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Hey, I'm Jon.
And I'm Becky.
And this is the We Are For Good podcast.
Nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions and the growing pressure to do more, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world.
We're here to learn with you from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories, all to create an Impact Uprising.
So welcome to the good community. We're nonprofit professionals, philanthropists, world changers and rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
So let's get started. Happy 2023 what's happening?
So glad everybody came back. Happy New Year, everybody.
It feels good to be back. I mean, it's been a crazy week on the podcast. You know, it's January. It's a new year, Scott Harrison kicked it off. We had this amazing episode on Wednesday with Rena. And I'm just like, so much possibilities are before. So you're just feeling that right now.
I'm totally feeling that. And if there is a word that is centering us and 2023 it is about evolution, and embracing evolution. And it's going to start with you.
Yeah, I mean, I feel like okay, if we kind of backtrack to let's talk about when the pandemic came through 2020, right, a lot of things change. And I feel like we went from like, what are we doing to we kind of got through that to build back better kind of in that phase. And we're all trying to figure out what's our new reality. And we started to settle into the new reality. But now is like this moment. I mean, a lot of the corporate world we're seeing is announcing layoffs. And there's like gloom and doom kind of at every corner where you turn. And so I feel like the conversations happening around the table right now are in our DMS are people like wanting to go beyond meeting the moment, but evolving to being this vibrant, mission and impact that is serving people right in the place they're at and knowing what that looks like in today's day and age. And so we just are really excited to pour into a series to hopefully give you a ton of inspiration in that. But also just kind of likes again as a guidepost of how to plug in personally, how to plug in with your nonprofit, and just so much more than that, as well.
And I love that you're talking about innovation and disruption, because it reminds me of our seventh core value, which is disrupt, grow, adapt, repeat. And so this is a space that's going to reject the cynicism the world. And we're going to be all about embracing joy, because we're going to be powering through that this year, because that is the fuel that's going to center our work. We think evolution can be so positive. There's so many opportunities that are ahead of us. I was just visiting with one of our We Are Are For Gooders yesterday, Sonia Perez Lauterbach and we were talking about how do we center our work and joy, because emotions are energy. And we want to change that energy into excitement. We don't want that energy to be about how we're fighting and trying to overcome, it really needs to be centered in how do we acknowledge fear, reject that burden. But get filled up with love and joy. So we can put back into the world the things that we are most passionate about. So you have the two biggest cheerleaders in your life right here in front of you. And we hope this series is going to provide you inspiration, conversation and a playbook to get you through this whole year. Because we want you activated, we want you disrupting, growing, adapting, repeat it, we want it to make it a practice. So let's talk about this Impact Uprising Jon.
I know and I hear if you're new to the podcast, or just finding this community, I hope you know, we show up very imperfectly, like this is a place where we show up authentically, we have conversations and we say we don't know when we don't know, which is quite often. And that is a really safe place here. And so we're going to introduce you to some tools, I hope that you can like lean on in this journey, which is a lot of mindset work and about how you can kind of prepare for this. But we're also going to point you to people that just know their zone of genius where you can lean in and rely on people that have a depth of experience that you can bounce ideas off and you can really go deeper in that. And so first let's talk about some mindset work. Because before we lean into the series, we feel like that's the most important place to start. And so I want to kick it to you B.
Yeah, I was talking with the team the other day and I thought about bringing this to the podcast, but you know, everybody New Year you really start to think about how you're going to approach it in a different way. A lot of people have vision boards, people have their goals and all of that Jon tends to overwhelm me. When I'm thinking about a vision board, I'm like go, Oh my gosh, I have to get the magazines out and start cutting out all of the images because I want to manifest this. But I've just centered on a word for myself the last couple of years. And the word that I picked this year is less. And that may seem really interesting.
I know, when you said less, let me just say there was like an audible gasp among the team like, wow, I mean, you know, because most people, the words are not only just bigger words, but it's kind of the opposite of us, most people lean into. So we really want you to unpack like how you landed on that.
