different from previous generations and then no matter who you are, nobody wants to be treated like an A T M. So building an engagement and stewardship opportunities is we found the best way to you get a donor from a one time giver to a lifetime brand, evangelist,

[00:03:28.30] spk_1:
evangelism, the evangelist for

[00:03:34.22] spk_2:
keeping them engaged, right? All the way through

[00:03:39.95] spk_1:
time. Have you done your session

[00:03:42.88] spk_2:
yesterday

[00:03:50.55] spk_1:
about how that went and what questions arose from that? Let’s see, I mean, I have your three learning objectives that were stated in the official document for your, for your session. Where would you like to start the topic? Where, where did you begin

[00:04:16.63] spk_3:
the session? Yeah, I think that it’s important to give an overview of why engagement is important as well as how it fits into the overall fundraising strategy. So yeah, I think a lot of organizations often time struggle with the balance and for us to be able to share the value of engagement.

[00:04:27.31] spk_1:
I want you to talk about it like you

[00:04:42.72] spk_3:
talked about it. So there is a strong value behind engagement and stewardship tactics. So you’re really building that relationship with your donor and potential donor. And by doing that, you’re building a case for support and they’re able to make their own decisions to give and quicker. So when you’re asking them to make that gift after an engagement, there’s little decision to be made because you’ve already helped prime and pave that path for them to make the easy choice to give, talking

[00:04:59.68] spk_1:
about giving, not just first time but

[00:05:08.81] spk_3:
any time. And we want to always try to lessen the time between the 1st and 2nd gift, get people to be giving at different levels. Um And so it’s not just about that first time donor and moving them down the marketing funnel, but also retaining those donors and moving them in their donor journey. Okay.

[00:05:24.86] spk_1:
So why don’t we stick with you kick us off with the first, we’re going to do engagement before we’re going to get the stewardship of the first engagement strategy.

[00:06:02.78] spk_3:
Yeah. So um engagement is really important in the beginning of a donor, potential donors journey. So thinking about um different ways to welcome an onboard. So someone who might have signed up for email, let’s get them into a automated welcome series. That’s explaining what the organization does, how they can make an impact, stay connected. And then when they get out of that series, get that first Baskin. So they’ve already taken the action of becoming a subscriber, but let’s get them to take that next step quickly, but also set expectations of how we’re going to be communicating, why we’re communicating. So really that onboarding is important to set the stage for how they are going to be included in the organization.

[00:06:23.07] spk_1:
How long does this welcome series last?

[00:06:57.78] spk_3:
So typically, um welcome series last could last 10 to 3 weeks having multiple touch points. It’s important, it’s important that when they are in a welcome series though, that you’re being mindful of other communication that’s going out. And so oftentimes, my recommendation is to suppress from other correspondents going out. So it’s very clear, concise and they’re on this track, they’ve been primed, they understand the organization and the communication stream and then get them into your normal cadence of communication. Um And it’s really about your organization. So you should test there’s not one prescribed timeline for a welcome series. And so based on your content and your audience, it might be shorter or longer, but it’s really important to test that

[00:07:45.73] spk_1:
out. You suggested that a part of that is informing them how you’re going to be communicating. Is that, is that really asking how do you want to be communicated or, or saying you’ll hear from us every three days for the next three weeks? I understand it would be, I understand this is not a template that everybody applies. You’re in the next 48 hours, there will be no communications after that. So, but how do you say to what degree are you informing them? How you’ll be communicating?

[00:08:44.86] spk_3:
Yeah. Again, I think it’s dependent upon your organization. I am a big believer in, in uh asking that question of what are you interested in? How do you want to hear from us? But sometimes if your system isn’t set up to actually do that or set those um standards of if you only want a newsletter, but we don’t have our system set up to only send you a news. Let’s not ask that. But we can be general to say you’ll be hearing from us and you’ll get newsletters, important updates. If you’ve given your cell phone number, you’ll be getting SMS messages from us. So you can be vague. But the big thing is you need to follow through on that. So if you’re asking how they want to be communicated to

[00:08:51.31] spk_1:
tell you. Okay. All right. How about you? What else about engagement before we get to stewardship? Yeah,

[00:09:39.62] spk_2:
definitely. So, I mean, engagement can mean many things to many people, right? And it really is in the digital space which is a lot of what we were talking about, um getting them to engage with content. So take an action, click something that is measurable in some way. Um Alyssa talked about onboarding, but we can take that even further throughout, you know, quizzes and surveys, getting their own preferences, even, you know, obviously action alerts for advocacy organizations, getting people to take action in a, in a more impactful way um and giving them feedback on what that impact is, is really critical. So depending on the organization, it’s a beautiful consultant answer, right? It depends, um you’re asking them to volunteer, asking them that they’re interested in these other opportunities to further bond them with the organization because whether it is engagement or stewardship or, you know, thinking of them as synonyms. It is about how they engage to stay bonded to the organization or become bonded in the first place.

[00:10:06.31] spk_1:
And there’s value in all these individual steps.

[00:10:07.38] spk_2:
There is definitely and some organizations can actually put a monetary value to them, right? Like they need this number of many signatures for this petition to take this to Congress or, you know, that sort of thing and some of it is a little bit more. Just feel good to calculate how folks are responding to the brand, whether it’s recognition and sentiment kind of things,

[00:11:13.73] spk_1:
any other strategies or tactics around engagement even beyond. So we, we’ve talked about the welcome series right? So now we’ve gone beyond the welcome series. Anything more. I mean, I guess we’re leading toward Alyssa. You had suggested a first gift or maybe, maybe, maybe the welcome series came after the after the first gift. So now we’re looking for a second gift. But the welcome series just to be clear, I mean, it could have come after some other action, right? A signature on a petition. I don’t know if you’re sophisticated enough, maybe a comment on a on a comment on a social post if you’ve got that kind of connection. But okay, so it doesn’t have

[00:11:14.76] spk_3:
to be so it could be, you know, an email subscriber, a new donor

[00:11:21.20] spk_1:
list,

[00:11:34.18] spk_3:
a new sustainer perhaps. Um or if you have like mid level giving or major giving, if someone’s made a mid level gift, they should have a unique onboarding experience as well. Um But beyond welcome series, as Brennan mentioned, having surveys and petitions to really bond and then that’s really focused in digital. But there are many opportunities in direct mail that can complement these as well.

[00:12:32.45] spk_2:
Surveys and petitions are a mainstay in direct mail, right? So those engage devices again, that’s the term that’s used in direct response for eras and eras is to get people to feel their impact beyond writing the check or making the gift. Um And you should be doing that. One of the things we focused on in the session was doing that on a recurring basis. So working, having the fundraising team either build them themselves as part of a comprehensive communications calendar or work collaboratively with a marketing communications team that may be already producing this type of more educational or quote unquote programmatic content so that it’s not just month 13 fundraising appeals and nothing else, we really want to make sure that the donor or prospective donor is having the opportunity to learn and engage with the organization in various ways. Okay.

[00:12:52.84] spk_1:
Okay. So anything else on engagement before we moved to? No, don’t hold out on non profit radio. I mean, what else did you share in your session?

[00:13:09.85] spk_2:
I feel like we touched on a lot of it. I mean, Alyssa talked about tactical opportunities to with whether it’s S M S or even like auto calls, voice recordings, things like that. Um And engagement and stewardship. Can

[00:13:13.80] spk_1:
people still people still react positively to

[00:14:19.92] spk_2:
the auto call? They do. I mean, we forget that our smartphones are actually phones oftentimes, right? Not just supercomputers in our pocket and getting a recorded message that is a human, sometimes even a volunteer or another donor from an organization that is thanking somebody, for instance, for their gift or giving them an opportunity to come to an event um or just saying, go online and check out this latest case that we just wrote this expose on again, depending on the organization is a really fantastic way to break through the clutter of somebody’s inbox, somebody’s direct mail, you know, actual mailbox. Um and technology now allows us to go straight to voicemail. So you don’t even necessary. Yes, ringlets, voicemail. Um and you don’t even have to, you know, have somebody answer the phone and it makes it feels very authentic for a recipient to just see. Oh, I have a missed call. Listen to the voicemail. It’s not a robo call, write personal

[00:14:35.80] spk_3:
messages. You don’t have to listen to the voicemail. You can see it written out in your transcript. And so, you know, that even is great. I like that is, you can see it there. It’s all written out, it’s emphasized. And if I want to listen to it, I can and I hear that real voice. But if I’m on the move and I don’t want to listen, it’s all written. How

[00:14:47.87] spk_1:
do we access ringlets voicemail as you’re calling the number. How do you do it? So,

[00:15:05.07] spk_2:
yeah, there’s third party partners um that work that offer these services um much like a telemarketing firm, but instead of the live callers, you are accessing a dashboard where your staff or volunteers can log in record a voice message. Um sometimes you can even record it just right on your iphone or whatever and then email the file over to the vendor um and then upload a list of phone numbers and the auto dialer spins amount. The vendor knows

[00:15:50.25] spk_1:
how to not make the phone ring. Exactly. Damn. Alright. Ringlets, voicemail. Okay. Very interesting. Okay. But again, I like the emphasis that these are personal calls. It’s not a, it’s not a, it’s not a robocall, it’s personal, you know, Brenna Alyssa, thanks so much. You sign that last petition a couple weeks ago and maybe the person says, um, and, and, and we’re so grateful.

[00:15:54.77] spk_2:
It is if you don’t have the time to do an old fashioned. Thank a Thon, right? This is a way that you can still give that personal touch and a very cost effective way.

[00:16:09.01] spk_1:
Um Okay, engagement. Have we exhausted?

[00:16:12.28] spk_2:
I mean, I guess that’s kind of stewardship to, right? So saying thank you. So kind of going back and forth.

[00:16:30.58] spk_1:
That’s true because we did say thank you. Right. Okay. Um But yeah, we want to keep folks engaged in your point early on. We don’t want to treat them like a T M. All right. All right. Um Anything else? So let’s move more formally to stewardship. Okay. What are your recommendations so we can increase, giving anybody?

[00:16:58.90] spk_3:
Yeah, I think that, um, one you need to make sure you have an auto responder set up for any action to say thank you. It’s very simple and it goes a long way and you need to be specific about what you’re saying. Thank you for. And so is it thank you for taking action. Is it? Thank you for making a gift. These things are important to take that kind of mass communication. And again, bring it to more of a personalized level and so digitally can have those auto responders for direct mail. I don’t think the written note is dead. It still makes an impact.

[00:17:27.55] spk_1:
It’s handwritten huge. I can’t emphasize enough uh fan of handwritten notes. They’re short, it’s not an 8.5 by 11 inch page that you feel you have to full, you have to fill their and nobody does them and they’re personalized and it’s somebody’s somebody’s hand handwriting. There

[00:18:02.83] spk_2:
are few organizations doing them but they stand out that hardly anybody, literally nobody. So that’s what we want. We want folks to kind of, it feels like going back to basics, but it really is just thinking about how would you as a donor, how would you want to be treated? How would you want to be recognized by an organization? Um And then thinking about what are the little things that you can do before?

[00:18:32.17] spk_1:
I want to emphasize the handwritten note. And then if you’re writing the folks, I’d say roughly maybe 60 65 over, don’t be surprised if you get a handwritten note back. Thanking you for your hand for thanking the time I’ve gotten scores of these giving everybody. I work with all the donors pretty much 55 over thanking you for taking the time to send a handwritten note. Thanking you for that. Thanks for your thank you. And they’re doing it another handwritten note back, especially folks in their seventies and eighties and nineties. Some of the donors I work with, that’s what they grew up with handwriting and postage note. So, absolutely. I mean, and also your mail is not junk mail to the folks that are giving to you, you know, an acquisition campaign that’s different. But we’re not talking about that for your, for your donors. Your mail is not your U S mail is not junk

[00:19:38.95] spk_2:
mail. Yes, people are touched and the generational giving studies that are coming out now too is saying it’s not just our elders in the United States that are feeling that way. Millennials respond to direct mail as well. They may not have checkbooks in the house. So you have to give them other ways to respond. Um But it stands out, we don’t get a lot of mail. Um And you know, it’s so having something, we talked a lot yesterday about the having a Q R code that is now ubiquitous, right? Silver lining of the global pandemic. But everybody knows how to use them. Do you remember Q

[00:19:46.98] spk_1:
R codes? They, I don’t know, eight or 10 years ago you’d see them on like a bus. And I thought, oh, these are brilliant and they didn’t take off them. What do we know what happened? 10 years? And if my timing is off,

[00:20:05.88] spk_2:
it was even older than that, actually, I remember them coming out really? In 2003. How come they didn’t take off then? Because each phone it wasn’t native in the operating system. And so if you recall, you had to download a specific app per code. So every company that was pushing these products or trying to get you to use their QR code platform to separate proprietary app reader that then had to be downloaded. So that’s a bridge too far for most of us.

[00:20:32.98] spk_1:
So every code could be a different, a different provider. I there was competition among them

[00:20:36.95] spk_2:
so we have to have the technology catch up. And thankfully now any operating system on any phone, has it native within the camera app. So you’re not asking the user to navigate their

[00:20:51.30] spk_1:
way proprietary app for our, for the company that provided our code. Alright. Yeah, I know it’s now native but I didn’t know why I thank you for explaining why they, why they died so many years ago. I thought this is a brilliant, okay, cool. Thank you for feeling that I’ve always had. Yeah. Now they’re right now they’re ubiquitous.

[00:21:53.24] spk_0:
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[00:21:58.73] spk_1:
Okay, millennials. Gen Z, no checkbooks in the house most likely, but give him a code, the

[00:22:49.47] spk_2:
donation page and like integrating that whether it’s donation page or you know, connecting from against stewardship pieces, newsletters. Um Calendar, people still really love having excuse me, um A wall calendar with beautiful photos to hang up year round and having Q R code there with various calls to actions to learn more about the very programs. You know that Q R code can of course take you to the website and specific pages designed, but it can also take you directly to youtube where you can watch videos. It can take you to a lot of other native apps on your phone that supporters already have and use and engage with on their own that then further your impact story.

[00:22:50.45] spk_1:
People react well to calendars December calendar for the next

[00:23:00.75] spk_2:
year, 100%. I mean, sometimes they’re even more than 12 months, right? So you’re sending them out uh summertime planning for the next year. Yeah,

[00:23:06.16] spk_3:
and all sizes.

[00:23:08.25] spk_1:
So like refrigerator magnets, calendars

[00:23:14.91] spk_2:
are magnetized nowadays. So that makes it harder.

[00:23:26.07] spk_1:
Stainless steel ones. I don’t even know. I don’t have a, I have a stainless steel stove, dishwasher but, but I never had magnets anyway. So I wouldn’t because I think that looks like clutter, clutter in my kitchen. Stainless steel magnetized.

[00:23:35.14] spk_2:
Obviously, I don’t know all of them, but on mine at home it’s just the sides that are magnetized. Interesting.

[00:23:41.49] spk_1:
Alright. Alright. So maybe maybe not the refrigerator anymore but people do like like

[00:23:46.06] spk_2:
wall calendar

[00:23:51.39] spk_3:
even with people moving, working from home and not necessarily working in an office where you’re hanging it up. Still want it interesting.

[00:23:56.54] spk_1:
Okay, cool. All right. So some of the some of the old school stuff is not dead. We’re talking about male, we’re talking about phone calls, we’re talking about handwritten notes,

[00:24:05.58] spk_3:
calendars. You can’t assume you can’t assume that these things aren’t going to work. And so you really need to know what your constituents right now. We go

[00:24:16.72] spk_1:
back to testing trying try a 12 month calendar, maybe there’s a is there a code on every month or something? And then we know right. We know how many of those, which months and how often we know we send 5000 calendars and if we get 1200 hits on a cure, is that, is that

[00:24:36.63] spk_2:
good? Well,

[00:24:42.85] spk_1:
alright, 5000 calendars times 12 month, 60,000 codes, but we only get 1200 I don’t know, but it depends what they lead to. It

[00:24:54.01] spk_2:
does tell you a lot about what your supporters are interested in. Um So if September,

[00:25:00.51] spk_1:
September, what the hell did we, what did we link to in September that everybody loved to volunteer opportunity was something related to the month of September month.

[00:25:11.39] spk_2:
It’s what was happening the world. Yeah, media. Yeah. All the things. So, and I mean, that’s what we have to think about from an engagement and stewardship and lifetime retention standpoint is it’s not just necessarily the bottom line L T V per donor, but it is how these supporters are engaging with the brand, the organization more broadly so that they stay engaged for the long term. Otherwise you don’t have planned giving prospects,

[00:25:56.91] spk_1:
right? My friend is so smooth. Didn’t even, I didn’t have, I didn’t have to give, I didn’t have to have to lay that out. All right. Thank you very much. Um These are awesome uh ideas you can implement for your program. So we’ve talked about a ton of ideas. Anything else that old school, new school stewardship,

[00:26:17.55] spk_3:
I think to part of engagement and stewardship is information sharing. So if something is happening in your organization, making sure that that’s shared and that can be seen as stewardship also because they’re in the know and they feel important and connected. And so thinking about content your organization already has or is planning to disseminate in other ways package it up as stewardship or engagement. So everything doesn’t have to be brand new just for this.

[00:26:35.76] spk_1:
What makes me think of is if you have insider communications, maybe it’s from donors at a certain level. Can you expand that circle? And you’re not diluting the content? You’re not, you’re not diminishing what you’re $10,000 donors get. If you start giving it to your $2500 donors, your $10,000 donors are still getting it. It’s not like a zero sum, right? So

[00:26:58.81] spk_3:
can you

[00:27:02.04] spk_1:
expand the circle so that so that more folks are considered insiders? It doesn’t hurt, it doesn’t hurt the existing insiders to bring more folks in. Repurpose the content, expand the content. I always think about that around and giving donors insider communications or events for your major donors. Why not invite your giving

[00:27:22.90] spk_2:
folks as well? I mean, we think about that similarly with sustain Ear’s. Um can I

[00:27:28.31] spk_1:
until they drop off? Yeah,

[00:29:10.69] spk_2:
I think, I hope we’re well past the like set it and forget it, don’t wake the bear mentality and you know, some things like the proposed Microsoft regulations from last year to will kind of shocked the industry in to having to be better stewards of these really important donors. Um and on the Microsoft. Sure. So I mean, we got a little bit of a reprieve. So, but it’s basically surrounding data privacy rules and allowing the donor themselves or from Microsoft’s point of view, the consumer to, to have a right to adjust their own information, have a right to change um what they want to change without having to jump through a lot of hoops. So Microsoft was not Microsoft, I keep saying Microsoft Mastercard, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry. That’s not good. Radio, Mastercard, the credit card processing is was going is requiring for for profit e commerce, things like that, that there’s a lot more of the automation and receding that happens for subscription services, right? It’s kind of the Netflix vacation of our lives where we all have so many different monthly subscription services um that we sometimes forget which ones were actually actively subscribed to, but our cards are being charged regularly out and consumer debt is skyrocketing. Mastercard was trying to also extend that out to subscription giving for nonprofits. So sustainer programs. I did sign up for a second sustaining gift to one organization because I had forgotten which one

[00:29:33.92] spk_3:
it didn’t make organizations think about what our process is that

[00:29:39.48] spk_2:
it was a really long time getting there. But

[00:29:43.67] spk_1:
because an explanation, that’s something I never called it Microsoft in the beginning, I would have known exactly what you’re referring to. I didn’t know, I didn’t know, I didn’t know that. That’s

[00:30:18.81] spk_2:
okay. So, uh the T N P A which is a wonderful nonprofit advocacy focused organization, the nonprofit nonprofit alliance. Yes, that’s all it is. Um fought and lobbied on behalf of the industry to have nonprofits be forgiven for these rules or not, not have to be held to the same standards that commercial companies like Netflix and others are because sustained charitable giving is different. People are signing up for it like you said, for a reason and they don’t forget about it quite as often as

[00:30:37.12] spk_1:
they would.

[00:30:40.10] spk_2:
Like I said, I am, I am an example. The

[00:30:44.89] spk_3:
whole selling point is you don’t have to think about it. You’re giving to an organization you care about and don’t worry about it. We got it.

[00:33:08.53] spk_2:
There is some benefit to the efficiency, certainly, but I think we do have to move past that. Um And, and not be scared to empower our sustain ear’s um with some D I Y functionality online if they want to change the amount or the date that their gift is processed. A lot of systems nowadays are allowing for it, but the nonprofits still have to go in and activate those modules and customize that ui that user interface so that donors understand where to go, what to do and also where the humans are when they need extra help to do whatever. So we got a reprieve temporarily or potentially temporarily. But I think what hopefully what this does and how we’ve been working with our clients is a little bit of a wake up call that it shouldn’t be seen as a reprimand. It should be seen as a stewardship opportunity because you’re sustain ear’s are generally 100 plus dollar annual donors. And if they gave that gift at a one time gift level, you’d be treating them differently. They would be part of a pipeline strategy. Um And, and so we need to not only, like I said, empower them to take some ownership over their own giving, but integrate them into, you know, the rest of the communication and stewardship programs that you already have in place for donors of, of that value and higher potential value. We were just looking at an organization’s um stats just recently that a one time donor online acquired donor, which most sustainer zar is online acquired um had an average 24 month LTV of $86 which is pretty good. 24 months, 24 months, $86 sustain urz 2 87 right? So huge difference um that you theoretically don’t have to do much for, right? Um But if they’re, if they’re falling off, um and not, not being stewarded up that pipeline of giving, it’s still a drop in the bucket compared to the potential that may

[00:33:13.25] spk_1:
hold just going back to the mastercard rules. Was it just wasn’t that charities have to start informing the monthly sustain that there’s a dashboard or something that they can go to.

[00:34:09.47] spk_2:
So, not necessarily, you have to make it available. There was a few different, was a four or five different bullet lists that you had to do or bullet items to do. One was having easy accessible like links and all your emails to a place where they could cancel or change their, their gift and or be in contact with within a very short period of time, which was subjective with a human who could then help them through that. Another was uh email notification before the gift was charged on a monthly basis, which actually felt quite was probably the most arduous thing that Mastercard was asking for because most systems are set up to set the auto responder after the charge, not pre charge. So there would have to be some configuration and new content developed to have that year

[00:34:38.20] spk_1:
after one said, thank you, you will be charged in another 30 days that had to be within a certain time of the charge might have been like 24 or 48 hours. But yeah, thank you very much. And you will be charged in another 29 days, right? I

[00:34:40.37] spk_2:
like that. All

[00:34:49.99] spk_1:
right. All right. Um Okay. But yeah, I just wanted to get that little little detail about what the requirement was. Your bigger point was that there’s value in these folks see this as a stewardship opportunity, not a, not a reprimand.

[00:35:19.89] spk_2:
Exactly. And I mean, I think a lot of stuff you’re hearing at the conference to around data privacy. Um and donor choice is going to kind of follow suit here where we, we have to build systems that empower the donors to take ownership over their own giving trajectory. Um And sometimes it is our corporate partners and regulations that nudge us and sometimes we can stand up and do it ourselves

[00:35:23.81] spk_1:
and don’t be afraid to talk to your sustaining donors. Never. Don’t. Let’s not, hopefully, you know, we’re not only over the set it and forget it, but we’re also over the, if I talk to them, they might, they might change their mind,

[00:35:38.42] spk_2:
scarcity

[00:35:39.17] spk_1:
mindset, they’re gonna take that gift away if I remind them that they’re doing it every month. No, no, no. So see, there’s an opportunity

[00:35:45.54] spk_3:
afraid

[00:35:46.11] spk_1:
of, you’re afraid to talk to

[00:35:49.79] spk_3:
these folks if you’re engaging in store them, if they do make the decision that they can’t continue being a recurring donor, hopefully, they still will make that one time gift or they’ll sign up for advocacy or volunteer or planned giving is that they’re still fully engaged with your mission and organization. So you’re not losing them completely. They’re just shifting how they can support.

[00:36:35.11] spk_2:
Situational changes, certainly will affect that, right? And especially some sustainer Czar only giving three or $5 a month. Um and things like inflation and a tightening economy might affect if they can temporary, you know, if they need to temporarily pause that sustaining gift, um If the system allows them to do that themselves, amazing, if not making sure they, you know, who to contact. So that how they can do it and keeping that open line of communication so that they know they can also come back is really important to, again, building that brand affinity and bonding them to the organization so that they say good things about you out in the world.

[00:37:13.18] spk_1:
Oh, this is awesome. Um Great ideas coming, I’ll be very interested in if that Mastercard rule takes effect in the sort of the data, the outcomes, you know, do we see, do we see a lot of sustain ear’s dropping off? My optimistic self thinks that we won’t see that happen. A lot that a lot of people are going to abandon it just because their remote, that they could, but I’ll be interested in the data, but maybe the rule will never. So where does it stand now? With the Master card? It’s not, it doesn’t apply to non profits now and we don’t know if or when it will

[00:37:26.70] spk_2:
change their mind. And they

[00:37:29.09] spk_1:
didn’t say like December 31st is it

[00:37:31.21] spk_2:
is a temporary but no deadline waiver?

