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Nonprofit Radio for June 13, 2022: Appealing To Tomorrow’s Major Donors

 

Nejeed Kassam: Appealing To Tomorrow’s Major Donors

There’s $50 trillion set to change hands in North America by 2050, enriching today’s millennials and Generation Z. Let’s talk about cultivation and fundraising strategies to reach these generations. My guest is Nejeed Kassam from Keela. (This is part of our coverage of #22NTC, hosted by NTEN.)

 

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[00:01:40.64] spk_0:
Hello 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 suffer with blended vaginitis. If you inflamed me with the idea that you missed this week’s show appealing to tomorrow’s major donors, There’s $50 trillion North America by 2050 enriching today’s millennials and generation Z let’s talk about cultivation and fundraising strategies to reach these generations. My guest is Najid Kassem from kila. This is part of our coverage of the 2022 non profit technology conference hosted by N 10 On Tony’s take two. Trepidation about new york city, 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 4th dimension technologies I. T infra in a box. The affordable tech solution for nonprofits. tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Just like 3D but they go one dimension deeper here is appealing to tomorrow’s major donors. Hello and welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 22 N. T. C 2022 nonprofit technology conference hosted by N 10 with me now is Najid Qasem Ceo and founder of Kayla Najid, welcome back to nonprofit radio

[00:02:18.54] spk_1:
Thanks so much Tony and just for the folks that are listening because I might have a conflict I’m also on the board of directors at N10 and so really really proud to be part of the governance team at antenna and grateful to all of those of you who attended NTC this past, I guess almost a month ago now. Wonderful.

[00:02:31.14] spk_0:
Thank you for thank you for letting me know. We have Miko Whitlock and Jason shim. I have to see if they’re still on, but we’ve got, we’ve got Beth Kanter coming up. Um,

[00:02:32.86] spk_1:
I mean those are, those are my people, that’s my tribe. So you’ve got a great, great lineup coming up

[00:02:57.34] spk_0:
well. And you’re on the, you’re on the board of a terrific organization. Any sample ward is our technology and social media contributor. So she’s on many times a year sharing her wisdom on, on those subjects. We’re gonna talk about your seminar topic. Great transfer of wealth, how to reach the next generation.

[00:03:00.54] spk_1:
Absolutely.

[00:03:07.04] spk_0:
And you say you’re in your description that there’s a $50 trillion dollar transfer coming. What’s, what’s on the horizon?

[00:04:22.34] spk_1:
Well, you know, I think a lot of the topic is just about the fact that boomers and those, the generation, the great generations as I like to call them, are starting to, to, to find peace and move on to whatever happens in the next stage of our lives and you know, as well as they pass our grand, my grandparents passed away. Um, the last couple of years and you see that generation, my parents are starting to get older and thinking about the next, you know, the next chapter of their lives and so for those of us that are gen, x, gen y and I guess gen z is now, um, you know, a lot of money ultimately is going to transfer between generations, the boomers and their parents Postwar really generated absurd amounts, like, like, you know, unthinkable amounts of wealth and, and that’s all transferring and there’s a bunch of really interesting factors that are, that are going to change how giving is done. What’s gonna happen to that? Just the demographic, you know, general demographics in the United States and so, you know, a lot of money is going to change hands and, and that’s going to have a profound impact on getting because for a whole host of reasons we’ll talk about today.

[00:04:25.00] spk_0:
Yeah, So you’re expecting that millennials are going to grow the

[00:04:28.50] spk_1:
wealth that’s

[00:04:30.28] spk_0:
left to them. Well, if they spend it, then we’re hoping they’re gonna be giving it away because otherwise we have nothing to talk about it. If they’re all buying super yachts, then you and I may as well end right now, shut the mics

[00:04:43.04] spk_1:
off. I mean, for the sake of humanity, I really hope that they’re not just buying superyachts. How about that?

[00:04:49.40] spk_0:
Okay, right. Super yachts, private

[00:04:51.42] spk_1:
islands.

[00:04:53.18] spk_0:
You and I

[00:04:54.38] spk_1:
can’t possibly conceive of tony

[00:05:04.04] spk_0:
Okay, I hope not. I hope it doesn’t go that way. Alright. Otherwise, like I said, you know, you and I are done in three minutes. Okay, let’s go on the safe assumption on the humanitarian and um magnanimous assumption that uh, they’re gonna be giving a lot of this wealth away and, and they’ll be growing it too. Right?

[00:05:16.14] spk_1:
Absolutely.

[00:05:21.44] spk_0:
So you’re encouraging us to focus well before we get to the, you know, what to do, how to reach these folks.

[00:05:25.94] spk_1:
What

[00:05:41.94] spk_0:
are, what are some of these factors that you alluded to? Why are you expecting? Why? I think the, the estimates I’ve seen of transfer from baby boomers to millennials is not 50 trillion. I’ve seen 20-30 trillion or something like that. But you’re saying so in

[00:06:00.54] spk_1:
20, in 2014, um, um, For Boston College or some researchers at Boston College did a research and their prediction was 58 trillion would, would be transferred to the next gen. And that I think it includes gen x and gen y and ultimately gen z. So it’s not just millennials would be in the amount of 58 trillion, but when we’re talking 30 40 50 ultimately, I think it’s the same. It doesn’t really matter. It’s just a huge amount of money.

[00:06:28.14] spk_0:
It is. Okay. And so you’d like us to approach are younger donors Because we’re talking about, we’re talking about anybody 60 and under, where, you know, I

[00:06:41.44] spk_1:
would say like when does gen x start 50 and under maybe probably 55. I don’t know whatever gen x is. But yes, I think millennials are the the the most commonly, um, the most commonly thought about populist, But ultimately I think, you know, the age of the internet, the age of artificial intelligence, all of these kinds of things are, are, are ushering in new ways to engage donors. And I think that’s the crux of it.

[00:06:59.74] spk_0:
Okay, okay, now you’re using millennials and gen X interchangeably.

[00:07:18.54] spk_1:
No, No, No Gen X is what 1965-1980? Millennials are 1982, Some say 2000, some say 96. And then gen, Gen Z is people that are too young for me to think about.

[00:07:31.34] spk_0:
Okay, we’re not there yet. Um, Alright, what, what’s your, what’s your advice around talking to these? Um, millenials and gen xers?

[00:09:03.54] spk_1:
Yeah, I think you asked a great question previously and I’ll get to this question, but let’s talk about why they’re different because I think that’s really important to note. There’s a few factors that are, that are super interesting. The first one is, household sizes are smaller and you might think, why does that matter? Well, there are fewer millennials and gen Z s than there were their parents. And so between, I think it’s from 1962 around today or 2018 or whenever this data was published, Household size in the us has gone from 3.6 people per family to 3.1 people. Now that might be only half a person, but that’s a substantial number of people. And what it means is the people inheriting money are actually gonna be fewer, right in terms of their populace, but they’re gonna have more capacity in terms of their wealth. And so I think this data point is actually quite um, it’s interesting, it’s a little bit terrifying in some ways because you know, you’re gonna organizations, the sector as a whole is going to have to seek, you know, a a lot more from individual people as opposed to being able to diversify in the same way. I think that’s a very interesting piece of data and one that I think is going to change the dynamic, especially of major gifts because, you know, currently you think about the people, the high net worth individuals, the families, they care about health care or they care about this or there’s a lot of yours, Right? I think with that next generation there’s gonna be a lot of ants because there’s less people inheriting larger amounts of money. And I think excuse me, that’s quite profound. Don’t you think tony I

[00:09:25.94] spk_0:
do. I think I have a person, times tens, the many tens of millions of exactly that we have in this country that’s significant. Uh, you know, we’ve always thought of the average family as, you know, a family of four. All right, so you’re saying

[00:09:28.56] spk_1:
you’re

[00:09:41.34] spk_0:
saying the average is 3.6, but look 3.6 rounds to 43.1, barely, barely, barely three. So, you know, with 3.6 and four, 3.1 is a big difference.

[00:10:03.74] spk_1:
Absolutely. And think about it like this, if somebody, you know, earns $250 million over their life and they built a portfolio of real estate and wealth and influence ultimately. And they take that and they go to one kid, okay, let’s say each kid, you know, 100 25 million, but when one child is inheriting all that money, your major donor pool is ultimately getting smaller and and so now they have more power, they have more influence, they have actually ability to write bigger checks, but organizations are gonna have to do better at collaborating to generate these things because whether we like to admit it or not in the sector, tony

[00:10:20.21] spk_0:
Another, the other 125 million goes to the Super Yacht.

[00:10:23.84] spk_1:
Of course, sorry, tony slipped my mind. So

[00:10:27.56] spk_0:
there we are. So we’re done again again, we’re done. One kid and one super yacht, there’s your 250. Alright,

[00:10:33.59] spk_1:
You just you just cut generosity and a half and I think we started, Alright,

[00:10:37.34] spk_0:
let’s reduce the super yacht, you know, let’s say in

[00:10:40.44] spk_1:
70

[00:10:44.94] spk_0:
five, let’s do 75 million on the Super Yacht. Another 50. Another 50 to be very generous

[00:12:26.14] spk_1:
with. I’m gonna cut you off because I’d like to share a couple more pieces of data that are useful. The first one, is that, Is that migration has changed over the past kind of 30, 40 years Kids or kids in that 3.1 case right, families are actually staying more geographically close together. And that was especially heightened during the pandemic, where 52% of people aged 18 or 29 were actually at home with their folks in 2020. Now, if you look at data from Um, I think it’s 2004 is when it starts people, both seniors. And so like the parents of these boomers who many of them have passed now, but also the kids of these boomers are staying closer together, which means, you know, they’re more integrated into their families. And what that at least the research that we read and I understood or interpreted was that that can actually mean that maybe people are more aligned with their parents, beliefs or they’re more engaged with them? Or at least they certainly know their parents interests better. Now. The question we’re going to have to figure out is is that going to make them more likely to continue the legacies? Let’s say I I’m I’m let’s say there’s a high net worth family. Okay. And they’ve spent years giving to poverty alleviation? Well, these kids or kids that inherit this money because they’re closer to those parents, both geographically and, you know, in many other ways, are they going to continue that legacy? Are they going to rebel against it when they give? And it’s a question we don’t know the answer to, but it’s an interesting piece of data well,

[00:12:31.04] spk_0:
which also leads to, uh, you know, our our subject of appealing to these

[00:12:32.07] spk_1:
folks

[00:13:45.64] spk_0:
so that they don’t, by default, abandon the philanthropy of their, of their parents. I mean, they may do it consciously, but you don’t want it to just happen because you never gave it a shot to, to avoid it from happening. It’s time for a break. Turn to communications. They’ll develop your media strategy for you. What are the parts of that? It starts with identifying your core messages then defining those channels, those outlets where those messages ought to be heard. The places where you want to be known as a thought leader turn to will do the legwork to approach those outlets and as they close opportunities for you, craft your message appropriately to the specific audience you’re gonna be talking to. That is a media strategy. That’s what turned to communications can do for you because your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot C. O now back to appealing to tomorrow’s major donors because I want to keep talking about the trends before we get to the Yeah. And I think there’s one

[00:14:14.84] spk_1:
interesting one that we can’t forget and that’s women outlive men, um, by like, I think it’s like five years on average in the US now. So it’s like, that’s a, that’s like, you know, a meaty 56789% of people’s lives. Right? And so it’s interesting because unlike, you know, unlike, unfortunately similar to many other things in our history, you’ve kind of focused on like older white men that’s been like, you know, kind of it’s you see it in representation in politics on boards of directors and ceo position in funding for investments, whatever it might be.

[00:14:27.65] spk_0:
Call it what it is. We’re talking about sexism.

[00:15:27.04] spk_1:
Sure, look, I’m a person of color. I I don’t and my wife’s a person of color who is a woman. She has it way worse tonight. Right? And so the interesting thing is my wife’s gonna be gonna outlive me almost for certain. I mean for sure in my case, but, you know, demographically as well. And so philanthropy forget about just the transfer of wealth. The transfer of wealth is going to be inter mediated by the transfer from men who are dying at, you know, whatever 70 something to women who are probably dying 56 years later. And so philanthropy is going to be affected by the fact that decision making historically and giving has been made by the primary breadwinners. But as we see more women taking positions and leadership making more money. We see women inheriting money, they’re gonna give differently. And I don’t think we exactly know how that is yet. But that’s like I said, it’s like a stepping in the in the in the transfer, right? So I did a point that’s super relevant to this conversation.

[00:15:40.94] spk_0:
There is research about the way women give being different than the way men give. They want to be more involved. Uh, they were more involved in in how the money is used. Um, it’s less transactional for them. And uh,

[00:15:45.73] spk_1:
that’s interesting. I didn’t know that.

[00:16:06.54] spk_0:
Yeah. And um, they like, you know, they like to have more of a role in how it’s spent. Um, and it’s, yeah, I don’t, I think there’s, there’s other research to that. They like to be not only involved in how what their gift is is going to do, but be involved in the organization generally. So maybe they’re giving they’re giving what we’re talking about major donors, I think is what

[00:16:17.80] spk_1:
the research

[00:16:18.85] spk_0:
research is. Um, but they’ll also be, they’ll increase their volunteering with your

[00:16:23.94] spk_1:
organization, which

[00:16:27.64] spk_0:
may have nothing at all to do with their giving. Uh, they again, less transactional more, much more relational when it’s when

[00:16:33.69] spk_1:
it’s and I think what’s interesting is like, there isn’t much data on that yet, Right. Because of the demographic realities and the power dynamics that have been so, so unfortunate. And so you see

[00:16:44.44] spk_0:
like, Yeah,

[00:16:50.04] spk_1:
and that’s, I think you’re gonna see more of the research and ultimately more from that because it’s valuable, you know,

[00:17:00.64] spk_0:
the sexism in fundraising is, uh, I think long standing and obviously shortsighted, um, not just in fundraising, right.

[00:17:03.23] spk_1:
tony and everything, to be honest.

[00:17:05.64] spk_0:
Absolutely, yeah.

[00:18:37.84] spk_1:
But what’s interesting is there’s also been and I’m not, you know, I want to kind of move on because there’s also been quite a significant ageism in fundraising. You said it yourself, we spend, what is it 80% of our time on the top? 20% of donors? I think that’s the math that everyone teaches at fundraising school. Um, but what’s interesting is that’s shortsighted ultimately. Yes, I understand it completely. I really do. But what is interesting is, and this is something I touched on in my lecture 10 10 was, you know, the investment in youth giving has actually been minimal to be honest, because it hasn’t seen us providing as much instant return on investment, which is true. It’s a long game, not a short game, right? And but youth, the youth, especially in the context of this transfer of wealth, are going to inherit all that money. And if you haven’t laid your groundwork, you can’t suddenly show up at their door and young people giving even if they don’t have wealth yet or at all. But yet for the sake of this conversation is different. A couple of interesting trends. The first one is young people and I say this millennials I think is the research that I’m quoting are much more influenced by their peers. So young people, I think the data point is our 46% more likely to donate if a co worker does and 65% more likely to volunteer if a co worker does. That’s fascinating to me because it actually it’s a social activity in a weird way. You know, the power, you know, we’ll talk about social media maybe in a bit. But that’s interesting. The second data

[00:18:45.66] spk_0:
point. That’s Yeah. So that’s just that’s co workers, not even necessarily friends.

[00:18:51.84] spk_1:
I assume the data is similar for friends,

[00:18:55.34] spk_0:
friends giving up their birthdays, friends doing peer to peer campaigns.

[00:19:06.54] spk_1:
Well, I think, and I think I have a peer to peer data point that in my notes, let me just see if I can pull it up. I’ll see if I can find it. But let’s keep going. Yeah,

[00:19:12.64] spk_0:
Okay. But coworkers. That’s that’s quite an affinity for co worker giving.

[00:20:19.84] spk_1:
But and you know, we see it, look, I have a lot of young millennials in all my staff and they’re wonderful and amazing people and they’re definitely, you know, whenever something personal giving, that’s the other point. The second point, this is actually a nice segue giving us much more personal to millennial generation. And that has a couple of ramifications for example, to segue from our previous conversation When you know, we have, I think we have staff from 15 countries at Kayla um, on our team born who are born in 15 countries. And so, you know, whether it’s an issue area they care about or something happening in in a in a home or or former place of theirs, they share the plight and also opportunities to engage, right? I think this is a beautiful part of our culture because it helps, you know, But I can, I can watch this in action. I can see I’ve made donations because our coworkers feels an affinity or a passion or, or a sense of connection to a cause. And so, you know, I think that is interesting because I’ve watched it kind of firsthand, right, tony I think that’s super. That’s it kind of reinforces from a non data perspective kind of qualitatively exactly what this data point is showing

[00:20:51.14] spk_0:
interest. But I think, you know, what else, you know, uh, anecdotally I’m a young baby boomer and I’ve never done that. I’ve never given because a coworker gate, I mean I haven’t, haven’t had coworkers for something like 20 years, but back when I did for the short time that I did and I could stand being an employee of someone else. I, I never gave for that reason.

[00:22:47.24] spk_1:
Well, and I think the social media thing is, is I can’t find the data point and I apologize, but I think it’s essentially the same thing. It’s that folks are influenced, not in a bad way, but like folks are inspired is a better way to put it from their communities ultimately. And it’s not church or synagogue or mosque or united way as much or community centers anymore. It’s what they’re seeing on social media, what matters most of their friends and what that actually is kind of segue. Me too is that they’re giving is much more personal for millennials than it was. You know I say our generation I’m right at the cusp of being a millennial but I consider myself at least emotionally outside of it. And so things like organizational status, tax deductibility, organizational legitimacy are much less at the forefront of their decision making. They you know the rise of go fund me where people are giving to people directly the rise of um of of of not having the intermediary of an organization. Um the rise of not carrying the fact that they’re not going to get a tax receipt which is gonna offset a percentage of their donations. Millennials aren’t necessarily looking for that break or something tangible. They want that feeling of making an impact right? There’s a huge feel. It’s it’s why we see the rise of you know be corpse attracting more staff and the why that almost every millennial says when you’re looking for a job impact is a part of that calculus. And so you see those I’m gonna go out and say values of a generation applying themselves or or or or showing their face in giving in a very different way from from me and you and our parents and I think that’s very interesting.

[00:24:09.24] spk_0:
It’s time for a break. Fourth dimension technologies. Their I. T. Solution is I. T. Infra in a box it’s the I. T. Buffet, it’s budget friendly. It’s holistic. You pick what you need and you leave the rest behind the different components that are available. I. T. Assessment, multi factor authentication for security, other security methods, cost analysis of where you’re standing, what you’re spending money on the help desk and there’s more you choose what’s right for your I. T. Budget for your I. T. Situation as it exists. Like they’ll help you fill the gap between where you are and where you want to be. That’s the I. T. Infra in a box. Fourth dimension technologies tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant D. Just like three D. But they go one dimension deeper. Let’s return to appealing to tomorrow’s major donors. Let’s turn to what nonprofits can do to huh exploit this and using exploitation as in a non pejorative sense. Take advantage of or

[00:24:09.64] spk_1:
C the opportunity I think.

[00:24:15.14] spk_0:
Yeah in the data and then the and then the trend.

[00:24:17.12] spk_1:
Yeah.

[00:24:18.01] spk_0:
And you know I think enormous wealth transfer. So let’s talk about the

[00:26:02.74] spk_1:
really low hanging fruit like the most boring fruit that you could possibly and and and that’s like you know when high net worth individuals give for major donors for major giving. Excuse me as major donors. They don’t see it as I. Samuel l smith is making the donation. It’s me the smith on behalf of my family. The smith family. It’s a family. There’s so much of that family legacy idea and so when organizations are so privileged to get those kinds of donations don’t just look at Sam look at SAm’s wife and look at Sam’s kids and make those connections with the family and that’s for two reasons. One, it’s the right thing to do. Super obvious. But to it’s actually laying the groundwork for, for relationships in the future, share the impact being made, engage the families, the kids. Especially because if you want to get another gift, if you want to, you know, create opportunity from that, it’s going to happen likely either when the donor dies and his or her wife does it or husband, but much more likely their kids continuing that legacy. So engage with them. Like that’s not hard. It’s like, you know, bring them, bring them in, engage them, take them out to lunch instead of just the major donor or the couple or whatever it is. It’s an easy thing to do is encouraging families to come and come around recognizing the families, not just the person and then offering entry points for the kids to um, to engage the organization as volunteers. You know, we talked in the, in the lecture and, and Nathaniel gave a great example about youth councils and, you know, bringing on kind of communities or boards of youth. Often the kind of, yeah, kind

[00:26:08.60] spk_0:
of advisory like

[00:26:09.50] spk_1:
engagement boards I think would be the best way to put it. But yeah,

[00:26:13.03] spk_0:
I’m,

[00:26:15.91] spk_1:
I’m just in our notes, we call them like youth, hold on. I’ll find the exact term we used.