It was really about not it was about doing more with less, and about having less than my life and having specific focus on the things that really light me up, and the people that I really want to invest in nurturing those relationships. And so I'm just really thinking about that through the lens of the community. Because I bet a lot of people just think sometimes our podcast can seem like episode after episode, we've got three dropping a week. And we hear so often, like, I'm sorry, I haven't listened to all of them. And I want to say to you, guess what, I haven't listened to all of them. And it's really about focusing your time focusing your energy and your emotions, on the things that really matter to you that matter to your growth that matter to your balance. And so in 2023, we just like want to scale back. So we can scale up, I want you to be really intentional about what you say yes to and what you go all in and to. And we're going to dive more into this and some of our trends, but it's learning about learning to say no, it's about celebrating the small wins and the 1% shifts and how far we've come. It's about creating intention and your purpose and mapping out how you can make a greater impact. And it's about working smarter, not harder, with things like batching and time blocking. And I want you to just hyper focus on the couple things that you want to accomplish and give yourself rest, give yourself grace, know that it's okay to do less, because it's going to bring harmony and balance. And if you can start there, the rest of these trends are going to be something that you're willing to embrace and go into in 2023.
I love that. And I'm kind of the opposite, like hand me all the magazines and let me cut out the vision board because I'm so like, I love that let's turn into like an art project at the dining room table. But I think that there's something there because I think as we go in this, I think it's so important to be relentless in your vision, and not relentless. Like there's no end in sight, but like not losing hold of that. And we're your case study in real time with we're for good. Our vision has impacted uprising, and we don't toss it around just to like hear yourself say it. But it keeps us centered as a Northstar like It's like our filter with is this pouring in the direction that we want to go. Because as individuals and organizations both I mean, this is the year, when we're going to evolve, we have to be incredibly open minded, we have to be open to innovation, new ways of doing things. But being really relentless in our vision allows us to make sure that that evolution is still going in the direction that we set out to do and that we don't wake up in October and being like, what did I do this year is not aligned with what I want to do in life or in our work. And so you know, we ended 2022 with a 10 part series on the habits of an impactful fundraising series. And I want to point you back to that if you're looking for new habits, because we think habits are honestly better than goals a lot of times because it's like, what's that cadence? What's the repetition that you can add to your life. So you can make sure you're aligned to get to your vision over a longer period of time. And that series breaks down the importance of intention about setting out each day knowing exactly what is going to move the needle. And what is something that you don't need to prioritize, and you can get to it when you get time. But also asking the right bigger questions. And that's something as the start of the year. We talk about that a lot. Because it's easy to get mired in tactics in the nonprofit world, especially, you know, we're going to start talking about what linens are gonna go at the table pretty soon, right? And we got to remember to ask the bigger question of what are we doing here? Why are we trying to get people together in a room? What's the goal of cultivating that event, like asking bigger questions in each of the things we do, and then just taking that consistent aligned action. And that's kind of the fun stuff, you know, it's getting to actually put, take the steps toward not just talking but actually doing, and we hope this series is going to lead you into ways around this. And these are pieces that have kind of come together organically, you know, people will ask us, How did y'all come up with these series? And I'll say, Becky, you can speak to this too. But it's like, a lot of times, we'll just be sitting around, you know, we just crossed 370 episodes, and people that don't even know each other but are doing brilliant work that are actually making a tangible impact will ultimately start saying the same things, even though they don't realize it or even know each other. And that's
Twilight Zone. Yes, it is so cool.
And that's the time when we added to our Google Doc and we're like this is something you know, there's something here that we think could benefit a lot of people if we really socialized it and shared it. And so this list looks a little bit different than maybe some of the trends list you seeing. This doesn't lead to a business sales funnel for Just to use our product, this is what we really think would move the needle. And they're big and they're heavy, but they also have a lot of action behind them. And so, welcome to our new series that 2023 nonprofit trends that we think really matter for this year.