[00:37:36.26] spk_1:
Okay, perfect. Okay. Um I’m looking at your learning objectives that were stated in the official and 10 document for this session. Um Ideas with dozens. If you have, I think listeners, you have to go back and replay this. We play this episode to capture all the ideas we talked about. Um understand the value of multi channel touches that increase retention and value what we’ve talked about multi, we’ve talked about all kinds of channels. Uh What else can we talk about that you talked

[00:39:59.74] spk_2:
about yesterday. So we touched on it with the welcome series, right? In the automation. One of the things that I said yesterday and I firmly believe is that we should be leveraging automation more than we do in the digital space. Uh There is so much still like manual labor happening in email, launches SMS, launches advertising and things like that building audiences that is unnecessary. If we take a step back and take a little bit of time to kind of assess the lay of the land first and build out campaign goals, priorities and tactics and strategies. You can pretty much pre schedule almost everything online. Uh So you don’t need to be manually sending out three emails a week or, you know, whatever it is your systems, your technology can really do so much work for you. Um And it’s hard for some folks to put their trust in the machines. Um Yeah, to let go and not review every single audience Celtic and every single, you know, test life, want to see a live seed for every single email, you know, those kind of things. Um But there’s so much more opportunity to do that and you can build trigger based behavior based triggered actions, um emails, engagements, things like that, that keep stewarding people on their own timeline. So you don’t have to pull a list of your, you know, almost lapsing donors manually every time if it’s based on the data that lives in the CRM. Um, and you can build these chronic non responder, trigger based behavior based re engagement series. That’s all about when I last engaged. And it’s different from when Alyssa last engaged. Uh, and it is a little set it and forget it though. Of course, you want to check in periodically to make sure nothing’s gone sideways and the content is still relevant and doesn’t feel dated. Um But that would free up fundraisers, marketers, whoever at the nonprofit to think bigger, think newer, think how we can do something differently or what are the things that we wanted to do for so long. But we never feel like we had the bandwidth at the time if we truly allow ourselves to fully leverage the software that we are investing in regularly, um We’ll have so much more time.

[00:40:27.85] spk_1:
Okay. Leverage automation.

[00:41:43.14] spk_3:
Yes, I think another thing yesterday and often times this is a big question of how can I come back to my organization and have them see the value, you know, they’re looking for the up front giving and want fundraising at the forefront to ask donate now, give now. And so with engagement, you can have after actions, but that’s behind the engagement, that’s not at the forefront. So really being able to share with people, the value is important to go back to their organization and say, you know, there needs to be a balance. You need to look at your communication calendar, where is there the give and take that you can have and sharing that while you might not get the gift today. When you make to ask, there’s a stronger case to give their. And so really looking at your unique file and what they actually respond to because there’s some organizations where you can send a fundraising appeal and you get tons of gifts right off the bat and then there’s somewhere you need to sell it a little more and have those touch points before you can make the ask. And so it’s def for everyone, but it’s important to evaluate that before just saying no, we can only give fundraising emails and direct mail appeals.

[00:41:54.24] spk_1:
All right, I’m gonna let you, that was semi inspirational, but it was very tactical too. So I’m gonna let you leave us with an inspirational message about engagement and stewardship and how that leads to increased giving.

[00:42:08.48] spk_3:
Oh, that wasn’t inspirational enough. Okay. Um

[00:42:15.35] spk_1:
Okay,

[00:42:35.52] spk_3:
this is pressure. I think that you, you just have to take that leap of faith with engagement and stewardship and no one is going to say you thanked me too many times. You sent me too much information. Um You shouldn’t be afraid to provide what your organization does and share your mission. That’s what we’re here to do. And so, um, yeah, engage steward and you’ll see, you’ll see the value come back

[00:42:50.32] spk_2:
around, convey that impact and they’ll, they’ll keep giving. Thank you very

[00:42:59.93] spk_1:
much, Brent Holmes, principal and senior Vice President at Mission Wired and Alissa Ackerman, senior account director at Mission Wired. Thanks very much for sharing, energetic and brilliant. Thank you. Thank you very much and thank you for being with tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 23 N T. See where we are sponsored by Heller consulting, technology strategy and implementation for nonprofits. Thanks so much for being with us.

[00:44:38.14] spk_0:
It’s time for tony steak too. Hi there. Who can you share non profit radio with? I would be grateful if you could identify one or two folks that would benefit from the smart guests that I’m picking the brains of each week for all our listeners in small and midsize nonprofits. Maybe it’s someone you work with, someone you used to work with. Maybe it’s a board member. Who do you know that you could share non profit radio with? Let them know it’s your favorite abdominal podcast. So I would be grateful if you could share non profit radio. Love to have more folks learning from all our smart savvy guests. That’s what the show is all about. Passing on expertise and wisdom. Thanks very much. Thanks for thinking about that. That is Tony’s take two. We’ve got Boo Koo, but loads more time here is data maturity.

[00:44:47.31] spk_1:
Welcome back to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 23 N T C. It’s day two at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver

[00:44:57.48] spk_0:
where we are sponsored

[00:44:59.15] spk_1:
by Heller consulting technology strategy and implementation for nonprofits. With me now is Joanne Jan. She is project manager of strategic

[00:45:11.35] spk_0:
partnerships at data dot org.

[00:45:14.61] spk_1:
Welcome to nonprofit radio, Joanne. Thank you,

[00:45:16.56] spk_4:
tony. Happy to be here.

[00:45:17.58] spk_1:
It’s a pleasure to have you.

[00:45:18.51] spk_0:
Thank you. And your

[00:45:28.69] spk_1:
session topic is, is data maturity, the key to meeting your mission. It’s question mark. All right, give us the 30,000 ft view of why this is important.

[00:47:14.45] spk_4:
Absolutely. So when data dot org is thinking about data maturity, we think about it in um three different ways, a specific framework we call the three PS purpose practice in people. And what we have designed based on this framework is a data maturity assessment, which is a way to understand where you think your organization is in terms of its data maturity. And we hope that you use the assessment as a communication tool to understand with other colleagues, perhaps your leadership, perhaps born members to think about what do you want to do next in terms of improving the way you use data more effectively? And um how do you use it better to meet your mission? What is data maturity? Yeah. And so there are a lot of different terms out there that um can encompass data maturity. But the way we think about it is again, in the three piece So when we think about purpose, we think about why are you collecting data? What are you intending it to do? Are you intending it to help you inform future decisions? Are you helping it? Are you intending to collect it to help you inform past um past programming or are you informing it or collecting it to inform um uh what you think could be right now, informing decision making right now in terms of the second P which is practice, this is what, how are you going to actually use the data? How are you gonna use it to achieve what you’re looking for? Um So this is thinking about data analysis, data visualization, um the way you’re using and working with that data. And then the third piece we think is probably one of the most important ones is the people. So thinking about who is actually doing this data collection, the analysis, the visualization, who at the leadership level is promoting and prioritizing data. And then there are the culture. So what is your culture around data as a team? Are you constantly collecting and analyzing data together using it to inform decisions um that type of uh culture?

[00:47:38.72] spk_1:
Okay. And the question is, is this the key to meeting, meeting your mission? So ah how does how does data maturity contribute to mission accomplishment?

[00:48:24.27] spk_4:
Yeah. So I think the way we think about it is it’s a way to be more effective, be more efficient and be more impactful in the way that you are carrying out your programmatic objectives. So um when we think about our data maturity journey, you can be at a different part of the journey depending on where your organization is. And perhaps if you’re earlier on in the journey, data collection might not be of primary focus. But as you’re moving along, as you’re developing more um understanding and knowledge and that talent and data, you might want to use it a little more and drive your specific decision making or practices in that way. Um And so the reason it’s a question that said students really thinking about where your organization is and thinking about what can I do now to um maximize the use of data that I as an organization and probably already collecting. So what am I doing now with the, with the data that I have on hand and thinking about in the future? Do I want to shift my practice is in any way, shift my people in any way or my purpose to make it a little more efficient, a little more effective? Um a little more impactful.

[00:48:53.98] spk_1:
Um You have some tools and resources. You mentioned the data, you mentioned data assessment. Yes. Is that, is that at data

[00:49:17.04] spk_4:
dot org? It is um data dot org is an organization that is a platform for partnerships to build the field of data, for social impact and we do it in the three CS. So the first one is the three CS, easy to remember.

[00:49:18.65] spk_1:
Three.

[00:49:40.85] spk_4:
No, I think that’s it. So the three C’s Cases Capacities, comments Cases, you’re really thinking about lifting up practitioners, nonprofits, social impact organizations that are already doing great work with data or data science. And we post those stories, we share their stories on our digital platform. The second one is Cases Capacity. So thinking about how do

[00:49:47.52] spk_1:
you do,

[00:50:44.61] spk_4:
you can only go from the capacity. So thinking about um how do you increase the capacities of individual practitioners and also organizations? And we do this in a few different ways. One of them being perhaps if an organization needs some technical assistance, we can match, make them with um different consultants or other organizations that do this type of work. Uh Thinking about upscaling organizations. So helping them become more um literate in data or developing a new skill. Um And then our third seat is commons, which is where the data maturity assessment falls in and comments is thinking about different digital public goods that you can offer for free for anyone to access. Um that is open source. Uh And that it um can help you improve your practice in some way. So we have an initiative called reverse at data dot org, which is what’s the name of

[00:50:45.62] spk_1:
the initiative divers?

[00:51:24.29] spk_4:
Okay. So that initiative was thinking about creating open source tools for epidemiology. And so if you have coders if you have public health professionals, everyone’s coming together from different roles and aspects and creating tools that would be helpful for um other people. So maybe a local government in a different country might want to look at these open source tools and helps them predict uh the way a pandemic might spread, predict a number of hospital beds you might need based on um different elements of their, of what has already happened. So putting things together and creating those tools and different packages that you can take and apply to different scenarios and context. So there is just one

[00:51:33.22] spk_1:
example of,

[00:51:34.32] spk_4:
of a comment of

[00:51:35.31] spk_1:
a of a commons,

[00:51:47.41] spk_4:
but the one I focus on is the data maturity assessment. And in addition to that, it’s connected to what we call the resource library. So there are a lot of different resources on our library that can help you figure out what you want to do next. So the way our assessment works is it gives you an overall score and a score for the three PS as well as subcategories. And with that, you get resources matched up to how you’re responding. And so say you’re scoring really high

[00:52:10.29] spk_1:
before we go to that, before we go to the outcome of the assessment, where where do folks find the assessment at data dot org?

[00:52:11.38] spk_4:
So data dot org slash DM A

[00:52:28.08] spk_1:
data management assessment assessment, maturity assessment, data dot org slash D M A. OK. Very well named, easily named. So then the outcome is we get, we get resources allied with our outcomes around the three PS.

[00:52:55.04] spk_4:
Yeah. So if you’re scoring a little lower and strategy, which is subcategory in purpose, you might want to check out our, our strategy guide, which is a step by step process that you, you might want to take your team through and think about okay, what is the data were already collecting? What do we want the data to help us inform in terms of decisions or in terms of team makeup or whatever? And then thinking about okay, what’s our over arching strategy and how do we communicate that with our team? So we’re all moving in the same direction. What do we need

[00:53:03.40] spk_1:
to know entering the assessment? Like is this something I can do in 15 minutes? Yes. So do I can I ceo do it or do I need my I T vendor with me or what?

[00:53:57.65] spk_4:
That’s a great question. And so the assessment you can do in about 10 to 12 minutes, it does not matter what role you’re in. Anyone in your organization can take it an important caveat. Is this is your perspective on your organization’s use of data. So this is not gonna be the objective assessment of how your organization is using data. It’s your perspective on it. And the way we encourage users to use the tool is to use it as a communication tool. So say I take it and then tony, you take it, but our scores are different. That’s okay. The whole point of it is to help you understand and have a conversation about why did you score maybe five in this category? But I scored eight, is it because of the role I’m in? Is it because we interpreted the question perhaps a little differently? And then once we’re aligned, then we can think about okay, we’re aligned on where each subcategory falls. And it seems like we both understand that maybe security is something we want to work more closely on because we agree that that is something that we don’t have the proper protocols and practices in place or that’s something we want to improve. So let’s work together on that and think about how do we improve that a little more?

[00:54:31.10] spk_1:
Um without our listeners having the advantage of having taken their uh data maturity assessment, how can we help folks? I mean, are there maybe there are some of the resources or tools that are commonly needed and helpful? How can how can we help listeners with their data maturity before they take their assessment because they’re just listening

[00:55:20.56] spk_4:
now? Yes. Well, so if you’re interested in exploring the resource library, we have a lot of different tools on it. But what I would recommend and what we recommend for those who are just starting their day to maturity journey is to think about strategy. So, data dot org has a specific guide for strategy in the resource library and you can think about, okay, where is my organization now? And how do I enact and write up a strategy with my team in order to use data more effectively, to better understand how data is coming in and what you could uh think about in the long term and future, what you want to do with the data.

[00:55:23.52] spk_1:
Okay. Okay. What else was in your session that we haven’t talked about

[00:55:36.09] spk_4:
yet? So unfortunately, my co presenter couldn’t be here. But another part of our session was thinking about um you’re using data but how you’re using it in equitable ways. So equitable, cultivating Ecuador practices for data for social impact. Um and the organization that was part of this presentation was the Data for Social Impact Initiative at the Social Policy Institute at Washington University in ST Louis,

[00:55:58.24] spk_1:
took four layers to get there.

[00:56:26.87] spk_4:
All right, I have to make sure I take a lot of pauses during that. And so what they’ve done is they created a course module. So it’s free and open to anyone to use and it’s thinking about data for social impact. So if you as an individual or thinking, you know, I want to learn a little bit more about data, I want to learn, you know, perhaps in my role, how you can use it better, just some foundational knowledge, this free and open courses, something you can access um at the Data for Social Impact Initiative at the Social Policy Institute website.

[00:56:44.36] spk_1:
Okay. Okay. Um How about questions that came from your, from your session? Uh What kind of questions did you get or anything that’s stuck with you? Maybe a provocative question around

[00:58:42.39] spk_4:
data. Yeah, I think um a question, one of the first questions we got was thinking about the word assessment and how that lands with people. So R D M A is called the data maturity assessment. And thinking about maybe assessment is not the right um word because it does have a certain connotation that you’re being evaluated. And the real purpose of the D M A is to help you set a um an understanding of what you think your organization is. So it’s not necessarily a value to it evaluative, it’s more of a um a snapshot of where you are. And so a suggestion was perhaps benchmarking is a little more um is a little more friendly or a little more descriptive of what it actually is. Um So that was really interesting question and useful feedback. Um I’m trying to think of others. I think an interesting piece about the data maturity assessment is that we um are global organizations. So we encourage wherever you are in the in the world to take it. And we’ve had um a lot of different countries represented in our dataset, which is over 1000 submissions at this point. So it helps us understand the field of data for social impact a little better. Um It’s a relatively emerging field. We’re still learning about it and the fact that we can have a larger pool data sets, we can better understand perhaps where there needs to be more support in the fields, um where there needs to be more funding in the field. Um Something that data dot org releases every year is, is a report on thought leadership. And our first report was work first wanted and thinking about what is the current talent landscape of this sector right now? And how do we train more purpose driven data professionals uh and bring some people over from the private sector, encourage new talent to get into data for social impact because we believe that data is going to be a huge um indicator whether or not your organization is going to be successful. What’s,

[00:58:47.62] spk_1:
what’s I guess I I really have kind of a neophyte question. So, but you’ve been your your data professional scientist and I’ve been studying this for about 16 minutes. So,

[00:58:58.10] spk_4:
well, I’m not a data scientist. I am. Yeah. Well,

[00:59:16.15] spk_1:
your title, your title is Project Manager, Strategic Partnerships. I’m sorry, you sound like a data scientist but you’re not. No, I’m not. Okay. Um Well, you have been working with this for a long time. Um What’s the value of knowing where we are in our data journey as an organization? Why, why, why is this important?

[01:00:54.28] spk_4:
Yeah. So I think, well, we hear a lot from organizations is everyone is collecting and consuming data regardless of whether or not you have a strategy in place. And so when you want to make a decision, perhaps you’re having a challenge at your organization and you think maybe buying software technology is going to solve everything. Um What we often hear is that making that big financial investment didn’t actually solve everything. It created more problems. And our hypothesis is that because there was no strategy in the first place, there was no overarching reason why um the decision to make an investment in some technology or software would help you achieve your overarching goals, which was, which is usually in some sort of programmatic objectives, your outcomes that you want your organization to achieve. And so it’s understanding what data are we collecting, what is our infrastructure, what tools do we already used and how do we make them all work in the same direction? How do we make it all work? So we’re going towards and working towards our programmatic objectives and something that we’re learning more and more is that data can help you be more efficient. It can help you understand the different trends in perhaps the different constituents you’re serving or the trends in um whatever your mission, maybe it can help you get more information and oftentimes you have this information, but it’s thinking about how do you um look at it. How do you analyze it in a way that can drive maybe financial decisions you’re making, maybe cultural decisions, you’re making leadership decisions. Um and this is just one data point. So thinking about the different types of data you’re collecting uh and helping you make as informed a decision as possible.

[01:01:21.88] spk_1:
Okay. Alright. So helping with strategic direction, obviously meeting mission um strategic

[01:01:24.96] spk_4:
planning. Yeah, talent decisions. If you want to hire who you want to hire, what skill sets you need, etcetera. Okay.

[01:01:32.28] spk_1:
How do we leave it there? All right. All right. So a big part of this is encouraging folks to do the data management assessment.

[01:01:41.57] spk_4:
Majority, maturity,

[01:02:01.46] spk_1:
maturity, dammit, I’m sorry, data maturity assessment, which you will find at data dot org slash D M A. She is Joanne Jan project manager of strategic partnerships at data dot org. Joanne, thank you very much and thanks for carrying the, the uh the other part of the other part of your session to for your co presenter who couldn’t be here. Thank you for representing that as well. And thank you for being with non profit radio coverage of 23 N T C 2023 nonprofit technology conference where we are sponsored by Heller Consulting, technology strategy and implementation for nonprofits

[01:03:07.70] spk_0:
next week, multigenerational technology teaching and goals aligned with technology. If you missed any part of this week’s show, I beseech you find it at tony-martignetti dot com. We’re sponsored by donor box with intuitive fundraising software from donor box. Your donors give four times faster helping you help others. Donor box dot org. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff shows. Social media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our web guide and this music is by Scott Stein. Thank you for that affirmation. Scotty B with me next week for nonprofit radio. Big nonprofit ideas for the other 95% go out and be great.

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[00:01:50.98] spk_0:
And welcome to Tony-Martignetti non profit radio big non profit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host of your favorite abdominal podcast. Oh I’m glad you’re with me, I’d be hit with mega low kyra if you handed me the idea that you missed this week’s show increased data literacy across your non profit widespread data literacy helps your teams build a shared language of data, communication, recognize good and bad data and appropriately apply analytics to improve decision making. Alexandra manna Rings makes the case she’s from Morocco knows This is part of our continuing 22 and T. c. coverage on Tony’s Take to Tiktok we’re sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot C. O. And by fourth dimension technologies I. T. Infra in a box. The affordable tech solution for nonprofits tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant D just like three D but they go one dimension deeper here is increased data literacy across your non profit Welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 22 N. T. C. You know what it is? It’s the 2022 nonprofit technology conference, you know that it’s hosted by N 10. My guest now in our coverage is Alexandra Mana Rings, founder of Morocco knows Alexandra Welcome to non profit radio

[00:02:01.04] spk_1:
thank you so much for, having me here today tony quite

[00:02:04.37] spk_0:
a pleasure Absolutely welcome for your first your first time maybe first time lets see

[00:02:10.11] spk_1:
Yeah it’s my first time with NtC. So

[00:02:12.68] spk_0:
oh, is it okay? I go back to 2015 or something. I’ve been doing interviews from NtC used to do them when, when it was an in person conference, I did them live on the uh on the exhibit floor. Oh,

[00:02:25.70] spk_1:
that’s fun. Maybe someday we’ll get back to their

[00:02:27.60] spk_0:
next year is supposed to be next year in Denver, it’s supposed to be

[00:02:31.09] spk_1:
well, perfect. Because I’m already in Denver,

[00:02:34.26] spk_0:
fingers crossed. Is that where you are? Oh

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well

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NtC is gonna be local to you. There you go. Save your savior, save the cost of a hotel

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room stay.

[00:02:44.65] spk_0:
Actually, people people, people who are local state because it’s so much fun up till like 9 30 10 o’clock at night, they don’t really want to be like driving home, rather just take an elevator home, you know, to their room. So consider that possibility too. All right,

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your

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session is the imperative to increase data literacy across your organization. Why is this important? Help us understand overview

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Why

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does this matter for everybody in the organization.

[00:05:36.37] spk_1:
I feel that data literacy matters for two critical reasons. The first is because it is very difficult to get through your professional life efficiently and effectively, if you are not data literate. And the second reason is it’s very difficult to get through your personal life if you are not data literate. And the reason that I believe this is because data literacy is a subset of literacy, we wouldn’t, we would imagine that getting through life if you weren’t literate. If you couldn’t read or write to be nearly impossible. And data literacy is the same thing. I think we get confused with data literacy because we think it means only the production of data products, right? We think that this means I have to be someone who can create those fancy graphs, build data models, be a data engineer, create data warehouses and that’s just a tiny component of data literacy. I joke that you wouldn’t say you weren’t literate if you couldn’t read Hebrew or you weren’t reading, you know dostoyevsky, that’s a very subset of literacy that is reserved for specialists. Same with reading a medical textbook. Sure there is technical literacy that’s needed if you work in very specific technical rules. But we expect the rest of us to be able to read at a certain functional level and we should expect that we can use data at a certain functional level. And the reason for this is that so many things use data literacy that I don’t think we ran recognize are actually data literacy tasks. For example, you go to the grocery store and you see two different items that are different sizes and you need to decide which one do I buy and one is priced at 2 49 1 is priced at 3 15. You’ve got to compare across different situations, different context of those numbers and decide what’s the right one using the values of what you need to actually get done. That’s literacy. Exactly. That’s arithmetic. Or write another example with data literacy um is also understanding how our brains function with numbers. So you go to buy an item, right? And you see the little strike strikeout number was like used to be 9 99 and now it’s 3 49 or whatever. And that leverages a technique called anchoring by exposing us to a higher value number were more inclined to think that the lower value number is a better deal than we would have had. We just seen the original that that actual price,

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we’ve just

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seen 3 49 right? We would respond differently to that foreseen 3 49 against a previous 9 99 price. And so part of data literacy is also being aware of how we as humans ingest and interact with numbers and we have to deal with those kinds of things all the time. And then I

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have an example. I share an example with

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you. I

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remember I thought so fascinating menus in restaurants, people will perceive a number with a dollar sign in front of it to cost more than if the price in the menu is written out. No, no, there’s no Arabic numbers, it’s written out 12 $12.12 dollars 50 cents. That’s written versus dollar sign 12.50. Because you don’t think of, you don’t think of the written out as money. It’s not something out of your pockets, not something you have to spend. It’s just, it’s just an abstract word, $12.50 or abstract words. I thought that was fascinating.

[00:07:24.83] spk_1:
And there’s so many things like that where because we’re humans and the way that our brains work, we have all these shortcuts that allow us to do these extraordinary things that computers are still trying to catch up to. But it also means that occasionally those shortcuts have these odd side effects and these sorts of things like anchoring are some of those odd side effects and being aware of them can help you not be misled by people who might try to to use that against you. And then sorry, go ahead.

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Remember my question. I

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was gonna say as well that another part of data literacy is being able to be appropriately skeptical of the numbers that you see around you, right. You don’t necessarily have to know how to produce those numbers. You don’t have to know how to calculate those sorts of things, but you do need to you know when you should trust numbers and when you should maybe ask a few more questions about where those numbers came from. And in order to be able to be effectively skeptical rather than just either say I won’t trust numbers because you can’t trust numbers, blanket statement or being other. Your other option is that you just have to go entirely based on who’s giving it to you and that can, can be helpful. It can be a decent shortcut. But you want to be able to actually look at each number in each case and say, you know what might be some shortcomings of this number or what else might I need to do to really understand how I could apply this number. Understanding the limitations of the data that it came from.

[00:08:22.98] spk_0:
All right. You need to be able to react in individual cases.

[00:08:26.77] spk_1:
Yeah. When

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when you’re seeing numbers right. All right. You need to give your cat some love the second time up on your lap. I saw she was very you couldn’t even to listeners. You couldn’t even tell. But she gave the cat a couple of strokes. Put it down and came right back. That wasn’t enough. Not not even close. All right. Um Do you have a background in in data science or in any something quantitative?

[00:09:15.49] spk_1:
I joke that I’m a scientist who works with data rather than a data scientist. Data scientist is a a fuzzy term. Um But for the most part, a lot of people interpret it to mean having a lot of technical skills coding, data engineering. But my background is actually in life science. I have a PhD in epidemiology. I studied spillover of pathogens from fruit bats into people in West africa for my PhD. So I say that that gives me a really good way of asking questions of numbers and all of my quantitative skills have come out of. How do I actually process information to get me the scientific answers that I was looking for?

[00:09:29.69] spk_0:
How did you get from spillover fruit bats in western Western africa? Yeah,

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I wasn’t gonna

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non profit to the nonprofit technology conference,

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God blessed the broken road rascal flatts.

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So

[00:09:51.56] spk_1:
life, life has funny things. Um, I guess the shorthand of it is I was intending to go into global public health. It was where my passion was very, very interested in, especially in the space of zoonotic disease. So things that go from animals into people which now we’re all very aware

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of coronavirus is

[00:10:01.02] spk_1:
right. Exactly.

[00:10:02.84] spk_0:
We, aside from conspiracy theories is very reputable. E deemed to have emerged from

[00:10:13.43] spk_1:
Yes, yes, no, coronavirus as we know are have, uh, they’re the reservoir for most coronavirus is, But yeah. And so that didn’t end up working out quite the way that I wanted. And so I found myself through a number of different things here. And I am very glad I did. I enjoy it. Very, very much good.