[00:26:22.30] spk_0:
I

[00:26:22.64] spk_1:
think they’re called youth councils,

[00:26:24.24] spk_0:
you’ve counted. But what you would call them for the folks. Youth council,

[00:26:27.60] spk_1:
right?

[00:26:40.94] spk_0:
You want that, you want that perspective in your, in your event planning, certainly in your event planning, but in your fundraising, you know, you may, you may not be thinking of peer to peer well,

[00:26:41.52] spk_1:
and that’s actually my next point

[00:26:43.60] spk_0:
Are in their 30s and 40s, you may not be taking a peer to peer campaigns.

[00:28:54.04] spk_1:
And I have a feeling a big part of there’s a, there’s a symbiosis between that data point on giving from coworkers and peer to peer. So peer to peer kind of had a lot of sex appeal a few years ago, and then people were like, is it that valuable? I’m here to say peer to peer is phenomenally valuable, but not necessarily because people think it is or thought it was. I think a lot of people thought, oh, it’s gonna spike our donation. I’m in it for the long game here. To me, Pierre, Pierre is an entry point to engagement with an entirely new group of donors. I think the numbers in the 80% of people who give through a peer to peer campaign are first time donors to the cause. And, and if you don’t store them effectively, which we can talk about later or on another show or I’m sure you have really qualified folks talking about it, you’re gonna lose that donor to bring them into your giving ecosystem as an organization, but they are an entry point where somebody else is doing the lead generation for you, right? Ultimately that giving about coworkers, I give to every single period of your campaign. One of my staff’s writing in a, you know, um, cycling in an event or running a race or I don’t know whatever it might be. That’s an entry point. That’s an entry point. And it’s an entry point to diversify your donor base to access new donors to get your giving list up and, and we all know in the space, the donor retention is a lot cheaper than donor acquisition. Every data, like there’s absurd amounts of data that show that and peer to peer is a great example and, and it’s how you engage a generation and I’m gonna take it a step further. Millennials like to feel agency, they want to be part of something that goes back to that feeling that personal nature of it. When you get folks engaging with peer to peer, what you’re doing is not just getting money. You’re, you’re, you’re building advocates right? Like the youth council, but much more scalable, ultimately right. You’re getting perspective, you’re building advocates, you’re, you’re finding new ways to get into communities and you’re ultimately empowering social media to do the work for you and why wouldn’t you do that? And I think it doesn’t have to be a big event or a race. It can be, you know, that we can use peer to peer much more creatively to, to think about the long term opportunities, does that make sense? tony I

[00:29:21.34] spk_0:
had a guest, yes, it does have a guest who used the example of a local animal shelter they hosted a dog wedding for and, and you know, again an event to attract younger donors and, and it was phenomenally successful. I know you said it to my

[00:29:44.94] spk_1:
staff, they would all go like all these, it’s just, that’s a lot of them have dogs and you know, you know, it is what it is and it’s, it’s wonderful for them cause a lot of them are having kids, right? tony look at that number kid that 3.6 to 3.1 that someone’s not having Children and so, but that’s a way to encourage an entire demographic, you probably would, wouldn’t get to otherwise. I think that’s brilliant. It’s brilliant.

[00:29:51.44] spk_0:
Her other idea was a bark mitzvah.

[00:29:53.74] spk_1:
I’m

[00:29:57.81] spk_0:
trying

[00:29:59.08] spk_1:
to make a joke with mazel tov like,

[00:30:04.45] spk_0:
like

[00:30:05.12] spk_1:
it’s there, it’s there,

[00:30:19.34] spk_0:
it was all about to share that with her. Um, yeah, very good, very good, very good. Um, yeah, as somebody who thinks that the only good puns are the ones that I think of, but I thought I thought bark mitzvah was very good, yes muzzle top outstanding, very good, very good. Alright, tony I told

[00:30:28.50] spk_1:
you I have now been a dad for two years and so my dad joke. This is just, it’s, it’s coming, it’s rising, you know?

[00:30:40.34] spk_0:
Well you’re still just approaching it because is very good. When the jokes start to be about your genes, you know, then then then they’re then they’re tired. They’re

[00:30:47.42] spk_1:
tired. You’re

[00:30:59.84] spk_0:
just you’re just approaching but but you’re still in the you’re still in the humorous category and not high rolling. You’re not, you haven’t, you haven’t transcended into the eye rolling. Alright.

[00:31:00.18] spk_1:
There’s two more topics I want to touch on briefly before we run out of time.

[00:31:17.24] spk_0:
We have time. Okay. Wait, are these still in the category of what nonprofits can do to, to attract and appeal to and or steward, you mentioned stewardship I want to, you know what be doing do talk

[00:32:23.04] spk_1:
about? I think there’s two factors that we all that. So I I don’t know if this is a do and bring me back onto shore if you need me to. But let’s talk about family foundation and donor advised funds for a second because engaging both of these things is actually critical to capitalizing on the opportunity of of the transfer of wealth. So, you know, for whatever tax reasons, right. A lot of folks might build family foundations or or engage with staff so that they can receive the tax benefits on the event of some kind of liquidation. Whatever it’s selling the company or having a windfall or whatever it might be. But what’s interesting is two things to think about the first one is how are we thinking about that as part of the transfer of wealth? Like what can we do with that? And the second one is, that’s a give now benefit or, you know, benefit other communities. It’s like give now from a tax perspective, give later for the organizations. And so to me, I think laying the groundwork engaging family foundations or high net worth individuals early as that process is starting is going to be super valuable because folks could pass with dispersement quotas very low, at least in Canada. And I think in the States they’re relatively low as well.

[00:32:39.16] spk_0:
Yeah,

[00:33:40.24] spk_1:
5%. So I think Canada just went from 3.5 to 5% in this past budget last week. Actually, well, exactly because their foundations, right. But yeah, so, but the thing is those are, those are like grounds for giving, you know, from a generational wealth because ultimately the kids might be forget about being involved, tony the kids might be actually driving that even when their parents pass on, so the gift has been made, but the, but the, but the beneficiary hasn’t benefited yet. And so it’s this liminal state that if we forget about as organizations and I speak as a board member of six nonprofits or five or whatever the number is, we’re losing an opportunity as part of this transfer of wealth. So laying the groundwork starting to build relationships with both the foundations and the daft or the daft, depending on the structure, getting the kids involved in other ways. Like peer to peer, I think, not forgetting the family foundations and the daft components to generational transfer would be shortsighted.

[00:37:02.03] spk_0:
It’s time for Tony’s take two. I’m returning very shortly To New York City for two weeks. In fact, as you’re listening to this, I’ll be in the city And you know, I lived in the city for 15 years, but I’ve got some trepidation about returning. Um and I don’t think that my situation is any different than yours. You know, returning to old Patterns, old places, it might be an office, might be returning home after having been away through the pandemic. That’s my situation. I haven’t been in New York City since early March 2020. And so things on my mind do I remember how to get around on the subway. I feel like that’s like riding a bicycle. Um I don’t think I’ll get on too many uptown trains when I want to go downtown, but you know, the familiarity, the old alacrity, the smoothness, the comfort, it’s not quite there. I’m gonna have to check check my subway map app more often than I used to where you know, I used to just pop downstairs. Oh yeah, it’s right this way pop pop pop. I know the turn, I know which uh entrance I wanna use. I know exactly where to stand waiting for the train. I don’t have that, that level of comfort anymore. And Covid of course, You know, I did see that. Covid rates are declining in Northeast. But I mean new york city is still a huge city densely populated. So we got some trepidation there. I’m gonna have to be more scrupulous about my masking than uh, than I am here in this little beach town in north Carolina. And then the other part is just, you know, identity. I was a new yorker for 15 years And yes, I, I moved out of New York six years ago. So it’s not, I didn’t move out because of the pandemic. I left several years before, but for two weeks, I don’t know, can I be a new yorker again for two weeks? Is that that allowed? Am I a tourist? I don’t know. I’m, I don’t think I’m an expat new yorker living in north Carolina. I don’t feel like that. No, but am I a tourist returning for two weeks? Interesting. What’s, what’s my identity? How do I fit in former resident? Not, you know, that that’s somewhere higher cash than tourist returning resident, but just for two weeks. So interesting. You know, and I’m sure that you have got lots of these kinds of thoughts going on as you return two old patterns, old places That’s Tony’s take two. We’ve got boo koo, but loads more time for appealing to tomorrow’s major donors with najid Kassem by the way. You’re on five boards, you were dismissed from one of the boards. I’m not at liberty to reveal at this time, but you’ll, they’ll be in touch with you.

[00:37:11.43] spk_1:
Good to know. tony I’ll expect the letter.

[00:37:14.13] spk_0:
Now the donor advised funds and the foundation. Yeah, very good. But when I said, when you know the kids are involved now, um, ultimately, I mean the kids may have already taken over, but ultimately when their baby boomer parents have died, then the kids are gonna be involved, especially in the family

[00:37:38.83] spk_1:
legally required to, to make disbursements. So if you haven’t gotten on the ground game now In 5, 10, 15, 20 years when there are these huge amounts of money, which they constantly have to be giving away, you’re gonna be behind the eight ball and that’s unfortunate position for folks to begin

[00:37:59.33] spk_0:
good. Yeah, no good advice. And that is right in line with what nonprofits can be talking about can be thinking about and and likely acting on. So yes, now you’re, you’re still in that you’re still in the, you’re still in the game.

[00:38:13.82] spk_1:
I’m still, I wanted to end at some point with five weird facts about legacy giving that I found, which I think you would really enjoy. I

[00:38:22.12] spk_0:
probably will. Let’s not, it’s, it’s not the show though. It’s still tony-martignetti non profit radio So hold, hold back with the, with the anarchy and we’ll get, we’ll get to the five points. we still have plenty of

[00:38:27.56] spk_1:
time

[00:38:31.02] spk_0:
alright, the five, five idiosyncrasies maybe of plan giving or legacy giving as you call it.

[00:38:34.79] spk_1:
And I think which is relevant obviously in the transfer of wealth conversation of course. What

[00:38:49.12] spk_0:
about what about more advice about thinking about acting on younger the younger generations, millennials generation, z you mentioned stewardship, what are we talking about? So

[00:38:51.08] spk_1:
I was just, I was just gonna go there and talk about

[00:38:52.72] spk_0:
community.

[00:39:56.92] spk_1:
So, so I think one of the pieces of advice that Nathaniel especially gave is like the post gift engagement, especially in peer to peer. And I thought that was really interesting because, and it’s two kinds of post of stewardship, the stewardship of the donors who give to peer peer campaigns, which is valuable and we talked about expanding the donor base, but I think what she really drummed down on is how important it is to actually engage with the fundraisers, the folks who are actually doing the period, like, you know, who are the, you know, for those of you who don’t know a peer to peer, you have a group of fundraisers who raise money for the cause and donors make donations in support of those fundraisers and the money goes to the organizations, but the fundraisers, they’re kind of like your champions, right? They’re the ones who are casting a wide net who are sharing and promoting, who are engaging their social media’s and I think one thing that we often forget is to thank the fundraisers, we do a good job of thanking the people with the money fine and maybe we don’t do good enough a job but you write a check general, you’re gonna get a thank you. But the fundraisers are actually your access to market their your go to market strategy, so to speak and so

[00:40:03.19] spk_0:
you’re right. They created the campaign.

[00:40:05.66] spk_1:
Absolutely. They did all your work for you

[00:40:15.91] spk_0:
birthday, whatever. Yes. Yeah. Are we are we are you seeing that? Are we bad at thanking the fundraisers? We are we

[00:41:37.01] spk_1:
are um it’s very automated, it’s thanking for signing up more than thank you for what you’ve done. So a lot of like the impact or or community reporting people often forget the fundraisers and there’s you know, we’ve seen that anecdotally, we’ve seen that with our product and I’ve seen that in some of the research as well. And so where you know, Nathaniel gave this great example, I’m trying to remember but she said send a personalized impact report to the things that the fundraisers care about because generally when you’re signing up as a fundraiser for a peer to peer campaign, you give insight into the things you care about the reasons you’re doing. My mom, you know, my grandmother passed away from acts or my you know, my my aunt did this or or someone at my work struggled with that. And so you’re gonna get some insight into what they care about and if you want them to run these things again to do it participate next year or in subsequent years to get more involved as a donor themselves or a volunteer that follow up is so valuable and make and spending the time Doing it for for each of them, even if it’s 10 minutes, you know, make a call, put their name on an impact report, it’s so little in terms of cost or time, but the value of the return and ultimately that feeling of values align, which was, you know, I’ve tried to come through, come up over and over again through the, you know, this conversation about millennials, they’ll feel valued, they’ll feel values aligned and ultimately it’s the right thing to do, but but also it will help you getting them to get engaged in other ways or or

[00:41:56.31] spk_0:
again. Yeah, Alright, very smart, very savvy. I’m disappointed to hear that we’re not being good about the fundraisers. It’s I

[00:42:17.30] spk_1:
think it’s easy because there’s lots of them and it’s hard because we’re not used to it. Right, peer to peer is relatively new, it’s not built into the muscle memory of us as fundraisers and I think that’s yeah, a lot of organizations, especially mid to large ones are actually getting peer to peer officers now. So you know, you’ve got your major grant donor officer or program manager, you got your recurring donor, you got your peer to peer now because the R. O. I. S. Is so strong both from a brand perspective and from the donation perspective. Right.

[00:42:24.33] spk_0:
Very good. Thank you. All right. When you said you had I think you said you had to

[00:43:45.90] spk_1:
I think I think the stewardship one is interesting and it actually comes to you know again it’s that personalization element what what millennials want to hear however you’re engaging them if they’re the kids of high net worth if they’re part of peer to peer campaigns or if they’re just giving in general as part of the transfer they want to see much more intimately or much more directly what’s happening with the money? Right. What are you know the older generation is like how much are you spending on administration? That’s actually a lot less. They don’t care as much and you can see that because of how they’re giving, what they care about is what actually happened to that money. I don’t care if you use 13 cents or 18 cents or 23 cents for administration. How many malaria nets was I able to get from that or you know what value did my gift or my time bring to the cause that I care deeply about and that subtle difference in stewardship is actually quite substantial in how you treat it. So you know it’s not a budget or or or a financial document that you’re sending as part of stewardship it’s a lot around stories around data on impact and and around around making them feel like they were a part of that, which I think is quite different from what we saw in this boomer and other generations. What do you think? tony

[00:43:50.96] spk_0:
Yeah, no, I agree. I think there’s been less attention to that.

[00:43:56.00] spk_1:
It’s

[00:43:56.78] spk_0:
been it’s been growing, but the boomers are probably dying at a faster rate than they can, they can gain the they can gain the benefit of. I’m one of them, I’m happy to be a younger one.

[00:44:32.29] spk_1:
But but I also think it goes back to the values which we’ve sort of been talking about, right, that different reason for giving, right that the reason people millennials take certain jobs or do certain things or engage with certain, you know, community activities or civil society, it is different. And if we don’t steward differently with that, we’re not only missing an opportunity. We’re kind of not meeting folks where they are.

[00:44:34.29] spk_0:
Look, if, you know, if you’re ignoring this, the difference in the generations, you’re, you’re doing so at your peril. You know, you’re, you’re ignoring critical difference is that there’s a difference between your 70 year old donor and your 40 year old donor

[00:44:48.88] spk_1:
and I don’t want your old donor and

[00:44:51.30] spk_0:
You’re 25-30 year old donor

[00:44:53.59] spk_1:
absolutely and I don’t want it to be like we’re just doing this to get more money. Like as much as that’s easy to do. You want to connect like it’s the right thing to

[00:45:14.49] spk_0:
do. Yeah. Including families has always been, especially in planned giving, but it’s, it’s just, it’s just smart. It’s just smart business, um, engagement, which leads leads to more, more, greater impact, whether it’s volunteering or giving or just thinking well of your cause.

[00:45:23.26] spk_1:
You know, you

[00:45:24.25] spk_0:
know, I don’t give to the organization anymore, but they were very good to me when my mom died,

[00:45:30.19] spk_1:
yep.

[00:45:35.29] spk_0:
All right. All right. The Big five now giving, I will, I, I prefer the phrase planned giving so I’ll tolerate, I’ll not accept, but I’ll tolerate your legacy giving moniker.

[00:45:46.49] spk_1:
This kind of, and I’m gonna type

[00:45:49.97] spk_0:
each

[00:46:47.28] spk_1:
of them back to the conversation we’ve had today. So this isn’t out of nowhere. So first data point is 50% of like of, of planned donors give to their organization for more than 20 years before making a planned gift. So when we talk about engaging folks If you’re 45 or 50 right now, you’re part of that gen x or you’re, you know, you’re an elder millennial. If the, if the data point stays strong 20 years, it’s gotta start now, You know, if you want. And that, that’s why this transfer of wealth is super interesting. Number two donors, aged 44 older represent about 75% of all wills and more than 80% of the total value of all charitable requests made. So again, 44 is a young, it’s, you know, it’s not, we’re not talking people in their seventies when people are thinking about their wills, their thinking about the, when their kids are still in single digits often, right? Like, you know, we, my wife and I did our will when she was pregnant. We didn’t have a will before that, but we, you know, we did our, our will our wills. I guess there’s two of them

[00:46:52.80] spk_0:
was donors, 44 and over represents 75% of all existing wills

[00:46:58.73] spk_1:
and more than 80% of the request

[00:47:07.58] spk_0:
And more than 80% of all right. I guess I’d like to see a finer breakdown. Like that’s 44 and over. You know, What’s, what is 60 and over look like

[00:47:10.18] spk_1:
and I don’t have that off my fingertips. But I would bet it’s even it’s the vast majority. I

[00:47:14.95] spk_0:
would bet I

[00:47:33.48] spk_1:
would bet again, Absolutely, absolutely. Number three, 50% of donors age 50 and over with no Children had charitable estate plans, but among similar donors With Children, only 17% had philanthropic plans. That one was actually quite interesting to me.

[00:47:41.08] spk_0:
Yeah.

[00:47:42.58] spk_1:
So

[00:47:43.91] spk_0:
your, your folks with no Children are better plan giving prospects than your folks with

[00:47:49.55] spk_1:
Children and

[00:47:50.57] spk_0:
There’s, there’s a difference of 33%.

[00:47:56.28] spk_1:
Absolutely, yeah. In terms of the number of them that have wills. Right, Which is fascinating.

[00:48:01.27] spk_0:
That’s the population is have a charitable request in there

[00:48:07.50] spk_1:
will be 30

[00:48:14.67] spk_0:
3% if you’re, if you’re 55 and over, No, 50 and over, You’re 33% more likely to do it if you’re 50 and over and have no Children than you are if you’re 50 and over and had at least one child.

[00:48:36.57] spk_1:
Yes, absolutely. And again, why is this relevant? Because in this transfer of wealth, more and more people are inheriting money who don’t plan to have kids. Right. And that’s super interesting and incredibly relevant. Um,

[00:48:38.77] spk_0:
You know what, that’s even, it becomes more interesting even on another level, because yeah younger folks are less likely to have kids from the current 55 year

[00:48:48.91] spk_1:
olds. So

[00:48:54.57] spk_0:
assuming human nature isn’t, isn’t changing then that the Delta is gonna change between between the population, that doesn’t have Children in the population. That does, because the population that doesn’t have Children is going to grow up.

[00:49:16.17] spk_1:
And you look at that first data point where most people are gonna make requests to folks that they’ve engaged with for 20 plus years. that’s again relevant because more people are not having kids. So you got to engage them earlier. Because if you do the likelihood of you getting a request is, is going to be like you said, the Delta is going to be higher and higher. Right? Very

[00:49:28.23] spk_0:
interesting. And

[00:49:52.27] spk_1:
ultimately Planned gifts from single, never married donors are actually 13% larger than from married donors. So it’s interesting is, again, how do you focus this? This is, this is part of the lecture he gave on like how do you focus your time? Of course, you have unlimited resources. You focus on everybody. But thinking about folks who haven’t been married, um, or are no longer married and without kids, you’re gonna get bigger donations. Right? And, and that’s super interesting. Especially in the context of people not having kids. A lot of this transfer is inter mediated by that,

[00:50:07.06] spk_0:
that those have always been your best planned gift prospects, folks who are unmarried and no

[00:50:11.65] spk_1:
Children.