This is so big, I feel like we need a drumroll or something. Because we really do curate these ideas over several months over the past year. And they're totally disruptive. They are unorthodox, thank you for talking about that. But it's what we see is trending not only for survival, but for people who are thriving in organizations that are thriving and evolving. Number one is prioritizing self growth. Hard stop, we put our first trend in prioritizing yourself, can we talk about how antithetical that is to nonprofit as we are living in this martyrdom and we give so much we're telling you this year, today is the time that you need to prioritize growth for yourself, we're going to be talking about mindsets, we're going to talk about getting clear on your personal values, we're going to kind of force you out of your comfort zone a little because you're going to be focusing on your strengths and how to extend them. But a lot of this is going to be focusing on self care. What are you doing to take care of yourself and avoid compassion, fatigue and burnout, we also want you to find your community of belonging and accountability, because that's going to help you grow. And it's going to put you with like minded friends who are rooting for you, and committed to your growth as well. And on the back end of that we think it's wholly important that you take time to map out a professional development plan for yourself. You need goals for yourself, you need to sit down and ask yourself, what is important to me, what do I want to know more about? What would I love to have accomplished at this time this year? We're going to talk about how do you map that out? How do you put intention behind that we have free ways of finding training sometimes are things that are nominal cost. And at the end of the day, we want you to share what you're learning, with your community, with your colleagues, maybe with your boss, because this is how we start to build culture back better is that we share what we learn and we grab arms with other people to help us evolve. So prioritizing self growth is not something that is self aggrandizing, it is something that is going to help you feel healthier, be more balanced, and have more energy to put into the things that matter to you not just in your job, but also in your personal life.
Love it. I love that we started there. And it leads right into Trend number two, which is trust based philanthropy, and leadership. And like just a tone set around this. I know this is kind of a topic that's out there a lot right now. But if you look at the Edelman barometer trust, this report comes out often that shows corporations are more trusted than nonprofits among the general public. It's painful, right? And so there's been a lot of thought around this and a lot of work around this. And we want to be the torch bearers of we're working on ourselves, how do we grow and build trust within our own organizations, because we see the future. And we have people like MacKenzie Scott through yield giving and her recently launched site that's kind of unpacking how she gifts and how she moves in this world. She is setting a new standard of investing and unrestricted support for organizations that she supremely trusts through her research and through some of the monikers of maybe their long term success, or maybe their impact. And so we really want to spend some time looking at understanding what is traced trust based philanthropy really look like? And how can we build organizations that can attract that and invite that and welcome that and know what to do with that, you know, at the same time, and it starts with leadership, that's when we put plans up with leadership, it's a new wave of conversation where there is trust among teams. That's the opposite of micromanagement. But it's truly gathering people around like values with a light vision with clarity, and trust, so you can move so much faster. And so we've already had a lot of conversations around this, and we're going to unpack some of those where we see it. But we really want to focus on how we can grow trust this year across our whole space.
I love that so much. And anytime we can talk about MacKenzie Scott is like a good day for me in the house. So Okay, number three is giving is identity. And what do I mean by that? Like the brands we choose to buy, where support, every purchase decision is centered in our identity, and how we view ourselves and how we want to be perceived are intrinsically tied to that. And so philanthropy is absolutely a part of that equation, as the lines kind of between for profit and nonprofit blur. So what I'm really saying is that your cause is trending right now. And people want to align themselves with it boldly. loudly and proudly, I think Nathan Chapelle and Brian Simmons talked about this beautifully in their new book, The generosity crisis, and they talked about radical connection is imperative. Because people want to be a part of something bigger. We've talked about this a lot as we sort of focus in on, what are millennials, specifically Gen Z? What do they care about, because they're really bringing up this notion that everyone can be a philanthropist Gen Z has specifically identified as holding fast to the cause. And not caring about the institution's Julie gave a beautiful example of this, you know, saying that, you know, she cares deeply about childhood cancer, but she may not necessarily be giving solely to St. Jude, even though she loves that organization, she could be looking for it locally. And we also look at like generation alpha, and I hope you guys are keeping your eye on generation alpha, these are this is everyone who was born 2010. And below generation Alpha was born the same year that the iPad kicked off, Instagram made its debut and the word app, you know, became the word of the year. They care a lot. And if they're technology capable, in a heart, wired hearts are awakened early and with an intentionality. They can be lifelong philanthropists. And I'll tell you how I've seen this play out at my house. My daughter is 12. She is a proud environmentalist. And I remember the day she came to me and said, I do not want to wear a Nike sweatshirt, like I would rather you go buy me a sweatshirt from Earth justice. So people understand that that's what I'm about. Because I want them to ask me about my shirt, because I want to tell them why I'm so passionate about the environment. These little philanthropists and I say little because she is little, but I'm also talking about millennials, Gen Z, I can tell you, I definitely want to wear you know, my shoes, the first shirt, because I want people to know that I am here for supporting women. So now is really the time to pour in. So we really believe that giving is identity. And this is such a moment for nonprofit and social impact organizations, philanthropy and psychology research shows that when we align our identities and values with our behavior, we gain not only that sense of belonging, but we secure our sense of self. And you know what, when you do something good, and it comes back to you, we can all attest to the fact that this fuels us to want to do more. So this is an incredible trend we're watching take hold, and we've got tons of examples of who's leveraging it well, and we want you to pour into it.