[00:11:02.27] spk_0:
We’re glad to have you. My law career didn’t work out very well and here I am nonprofits, fundraising and podcasting. So all right. So that seems like enough motivation hopefully for folks. How do we start to get um, everybody in the organization, I mean, you said everybody can do better with data literacy in their jobs than without. So how do we get this to trickle down to folks that may believe that their work, it’s very, maybe manual or just doesn’t involve data. Let’s let’s start with those folks that that would believe that they’re they believe that their job just doesn’t require data literacy. How are we going to get them on board?

[00:11:58.08] spk_1:
I mean, I think the first is to make sure that we all understand what we mean by data. I think it’s easy. I I run into a lot that people think that data means finance. Right? And I again, like data means numbers and numbers or money and therefore they’re the same thing. And if I don’t deal with money, I don’t have to deal with data. But really all data are data are bits of information that we can store and repeatedly collect and come back to again. And when you think of data, that way you’ll start to realize that a lot of what we interact with our data. Images, our data, your emails are data. Your timestamps are data right? Every click that someone made on your website is data. And so there are very few jobs that don’t in some way involve some element of data.

[00:13:30.10] spk_0:
It’s time for a break. Turn to communications media relationships, you know how important relationships are in fundraising essential. They’re just as essential in media exposure. Both of the turn to partners are former journalists. One of them is Peter Pan a pinto who was an editor at the chronicle of philanthropy. So they know what to do and what to stay away from, to build relationships with journalists. Those media relationships are going to get you heard when you need to be heard, make you the thought leader you want to be. It’s all about relationships. Turn to communications. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o. Now back to increase data literacy across your non profit you say something repeatable and collectible. I mean we’re all doing repeat tasks. Even even those of us who do manual work, there’s a way to do it better if you’re I guess intentional about collecting some simple data.

[00:13:47.09] spk_1:
Exactly. I mean, you can think about farming, which is probably one of the most manual labors out there and there’s an incredible wealth of data available that many farmers, especially small scale farmers are putting to use to really help them whether it’s tracking rainfall, soil moisture, ph of the soil germination rates. I mean changing weather patterns are critical for farmers. So understanding new flowering times, um, and last frost dates. All of that is data. And if you can understand it and interact with it appropriately, you’re going to be better at your job.

[00:14:06.43] spk_0:
Okay, so

[00:14:25.43] spk_1:
that would be the first thing is, is how people realize that there are very few jobs out there that don’t involve data and if you can get them there, then I think the next step is socializing it. Let’s discuss it. Let’s have donuts and coffee and chat about our data and make it comfortable and easy space to be in where we can ask questions where we can explore where we can feel uncertain and like when we started discover terms that we don’t actually know what they mean and and asked, hey, does anyone know what variants actually means or or what do we mean when we talk about a standard deviation? Can someone help me know how to interpret a standard deviation and just discuss that chat about it, make it accessible.

[00:16:05.56] spk_0:
And now it’s getting a little now it’s getting uh more well now it’s getting more technical, but but you start to bring people along by having a broader definition of data. Data is not necessarily numerical, as, as you said, anything repeatable, collectible that you’re doing in your job. All right. Um then you start to use start to weave in your standard deviation and variance. Um Now I’m calling on my high school, I mean my college, my college statistics, I took I probably took statistics for poets or something. So I’ve heard the phrase standard deviation. No, I know I know that between an average and immediate. I’m trainable. Trainable. Um, Alright, so, alright, so we’re talking about, so we get everybody together, we’re talking about, you know, data in our, in our day to day work. And I remember to you said in your personal lives as well. But you know, we’re going to focus here on the organizational level. That’s all our listeners are in small and midsize nonprofits most mostly shout out to our board members and to those who are vendors to nonprofits as well. I know you’re out there, I know you’re there, but you’re supporting small and midsize nonprofits. Um, alright, so where do we go? I mean, all right. So we get to start and realize, help people recognize that data is a part of their work life every day.

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What

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are we gonna do with that information with that fact?

[00:17:53.46] spk_1:
So I like to sit down and say, what are the most critical questions that if you got answered, you would feel more comfortable with the decisions that you’re making or you would be able to make more effective, efficient decision. And the thing is, is even people who may or may not recognize the elements of data in their work. They usually know these questions. So if you are a development officer, the first thing you’re gonna say is man, if I knew which of my donors were more likely to give bigger gifts, I would know who to spend more time on or if I knew, you know, as a volunteer coordinator, the most effective way to reach out to my volunteers to make sure they respond. That would make it so much easier for me to figure out what modality, what method to reach out to them to. Well, both of those questions are questions we can ask of the right data sets. And so without making anyone be a super technical data person, we can find out what those questions are and then start to say how do we get the data to answer them? And and there will probably be a point at which you may get to a question that requires some more technical data expertise that you might not have in house. But until then ask those questions, look at the data that you have, see, who in your organization might be able to help you answer that. And this is where that socialization part comes in because if you’re a volunteer coordinator, maybe you don’t necessarily know how to dig into your volunteer database and find that. But maybe your program evaluator does. And even though maybe that program evaluators used to focusing on program data, You could carve out a little of her, his or her time to spend 20 minutes on your data and maybe give you some new insights of. Hey, I noticed that when you send emails, you get a 50% open rate. When you’re sending those text messages, you’re getting 5% of them responding. Let’s focus on email communication for your for your volunteers. Something simple like that.

[00:18:14.49] spk_0:
Okay, that’s that’s pretty achievable too. I mean that that’s something that’s easily easily figured out. Alright, alright, this is uh better living through data literacy.

[00:18:26.77] spk_1:
Alright,

[00:18:32.73] spk_0:
better living, better working Um part of your session was um well recognizing good and bad

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data.

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What do you want folks to know there?

[00:20:29.73] spk_1:
So this is again where I’m not sure that there’s a good way of getting this kind of knowledge unless you have someone come and teach it to you. You can self educate. There’s a lot of great resources out there but you have to have the time to invest in it. But these are learning things like survivor bias. So in my presentation I told a story about Abraham wald who is a statistician in World War Two, who the military approached and said, hey, a bunch of our planes keep getting shot down by the luftwaffe to write World War Two. The german air force is the dominant force in the sky. We have to keep our planes in the air against the Germans or we’re gonna lose. How do we armor these planes so that our planes last longer. And he had all the data from every bomber that returned and where the bullet holes were And when he looked at this, you could see and he did some quick back of the napkin statistics and he could see that there were areas that were twice as likely to be hit on the plane than others. So the tail was more likely to be hit. The ends of the wings were more likely to be hit. This sort of gap in the fuselage between the cockpit and the engine were more likely to be hit. So militaries like that. Is that where we armor and he was like you armor, where the bullets aren’t hitting because you were missing planes from your data set. They sort of looked at him and they were like what? Because I am looking at every returning plane. The planes I don’t see are the ones that got hit in a place that made them go down. And he had the data literacy to recognize a limitation of the data set that he was working with. And I used that as an example because he didn’t use a fancy formula to find that out. He didn’t run some algorithm to find that out. In fact he couldn’t have because his insight was on what was missing from his data, not what he did with the data he had. And so so this, what he discovered is this concept of survivor bias which is, there can be systematic gaps in your data based on the factors that you used to collect it. You know how you’re getting that data. In his case. It was literally a survivor bias right that the planes

[00:20:48.21] spk_0:
that went down

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couldn’t be in his data set. But we find this in other cases right. If you’re trying to study student success and all you have are data on alumni, you’re missing everyone who dropped out. Um, and so those sorts of things are, are things we need to be aware of when we’re looking at data. So survivor bias is a great example of bad data. Um And it’s not necessarily it’s bad. It’s limited. There’s there’s a shortcoming to it.

[00:21:19.36] spk_0:
Okay. Okay. I think I have a book that talks about things like this. Alternative interpretations of data based conclusions talks about like confirmation

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bias.

[00:21:26.17] spk_0:
Um It’s a college. I’m not kidding, I

[00:21:31.05] spk_1:
would believe you and now I would point out the confirmation bias is something a little bit different survive

[00:21:36.11] spk_0:
for some reason I kept this thing hypotheses rival hypotheses. For some reason I kept this in college. I don’t know why

[00:21:43.61] spk_1:
rival

[00:21:44.89] spk_0:
hypotheses. Alright well

[00:22:11.97] spk_1:
and that brings up a whole second issues. So you have issues that you have to understand with your data right? Are your data incomplete or your data biased in some way? And I don’t mean that like the data itself has some internal bias. I mean that the way that you collected it leaned towards a certain sample or another. Another great example is if you’re looking at um survey data and your survey was collected by landline phones That is not going to be a representative group of people because I don’t know anyone under the age of 40 who still has a landline

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and

[00:23:32.88] spk_1:
so it’s again not that the data in the data set are wrong per se but they are incomplete in a biased way. It’s gonna be heavily leaning towards older people in your sample. So those are functional problems with your data themselves that you have to be aware of and know know how to adjust and respond to what you brought up with confirmation bias and how we interpret that data and apply it to decisions is like a whole nother can of worms that I sort of reference with how we react to numbers and and this is really important too because I think that we often jump to a conclusion on interpreting a fact without realizing that we do it. So I could say and I actually had this happen, I was looking at uh the amount of money that hospitals in Colorado we’re spending on construction. So just how much money do Colorado, hospitals on the whole spend on construction. And I shared this with this number with an individual and she goes, I knew it, they’re spending way too much. And I was like well that wasn’t what I said, I just said it was however millions of dollars and she goes, yeah, I know. And she was immediately applying her interpretation to that number without realizing it. So I said 50 million let’s say. And in her head she heard me say hospitals are spending too much, but all I said was 50 million. So this like jump that we make to putting a value on the number or judging the number or applying that number often happens seamlessly and we have to be really aware of that as well.

[00:23:51.42] spk_0:
Yeah, I think I yeah, I do that all the time something. Reading something in the paper and say, oh my God, that’s so low.

[00:23:58.43] spk_1:
How

[00:24:07.38] spk_0:
can how can it be that small? But you know, without a context for comparisons that are similar. All right. Yeah.

[00:24:08.29] spk_1:
And that’s all part of data literacy as well is being able to bring to light how you’re interpreting your numbers. So that if, if you’re using something, if you’re falling prey to something like confirmation bias, you’re more likely to notice it or at least be able to counteract it in some way.

[00:27:28.92] spk_0:
It’s time for a break. Fourth dimension technologies. They have a free offer. It is exclusively for nonprofit radio listeners. It’s complimentary. I said free. Yes. Free is also complimentary 24 7 monitoring of your I. T. Assets. They’ll do this for three months. They’ll monitor your servers, network and cloud performance. They’ll monitor your backup performance. All 24 7. Any issues they will let you know asap Plus you will get a comprehensive report at the end of the three month monitoring and they promised they’re gonna throw in a few surprises as well. All free, all complimentary. It’s for the 1st 10 listeners. It’s on the listener landing page at tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant D. Just like three D. But they go on to mention deeper It’s time for Tony to take two. I am a uh, what is that called again? Oh Tiktok. I am a Tiktok Pioneer. Alright. So There’s a billion users. I’m an early adopter. I am on Tiktok. If you are there, uh, following hashtag nonprofits, which is a very widely seen one, like 360 million views I think. Uh, there’s another hashtag, uh, tiktok for nonprofits. Uh, and I’m also of course, uh, using hashtag plan to giving. So if you’re on Tiktok, I’m having fun with it. I hope you are. If you’re there, uh, it’s the, the app is so damn easy to use, so intuitive and so powerful. So this is a, you know, this is a revelation to me. A billion people have tested it. Try it out now and now it’s my turn. So yeah, no, it’s really is. I’m finding it fun and simple. And So if you’re there, there, there are a bunch of other nonprofit folks there, but we need more if you want to, you want to join. I’m 60 not too old to be on Tiktok at least by, uh, by my estimation, you might ask some 14 year olds, they may have a different opinion, but we’re not. Uh, I’m not 14 and we’re not talking to 14 year olds here. So, uh, doesn’t matter. Come in, join Tiktok. Follow those. The hashtag nonprofits, uh, Tiktok for nonprofits join us on Tiktok. If you’re there, check me out. Love to have you. That is Tony’s take two. What do you know about that? We’ve got just about a butt load more time for increased data literacy across your nonprofit with Alexandra mana rings. I feel like we’re, this is valuable, but we’re getting, we’re kind of ethereal

[00:27:34.55] spk_1:
here. Let’s

[00:27:49.99] spk_0:
drill down to the small and midsized non profit listeners that we’ve got. What are they gonna, how how is, how are they going to implement data literacy? I think we’ve talked enough about innovation. Why it’s important. How

[00:27:51.15] spk_1:
are they actually gonna do something?

[00:27:52.81] spk_0:
What are we gonna do with data literacy? What are we going to do with data literacy in, in our humane society?

[00:29:25.72] spk_1:
So the first thing that I tell people to do is conduct the data audit. This sounds fancier than it is. Basically. What you’re gonna do is you’re gonna get everyone around the table or virtual table and you’re gonna say what data sources do you have or know about that? You could access and get again as broad as possible. Start with this definition that data are repeatable, collectible pieces of information and say, what do we have out there? And if you start it with it on index cards or sticky notes awesome. I don’t care. Just start to get a sense of what you have out there and where it lives. And then you can start to apply a little bit more description to them. So if you know, okay, we have a student database, We all use that as how all of our students apply for our um scholarships for example. Well, could you make a table that says all of the data elements that are available there. And can you do that for as many of the data sources as you have and then get together and share that. Just tell everyone this is our little data dictionary. Here’s all the things we could find and what’s in them and what you’ll start to find already is people in the organization go wait, what we have we have student birthdate. I didn’t know that I could use that from the birthday cards. I was trying to send out or oh hang on, we track retention. This program over here was trying to figure out if if you know our coaching program was actually you know, improving retention and they were having, they were collecting retention in a separate survey. We can get rid of that survey and just use you know what’s happening over here. And so already people are gonna start to engage in the day to ask new questions, bring it on board because they didn’t even know it was there and they’ll find ways that they can start to bring it into the work that they do. A lot of people want to use data and they just aren’t aware of where it exists in the organization.

[00:29:48.62] spk_0:
What else. What else can we? All right. So we’re starting with this data on. So

[00:29:52.28] spk_1:
that’s that’s the first

[00:29:53.58] spk_0:
thing conversations right? People are seeing connections. People are seeing duplication.

[00:32:30.11] spk_1:
Yes. This will likely spin off something that is is necessary for data literacy though it’s not the same thing which is you’ll start to realize the need for some data governance and data standards. Right? Make sure can we standardize how we collect birthdate? Can we make sure we all do it the same way? Can we standardize how we define our donors? You know when I say repeat donor, do we all mean the same thing? Can we standardize how we calculate that so that we’re all on the same page with how we talk about it and part of that data standards that does feed into the data literacy is not just to document then all of your pieces of data. But let’s create a shared vocabulary. When I say you know a lapsed donor. Do I mean the same thing as someone you know in development is gonna mean And can we all agree? All right. When we say lapsed owner, what we mean is blank. We’re gonna calculate it this way. It means someone who hasn’t donated for one or more years. Perfect. We can all agree on that definition. And now when we use this, we’re gonna understand each other a whole lot better. So that would be the next step of this is data audit, shared vocabulary. And some of that shared vocabulary is just gonna be like do we mean the same thing? and some of it will be actually writing formulas right? I’m going to calculate churn this way. Let’s all agree we’re gonna calculate at this anymore then I think the next level is figuring out how you’re going to use the data that you find in your data audit and those metrics that you agree on, how to calculate in the decisions that you make daily and strategically. And this requires a culture shift as well as a process shift. The culture shift is around making sure that you are intentionally asking for that information when you go to make those decisions. So as a leader are you putting on the agenda a period of time where its data review? Are you making sure that you give people time to get those numbers to you so that you can incorporate them in your decisions? And then as you know a frontline worker, are you identifying the places where you might need data and don’t have it and passing that up the chain so that those resources can be earmarked for that. Whether it’s just giving you some more time whether it’s figuring out how to bring systems whatever it might be. So you can have that data in your decision making and the culture shift also is about when you sit down to make that decision, are you saying do we agree on this decision or are you saying? What do the data say about this decision, right is it about the people behind, you know, each option that you’re looking at or your gut feeling or how sensible that common sense. And I put that in quotes because I have a lot of issues with common sense things. Are you picking based on that or you picking on the thing that seems like it has the best evidence to support that it will get you where you want to go.

[00:32:58.81] spk_0:
Sense. And intuition

[00:33:00.64] spk_1:
right?

[00:33:01.82] spk_0:
Can lead us astray

[00:33:02.98] spk_1:
if you’re not aware of how they work. Now. I like to argue that to some level intuition is our unconscious data evaluation

[00:33:11.98] spk_0:
because it’s that well informed. You think

[00:33:26.63] spk_1:
well it’s unconscious. So it’s not all that well informed, but it follows the same model, right? Intuition is basically saying, here’s what I think will happen based on what happens to me in the past. And so the problem with intuition is it’s limited to your own experience. Whereas data can broaden that intuition to lots of other people’s experiences, right? Everyone in your student database gets to contribute to that data driven intuition rather than just your singular experience,

[00:34:13.55] spk_0:
aren’t we? Uh, particularly poor data uh, data analysts, you know, as we we we think, oh, the price of gas is is the highest it’s ever been. But we don’t know that in the early 19 eighties actually had spiked maybe not absolutely higher, but as a percentage it was it was a greater increase or something like that, aren’t we? Um I don’t want to necessarily say intuitively but inherently aren’t we? Inherently bad data scientists or of you know bad data aggregators aggregators.

[00:34:23.20] spk_1:
It’s a great question and the answer is sometimes and sometimes not,

[00:34:29.49] spk_0:
you know,

[00:36:08.85] spk_1:
so we as humans are incredibly good at making and finding patterns. In fact we are still better than many ai systems. Certainly better than any of the like hard coded ways of finding patterns. Um Like my two year old can could figure out the difference. I mean actually before when she was like 15 months old she knew the difference between dogs and cats, right? She would look around and be like that’s a dog basket cat, Ai still trying to figure that out. For the most part if you show them pictures of dogs and cats, they get close but they still get mixed up. And our ability to find those patterns and extrapolate those patterns out accurately is unparalleled. But to your point we’re not very good at being able to bring huge amounts of numbers together in an accurate kind of way. So if you throw a spreadsheet up and you’re like what is the spreadsheet tell me right? Like what’s what’s the average increase in prices? What is the peak of the prices and the dip of the prices or whatever. It might be. We’re not very good with handling like those huge amounts of numbers. Um And we do have other cognitive shortcuts that can can trip us up sometimes. So what I like to always say is that for us as humans, we want to use our skills where our skills are better than computers. And we want to give tasks back to computers where they’re going to be better. So again, for us, where we’re going to be a lot better, is looking at lots of different pieces of data results from data analysis and understanding how that fits together in the big picture. But how do we put together a decline in overall donors with an increase in average donor? So guys, with this engagement level of volunteers, we can put that together and understand what that might mean for our nonprofit a lot better than the computer is. But don’t ask someone to buy hand, go back and track how many hours every single volunteer did get an excel sheet to do that.

[00:36:38.99] spk_0:
Okay, leave us with, uh, leave us with some inspiration about data literacy and, and uh, what it’s gonna do for our, our, our work.

[00:38:19.95] spk_1:
A simple question. Right? So for me, the reason that I called this presentation, the imperative is I believe that we do have an imperative. We have both a moral imperative and a practical imperative. The way donations are really going and the way funding is really going for nonprofits. People want to see impact. They want to know when I give you $10. What happens with those $10? And in the past we’ve been able to say, oh we bought 15 lunches for those $10 and that was enough. Now what people want to say is well, are you helping people, you know no longer be unemployed? Are you keeping people out from being homeless? Are you able to actually make farmers more secure against rising temperatures? And those kinds of impacts are difficult to do with just simple check marks, right? Simple counting. You have to have more sophisticated data technologies and more sophisticated analytics to really be able to measure the impact that people want to see. So that’s the practical side of the imperative is if you want to survive as a nonprofit, you’re going to be able, you’re going to have to show and calculate and track the actual impact that your organization is having. The moral side is that we as nonprofits exist to make the world a better place and I don’t know of a better way to succeed at that than by using data effectively. The scientific method, the whole approach of testing things, measuring whether you get closer to your goal and adjusting what you did and trying it again is the best way that I have found to get good results. So if we are saying that we are here to make things better, then I believe we have then a moral imperative to do the best we can to make things better. And data literacy is a critical tool in that.

[00:38:52.55] spk_0:
The imperative to increase data literacy across your organization, Alexandra mana rings are first PhD epidemiology guest, I’m sure we’ve had master’s degrees in epidemiology but never a PhD I’m quite certain she’s founder of Morocco knows m E R A K I N O. S Alexandra. Thank you very much, enjoyed it.

[00:39:11.66] spk_1:
Thank you so much for having me here today.

[00:39:13.59] spk_0:
My pleasure

[00:39:15.37] spk_1:
and

[00:40:37.77] spk_0:
thank you for being with nonprofit radio coverage of 22 N. T. C. The nonprofit technology conference Next week. A 22 NTC pause board members are people too with judy Levine if you missed any part of this week’s show, I Beseech you find it at tony-martignetti dot com. We’re sponsored by turn to where like I’m 14 voice crack were sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits your story is their mission, turn life into dot C. O. And by fourth dimension technologies I. T. Infra in a box. The affordable tech solution for nonprofits. tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant four D just like three D. But they go on to mention deeper and they’ve got the offer go to the listener landing page. That’s it. tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant grab the listener offer. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. The shows social media is by Susan Chavez Marc Silverman is our web guy and this music is by scott stein, thank you for that. Affirmation scotty. You’re with me next week for nonprofit radio big non profit ideas for. The other 95% Go out and be great.

Nonprofit Radio for April 26, 2019: Strategic Knowledge Management & Ethics In Your Prospect Research

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Dar Veverka & Janice Chan: Strategic Knowledge Management
Documents. Data. Projects. Governance. Training. They’re all components of knowledge management and our panel from 19NTC explains how to manage properly. Both returning, they’re Dar Veverka from Urban Teachers and Janice Chan at Shift and Scaffold.