[00:50:23.46] spk_0:
Um, not to not to exclude others from your program. If you have the, if you have the luxury of knowing who has Children and who never married and a lot of that, you can just find out from, uh,

[00:50:26.19] spk_1:
social media.

[00:51:04.96] spk_0:
Well, yeah, that’s true. Um, then then those are your, those are your, you’re ultimately best prospects. And thank you for using the word Penultimate correctly. I appreciate that so many things. So many people think that penultimate is is the better one comes after the ultimate because its penultimate. So she correctly, thank you for using Penultimate, it’s among my favorite words along with, but the ultimate, it’s the

[00:51:11.86] spk_1:
Ultimate, the Bark Mitzvah. Ultimately Pet owners are 70% more likely to give request than non pet owners.

[00:51:15.06] spk_0:
Pet owners.

[00:51:33.86] spk_1:
So free will, which is a will’s website in the US. It like helps folks create their wills. Did some really interesting data around the charitable giving of pet owners and folks who have pet owners are much more likely to make requests, 70% more likely than non pet owners. So I have no idea how to use that piece of data, but it’s so obscure and so interesting that I included it as my factoid and I’m sharing with you

[00:51:46.06] spk_0:
for folks who are in a, in an animal oriented non profit you know, they know

[00:51:48.68] spk_1:
that a lot

[00:51:49.97] spk_0:
of pet owners are very concerned about the life of their pets after their own deaths.

[00:51:55.36] spk_1:
So

[00:51:56.60] spk_0:
they’ll make, they’ll often make

[00:51:58.39] spk_1:
gifts for

[00:51:59.55] spk_0:
the care of their

[00:52:29.65] spk_1:
pets. Interesting. I, I think what’s interesting is going back to millennials and the demographic data that we’ve seen as most folks, you know, a lot of people who don’t choose to have Children choose to get a pet. It’s like a pretty common, you know, trend, I think. And so, you know, that’s interesting because there they still have a lot of love and they’ve made a choice which is so personal and they want to continue a legacy, Not just for their pets, for what you said, but rather just in general. And so they see their way to, to continue. They don’t have Children. So their legacy is gonna live through their gifts. And I think that’s, that’s, again, speaking to the 3.6 to 3.1 number of people in the household and that number continuing to, to change.

[00:52:49.05] spk_0:
Thank you very much.

[00:52:51.52] spk_1:
Let’s

[00:52:59.35] spk_0:
let’s take care of a couple of things when it first, don’t you shout out to Nathaniel Fung, since you mentioned a few times, So

[00:53:24.35] spk_1:
was was my co presenter on this. Um I got to give a lot of the nerdy theory that I shared with you all today, but Nathaniel did a phenomenal job of sharing the case studies that she’s done. She spent a lot of years, decades I think, working in health foundations and health giving and she just brought incredible examples of youth councils and examples of campaigns and how they started them. And so it was, it was an absolute treat to, to speak alongside her.

[00:53:32.65] spk_0:
Nathaniel is director of philanthropy, where at

[00:53:32.82] spk_1:
the BC Women’s Foundation

[00:53:34.75] spk_0:
Women’s hospital

[00:53:36.48] spk_1:
british Columbia, women, women’s hospital, where my son was born.

[00:53:41.35] spk_0:
And Kayla, you give it a shot for Kayla,

[00:54:30.04] spk_1:
I mean, always happy to, to to serve such an incredible institution um for those of you who don’t know, Kayla is, is fundraising um intelligence and donor management tools, built, you know, with the most powerful, exciting technology. But built by fundraisers myself, being just one of many and ultimately our goal is to help folks, you know, have a great um donor management experience, to help increase the predictability and to help nonprofits grow. They’re giving it’s a Crm, it’s an intelligence tool. It’s got beautiful and amazing forms you can pick and choose if you want crm, you want forms, you want intelligence. But ultimately it’s a it’s a technology company with the sector at its at its core and I encourage everyone to to always take a look at kayla k e l a dot com.

[00:54:37.34] spk_0:
Dot com, awesome dot com. Very good. Look

[00:54:38.81] spk_1:
at

[00:54:43.18] spk_0:
dot com. It definitely rhymes what? Almost com

[00:54:49.84] spk_1:
Alright.

[00:54:52.84] spk_0:
And he’s the ceo and founder, thank you very much for sharing your ideas.

[00:54:55.18] spk_1:
tony always a pleasure and hope to see you. Hopefully not two years from now, maybe before that.

[00:55:00.40] spk_0:
No, thank you. Well, will you be in you think you’ll be in Denver if it’s actually live?

[00:55:05.47] spk_1:
Yes, yes I will. Next.

[00:55:06.74] spk_0:
NTC 23. NTC I believe I’ll be there too. All right,

[00:55:10.81] spk_1:
wonderful. Thanks. tony

[00:56:29.54] spk_0:
my pleasure and thank you listeners for being with Non profit radio coverage of 22 NTC. Thanks so much. Next week, It’s your RFP process as our 2022 non profit technology conference coverage continues. 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 communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o And by 4th 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 one dimension deeper. 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 Be with Me next week for non profit radio Big non profit ideas for the other 95 go out and be great.

Nonprofit Radio for May 9, 2022: Using COPE To Keep Your Website Fresh

 

Katelyn Gerber & Rachel Kribbs: Using COPE To Keep Your Website Fresh
Create Once, Publish Everywhere. User friendly COPE workflows and principles will efficiently keep your website content up-to-date. Explaining how are Katelyn Gerber and Rachel Kribbs, both from FORM. (This is part of our coverage of the 2022 Nonprofit Technology Conference, hosted by NTEN.)

 

 

 

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

Every nonprofit struggles with these issues. Big nonprofits hire experts. The other 95% listen to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio. Trusted experts and leading thinkers join me each week to tackle the tough issues. If you have big dreams but a small budget, you have a home at Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio.
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[00:01:58.54] spk_0:
mm hmm. Hello and welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio Big nonprofit 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 a Nicaea if you nailed me with the idea that you missed this week’s show. Using Cope to keep your website fresh, create once published everywhere. User friendly cope workflows and principles will efficiently keep your website content up to date explaining how are Caitlin Gerber and Rachel cribs both from form. This is part of our coverage of the 2022 nonprofit technology conference hosted by N 10 On Tony’s take two please share. 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 4th dimension technologies I thi 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 one dimension deeper here is using Cope to keep your website fresh. Welcome to Tony-Martignetti non profit radio coverage of 22 NTC. You know what that is The 2022 Nonprofit Technology Conference. Our coverage continues with Caitlin Gerber and Rachel Cribs Caitlin is director of operations at form and Rachel cribs is account executive at form Caitlin Rachel Welcome to nonprofit radio

[00:02:06.04] spk_1:
thank you. Thanks for having us. It’s

[00:02:10.84] spk_0:
a pleasure to have both of you. Your

[00:02:11.86] spk_1:
session

[00:02:21.54] spk_0:
topic is using Cope principles to keep your website fresh. Well we’ll get into what Cope is all about um Who wants to explain what Form is all

[00:02:58.14] spk_1:
about Caitlin? I can take that one Caitlin Caitlin has been here longer than I have, but I have the the the elevator speech down. So form is a we are a digital first creative group. Um and we only work with a non profit organization, so we are based in Cleveland Ohio, but we work with nonprofits in every corner of the sector um all over the country. And we, our mission is to help nonprofits connect with their patrons um and do more work and do it better and reach more people. We do that through website creation, we do print digital marketing campaigns, um Digital interactive. So anything digital first, we provide those services for non profit works. Um And I come from about 11 years of nonprofit admin before joining the team. So that’s kind of the perspective that I bring to the group.

[00:03:31.14] spk_0:
Alright, very concise. Thank you. You do have to have it down. Your right. Absolutely. All right. Um then Kaitlin, let’s go to you what what Cope Principles give us an overview of of Cope and and how this is valuable for nonprofits.

[00:04:03.34] spk_2:
Yeah, so it’s one of those acronyms that we can add to the acronym jar. So it stands for create once publish everywhere. And the whole idea is really to work smarter, not harder. Um So when you’re creating website content, you want to create it only one time, but show it in multiple different places. Um So it cuts down on kind of retyping the same things or having to keep different pages updated and keep track of all of that and really tries to simplify your workload um when it comes to creating your content on the web um and making it as easy for you to keep track of and keep updated on an ongoing basis,

[00:04:16.34] spk_0:
is it something different than just simple repurposing?

[00:04:33.84] spk_2:
So it really comes down to how your website is set up. So it’s kind of a whole ideology of how you enter content into your content management system for your website. Um So it is kind of a records based approach. Um So rather than creating individual pages and copy and pasting that content, um you really are only entering at one time um into a form and then your website is displaying that content in multiple different places, even though it only exists one place in your content management system.

[00:04:54.60] spk_0:
So

[00:04:56.34] spk_1:
yeah, the the

[00:04:57.67] spk_0:
more sophisticated than my simple minded repurpose,

[00:05:01.21] spk_1:
the end, the end result is that content is repurposed repurposed and there are all kinds of benefits to doing that. But the way to get it repurposed is a lot easier and more effective and efficient on the back end.

[00:05:14.54] spk_0:
Okay, so let’s stick with you Rachel, what did you talk in your summary of the session about Coppola workflows, what is this, what does this start to look like.

[00:06:51.04] spk_1:
So basically you’re ideally the content management system. So the, the thing that the nonprofit organization would see on the back end in order to publish information on the front end of their website. So your content management system, you know, examples of this are WordPress, it’s probably the most popular one. Um, Drew Apple Squarespace and Wix. These are all content management systems. So in the C. M. S, uh, there are a series of forms ideally so that you are entering information about certain types of content that may change frequently. Um We call this dynamic content like event listings, blog posts, news articles, these types of things that are going to change frequently. You would enter into a form fields, uh, you know, date, start time and time. When do I turn this off? What’s the body, what images do you want? Um, into this form based system in your CMS. And then you select where it’s displayed on the, on the front end to your users. So that’s why we call it a workflow. It’s really um about the cope refers to the system that the content creator is using to get this information out. Um sounds really dry and boring, but the end result means, I mean literally an exponential amount of time saved for nonprofit admins and having been a nonprofit admin. I understand, you know, time is of the essence and and also it avoids um, broken links, errors, typos because, you know, you’re entering all this really detailed information multiple times. Um but that’s why we call it a workflow because that’s really what it’s all about.

[00:07:17.74] spk_0:
And how does someone create this? How does someone create the document that is linked? That is part of your, your content management system that is then going to distribute this, how does this all get made? So for people who aren’t working for form or working with form, how do they implement

[00:08:03.24] spk_2:
this? So the first step is to really identify types of content on your site that work well with this type of workflow and what we mean by that are things that um typically have a similar format on your site. So Rachel mentioned things like events. Um so date based things are really great um because that allows uh, your system to automatically hide those things for you um when the date passes. Um, so date based type things are really good things like fundraising events, um, community events, if you’re an arts organization, um, things like exhibitions or performances, um, those are great types of content to consider using this form.

[00:08:07.34] spk_1:
Um

[00:08:28.54] spk_2:
also things like blogs, news, um kind of the usual suspects there in terms of content that’s created in a kind of standardized way, um and things like your program services, location, staff, um, things that you can easily imagine, you know, I can enter all this information into a form because it all kind of follows the same format. Um so the first step is really identifying what types of these things do you have on your website? Um Almost every nonprofit has events, um Almost everyone has staph or programs, things like that. And so really uh

[00:08:44.42] spk_1:
taking

[00:10:04.04] spk_2:
stock of what types of content you have on your site. Um and then really mapping kind of how those relate to each other. So on your program page you might want to also display news about that program. You might want to also display who you should get in touch with if you have questions about that program um or events that relate to that program and really kind of creating this map of kind of how your content can and should relate to each other. Um and then really assessing, you know, are you already entering this content in this way or are you entering it one page at a time copying and pasting it over um and kind of taking stock of that. And then really it comes down to kind of how savvy you as an individual are um with content management systems. Uh it might be a thing where you feel really comfortable in WordPress and installing plug ins and you can get these things set up yourself, um more often you’re probably going to be working with whoever you use um to work on your website, um and saying, hey, these are the types of things that we would like to modify to be cope friendly. Um and web developers will know what that means. Um they will understand that, that terminology, um they will understand what you mean by hey we want to make this a plug in um and kind of working with them to update that. Um The best time to consider this really is if you’re doing a website redesign you can certainly update your existing website, but it’s definitely easiest if you’re thinking about embarking on building a new website in the next year or two years, if that’s in the plan, um start taking stock of these types of content and mapping them to each other. So that way when you are

[00:10:30.51] spk_1:
selecting

[00:10:43.54] spk_2:
a vendor or working with your existing vendor from scratch, um you have your arms with its information and arms with these requests. Um so that way it can be built right kind of from the, from the start. Um and really just make sure that you’re maintaining that. So if you as an organization do decide to add a blog, for example, um make sure that when that’s added to your site added in a friendly way. Um so that way you’re kind of future proofing your content. Um but really the first step is to take stock, where are you, where are you at now? Um and then you can decide how you want to proceed

[00:11:09.14] spk_1:
from there.

[00:12:22.34] spk_0:
It’s time for a break, turn to communications, the content creation and the content management, you see now how they work together. Turn to can help you make the content right? The content, deliver it and deliver it to the audiences that you’re trying to reach, then you also need to manage it right? You want to keep it public on your own sites, so you’re getting it out through media channels, that’s the ideal. And that’s what turn to does. But then you got your own sites to that’s the earned versus the owned media. So where you own the site, whether it’s a blog or uh, maybe it’s a podcast or, you know, just your website, it’s all got to be managed. So it’s findable. The content creation, content management turn to communications turn hyphen two dot c o. Now, back to using cope to keep your website fresh, Rachel anything you want to add to the to that.

[00:12:47.14] spk_1:
Yeah, I think just the the short, the The point is, uh you mostly have to work within your content management system, involve your web developer. WordPress, scruple those are really popular content management systems. Um there’s another one called final site that a lot of K-12 schools use these are all they all support cope. Um I know on WordPress and ripple, you could do some googling online to figure out exactly how to do that. But it does get technical and as Caitlyn mentioned relying on third party plug ins. But if you’re not the developers, you mentioned doing that kind of content mapping. Thinking about how your website, visitors might want to see information or what’s going to be most informative to them is an important step you can take even if you don’t have that technical skill.

[00:13:17.04] spk_0:
Okay. I mean it’s imagine it’s hard for me to imagine a nonprofit not working with form, but I like to have listeners understand, you know, how they can, how they can proceed on their own. Alright, so

[00:13:23.67] spk_1:
any

[00:13:36.44] spk_0:
web developer, anybody works in WordPress or drew people is gonna know or you mentioned square to, you know, is gonna know what cope Cope is and Cope friendly principles are okay, Okay. Yeah, this

[00:14:00.94] spk_2:
is in a brand new concept. I think that the term was first coined about a decade ago. Um, and it’s just gained popularity because as Rachel mentioned, non profit admins are busy people, they have a million things that they have to do. Um, and entering the same content for their website six times is not among the priority list. Um, so this, this is really kind of taken taken off and become a very familiar term in the industry

[00:14:43.44] spk_0:
and I was concerned when, when I selected this because on nonprofit radio have jargon jail, but you both have been very good about explaining terms, you know, con CMS, not just throwing out CMS content management system Rachel, you were very clear about that. So, but, but I’m uh, I’m very sensitive, you know, I’m, I’m, my, my antennae are up but you’ve been very good so far. So no jargon jail transgressions. You’re, you’re succeeding. Lots of people trying, you’re, you’re succeeding. Um, you talked a little too about building consensus and and buy in around new new workflows that I get that I guess are gonna be cope, uh, helpful friendly. What does that, what does that look like trying to get like leadership by in what are we talking about there? Who don’t know who wants to take this?

[00:16:15.54] spk_1:
I can take this one Caitlin if that’s all right. Um, since I talked about this in the, in the, the webinar to really cope benefits. I mean, it sounds so dry and boring, right? Like if you go to leadership at the nonprofit and it’s not about like here. So I’m gonna bring in the next million dollar gift, It’s like, okay, please don’t bother me. But really, this not only benefits your organization and saves time. So there’s a clear, um, kind of business outcome. You can save a lot of resources and your folks can focus on more of that fundraising or helping their constituents by using this system. Um, but it has a huge benefits for the website, users to, So, okay, maybe this isn’t a direct, um, fundraising tactic, but if the end result is a more enjoyable user experience on your website, that really, really goes a long way. And I think nonprofits, um, like I said, having worked for several and just what I’ve observed, tend to think that if people are coming to my website, they care enough about my organization to find what they need. No matter how much digging it takes. And really that’s becoming less and less the case. If someone’s frustrated, confused, they can’t find something easily, You’re going to lose them, you may lose their support, they may lose interest in you. So we have to make sure that our website visitors are having a really positive experience. So in order to get buy in from the organization, those are sort of the two angles I take. This is good for us. This is good for our constituents. But

[00:16:21.67] spk_0:
before you start to get to buy it, why is it better for website visitors? What, what, what difference does it make for them?

[00:17:23.04] spk_1:
Yeah. So a couple of things, um, it makes your website more engaging. So let’s say you’re browsing a nonprofit that you’re, you’re not familiar with. And you see an interesting article, let’s say. Um, the first thing is maybe it links at the bottom two other articles from that bank of articles you have that are related to this topic. So they might see that and then go down this rabbit hole and it’s kind of how you get on like a Wikipedia rabbit hole, you start clicking on the links inside and going down these other things. So that’s kind of, the idea is you can have related information to the page that they’re on and it’s going to create a more engaging website experience. Um, we like to say it avoids dead ends where a website is, there’s clicking through, they get to a page and then there’s really no obvious place for them to go next. We don’t want that to happen. Um, it also makes it more informative. So as the example, Caitlyn mentioned, um, if someone is seeking out service of yours and they’re on your, your services page and they’re looking at something. Uh, if you have information from like your staff database pulled right into that page of like, here’s the person you contact you about questions, then it’s all right there. They don’t have to then go digging through your contact form trying to figure out who to get in touch with if they have a follow up question. Um, so it makes it more informative, more engaging. Um,

[00:17:53.54] spk_0:
more relevant. It sounds like a page has more relevant. You’re saying a page would have a contact person not just go to our general contact page and try to try to sort through. Yeah. Okay.

[00:18:37.94] spk_1:
Yeah. And the last thing I mentioned, the last thing I’ll mention about that too is we’ve seen nonprofits air on the side of not including this kind of information at all. So out of fear of having to make sure they remember to take down an event when it’s past or avoid having to manually update all of these things. They’ll just leave blogs off of their website. They’ll leave events off of their website and then that is really irrelevant. I mean, you know, that’s what people go to like find this up to date information. They want to see that you’re doing things they want to read about you. So the alternative is not a good one too. Just not include this kind of dynamic information on your website. Makes it stale. Um, not helpful. Not informative. No. That’s another reason

[00:18:59.24] spk_0:
that what you’re describing now is the tail wagging the dog. You’re, you’re, you’re unsophisticated content management regimen. Not, you’re not necessarily the system, but the way you’re using it is, uh, is preventing you from putting relevant content on your site. That’s, that’s antithetical to what the whole purpose of a content management system.

[00:19:06.74] spk_2:
And I think we’ve all been to nonprofit websites that

[00:19:11.14] spk_1:
still

[00:19:11.49] spk_2:
have their event from six months ago on the home page. And that, that doesn’t have a lot of trust with your organization. Just I

[00:19:20.03] spk_0:
think just a week old, you know, oh, this is coming up. Oh no, it was last

[00:19:29.74] spk_2:
night. No, never mind. Uh, yeah. And it just immediately creates like a, what’s going on over there. Right?