And I like that it also points to that. It's no longer about this, like small mission that we're only talking about the donors that give to our organization, it's talking about this activation of people that are everywhere in the ecosystem that they want to identify with your organization. So that leads into trend four, which is marketing is mission, and you hear us if you hang around, or if you follow us on social media, we talk about this a ton because it is becoming more and more prevalent and more and more important that we understand how marketing is part of our mission. So it's no longer just like a facet. So when you're just like this department, it is how you can tangibly manifest your mission inaction, you know, it's about using the words that can help change biases, or it could change people's perspectives. If we kind of lift and change narratives that are out there. That's part of our actual mission. So when marketing plays into that, you're not only living your values really boldly, but you're attracting people, you're also changing the currents that are happening in our culture, or maybe rewriting some of the inequities that are happening systemically, and just talking about those things. And you're gonna hear that come up further as we talk about the trends that we're unpacking today. But viewing the lens of marketing as a mission, gives it a bigger dream, which also means this is not the time to pull back on marketing, with everything talking about recession and layoffs and all these things is, you know, what, what should we do with our marketing, and it's easy in a nonprofit to cut this, but I hope we're making the case that if you're viewing marketing as your mission, and it's critical pipeline to finding and connecting and changing some of the bigger questions that we're trying to solve for, it wouldn't be the first thing that you would cut at all, it'd be something that you would double down on, and it's an opportunity to really separate yourself time. So we're going to unpack this. I can't wait for all the discussions to follow, but just really feel passionate about lifting this topic this year.
Well, no one will be surprised by Trend number five, it is community is core. And we have seen this play out so massively in the We Are For Good community because when you create a safe space of belonging and integrity of like minded humans, people will come and they will be generous, and they'll stay and they bring their friends and they share so openly and the vulnerability and authenticity is so palpable, and we want you to gather your community. This is just a huge And in the marketing space, because if you kind of think back, you realize that you used to be able to buy or pay to garner eyeballs, you know, in paid searches and social ads, but it's getting more and more expensive to do so. And we're watching people sort of pull back on where they're hanging out. Have you noticed this, Jon, like, there are less people on different platforms, and we're watching data on this, people are being really intentional about where they spend their time and who they spend it with. And I think we're all just kind of burned out from the negativity that are in these echo chambers on social media. And we want to be with people who believe and fight for the same things we do. So it's really no longer about if you build it, they will come. It's more about gather the people and build for them. So many businesses are shifting to a mindset of community as business where you gather your people first, then your product gets better, then you build to solve a specific problem. And you know, our core value is community is everything. And it's it's probably the underpinning and the bedrock of the entire we're for good family. And this is such a really strong complement to this way of thinking businesses are doing this so well in seizing this opportunity. And we want nonprofits and social impact organizations to do the same. Because when you find your people and create connection, belonging, activation, everything becomes richer. So, so excited about community as core, and we're going to be diving heavily into this with a lot of great examples and pro tips for you.