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Hello and welcome to Tony martignetti non-profit Radio Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent on your aptly named host. Oh, I’m glad you’re with me. I’d come down with a case of stati O p Jia if you kicked me in the butt with the idea that you missed today’s show Strategic knowledge management documents, data projects, governance, training They’re all components of knowledge management and our panel from nineteen ntcdinosaur planes. How to manage properly both returning there. Dar Viv arika from Urban teachers and Janice Chan at Shift in Scaffold and Ethics in your Prospect Research There’s a lot of personal and private info available about all of us and your donors. Your researchers job is to find it. Where are the boundaries? How do you protect it? Maria Simple takes on these and other potential landmines. She’s our prospect research contributor and the Prospect Finder. I’m Tony Steak to be the one we’re sponsored by Pursuant Full service fund-raising Data driven and technology enabled Tony dahna slash pursuant by Wagner CPS guiding you beyond the numbers weinger cps dot com and by text to give mobile donations made easy text NPR to four four four nine nine nine Here is strategic knowledge management from the twenty nineteen non-profit Technology Conference. Welcome to Tony martignetti non-profit Radio coverage of nineteen ninety si. You know what that is? It’s the twenty nineteen non-profit Technology Conference. You know that we’re in Oregon, Portland, Oregon at the convention center. You know that all of our nineteen ninety si interviews are brought to you by our partners at Act Blue Free fund-raising Tools to help non-profits make an impact with me now are Darby Burka and Janice Chan. Dar is director of information technology and at urban teachers seated next to me and Janice Chan is consultant at Shift in Scaffold. Welcome back to the show. Both of you think you can be back. Thank you very much. Let’s so we’re talking about strategic knowledge management Your your workshop topic Strategic knowledge Management Don’t stop halfway. Janice. What? What? Halfway. What? What? What’s the problem here? Why do we need this session? Uh, my dar actually chose the name of the sessions and maybe you want to talk about that. Okay, Well, either won or you go for a lot of places. People think of knowledge management as solely just We put some documents and SharePoint. We organize the things on our file server and that’s it. They stop there. But that’s really just a foundational piece for knowledge management, and it’s really just a small part of it. So our session was going over the other things you need to consider instead of just we filed our documents. Okay, Janice, how would you know? Let’s make sure everybody has a common understanding of terms. What we need, what we mean when we say knowledge management. So this is, you know, when you’re in an organization, everybody needs some type of information. People have a lot of experience and expertise, but it’s it’s often trapped in people’s heads or we have the file somewhere, but nobody could find them. So I just end up asking darl the things. And so how do you make it so that the right and the people confined the right information at the right time when they need it on DH in the way that they needed? So they’re not spending an hour digging through unorganized sheer drive when we could have just organized and they’re like, Oh, I know howto Advil unt ears to our serum because it’s in the volunteermatch judgment folder and that, you know, like it’s in a place that makes sense. Teo Awesome to our organization. Okay, okay. I said, uh, the So the halfway point is the documents in a share point. And that’s where a lot of people are stopping but trouble? Yeah, a lot of folks just think that’s all you do, and it’s You need to go beyond that and get buy-in from the rest of your organization and think about the other ways that knowledge flow. A lot of knowledge flows through organizations, and it’s not just sitting in your SharePoint drive and you need to deal with How do you manage all that? A lot of places waste a lot of time. What are what are the other elements of knowledge? Management? Um, knowledge management comes into play with data governance. Were all data driven organizations these days. So you’ve got everything sitting in your databases. Why isn’t why are people dealing with processes around that? For knowledge management, you’ve got project management. You do you know these these built out tech projects that cost you thousands of dollars and nobody does the documentation or things about thinks about building things in. Like, for instance, whether the examples we gave it our session. If you’re redesigning a website you’ve already thought about who’s gonna be maintaining that. Whose job is that? After the fact? What do you need the vendor to do? What type of documentation. But people don’t build that into the project. They think about it, but he never actually get it into the formal project. So that’s all part of knowledge management. Okay, eyes, they’re more generous. And also things like training, right. Like when we have new staff, we think we need to train them. We need to onboard them, we think actively about that stuff. And then we don’t always think of it after That person is no longer the new employees. And so we don’t keep that going. And we lose a lot that way because things change right? We don’t necessary. Maybe updated as a star. Kind of referred, right? Like we know we made the how to guide. Great. We never have to update it. But that process of balls because we realized hey, this doesn’t work out as well as we thought. So now we’ve changed it, right? We’re applying that learning that can get loss of It’s not documented when that person who made that improvement walks out the door. You know they find your job or whatever or, you know, even just things like, you know, when people leave right, we don’t always capture that institutional knowledge. My people, when people leave and we’re just like all right, give us your email account password on like you know it. So making sure that that stays within the organization also that it just feeds back into the world, you know, sort of like when you manage a project and you kind of do be brief sometimes after a project. Hopefully you debrief. Does that go anywhere? Because if you have that meeting, then it’s only in the minds of people who were at that meeting. And that doesn’t That’s a lot of knowledge that maybe it’s useful to other people. Normalization will be used for moving forward, and it can easily get lost. We’Ll capture it. I presume you spent a lot of time in the session or have you had your session? OK, you’re dahna downside. Okay, Talking about resource is tools tools that we can use for for knowledge management going beyond documents. So let’s spend a good amount of time doing that. Janice, you want to start with, um, with a tool? Sure. So I think one of the things that way talked a little bit about there. Two types of knowledge is the explicit were just like here you do Step one. And here you do Step two, and usually the task knowledge is sort of like, you know, when you’re baking and you’re like what this done look like? Great. And it’s hard to figure that out sometimes. Like, you know, data governance. You’re like, How do I define those? Like, What does this mean? Why does this number look like not what I was expecting? And I think a lot of times we don’t always have the language. We don’t always have that shared language. Tio have that discussion. So when you map out a process right, if you do that diagram of like here’s, here’s what happens. Here’s which systems are connected to each other, and somebody’s like I never realized that right, Like that’s not the model that I have in my head of how these things fit together, and I had these other pieces that are not on the diagram that you just wrote. The act of like making those diagrams is is you know, Wei Tau have that conversation, get that knowledge out of people’s heads and get a documented right than other people can see. That s so There are a lot of tools for that. Like really simple. I’m sorry. Taxonomy. Taxonomy is another. Another helpful thing I think about autonomy is Oh, no Texas. Tow the grant like different things. Teo also think about it. Buy-in named Tulip zoho. I really like like paddle. It is really, like, cheap. Easy. It’s not made for that necessarily. But you can use it. Pagnoni. It’s really it’s men for teacher. A lot of teachers use it, I think. But it’s free. It’s You don’t have to, like, learn how to use it. There’s not like a steep learning curve, which is helpful for diagrams. You’re like, you know, you can just do pencil on paper, but you know, good, more advanced toward, You know you’re losing charts and all of that or more advanced. But they take longer to learn how to use, so that vanish now. So I’ve got a I’ve got a question. It may be embarrassingly basic, but we ask anyway. All right, So now if we have created this, uh, sort of this organizational chart or this this flow of this chart that in paddle it how do we How do we now preserve that so that people confined It is, It is. It is a simple is the shared drive on a network. I think it depends on what it is and what it’s for, right? Like if it’s hears we’re documenting our process for maybe managing volunteers. Or maybe this is how you make updates on your way you might share. You might save it wherever you might be in your share. Dr. It’s wherever you have your documentation, which honestly, should be wherever people go, because if people don’t go to it, then you have to do that whole, like trying to get people to go to. No place is just more on top of more like it’s just not gonna happen when they already are exactly exactly wherever they are. Just just make it work for there. Okay, okay. Time for a break. Pursuant. the art of first Impressions. How to combine strategy analytics and creative to capture new capture, captivate its, actually captivate new donors and keep them coming back. It’s their e book. It’s on donor acquisition and how to make a smashing first impression. You will find it on the listener landing page at tony dot m. A slash pursuing capital p for please, of course. Now let’s go back to strategic knowledge management. Another tool door you can share with you a couple things I can think about. We demonstrated some visual tools, just having simple visual guides to guide people on what systems do what we demonstrated several of those yesterday, and we also know what kind of systems are we talking about? A different knowledge systems. Maybe you’ve got databases. Maybe you’ve got documents, shares, maybe a process. Documents for the finance system live somewhere else. How our users supposed to know what system Teo use if they don’t even know what systems that you have so doing visual guides for where do I find this? Or where do I put that simple stuff that people can literally stick on? The fridge is in their offices, so people see that constantly as a reminder. We demonstrated some landing pages in Portales. A lot of people think of of that is just a way to get into the document management system. But you could do so much more with a portal you can have links to. Resource is links two different systems guides on where you should put stuff. Updates from the internal newsletter. To remind people of recent resource is way did a whole system of links. If folks check the collaborative notes for our session, we put about a page and a half of links for folks to different tools. And then he also made a Google drive of downloadable resource is for folks to express. Okay, well, we need to identify the first. Where’s the where’s the sheet of patient half of links that’s going to be in the collaborative notes for our session. With that, it’s it’s on this session. If you go to the session page on the NDC agenda, there will be a link to our social. Okay, so you start in ten dot org’s, then you go into the conference, extend into the agenda. Great. So on on Wednesday morning, we have is the strategic Knowledge management. If you click on that the session description, all of the links Aaron there Wave also tested it on both of our Twitter accounts. And then we can also post at the forums and handup Florence under the Where do we want? Put that one in the main discussion or debate? Remain discussion with the mid discussion for him with us. The links because we did a lot of resource, is this is a lot for folks to absorb. Let’s take time. What is your what? Your Twitter ID? Oh, sure example. At Darva arika d a r E v e r k Darby murcott Janice What’s yours? It’s a curiosity bilich at curiosity. Bone or bones? Singular singular curiosity. Bone going challenge metoo way. Curiosity is much easier to spell them. Geever. That’s curiosity Bone. OK, OK, good. All right, So now where else is it? Besides the Twitter Twitter accounts, you said it’s in a forum. Thie tenn dot org’s community forums will go ahead, and we’ll post that on the discussion. And then I think the decision makers would be a good one for that as well. And folks confined that okay, community forums within within ten dahna. Or there’s an decision makers as well as a discussed one, and we’LL go ahead and put that link up for folks because we did a lot of research, and a lot of resource is because we know it’s it’s hard to keep track. We’re gonna have to talk about some of these because we’re doing this for about ten minutes and I have a half hour segment to fill. So it’s okay. You don’t hook with Don’t look with go to the community forum, weigh a lot more. Okay. Okay, Janice, go ahead. Your turn, please. S o. I think that Okay, way talked about sort of the diagram diagrams. They’re, like, my favorite way. Talked about training, right? So I think also in terms of thinking, we talked a little bit about, like, the explicit versus task knowledge. And so sometimes it’s sort of like you’re like, where do I start? Right, So, like, I think that, like, just starting with getting things out of people’s heads, and you’ii think you come up together with some strategies like the, you know, shadowing people and sort of like doing the retrospective after an offense or things like that about shadowing something in real life. What’s that about shuttering people? So, you know, sometimes I don’t know if you’ve ever had that experience. It’s like, maybe haven’t somebody knew who’s coming on board and they ask all these questions. You’re like, I never would have thought to explain them if you had an *** that question. So sometimes, you know, in terms of getting that knowledge out of someone’s head, we don’t always realize that we have it because we’re like, Oh, yeah, like I just do it. And I’ve been doing this for a long time, and I don’t realize that that, you know, personal system that I’ve come up with for how to get this done really efficiently, that that’s actually knowledge that is useful and that I can share with someone else, like I could teach somebody else I do. This, it is, may be hard to think about how to do that, and sometimes the best, like the easiest way is to have someone who doesn’t have that experience watch you do, you know, like maybe how do I, you know, host a good podcast? How do I do an interview, right? And so you watch somebody else do it, and then you come up with these. You either like notice. Oh, they’re doing it. This and this order, they’re doing it in this way. Or it’s an opportunity to ask that question of, you know, like, why did you choose to do it that way? Right? And I wouldn’t have thought to explain the decision for me, Like, you know, I’ve done this a million times advantage, just, you know, So I think that’s a good, easy way to pull it out. Anybody could do it. Another simple related to that. Is it sort of just telling someone like, Oh, yeah, you just go enter this over there. You could use simple tools that we all have on our laptops I movie or another, you know, quickie tool, off of Windows, laptop and just scream cast really quick what you’re actually doing and capture that in a thirty second video. You know, you could post that internally. A lot of us use chat programs at work, you know, slack or G chat or whatever. You could post that straight in there on a team channel and say by the way. This is how you do the thing. And then if people have questions about, why are you doing it? That way you can have more of a live back and forth and just a static. You know, just go do that thing. But I think even to write, like not just the not just sharing it in that moment when somebody has that question, but making sure that it’s it’s stored somewhere that people confined it later because they’re like you had that question. Probably five other people will have that question. So let me just save save the time now and just put in a place where you could find all of the screen cast on DH. Yeah, they’re a lot of simple, like snag. It is. Another one is just really. It’s really simple to use on. It’s not that expensive, so a screen Flo would be another one that’s a little bit more pricey. It’s maybe ninety nine, but it’s it’s another good moflow captures maggot. What you’re doing live on your computer to demonstrate that for folks, Maybe you’ve got your Tio. You know, a lot of folks are purely remote offices, so you might not have that ability to sit one on one, but you you could capture what you’re doing for a training video like Janice mentioned. If one person has that question, you know, ten other people have got that questions of capturing that knowledge of them, making sure you get that knowledge out as well, Not just capturing at once, but making sure people know where that resource is good. And sometimes that’s faster, right? Like trying to get somebody to like, can you? Right, the out, all the stops and documentation. They just look at you with that leg. Look like I don’t want to need you to spend time like if you were to ask him to show you that I’m like, Oh, yeah, like you did so did it up right? And and so that’s almost a wayto document more quickly. So especially people who don’t like to write things out or like they’re really stress out about it, but are willing to answer that question in that moment. If you can capture that then and make it easy for them, I think sometimes that it’s pompel for that, Uh, I don’t have anything else to say except what other? Whatever tools we got when I was trying, I was trying to think of some different types of data needs, but I can’t I can’t think of any that that I was going to ask you about specifically. So you may as well just keep going. We can talk about women defremery. Sure, a couple of the other items we talked about that are sort of the basis for when we talk about knowledge management. People look at that and they go, How did I do that? What are some practical ways to do that? So we talked about having a knowledge management framework, and frameworks can be really intimidating for folks. They see that they look online and they say all these diagrams and they go. I don’t know what that is, but it’s really just a lens for thinking about the structure. Framework is just a structure. It’s a scaffold. Eso It’s how you build your knowledge management and a focus of what’s important for your organization. Is it that is Janice mentioned? Capturing tacit knowledge is a huge problem. Your organization nobody writes anything down. They leave and then you don’t know what they did so maybe you want to build your knowledge management process, focusing on capturing tacit knowledge. Maybe it is that you guys love doing documentation, but nobody ever updates the documentation. So maybe you need to build your framework on a continuous capturing of that knowledge and continues updating instead. So we talked about different ways to to think about how knowledge works at your organization and how you should build your structures around that. And then another simple tool that we talked about is a taxonomy, which most people already have at their organizations. But they don’t think about it, and it’s not really written down. And that’s the way you refer to commonalities. So maybe your know it. Urban teachers. We’ve got three remote offices, and we use acronyms in particular terms to refer to them. We’ve got terms for referring to our program and for different stages of our participants. That’s a taxonomy. That’s something we can use across all of our systems as a common language, and it usually starts in the in the document management system, and that’s often where people see it. They build that out across multiple systems that can be used in your CR M. It could be used in your HR system. It could be used in your documentation on when you start having a common taxonomy or lexicon like that, it makes it easier to capture knowledge management cause People start using the same things to refer to processes, and it helps bring teams together and really provides a cohesion around your knowledge in your organization. Just a common understanding. Yeah, and people are often they already have one. They just don’t think about it, his attacks on me, but in general, they’ve already got one. The other thing, too, is that you can capture all of this documentation, right? But if nobody knows what it’s called like if you call it volunteermatch judgment and I call it, I don’t know constitutent management or whatever, right, I that’s no good, because then I’m not finding I’m not looking under there because I don’t think that that’s relevant to what I’m looking for. So I think that that common language is also what makes it you know, that your consistent about it you can other people confined it. They know, like OK, when someone says like this is you know, our hears their marketing materials, right? I know that that our logo is considered our marketing materials, right? And some other places it might be under something else entirely. Might be, like under and join our brand your brands, right? So it doesn’t matter what that is, as long as there’s that shared understanding the organization. This is what it means so that I can go into the document German system or, you know, if I ask, ask somebody. Hey, I’m looking for acts, right? Like we have a shared. Understand what that means and what they look for it. How do you create the shared understanding and taxonomy if one doesn’t exist? You were saying, You know, it probably exists and you don’t know it, but suppose it doesn’t suppose you know, just lots of examples of people referring to the same thing by different names. That’s where you need treyz glossary. What do you do it? It’s where you need to do a little bit of legwork. Someone on your team. It’s usually on the team, but not necessarily needs to do some knowledge. Management work needs to work with those teams, and, you know, maybe you’ve got eight sites but they and they’re all talking about his Janice mentioned things under different labels, but they’re all really doing operations, functions or volunteermatch judgment. So you work with those individual departments are sites and you find out what their commonalities are because a lot of knowledge management is about finding commonalities between things a lot of groundwork. Yeah, And you do you have to, As Janice said very aptly yesterday, you’ve gotta invest some time to save some time. You know, you can’t get saved time for free. You need to invest some some leg work up front. So if you work with those different departments to figure out what their commonalities r and you work with them to build a lexicon, you’re going to find that people aren’t is really determined to refer to something as a particular thing as they once thought. When you start showing them the commonalities on DH when I’ve done taxonomy, is that organizations? In all three cases, I’ve had to do it. People end up agreeing on the taxonomy because they you know when when you get him talking, they’re really just talking about the same things. And they’re really not that invested in referring to it as a particular thing. They’re okay with going with operations instead of, you know, office, office management or something like that. You know, they released a little bit, and they realize special and you promoted as like, you know, we’re trying to make it easier to work together. They tend to release a little bit and go. Yeah, okay. We’re cool with operations, OK? I’m surprised to hear that, actually, people would stick to their This is operations. Well, that’s what culture. So that way, that way. So So, Yeah, we talked a bit about organization because I think any time you talk about language, any time you talk about the way that we do things here, right, that is organizational culture. And you know you don’t have unorganised age culture that supports knowledge management that supports learning, right? Sharing of information. You know, sometimes people will get very Don’t touch my stuff. Stay in your lane. You know, this is my job. That’s your job. Whereas I think if you are learning organization, if you want to build that college culture of you know, we share our knowledge here and we all learn from each other. You know that obviously you don’t want those silos. That doesn’t work out very well. That’s kind of the essence of what you’re trying to do. But I think like the one of things that we talked about in terms of road blocks, where you’re trying to roll some stuff out and maybe people are like insecure, they viewed their knowledge is job security. And it’s not that Maybe that doesn’t come from a place where they used to work somewhere where you know that was an issue and that that certainly can be at an issue and in some organizations, But a lot of times it’s just that really, that individual like, you know, I want to make sure that I keep my job or I want to be seen as valuable. And you can use that to write because so it can be not were trying to steal your knowledge and take take your job away from here, take things away from you, but also you know, Hey, your knowledge is valuable and sometimes people don’t see that and helping them see that you’re acknowledges really valuable to the organization and look how much stronger the team could be if we all had could use that knowledge, and we could help you even more. And, you know, whatever you’re you’re role is all right. Gentle persuasion, all but all for the good of the mission. Absolutely. Way all could do a better job if we could come together with this agreement around this common language. Yeah. Yeah. And also acknowledging that you might be in an organization where you know there is a toxic or culture, and they’re no amount of knowledge. Management is going to fix that. So they’re just, you know, knowledge management cannot fix broken business process buzzes and broken culture. So there is an acknowledgement of that. You you’ve got larger problems if that’s going on in your organization, and we can fix that for you. We’ve had discussions about on the show previous ntcdinosaur about blaming technology when leadership or processes or culture are the problem, right? And I’m looking for a technology solution to a bad CEO, right? No amount of pretty software is going to fix something like that. No amount of nice, you know? Well streamlined document man, aren’t you? Knowledge management is going to fix that. Wait a couple more minutes together. Uh, what else did you talk about? That maybe some questions about some of the Okay, Well, a lot of the questions were related about related to culture and trying to get people on board with things when people were resistant. Because it’s hard to make it hard to make culture change. Absolutely, absolutely. And I think it’s sort of like it needs become a part of the way you do that here. And so it needs to also be part of, you know, one way. Besides, getting people’s buy-in is also making a part of job expectations, making it part of your performance performance evaluation on DH. You know, just making it like every time we haven’t have a project meeting, right reflection is part of that. Every time we have a staff meeting, there’s there’s some aspect of knowledge mansion or we talk about. You know, every quarter we talk about what do we need to update? Maybe in document management? Maybe. What do we need? So like, nobody uses this folder. Nobody looks like this like it’s maybe we need to just archive it. We don’t need it anymore or things like that and building that in and acknowledging that you can’t do this solo, you need your stakeholders and identifying who those are early on and that you’re going to need some executive stake holders. Get them in. Earlier on, we talked about different techniques with you know, that straight project management type stuff. But in terms of knowledge management, get him onboard early. You know you’re going to need them to help you push this through on DH. Really? Make sure you take care of your stakeholders and you deal with the people that are not liking your process. Figure out why they don’t like your process and try and work with that. You know it might not make them your favorite stakeholder, but if you understand where they’re coming from, like Janis was just talking about, like understanding why they’re a road block that could be really key to getting past them and really making them invested in your project and turning them around to liking your project. Having good office relationships helps also yeah, long before we’re talking about knowledge management. Just if you’re decent and it isn’t to your peers and colleagues and, uh, you get to know them outside the office, you know? And you’ve got his foundation of a relationship than when you’re calling on them for some. Some compromise. I think you’re more apt to get it. Yeah. They didn’t trust that. This is going to be good for the organization. This is We’re working towards the same goal if you don’t have that trust, and you need to start there like you need to start establishing Janet. You also mentioned the