[00:22:46.04] spk_0:
Just write it all contributes. Like Rachel’s suggesting it all contributes to an overall feeling that a donor a potential donor has. You know, it’s just see something stale on the website. I mean, this is 2022, you know that shouldn’t We’re not in 1996 websites where you know everything is done by by single keystrokes anymore. It’s time for a break. Fourth dimension technologies. Their I. T. Solution is I. T. Infra in a box. It’s budget friendly and holistic. It’s the it’s the buffet of I. T. Solutions because you take what you need and leave the rest behind. So as you’re browsing the buffet, walking through the line, you’ve got your tray sliding along on the on the silver rails. You can choose from I. T. Assessment. Yeah, I’d like a dish of that multi factor authentication comes in a small bowl just perfect. I’ll take one of those other security cost analysis help desk. Hmm that looks like a good dessert. I’ll take that along as well And there’s more in the buffet that you can choose from. So as you’re going along with your tray you choose what’s right for your I. T. Situation for your budget. Fourth dimension technologies. tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Just like three D. But they go one dimension deeper. It’s time for Tony’s take two. Please share non profit radio I grew up with share share. That’s fair. Well not not exactly the sharing we’re talking about. That’s two brothers fighting over the same Tonka truck. They used to be metal back then but that’s a bit of a digression. non profit radio is it helping you? It’s your I I presume it is. Otherwise you wouldn’t be listening to me. So it’s helping you. Who else can it help that you know within your networks, your sphere of influence, somebody else who works at a nonprofit, somebody who works at your same non profit a board member, Maybe it’s a board member to your non profit you’d like them to have the savvy ideas, but but then you’re gonna give away your source of savvy ideas. So maybe that’s not such a good idea, board members and other nonprofits. Okay, so who do you know I’d be grateful if you would share the word of tony-martignetti non profit radio so that more folks can learn and benefit the way you are. Make it makes perfect sense. Right? So in that respect actually share share that’s fair is appropriate. So if you can share non profit radio with someone else. I would be grateful. Thanks very much. That is Tony’s take two. We’ve got barely a butt load more time for using cope to keep your website fresh with Caitlin Gerber and Rachel cribs. All right, so I made you digress, Rachel we were talking about but I remember to go back, I I usually remember to go back to your your suffering a lackluster host but not not not untraceable, just lackluster. So you’re always talking about getting getting buy in on these uh on workflows adopting these new workflows

[00:23:04.54] spk_1:
you know

[00:23:05.85] spk_0:
to remind us to rationales good good for your constituents your website visitors, and then also good internally because you’re you’re saying exponential time savings,

[00:23:42.84] spk_1:
yes, it’s an exponential time saver. So hopefully the argument that this is really good for the people we are serving is enough. But if it’s not, you can also make the time saving argument. Um It also ensures it helps you ensure accessibility and a. D. A compliance um more efficiently on your website, which is, you know, usually that gets everyone’s attention. Um But again, that should be because it benefits your constituents, but this is because you can set up those forms in a way that, you know, the way that you’re putting the information in is always going to appear in an accessible way. Um Not only in terms of design aesthetic. So we’re talking about um you know, the type faces that you’re using some of the formatting things you can preset in this scope workflow. So every time it appears it’s meeting its compliant to that. Um But it also appeals to

[00:24:12.64] spk_0:
across your many pages. That’s another thing that it’s just a general again, just a general feeling of

[00:24:16.04] spk_1:
web

[00:24:16.39] spk_0:
web visitors, you know, that that’s a that looks like the headline on the other page was so much bigger and it was blue and this one is smaller and it’s red. Okay. And

[00:25:04.34] spk_1:
those design choices ideally should be made very carefully to make sure that it not only looks good but it’s it’s appealing to folks that may have different disabilities, visual impairments. Um even it even appeals to um neurodivergent learners so cope setting up cope on your website. This is kind of getting back to the benefit to the users so I promise I will get back to the organization. Um but it’s a good point is that it appeals to we say multiple browsing styles as I mentioned in the webinar. So you might you know Tony you might get two events on a certain web page by following a certain workflow that feels natural to you but Caitlin might find it differently and this kind of allows you to follow any of those

[00:25:08.20] spk_0:
pathways.

[00:25:09.64] spk_1:
You’re

[00:25:11.80] spk_0:
not doing it my way because I’m center. So if you’re not doing it my way,

[00:25:16.78] spk_2:
tony

[00:25:20.27] spk_0:
you’re shattering my reality, shattering my subjective reality. So please

[00:26:29.24] spk_1:
I would I would push back because Caitlin is like the most logical person I know, so I’m sure hers would be very direct but it appeals to that neuro diversity which again just gets back to um being more compliant and inclusive on your website which is going to to promote a sense of inclusivity of your brand, your organization. But um the last so that that A. D. A compliance is usually a strong case um to make with senior leadership and other members of your internal organization um and another big one is that it improves your search engine optimization results so um when folks are searching for different things on your website, if google suspects a sense of of structure to your content, um, it’s going to prioritize that in your S C. O. Um and also if you have the same piece of content, like a news article that pops up in multiple places, it’s also slightly more likely to appear, appear higher. So when people are asking, how can we improve our sc Oh, this is one really great way to be able to do that. So those are kind of a big the big benefits

[00:26:31.01] spk_0:
benefits the advantages. Okay, okay. Um you said it’s interesting if google senses a structure

[00:26:40.14] spk_1:
mm hmm,

[00:26:43.64] spk_0:
it can it can suss out a better organized versus less well

[00:26:47.41] spk_1:
organized

[00:26:48.74] spk_0:
web website.

[00:26:50.64] spk_1:
Google is essentially being google is very all knowing. Sorry, Caitlin, go ahead.

[00:27:34.34] spk_2:
No, it definitely, it definitely can. So it can tell if there are pages that are related to each other. So it is a bot that crawls around your website and if you’re making it easy for it to do that by relating things to each other, that makes sense. Um it is going to reward you for that. Um and as Rachel mentioned earlier, having things in the appropriate uh, aesthetics, but it is also kind of the underlying code, um, making sure you have a header on every page, making sure you have a description captions for photos relevant, links, things like that. Um it rewards that as well because it can tell that your content is broken up that it’s been thought through. Um, and it rewards those types of behaviors. Um, and so having a system that kind of enforces that for you. Um, really goes a long way. We’ve all seen pages that are kind of just walls of text with uh, you know, scattered headings and things like that. Um, google,

[00:27:57.54] spk_1:
I can tell

[00:27:57.97] spk_2:
that that is scattered. Um, and so you want to make sure things are structured as possible. Um, and using this workflow really goes a long way to achieving that structure that google is going to report.

[00:28:10.74] spk_1:
If you took away all the aesthetics from a website that’s designed this way, you would see a very thoughtfully, um, a very intentional like network and a web and that’s actually like internally how we design our sights as we start with those, those wire frames first and just these literal diagrams and so that’s kind of what google can see through versus like if you’re creating a website that reads more like a book of just like information, information, information, you want to think of it more as an interconnected web of information. And that’s, that’s what google is going to like better, that’s really what’s easier to browse from a user perspective, but kind of what Caitlin’s getting at with stu

[00:28:51.44] spk_0:
what else should we know

[00:28:52.25] spk_1:
about Cope,

[00:28:54.74] spk_0:
that you shared and don’t hold back on the nonprofit radio listeners, but

[00:28:59.38] spk_1:
what else

[00:28:59.67] spk_0:
did you share in your session?

[00:30:07.24] spk_1:
Um, I think that, I mean, what I would say again coming from the former non profit admin spaces don’t underestimate the importance of doing this kind of research when you’re coming up with a new web solution. Don’t just look for a website that is going to look really good, but it has to have some underlying structure make your job easier. Um, make your website visitors have a more enjoyable experience. It’s really, really, really critically important. And, and we think that, uh, lots of other people do too, that having a cope workflow and Cope systems is key to that. Um, we in, in other conversations Caitlin, I’ve had and you’ve maybe heard this before. Non profits are now calling their websites their digital front door, especially during covid. This is maybe the only way for one of the few ways we have to establish touchpoints with our constituents donors, you know, clients, patrons that were working with. Um, so I think that nonprofits should start investing the time in thinking as carefully about it as they do their brick and mortar organizations. Um, so, so Cope, we think is a really important part of that, of that structure

[00:30:12.24] spk_0:
Caitlyn. Can you remember any questions that you got that were significant?

[00:31:53.34] spk_2:
Yeah, I think, uh, people are always scared of how do I start like, okay, I want to do this. How do I even start doing this. Um, and I think not being afraid to just take that first step of just seeing where you are because you might be surprised, you might find that a lot of your content already is in this workflow and you’re doing a good job um and you might just need to make a few tweaks um so I think people hear this and think oh my God, I’m gonna have to start from scratch, um and if you’re using a common content management system, that’s probably not the case, um you’re probably already somewhat there. Um and so I think doing this assessment can really help people feel better um and feel more equipped with that knowledge. I think it sounds scary because it is an acronym and it is web development um and it can be this very technical thing. Um and so I think that where do I start is the question that we get the most. Um and it really is start with a scene where you’re at um and I think you’ll feel a lot better um and I think to uh you know, it’s working with the right people um so oftentimes uh find a partner that will work with you on this um and make your life easier and they’ll understand um so I think it’s all about finding those right partnerships um to kind of help bring this, bring this to life um but start somewhere that’s the biggest thing is don’t be intimidated by it, um don’t be scared of it because it’s technical um kind of take that first step and just see where you are.

[00:31:59.44] spk_0:
tony

[00:32:40.94] spk_1:
Can I add one other thing to that? Um, in terms of where to start, you know, start with one example, start with one place where you decided, okay, these two pieces of content relate, let’s have them appear on each other’s pages or connect in some way and the place to start might be um, you know, if you listen to, if you listen to your audiences or your constituents, maybe like what’s the question you’re always getting that you’re like, this is on the website. Why are people not finding it on the website? Maybe adopting a Cope mindset could be the solution to mitigating some of those questions and that might indicate where to start with setting up some of these structures and see how that works. So you don’t have to create this whole interconnected web all at one time. Maybe just start with one connection and build from there.

[00:32:57.34] spk_0:
Okay, excellent. Yeah, consistent with what Caitlin said, you know, don’t be intimidated its scope. You know, it’s cope, it’s it’s not, it’s not like, you know, some abstruse acronym create once, publish everywhere. It’s friendly. You can cope

[00:33:06.74] spk_1:
with popularized. We can cope with Cope, It was popularized by NPR what’s more friendly than NPR so we know that this is yeah, the about a decade ago, I think that’s where the term became popularized, um,

[00:33:17.07] spk_0:
executed it on their, to

[00:33:36.04] spk_1:
be honest with you. I’m not sure why it was popularized, but I know that it was kind of at a time when okay websites are becoming next level content creators have to start getting more savvy with how we’re pushing information out. Um, I think it had to do more with timing than this is necessarily something that they had adopted.

[00:33:46.94] spk_0:
That was like the 2008, If I have the timing right? You know, like making websites more sophisticated, much more user friendly thinking about the users who are coming and what they’re, what they’re flows are mapping, mapping their journeys through sites, things like that. All right,

[00:33:59.34] spk_1:
okay,

[00:34:01.84] spk_0:
wonderful. Thank you from both from Cleveland Ohio home of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,

[00:34:06.18] spk_2:
Caitlin

[00:34:10.44] spk_0:
Gerber Director of operations at form Rachel cribs account executive at form where what’s the what’s the form website you want to say it

[00:34:17.84] spk_1:
together ready? Just kidding. It’s

[00:34:21.36] spk_2:
the form groups dot

[00:35:43.74] spk_0:
com. The form group dot com. Okay Caitlin Rachel thank you very much. Pleasure and thank you for being with Tony-Martignetti non profit radio coverage of 22. NTCC next week. More from 22. NTCC 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 communications pr and content for nonprofits your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o Did my voice just cracked like I’m 14 Your story and by 4th dimension Technologies IT 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 one dimension deeper. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff 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 be with me next week for nonprofit radio Big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great. Mm hmm.

Nonprofit Radio for April 25, 2022: Asking For, Receiving & Giving Feedback

 

Amy Drader: Asking For, Receiving & Giving Feedback

The mere thought of getting or giving feedback makes many people anxious. Yet normalizing feedback as a safe, productive, routine exercise will improve your team’s performance. Amy Drader from Growth Partners Consulting, reveals how to get to that higher state. (This is part of Nonprofit Radio’s coverage of 22NTC, the 2022 Nonprofit Technology Conference, hosted by NTEN.)

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[00:01:46.34] spk_0:
mm hmm. Hello and welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio big nonprofit 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 thrown into Ankara rex sis if you broke me with the idea that you missed this week’s show asking for receiving and giving feedback, the mere thought of getting or giving feedback makes many people anxious yet normalizing feedback as a safe, productive routine exercise will improve your team’s performance. Amy grader from growth partners consulting reveals how to get to that higher state. This is part of nonprofit radio’s coverage of 22 NTC. The 2022 nonprofit technology conference hosted by N 10 On Tony’s take two ever sued a donor. We’re sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o From 22 NTC here is asking for receiving and giving feedback. Welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 22 Ntc. Our coverage continues. Of the 2022 nonprofit technology conference hosted by N 10 with me now is Amy draeger. Welcome Amy.

[00:01:49.84] spk_1:
Thank you. Thank you for having me

[00:02:16.34] spk_0:
Pleasure. A pleasure to have you on nonprofit radio Amy is consultant and leadership coach at growth partners consulting. Amy you’re session topic is asking for receiving and giving feedback. It’s very interesting. It caught my eye. Why do we have such a difficult and awkward relationship with feedback.

[00:02:34.94] spk_1:
Absolutely. I you know, it’s funny you brought that up because that’s one of the first questions I posed to the group at the session was and you tell me actually. So if somebody were to come up to you and say, hey, can I give you some feedback? What comes to mind? What’s that connotation for you?

[00:03:05.34] spk_0:
Well I try to say thank you. Yeah. You know what, what are you, what are you thinking? What what can I do, what can I help you with? Maybe what can I do better, what can I help you with? Uh you know, but it’s hard to not to personalize it, especially, you know, I’m the host of a podcast, although the podcast of course only gets positive feedback, it’s all, it’s 100% unanimous. I’ve been doing this for 12, 12 july will be 12 years. I’ve never gotten a negative comment. Natural. So so that’s feedback is easy to take. No, but you know, it’s easy to personalize it of

[00:03:07.30] spk_1:
course, you

[00:03:21.84] spk_0:
know, instead of you thinking about it being your performance, you know, you think about it being you? Me alright. Oh I did something, you know, especially I have my own business podcast, et cetera. Um, so but I try to be opening open to it and I like to think I am.

[00:04:48.64] spk_1:
Yeah, absolutely. And you know, the majority of folks do try to do that. What’s interesting is I posed this question to the group and the reaction over 70% of the people in the session, associate feedback as either something bad, there’s going to be a problem or a correction of some sort or avoided the word entirely. So the organization didn’t even want to use the word feedback instead use advice, suggestions, recommendations. So there’s this connotation, that feedback is something back and you know, it’s, it’s kind of one of my missions in working with leaders and teams is to normalize it into information that’s intended to advance performance or intended to improve or help us grow. It’s just information. Now, naturally we are human. And so when we hear something about ourselves, we naturally go into threat mode, there must be something wrong. So exactly what you brought up. We try not to personalize it, but then we sometimes do and then we have to figure out ways how to navigate that. What we do know is talking about how the team works together, how a leader performs, how the team works with the leader. When we have open feedback on teams, we get better results, Teams perform better. And so that’s, that’s really what the goal of of having open discussions without feedback is really about.

[00:05:15.24] spk_0:
Let’s start with not banning the word back. Okay, The word is feedback. You know, like I work in plant giving fundraising. The word is death. We don’t have to say. People passed on, moved along, left us went to a better place they died. It’s okay, they died. It’s someone’s death has happened, death. So here the word is feedback. It doesn’t have to be advice or mentoring or, you know, whatever other euphemisms feedback don’t be afraid of the word feedback.

[00:05:28.04] spk_1:
Exactly, Exactly. And that’s that’s the whole goal. Let’s normalize it. And when we normalize it, then we can talk about it, keep relationships intact and then continue to improve in advance and achieve whatever those goals are that we want to achieve.

[00:05:41.74] spk_0:
Your description says normalizing feedback begins with asking, not giving Yeah, What do you mean? How do we start this?

[00:05:44.50] spk_1:
Yeah. So, so the so often people will come to me and say amy, how do you get feedback? And we’re very quick to want to give it to others and let others know what we think

[00:05:53.84] spk_0:
about,

[00:05:55.33] spk_1:
right? Right. And and

[00:06:06.44] spk_0:
like my my modeling that is Larry David, you know, on curb your enthusiasm. I’m not this is not criticism. It’s help. I’m helping. I’m helping.

[00:06:08.12] spk_1:
Exactly. Exactly.

[00:06:09.62] spk_0:
But he’s he has the vindictive school of feedback. We don’t want to don’t want to go to Larry David model. All right.

[00:07:49.44] spk_1:
Exactly, Exactly. But really it begins with us asking for it and modeling how to receive it in a safe and productive way. So we demonstrate that we’re open to feedback. We embrace it as valuable information that’s helping us improve. People are going to be more likely to receive feedback from us. So it begins by asking for and receiving feedback and doing that in in, you know, I really say, there’s two high quality ways to do that um and the first one is to ask for feedback about something specific. So most people are not very good at giving feedback spontaneously. So the way to not ask for feedback is to just spring it on somebody, you’re like, hey, how do you think I’m doing? The person isn’t gonna know what to say about what? Right. So the first way to really ask the feedback is to do it about a specific activity. Maybe there’s a particular skill you want to improve upon. Um You know, a simple example is maybe you want some feedback in the organization on how you run a meeting. You might go to a trusted colleague or your boss and say, hey, listen, can you observe me in this meeting and watch how watch to see if I engage everyone in the meeting to speak up. I want to be sure that my the way I’m facilitating and engaging people, I’m doing it in a very equal and consistent way. So that’s very something very specific for someone to observe of you and then give you some feedback on it. So ask for specific feedback about something. It was interesting, we had folks in the session get excited about that um and and to be able to narrow in on something about their effectiveness and be able to get specific about it and get some specific feedback.

[00:08:02.34] spk_0:
Does that include asking a supervisor, you know, to be sure be that specific? Alright.

[00:08:24.34] spk_1:
Yeah. In fact, it’s funny you brought that up because a woman in the session said she often goes to her boss and says, hey, can you give me some feedback? I really want to be sure I’m doing my best. And she said her boss never has anything good to say. Her boss just says you’re doing a great job. Just keep it up. And that’s a good example of even leaders in positions may not be prepared to give specific high quality feedback. So giving them something to look for is going to help you get something of higher quality.

[00:08:44.74] spk_0:
Okay, okay. How does this all play into the annual or semi annual performance review? You know, you don’t have, you don’t have to ask for that. It’s coming whether you want it or not, it’s it’s coming.

[00:08:50.34] spk_1:
What

[00:08:50.94] spk_0:
what’s your advice? Maybe I’m jumping ahead. Maybe I’m jumping, you

[00:08:53.82] spk_1:
know, you’re

[00:08:57.94] spk_0:
stuck with a lackluster host. I’m sorry about that. So how do we how do we incorporate normalizing?

[00:09:02.72] spk_1:
Well, I guess we don’t

[00:09:11.04] spk_0:
have a normal, I mean that’s just part of the procedure, you know, it’s coming, it’s coming in a month or it’s coming in a year? Whatever. What’s your advice around that performance review?

[00:09:12.06] spk_1:
No, that’s a great question

[00:09:13.43] spk_0:
formal stuff.

[00:09:23.54] spk_1:
The the the the bottom line message with feedback is to have it uh frequently occurring throughout the year. And so, you know, one of the things we got into in the session was the right ratio, positive two critical feedback. And and what we know really well is that positive feedback motivates positive performance and that’s well established in, in psychology literature.

[00:09:42.13] spk_0:
So

[00:10:04.74] spk_1:
when it comes to your question about the performance management system or the performance reviews, by the time an individual gets to a performance review, there should be no surprises because the leader has been having conversations about performance the entire year and and none of that should be stockpiled for the six month review or the the annual review. Honestly, performance review should be no big deal because we’ve been having routine and consistent conversations throughout the entire year.

[00:12:17.74] spk_0:
It’s time for a break. Turn to communications. They can help you with content creation. Content management and content promotion. The creation. Do you have documents that need to be written like an annual report or do you have research that you want to have produced? Maybe a case study, maybe an interview series, any big content project you want to get off your staff shoulders turn to can take care of it for you, the content management, that’s the organization. Do you want to create a blog? Do you want to need to organize your blog? All content management and and organizing so that you can find things that your team can find things. Everything is put together orderly, whether it’s on your website or some external site, that’s the content management and the content promotion. They have the relationships and they can help you build relationships with journalists, podcasters, other industry folks, industry, maybe related nonprofits that you’d like to partner with all to get your messaging your content promoted in all those different channels. Right? So the content creation management and promotion, do you need help with content with written words, video, audio speeches. Even though those are, those are spoken words, spoken words turn to communications turn hyphen two dot c o. Now back to asking for receiving and giving feedback. So should we go back to the, the normalizing process? So you know, All right, number one, So ask for feedback. So ask your boss, ask your, I mean, I think a good boss will be asking for for feedback from people who work for him or her.