Okay, and so we're not meeting you have to like literally set out the folding chairs together your community, because Trin six is about humanizing tech and the digital experience. And there has been some incredible conversations around this in the last year. But raise your hand right now if you're feeling like the digital fatigue. Okay, so just at least Becky hands raised, it's happening. Because I mean, look, we're living in a crazy time of tech, like just chat GPT, the surge of AI. But here's where the threat of optimism and evolution. And these mindsets that we started with are so important, because we have to look at this evolution as this opportunity for us to go much further, much faster, and better than we probably have ever gone before, as we kind of learn how to use it and learn how to harness it for our communities. And so there's also a lot of discussion around just humanizing this entire experience. And we got to give a nod to our friend Tim Lockie that I feel like really led this conversation last year. But it's like leaning into creating a place of belonging in our tech and realizing that we don't necessarily just have to replace tech, the second we don't understand it, or maybe it feels broken. But it's probably looking into inside us like what personal mental blocks that we may have, or belief systems that can be holding us back from leaning into automating aspects of our work that could really unlock a digital experience, that would be so much better for our donors and our supporters. And so there's a lot that we want to share here. But this idea of humanizing, and creating these digital experiences are everything nowadays, and just have how we're going to be able to accomplish the impact that we all want to find in our organizations.
I am all for the humanizing tech and no more digital fatigue. So I really want to encourage everybody before I unpacked trends seven to open your mind, open your heart, because I think this one is going to be a challenge for a lot of people. But man do we see the moment is ripe for it. Trend number seven is it's time to be a change agent. What we mean by this is, it's time for you to step into your voice. How do we use the lens and mindset of being a change agent? And what we mean is, how are you looking beyond the horizon to make decisions today that will ultimately change systems. They will change beliefs, they will change ideas that they'll go from being siloed into a more organic grassroots community led ideals. And so the trick in this is really believing your knowledge and your skills and abilities are relevant to diagnosing and addressing organizational challenges. And then the second part of that is knowing how to take action. So we're going to dive deeply into how do you become a change agent. This goes beyond being a thought leader or just being a leader in your organization we're talking about, you are seeing things within your organization that ultimately affect the way you deliver care. The way you help humanity. The way that you gather and empower people in we need your voice to say what's going on in the world that diminishes that. What's going on that challenges that and makes the work so much harder. We believe that if we can socialize the great ideas that are working, and boldly and bravely step in to your expertise, your knowledge and your power, you can be a good groundbreaking world changing change agent. And if you're here listening to this podcast, we already know you're one of those people your growth mindset already because you have actively chosen to be the change that you want to see in the world. So we're gonna dive heavily this season into courage into how can you be brave? How can you focus on change that outlives you? How can you be a catalyst to inspire those around you to find their voice and their courage. So this one is really exciting. And I cannot wait to unpack the brilliant leaders who are doing this in our sector right now.
And when we show up like that, it invites us, it invites other people into this conversation, that's where trend eight comes about is this idea of locking arms for impact. And here's some truths, we cannot go with this alone to accomplish the impact uprising that we talked about around here on the daily, it's going to look like figuring out how to break down walls, leave our silos and solve for like, the bigger pictures. That means like across the aisle, if you're talking politically, but also like across the street, in our own neighborhoods and our communities, because the impact that we're talking about is a mosaic. And it's going to be so much better when all of us lean in to our zone of genius. And that may look like figuring out your niche that you are incredibly gifted at as a human, but also your organization, what are you incredibly gifted at solving for? What do you have the metrics to show that you're moving the needle on, and then you start locking arms to create a comprehensive mosaic of impact for the community or the injustice that you're trying to solve. And so this means we're leaning in and talking about partnerships, we're talking about innovative ways that people are working together across the traditional borders, that might look like mergers, that might look like collaborations, you know, so we'll explore, you know, try sector solutions, which we talked a little bit on the podcast last season, and just also what's gonna make you become a really great partner, how do you show up and lean into the strengths that you already have in place and double down on those for the year ahead.
I'm all about collaboration and locking arms, locking arms is probably going to be a great theme for us for this year. So you've made it through the trends, we're down to the last one. And Jon, Trend number nine, normalized rest. So I don't know why I had to create like a pause there.
I knew that was intentional.