archive folder. I do plan e-giving consulting on. So I’m brought in sometimes to revive a program that’s stalled. And maybe there was a plan e-giving consultant or director. You know, four years ago. And then they eliminated the position, and it just kind of faded away, So I’m so I’m invited. Tio, update the files. Update the files. I can’t tell you that the first full day I makes archive, I’m opening this. I don’t know what everything is from two thousand six. We’LL move archive. You know, it has no relevance reducing that I think producing that clutter are not overwhelming to people. What are things you that actually relevant to to our organisation and our operations now, like maybe we need to keep that. You know, we don’t care. We’re not sure if we need to keep out, and we’re keeping it just in case that sort of get it, clear it out of the way, right? Because, like, it’s not the stuff you’re using all the time. The stuff that you are using frequently That should be, you know, really central and real quick. Good technique. With that, people get really nervous when they say you’re going to delete those archives and they hide a copy of them. So you just do a process where you keep them. But you put them in a place where it’s not clogging up their search terms and assure them they really, really need that. You can still get that back for you, and that really helps them move it out of what? What’s searchable their day today life. But if they know that it’s still there somewhere, they often are much better with being able to archive because they’re not worried about you pushing the w good. Okay, Janice, I’m gonna give you a chance to wrap up. Oh, like she’s pulling together. So I think some of the biggest things we talked about were really like, Get things out of people’s heads, Get the knowledge out of people’s heads, make it organized so that people can find it in a way that it’s It’s not overwhelming to people what makes sense to them, right? And also not, you know, being aware of people’s what people are scared of or what people. But those hang ups or obstacles might be to make sure that we can address them and get them on board. And it sounds like a lot of rigging it is, but the passing that time out front will really help you save time down the road. All right, that was Janice Chan. She’s consultant Shift and scaffold on DH. Also Darby arika, director of information technology at Urban Teachers. You are with non-profit radios coverage of twenty nineteen, the non-profit Technology Conference. All of our nineteen ntcdinosaur views are brought to you by our partners at Act Blue Free fund-raising tools to help non-profits make an impact. Thanks so much for being with us. I need to take a break. Wagner, CPS. They’re free. Webinar came and went earlier this month. Tips and tricks for your nine ninety you missed it. You suck. No, but you can get it back. You watch the archive? Yes. Lamenting wayward listener that’s you gets the archive. You learn how to use your nine ninety as a marketing tool. You goto Wagner cps dot com Click seminars go to the month of April. I know it’s a little convoluted, but they don’t have a landing page there. Wagner cps dot com Click seminars Go to April and you’LL find tips and tricks for your nine ninety. Now time for Tony’s take to be the one that is my video this week. Inspired by in an Air Force reunion that I put together. It’s not really fair for me to say I hosted it because it was on the Air Force base, where we all worked Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri in the mid to late eighties, and about thirty five of us came together and then you add spouses was like fifty people, a total, but we all had this shared experience of doing an unusual job. We were launch officers for Minuteman nuclear missiles at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri in the Reagan years, and so we came together and It was just wonderful seeing everybody reconnecting you. No way have had we’ve had to reunion since then, So some of us have gotten together at other times. But some of us we have some haven’t been seen since, like nineteen eighty eight eighty nine. But there’s a re connection immediate, and that was the inspiration from my video. Be the one and what? What I mean by that? You’re just gonna have to watch. The video is at tony martignetti dot com, and that is Tony. Take do now. It’s Miller time. No, it’s not Miller. It’s Maria time. Real simple. Maybe Maria drinks Miller. I don’t know. Probably not. She has better taste. She has better taste in that. She’s much, much more refined. She’s, Ah, she’s the prospect. Find her. She’s our our trainer all. She’s a Strainer and speaker on Prospect Research. He’s our research contributor. Her latest book is Magnify Your Business Tips, tools and Strategies for Growing Your Business or Your non-profit. She’s our Doi End of Dirt, cheap and free. She’s at the prospect finder dot com and at Maria Simple Maria. Simple. Welcome back after many, many months. Yes, thank you for having me back. It’s great to be here. Absolutely. You’ve been absent since Hurricane Florence, which you and I all know know verywell. Now we track hurricanes because we live in North Carolina very close to each other on that was last September, like September twelfth or so. Yes. You’re supposed to have been on. And you had to. You had to cancel because the hurricane was imminent. Yes, I was evacuating your evacuating, right. We had an evacuation order in my town, too. On. That’s last September. Now, are you Are you done with? You had some damage. You had more damaged than I did. Are you done re rebuilding? No, they haven’t even started. Yeah, that’s the problem that people don’t get. It’s hard is held to get contractors. And this is back from September. We’re talking about September. Well, yeah, well, we’ve got this contractors on site, but there have been a lot of insurance related issues, so that’s a whole other thing. Yeah, well, there’s that too, but but just the idea of getting contractors, people don’t realize that. Of course, I never did When I lived here in the city that it’s it’s It’s not uncommon for it to be years later. I mean, I guess we experienced it somewhat with Katrina. You saw, you know, the one year anniversary, the two year anniversary. But everybody, you know, Katrina struck me as a riel aberration. Although now as the climate changes, it’s it’s less so. But at the time, it seemed like, you know, it couldn’t be that devastating. But But even just Hurricane Florence from last September in the Carolinas, it is devastating. And people are still rebuilding and have not like like you. Yeah. Yeah. Still still waiting on a lot of a lot of work to get done. But you know what? I’m grateful and blessed to still have a roof over my head and we can live in our space so that that’s all good. Yeah, yesterday. I mean, when I say rebuilding, you weren’t destroyed. But you had you had damage damage in your in your apartment. What do you It’s a townhouse. Where do you have their townhouse? Condo. Thank you. Answer. Okay. That word eluded me. That’s a That’s an advance word from a condo. Right on your in your condo. Alright. So welcome back. It’s been many many months. I’m glad you’re back. Thank God you’re back. Um, so we’re talking about ethics? Um, what’s I mean? There is a lot of there’s a ton of private information and personal info, and you know, they have to be boundaries around what we collect and how we save what we do collect. That’s that’s issues here. Yes. So, you know, that’s definitely a lot of the issues here. You know, it’s it’s interesting because sometimes people will call me and they will say, You know, Maria, I need you to work up profiles, whatever these five or ten people we need, Thio know everything they’re interested in. You need to know their network on DH a sentence. They actually, as soon as they say that word network. I know that there’s a certain level of educating that I’m going to have to do even if I begin to start to work with this particular client. And and the reason for that is because what we as prospect researchers have access to, So whether you’re working for a small to midsize non-profit or you’re a college or university or ah ha, that all you have on ly to information that’s in the public domain. We do not have access to private information such as credit reports, right? So it’s important to make that distinction. Because when we’re looking at publicly available sources, we can never come up with a net worth. I don’t tell someone. Yeah, we’re going to get into detail on the Net worth conversation. I know you. Yeah, You specifically have wrote something on it. We’Ll get to that. Um but so let’s let’s let’s pursue what you just said about public versus private sources. I mean, I would think that when your clients hire you to do prospect research or when we task our prospect researchers if their in house, uh, we want all sources, whatever you can get it. Where did you get your hands on? No, right, that’s not so right. That’s that’s an uninformed doesn’t mean she can’t get your hands on. It might not be something that your organization would consider ethical. So an example of this might be, um, divorce records, right? So sometimes those be publicly access. However, think about this. If if you have to stop and think to yourself, how would how would this donor for a perspective donor-centric er ds. And if the answer to that is G, they might sever the relationship with our organization altogether. Then it’s simply not worth looking at those divorce records or even hey, even, maybe not. Maybe not be so extreme, but they would be upset that we were evaluating that. But But But But it has value. Okay, so let’s have a conversation. So I’m gonna push back. It has value to the organization. Um, if I’m trying to find out how much a person’s settlement is in a in a divorce, you know that that goes to what I think their capability is for giving to my organization. How much they gained or lost in a divorce is goingto figure into that calculus, all right, but just let’s say they’ve gained a million dollars from that divorce settlement. Are you entitled necessarily to that million dollars? It’s just like anybody making their money in any other way. Just because they have it doesn’t mean that they would want to gift any part of that settlement here working well, you, But you could say that about you could say that about anything. You could say that about their salary. Just because they make one hundred fifty thousand dollars a year doesn’t mean I’m entitled to any of it or one and a half million dollars a year. You could say that about anything, right? But that’s why I think you really want to rely more heavily on good old development, work and cultivation and developing a relationship and under standing what those people have an interest in funding on DH whether it’ll the lines properly rather than knowing the final settlement amount of what their divorces. Okay, But it’s still I mean, I I agree that it’s unseemly, but I’m I’m challenging it anyway because, uh, you’re stuck with me as the host. I mean, that’s the best. You’re the best reason I’ve come up with. So you’re stuck with it. You can either hang up or continue. It’s your choice on I’LL be fine without you. So don’t worry. You know, if you want to end up going so I mean, I’ll entertain myself. If nobody else, I just amuse myself. Um, no. Okay, so now but it’s still it goes to their potential. I mean, you’re you look at other sources of potential, right? Like like you public public public stock holdings, right? If the person happens to be an insider, you and I have talked about this, so this is not jargon jail material. You know, I’ve talked about this. If they’re an Insider Inc. Then their public, their their their stock holdings are public. That goes to their capacity to give. So why write? You have to find another reason why divorce settlement either gain or loss is not is not valuable info because because so far so far it’s analogous to a matter of public of insider stock. So when those when those insider stockholders file with the federal with the SEC right, the Securities and Exchange Commission, they know that this becomes part of a public filing that is completely searchable online, etcetera, etcetera. Operation will have it on their website. No eso again. It’s just what is the perception that they’re goingto have of you looking at the different types of records. So I think that again, and it’s just if your organization ends up having a policy that it’s perfectly fine to do that, then that’s fine. But I think that you do need to make a decision about you know if if are there certain types of records that you will consider off limits for your organization and just put a policy in place, whatever. Whatever way you decide to go, in the matter of, say, divorce records, for example, what’s another word not going against your policy? Do you think of another category of data? That’s Ah, a gray area. Um, you’re a professional, and you’re professional researcher. Yeah, well, you’ve been asked three years for other stuff that you felt uncomfortable with. Well, they’re what they’re I can remember one time in particular when I was researching an individual. Ah, that I decided not to put something in writing because I knew that the perspective donor-centric lorcan ization And this is this is across the board. You need to be aware of this, uh, altum non-profits do that. They could walk into your organization and say, Show me what you’ve amassed on the show Me any. Tell me my donor records. Show me my files. Right. Uh, so you need to be able to turn that over and know that they’ve been written in a very subjective and objective way. I’m sorry and not put anything subjective into it. No subjective statement. So, for example, there was something that I passed along to a development officer verbally, as opposed to putting it in writing, because I felt that it was going to potentially jeopardize our relationship that they were developing with that individual. However, it was very important that the development office, they’re new, that this person had insider trading and had done some paid a lot of fines for it in their background because they were considering this person as treasurer for the organisation Esso. I felt that it was my duty to toe let this officer know that this was in this person’s background because they just didn’t know that, right? Very Jermaine. Yeah, I think you might have used that as an example some other time for something else we talked about. That sounds familiar. Yeah, okay, but it’s a good one. It’s a poignant story. Okay, okay. All right, so So I. So I guess you’re saying divorce records. That’s the main. That’s the main thing that you find unseemly. And I do kind of like your standard do of what would if someone came in and read everything that we have on them. What would they say? How would they feel on that? That’s going to go to not only what you include, but how you describe it to how you describe your conversations with them. You know, you and I both agree that the best some of the best research, not all some of the best research comes from face to face meetings. How do you describe those meetings in your CR M after you’re back from the lunch or the dinner on DH? So thinking how the person would evaluate that feel about it could shade how you describe it? Okay, I gotto now. I just did a lot of talking. I gotta take a break. Hold on, Maria Simple. Stand by our last Break last break text to give you diversify your revenue by adding mobile e-giving. It is a misconception that this is only for disasters. That’s not true. You can build relationships by text. You do what you do it all the time with your family and friends. You can build relationships with donors as well. It’s very possible to do through texting. You learnt how, with the five part email, many course, um, to get into the many course you text NPR two four, four, four, nine, nine, nine. Now we gotta do the live listener, love. Ah, and it’s Ah, live listeners are in starting abroad. Seoul, Seoul, South Korea Gotta send annual haserot comes a ham Nida, of course, to Seoul Moscow, Russia Welcome Moscow on DH Hanoi Hanoi, Vietnam Sometimes Vietnam is with us, but we can’t see the city. But today we can we know. We know it’s Hanoi. Welcome, live! Listen, love to Vietnam and also Istanbul, Turkey. Very happy to have you with us Live love to you and Burundi. I’m sorry. We cannot see your city Brandy, but we know you are with us. So live love. I think that’s a first for burned e cool. And here in the U. S. Only couple Tampa, Florida Live love to you New York, New York Multiple love to see that. And on the heels of the live listen, love comes the podcast Pleasantry are pleasant trees. It’s multiple. There’s more than one listener podcast. In fact, they’re over thirteen thousand, so I can’t just send one pleasantry. The pleasantries to you so glad that you are with us. However, non-profit radio fits into your schedule. Pleasantries to you. Thank you for being with us on the podcast. Now, we’ve got lots more time for ethics in your prospect research. Um, anything you want to say, Marie Sample. I gave a big diatribe, and then I cut you off with a with a with a break. Anything you want to add or comment on About what I just said. Now, Now, I think I think we covered that in general. But I did want to spend a little bit of time talking about, you know, potential code of ethics that the organization might want to follow on where they could find some guidelines. Yes, you get your dirt free and dirt free. Resource is cheapen defremery everything. Okay, So there’s this awesome organization that you’ve heard me mention it before. That professional researchers prospect researchers either belong to it were at minimum, will adhere to their code of ethics and its apra a p r a. Dahna work. So that stands for the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement. And the thing about APRA is that they’ve got this page of their website that is actually dedicated to their statement of ethics. So it would be great if your listeners at least went to the after a website. Took a look at the ethics statement Whether or not you remember and really take a look at you know what is involved? What are the areas that you need to be aware of as you’re putting together your your code of ethics for your organization. And they’ve even got a wonderful ethics tool kit. A za pdf document that’s chock full of great resource is so I really would encourage your listeners to go check out our our listeners. Maria. Simple, please. You made that mistake. You made that part in that pronounced twice. I share the listselect hours. No ownership here. Yes. So I I went through. I was disappointed with the statement of ethics. I I found it kind of vague. However, the tool kit had the good examples. Like I was looking for examples. All right, um, of you know, they talk about, for instance, in the statement of ah, statement of ethics, they talk about bilich shall only record data that is appropriate to the fund-raising process. So I was thinking for I was looking for examples of what’s inappropriate, but it gets flushed out when you go to the when you go to the tool kit now, right? So let’s, uh let’s talk a little about Oso in the ethics statement, it suggests a couple things like you should not be. You should not be friending prospects that you’re doing research on with your personal accounts for one is that that’s right. Is that your statement? Yes, yes, that’s correct. And and also, you should be transparent when you are doing any type of research on behalf of your organization, right? So if you’re, uh if you’re if you’re calling somewhere to find out, you know, whatever. Somebody stop holdings are something like that, you know, in public stockholding records and and they ask you, you know who’s calling you. You have to be transparent as to who you are on DH, you know, and what organizations of your work you know as well. So you want to just make sure that your you do have maintained the standard. Okay, so So when you’re calling, you’re not just saying, uh, my name is Maria Simple, but you’re giving the name of the organization that you’re calling on behalf of two. Is that what you mean? Right? And quite frankly, it is rare that you’re going to be asked for, you know? So when they’re publicly source to information, they’re typically not going to be asking, you know who’s calling? I mean, I’ve never called. For example, if I can’t find information on tax assessment records, right or tax property tax records and I call it an assessor’s office, they’ve never really asked Who is this? Why are you asking? Because they know it’s publicly available information. They just give you the information that you’re looking for, you know, on that property record so you can call and ask about any property you know, anywhere in the United States, and you’d be able to get that information without being asked. But if in the in the event that you ever are rushed to be transparent, so the same goes on social media, right, um, you can That’s why you don’t want to make a fake profile. But I know I saw that. Yeah, people do that. You don’t want to make a fake Lincoln profile with the, you know, with the intention of trying to take all these people into becoming your first degree connections just so that you can reap all this wonderful information off their profile, right? Because now they might be okay. Here’s an interesting one. Suppose they’re talking about their divorce on, um, Now, don’t make it Facebook, because the likelihood of friending prospect on Facebook is pretty slim, I think. But let’s see. Well, wait. Now let’s see if they’re If they’re a fan of your organization Page, does their personal feed become visible to you? No. No, it doesn’t. No, no, it doesn’t work that way. Okay, but if they made any comments, you know, on DH, I got in. Any person would make a comment about their divorce, and I’m trying to I’m trying to make it more like trying to make it more likely. Okay. Suppose this supposes Twitter, Um, suppose you’re the organization is following them on Twitter. Um, and, uh, and there another bitter. Or maybe they’re ecstatic. Maybe they did great. You know, maybe the guy reaped a big reward. Um, it feels like he you know, he’s got over. So the guy or the woman is now bragging on Twitter and you’re following them. That’s that’s public now. Right now, it’s now it’s public. Now it’s public. So in my opinion, I think my fellow researchers would probably agree with this. It would be perfectly fine Teo to take a screenshot or quote what was said and then give attribution to the day, uh, that you saw this particular quote on Twitter. Ah, and but again write it in a very objective way. So you know you don’t write. You don’t introduce it by saying, you know, looks like metoo windfall in their divorce, as evidenced by the tweets. And, you know, just you know this so and so commented on their divorce by saying, you know, the couple was divorced, It would appear the divorce is final and the prospect had the following tweet regarding their divorce. Not now. Very objectively written. Okay, I agree. I see. Um, so going into the going into the er going to the tool kit? Um, they said something about list sharing that I was surprised by, um, list sharing. Never share lists with volunteers, key stakeholders, um, etcetera, etcetera. But But they were saying they said volunteers and key stakeholders. But we’ve talked about Andi. I’ve had other guests to talk about sharing lists with board members. But but this opportunity, it says you shouldn’t be sharing this with volunteers and key stakeholders. What do you make of that? Yes, so again have a very clear policy in place. So if your organization’s policy would be that the only stakeholders who would have access to discussion of proactively created list would be boardmember and state that on DH, then maybe put together ah, confidentiality confidentiality policy for your volunteers board members on employees. Also, by the way, on DH, we could talk a little bit later about a particular organization that has an excellent example of those types confidentiality agreements. But if you are going to start doing that type of list creation, discussion of lists or even quite frankly, discussion of any prepared profiles that you have on individuals, it’s going to be a good idea. Tto have thes confidentiality policies in place. Okay, okay, shut out the organization now go ahead. The one that has good, good examples. What right? And so there’s one called the National Council of non-profits. Ah, and the the way I actually got to their their confidentiality agreement was actually through through the two tool kit and through operas website. So that would be a really good place for you to start. And then, you know, get your way over to those agreements that they get very good samples that you could literally just, you know, very easily modify, um, plug in the name of your organization, you know, run it by your attorneys to make sure that being the language would be appropriate for your organization and then actually have these folks sign it. So, Fury, let’s say you’re only going to have the Development committee is going to be the only folks that have access to any, uh, any of these profiles or these lists that you create and make sure that everybody on that development committee, whether they be a boardmember or outside the board, you might have you might have some outside boardmember is also involved in development efforts. Have them sign the agreement as well. And then these documents have to be treated properly after they’re after there. You set the board meeting, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. If you decide to print anything out, be extremely careful about what happens with those documents. Try not to let any of them walk out of the room, make sure you’ve got a shredder in house. The last thing you want is for something to go into the trash and, you know, or recycling or whatever and then get, you know, literally the wind blow it around the neighborhood. So did you want to be careful? And even though it’s all publicly sourced information, still, it is something that, uh, that they were accepted the donor or perspective donor. You know, out there in aggregate, it could be a lot more valuable than individual discrete pieces of data that people have to go and find on, especially when it’s a list of fifty potential major donors, etcetera or even foundations. All right, I want to give you a shout out. You are. You are named in the Capital kit because you wrote an article about being more than networth for from non-profit times and we so So you already already explained why you need need no liabilities, not just assets if you if you’re going to do real net worth. But they shot you out in the tool kit. So I wanted to mention that. Okay, wait. Just have thiss flies, but it always does with you. So we just have, like, thirty seconds left. Um, wrap us up. Okay. So to wrap this up, then you’ve got all this wonderful information. Make sure that it is stored in a secure way. Locked file, password protected files if you you share it through e mail. Make sure through password protected, encrypted ways that you’re communicating this thes profiles and so forth on. So make sure that the data is all security in some way. Ah, if your whatever you’re using Teo as your cr m Teo donorsearch software, make sure it’s password protected. And I know exactly who has access to those passwords, then change them often. Thank you very much. Maria. Simple. She is the Prospect Finder trainer and speaker on Prospect Research are doi and of their cheapened free you’ll find her at the prospect finder dot com And at Marie, a simple thank you again. Maria, Thank you for having me. Good to see you again. Thanks. My pleasure. Next week, more from the non-profit technology conference. If you missed any part of today’s show, I beseech you find it on tony. Martignetti dot com were sponsored by pursuing online tools for small and midsize non-profits, data driven and technology enabled Tony dahna slash pursuing by witness Deepa is guiding you beyond the numbers when you’re cps dot com and by text to give mobile donations. Made Easy text. NPR to four four four nine nine nine A Creative producers. Claire Meyerhoff Sam Liebowitz is the line producer show. Social Media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our Web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein be with me next week for non-profit radio. Big non-profit Ideas for the other ninety five percent Go out and be great. You’re listening to the talking alternate network e-giving Good. You’re listening to the Talking Alternative Network. Are you stuck in a rut? Negative thoughts, feelings and conversations got you down. Hi, I’m nor in Sumpter potentially ater. Tune in every Tuesday at nine to ten p. M. Eastern Time and listen for new ideas on my show yawned potential Live life your way on talk radio dot N Y c 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. Yeah, Theo. Best designs for your life start at home. I’m David here. Gartner interior designer and host of At Home Listen, Live Tuesday nights at eight p. M. Eastern Time As we talk to the very best professionals about interior design and the design, that’s all around us right here on talk radio dot N. Y c. You’re listening to Talking Alternative Network at www dot talking alternative dot com now broadcasting twenty four hours a day. If are you a conscious co creator, Are you on a quest to raise your vibration and your consciousness? Sam Liebowitz, your conscious consultant and on my show, that conscious consultant, our awakening humanity. We will touch upon all these topics and more. Listen live at our new time on Thursdays at twelve noon Eastern time. That’s the conscious consultant. Our Awakening Humanity. Thursday’s twelve noon on talk radio dot You’re listening to the Talking Alternative network oppcoll