[00:13:17.64] spk_1:
Yeah, that’s the second way of asking for feedback is to do it in a routine exchange. So, so I always share an example that it actually comes from a boss I used to work with, we had quarterly feedback sessions with each other and we would ask each other the same three questions and it was like, you know, what am I doing well and what contributes to our effectiveness together? What’s something I could stop doing and then what’s something new that I could try that might really help me out. And it was three questions that we ask the same every single quarter. And he would ask me those questions and I would ask him those questions and it would foster this routine discussion about how we work together and how our work affects the team. And the beauty of it is that it was expected. So it didn’t create this like a ton of nerves or concerned because we knew it was going to happen. So routine exchange and you bet happens with bosses too.

[00:13:47.74] spk_0:
And that also helps you prepare, you know it’s coming. So we’re doing this quarterly, it’s on our calendar, we have plenty of time to think through what what am I doing? Well, what what should I change? I noticed you didn’t say what am I doing? Well, what am I doing poorly? He said what am I doing? Well what should I

[00:14:21.24] spk_1:
change? It kind of depends, you know, I I would like to think if something needs to be corrected, it’s corrected in the moment. So if somebody full on makes a mistake and it compromises client relationships, safety depending on what type of work it is. The correction is done in that moment, we’re not waiting for a feedback session for that. So if something needs to be corrected because it’s a mistake that happens immediately. But when we’re doing performance exchange debriefs, this is really about advancing performance, taking it from this point today and take us into the future versus talking about the past to correct it.

[00:14:59.84] spk_0:
Okay, Okay, so so you have three questions, what am I doing? Well, what can I do better? Is that the way you, can I improve on, what can I improve on? Alright, and what’s new, what can I try? That’s new. You’d like to have me try all right now, this sounds like an ideal boss though, taking feedback from, from below, from those who work for him or her, I’m not sure that’s a typical scenario, is it really?

[00:15:33.84] spk_1:
Well, I would say if you have a leader who is embracing leadership best practices and a leader who was likely trained in leadership, it’s quite common and and it’s really, you know, being able to have conversations about how the team works together or performance is a part of leadership responsibility, so leadership is getting results through others. That’s really what being a boss is, is getting results through others. Now that said, there are plenty of people who are promoted into management jobs who don’t have the leadership skill set and so to your point, that may not be a part of the routine expectation experience,

[00:15:47.84] spk_0:
part of what? Say that again,

[00:16:01.14] spk_1:
I said, it may not be a part of the routine experience if you know, and and you know, folks took the session at intent because they wanted to beef up that skill set. So you bet it’s not one that that is always this common

[00:16:10.64] spk_0:
Alright, boss’s boss is listening be good to the folks working for you, uh you know, ask for their feedback about your

[00:16:13.18] spk_1:
performance. It’s

[00:16:14.37] spk_0:
it’s good for the whole team

[00:16:15.58] spk_1:
it

[00:16:28.54] spk_0:
Alright. Um Alright, we still have to talk about the personalizing but but since we’re talking about these feedback, the routine feedback that we’re now gonna have quarterly, right? Um this is done individually, I assume one on one, right. Not in a not in a group, not four or five people who work for one, you know, one vice president or something doing this uh as a team. No.

[00:17:09.14] spk_1:
Right, right. You can do team debriefs as well. In fact, teams that debrief together on their work Perform. I think that the last article I read was 25% better than teams that don’t do debriefs of performance. So you can do a group debrief and it’s for example, what are we doing really well as a team, what are our strength? Where can we improve? So yes, you can do a team debrief. What we were just talking about is exchanged between boston employee. Yeah, do that in in an office or private.

[00:17:29.94] spk_0:
Ok. Now, a team debrief, you need to you need to monitor that to make sure it doesn’t turn into finger pointing. You know, she doesn’t do this. Well, you know, she, I rely on her and she’s often late. You know, then the boss has to step in and say, well, you know, we’re off the we’re talking about a team, we’re looking macro level here, right?

[00:17:31.92] spk_1:
Yeah.

[00:17:33.01] spk_0:
If the monitor, make sure the thing doesn’t collapse.

[00:18:19.94] spk_1:
Yeah, absolutely. The content of feedback matters. So we’re talking about the activity right now. We’re talking about content of feedback and what what we advocate for. And you know, many folks who are having expertise and leadership development are well versed in positive productive feedback is what advances performance. Um Not only is it helpful to know what we’re really good at so we can replicate it, but when we’re recognized for positive performance, it makes us feel good, it makes us feel valued and as obvious as this may seem, when people feel valued, they perform better and that is well established as well. Um You know, there’s there’s lots of research that shows that when bosses show very simple demonstrations of gratitude, people perform their work more accurately, they perform their work better

[00:18:33.34] spk_0:
or

[00:18:45.84] spk_1:
when teams recognize each other’s strengths and when teams appreciate each other, they then perform their work tasks more effectively because they know their peers respect and value them. All right,

[00:18:47.14] spk_0:
Alright, positive, positive positive feedback causes positive performance.

[00:18:52.42] spk_1:
I

[00:18:52.54] spk_0:
mean, it’s it’s clear you said earlier, it’s clear in the research.

[00:18:55.79] spk_1:
Alright.

[00:19:08.94] spk_0:
Positive. Okay. Some of it’s not going to be positive though. Some some feedback of necessity, you know, it’s gonna be negative if we’re let’s go to the personalization again, we touched on it. I’m receiving some negative

[00:19:10.82] spk_1:
feedback.

[00:19:32.44] spk_0:
How do I how do I accept it best. How do I think through it best for really to self preservation. Let’s start with the self preservation before I before I start thinking about how I how it’s gonna help my team if I receive this. Well, how can I help myself to receive this? Well,

[00:19:43.64] spk_1:
yeah, absolutely. So if it sounds like um was it? Well, it can be you get feedback two ways. Either you asked for it or it’s sprung on you? Right. It’s a surprise. Either way, let’s say if you’re asking for it because that’s what I’m trying to normalize it.

[00:19:47.20] spk_0:
Right? Let’s do the ideal. You’ve you’ve asked for it and you you asked for it. You got it.

[00:19:51.21] spk_1:
Exactly. In fact, this just

[00:19:53.80] spk_0:
careful what you ask for it goes be careful what you ask for. All right?

[00:20:25.54] spk_1:
And and that is a worthy thought process, thought process to go through before you ask for feedback is take a step back and think about, okay, what might you hear? And just to prepare yourself and you know, some people get a little bit more extreme than others. Some people go to worst case scenario, whatever works for you because you are putting yourself out there even though asking for and receiving feedback is the way we get the great performance. It’s still can sting. It’s uncomfortable, right?

[00:20:26.78] spk_0:
You’re making yourself vulnerable.

[00:20:28.35] spk_1:
Absolutely

[00:20:29.73] spk_0:
absolutely discomfort. You know, you might consider it attack,

[00:20:33.50] spk_1:
yep.

[00:20:34.09] spk_0:
Alright, so, Alright, so you’re it sounds like your first advice is just prepare

[00:21:34.74] spk_1:
Yeah, just prepare for it. A second piece of advice is to consider it a single so you’ve received it. Okay, so you asked for it? You’re prepared. You received it and you’re like 00uch we’re quite prepared to take a step back, maybe take a deep breath and know that in the moment you don’t have to agree, this could be feedback that you received that you consider is wrong. Maybe you consider it unfair or you consider it hurtful and in that moment there is no need to agree to this feedback to explain this feedback to justify your actions. Take a step back and just thank that individual for their candor and that they had given you something to think about and process even asked for time. May I have some time to process this? Mhm. So take a moment to just thank that person because you did ask them for it. They delivered on what you asked of them. The last thing you want to do is punish them for doing something you asked them to do

[00:21:40.45] spk_0:
right?

[00:22:54.34] spk_1:
Thank you. Don’t have to agree with it. Then give yourself some time and think it through. And and the first piece to remember is this is a single data point. So everyone has an opinion and a perception and ultimately a bias. And so when you receive feedback, you are also receiving feedback from a single data point from one source that likely is not a full representation of who you are. So go out and seek additional data points. This is where you might go and ask a trusted colleague or a trusted friend. Hey, listen, I received this feedback. I want to check it out with you and get more information. Now the key here is not to discredit the person who just gave you this feedback. That’s our experience and that’s our experience with you. There is truth in that. So you also don’t want to discredit it. Get additional data points and then take some consideration on how you might start to adapt your style. Maybe you might adapt the way you communicate with just this one person or maybe you, you might get more feedback that validates the original feedback and you realize, okay, now I I need to adjust my behavior or I need to adjust my work.

[00:26:05.64] spk_0:
It’s time for Tony’s take two. Have you ever sued a donor to enforce a gift or maybe an estate to enforce a gift? This came to me because there’s a recent piece, it’s from March in propublica about ST jude. Children’s hospitals practices around litigation uh, at ST jude in Memphis Tennessee, I can’t really comment on whether ST jude is appropriately suing estates or not. You know, I need a lot more facts than the article reveals and you can’t always trust media to get details like that. You know, 100% correct. But it gives rise to a really interesting question. You know, what factors go into deciding whether to sue a donor or again, you know, maybe a donor’s estate. Like how much is the gift worth? That’s important. What about the possible public relations fallout? Some people are gonna think you’re champions for your mission, other gonna other people are gonna think you’re scoundrels picking on widows, widowers and, and bereaved people or elderly people or an innocent family. So the pr fallout, you have to consider that how well known is the person that you’re considering suing. That’s gonna give rise to more press than, than less if the person is not very high profile, um, what are, what are your board impressions or board opinions? Your board is your fiduciary, uh, your, your, your, those are your fiduciaries. Um, you know, their opinions are going to be important. Can they come to a consensus? Lots of factors to consider. So just wondering if that’s ever happened to you, if there’s a story you’d like to share. You can let me know because I am interested, I used to be an attorney a long time ago, but you know, I still am interested in the legal side of fundraising and certainly planned giving, you know, if we’re talking about potentially suing estates. So you can get me at tony at tony-martignetti dot com if you have a share a story that you want to share all around suing a donor. Maybe in a state to enforce a gift That is Tony’s take two. We’ve got about a butt load more time for asking for receiving and giving feedback with Amy draeger a little shorter show this week. What if you’re asked to sign something? Uh This is a more perform, this is a more formal now performance review, semiannual or annual. Um There’s let’s say it’s a mixed bag you know but there are some things that you don’t agree

[00:26:15.92] spk_1:
with, some

[00:26:17.81] spk_0:
of it’s quite positive but some uh some is

[00:26:21.11] spk_1:
feels

[00:26:26.44] spk_0:
unfair or wrong but you were then asked to sign the performance evaluation form.

[00:26:28.45] spk_1:
Yeah

[00:26:48.74] spk_0:
usually the boss was I mean in my experience I haven’t been an employee for a long long time. I would be I would be a lousy employee. I could go I could go much stronger than the word lousy but let’s just leave it lousy I’d be a really lousy employee. Um When I used to do you know that I would say you know it doesn’t mean that you agree with it. It’s just that you have received it or something like that. You know you have to sign the form really don’t

[00:28:15.74] spk_1:
you? Huh? I think it depends on your organization and your HR policies so I don’t really know um I have some you know past experience in some organizations and HR was fine if you didn’t sign it, you didn’t have to you know. Um So I think it would depend on what the HR policy is but this is such a good example of not leaving feedback to these like specific events that occur. Um and where I see leaders really compromise candidly, their own credibility is where they’re not recognizing their team for their positive contributions and and and stick with me here because what I find and in fact we we talked about this at the intense session is that there was a lot of leaders in the room who said that they only said thank you or recognize positive behavior if someone went above and beyond or only if they thought about it. And so when we don’t recognize the good things that our teams are performing and doing then when it comes to having a difficult conversation. The context that’s even worse because we haven’t acknowledged all the positive contributions that the person has brought to the table and so that person will feel even more attacked. Undermined by getting this zinger of a negative piece of feedback out of the blue.

[00:28:23.54] spk_0:
So do you

[00:28:23.87] spk_1:
mean

[00:28:25.64] spk_0:
what do you mean? Are are are positive feedback should be even around routine things that the team is doing well. Don’t ignore the d don’t ignore the day to day. In other words

[00:30:09.54] spk_1:
don’t ignore the day to day. And and that’s and the reason for this is that critical feedback negative feedback inhibits our learning in our brains. It triggers fight or flight and when we go into fight or flight, uh, we become very defensive, it’s that taking it personal component that we talked about this whole time. And what we know well is that when we get critical feedback, we then have these negative emotions that emerge, whether it’s shame, embarrassment, uncertainty, these are all very natural emotions that come up when we’ve made a mistake or we haven’t performed in the way our bosses wanted. Now this is why having routine positive feedback flowing on a team is because it creates this foundation of support. And so when I’m on your team and I’m working with you and we recognize each other’s contributions and then I drop wall. You gotta come and talk to me about that. You talk to me. But because we have this relationship where we’re recognizing each other and appreciating each other’s contributions. I know you’re not coming to embarrass me. You got my back because we already have this routine exchange of appreciating, appreciating each other. And so that’s what is critical for teams, especially teams that perform at the highest levels is that they routinely appreciate and demonstrate respect for each other. So that when they have to address the tough stuff, they’ve already got a positive foundation set.

[00:30:13.24] spk_0:
It’s like a relationship building, right? You want to, you want a strong relationship, whether it’s with your co workers, those who work with you for you, uh, above you.

[00:30:24.25] spk_1:
Just

[00:30:34.34] spk_0:
donors, volunteers. You want to have a strong relationship. So that when there is some difficulty, maybe it even escalates, rises to the level of conflict you have, like you just said, I mean, you have this strong foundation and and it’s all kept in context.

[00:30:41.39] spk_1:
It’s

[00:30:41.97] spk_0:
not an isolated negative feedback because there’s never any routine positive feedback.

[00:30:47.84] spk_1:
That’s right. That’s right. And so, you know,

[00:30:50.66] spk_0:
it

[00:30:52.03] spk_1:
is, it is and that’s really what we are at work. We are humans in a relationship with each other. And so acknowledging our contributions and the value each person brings to the table ultimately helps everyone achieve the goal.

[00:31:28.74] spk_0:
And you, you said it so many times you used the word routine routine routine. Don’t wait till the giving Tuesday campaign that everybody, you know, killed themselves on for 4.5, 5 weeks or something, you know, don’t wait for the big gala. The fourth quarter fundraising routine routine positive feedback. So that then routine negative feedback is in the context

[00:31:32.04] spk_1:
of the

[00:31:32.34] spk_0:
more positive and the positive is most likely to outweigh the negative. Otherwise you have a you have an employment problem.

[00:32:18.24] spk_1:
That’s right. That’s right. And and there is a difference between positive routine feedback with occasional critical feedback to advance our performance, right? And performance management. When you have a habitual poor performer who’s lacking the skills to perform in the job there. Those are separate where we want leaders to create a habit around is appreciating the team demonstrating valuing someone’s opinion. Thanking people for speaking up. Um and and doing that, that level of routine feedback performance management is almost a separate topic.

[00:32:22.44] spk_0:
Okay,

[00:32:23.03] spk_1:
okay. What

[00:32:30.14] spk_0:
else should we talk about around this, that that we haven’t or maybe anything that came up with the intense session, what what more do you want to

[00:32:31.78] spk_1:
Know? Well, I think, you know, um my first management job, I was 23, I had absolutely no training and um I had a team of 30 people. It was looking back on it three

[00:32:44.68] spk_0:
years ago, three years ago, you were leading 30

[00:32:46.65] spk_1:
People uh when I was 23.

[00:32:49.39] spk_0:
Yeah, three years ago.

[00:32:52.44] spk_1:
Oh Yeah, yes, three years

[00:32:54.30] spk_0:
ago. Okay,

[00:32:56.01] spk_1:
that was good. Anyway, very early in my career, I was taught the sandwich feedback model, have you heard of the sandwich

[00:33:02.73] spk_0:
sandwich feedback model? No, I don’t. Not acquainted with this.

[00:33:21.34] spk_1:
Okay, this is positive, negative positive. So you need to give someone some sort of critical feedback and you go in and you say something positive to them like, oh, tony you’re, you know, you’re such a valuable member of the team. I just think you’ve been doing a really good job these past couple of months. But you know, when you talk to that customer last week, you could have done this better, but hey, you’re really important member of the team and I

[00:33:28.92] spk_0:
just think you’re doing very, very, very the reality between, well, maybe it’s not between fantasies, but you know, very the reality in the middle very the hard part in the middle.

[00:36:45.93] spk_1:
Yes, exactly. And so the sandwich feedback model, positive, negative positive has since been studied and it’s wildly ineffective and it’s ineffective for all of the obvious reasons. The the employee feels that there’s a grenade in the middle of the positive feedback which undermines positive feedback. So the employee either doesn’t believe the positive feedback or just only listens to the positive feedback because there’s more of it than the negative. So the the key that when you do get to the place of needing to give feedback that you’re very direct and clear on the specific situation and not too muddy it with positive things beforehand. And this was something that was interesting in the session is we we talked through a framework for giving feedback that is um standard for positive or for critical feedback and it allows the person. So let’s talk about critical feedback because that’s really what people want help doing. That’s what makes people mixed managers the most uncomfortable. And so the framework for giving critical feedback begins with allowing the other person to self evaluate. Okay so let’s say I have dropped the ball in a couple of meetings and my first meeting started 20 minutes late and the second meeting, I forgot all the materials for it. Okay you’re my boss, you need to talk to me about it. The first step is to let me evaluate myself because if I already know I screwed up, there’s no need for you to pile on. So the first step is allowed self evaluation and tony you might say to me, hey me, how do you think those last two meetings with marketing went and you’ll just bring up the conversation and maybe I own it and say, you know what, I really dropped the ball on those two meetings or maybe the opposite happens and then I think I nailed them and I just think I was fantastic at this. You now need to share, share with me some candid feedback about these two meetings. So then described the situation from a fact based situation And described first meeting started 20 minutes late. Second meeting didn’t have materials, what do you think about that? So you’re asking me for my perspective then describe what that impact was? My reaction. Is that we started that this my reaction is that um this looks like we’re unprepared. Okay, it’s your reaction then state your expectation moving forward. I want to be sure we’re prepared for all of our meetings. How does that sound and support the person. So this is the framework for getting feedback where I’m going with this story, is that there was someone else who asked the question he said, but do you have a different way of starting it? Like is there a different way other than saying, can we talk about that meeting and what was coming forward is the person was just uncomfortable giving feedback. There was a need to have like the perfect phrase and giving feedback isn’t comfortable. That’s not the goal, that’s not the expectation. And in fact, if you’re someone who has to give feedback and you’re uncomfortable with it, I’d say that’s good because you’ve got some compassion there. You know, it’s an uncomfortable situation. Okay, So my point

[00:37:07.13] spk_0:
that you played sort of a therapist role in that evaluating what was what the core of her question was. It wasn’t opening the conversation. It was discomfort with giving feedback.

[00:37:27.93] spk_1:
Yeah, it was it was one of those things that I think because we’ve all been there, we’ve all had to give feedback and there’s this, you know, for some people it’s dread. And for others it’s just sheer avoidance. And it’s because we’re we we have this belief that giving feedback should be easy. It’s not. And so eliminating that from the expectation is important because if you feel discomfort, it’s okay. That’s pretty typical.

[00:37:39.63] spk_0:
I I appreciate that you say that’s compassion.

[00:37:42.33] spk_1:
Mhm. It is, it’s compassion.

[00:37:45.03] spk_0:
How did you get a leadership job over a person with a team of 30 people at 23? Is that right? That was that right out of college?

[00:38:03.62] spk_1:
Uh nearly I had one year under the book. Uh I had one year at the the organization, I think I was recognized at the time for potential. Like I had no past

[00:38:04.67] spk_0:
experience.

[00:38:21.42] spk_1:
And um, and I also worked for at that time the most influential boss I’ve ever had. And he taught me he was the kind of boss who grew leaders And he would invest 20 minutes with me every day, Those first like 90 days. And he’d quiz me, he’d asked me, Okay, what’s important to your team? What are your goals, who’s doing? I mean he would in

[00:38:35.52] spk_0:
20 minutes a day, 20 minutes a day For your first time for your 1st 90 days that is a real investment in a new employee.

[00:38:54.52] spk_1:
He did and I learned the most about leadership from him in that very short time frame. And so, you know, I also find that everyone benefits from having a great mentor and he ended up being a great leadership mentor for me. And so, you know, that could be a turning point in people’s careers, is to

[00:39:02.97] spk_0:
have somebody, somebody you want to shout out,

[00:39:13.02] spk_1:
oh sure I could. His name’s wade upland and he was my uh, this was 22 years ago,

[00:39:16.42] spk_0:
where, what was the organization?