But, friends, we have got to normalize rest and our work, if I were going to define what I had heard the most, one on one from DMS in our, in our community, in my email inbox through my zoom, it is that individuals who have weathered the pandemic, individuals who have weathered nonprofit for any length of time, are extremely tired, they are unwell. And we want to normalize rest, not only in your work, but in your personal life too. So we want to talk about wellbeing, we want to talk about mental health and self care within your organizations. We see this as something that's not only holding our sector back, but it's burning our people out. And they're leaving the sector to do other things. And they're taking that passion with them, which is such a loss for us. And even worse, some of us and I will say my guilty hand is raised, we're modeling this grind, to our staff members, to our boards, to our volunteers to our families. And we don't want to normalize grind, we want to normalize rest, we must take time for the rest, we have to put it on our calendars, we're going to have to talk about knowing our limits and knowing your routines. We're going to talk about consuming What brings you joy, and saying no and setting boundaries. This is the year I hope all of us normalize rest. And I can tell you that Jon, Julie and I are going to be working on a practice of this ourselves because it's so easy to get caught up and all the busyness and the passion of what we're doing. But if we're not healthy, our organization and our missions cannot be healthy. So normalizing risk is going to be a recurring theme for us for this year.
Okay, so there they are. That's the nine trends. And I gotta say, I'm kind of shocked that we were able to go through them so fast, which if you're thinking that was a long wind, we have so much more to unpack, which is why we're turning this into a series that you can kind of binge with us over the course of the next few Fridays as we unpack each one. But here's some exciting news. So we've put together a live webinar for January 24. If you're listening to this after release, it's going to be available for replay at the same web address. But that site is we are for good.com/ 2023 And we said this at the top but we really mean this. These are ideas that are going to push you and we realize you probably can't do all of these at the same exact moment. We've feel like it's our duty after having so many of these conversations of organizations that are just doing the evolution so much differently and so much better that we want to get this information in your hands as kind of a hope offering is kind of a peace offering, but also just to make you feel excited about the year because we look ahead and we're like, there's so much opportunity. There's so many incredible, good, deeply good people doing good work across the sector, and across all the different sectors that we want to be part of that conversation. So come to that live webinar, you're going to leave with actionable counsel some pro tips that you can implement right away some people to follow to go deeper, some episodes to binge if you want to, like carve out some nuggets around that. But that went live webinar on January 24, weareforgood.com/2023, go register. And you'll get a copy of it right in your inbox too.
The other thing is come join our community we're at weareforgoodcommunity.com This is our community of belonging. We get unstuck. We take the podcast episodes further and deeper. And we share resources and camaraderie there we would love to see you there. And if you're someone who is really focused on self growth this year, come into pro We Are For Good PRO is our classroom. And we're gonna be doing ongoing learning and activation on these trends on so many other topics. Throughout the year. It is a thriving community, people who are in it are deeply passionate, we want you there and it's completely affordable. Come find it at WeAreForGoodPro.com.
And I say we're not great about self promotion around here. But we just got an email this last week that made me pause and be like, This is why we show up. If you're considering Pro I mean, we got an email from someone in our pro community that not only did she reach her year end fundraising goals, but she felt seen and she felt supported. And that's honestly the reason why we created this that we wanted to have a place where you felt like you had support around you and community. And that's what's available through pro so we'd love to invite you to tank with Becky, myself and the incredible people gathered there this year. We'd love to have you inside.
Okay, we are jazzed for a new year, we are ready for the evolution that is going to take place and we are entirely committed to giving you the case studies, the connections, the community and the activation to make it happen. We hope we've hyped you up today. You guys, you've got this. We know your budgets and all of your goals started over on January 1. But we think you can make a mighty imprint into it. And it starts with work with yourself. So thank you for being here and let's pour into more good this year.
Thanks for being here friends.
Hey, friends. Thanks so much for being here. Did you know we create a landing page for each podcast episode with helpful links, freebies and even shareable graphics? Be sure to check it out at the link in this episode's description. You probably hear it in our voices but we love connecting you with the most innovative people to help you achieve more for your mission than ever before. We'd love for you to join our good community. It's free. And you can think of it as the after party to each podcast episode. You can sign up today at we are for good.com backslash Hello. One more thing If you loved what you heard today, would you mind leaving us a podcast rating and review? It means the world to us and your support helps more people find our community. Thanks friends. I'm our producer Julie Confer and our theme song is Sunray by Remy Borsboom.