Nonprofit Radio for November 2, 2018: Working Virtual & Map Your Data To Your Audiences

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Heather Martin & Alice Hendricks: Working Virtual
We talk through the issues encountered when managing remote staff: technological; generational; emotional; measurement; recruiting and retaining. Our panel is Heather Martin from Interfaith Family and Alice Hendricks with Jackson River. (Recorded at #18NTC, the Nonprofit Technology Conference.)

 

 

Courtney Clark & David Mascarina: Map Your Data To Your Audiences
Feed your folks the data they crave. Courtney Clark and David Mascarina have identified 5 audience types and their data needs. She’s with Forum One and he’s from the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation. (Also recorded at #18NTC.)

 

 

 

 

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

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Hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I’m your aptly named host. Oh, i’m glad you’re with me. I’d be hit with strep. Oh, simba, leah if i had to read that you missed today’s show working virtual we talk through the issues encountered when managing remote staff technological, generational, emotional measurement, recruiting and retaining. Our panel is heather martin from inter faith family and alice hendricks with jackson river. I was recorded at eighteen ntcdinosaur non-profit technology conference and map your data to your audiences. Feed your folks the data they crave. Courtney clarke and david mask arena have identified five audience types and their data needs she’s with forum one and he’s fromthe conrad and hilton foundation that’s also recorded at eighteen. Auntie si, tony, take two who’s on first, we’re sponsored by pursuant full service fund-raising david driven and technology enabled tony dahna slash pursuant capital p well, you see, piela is guiding you beyond the numbers. Wagner, cps dot com bye! Tell us attorney credit card processing into your passive revenue stream. Tony dahna slash tony tell us and by text to give mobile donations made. Easy text npr to four, four, four, nine, nine, nine. Here’s working virtual welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntc non-profit technology conference twenty eighteen we’re coming to you from the convention center in new orleans second interview of the second day of our coverage all our ntcdinosaur interviews are sponsored by network for good, easy to use dahna management and fund-raising software for non-profits my guests right now are heather martin, ceo of inter paid family, and alice hendricks, ceo of jackson river. Heather alice, welcome. Thank you. Welcome to non-profit radio. What have you wanted to be here? How’s? The conference going for you ladies? Great. Have you done? Yeah. Excellent. Okay, great. Next one. That goes good. Superlative. Have you done your session yet? We did. We were on yesterday morning. Okay. So, it’s all relaxing now? Right now, we’re just partying. Drinks last night. Exactly. Okay, all right. Your workshop topic is working virtual attracting and managing the best talent. I’m sure we have stats on how many organs non-profits have virtual employees. Or at least what the trends are. It’s it’s obviously growing. It’s really growing wouldn’t be here. And not only in the nonprofit world in the for-profit world as well, and especially in tech. Yeah, okay, absolutely it’s becoming it because of the technology that can enable easily to work from home, your chat technologies, videoconferencing, it’s become a thing and everyone is doing it now on exploring whether it works for their organizations a lot. Let me dive into the word, everyone not to quibble with you at all, but i was thinking generationally, are there fifty and sixty some things that are comfortable working, being virtual? Not well, maybe we’ll get to whether they’re comfortable having virtual employees. They will get to that. My voice is cracked like i’m fourteen get that, but how about being virtual employees themselves? Are they comfortable? I’m over fifty, so include myself in that? Are we comfortable doing that? Or, you know, i think it actually depends on the organization and it’s really dependent on the organization making the employees comfortable, and so i’m not sure i don’t know if you have any stats, but i don’t know from an age perspective, there’s a very good question about an older generation being comfortable having virtual employees under the managing them, however, as being the virtual employee, i think it’s all about how the organisation sets it up. Okay. Excellent. All right, so that there’s promised them for those fifteen. Sixty something? Absolutely. Okay. Okay, let’s, talk about it. Since since we’re skirting around it, how about comfort or discomfort with having employees being virtual when you’re over fifty? So i again, i i think that there might be an age discrepancy in the comfort, but i also think it’s just personality, and i’m finding that when i talked to a lot of people who are looking to work virtual and they’re asking me, what can i do to go to my manager, my supervisor and quote unquote, sell them on me working virtually my answer to them is find out what the resistance is. There is part of the resistance as we’ve always done it this way i need to see my employees to know that they’re working. And how do you get around that? Some of the key things that we talked about in our session are setting very clear goals and making sure that those goals are being met. But let’s, go to alice talk to flush out the gold. Gold setting a little. Yeah, i mean, i think that there’s not that much difference in terms of goal setting in terms of accountability for delivery, bols, that you’re supposed to be doing so used that the real issue is communication making sure you have a structure where there’s frequent communication and proof that you’re doing the delivery ble. So you’re measured not on a punch clock style of i get to work at nine. And i leave at five. And therefore i must have worked during that eight hour period you’re measured based on what is the work you were set out to do. And did you actually do that work in the time period? I said i would do it. So if you’re a project manager are working on a program area you work with your you work with your supervisor on here, the things that i’m going to get done at a particular time. And if that’s not done that’s ah, that that could be a concerned that’s a problem, but that’d be a problem in the non workplace too, but rather than time. It’s mostly based on work product. Okay, okay. So that should apply even if you don’t have any virtual, i think one of the things we found is that working virtually is this, or managing virtually is the same as managing in an office. But you just have to be much more intentional about what you’re doing. Much more intentional about your communication, understanding that you’re not gonna have that water cooler conversation, that someone’s not going over here. Something and understand where you are in a project and b ready to communicate with those people who are not physically in the office. But the management and the psychology of the management is very similar. Okay, it’s, very valuable, you know, and make explicit. Yeah. How about attracting people, teo a virtual or attracting the right talent so that we’re comfortable that they’re gonna work in this work environment? What do you, what you thought? Well, there’s. Two thoughts on that that i have one is what one is that your talent pool is the entire country or world, should you see fit? And there are wonderfully talented people in places that aren’t in the city or town in which your organization is located, and it gives you this ability to recruit from a wide place. And you can also hyre incredibly talented people from who have a wonderful life style. In a less cost of in my organization, we have people who live in a lower cost of living state than washington, d c where were based, and that allows me to provide a living wage and for my employees in that. But the other thing is just you, when you’re recruiting, you have to be very mindful of the interview process, and i think one of the things we talked about in our session was helping people figure out who these folks, how well they’ll respond to working virtually how do you do that in an interview? Yeah, who’s best with that, heather so so some of the things that that we recommend, some of the things that we recommend is number one, we use technology as a tool to enhance communication in a virtual environment. So sometimes you’re using video comp, renting just for a regular meeting, and you’re talking through instant messenger and there’s other ways you’re using technology. So in the interview process, i always recommend that people use the technology that you’re going to require those employees to be using during their job if they can’t do an interview on skype or zoom or appearance and it’s very uncomfortable, it’s not to say that that might not be a good employee for you, but you have to be aware that there might need to be some training or development on that tool for them and no going. Into that is important when you’re hiring that person, and if you see generally a discomfort with technology that’s a pretty big red flag, or or or a red flag that you might need to overcome or that person’s not right for the position, and then the other question is some positions just don’t lend themselves to working virtually, and you have to be aware of that when you’re hiring also what are from? Well, one of the easiest ones that we look at it if you’re an office manager and you’re managing the physical office days, it’s really difficult to be virtual when you need thio notice that there’s a crack in the ceiling where the vendor needs toe, you know, deliver something and be their way. We don’t have a tool for measuring the coffee level. Zack remotely happen. And now there’s an app for that you can probably it’s time for a break pursuing they’re e book is fast non-profit growth stealing from the start ups. They want you to see this because they’ve taken the secrets from the fastest growing startups and applied those to your non-profit it’s free as all the pursuant resource is, are you accustomed to that? Come on, it doesn’t even bear saying it’s on the listener landing page that’s at do you know where tony dahna slash pursuant capital p for please now back to working virtual or any others that stand out to you? I think it depends on the industry and what the job you’re doing. If you’re someone who does intake or you have to be there to welcome people into the office, you need someone physically there. There may be hybrids where sometimes people could work in the office and sometimes people could work from home. And i think thinking this through before you moved to a virtual environment or virtual job for that specific role is ki you can’t just say, ok, tomorrow we’re just gonna go virtual zoho alice, how do you how do you create this environment? Gonna be hospitable? Toe virtual? I mean it’s all about culture. You have to create a culture where everyone is communicating well with each other, where people know what the expectation is on response times of communication has got to start at the top. It has to start a willingness that you absolutely to accommodate virtual employees. Okay, so it starts there and how does that how does the ceo trickling down? You adhere to it. So rather than walking from my office into someone else’s office and telling them what i think they should know that maybe two other people who aren’t physically, they’re also need to know i will do that on a slack channel, for example. So i’ll use an instant messenger chat program, and i’ll put them all on the channel and talk to them all together at once, even though you were the mark, even if that’s the situation. Yeah, because it requires amount of discipline because you don’t want to leave people out. The interstitial conversation that happens at the water cooler can also be done virtually and that’s pretty important, too. Okay. All right. We’re going to get the tools you mentioned. Slack, slack channel. Is that that it’s? All okay, okay. A chat. It’s. Simple chance a chance. A chance for you. You’re over my head, but i’m trainable. Alt-right i could be a virtual employees trust way. Mind of some technology challenges there, but we could get there. I’ll be there immediately. Got the radio stuff? Yeah. I’m very good at that. I mean, i got knobs and everything in front of buttons and all. I don’t know what they do. Okay, what else? Uh, anything else about creating the environment, making inhospitable? I think some of the things that seem or some of the other things are making sure that your remote employees have the tools, whether it’s, the technology or even a monitor to go along with that laptop that you’ve given them because some some people who go into a new job, they’re given a laptop, they say work from home and it’s not as easy as just is your home office conducive and being able to help them think through what are the things that they need to set up in a virtual environment to make them successful and effective at what they’re doing. We talked about it a little bit about security and knowing what the security measures are. You can’t go into a coffee shop and work from your computer. Number one. Are you on the y fire you on the public wifi? Are you on a virtual private network? Are you using your hot spot? You’ve to go the bathroom and your computer’s sitting in starbucks do you leave it there and ask the person next youto watch your computer while you go to i mean, we set policies around these things, especially in organizations that have a lot of regulations on data and accessibility for their information. These are things you have to think about when you’re creating a virtual environment. Okay? It could be hip, baby what’s the credit card p c m p c i b c i okay, what do you do when you’re at starbucks alone? You’re on you’re on a vpn virtual private network? Yeah, you have to go the bathroom. You gotta close up. You use the diaper changing table in and you pull it down in the restroom and put your laptop on that. Take care of your business. Okay? It’s? Very. You know, i love the ditty gritty. This are listen, i mean, we’re all about real life here. Way need detail. You need clear policies around policies that people sign and everyone is very well aware of what the security policies, our protection use of technology. You said the company’s versus your pride, your personal technology home versus away from home. Okay, all right. Help me out here. Getting else what else belongs all this? What else belongs in our policy? Well, so there’s, we’re talking about there’s communication policies. How? I mean, one of the things that we found when we first started having more virtual employees. We started as an in office, evan was in the office, and as we grew into different communities, we had employees in different cities and states than our headquarters were located in and things like when i sent an email, i just need you to acknowledge that the email resent if you’re in the office and i send you an e mail and you haven’t responded, i could walk into your office and say, hey, you get my e mail even if you’re not ready to respond to it. I know you’ve gotten it, and by five o’clock that day, i’ll get an answer when someone’s virtual and you send an e mail, you have no idea if it got lost, did it go into their spam and you have to get some kind of communication with one quick got it. So we said a communication policy that says if i asked you something or requested something, you send an email back saying, i got it, and i’ll get back to you by wednesday period the end it’s all set, and so that that you need to be very much more aware of those types of things and other community way have communication policies that go along with that. Okay, alice, you want teo or policy statement? I mean, the security, i think, is the most important, you know, the email security, the hacking potentials. You know what happens also, when someone is let go, the lockout procedures, they have access to all of your systems, and they’re, you know, in north dakota somewhere to coffee shop, you have to shut down all of their access to things. So all of that needs to be planned at the level in the company. What are you going to do and how you handling staff with remote devices? Can we do this if we don’t have a dedicated staff person? And we don’t have a dedicated staff person? Yes, face-to-face so the family says the answer is yes, okay, because are you know, we’re small and midsize non-profits in this audience, listeners. So you you on board someone with technology when they leave, you do the same thing on lee with a virtual person, you don’t physically have them there, and so you have to do the same thing you would do if someone was in the office, but make sure you couldn’t do it while they’re not physically there. How did they get your computer back to you? Do they fedex it to you? Are you going to go pick it up somewhere if they’re not there? And so just those types of things need to be thought through, okay? No. Excellent. I love the policy statement details because this is stuff you have to think through, and then alice to your point, has to be activated, implemented on from the top absolutely can’t just have a policy and ignore it. You know, if if it’s the ceo hyre it’s a sea level person whose whose distant you know, they too have to say, i got your e mail and i’ll get back to you by wednesday, everybody has to play by the same rules. There shouldn’t be exceptions or any accommodations or anything else. Yeah. Okay, um, how about let’s talk about some of the needs that your remote staff has we’ve been talking about managing the office? What what special needs to the people? But we only see a couple of times a year that’s a great question, okay? I mean, i think they way it took that long, they need community, they need a partner, they need a buddy, they need to know that they’re not all alone. I’m so frequent meetings daily standup calls on dh heather’s organization native oppcoll standup called well, it’s a it’s, a phrase for a daily time when you just spend fifteen minutes sort of roll going around the company’s saying who’s doing what that day or our a team, if you’re working on a project together, you know everyone’s together on either a video chat or a conference call, or it could even be during us dahna slack channel or a skype group or a google hangout, or any type of technology that people can come together for a period of time. The more frequent that happens, the more connected they feel, and there is an issue of feeling lonely, it’s not that you’re just going off on your back room and typing all day long on your own, you need to be part of a community and part of a team. And the technology helps enable that. And heather’s organization there’s you do? What is it a buddy? So anyone who is new who comes on board there’s a couple things we do one is, no matter what level you’re at, you come to boston for a couple days, toe on board. You actually see physical people that’s probably essential. It’s, really? It was one of like he learnings when i started working virtually is to know that there’s a physical person and a physical space or just seeing meeting someone face-to-face gives you much more of a connection to them immediately. The other thing we do is when we hire people we kind of give them we give them a partner. So we hyre associate director her in l a and we put them with the associate director in atlanta. This is not a mentor. This is not a supervisor. This is someone you can ask the dumb questions too. Like, how do i get my expenses paid? Or i’m sure they told me this during orientation, but i don’t know what. To do about x, y and z and just having that person that you know you can go to is critical, especially when you’re by yourself in an office or in your home, and you’re trying to go up the learning curve of starting a new job. Okay? All right? What else? Uh, anything else to be a empathetic to our remote employees again, this is a typical management. I would say this you should be doing this any time is just everyone’s intent is good. Assume that is good and there’s a good intent all all the time. That could be that that that’s going to have implications for chatting any female? No, you can’t you’ll never hear the well, not never, but most of the communications you’re not going to hear the inflection in the person you don’t see the sometimes you don’t see the physical, you don’t see the physical, you don’t get the inflection, and so before you jump into anything or someone sent and i get this all the time and sends me an email and says i need blank, well, that could be taken in so many different ways. Are you demanding something from me did ice not get you something there’s so much in just those three words? And so my first thing is tio okay, they have good intentions. Let me follow-up you need blank by when? What is this for? Get mohr information, they’re not now. They could be like you haven’t done something, i need it now and could be screaming it could be screaming at you with the default is the default is not do that and what we do actually, as we have everyone’s created communications charter that says how they like to be interacted with. And so i understand if you are one of these people who sends very short emails, i also have the flipside where someone sends me seven paragraph emails to describe one thing. And so if i understand how you interact, i could read that email with that understanding, not teo immediately assume that you’re yelling at me in the e mails. Excellent. Okay, very valuable. Are anything else? Anything else to be supportive again? Empathetic to the remote employees if we covered it, recovered it? But i want to make sure we’re the only other thing i can think of is definitely getting together at least once a year with the whole team culture building wants that, yeah, it’s tough, it’s, tough in a non-profit environment where you’ve got a very tight budget, but we have prioritized and all in person meeting in boston, so we’ve got staff in california, in chicago, in atlanta and philadelphia. We make sure that we try in our budgeting process to bring everyone to boston for two days during the summer, not only for good brainstorming and thinking and strategy conversations, but also so they can connect with each other and have that community and build that in person conversation and feel comfortable with each other, and you feel like once a year is sufficient, you know, if i had the budget to do it more, i want a little longer, but all of that, yes. And so you have to take it for one of the that the tools that we talk about is the airplane. I mean, yes, it’s expensive, but it’s a really helpful tool to really get past some of the boundaries that are put up when you don’t actually physically meet in person. Alice, do you have a virtual employees also? Jackson river, thirty thirty. Thirty. Revoting entire organization is ritual. Oh, my god. Okay, where’s, the is there a physical office? There is a physical office with three people in washington d c yeah, but so we all behave as if were virtual. And there are many days that i don’t go into the office so in it. So you know, it saves a lot of money and transportation costs. It stays dry cleaning bills for everyone. It saves child care expenses. If you know it’s a very great way to have a lifestyle. Because yu yu have that flexibility, there’s also downsides to it. There are days that i wake up in the morning at six a, m and check email and all the sudden it’s too. And i haven’t eaten breakfast yet. And then i’m until six at night. So you know it’s a the same type of work-life integration needs to happen in a virtual environment as well as a physical office space. You know, you need to know how to take a break. You mentioned saving childcare expenses. So so the the remote employee it needs to be understood that the remote employee may not be immediately accessible right for a quick, you know, for for a last minute way gotta talk right now. So i think it’s about have something going on that is going to hold him up for ten or fifteen way try and make sure that people have adequate coverage to do their job during the day, the hours that they need to work. So we have a lot of employees that are at thirty hours a week because they want to spend more time with their families. Um, older children can be met at the bus stop and take care of themselves for a few hours in the afternoon, but the expectations of performance are still there. You know, we’re pretty high street standards of that, you know, we don’t want you to be distracted from your work. He managed the west coast versus east coast. Well, what is the west coast people have to do? The westfield people have to start at six a m local time. I think a lot of people do different policies on that. Our policy is that you work for the day that work the business day in the time zone in which you live. So it’s, sometimes hard if we’re dealing with europe and the west coast at at the same time because the time zones i don’t overlap is, well, every boy’s in europe, we don’t have employees in your body to have clients in europe. So it’s ah it’s a situation where we have to manage that, but there are organizations that have west coast people working east coast, ours you have that way don’t have explicit policy that you work those hours, but we ask people how early on the west coast, how early would you be willing to have a meeting? So we will not set meetings with some people? Some people are early morning people and they would rather work from seven to three rather than nine to five, and so we’ll work with your schedule individually and so we so there are some meetings i will have on the west coast is seven o’clock in the morning, but that’s due to that person willing to do that, we have a few minutes left still let’s talk about some of the tech tech tools back-up that was i gotta ask you about slack. But what? Black dot com how? Do we find it or what you do for us? Blackbaud comets, how you find it, you know, it’s it’s equivalent to skype or there’s google chat any type of chat software where everyone can log into and then there’s you can make groups in them. So the term for a group in slack is called a channel. And in our organization we have a channel for one of the channels is named lunch and if you’re going to be away for twenty minutes are going to lunch. We just take we just like everyone who’s in the company on that channel and say, hey, stepping away for a bit, i’ll be back in half an hour so we are all know it’s almost a cz though you would see me walk out the door, you know, and i instead of walking out the door i’m just telling that channel what’s happening there’s channels for each project also. So slack is a good one. Scott argast black is already a verb. Just like someone you’d like someone it’s a verbal. You skype someone you trust someone. Do you remember a well, instant messenger? That that was a one man was that you could use that well, i was. But okay, so slack for for chatting. A quick, quick chat about document sharing is simple google docks or something better. It’s a simple a school back and microsoft has a great year. We have this product microsoft’s one dr sharepoint microsoft suite has has a document sharing software. Ah, cloud based saving system skype is now skype for businesses and integrated with it. And so we’re using that in the office and then there’s there’s a ton of independent ones out there. And it’s, whether it’s, videoconferencing or it’s document sharing or it’s chatting there’s a ton out there. And i think it could be overwhelming. And for us it was evaluating what was best for our organisation and what our upper management was able. Teo use we talked about this before is modeling the behavior you want from your staff and so getting upper management on board was key. So one of our project management software we use a sauna, and we’ve tried three or four of them and our ceo like hassan, and so if she was going to use a sauna, we’re all going to use this on you and so i think that’s really important. It’s got to be easy to use and work for your organization. Calenda ring simple is good calendar ring, yet you have any other tools besides google calendar? We’re using outlooks calendar. Yeah, okay. Microsoft again. Yeah. All right. I think what other categories we need. Teo a video chat video is really important to scrape. A couple couldn’t do one on video with skype you khun duvette dio with google hangouts, but any time you can actually have an opportunity to see someone’s face and most of the calls we try to do as videos on dh, we find that that works really well. River again, the sense of community and if you can’t get together, that’s almost the next best thing and video has come a long way. The technology is more seamless than ever before, and so at least you’re seeing the person you might not get all of the nuance of the physical that that’s in the room. But you can see it in emotion or you can see a reaction to something which is super helpful or their cat walking of the cat we could get a lot of pets walking in front of the camera while people are on video that’s gonna be a lot of fun to talk about cats, but, you know, you have thirty virtual employees. You have fun doing it. I mean, oh, it’s awesome. Oh, it’s completely awesome is i love it. And well, you know, the best thing is that that people have really formed strong relationships with each other, they when you ask them what they like most about working here is they say each other, they say the people i’m here because i have connected relationships with other people on the team and to be able to create a culture where people feel connected to each other in a remote environment is is like, that’s the thing i’m most proud of, anything we’ve ever done, it doesn’t have to do their software product or what we’ve done to impact non-profits is the fact that we’ve had a culture of people that have had a wonderful time working and doing productive, impactful things. Jackson river always had a largest proportion of employees virtual from the beginning, when the beginnings and the culture to start about about it in the family way started as a two and a half person organization in the same way got to probably about eight to ten people in the office. And then our growth took us into different cities and communities. And that’s when we became virtual because of the growth, and so were probably half in the office in boston. And then half of our staff is outside and there’s one or two people in a city by themselves. We’re gonna leave it there. Excellent. Very much. Thank you. Alright. They are heather martin, ceo of interfaith family and alice hendricks, ceo of jackson river. This interview sponsored by network for good, easy to use dahna management and fund-raising software for non-profits. And this is tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntc ladies. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Way. We need to take a break. Wagner, cps. Do you need help with your nine? Ninety or your brooks? Are your brooks or your books of those books? And brooks properly managed? Well, i could help you with the books. Eyes financial oversight in place so that your money isn’t going to fly out the door over the brook talkto wagner, partner, eat huge tomb. I’ve gotten to know him. I trust him. He’ll be honest about whether wagner is able to help you. You know where to go. Wagner, cps dot com now, tony steak too. I was at the lou costello statue in paterson, new jersey. Remember lou costello of abbott and costello and who’s on first. So what’s the connection, i hope, you know what’s on first is you’ve got to know that i mean who’s on first. Now who’s, what’s on second. I don’t know’s on third. I hope you know what i’m talking about. The connection is you gotta have some sense of history because this this comedy routine and the abbott and costello you they were from the forties, and if you want to be really successful, implant giving and you going to be actively talking to planned giving donors, you need to have some sense of history from the forties or fifties and vietnam. My video is that tony martignetti dot com now it’s time to map your data to your audience. Nces, welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntcdinosaur the twenty eighteen non-profit technology conference day two we’re kicking off our date to coverage with courtney clarke and david mask arena all of our eighteen ntcdinosaur views are sponsored by network for good, easy to use donor-centric software for non-profits courtney clarke. Hello. Hello to you. Welcome. Let me give you a proper introduction. David, you could say hello. Hello, david. Mastering it from the convent and hilton foundation introduced himself. All right, david happens to be the digital communications manager at the conrad hilton foundation. And courtney clarke is managing director of user experience forum one. Welcome. Good morning. Thanks for having us kicking off. Thanks for kicking off with us. Hey, happy to be here. You’re workshop topic is data and audience connecting to create impact. Okay, let’s, start with you. David. What do you think? Non-profits aren’t getting quite right in this subject. Like, why do we need this workshop? To be honest with you, tell you, please beyond yeah, don’t wear really blunt with the arika there’s a lot of data collection that’s happening in the nonprofit sector, but people don’t really do anything with it. There’s like a statistics where it’s like a very, very small percentage of non-profits you do something with data? And, you know, for example, there’s so many data points that in any day, that non-profit collectibe we have overload, i mean, really was data over there’s like there’s, like this just beautiful dash was like, what do we do with this? You have to stay close to michael, okay? All right, so we’re overloaded. So courtney, what we’re trying to do and have you had your workshop yet? Yes, we had it yesterday, so you’re on the downside. Yeah, this is easy for you. So what you were doing and then? And what we’re going to do now is trying make sense of data that well don’t feel overloaded. Well, it’s, it’s mostly around communicating data and really being clear about who your audiences are when you’re doing that cause we have identified five different data, sort of consumers or data people who will consume your data, but they all need different amounts of information, different formats. So for example, like a data consumer, this is like an interested person in the public. Maybe they’re a news consumer. They don’t have a lot of domain knowledge always, and they don’t have a lot of data skills, so what, you’re giving them is going to be very different than, say, a policy maker or a date. A producer. Okay, someone who’s more in depth in the details of it already knows, has has a yeah, you’ve identified let’s. Take it from there. We’ve identified five different audiences. Is that right? That’s? Different, different types of audiences. Okay, what are what are the five? We should start there. Yeah. That’s okay, what? Five? I’ll start. Okay. The next one. So data consumer two and then three e before there’s a ping pong tournament here. But we’re not. We’re not going out today. Okay, fair enough. So first is i mentioned the data consumer. This is i hate it when people say general public, because here you’re not really targeting everyone in the whole world. So let’s be a little bit more specific news consumers, people who are already interested a little bit. Okay, okay. Like i said, not a lot of dough mean knowledge. Not a lot of data skill. What you’re calling this group the data consumer. So this is the person you’re like scrolling through your news feed you’re looking at your phone. Ahn, do you see an instagram? Post or something on facebook, or even in the press in the news. And what do you see? You see an infographic that’s, simple right language that’s easy to understand. The point is very clear. That’s for the data consumer. They don’t have a lot of power, but there are a lot of those people. Okay? Hey, name another one. The next one is the data actor. So this is who everybody is targeting. This is decision makers, policymakers on dh. These folks may have some domi. Knowledge may have a lot of durney domain knowledge, but they don’t have time. So even if they do have dana skills, the ability to analyze and understand massive amounts of data didn’t have time to do that. They have analysts who are helping them do that sort of thing. But very important people. They have the staff, they have the cloud. They have our policymakers decision. Is that right? Yeah. Okay. Okay, david, just give us our remaining three. So, of course, to consume someone has to share it. So you got a date? A promoter. So these were the bloggers he got you get the journalist. The advocacy for folks. This software developers, the entrepreneur. So these people are the ones who are, like projecting that data out there so that the consumer and the actor be able to see that. And then you have the analyst, which is very, very important a lot. You missed this one too. It’s, like now i have all these data is beautifully being shared out being read, who in a way is a domain expert, this staffer that’s going to be able to analyze and help advice, what to do with the data. And then finally, the researcher you got, you know, these air, the phd folks, these are you know, i was talking about like jin ho was their learning officer, that comet and hilton foundation she’s a researcher, and we recently did a site visit nairobi, kenya, for one of our grantees, shopko shining hope for community and they have rich, rich data they’re collecting around there, committing kibera and compare, by the way, is the largest of informal settlement in africa and think about, like, a size of, you know, central park in a compressor that seven thousand people and there’s so much data that they’re collecting about the community and helping them with their health care and, you know, with an education and such and community services in the way when she’s taught dana, she was just, like, drooling all over it. But she’s, like, i want to do something that and she’s such an academic she just wants to, like, basically designed something around it. So these air, like the data modelers is with the academics of phd folks that will help let’s take the data to a new level. Alright, much so our audience is small and midsize. Yeah, non-profit twelve thousand. So we’re talking a lot of people there in small, small and midsize shop. Yeah, they need to identify which of these audiences they’re talking to some some may never be talking to to the researcher, right? Or the or the data actor. They might not be doing lobbying, so they may not be. So you have to identify which audiences you’re talking to, right? You guys hear me? Okay. And your headsets? Yeah. Yeah. Okay, good. I don’t hear myself too well, but as long as you hear me, ok, you have to identify who you’re talking to you and then okay, so so i guess we’re going to get through now there are different data needs different ways of conversing about data with data to each of these different audience that’s right? You don’t have that, right? Yes, we’re mapping needs and method to the five different audiences and the knowledge that they have tio and the time, right? So i mentioned the policymaker. They may have some expertise. They don’t have time right on time, don’t time like the researcher. Whereas the researchers, like, get out of my way. Just give me the spreadsheet, all query my own database, okay? And then also in the spirit of being totally honest, so they have to be honest with yourself who you’re going to deliver the data to, like. If it’s your board, it’s your board and it’s. Okay, you know, and some people are like, oh, this is only for one very specific orders and that’s. Good, you know, because they’re being very, very honest with yourself. Okay, very good. So let’s, start with the ones that are most likely for a small and midsize not to be talking. So certainly data consumer. Yeah. That’s your nose. Your nose could be your donors. I know you’re not calling your donor’s, maybe even just board members. Okay? Data actor. Maybe it could be any decision maker that could be your board as well. It could be. It could be your boss. It could be somebody who is influencing budgets influencing programming. This is the person who has the power to make a change. So it’s therein you figure out which ones were going teo so they’re they’re in data promoter. That could be a journalist. Yes. Right. So that’s potential. The analyst remind me. What’s what’s the likelihood of a small mid size shot talking to the analyst sometimes yeah, for smaller medium non-profit portable. Forget it. Yeah, yeah. Bonem altum but scale that xero scales up now we’re not going right. We’re not going treatable, but let’s, just talk about it, okay? I think what i think what’s different, though, for smaller midsize non-profits is that the people listening may be the ones doing the analysis themselves. They may not have a supper analyst. Okay. Yeah, and many came from currently hilton foundations. They get smaller foundation. And a lot of us were multiple hats. So someone might be liberta both, but yet, yet they still move every important. Okay? They’re all in. Okay? Yeah. All right. So what do we do for the data consumer? How do we have a retailer to that audience? Yeah. They’re a couple of key things. That’s. What we need. Yeah. So one is use plain language when you’re communicating to them, they may not know who you are, what you do, why it matters. Plain language is really key. Sometimes people get a little too marketing me. Sometimes they get a little too research. E you need to be able to say what you want to say in a really simple visual with some simple language like you’re talking to your friends. Yeah, we were at a dinner party. You’ve got ten seconds to explain what this is and what matter-ness schooling for. Graphic. That will do it for you or something like that, right? Or even just like a data point point. Okay, we got to take a break. Tell us, for pete’s sake, think of the companies you can refer and start asking them that’s the first step. Well, actually, the first step is watching the video. Then you start referring the companies and talking. To them, you’ve heard the testimonials from the charity’s. You’ve heard the testimony from the companies. It’s. Time to get that long stream of passive revenue for yourself. Start with the video. That is the first step video. Is that tony dot, m a slash tony tello’s. Now back to courtney clarke and david mask arena from eighteen. Ntc what’s. The summary. Yeah, and a couple of that with something you mentioned visually could be motion. Could be a visual visualization of data. It could be a story. It could be a video that couples with the data because just it’s. Just a lot more impact for when you, when you when you pair it, but okay, let’s, start to make sense. Your data consumer is gonna be a lot more interesting story then your analyst or your research eggs? Absolutely. And during our session yesterday, there are people in the audience who talked. We talked a lot about how we paired data with stories because the narrative makes it so much more riel, it elevates the people that are actually being affected by this data. So there were some great stories about that. Okay, okay. Back-up let’s, go to the well, anything else about the consumer? I mean, this is this is this is probably our largest constituency. Yeah, so i think the other thing is to be clear about what action you want them to take because your data should support that action don’t just and and actually that came up from an audience member yesterday who said people weren’t being moved by the data and so that’s why they started pairing it with stories and once somebody gets hooked and they feel those heartstrings being cold or they feel that passion rise that’s when you gotta capitalize and be really clear what the action is, whether it’s donating, volunteering on asking for more information yeah, signing up for the male daughter, give us your new gives your email yeah, and think about the safety step back a little bit this like you have to identify goal, like whether you’re trying to accomplish with this data set and it would help you help you with to decide like what to share in how to share that welfare that’s always important place to start gold. What was the purpose of this, exactly what we’re trying to move people and then we try to move people to do and then be clear about exactly called. Okay? That’s, right? And the goal is the hardest part. Frankly, knowing the goal is the hardest part. It’s on so simple, but it’s like that ask why five times you got to get to the real root of why you’re doing this. All right? We’re talking about our actor actor. Okay, refresh my recollection, who’s, this decision makers, policymakers, people who are going to make the change that you want, sir. Yeah. Okay. Okay. How do we talk to these people that data. So the format is briefings sometimes it’s in the form of a press release. They need, like, think about a policy maker who has a staff and maybe they have to vote on a bill or make a decision. The staff member is the one who’s calling non-profits calling agencies and saying what’s happening in my district around this topic. So being able to slice your data by topic and location is really valuable to these folks and getting this summary out and again the action. What? Why does this matter and their actions going to be different than the consumer? Usually you’re looking for a decision, a vote, something exactly what you want to say more about the actual, i think something that’s adjustable something that if you could package it for them, like staying here, the key takeaways from this a swell, you know, think of this, like, you know, you know, working the communications team. And, you know, we provide press kits for people. And if you could provided that, you know, so so they could easily digest and help, um, guide them through the decision making process, i think will be the key. Okay. Yeah. Okay. And i guess also keeping in mind you you may not be talking to the principal. Yeah, right, right. It could be a staff staff, something. Usually it is so it’s. Gotta be it’s. Gotta be so your your urine for always going through someone to the decision maker way don’t love that. Right? Twice removed, twice removed from your there once removed from your data. Yeah, it happens. I mean, that’s what? Any communication, though. Anytime you’re putting something out, somebody could take it. Andi at their own commentary around it. That’s what? The data promoter that’s a that’s a benefit in a risk, right? Because they could date a promoter could be multiplying. Your audience is your audience, but they could be putting their own message. They could be manipulating the data in a way that may not be true to it. But, you know, were you everybody has had, you know, that journalist didn’t get the quote quite right? Yeah, you are taking over simplification exactly. If the press often has to do to make something interesting to readers, you know, put in a headline. Yeah, yeah, and the promoter should also think about, like, segmenting looking if they could do, like, a more targeted in a way, like, if they know specifically that they’re going to try to communicate. Teo, i think they’ll be the key as well. And you get to know your trusted data promoters, right? You know, the journalists or the bloggers are the advocates who you trust, who you align with the messaging around. So identifying those folks or maybe you don’t know them and you do a little research and you find out who you are, where, wes, you need to know within your sector who the influencers are. Absolutely yeah, i get a little bit of research. Goes a long way. Yeah. Back-up how do you feel about the standard press release? Since we’re talking about the audience of promoters, we’ll be sending it to either of you have, ah, opinion on press releases. Are they outdated there? Some school of thought that press release is dead. But it’s it’s still being used is using it. You’re still using journalists say they ignore them. Yeah, andi, and honestly goes back to relationship building, you know, like in communications, that our primary key is build relationships with with journalists. So when our press release passes through their deaths, they’d be able to, like sick. Oh, let me take a look at this and then dig deeper into the story for us. Just a little more let’s. Talk about building a relationship with a journalist before you want them. Tio, take some action for you to write about you in to quote you on that day’s breaking news. Yeah. How do we build that relationship when we don’t have a need? But, you know, we want to be in front of the person. Yeah. I mean, honestly, like i just it’s a good old fashioned relation building, you know, you have called them, reach out them email and called, you know, like you have no agenda, but i mean, this marketplace exactly you often cover way. Have coffee, exactly. What a concept. I mean, like, i’m also part of communications network conference, just another communications based non-profit unconference and a lot of journalists attend that and it’s a great opportunity, this plate, this form and ten is a another great form to meet people like i would add to that you need to be you need to understand that audience and you need to be curious about they have their own set of requirements that they’re trying to meet. They’ve got an editorial calendar there. Boss has told them what topics to focus on. They’re looking for. They need they need to youto help them connect the dots. So maybe don’t start with the ask, understand what they’ve been working on for the last month. What stories? What topics? And then being able to which, which, by the way, does not mean ask them what have you been writing me out? It means doing your research before you do the outreach, so that you know, so that, you know, you’ve shown that, you know, you show that you’ve taken the time to know what their beat is exactly not just asking you what do you write about lately? Well, it’s in the paper buy-in there dubai it’s on it’s, on the site, in the research, and then and then what are you working on next or what’s? The story you’ve been dying to write that you haven’t had the chance to there’s always a good answer for that and there’s a great conversation starter, especially like imagine putting yourself in their shoes, you know, like someone just roundly wants to have coffee with you, but you have no idea who they are didn’t even do any sort of research like and, you know, you have very, very busy schedule, and you have multiple crowdster headlines like we just need to remember they’re people tio don’t waste their time any more than you would waste. Teo spend the time with a potential donor. Exactly ask them what you’re worth. You’re not gonna ask them things that you want to know already write, write, write what is it about our work that he loves? Well. I’ve been giving to you for fifteen years, i think it’s, probably in my e-giving history, you know, don’t waste people’s time exactly, but but it is important to build relationships with exactly these influences. Okay, i would add to that there channels are largely on social media. If you talk to any journalists, they spend all their time on twitter. So if your twitter gene is not great it’s time it’s time. Learn what hashtags there using. Follow those channels, see who they’re following. See what they’re talking about. A great way to do research on also how to start to engage early on, even if it’s just observing. Okay. Okay. Very good. Okay, so i want you. I want to spend more time on that. I want to check my mike. Want to make sure that everything is good here. Okay, a little insecure about the way i sound. I don’t know. I sound you don’t sound good to me, it’s. Not okay to you, though, right? It’s? A little soft. Like i can hear myself. Really? I could hear myself, teo. You don’t hear me. According to richard it’s. Not as clear. Yeah, in-kind okay. And give. Myself a lot more volume. All right, now, my too loud. Ok, it’s. Good. Allright. Thank you. Time for our last break. Hoexter give quote, i compared a bunch of companies in my search for it hoexter donate company and text to give is the best hands down. They have b been beyond helpful. I can’t imagine anyone doing this better exclamation mark end quote that’s lauren bouchard from global commission partners in clermont, florida. Satisfied? She is with text to give you will be, too for info text npr to four, four, four, nine nine, nine. We’ve got several more minutes, and here they are for map your data to your audiences. Let’s, continue the analysts. Right. Data analyst. Refresh our recollection. David who is this? So this is the data expert this’s. The staffer that’s or consultant? That would help be a read data. Okay, and analyze it for you, like they be in a foundation. Now. I like the way i sound better. Okay? Like they’d be a foundation program, officer. It could be. Is that an example or no, i’m not necessarily. I mean, it could be a learning officer for the foundation meeting the one. Who’s like analyzing all the learning and data sets. Ok, he could be a data manager, you know, within an organization. Where would you? Where would you put a program, officer out of foundation? Someone who’s evaluating your grant proposal. Where? Where would they fit in these audience? Most like, i mean, it’s a little bit of both between the consumer and the actor, to be honest with you, because they’re both a decision maker. So they’re going to read the data and they’re also going to get this just like, okay, this is how my program is going and here’s how i’m going to act upon it. And here’s how i’m gonna adjust my strategy with it. Okay? Yeah. All right. So, let’s, go back to the analyst. How do we, uh, david? You keep going. What do we do with this? How do we talk to the analyst with our data? Go. No. Gosh, just give it all to them. Honestly, rod, they love him. They loved it. They love spreadsheets there. Said if they see a string of numbers, imagine like matrix type of thing. They’re like oh, my gosh, this is habit. Okay, okay. Yeah. It’s that simple? Well, they have, i would add that they usually have the domain a knowledge. Do you think of a policy maker? They haven’t education expert on staff or they may have an expert in international relations it’s that person who knows the domain quite well and feels comfortable digging through the data and furthermore to add to that, too is like if he providing which your goals and what your strategy is for and what they’re trying to provide the otherwise they’d be able to help you got guide you through the breeding process say more about that? Yeah, what shit a little bit, so think of him like, you know, like, if i’m like, if i am se the heather communications in the foundation and i’m like, i’m gonna talk to a data analyst we’re trying to accomplish x can you help me read through this day that what types of data sets can leave first collect and what’s up days says comey can provide so they’ll be able to accomplish that goal, then they were able to narrow down because otherwise they could they could. You stand in any sort of ways, but if you provide some sort of direction or gold. They’re able to, like filter things a little bit better for you. Okay, yeah, very good. Really good. And our last left audiences the researcher buy-in courtney yeah, the researchers are get out of my way and give me this red sheet they the like they may scan through your infographic, your visualization, your query tool. But really, they’re going to build their own query tool. They’re goingto grab that they’re the ones who are in sequel making pivot table like they’re doing all of it. Okay, we have jargon jail on twenty sequel i think people will know, but i’m going to pivot table. Alright, excel itself. Okay, sorry, i’m taking a data analytics class so i’m learning this stuff, so i’m excited to be able to talk about it just dropping, dropping top, but, yeah, i imagine you’ve got an excel table that is so large that you can’t open it x l can’t open it. That is what these researchers are are working in and they’re very comfortable working in and they’re the ones who may even be collecting data as well as analyze sing it for themselves, so think of it like a like a layer deeper than unless they got analysts who may rely also some visualizations. And of course, like a deep amount of pressure. But these guys are like they’re just like neck or forehead, deep of like numbers and data, and they want to do everything themselves. Yeah, yeah. So one one important thing here we have worked on a number of data projects and for non-profits or foundations any group who wants to attract many of these audiences, the keeping with researchers is you have, like, the get data page or sometimes we’ll put it in the footer and it’s, like, just download the excel spreadsheet because i keep saying it, but you got to get out of their way. Just give them what they want, okay? Okay. We have, like, another minute and a half or so do you have tools? And, uh, in your description, you mentioned choosing the right data tools. Any tools we can introduce briefly that you like, i mean, to be honest and this is like, tio, you get off being out of keeping it will be really hash tag riel here, please place if you’re old website have google and alex installed. I mean, you’d be surprised how many webs are out there and smashing non-profits believe that twenty nine, twenty nine percent of them are using do or not. Okay, okay did not have google and licks and police bare minimum do that and they said, like have i think the fun? Nothing is like have goals, you know, before it was like before you venture into the day the world? Yeah, there is there’s a great study that every action did called the state of non-profit data. And you can it’s from twenty sixteen. But it’s a great read a page i recommended. Okay, we’re gonna leave it with we’ll leave it there without recommendation. All right, all right. They’re courtney clarke, managing director of user experience at forum one. And david mask arena digital communications manager at the conrad hilton foundation. Courtney and david. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Pleasure. This interview along with all of our eighteen ntcdinosaur views sponsored by network for good, easy to use dahna management and fund-raising software for non-profits. Thank you for being with non-profit radios coverage of eighteen ntc next week the buy-in bitches getting buy-in from your leadership. If you missed any part of today’s show, i beseech you, find it on tony martignetti dot com, responsive by pursuing toe online tools for small and midsize non-profits data driven and technology enabled. Tony dahna slash pursuant capital p well, you see, piela is guiding you beyond the numbers. Bradunas cps dot com by tello’s, credit card payment processing, your passive revenue stream. 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Nonprofit Radio for May 18, 2018: Blockchain and Bitcoin 101 & Be Data Driven