[00:39:33.62] spk_1:
It was retail, it was a department store, retail, which, which lends to leading a team of 30 people. It’s probably one of the toughest leadership jobs out there because it’s shift work like people work in these shifts. And um, and it was for a department store that of course is now defunct, no longer in business,

[00:39:39.13] spk_0:
which one

[00:39:39.90] spk_1:
marshall field’s

[00:39:44.31] spk_0:
that was a huge brand, huge

[00:39:46.33] spk_1:
brand in the midwest. Yes, yeah, yeah,

[00:39:49.82] spk_0:
I know it because

[00:39:50.97] spk_1:
I

[00:39:51.72] spk_0:
I lived in Missouri for five years when I was in the Air force.

[00:39:55.12] spk_1:
So

[00:39:55.71] spk_0:
I may remember it from, this was

[00:39:57.37] spk_1:
uh

[00:39:58.54] spk_0:
Mid Mid to late 80s,

[00:40:00.34] spk_1:
84 to

[00:40:14.91] spk_0:
89. So maybe I remember it from Kansas City here. I lived about an hour from Kansas City, I may remember Marshall fields, but that was a huge yeah, that was big. Alright, well not not not not because of your leadership experience and you’re not because of your skill. Had nothing to do with the downfall of marshall field.

[00:40:19.03] spk_1:
No, no, there’s there’s more external forces at play

[00:40:24.11] spk_0:
hard to imagine more powerful forces than than your leadership though. Right? Alright.

[00:40:29.81] spk_1:
I

[00:40:40.91] spk_0:
know, I don’t know what, well, I felt bad about the three year comment. I don’t know, it’s commenting on your age. That was probably a misstep. Alright, I feel bad about that. Um let’s see, Oh, anything else that came out of the intent. Any, it sounds like there are a lot of good questions, anything, anything else you want to share with uh with nonprofit radio listeners about?

[00:41:09.91] spk_1:
You know, I think, I think the biggest aha for me is, you know, consultants, we immerse ourselves in the content and and we start to believe that everybody thinks the same way we do and that’s kind of classic and I think one of the things that was so compelling for me was the candor with the group in questioning how frequently they should recognize someone for just doing what’s expected of

[00:41:17.31] spk_0:
them. And

[00:41:46.51] spk_1:
there was almost a resistance to do that and I found that very candid but also unfortunate because if there’s one thing we need more of right now is recognizing and appreciating each other. And so if there’s one thing that anybody takes away from listening to this or you know, reading articles on appreciation or on feedback is to go out and practice giving good feedback, recognize people for their contribution for the time they spend um because appreciating and valuing others is really what we need right now.

[00:42:00.90] spk_0:
Amy trader consultant and leadership coach at growth partners consulting. Where can we find growth partners consulting. Amy

[00:42:07.11] spk_1:
you can go to try GPC dot com.

[00:42:10.90] spk_0:
Try GPC dot com for growth partners consulting of course, this is terrific. Thank you very much. Terrific I think provocative, certainly timely. Well, timeless, really timeless and uh and and provocative too, you know, but but significant important topic. Thank you very much Amy,

[00:42:32.20] spk_1:
thank you. I really enjoyed it. Mhm.

[00:43:41.90] spk_0:
And thank you for being with tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of the 2022 nonprofit technology conference Next week. A break from 22 NTC coverage. The other tony-martignetti if you missed any part of this week’s show, I beseech you find it at tony-martignetti dot com, I own that he, the other guy does not own that were sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff 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 B with me next week for nonprofit radio Big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great. Mm hmm.

Nonprofit Radio for April 11, 2022: Measuring Equity

 

Danielle Fox, Ellonda Williams & Raj Aggarwal: Measuring Equity

We’re kicking off the 2022 Nonprofit Technology Conference (#22NTC) conversations, with a discussion of how equity can be incorporated into your nonprofit’s performance measurement. Sharing their collaboration are Danielle Fox at Union of Concerned Scientists, Ellonda Williams with B Lab and Rajneesh Aggarwal from Provoc.

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[00:02:45.84] spk_0:
mm hmm. Hello and welcome to Tony-Martignetti non profit radio big nonprofit 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 get slapped with a diagnosis of pollen, euro Maya’s itis. If you inflamed me with the idea that you missed this week’s show measuring equity, We’re kicking off the 2022 nonprofit technology conference conversations with a discussion of how equity can be incorporated into your nonprofits, performance measurement, sharing their collaboration are Danielle Fox at Union of concerned scientists. Alando Williams with the lab and Rajneesh Agarwal From provoke On Tony’s take two, you’re responsible for donor relationships. We’re sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o here is measuring equity. Welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 22 N T C. By now. You know what that is. You know that it’s the 2022 nonprofit technology conference, you know that it’s hosted by N 10 very smart savvy organization helping everyone use technology in their social change work. You know, all this. What you don’t know is that my guests now are Daniel Fox, Alando Williams and raj Aggarwal but now you do now you’re informed now, you know, as much as I do Daniel Fox is campaign and Science network manager at the Union of concerned scientists. Alando Williams is director of justice Equity, diversity and inclusion Jedi at B lab and raj aggarwal is president of provoke Daniel Ayalon garage welcome to nonprofit radio and and Farage welcome back. I hope I’m, I hope I’m as excited to have you back now uh, in half an hour or 45 minutes as I am now, Rogers already given me trouble before we even started recording. So I’ll have to check in with me every 15 minutes to see how my raj meter is is is jumping. Okay,

[00:02:47.88] spk_1:
what about what about my tony meter?

[00:03:07.24] spk_0:
It’s less important because that’s the relevance of that is raj Aggarwal. non profit radio that’s where you can measure your tony meter, but tony-martignetti non profit radio I can measure my raj meter anytime I want to. So pardon me, Yolanda,

[00:03:08.51] spk_2:
it’s House Rules,

[00:03:33.94] spk_0:
House Rules, House rules, get your own show essentially it was what my advice is to, to raj. Okay, let’s see, So let’s give everybody a chance to give a brief, let’s, you know, we’re not, you’re, you’re talking to an audience of 13,000 folks who are already in nonprofits. So you’re you’re likely not talking to potential donors, but for a little context please, you know, briefly Danielle, what’s the union of concerned scientists about?

[00:03:37.34] spk_3:
Sure. So the concern of concerned scientists is a science advocacy organization, essentially. We’re all about how do you put science and the scientific community to work for a better world. Uh, and that also means more just policies and political systems and so we’ll get into it a little bit soon but working with the justice and equity lens is fundamental for us to actually be able to fulfill our mission. Um And so that’s why I’m excited to talk about how we measure it.

[00:04:33.84] spk_0:
Thank you for supporting the work of scientists. Uh it’s especially now, but please thank you. You know, science scientists, they’re I think they’re not to be marginalized and and mocked there to be central to a central to a conversation and essential in a in a rational world. So thank you for doing that, Yolanda. Please tell us about B Lab

[00:05:26.14] spk_2:
you too. Yes. Um so the lab is a non profit network that transforms the global economy to benefit all people communities and planet. Basically what we do is really our vision is to create a collective vision of inclusive, equitable and regenerative economic economy. So we really come into organizations and businesses known as the corpse. Um and we certify them using our set of standards to really take a look at their organization. How are they treating them? How are they treating their community? How are they paying their staff? How do folks feel showing up as part of a member of that organization? And so collectively we have over 4000 dead corpse across the globe. Um and we all come together to really assess how to do things in a more um Jedi forward and equitable way with really um centering around economy and how do we change? How do we think about business

[00:05:29.74] spk_0:
is B lab the certifying like agency or not for for B corpse? It’s isn’t where folks apply for for for B corp status.

[00:05:41.24] spk_2:
You got it. That’s a really good question. So be lab, which is where I work. Um It’s part of our entire B lab global network. So we are movement. So be lab itself is the certifying body and that is where individuals kind of start um taking our basic impact assessment in terms of your organization to really assess how do you fare as it as it as it is against our current standards. Um and that kind of gets, gets your foot running in terms of getting certified to become a B corporation.

[00:06:20.24] spk_0:
Excellent. Alright, thank you raj. Tell us about provoke which is spelled P R O V O C. When I first met Roger, I thought it was provocative. He corrected me. Of course it’s provoked raj, Tell us about the the agency,

[00:06:29.74] spk_1:
thank you. tony So provoked is a brand, the narrative strategy and uh communications and campaign um firm that roots are that does their work through an ever deepening racial equity lens.

[00:07:08.94] spk_0:
All right, thank you all again for being here. Um Daniel. Let’s start with you. Oh well, I didn’t introduce the session topic which is can equity be measured lessons from a great collaboration Danielle. It seems that you’re the you’re the organization that was interested in as you said, Centering I guess you know, walking the walk now of uh justice equity, diversity, inclusion Jedi why why did that become important to you when whenever it did versus some other time.

[00:08:22.04] spk_3:
Yeah. Absolutely. Well I think it’s I think that the organization has had to do its own unlearning relearning and thinking about, you know, as we look at the political systems and systems of racism and injustice that we need to change how we do our work frankly and how we show up. Uh it’s a different definition of success if we’re going to be true to our mission and our stated values and so with that um we’ve tried to work hard and continue to continue to learn, continue to mess up, continue to make progress and continue to take steps forward. Uh, but the work that we did with provoke was specifically around our science network. So we have this network of about 25,000 scientists and technical experts that come to U. C. S. To say hey I want to grow as an advocate and get involved and put my skills to work for social and policy change now for us for us to truly be successful. That meant that we also needed to ground how we were organizing and cultivating scientists and researchers and putting their skills to work to rectify social wrongs. That includes fighting environmental racism. That includes addressing the disproportionate impacts of all the health and environmental hazards that are going unchecked that we’re trying to put science to work to help tackle. So at the end of the day, that is really what it’s about. I think we truly

[00:08:54.34] spk_2:
when

[00:09:42.84] spk_3:
you know better you have to do better, Right? So we needed to change how we define success. And one of the things that has been so fantastic is to see the power of scientists as authentic partners with communities most impacted by the issues we’re tackling. And so the initiative that we were working on is looking at how do we scale up the ability for scientists to join us and get active? And that was through building local teams. That’s a distributed network of now, more than 50 groups throughout the country who are getting involved, but we knew that we needed to hold ourselves accountable and learn deeply about what did it what did it mean to have inclusive teams and what did it mean to integrate a lens of justice and equity and how we did our advocate building and engagement. And so that’s where we teamed up with provoked for and that’s how we’re trying to um you know, put metrics and accountability to the progress and what we’re trying to do here.

[00:09:58.74] spk_0:
Okay. And I love when you know better you need to do better. Excellent. Um Yolanda, how did how does B lab fit into this collaboration?

[00:12:30.04] spk_2:
Well, there’s there’s a couple of different ways that we fit into this collaborate. So this particular collaboration uh was between um you know, as Danielle mentioned with garage um and collaborating, collaborating provoked provoked as a report. So the fun thing about that is that I worked really closely with other be corpse that are in this space. And so not only is provoked A B corp but provoke is a B corp that that works in the Jedi space that works in the equity space. And so we’re able to constantly um share learnings, share what we share what we um discovered in in our our dialogues and our policies and our practices and and from the results um of surveys and internal work that we’re doing. So we all always able to kind of like iron sharpens iron. Right? So I’m in good company um with provoking those over, over in that space to be able to think more about, okay if provoking the people up and we’re working with other organizations to really identify how do we show up what role does the lab have in that and how do we kind of take the ideas that are that are that we’re starting at the lab in this conversation while we’re trying to tackle eyes some of these critical challenges. These are global challenges. So um sharing learnings and adapting what we learned is really a way to uh drive the learning forward. And then these types of collaborations, we can learn what went well and a really fun thing is when I was even spoken speaking with Danielle like a lot of this stuff is the same thing. There’s a lot of similarities in this realm and I think what it does that drives the, the understanding that Jedi is everybody’s job, equity, bility is everybody’s job there. It doesn’t matter what your role is, right? I’m quote unquote an expert, I didn’t give myself that title, right. People see people in the space and we give each other these titles, but we’re all accountable to this work. We’re all accountable, we’re showing up differently and I love what Danielle said as well around when you know better, you do better because then that means that you have to think differently and so our session and when we talk about how do we measure, how do we measure equity? It really starts with asking ourselves a lot of questions, why are we doing this way? You know, why do we always do it this way? Who who, who are we thinking about? Who’s in the margins and in these intersections there is no one size fits all. So something that Danielle and and and their team might do might be very different. But in the learnings of what went well, what are the challenges, what, what, what we still need to elevate um is where we can all try to come together to identify solutions that are gonna be solutions that we all can, can, can use.

[00:12:42.41] spk_0:
Yeah,

[00:12:43.18] spk_2:
alright,

[00:13:34.14] spk_0:
now raj despite your, your pre recording admonition that I’m not turned to you too much. I promise. Trust me, trust me, I won’t, but I will at this point because you were the um I don’t know, maybe it’s not fair to say the catalyst, but you were the you were the, the, the helpers. That’s a great word, that that’s a sophisticated technical term. You were the you were the you were the drivers for the union of concerned scientists. So what should, what should nonprofits be thinking about? Like at the very early stages, what did you advise Danielle and her team, you know, at early stages to be, to be, I don’t know, assessing uh measuring or you know, given where they were at the time. You know, what was your advice at the earliest stages is what I’m trying to get at.

[00:16:02.34] spk_1:
Yeah, so first of all, um I just really appreciate Danielle and Yolanda and I learned so much from them all the time and just how we show up in partnership. So I was really taking this as an opportunity to learn from them. Um I appreciate the term catalyst and also with our work with the Union of concerned scientists, I was reminding the client just the other day that, you know, the term catalyst is a is a term and chemistry, which I actually have a degree in which I rarely use and the purpose of that is a catalyst is something that helps to reduce the activation energy of a chemical process. So, so it’s going to happen anyway. But hopefully through an intervention through hopefully our team, we can maybe get there a little bit quicker. That’s that’s what a catalyst does. So I’ll take it. Um um so you know, with with so obviously part of the reason that we participated in this work is we do a lot of work on equity. And often people ask this question, you know, because of just the nature of the world. Business capitalism is are we really getting there and how can we measure it? And how can we report on it? Um and that’s obviously really important to do that as well. And so some of the things that we asked, you know, for certain scientists to do was to really think critically about why they want to change the world, how they plan to turn that into reality and what best metrics represent that success. And so for example, sometimes we would hear language from um union of concerned scientists around things like high impact actions. And so we asked them to specify what is the list of those actions or underrepresented scientists. And then we asked them to get really specific about what does that mean race, economic status, gender identity, disability. And to amplify and support. And what does that mean? And one of the big things that came up in our session with uh N. T. C. Just last week is this idea of impact and how that’s been so much that comes up in nonprofits, but we don’t really define it. So this practice that really was a whole practice of definition and then determining what tools and measures you can go about doing it. And Danielle will talk to you also about like what has happened since they started doing this and where did it work? And where did it didn’t, where does subjectivity come into this? Because some of that, so many of these things are going to be subjective through how a person might perceive what they’re actually doing. Um, and it may not be measured by a specific number. So, um, that was, that’s just one thing in here. So what the union concerns scientists did was they established six key performance indicators and 15 supporting metrics to evaluate the growth of local engagement program across the US, um, including an equity specific KPI

[00:18:39.74] spk_0:
it’s time for a break. Turn to communications. Here’s the ways that they can help you media relations. You’ve heard me talk about this, that’s the relationships building those relationships with outlets like the chronicle of philanthropy, the new york Times Market watch fast company Washington post. All places where turned to clients have gotten placements, content marketing. If you’re interested in white papers, Your annual report falls into that. You want them to do research for you. Maybe research on a program and then publish that research for you to share with donors, foundations. You know, other supporters research. They can do research for you and write about it. Speech writing, ghostwriting training on media management, media relations website. They can build website for you website creation redesign. I haven’t talked about that one. But yes they do that too. So all you know media relations, content management thought leadership web social media social marketing turn to communications, right? Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot C. O. Now back to measuring equity. Raj said this is all very subjective. I was thinking ethereal you know, but it’s it’s uh it’s it’s it’s hard to it’s hard to grasp however you you know how every whatever word you use to describe it. So Danielle, you know how did the U. C. S. Start to start to start to grasp it. You know, start, I mean eventually you end up with like raj said, you know, six KPI s and 15 supporting metrics, you know, whatever. But you know, how do you take that incrementally with this? Very subjective these very subjective concepts.

[00:21:57.84] spk_3:
Absolutely. Yeah. I’m happy to I’m gonna try to discuss it. It might sound a little messy when I discuss it but that’s so actually symbolic of what the processes and the fact that it’s just messy. Let’s do it. Oh no, it’s fine. Honestly if we’re going to talk about equity, it should always be a little uncomfortable. Um so one of the uh you know, one of the very first things I think we did with roger and the team and I really appreciated it was to just hold space for dialogue about why this even matters and what impact looks like. And I don’t mean that vaguely, we had to do a tactical visioning exercise. What described, what does impact look feel smell like when you see it, when does it take place? Um, and I think that that was so critical because we took the time to ask ourselves questions before thinking we knew anything just like Yolanda had said. Um, and so it was the time to ask ourselves those questions and overlay that with our theory of change. Why are we even saying that these local teams need to be organizing with the commitment to equity, What is equity scientist organizing really looked like. And so we held some time to really build that, which was so critical because it ultimately served as a compass for when my team of organizers waited through all of the possibilities of things we could look at and measure. And we’re from a science based organization. So you might imagine we are curious souls that want to learn a lot of information and bless rajan their team. They sat with us through it and said, well it sounds like you’re interested in your heart is telling you you need to know all of these things that might have something to do with it. But at the end of the day when we just talked about that compass of what does impact actually look like? What are the most fundamental indicators that you can consistently track that will tell, you will do the real learning of letting you know if you’re making progress or not. And so it was really the process of starting big and messy and then running through all sorts of variations of how we may or may know whether we are in fact grounding equity and inclusion in our teams based organizing and then painstakingly. But we had we built good trust along the way. So that was so critical um narrowed down to core um things that we were going to measure. So we ultimately had two of our six core keep key performance indicators that helped us measure three things, diversity of the team’s inclusive practice of our team leaders and how they are building and running those teams and the members education and engagement in terms of what is explicitly addressing equity or amplifying underrepresented upper underrepresented voices and the issues that we’re working on. And we had to define those throughout the way to be able to measure that. So that was a little bit of the process.

[00:22:06.04] spk_0:
You were able to capture those three Concepts in two Kpi s.

[00:22:46.24] spk_3:
Yeah, we we collected we collected for a few different things. So that is, you know, a number of instances where underrepresented scientists were supported or where partners were grounded in the work that uh some of the team members were um, taking up, uh, that also includes things like number of teams. What is the diversity in the makeup of that team and discuss the actual practices and how you’re running those teams. So we did that through some collection of different survey questions which we can dive into a little bit later. It was an iterative process. I’ll tell you that much.

[00:23:06.94] spk_0:
Yeah, no, I can tell for sure. And and and just for some context, I guess, how does this relate then to um, performance measurement? Like is this, is this is this drill down to individual employees or volunteer? No, I don’t know. It’s volunteers or employees like performance evaluations.

[00:24:23.14] spk_3:
Yes, that’s a good question. This for us is more about impact measurement. Um, and so the reason why we did this all along is to make sure that the data, we’re going to need to collect data about how these local teams are working and building. And it seems fundamental to us to make sure that equity inclusion were part of those because we were talking about this earlier. You manage what you measure, right? And so we needed to make sure that our key performance indicators included equity and inclusion and how we were building out our program. So the whole goal of those indicators are to help us learn as the people, the practitioners and the people who are building out this program are we actually making progress on those things that we are saying we care about and then to hold a space for accountability when we actually have to assess the growth and impact of our program. And then also just finally to invite a culture of learning both for us as staff who are trying to do things differently and for our science network members who are trying to join us in a movement to evolved scientists engagement and advocacy with a stronger equity lens. So it served more of a learning and accountability versus a performance performance evaluation.

[00:24:46.04] spk_0:
Okay. Okay. Um Alondra, your you wanted to take away, you know, you wanted to learn lessons takeaways like what, what are you hearing as as Daniel is describing this?

[00:27:56.34] spk_2:
Ah what I’m hearing is excitement, right? I’m hearing, I’m hearing alignment. Um uh we, we talk a lot about accountability especially at black. So, so um when you’re thinking about KPI S and I’m something that Daniel said around like you when you’re measuring, like that’s what you’re focusing on, your focusing on what you’re measuring. And so if you’re not measuring something that is a clear kind of like red flag of like if you’re not measuring it, you’re not tracking it, you’re not paying any attention to it. Um and so you’re measuring what really matters. And so it’s an outward depiction of what an organization truly matter, what matters to an organization, look at what they’re tracking and look at what they’re measuring. Um and so as a network B lab and we have all these reports, thousands of people were measuring what matters. But how are we if we’re trying to build an inclusive economic system and business is at the center of that? How do we do that? How do we have conversations with people? I might be an expert in the area. Um and raj talked about his degree and we’ve got we’ve got scientists and I’m not a scientist, right? Ah And so how do we educate people around how to approach their job? A lot of times we have conversations around Jedi and someone will say what you’re the Jedi expert? Like why do I have to do that’s your job? And I say, but it’s not, it’s not. Um we talk about what makes a leader, what makes a good business, what makes a leader someone you want to follow? Um if you’re doing things and how do you make people feel, how do you make other businesses feel? How do you make your community feel right? And so if we are we’re all knowing better and doing better and sharing this information, how do we take this information and have further dialogue around things like our standards are certification requirements? How do we measure what matters? And if we have conversations with our community that helps us understand what are the needs of the most marginalized in order to center in order to think more Jedi forward. We have to always ask ourselves who are the most marginalized. Um who who who are we not thinking about? Who are we creating barriers for a lot of times. We look at the outcomes and what’s gonna happen. But we don’t ask ourselves the question around, have I created a barrier? And more specifically, have I created a barrier for a representation that is traditionally or historically marginalized? And the only way to do that is to ask questions. Right? And so what Daniel said around dialogue. So we’re learning around listening to the community. What are the challenges that organizations are having when they’re trying to approach? Not only their KPI but whenever they’re approaching their supply supply chain, whenever they’re approaching their community communication, whenever they’re working with community, uh what are the challenges that they’re experiencing? Because if we’re looking at that, that is the information that we can use to build more resources, more uh more policies that are actually going to help uh create equitable outcomes. It’s gonna help our tools and our programs and just general accessibility of the work that we do.

[00:28:17.34] spk_0:
So, so Alondra is this is this work that’s going to be um spread among the b corp Among these 4000, you know, be corpse that that they’re going to start to be held 2, 22 Jedi standards, as I don’t mean, I don’t mean tomorrow, but tomorrow’s Saturday. But I don’t mean

[00:28:26.24] spk_2:
monday monday

[00:28:34.34] spk_0:
either. Give yourself some time. But um, this is this is this is this eventually going to be part of b corp I don’t know the approval or

[00:28:37.74] spk_2:
certification,

[00:28:39.02] spk_0:
certification,

[00:30:08.34] spk_2:
certification and verification. Um, so let me clarify so a couple of things we already tracked. So Jedi Jedi and equity bility, um, inclusion. These are already built within our standards. Um, but we are an organization, like many other organizations where trucking along and we’ve been in existence for some time and so, um, what we used to do to measure the past or not the things that we’re going to be able to measure the future as things are growing and as things are changing. So why we have always measured Jedi, why? We’ve always measured things like what’s the difference between your highest paid individual and the organization and the lowest paid individual in the organization. And the farther across that spread is indicates that there’s less equitable ability built into your systems in the organization. So we already looked at things like that. But what we’ve done in this past year is we’re really, really looking at all of our requirements. We’re looking at how we measure what truly matters. And so how do you measure equity? What is, what is that question that we write in the basic impact assessment that is gonna give us the information that we need to track how well an organization is doing identifying those questions if it’s difficult identifying those parameters were global. So it’s not just us, it’s not just Canada, I mean we’re a global network and so we have a lot of things to take into consideration. Jedi is not one size fits all, um, something that one global partner might do might not be suitable in another region of the world. So we are constantly challenged the lab Global with creating standards that are actually going to be not only accessible, but something that’s going to translate across the globe. So that’s why it’s important for us to ask lots of questions ourselves.

[00:33:34.04] spk_0:
It’s time for Tony’s take two. You’re responsible for donor relationships. What do I mean, I’m talking about keeping relationships strong, moving relationships forward. I’m also talking about when there’s been a solicitation not lettering, not letting, not lettering, not letting that solicitation sit fallow, but you follow up on solicitations right? You never want to have a solicitation hanging out there that looks like you didn’t take the thing seriously to begin with. So it’s your responsibility to keep relationships strong and moving forward with your donors. You do that in ways like remembering milestones, birthdays, anniversaries, uh, the anniversary of their very first gift to the organization. Their 20th gift to your nonprofit, their 50th gift milestones like that. Um, so milestones in their personal lives, but also related to your nonprofit, keeping in touch with just, you know, handwritten notes, phone calls where it’s appropriate. Not every donor wants phone calls. I realized that however they want to be communicated with keeping in touch in those ways, email phone notes. Keeping relationships strong and moving forward. This is your responsibility as the leadership, as the fundraiser, as the board member involved in donor relationships and fundraising. It’s not your donors responsibility to keep in touch with you. It’s your responsibility to keep in touch with your donors. And that’s what I mean by keeping those relationships strong and moving forward. That is Tony’s take two. We’ve got boo koo but loads more time for measuring equity with Danielle Fox, Alando Williams and raj Aggarwal, Danielle. Let’s talk about leadership by end. I don’t know if, you know, maybe maybe it wasn’t an issue for the the union of concerned scientists ceo necessarily or you know that c c suite level, but there must have been leaders at some at some levels in in U. C. S. That were um, I don’t know at worst, you know, unwilling at best unaware and and and so for either reason, you know, not not accepting what you C. S. Was trying to do. How do you whatever management level we’re talking about? How do you what’s your recommendations for getting that kind of buy in among leadership because it’s it’s essential otherwise this work is going nowhere, you know. So what do you recommend there?

[00:33:37.34] spk_3:
Oh that’s such a good question. I will try

[00:33:39.69] spk_0:
To finally only took 29 minutes. Almost all right.

[00:33:43.25] spk_3:
Yeah. The other ones were no, you’re

[00:33:45.83] spk_0:
suffering a lackluster. There’s no question about it. There’s no question.

[00:33:52.24] spk_3:
I uh I’m happy to to try to take a crack at that. Um and but also I’m really interested with uh with what Yolanda and Roger have that, so if you don’t mind, I’d love to have like that be a team effort. Um

[00:34:05.13] spk_0:
but

[00:34:21.54] spk_3:
but I’d say, you know, there there was no sort of, there was no overt objection to it. It was just more of a sense this understanding that when you want to track when you redefine success and you want to meaningfully track that, that means we’re gonna have to have a hard look at our systems and our status quo of how we usually track and monitor things and to to unpack some of that and potentially to have to change um

[00:34:41.64] spk_0:
what

[00:34:42.02] spk_3:
we’re defining as success and what even systems or tools or capacity we have to be able to then consistently monitor and learn from it. So I would say that it wasn’t, there wasn’t a particular opposition, it was just more of a question of,

[00:34:59.74] spk_2:
well,

[00:37:28.33] spk_3:
what does new success actually look like. Uh and I think for that the approach was more just creating an authentic space for learning that no matter what level you are in an organization of space to ask critical questions together and to relearn and re envision together and have really difficult conversations about what we might need to be doing differently and why that’s important for what contribution we’re trying to have is so fundamental and that it doesn’t from my perspective and maybe this is my personal opinions towards like hierarchy were all at the end of the day, people with different ranges of responsibilities that hopefully if we’re showing up at that meeting and that conversation and good faith want to do better. Um, and so maybe that’s naive of me perhaps, but I think some of it was just creating a lot of spaces without particular judgment, but very honest, candid conversations about um what what’s different, what does success actually look like that needs to look different from how we’ve defined it before and then um what do we need to do as a team to be able to outfit ourselves to authentically monitor that and hold space to check back for whether we’re really um meeting the markers that we have and if we aren’t how we’re willing to adapt. And so maybe this is my own opinion every I’m an organizer at heart. So everything’s a campaign and part of that is a mix of sure pressure, but also persuasion and bringing people on board to join in a collective vision with you and see their role in it. And so I think there’s a lot of conversations along the lines of that and then a lot of conversations about if we’re going to do more of this, what are we going to do less of and having to make difficult decisions about what we prioritize and actually invest in. Uh those were difficult conversations and that is a okay. And so just giving yourself the time to work through that so that when it comes time to start up these key performance indicators and this initiative with equity and inclusion as barometers for progress that we’re all on the same page and were brought in and we know how we’re going to do it.

[00:37:57.13] spk_0:
Well if any of that was naive then I share your naivete. So I don’t think it was, but that’s because I’m with you all right. Uh Irlanda, do you wanna Danielle opened the door? Do you want to talk about? You know what I want to focus on leadership? Leadership buy in for Again, it could be anything from unawareness too. I don’t know. It could be blatant racism and just unwillingness, you know, at the at the extremes. What about leadership by in which again I think is essential to this work.

[00:42:30.50] spk_2:
Well uh it is right, it’s not, there’s no guests, right? Uh leadership buying is absolutely essential. Um And it is going to help drive longer term change and success, but a couple of things that Danielle said makes me think like that. So I’ve had a couple of experiences. I have had a myriad of experiences, I’ve had experiences where your your stuff trying to like you’re back at the business case, right? You’re back at business case. So so for those of us in the in the Jedi, I say look at Danielle Danielle, for those who can’t see, Danielle is vigorously nodding her head. Um the business case. So when Jedi hit the scene, when equity diversity E. D. I hit the scene, um the business case was like a really big thing because when we think about Jedi, it’s really rooted in how people feel the experience that people have or lack thereof, and how those experiences create inequities that can show up in education, obviously in business um in the health care system, you know, pretty much any system that we have with that inequities can can show up in. So what’s important for us to take into consideration, how do we get this by it? And so what we had to do was is we had to make the business case which was a lot of contributed in money, right? We had to say this is this is relevant to a business because businesses that are diverse that have diversity of thought, not just the color of someone’s skin, diversity of thought, thrive, They do better. And there’s years of evidence for that. Um so long before we really were having conversations about inclusion and justice and how people feel we were having conversations around your business should do this and it’s worthwhile for your business because you will get a return on your investment financially. Um, and I love the fact that we’re kind of shifting away from that and uh I’m having a lot less of those conversations and a lot more conversations of I know that there’s a problem. I recognize that something must be done. I have no clue where to start or I know that there’s a problem. I just don’t see it, help me learn how to see it and in that work it’s very, very difficult and it takes a long time. And so I’m lucky that in my current experiences I have with leaders that that know that there’s a problem and want to do something about it. But the struggle sometimes is what one thinks is the solution to the problem is not the solution to the problem. So what I see happens is you get the buy in. Sometimes you might have an organization where you have buy in from leadership. However, when you talk about what the actual solutions are, that’s when there is discrepancies, there’s discrepancies on whether or not we can actually solve this problem by by enacting that solution. And so we have to have a lot of conversations around resources and for me, I’m able to really elevate vision right, what is the vision of your organization? So I could ask that all the time. Staff say how I would love for my organization to put E. D. I first right to elevate equity. What is the conversation that I need to have with my manager, with my boss, with my supervisor, with leadership? How do we have this conversation? And I really challenge you to kind of like look at the vision and I’m encouraging those who really feel like they want to be a part of organizations that are putting this type of work forward. Take a look at the vision of the organization that you work at. We have an inclusive equitable regenerative system. So I was able to say if we want to do this work, we have to think about equity, but we have to take into consideration if we know that we’re not only going to get a return on our investment are people are going to feel better. They’re going to want to be here. They’re going to um, feel valued being here. You don’t have to work your employees to the bone to get dedication from them and treating them like human beings is how you’re actually going to be able to work together to create not only solutions but a space where everyone can show up as their true, authentic selves and feel good about being at work. Um, and we’re not there yet. You know, we’re not there were not there at the lab right? We still have these challenges internal to our organizations. Just like other organizations.

[00:43:03.80] spk_0:
I am gratified that you’re having fewer conversations that are based around money. You know, bottom line, that’s, that’s encouraging in the end it is all it is all about the bottom line but that you’re having fewer conversations that are rooted in that, you know, that are, that are explicitly about why it’s better for your, you know, how it will help your bottom line um, Raj. I’m only turning to you because Danielle suggested that you might want to comment on this. So uh would you, would you like to on the, on the buy in? We just have about 10 minutes left or so.

[00:43:18.30] spk_1:
I don’t have anything more to add than what these folks do.

[00:43:22.05] spk_0:
Yeah,

[00:43:22.68] spk_1:
I did share though, Danielle with Lane frisco and Denise done. Um how happy it makes me here? How happy it makes me to hear you share this in this way. So thank you so much.

[00:43:35.90] spk_2:
Oh,

[00:43:36.50] spk_0:
you’re thanking me.

[00:43:37.80] spk_1:
Yeah, I’m always thinking tony and I’m thinking Danielle and of course dr Williams all the time.

[00:43:54.20] spk_0:
Yeah. Well, these voices, right, the conversation needs to be elevated and I can help deliver it to another 13,000 folks. So, um Yolanda, I have a question um, I am, I am, I am, I am I because you’re the Director of, of Justice Equity diversity inclusion. I am. I am I to 2019 If I refer to D e I

[00:44:07.89] spk_2:
am

[00:44:08.83] spk_0:
I am I if I’m if I’m three years old, if I’m living in the past. Tell me and I’m asking you d i is what it used to be. But now I see Jedi more, I see Jedi emerging, I know

[00:46:07.58] spk_2:
are you 2 2019? Ah that’s that’s a lot of pressure to put on. Maybe you’re not there and you’re jeremy Tony and I respect that. But I will say I will encourage folks that are still really focusing on like, quick. The fastest Jedi training that I ever can give right is um, the justice aspect is is really, really important because it takes into consideration where we are, And it’s really difficult for us to look at how the existence of things as they are right now in 2022 without paying homage and respect to the fact that there is a very specific reason why we are facing the inequity that we face today. And so it’s important for us to bring that element to the conversation, because then we can say the reason there’s a really good reason why we need to have a conversation with our HR department about whether or not this level to position needs to have a bachelor’s degree, and that is that role actually necessary? Or have we are we a product of a of a society that folks of privilege and power decided what was necessary in order to be able to succeed again defining what that success looks like. And so we are just perpetuating that same ideology, even though we know that’s not true, and so how do we really root equity diversity and inclusion in in, you know, in a way that allows us to change from the way things used to be with recognizing that it’s not going to get us to where we want to go. So that’s why justice is a really key component. But again, some folks aren’t there in their, in their Jedi journey. Um, and I aspire okay,

[00:46:43.58] spk_0:
well, and I regret that I personalized it. I got, but I was thinking, I was thinking to myself, but you know, because I don’t mean to put pressure for Jedi, I love Jedi Jedi warrior. You could be a Jedi warrior. Um, yeah. Okay. Okay. Um, let’s see Danielle, why don’t you, why don’t you leave us with some, uh, inspiration if you like or something that you think we haven’t talked about yet doesn’t have, doesn’t have to be, uh, doesn’t have to be grand inspiration. Maybe just something that we haven’t talked about yet that you’d like folks to know about, uh, this work, this journey that that you see us went through. I’m gonna give you the chance to, uh, to leave us.

[00:48:52.87] spk_3:
Sure, you know, it, this is gonna sound a little atypical, but I think the for me, what’s been inspiring is that we’ve already learned, What isn’t working from what we did with provoke. Don’t take that personal rush. I mean, that is a wonderful wonderful thing because what weird doing is we’ve built in an invitation to ourselves as I would invite our advocates and any other organization that um is questioning whether they um have the knowledge or expertise to deepen equity and justice in their work and have to measure that. Um I think we’re a perfect example of organization that doesn’t have a deep expertise in this, but still wants to do it and is trying to do it, had built out something that I think really has helped ground us to be able to see how we need to keep improving. Um and that, for me is uh pretty inspiring because Ellen and I were talking a little bit about this before very often this can feel like an such a high stakes topic that can sometimes paralyze people from investing in it in taking steps. And I think the inspiring thing here is we’re already learning in the first couple of years of using these KPI s ways we can organize the local teams to to be a little bit better and more thoughtful in justice and equity, and we’re also learning that um there’s opportunities to reiterate and and strengthen our key P. I. S. That is an invitation for more learning and accountability, and for me that’s pretty, pretty exciting because this is ongoing work. I don’t think there’s gonna be a year that you see us as check we are an anti racist organization, it’s going to be ongoing work, and that’s exciting.

[00:49:21.27] spk_0:
Perfect inspiration. Thank you. And I realized that uh I made a mistake, Yolanda, I’m gonna let you take us out because B Lab, the lab is in this for takeaways. What what you what you can share with your your your 4000 certified companies. So you take us out with some with some takeaways.

[00:50:59.06] spk_2:
I love that. Um don’t let perfection be in the way of doing something right. Doing doing nothing is never good enough. So I love what Danielle said about a moving target as well. Um lean into uncomfortable that we don’t know what a utopian world looks like. We do not know what an equitable world looks like. We don’t know we haven’t had it yet. That’s the beauty and all of this is like we can imagine whatever we want and so be a part of what the new normal looks like. Step up and take apart to stake your claim because we’ve all we are all a product of of systems that were created before we got here. We are in a unique juncture in society in history that we can take a part in what success and the new normal books like moving forward and we can create systems that actually are inclusive for everyone that allow everyone to succeed regardless of where they were born, what they looked like, their social and economic status, um sexual orientation. We have a weird and unique space that as our leadership and when I say leadership, I’m not just talking about organizational leadership, I’m talking about in the world humans and and society members who have been a part of making decisions for a long period of time. That shift of power and influence is shifting and we’re all getting apart and we and so this is a unique opportunity, don’t squander your opportunity to be a part of something different for your Children, for our future for youth. Um we get one shot. Um and and this is gonna be, this is gonna be shaped the next 500 years of society. And so I want to take, I want to encourage everyone to kind of step up to the plate and and take ownership of your part in what the future’s gonna look like for others.

[00:51:45.46] spk_0:
Perfect, thank you. That’s Alando Williams, Director of justice, Equity, diversity and inclusion at B lab, also Daniel Fox Campaign and Science Network Manager, the union of concerned scientists and the other person around was is raj Aggarwal, president of provoke who asked me to not focus on him too much. So I took him at his word. I assume he was. I assume he was honest when he’s when he made that recommendation, made that made that request, I should say so.

[00:51:50.41] spk_1:
tony what do you think? Don’t you think it was better to focus on Dr Williams and Danielle.

[00:52:03.35] spk_0:
I do, but I’m I’m disappointed that you didn’t expect me to do that anyway. So little faith after the third time on the show and still still thinks I’m an underperformer. Thank

[00:52:10.62] spk_2:
you like I know how to do my job and I didn’t, I didn’t need you, but thank you, thank you. All right,

[00:52:31.55] spk_0:
maybe the fourth time if there is 1/4 for you, I’m not sure I would say anybody wants to be on nonprofit. radio Uh, don’t partner with Raj in 2023 because you’re greatly reducing the likelihood of being of being selected. Uh, Alondra Danielle raj, thank you very much.

[00:52:34.42] spk_1:
tony it was really nice when we received your emails, valuable

[00:52:43.75] spk_0:
conversation, I appreciate it and appreciate you all for being good sports to while I uh, make fun of raj, especially

[00:52:49.43] spk_3:
thank you

[00:54:07.05] spk_0:
and thanks to all of you for being with tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 22. Ntc the 2022 nonprofit technology conference with the hope that we will be together in person in 2023 in denver colorado. Thanks so much for being with us Next week. More from 22. NTCC asking for receiving and giving feedback 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 communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o our creative producer is claire Meyerhoff 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 be with me next week for nonprofit radio Big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great. Mhm mm hmm.

Nonprofit Radio for February 21, 2022: Pay Attention To #22NTC

Amy Sample Ward: Pay Attention To #22NTC

It’s the 2022 Nonprofit Technology Conference and it’s for everyone who uses technology to work for social change. That’s you. It’s a big, virtual gathering of smart, fun people. And me. Our Amy Sample Ward, CEO of NTEN, shares what’s in store.

 

 

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[00:00:10.04] spk_0:
Hello and welcome to

[00:00:27.34] spk_1:
tony-martignetti non profit radio Big nonprofit 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 para keratosis if you rose up and persisted with the idea

[00:00:32.52] spk_2:
that you missed this week’s show.