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Sheila Warren: Blockchain and Bitcoin 101

You’ve certainly heard of them. You’re probably confused by them. Let’s straighten it all out. What are these technologies and what do they mean for your nonprofit? Sheila Warren is a knowledgable instructor and makes it easy to understand. She’s with World Economic Forum. (Recorded at the Nonprofit Technology Conference)

 

 

 


Eli Hertz:
 Be Data Driven
What are the reasons to create a data-driven culture in your organization and what challenges will you face? Which tools can help you? Eli Hertz is from United Service Organizations (USO). (Recorded at the Nonprofit Technology Conference)

 

 

 

 


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Hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I’m your aptly named host. Oh, i’m glad you’re with me. I’d suffer due to wrap a thie if you said primarily that you missed today’s show blockchain and bitcoin one oh one you’ve certainly heard of them. You’re probably confused by them let’s, straighten it all out. What are these technologies? And what do they mean for your non-profit sheila warren is a knowledgeable instructor and makes it easy to understand she’s with world economic forum that was recorded at the non-profit technology conference and be data driven. What are the reasons to create a data driven culture in your organization? And what challenges will you face? Which tools can help you? Eli hurts is from united service organizations uso that’s also recorded at the non-profit technology conference. I’m tony steak too it’s. Time to make time. We’re sponsored by pursuant full service fund-raising data driven and technology enabled tony dahna slash pursuant to radio bye weinger cpas guiding you beyond the numbers wagner, cpas, dot com and by tell us turning credit card processing into your passive revenue stream. Tony dahna slash tony tello’s here is sheila warren and block, jane and bitcoin welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntcdinosaur non-profit technology conference. We’re coming to you from new orleans, the convention center there. This interview is sponsored by network for good, easy to use donorsearch and fund-raising software for non-profits my guest is sheila warren. Welcome, sheila. Thanks, tony. Thanks for having me. It’s a pleasure. Sheila is head of blockchain and distributed ledger technology at the world economic forum on dh her workshop topic is started. I’m talking about you like you’re not here. You’re workshop topic is blockchain for non-profits fact versus fiction. Yes. Okay, um i’m gonna tell you this one has been intimidating me a little bit because i and i even did research on this research. My voice is cracking over, not nervous, but it isn’t intimidating because i’ve tried to crack the bitcoin, not blockchain, but the bitcoin topic two years ago at ntc it was not a dedicated topic. It was became a a digression that i created on i regretted it while i was mired in it and i couldn’t get away out gracefully and and we never really talked about you in what? What the heck bitcoin is okay, so since then i’ve done some technology. I’ve done some reading if i describe bitcoin as there’s, no there’s a greater fool. Does that make sense that you mean it doesn’t really have a value other than the hope that someone will buy it after me and therefore increased my value? I mean, is that i think you’re jumping right into the controversy right into the thick of it. I read the wrong article, i think that’s great, i think let’s back out of that. Okay, okay. Go in. Any direction you like? I did some research, but i don’t want to get mired in it. Okay? Bitcoin. Blockchain. All right, why don’t we start since bitcoin was popular before blockchain? Although i know that they are related in one relies on the other. I have that much down. So i think you’re ahead of many knowing that there’s a distinction between the two? Yes. Ok, i do. All right. I’ll just ask you simply, which i tried two years ago. What is bitcoin and how does it relate? Toe non-profit? Yeah, sure. Okay. So i’ll start by saying you know the number one thing i want people to take away anytime i do any kind of speaking is bitcoin and blockchain are not the same thing now they’re equated because bitcoin is built on something that’s called the bitcoin blockchain, so the terminology is quite confusing but the best analogy i can think of is that bitcoin is to block chain as email is to the inter so blockchain is a foundational technology when it is finally really baked into our systems, people will stop talking about it the way we don’t really talk about the internet anymore except we’re being a bit ironic. We talked about applications, right and bitcoin is an application on blockchain. It is the most famous application on blockchain. It was the first application on blockchain. Bitcoin blockchain was built for bitcoin. So be like if the internet was built for email, you could do other things. But it would be this equations were trying to do is teo that of course let’s tease it apart. These are a lot of other things you could do with a block to that have nothing to do with bitcoin. And even if bitcoin were to completely fail and go away. There would still be exactly the way it will be an internet without email. Okay, let’s, just before we get to the blockchain value on its transparency, etcetera, let’s just flush out the big going a little more so i think non-profit think of it because it’s impossible fund-raising right? I mean, it’s, possible revenue source. Yeah, donors could give gives to you and there have been enormously large gift in the press. Yeah, of bitcoin two non-profits so, yeah, i agree. Okay, so let’s dive into a little green deeper into bitcoin. Yeah, so i was wrong. So i was that was something controversial. I said that it doesn’t have intrinsic value. Well, i mean, i think it has doesn’t have intrinsic value. I mean, bitcoin itself that’s a big debate. I mean, people, some people argue absolutely has intrinsic value because it’s filling a gap in a way that nothing else can really fill the gaps. Some people argue it has absolutely no intrinsic value. It’s all just like, basically hyped value in market value. Like whatever the pr around and i think that’s, right? But that that’s arguably no different than many. Early stage, you know, cos right, like, when you think about equity in an early stage company doesn’t have value of tv, you know, so it’s not that different. So i think to me what i find interesting or kind of mildly amusing at times is like the idea. This is like this brand new distinction, right? We kind of have this model already. It’s called early stage equity grantwriting mean, like those might be paper and worth nothing. They might be worth a ton of money you don’t really know. And to be honest, like your kind of gambling when you buy a digital currency, you know, you should have written the article that i read well, of course you know, you should get them. I not that i should have found your articles. I didn’t know you when i was doing this. Well, i wasn’t in this case two years ago. I just entered the space two years ago, but my research is more recent durney written articles way have something coming out actually, next week on april nineteenth, we’re doing a launch of what we’re calling a blocked a decision making, took it about blockchain and really trying to make it very accessible to the layperson, not in terms of what is it? But is it valuable to you? Is that we’re gonna find that in the world economic forum. Sightly ok, ok, good. Look for that if you want to know more about this, okay. Back-up so let the bitcoin all right? Backing out of the controversy part of it people could give you get absolutely, yeah, just the way they used to get. Yes, you make some very good analogies up early stage equity interests. That would be a challenge for non-profits to deal with. Exactly. Okay, and now we’ve overcome that at some point, real property was hard to deal with, like getting real estate starts thinking the new newest iteration of that. But it’s really no different. Don’t be scared. Don’t be scared. You want to know how to receive it? Receiving bitcoin is actually not that hard. You got a coin bait. I mean, this is one example, but what the easiest example probably is you go to coin base, you get a receipt on lee wallet base. Coin base is a company that has what’s called bitcoin wallets. You get a rece ive on ly bitcoin wallet that lives in the ability to receive bitcoin, converted into fiat currency and move on with your day. You can’t buy bitcoin with that wallet, but it’s a pretty easy mechanism. We’re getting you and their other competitors as well. There’s a kind of ah a cottage industry, if you will, in this kind of thing, okay, you receive only while it will be sufficient. And then how will you convert that to its done that’s? All worker magically on the back end, right? You kind of pick your currency usually it’s usd. And then you just they do the conversion for you at the current rate and then you move it out. Now you’re still accepting whatever the current rate is, you might decide you want to hold it longer and want to play the market. It exactly. But it’s like it’s no different for foreign currency. But the cashing out of it is just another it’s. Just a different call. The defense called a wallet, which isn’t you know, i think a very accurate term actually ways we have one of those wallets that enables you to receive this particular kind of currency and then you just decide when you want to cash it out. You move on with your job. These doesn’t want to do he’s well known icons, wallets, you know, it helps. It helps those of us who were trying to get our way in. Well, well, i put my money in my wallet, right? So i’ll just get my bitcoin in my virtual wall. Exactly. Okay, what’s, the what’s, the one you you name, that we could go to base one base dot com and there are others are ok, but you can start there. And it’s. Very simple. Okay. That’s, how to receive bitcoin gift for your non-profit thank you, strickler. You’ve been doing this a while. You’ve been talking to a lot of deal fights. Clearly it’s my my fair parts of my job. Okay, excellent it’s. Time for a break. Pursuing the art and science of acquisition is one of their content papers acquiring new donors. Is it part of your summer planning, perhaps, or keeping your prospect pipeline full is on your mind so you keep revenue robust? How is revenue? If you’re thinking about acquisition? Get the paper. The art and science of acquisition it’s on the listener landing page. Tony dot m a slash pursuant radio now back to block chain and bitcoin one oh, one now let’s, go to blockchain technology. Okay, now that we understand that bitcoin is but one one channel it’s built on built on a blockchain technology. Okay, how would you describe blockchain technology? Yeah. So i like to use the example. Elect yousa thank you. Tell me, but it seems to worry working for so if you and i were teo, i would buy something from you. Whatever it was, then we might decide. Okay? There are two options when we could just we don’t trust each other. Let’s say we contains other cash, marie and i just can’t do it. Whatever dollar bill ten dollar bill you give me the whatever it is and i walk away and we both walk away very happy our transaction is completed. Another way that people do. This is we get our mobile devices and we decided we’re using paypal or venmo are square cash or whatever it is. And we engaged in a transaction and we both again walk away. Satisfied? That transaction is complete. There are five. Parties in the mobile example there’s you, me, your bank, my bank and intermediary, whether that’s, paypal or whatever it is and the reason that you and i are confident enough to walk away from the transaction feeling it’s completed is because we trust those three intervening parties. We trust that they’re goingto all suspect effectively and sufficiently debit my account and credit your account the right amount of money, and we don’t have to really pay attention to that, right? But you can imagine, and this is hypothetical in our case and sort of the western united states largely, but not everywhere. You can imagine a world in which i don’t have access to a bank account or you don’t or both of us don’t. There is no intermediary that’s going to be trusted any matter is easily hacked whatever is for whatever reason we have no trust in this system and we want to exchange something that’s analogous to cash bitcoin additional currency. Is that anil? It is basically the internet analog of my handing you cash there is no meaningful intermediate is no centralized intermediary that’s mediating that transaction for us we’re able to peer-to-peer exchange that value so that is the beauty, if you will, of digital currency, right? And what it provides the marketplace that doesn’t currently otherwise exist except for in paper. Ok, how does blockchain is what enables that happen? So what’s happening this magical middle? I’m not actually hand i’m not like brain sending you something, right? There’s something happening in here what’s happening in here is blockchain is being deployed essentially i mean it’s not technically accurate, but let’s for our sake. What is actually happening? Okay? Rather than me sending something to a central authority and kind of like a chain of central authorities were sending it to a distributed network. So we’re saying what our ways of creating trust? Well, one way creating trust is to trust an intermediary if you don’t have one other way, cretin trust is to make take it totally distributed. So imagine if between us there was a network of a thousand computers not connected to each other independent pseudonymous so no one knows how anyone else is right at the exact same time they’re creating simultaneous this is again not totally accurate, but likely to be a simultaneous record of our exchange, they’re indicating i opened up my digital wallet i released, you know, one bitcoin, which is money. And you gave you something very valuable in exchange and you receive it. Okay? And in orderto hack that transaction, you would have to convince thousand computers to change their record. That’s why they’re i was going to ask you, why are there a thousand computers? That’s? Why security? Security? So it means you can see it’s far more secure than a central database that could be easily hacked. Right? Like one source of truth can be hacked very easily. A thousand simon, identical sources of truth are very hard to have. So each of these computers houses the same information. We call it a ledger about our transaction. And this is why we call it distributed ledger technology. And we can do this because my voice keeps cracking like i’m fourteen because because the cost of storage is so dim minimus on the margin that we don’t worry about all this redundancy. I mean, we got a thousand computers with the same in-kind large network with the same data, the same ledger, but but that’s because storage is so cheap. It’s not so. Much storage is so cheap because it’s a method of achieving trust. Right? So if you if you either either you you trust something? Are you trust nothing. And if you trust nothing, then a thousand synonomous computers is about is going to get right. Exactly right. Nobody has an incentive to screw up our transaction record incorrectly. And if they do, if one computer in that thousand computers records a different version it’s competition we spotted almost immediately and there’s a check that happens. What happened? What’s going on there, you know, so it’s very, very hard to hack. It makes it quite secure. How about how about hacking it so that the one becomes the accurate transaction and the other nine hundred ninety nine convert to that that’s computational e-giving possible? Yeah, demographically impossible to do that. Okay, okay. Yeah. So that’s the way it works now latto brand not going to get a ring about it has given it was going to kill it. Ok, i don’t want to know what’s interesting about this, right? So this is the premise of the bitcoin blockchain and of what are called public blockchain but interestingly enough, which are getting are the human impulse, i think, is to say what i want to control something, if i want, if i want, if i don’t trust something, i want to control it, right? So you’re getting a lot of explosion of these permission block chains, which means that you control you know who all the computers are. Basically, are you on, lee? Allow computers that you have kind of vetted into the system. When you do that, it becomes more securely it’s gotta be it’s, kind of like counter involvement words, they don’t know. We don’t know which each other dahna that’s very good that’s, right? Okay, so what’s the oh, what i’ll ask it instead of trying to figure it out, what’s the value of this two non-profits yeah, i think there’s a lot of value to this. So one, i think, in the sort of remittance space in terms of programmatic work, there are a lot of places where, you know, charitable work is done it using remittances using kind of the last mile payments, like problems that have existed for a long time, that we’ve been unable to really have a great solution for there’s a huge problem osili is realized recently through a world bank project there’s a huge problem with charities, certainly in certain kinds of region syria, the kinds of places being unbanked like having no access to bank accounts. And in many of these regions, people are literally taking paper cash into these environments and using it to provide services right, hugely problematic, very unsafe, very risking dangerous activity. If you have a digital wallet it’s that much more secure, right? Like it’s, actually that much harder. Teo, steal that hack it. You can prove ownership using encryption, there’s a lot of other things about it that are better. In these situations and that’s sort of the extreme example is the example we’re seeing a lot of different application level there’s, other completely non currency related applications of blockchain, so one that i think is really critical is digital identity. So this is this comes up a lot in the refugee asylum situations you could imagine a family has to flee in the middle of the night. They can’t bring any of their papers with them there’s no proof of who they are, their citizenship, their credentials, whether medical license, whatever it is that medical records, nothing like that. If all of that we’re on a distributed ledger, it would be security’s, not a paper based system. So so when you think about the application layer where you’re moving away from paper and you’re storing something in a secure manner, but not in some sort of like a database of government, where the government could be corrupt and come in and kind of change things up and disavow it, but in a way that really is truly secure that you own the only entrance key too, like that is very powerful to think about, you know there are we. Know that in homeless encampment, united states leaving aside like this war tor in-kind of regions, even in united states, there’s no accurate record of the homeless population because people who are born homeless often don’t have records, right? And then if you die homeless, there’s no account about this son accurately, in a sense, is acknowledges it’s completely off with that population. Imagine if there were a digital ledger that you could create around that now policy on how you do that is very challenging because it’s not an easy problem to solve, but at least there isn’t a different option. Now for three zsystems exactly exactly for preserving it current once you once you are creating and has overcome the challenge of gathering data, there’s a place to preserve it and the persons data is not vulnerable. Exactly loss or hacking. Okay, okay. Um now one of the articles i read talked about the transparency on dh. The example was a donor giving to a program and tracking progress of that program and then tying her funding two milestones that disease through the blockchain technology through some user interface. I guess the fucking can you help people understand? Better than i just did. What i’m talking about is absolutely so i think that we call the supply chain integration and i get a flow is an example of a supply chain supply chain of cash, but their supply chains of all kinds of things, i think it’s easier to understand that if we think about a supply chain and we’ll take mining as an example, because this i think people really understand this, ok, so and one hundred percent with your analogies. Thank you. I’ll make sure we bring it back to the non-profit but you go ahead. Yeah, so when you think about mining and you think about sustainable practices, right, so people don’t want blood diamonds. For example, there is a international process established called kimberley process that evaluates whether or not i don’t recall the kimberley process so it evaluates whether or not a diamond is mind using fair labor, you know, no child labor and all the things that you actually would care about is a consumer of this diamond and using blockchain technology, those diamonds are actually etched. Can you confirm follow using a combination r f i d e a lot of things and block chain a diamond throughout the entire supply chain from the moment its mind and you can you can certify that the mine itself was done with correct worker conditions, and etcetera are fundamental. Whatever it is, you contract that all the way to the refinery, to the manufacturer, to the retailer to thee. Kayman right, so there is certainty that that specific mineral or metal was taken all the way through, and this applies to other kinds of minerals and metals as well. You could imagine something similar that would apply, teo, you know, cotton or coffee or whatever it is, right? Like you could actually certify that a particular bag of coffee beans was crude was was harvested on a plantation that would that met their labor practices and was organic. And, you know, whatever the things are you care about fair trade certified, you could track that of a supply chain, and you could therefore ensure and give meaning to some of these labels that we don’t actually have any proxy for ascertaining are actually true. Great. So this provides more accountability and transparency because you can track the same good throughout an entire system. Now the same thing is true of aid flows. So a dollar originates somewhere. It’s basically just a supply chain all the way through. So any diversion of that money can actually be tracked. It’s a really interesting question. If you do this in digital currency every time digital currencies exchange there is a record created by definition. It’s not like cass. We’re just kind of khun vanished. There’s no ability for to vanish. It’s. Impossible. Great. So if i give it to you and you give it tio some other intermediary and they suddenly diverted to some corrupt whatever it is that that currency can be tracked so you can create accountability system, you can show that it went to pay your staffer that it went teo, you know, a contract to build the well or whatever it is. You can actually show that. And you can report all that ledger back too. The donor exactly. How does the organization interact with block james with the right to say the blockchain? No, there was no. It depends on a blockchain blockchain. And normally just sabelo depends on how dramatically interesting. You okay, what’s the user interface. That thing with donor and really question sametz finally twenty minutes and i got one good question is, is it okay for the donor and the non-profit? How we interact with? Yeah, this’s one of the challenges right now and it’s one of the reasons there isn’t at this gigantic explosion in use cases, even though they’re theoretical use cases everyone agrees on. People are now in the wake up in the state got started on the stage where this is being developed. When you think about the early internet and everybody was kind of risky, prompted was typing things and whatever that was not accessible. Teo fingering people call this business was not it was not accessible to a lot of people, right? But once you had a graphical user interface that came into play, people could pipe in plain english. And you kind of had with me what you had. What you see is what you get. You have these interfaces that were just more intuitive. You know what? You were wearing a realist. I have george in jail, but i wouldn’t wait. I mean that’s that’s. Well, that’s, not jargon. Ok. Fantastic, i presume. Thanks. I don’t agree with you. I’m fearful that you have low expectations of my understanding. Now go. Okay, okay. All right, well, listen, non-profit lady radio listeners or at least at my level, most of all, most people going with us so that those were all huge innovations enabled the explosion and things like email in google and search engines than whatever, until you had that was very hard to imagine being there, steve jobs is times a thousand, right? Exactly, right? So give it a little time and we’re going to get there and before you know it, we’re not going to talk about blocked it anymore. It’s going to be kind of this thing of the past, right? No, one’s talking about consensus mechanisms are proof of work or bubble it not going to care about any of that we’re going to be like, oh, did you check out your whatever the company is it’s the new facebook, but now built on block chain that we all now can’t live without you. So we’re getting there. We’re getting there. Awesome. All right. You really think you have very good analogy is a very good way of explaining this. Thank you. And thank you. We still have a couple minutes left together. So what more do you want to say? Is there another level we can go to? Ise there a story you want to tell about a non-profit using this technology? What? You know, i got love, yeah, i will say a couple of things, i think that, you know, i would really encourage listeners and anyone, you know, to really think beyond the digital currency example, and so we gave some examples of identity and supply chain and others, you know, there’s, interesting work happening around impact and how charity’s khun demonstrate impact using blockchain and kind of tag metrics. Tio tio not necessary to cash, but to sort of the street planning that goes all kinds of different implications for this technology and really the kind of, like joke in the blockchain nerd of which i am one system is to say, like, when you really start thinking about what this can do, you have these, like, three a m wake ups where you think like, oh, my god, like, you could do that, i could do that, i could do that, and you have to kind of dialling back down and we’re not there yet, you know? So one example, i’m really what got me my three a m moment that got me really hyped about this technology was in criminal justice, something i’m very passionate about and thinking about chain of custody of evidence. So thinking about thie way that evidence gets lost things like rape kits or dna evidence or whatever it might be a chain of custody people exam, and i’m thinking more of in other countries were tortured or vanished, get disappeared, kidnapping or not, it is our most of our institutions are exactly so we’re doing a big project anticorruption work in south america, where we’re thinking about government accountability and transparency and how you can actually work around and mitigate corruption, which is i’m the president in many parts of the world, using this technology because of the ability to track and trace, which is really key. So i think that is where the big innovation is gonna happen. It’s already happening and will continue to happen in this space and the implications, i think, for non-profits are quite quite profound the ability to track and trace something or someone is very, very so. Any objects like you had said the diamond is physically etched. Yeah, i mean, it’s gotta be obviously a pretty small, actually. Dankmyer dahna it is. Okay, so but any physical things, physical evidence in a criminal in a criminal case. Oh, it’s, great kids. A bloody glove, as a random example. Okay, very good. Okay. Uh, out. Forever. Forever. Forever. We will never have treyz we won’t have lost evidence. You’ll know if if it is disappeared, we’ll know exactly at what stage is exactly at what stage disappear. There won’t be a guests there’s no ability to hide, right? And you can mark that that security with like, with a geo look, even geo tag it, you know exactly, literally. Exactly where that thing was that the last recorded exchange of it. Okay. So which is really profound when you think about that, we have about a minute left. What do you love about this work? Not not so much. Not so much of the technology. But what do you love about explaining it to people? I think you know, i think it really is. Ah, i don’t think it’s surprising. How intimidating it it it’s a very intimidating technology, in part because there’s so much media attention about it, the volatility, the currency and then bitcoin millionaires and all this kind of billionaires and all this stuff and and you know it, it’s a community that’s really fascinating. Someone just used bitcoin. I asked you to talk about someone just used going to fund every single every single request that was donorsearch shoes dot org’s every single one got funded overnight, a lot of money, and charles rich asked for it. He couldn’t believe that he got it. Well, it’s also crazy because this is like there’s so much money in this that there are people who are they want to press, like the people that really, really have the money security to hired security. Us. What has this like thug element to it in this history of, like illicit actors in nefarious activity, you know kind of things people mean arms were sold using bitcoin, that the fact people were traffic using bitcoin? That is a fact, all right. And the idea that we’ve moved away from that not saying that is it still happening? Because let’s be candid, it is still happening, right? But that’s not the case for which it was really designed, and most people in this space are not interested in that kind of activity when you think about the shift away in the movement opportunity it’s really exciting to get ordinary people call them, like, lay people aware of this at least at a base level, and to not be afraid of it that i find very rewarding, okay? And like, we no longer fear the internet and automobiles exactly where you wanna go both okay? All right. We got every motive. Transportation? All right, sheila warren. Thank you very much. Thank you for the pleasure. You helped enormously. I’m so glad. She’s, the head of blockchain and distributed ledger technology at the world economic forum once the article it’s coming up that we should look for, it’ll be april nineteenth and it’s called the decision making till can’t it’ll be on our website? Awesome on our twitter my interview with sheila is sponsored my pleasure by network for good, easy to use dahna management and fund-raising software for non-profits thank you so much for being with non-profit medio coverage of the non-profit technology conference twenty eighteen we need to take a break, wittner. Cps. You need your nine. Ninety done. Right. You need an audit. Start at wagner. Cps dot com. Look at their services for non-profits. Read a few testimonials. Then pick up the phone and talk to partner. Eat huge tomb. I know him. He’s. Been on the show. He’s. A good guy. You explain what you need. He’ll tell you if they can help you. No pressure, he’s. Not that way at all. Talk to him. Wagner. Cpas dot com is the place to start now. Time for tony’s. Take two. Summer is close, it’s. Time to make time for your time away, including offgrid time. I hope you can do this. You need it. We all need offgrid time. No phone, no email. You know offgrid my encouragement video. Is that tony martignetti dot com good link. Dot com. Listen, i’m a safe too. Looked our founder of good link at goodland. Dot com non-profits connect with businesses that advanced their missions. When i want the best connections i listen to non-profit radio like you are safe. Good link it’s a new marketplace where non-profits meat vendors providing products or services? No cost to you as non-profit it’s, your bridge, your connection to the products and services that you need i’m helping them get started see what you think. Check out good link dot com it’s l i n c now time for a lie hurts and be data driven. Welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntc it’s a non-profit technology conference hosted by the non-profit technology network. We’re coming to you from new orleans convention center there. This interview is sponsored by network for good. Easy to use donor-centric software for non-profits. And my guest is you. I hurt he’s, the vice president of information technology at united service organizations. Us. So you lie hurts. Welcome to the show. Thank you, tony. Pleasure to have you. Thanks for having me welcome. My your your subject is becoming a data driven organization. Why should we? Why should read to make better decisions to do our mission better, more efficiently. B a and teo, to be able to have more impact, you’re confident that this changing culture going to bring about all these good outcome? Yes, yes. If you are you okay? It will there be challenges to get there? Yes, there will be. Challenges to get there isn’t a transition necessary, absolutely, but i’m confident that if and when we navigate those those challenges, the getting there enables better decisions, so we’re able to do our mission more effectively and that’s really what it’s all about, okay, and this does not just apply in the information technology department knows is you know what? This is organization wide. Oh, absolutely matter of fact, i’m glad you asked that tony, because if it only applied to information technology department, we would never get there that’s not how it’s accomplished the my department is about enabling the tools and technology that air the underpinnings, but really getting there and ineffectiveness is on ly when the business used the lines of business, that of performing the mission are asking the questions that are doing the analysis, they have the context they know the right questions to ask on the story that needs to be told it is absolutely not by-laws malefactor tools just one other piece, that the tools are evolving to enable that the so that it doesn’t take a technical person like it did in the past. The tools are being designed so that anyone khun, step up, use um and ask the right questions to get the answers they need. Okay, are we able to talk about some of those fools later on? Sure. Ifyou’d like tio conversing with them. Okay, you know them. Okay, good. Well, i’m guessing if this is going to be a cultural change, the change is gonna come from the top. So ideally so, the way we’re approaching a tony is both a top down and bottoms up approach both simultaneously kind of come out it from two angles, and we think both are necessary. Neither one by itself would would get us all the way there. We are fortunate have a ceo is very technically driven that understands the has the vision of what it can and should do for the organization to be able to make data driven decisions. However, just mandating it isn’t isn’t going to get us all the way there because the ones that are going to make it work are the ones that are going to be working. The tools are maur bottoms up because they’re they’re day today they have the context, they they have the context for the fund-raising with a marketing or the program delivery there of our constituents, and they have a better sense of the business processes and what all the data means so they can ask those questions if they don’t buy-in and have the right inquisitive mind set dahna we won’t get the answers that we want, they want to know more about what they’re doing and what the outcomes are on. And, you know, what successful was not now, of course, you’re coming at it from the uso perspective, but hard now they’re our listeners air over twelve thousand people in small and midsize non-profits sure, so the lessons apply equally, right? You know, nowhere and what i’ve said so far. Did i talk about the mission of us? Owe every single non-profit has a mission to deliver some service or product, mostly a service, for the benefit of of their their benefactors, so really it’s about understanding what their mission is and and they can all equally equally gain from increasing their impact, it’s about increasing the impact based on the insights that you have on the data that you’ve collected or can aggregate nowhere and what i just said that i talk about. The uso mission every single non-profit and benefit from it. Okay, i want to make that explicit. I i know it’s true. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here. But i want metoo explicit for our for our listeners. All right, so ah, a lot of this is around empowerment also. Right? So we’re empowering staff to be asking the challenging questions that data can provide answers to. Yeah. Ok right. Are we empowering? Well, empowering is part of it. Yes. That’s a necessary but not sufficient. Okay, so we have to start. You know it has tohave empowerment. They also have to have access so access to the right data stores. And this means breaking down stone by breaking down stovepipes for silos breaking down paradigms of no, this is this is my thing. And then also learning the skill set and the mindset, skill set and mindset. So the skill set to to manipulate tools which, again are being designed to be always there friendly using some of this technology yourself and then and then the mindset is critical as well. Tony is having that inquisitive mind set to what’s what’s really happening here in my fund-raising in my marketing campaign in a program delivery what’s the underlying what’s the activity that’s happened. Who are the players that are impacting it? And what can i or do? I want to learn to make it better. So it’s that inquisitive mind set this is not we won’t get there by what some folks air more accustomed to is generate some report that says, what happened? That’s just reporting that’s the same, you know, something that you can construct and say point to this was thing that happened, this is about in court inquisitor enquiring mind set and interacting with it. So if i’m listening to this and i’m i’m motivated by what you’re saying, but i don’t yet have the top down or the bottom up, or i guess i’m in the bottom or maybe not right in the middle somewhere sure, or might be at the top. We have ceos who listen also how do i get the other end? Or if i’m in neither end, how do we get both ends to buy into this? Yeah, great question. Well, first, we think is start small and show a little benefit and you can do it relatively relatively easily, relatively. Affordably and, you know, for every non-profit every dollar we don’t spend is a dollar that goes to our our mission, and some of the tools are very affordable and show the way do a little pilot hyre we did a proof of concept, the uso first to say, hey, for very few dollars, this is a kind of insights we can generate and here’s iraq without. What do you think? Wow, this is really given tell the story of your your test because i think i think the example will help, okay, listeners understand, you know what? How do you bite off a little bit of this, like, a little a little bit of what? Where do we start? Yeah, absolutely. So we we had, uh we took data from two of our important or two of our sources that support somewhere big, most impactful business processes. One is financial, so that shows a roll up of our fund-raising how we’re doing on revenue, you know, fund-raising and the other is relatively new data set that that we just deployed a system last year for part of our digital transformation, which was collecting usage metrics of our customers, they check into our centers and way made a digital platform that collects the check in and some of that there some of their demographic snoopy ii, obviously and and we have now about six months of here’s how they and when and how they interact with us and what they think of us and what they like. And these are two data sorts one was just talking about the tools, but one was in the great plains data set which many organisations used, which we exported from report into a csp export, relatively simple stuff. And the other was in a sales force back and data set. And what we did is we used a pretty affordable tool for non-profits microsoft power b i it’s okay to talk about product. Certainly. Yes, i want you to. Yeah. Okay. Super yeah. Which is very affordable for a non-profit handup power b i microsoft power b i business business insight. Because this intelligence argast it’s ah it’s in the gardner magic water and for the last two years is one of the top in the b i space non-profit the cost is very affordable there’s a free version as well. And you can experiment the free version. So what we do is we got a little bit of help because if this does require some different mindset, you know, then then folks have been doing one thing for a long time, so we got a partner for a little bit of help to say, okay, help us bill, do some analysis and build some visualizations in a dashboard that shows what what’s happening in these areas, both from financial progress. Oh, and also for our customer usage, we did it in a month or two, just a few dollars, not much product dollars, and we built visualizations and showed it say, hairs here’s, how we’re being used right now, and it was very, very well received. The insights were kind of ah ha moments. So so what i recommend is start with some existing data stores and and sort of identify first what it is you think will be impactful and then showcasing take it around, say, hey, this is some insights. What do you think? And and if it doesn’t get enthusiasm either learned a lesson from it to say what’s more interesting or perk it, move on to something else. Okay. Okay. Test for value early. Yeah. All right. And in a small bit. Yeah. Small piece. Okay, awesome. Ah. All right. So then what? What? What’s, the next step in this you don’t change this culture. So let’s say we get some approval. Okay? This this is pretty stark and i can see some value. Um, otherwise the interview’s over. So we better remove this phone way. We’re not taking the park and move on to something else. Option forget move on. Yeah, what? Where do we go from here now? We with our test results. So where we’re going is an operational pilot and recalled an operation pilot, so because we’re adding a little more funding and setting the setting the goals of a little bit hyre but we’re also not in the same breath, not institutionalizing it yet. So we’re going to expand the number of data stories that we bring in on then here’s the other key, tony, is what we’re also going to do since the product and microsoft power b i again is the one we’re using. It is b is designed so for someone that’s in the line of business, the development department of marketing department, the program delivery, not the geeky tech person it’s not designed for that person is designed so that those that a former that i mentioned can learn how to use it. So we’re rolling out training at the same time, we’re going to take him through here’s how to use the tool and here’s the art of the possible, and let them loose and let them loose on the data, and also let them see, you know, some of the additional products, visualizations and, more importantly, the insight that comes out. We’ll let that run for a while. Say, you know, show us how it’s changed your ability to perform your mission. Okay? Yeah. And where are you in this process? So we finished the proof of concept on we go and let’s see january, late january or february on we look at it for a little bit and were actually just going to start up our operational pilot, which will be a six week effort with some some assistance. We’re gonna start that up in several weeks. So by this summer for april thirtieth. So okay, here a couple weeks away from taking the next step. Will spend about six weeks building it up, and then we’ll look at it for a bit. How do you figure out what what the data is? That is most important for the organization? Well, we’re starting with, you know, the the kp eyes that are most dahna most impactful and most important for insight and that’s a, uh, you know, that’s a that’s, quite frankly, a lift and shift of current reporting. Two more digitised on dh that’s sort of a stepping stone, because these with kp eyes that dahna that air that leadership needs teo, understand where we’re going and where we are, but again that’s ah that’s a stepping stone. So it’s also going to relieve some pain? Because, quite frankly, you know, the other way of doing the reporting takes a lot of time, and a lot of resource is, which is time and resource is to be better well spent by those down the chain of command that have to do all that every organization has that, but instead of we’re goingto automate that enhance it, enhance it, and let me touch another key point because what we can do that can’t be done as effectively as connect the dots across data silos for combined visualizations that tell amore comprehensive story, the whole organization, right, especially the sea level, is interested in that sea level. And we think every yes, but not just to sea level and again that’s a stepping stone, because what comes next and the rial golden ring is ah, and well, we will have accomplished a lot by that intermediate step, which is much more efficient, comprehensive reporting and visualization. But the real golden ring and the next step it is doing predictive analytics and being able, teo asked questions of the data by interacting with him. So there’s a k p i reporting this is the important stuff we need no for how the business is going that’s again, the next step and once it’s all in place and folks get comfortable with it, say, well, i could really ask some questions. You know what i haven’t thought about? Fill in the blank. You know how our current trend is from a predictive analytics perspective, our fund-raising is happening over time or what is the impact if we change these variables? You khun, you could do all of that once. You’re in the platform and uncomfortable. Okay? Got to take a break. Tell us i have a new tell us. Moughniyah lll. Lead quote. Lee elementary school foundation is receiving a monthly donation from tello’s for the credit card processing of a company one of our parents owns is likely the easiest donation source we have ever secured. End quote. A parent’s company. That’s. Brilliant local companies taking credit cards. Do you need more revenue? Get started at tony dot m a slash tony. Tell us now back to be data driven with eli hurts. Let’s talk about the challenges of doing this. You brought him up earlier. I want to come back to it. Sure. Uh, what what? What should we expect? Yeah, well, there can be some and actually just came from aa good session, where we had this same discussion and with a group full of non-profits and it was it was really it was it was a really wonderful conversation. It became a conversation and of the same topic. And one of the challenges is that one of the non-profits brought up is hey, what if you know your shot in the light on something? That’s? That is kind of a hard story that, you know, has projects bad news where you have been visualized way have start asking questions. We may not always like the answer. You might not like the answer, and what we would suggest is that we shift the focus away from the who, which is can be a tendency if you see something responsible who’s responsible who hasn’t been doing their job who’s been falling short and and shift it more towards the what and what’s the impact on the on the mission than everybody circles around. You know, the conversation about how do we improve the mission based on what we learned, not who’s not been doing their job effective. So it’s changing the conversation based on the insights? Okay, so that that’s one is that the kind of fear three other has changed management? You know, i’ve been doing it this way for a long time, and this is what i was hired to do. So, like many classic change management problems or channel opportunities, it’s about education that can be circumvented with education and finding a few folks that were shown successes with him by doing it a different way with a different tool, shining the light on them and say, hey, this is an early adopter. Look what they were able to dio you could do something similar in your position will help you do that. You mean drawing on the early testing that you did well early? Six it continuing success is its a continual process. Let me give you a specific example. We did the proof of concept way showed the platform the possible everybody, not their head sea level, sweet like that. Others looked at it. Xero but can i do this to answer a question i need to do? And we identified one of those one of those this i really need to tell this toe understand this and tell this story better one just as i’m sure you know, when i tell say, tell the story, it’s obviously not about creating fiction, but it’s about painting the picture what’s going on, and so we identified that person who’s, not technologically savvy didn’t need to be we didn’t create it, so he needed to be that’s the point, and we’re helping him build something so that he can answer that question and expose. That so we could make better decisions. So we built on that success. This is, before we build out the operational pilot way found somebody else who has came to us because they heard about the success, the operational pilot or sort of proof of concept said, hey, i need another answer here. So, you know, we incrementally show successes, leverage some of these early adopters and their successes in trying to bring some skeptics along. Exactly okay, yeah, now the rial on dh so the following we haven’t accomplished yet, tony, i’ll just say that for what i’m about to say, but a study of change management and you’ve probably heard many of the folks you interview talk about it from and one of the best yeah, disciplines. I’ve been through his pro side change management certification encourage it for any non-profit listener is the best three days i’ve ever spent. Tell me again what it is a pro side p r o s c i change management three day certification class and it covers the breath of technology is what one piece of it it’s really about change management? Okay, but if you really but to go get to the next level. So some of things i’ve talked about or some sort of the classic change management techniques what’s, really a strong accelerator is to find a skeptic allowed skeptic on someone who’s yeah, so till happen, you know, if you’re not watching the video, you maybe i can tell i’m laughing. All right? So you probably last on somebody there? Well, i work for myself, but i have in the end, everybody got clients that whatever somebody who’s allowed skeptic, we’ll leave it at that. All right? Yeah, yeah. So every organization sufficient? Yeah. On dh who’s sort of maybe established will say yeah, so they have some credibility in the organization and they’re also established with the way they were used to doing things. If you make that person and advocate, they will amplify the successes to the same degree that they amplified their skepticism. Now that’s the breast, that’s, the it’s dueled brass ring. Yeah, back to your mary-jo exactly, but it’s it’s a it’s a huge accelerate an amplifier so it can be done. But instead of avoiding that skeptic, use um, empathic techniques understand why they’re they’re skeptical. Remember? Well, trying to embrace them train, embrace, understand what they need and then help them. And if they flip and you got maybe a fifty fifty chance i’ll be really but if and when they flip and then the rest the organization, by the way, everybody, when i said that they know who the organization skeptic is, right? Everybody knows so when the organisation sees a skeptic that’s a believer katie bar the doors everybody’s in, so okay. Okay, way exhausted the challenges. Well, one other, you know, is just learning the learning a new approach. It’s a different mindset. So, you know, that’s more, much more the emotional side of the psychological side of change in management. Well, you know, those pieces just address, but there’s also some some, you know, functional skills. Oh, the skills. Yes, you get skillsets the mindset skillsets so i spoke to a willingness to take on new skill and the ability. So it’s it’s a different way of operating it’s about, you know, the science behind data science is about exploring and experimenting and asking questions and telling a story. Eso again, a lot of us, you know, and many parts organizations say, hey, bill, be a report that shows nothing fund-raising how much you know how many impressions were on the website or whatever? How many times are programmers using a report? You know, it’s more of a diagnostic or reporting this is what happened? And they say, here’s, what happened? But what this cannon and get to with a different skill set is ask some questions on dh, interact with it, tio, connect the dots, teo answer answer, tell the story of what’s really going on versus saying what? What happened? Okay, eli, i want to talk about some of the tools that way because we just have a couple minutes left, okay? Uh, tools that can help with this with this process, yeah, yeah. So one i wrote, we use and and we’re having very good success with it is microsoft power b i mentioned and that’s the primary one now the other is, you know, the benefit of it is the tool is it can integrate and interact with the data wherever it is, so you don’t have to create something new, leave it in place and integrated. There are a few, you know, competitors in the place in the in the space. That’s the one we’re getting no success, we’ve put a lot of our operational data and a sales force back end, which we built up for several reasons and integrating it in on dh and again, others and data in place. So those those are some of the primary ones the sales force haven’t add on for this kind of data introspection, they do, they do they call it einstein analytics, einstein yeah, and sales force just recently, we’re recording this in april of twenty eighteen they just recently perp made a purchase of another integration product called mulesoft so they’re going to integrate that product so that in their analytics engine they can pull in other data sources, which is really important fan letters because a lot of systems have been built up as here’s, my tool or data set based on what’s happening in this piece of the process and really to tell the comprehensive picture is about connecting the dots so you won’t be able to pull in from several sources. So salesforce’s getting has that capability and einstein analytics with mulesoft added tio okay, we have just about a minute or so left and i want to ask you what is it? You know, vice president of information technology. Yeah, yeah. What is it you love about the work you do? Oh, great question. Thanks for asking. People don’t think about it. It is a lovable, lovable office toe working, let alone lead. Yeah there’s a little maytag repairman have the successive nobody’s angry, right? Yeah, when i really like about is we’re rolling out capabilities that are that are making a everybody’s every employee’s job better, more effective cut across the hall organise a cross organization and we feel that we can make them more efficient by either the systems where the insights they get that gives lifts to the entire organization. We’re also changing the way we’re we’re interact with our constituents or service members were rolled out a mobile app. Recently go the apple or google play and download the usl app it’s really gratifying to know that weekend engage with our customers in away reach him where they are dahna but really it all rolls back to we can make the mission more effective, and if we can save a dollar while we’re doing it and then as a non-profit we’re serving. Our service members are constituents more effectively and that’s. Gratifying. Are you a vet? I am. Yeah, i am too. Well, thank you for your support. Thank you. You thank me. First what service? I was in the navy about you turning air force air force. Okay. We so we should have a little rivalry going on here. Very friendly, though. Of course. Eli hurts. He’s, the vice president of information technology for united service organizations uso this interview is sponsored by network for good. Easy to use donorsearch and fund-raising software for non-profits. Thank you very much. Thank you. To you know pleasure. Thanks. Thanks. And this is twenty martignetti non-profit radio coverage of eighteen ntc. Thank you so much for being with us next week. Change agents on your board and more from the non-profit technology conference. If you missed any part of today’s show, i beseech you, find it on tony martignetti dot com were supported by pursuing online tools for small and midsize non-profits data driven and technology enabled. Tony dahna slash pursuant radio by wagner, sepa is guiding you beyond the numbers weinger cps dot com and tell us credit card and payment processing your passive revenue stream. Durney dahna slash tony tell us. Ah, creative producers claire meyerhoff. Sam liebowitz is the line producer. Show social media is by susan chavez, and this very cool music is by scott stein. We will be next week for non-profit radio. 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