[00:01:33.34] spk_1:
Pay attention to 22 n. t. c. It’s the 2022 nonprofit technology conference and it’s for everyone who uses technology to work for social change. That’s you. It’s a big virtual gathering of smart fun people and me finally our AMY sample Ward shares what’s in store Antonis take two remembering Michael Davidson and robert Sharpe Jr we’re sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot C. O. It’s always a pleasure to welcome back AMY sample Ward the ceo of N 10 and our technology and social media contributor. Their most recent co authored book is social change anytime everywhere about online multi channel engagement, but that’s about to change. They’re at AMY sample ward dot org and at AMY R. S Ward. Welcome back AMY, so good to talk to you.

[00:01:39.74] spk_3:
Yeah, he and I don’t know if I’m spoiling anything, but I think I might get to share that title of of social media contributor with another guest soon. Hopefully. Right maybe. No,

[00:01:52.94] spk_1:
no, I know that

[00:01:53.68] spk_3:
you want to start over and we’ll edit that

[00:02:35.44] spk_1:
out. It doesn’t work out so well that’s alright. That’s okay. Um, she’s starting her degree and just can’t do long term commitments. Um, you know, I don’t think it’s, it’s, it’s not so bad listeners. We’re talking about Charles King Matthews, who was the outstanding contributor a few weeks ago about um Social Media in Social Media Prospects in 2022. And I hope that she could be a regular contributor, but she’s beginning her degree as you heard us. She and I talked about at Howard University, starting your PhD and it’s too much.

[00:02:36.33] spk_3:
So that’s

[00:02:37.23] spk_1:
fair. Amy remains our technology and, and social media

[00:02:57.24] spk_3:
content. Okay, well, I’ll continue to to bring in other folks and I am happy to share a title with with anyone, but as you alluded to in the intro, after many years of the same intro, you finally get to say a new book title when, when I do come on the show. So I’m excited. I’m excited for that.

[00:03:06.20] spk_1:
Too much. Too much laurel resting previous book, you know, and we’ve only, you know, this is, this is what it’s going to be your third, I believe. Right? Yeah. I

[00:03:16.03] spk_3:
Think there were only a couple of years in between the first and the second. So this, you know, too much laurel resting as to say, I waited too long for book # three.

[00:03:36.64] spk_1:
It’s it’s it’s a little embarrassing. It gets a little embarrassing. It’s like Gene Takagi being the a b a nonprofit lawyer of the year, you know, in 2014, you know, jean, what have you done

[00:03:38.41] spk_3:
lately, Jean has done so much lately. Not

[00:03:43.81] spk_1:
Since 2014 as far as I know it hasn’t even been that early. I’m I’m giving you a hard time. So um yes we will get a chance to talk about your book. It’s about equity, equity and and technology.

[00:03:56.64] spk_3:
Yeah. The text that comes next,

[00:03:59.24] spk_1:
the tech that comes next. That’s the book. That’s the title. Right. Right. And has implications way beyond the nonprofit community.

[00:04:05.84] spk_3:
Right. Yeah. The book talks about policymakers. Um anyone who’s funding technology and social impact work people that want to do that work people in communities that aren’t in any of those roles that want the world to be different. Um And really how all of those groups can work together.

[00:04:26.14] spk_1:
Fantastic. Well we’re gonna have you and the co author on. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. And uh it’s good Universal appeal residuals for life. You can

[00:04:33.36] spk_3:
yes. Yeah. Sign you know, sign it over to a Hollywood movie everywhere you go.

[00:04:39.45] spk_1:
Yes. Yes. You and Nicholas Sparks. Absolutely.

[00:04:45.94] spk_3:
Stephen King. I’m

[00:05:25.94] spk_1:
thinking of Nicholas Sparks because he lives only about 45 minutes or an hour away from where I live in a town called new Bern north Carolina Burn is B. E. R. N. Um so he’s well known in over there. But anyway, yes you’ll join the ranks of movie. That’ll be what a cool movie. That would be all right. We got to talk about 22 N. T. C. This is uh this is this is a long one that, I mean this has been a long span. I’ve been, I’ve been going to NtC’s for since 2014. I know, I know with a skip in 2017. I think you uninvited me in 2017 invite you. Yeah. I think I must have done something in 2016 that embarrassed until 20

[00:05:34.95] spk_3:
17. We were in D. C. Maybe you just didn’t want to come to D. C.

[00:05:40.34] spk_1:
No, I think it was you didn’t invite me.

[00:05:42.54] spk_3:
I’ve never invited you. You always come. I don’t know. I

[00:05:45.57] spk_1:
just show up. You show up like gum on your shoe, right? You always just shows up. Alright. Anyway, I

[00:05:52.29] spk_3:
well know travel this year. It’s virtual again. So you can just find a link and there you are. You know, big. It’s virtual.

[00:06:01.64] spk_1:
Yes. Um let’s remind folks what the dates are first. Let’s start with the basics.

[00:06:11.54] spk_3:
March 23 through 25th. It’s a Wednesday Thursday Friday. And it’s because it’s virtual. So here in pacific time it’s like eight a.m. To about 2 30 in the afternoon. Um So depending on what time zone you might be in. Might, you know, you might be starting around lunchtime instead of breakfast. But

[00:06:31.14] spk_1:
okay. And let’s uh you will be more eloquent about this than I am. As I said in my intro. This is for everybody who uses technology for social change. So let’s allay the fears that it’s the nonprofit technology conference and it’s only for technologists.

[00:08:24.34] spk_3:
Yeah. I mean, I guess I would start by saying it’s 2022 who is not a technologist, right? We’re recording this podcast through the Internet and then people are going to be listening to it through the internet, Right? Um, nonprofit staff, regardless of what job title you have or or what department you’re in or even what your organization’s mission is, you have probably relied on technology the last two years to continue doing your work. Right. And I think that folks take on this idea that, you know, we’re just over here using technology and that means that we’re not technologists, but we’re making decisions about which tools to use. We’re budgeting for what tools to use and the decisions we’re making aren’t just a decision about technology there a decision that’s going to determine who and how our community members maybe participate with us. Right. Like these are questions that have big implications for our mission and our impact. And the entire community is folks of every job title you can imagine because you know, lots of organizations make up ridiculous job titles. Um, you know, every department, every mission area people from all around the world. It’s also not just north America. So I think getting getting rid of this idea that like only certain people get to be technologists. Like we can, we can leave that in the before time, right? And now really say, yeah, I need to make technology decisions and I want to make them intentionally and I want to make them good. Um and and the Ntc is a place for those conversations.

[00:08:35.14] spk_1:
Yes, there are. There are lots and lots of seminars, workshops that are that are for non well the way AMy is describing them

[00:08:38.47] spk_2:
there for their there for technologists included. I was gonna say for non technologists,

[00:08:57.44] spk_3:
but people like technical conversations, we’re not saying how do you know what’s the literal code to make this module work? But they might be saying, hey, what do I do to set up a report in my crm to automatically, you know, come to my team every friday afternoon, right? Like it is still maybe more technical than we would have thought about a decade ago, but we’re not necessarily coding everything. Even if we’re really trying to make technology work for us.

[00:09:17.14] spk_1:
What are the biggest Selling points uh that you want folks to know about? Is it is it the is it the keynote speakers? Is it the 100 50 plus sessions? What what what do you want to tell folks about?

[00:10:34.34] spk_3:
Yes, all those things. Um we have really incredible keynotes. Um Alice wong the creator of disability visibility. Um and she just announced her new book coming out this fall, which we didn’t know about. That’s not why we booked her, but then I was very excited to know. She has another book coming out. Um Angelica ross, many folks may know her from pose, but she created trans tax social and um see jones who I I cannot wait. Um a lot of community members are like, so you’d better bring his really cute dog because if anybody follows him on social, he’s always posting photos with his little cute dog. Um so we’ll see who makes an appearance in the keynote zoom video or whatever. Um but this year because because it is virtual, so we don’t have to worry about physically how many rooms the convention center holds. We just kind of threw out the old uh, rubric for how many sessions we can run and we have over 100 and 80 sessions in three days this year, which is bananas now that we’re trying to figure out how to host that many sessions concurrently, you know,

[00:10:40.38] spk_1:
technologically

[00:13:06.84] spk_3:
Right? We only have 16 staff, so we need, we need other people hosting the rooms. Um but it’s so awesome because that’s just that many more community members sharing experience and expertise that they have. And um you know, if you’re registered for the conference, of course, it’s amazing to participate live and and engage with people, but just like last year we’ll keep all the recordings up. So if you’re registered, you can go back and watch them and there were folks last year, you know, that went and rewatched sessions that they had missed live and there were folks like Up there, you know, had had watched 80 sessions for example. So if you really want to get all the, you know, squeeze the lemon like all the way to the last drop you really can. Um, so that’s an awesome resource. And what else? I think the other piece that’s fun that we really care the most about obviously is the sessions and the learning. But if you’ve ever been to an in person, ntc, we care so much about the community feel and the opportunities to meet other people because even though we know every single person in a nonprofit is using technology and and has a place in the antenna community, we know that, that isn’t really what it’s like in an organization, right? That like you might be the only one in your organization who really cares and wants to think about technology in this way and it can feel isolating regardless of what team you’re on. If you’re the only one who wants to have these conversations, it can feel really hard. Um, and so we want that same feeling of like, oh my gosh, I found my people, you know, even though it’s a virtual conference, so we have lots of non educational session things. Um, during the day, we every morning has, has like a coffee talk session. So people are having great conversations. You don’t have to be one of those people, you can just drink your coffee or eat your lunch and and listen and kind of warm up for the day. But we have community conversations all throughout the day and community members, attendees submit those topics. Um, you know, and there’s ones that are like knitters of NtC all the way over to people who want to talk about product management, you know, so it’s really whatever great way to find and meet new folks. And this year we’re also gonna have some that stretch into the evening so that you can kind of relax and have, you know, do do an evening meet up for, for an hour. Yeah,

[00:13:42.54] spk_1:
it’s time for a break. Turn to communications. Do you want yourself or your non profit to be a thought leader around your work. A thought leader. It takes time to learn that credibility, but turn to, can get you there, get you to where your opinion is sought after, to where people come to you for advice to where you’re a leader for your cause.

[00:13:49.14] spk_2:
Thought leadership.

[00:14:02.04] spk_1:
Turn to communications. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o. It’s time for Tony’s take two, Michael, Davidson and robert Sharpe

[00:14:16.74] spk_2:
JR both died recently. I played a tribute show for Michael because he had been a guest very recently, just in october So that was, that was fitting Michael, you know, such a a smart, humble gentleman,

[00:14:22.74] spk_1:
so knowledgeable about

[00:16:54.54] spk_2:
boards, board efficiency, board functioning, board fundraising, the ceo board dynamic, the staff, board dynamic he had decades of experience in, in all those areas and he was very willing to share that expertise that he had gained over over all those years. Uh, had been on nonprofit radio several times. I had done webinars with him, just always willing to share and, and a real gentleman. So Michael Davidson, robert Sharpe Jr, I just learned A few days ago that he died about 10 days ago. Um, very learned in planned giving. He had the rare gift of working in the weeds but also looking at the big picture, you know, he could be diving deep into a client data set to solve a problem or develop a strategy in the morning and then in the afternoon, do a training on legal strategies and, and forward looking planned giving opportunities based on, you know, current tax law. Ah again, you know that gift of, I guess working in the trees but also seeing the forest and the future of the forest. I hope I didn’t take that metaphor too far. Ah, I’ll always remember co teaching with him some seminars in new york city many years ago and I’ve been grateful to just have his friendship, his advice, you know, through the years. I’ll remember our, our dinners together in new york city that co teaching. Um, and him just being a, a learned gentlemen in gift planning, Michael Davidson and robert Sharpe Jr both, both recently died and always will be remembered.

[00:17:02.24] spk_1:
That is Tony’s take two We’ve got but loads more time for pay attention to 22 NTC with Amy Sample Ward only. But loads

[00:17:18.34] spk_2:
this week. Not boo koo, but loads this week is a short show packed with value but

[00:17:24.04] spk_1:
shorter than usual. What about equity and inclusion? You’re, you’re always, that’s always, it’s a core value of N 10. What are you

[00:17:30.40] spk_2:
doing around the Ntc for that?

[00:18:56.24] spk_3:
Yeah, I mean, the biggest thing to name really is it feels great that we’ve talked about that so centrally in our work for so many years now that we’re really at the place this year where when we were looking at the sessions that came in the session proposals, I think we had 500 some for 180 spots. And you know, years ago there would be like a session and its session name was like diversity equity and inclusion. Like what is it? How could you, you know, um, and now there aren’t any sessions that are assuming equity conversations are like over there, you know, in their own designated equity area. Right? It’s like regardless of what topic you’re presenting, whether it’s fundraising or how to do program delivery online or whatever. So many sessions just in the way they talked about their description or like, you know, the, the outcomes of the, of the session. We’re, what are the equitable implications for this topic. Right. What is it? What are the outcomes that might happen because of X. So it was just so awesome to see the whole community, really understanding equity as the, as the position from which we’re talking versus, oh, Equity is a thing we’ll think about at some point, you know? Um, so it’s all throughout the sessions

[00:19:14.94] spk_1:
now. It’s just, it’s right now, it’s woven in people know that it’s a, it’s a value for N 10, right? Um, you’ve, you’ve been, you’re like, you’re no longer, I don’t know. Is it is it right to say fair to say you no longer need to be conscious about, you know, uh, you include an equity component in your, in your in your in your session proposal. You know, it’s more likely to be well attended, right? I mean, you don’t have to be that

[00:20:24.94] spk_3:
intentionally because yeah, it’s like if you wouldn’t have thought of that, it’s probably not this the conference for you, right? Um, yeah. And there are some sessions that are really explicit, like they are here to talk about equity, but they’re not like, what is it? You know, it’s like, how do you equitably evaluate your impact? It’s probably not all your story to claim, right? Like really interesting conversations like that that I’m looking forward to. Um, but just like we have done in the past, in, in, um, in person conferences. You know, we have racial affinity spaces throughout the day. We have, you know, um, an an accessibility committee that helps you around supporting the conference. Um, and then we’ll have, you know, we have like an accessibility tour and, and places to make sure that whatever place you’re coming from, whatever ways you want to be engaged or or want the conference to adapt to be best for you. We are hopefully already planning for that. And there are ways for you to engage in those ways.

[00:20:37.24] spk_1:
How about some of the fun, the fun parts you mentioned evening sessions or evening meeting? Is there a, is there a replacement for NtC beer? I

[00:22:16.04] spk_3:
think that that I think the Ntc beer folks might be trying to organize um a pre Ntc virtual hangout. Um a really big piece last year that was very popular was we had some music and art sessions and so we’ve expanded those. So we’ve got um, I think five different bands have have signed on and so they’ll be performing a full set and we all get to watch it together and chat. Um we’ve got artists who will have depending on the, you know, there are different types of artists but um we’ll get to see their work and explore what they do and hear from them. Um, so you know, we really wanted to be a place where we’re kind of like feeding different parts of, of your, of yourself, right? So feeding with some knowledge and and new ideas but also, you know sometimes we have great ideas because we looked at a painting and we’re like, oh my mind like opened up that other space that I needed to to have this idea, right? So we really want to incorporate those different pieces and we always have things like meditation walks. Uh, last year we had no idea how walk was gonna go for a virtual conference, but a bunch of people like put zoom on their phone and they went walking in their neighborhood together, you know, even though they were all all over the the globe. So um, where there’s a will, where there’s a will, there’s a way in this community. Yes,

[00:22:40.24] spk_1:
what else? Um, what let’s say? Well let’s let me give my endorsement. Alright, so I wanted amy to talk about it obviously. Uh, so I’ve been bringing non profit radio too, a nonprofit technology conference since 2014 -2017 when I was uninvited seven years. So this is the eighth year that I’ll be capturing a bunch 25 to 30 interviews of, of smart speakers. It’s, it’s my

[00:22:51.24] spk_3:
chore.

[00:23:00.54] spk_1:
I know it’s my unenviable task to go through now. Now 180 sessions to pick out, You know, 50 or 60 to invite so that I get 25-30 folks who can meet, meet, meet at my times and and and want to sit. Um, and of course the virtual conference makes it so much easier because I don’t have to capture 25 or 30 interviews in 2.5 days.

[00:23:19.34] spk_3:
Well the exhibit hall is being torn down around,

[00:24:09.34] spk_1:
that’s right, the lights are going down, the forklift trucks are coming through with their backup back up beepers. non profit radio perseveres. I don’t care. I have something scheduled folks, you’re just gonna have to wait to take down my, well, you can take down my bunting if you want, but you can’t pull my electricity that’s all. Um no, so I’ll be capturing these, these almost, you know, maybe even 30 30 interviews um in the weeks after after the conference. So listeners will be getting a good sample of, of the smart speakers that are gonna be at ntC, but Not as good as having 180 potential videos. Maybe you can break the 80 person record, You know, You Wanna, You Wanna Watch one. Um these are smart people, you know, it’s, it’s a, it’s an engaged smart community so

[00:24:15.04] spk_3:
we’ll have to do some sort of, you know, tracking and announce the top three leaderboard. You know,

[00:24:22.77] spk_1:
we

[00:24:48.74] spk_3:
did, we did, you know the platform that we hold the conference on. Um it has a bunch of stats that you can see back on the admin side and one of them is just hours logged in. I don’t know why you would, whatever, you know, um and we found that a staff person had a tab open and had minimized it and forgotten it was there and so you know, two months later, it was like, oh, this staff person has had, you know, 400 hours and was like, what are they doing? And then they was like, oh, they just never closed the tab, you

[00:25:15.04] spk_1:
know? Well if you, if you start to announce top three, then you know, you’re gonna need a quiz after each session. So I don’t want people just streaming videos, but not watching, I want them, you know, engaged with the content. So we’ll have to have a little quiz every 15 minutes or so,

[00:25:20.66] spk_3:
just like netflix.

[00:25:28.24] spk_1:
Yeah, right. I used to watch Yes, yes, something. Um All right. It’s uh, well, anything else, anything else that’s important that,

[00:26:03.84] spk_3:
I mean, I think, you know, the last thing I want to say is there’s even if you’re just now learning about the conference or just now remembering that the conference is coming up, you haven’t missed anything. You know, you can certainly still register there are sessions who are still looking for somebody who might want to co present with them and share their, you know, whatever expertise you might have. Um, and all those community conversations, We haven’t even opened the form for those yet. So you could also come and you know, put something on the agenda. It is not too late. You are welcome. We want you to be there and especially in a virtual world, like the more of us that are there, the better because then there’s more probability that you’ll find the people that you’re looking for

[00:27:01.24] spk_1:
March 23 24 25 go to n 10 dot org. It’s it’s splashed on the homepage, I’m sure. Right and 10 dot org. Okay, okay, non profit radio will be there, we’re going to be uh we’re gonna be capturing a bunch of interviews after um and so you’ll get a sample that way, but it’s not the same, it’s not the same as first of all, you just want to support the community. I mean I wouldn’t suggest, you know, I’m not suggesting just pay to go to the conference and then don’t show up but you want to be, this is a, this is a community you do want to support. So it’s a conference that’s worth it and in 2023 it’s gonna be back live in in person live, you’re gonna want to be in Denver, You’re gonna want to be in Denver, I will be there in Denver assuming I’m not uninvited like I was in 2017.

[00:27:08.04] spk_3:
I’m gonna have to print an invitation now just so that I avoid these accusations,

[00:27:37.94] spk_1:
I will go to Denver, yes non profit radio will be there in 2023 but you wanna you wanna support this in 2022 it’s just smart, you know, there’s a lot to learn, there’s a ton to learn, that’s why I capture so many of the interviews and I bring them to us here a nonprofit radio because there is so much to learn, but you can learn even more by joining the, you know, by by being in the, in the, in the live sessions and and the great fun the evening’s the affinity

[00:27:39.51] spk_3:
groups.

[00:27:41.64] spk_1:
It’s a good community.

[00:27:42.94] spk_3:
Yeah, it really is and will be better with you there. So whoever you are, I’m I’m looking at you through the interwebs and inviting you personally.

[00:28:04.84] spk_1:
Thank you very much amy and 10.org just to to join the conference. Amy is that AMY sample ward dot org and at AmY R S Ward and probably the next time that they’re on, we’ll be talking about

[00:28:09.74] spk_3:
the new book.

[00:28:36.74] spk_1:
That will be the next time. Yes. All right, good luck in the conference planning. Thank you over the next several weeks. And uh, we will, we will, we will be back soon. Thanks very much. Pleasure next week Founder’s syndrome with Heidi johnson. 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 communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o

[00:28:46.74] spk_2:
our creative producer is

[00:29:06.94] spk_0:
Claire Meyerhoff 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 Be with me next week for nonprofit radio big nonprofit ideas for the other 95%. Go out and be great.