Donor Engagement Kindergarten Style: Play Nice in the Sandbox - Jonathan McCoy, CFRE and Becky Endicott, CFRE

9:55PM Oct 26, 2021

Speakers:

Julie Confer

Becky Endicott

Jonathan McCoy

Keywords:

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Hey, I'm John.

And I'm Becky.

And this is the we are for good podcast.

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So let's get started. Happy Friday, Becky,

Happy Friday, everybody. I'm so glad you're here.

Yeah. So you came back to kindergarten class. Thanks for coming back.

Every time we talk about kindergarten, I feel like I need to bring graham crackers and a cup of apple juice or something.

Back circulating that. So hi, welcome back. We're in a multi week series where we're taking it back in the garden style if you hang around us, I'm sorry, not sorry. We like to perpetuate the idea that really, the fundamentals have really solid donor engagement, the way to raise the most money is really getting back to just basics. And these are things that even kindergarteners get right. So we're showing you the lens through this conversation, I hope that this really connects with you. And today

we are talking about how to play nicely in the sandbox. And again, might seem a little Elementary, a little rudimentary. But we have seen this play out very interestingly in our careers and nonprofit, and I'm guessing you have to. And at the end of the day, development is a team sport, internal relationships are vital to your success. But external relationships are also just as important. And they can create an expansive ripple. And so we're going to riff on that today through the lens of playing nicely in the sandbox.

And so you know, these conversations, we're giving you some principles, but then we're also going to share some case studies because, you know, we get to have all these amazing conversations on the podcast, but also offline of what's really working and how this is applied. So we want to share that today. And we're gonna round it out with some pro tips. These are the things that we really hang our hat on, in terms of just ways you can take action today to start implementing.

So the first one we want to start with is, what are the keys to foster really robust and healthy partnerships. They are clear communication, shared expectation, and shared goals among the team. So the thing that we love about this so much is that the the weight of the process of the KPIs of the goal, whatever it is, when it's shared by a group, it kind of takes some of the pressure off, and you're kind of pouring into this together, and it feels better. And I want you to look at it not like a group project, where one person is doing all the work, we're talking about pouring to this equally. And you have to have communication the entire time. Who's running point? What are what are the steps and the seeds that have been planted? Where are we now who needs to pivot? First, having that clear communication and shared expectation is really going to set the tone for this partnership?

Yeah, and every I feel like in a lot of conversations, we always lead in with like, what are your goals, because when you get lined up on that, it's just it's a lot easier to play well together, because you realize you're pulling toward a shared mission. And so the second principle, I'd really lift takes that to an even deeper level, really establishing and rallying around the values that you're that are true for your organization or your team, and establishing some norms for teams. And so we've been part of some really dynamic teams over the years. And I do think when you can get really clear and an alignment of the deeper reason that you're all here. And if that connects to your organization values, like it's, it's truly transformational, because I think when it doesn't work, it can feel really cheesy. And so I'm sure some of you are listening or like rolling your eyes, because it seems like so I don't know, basic to say that. But when they're aligned when you actually have a team that is together, pulled together in values, and I think threading together are multiple conversations over the last few weeks. This is a movement right now that's happening in the industry, people are looking for purpose, people are pushing into areas that are more aligned with their values. This is the time to make it about values if it's not, and getting really clear on that, because it's going to connect people more deeply to what you're doing, and allows you to kind of shake off the small stuff, if you're bought in on the bigger things together.

That was a really good tip. So number three is also seems kind of basic. But man, this is something that can really help build culture and camaraderie, celebrate your wins together. And what we mean by this is, we are in such the grind of nonprofit there are so many tasks that are on our plates every single day. And sometimes it's hard to just create a pause, create space and say, oh my gosh, we accomplished this one thing at the end of a campaign and I don't mean like a massive capital campaign I'm talking about if you just had a really successful digital campaign, don't just report out the numbers talk about everybody's role in that from the data. You know, the person who extracted data from the person who was writing the copy to the person who was, you know, writing the receipts or sending out receipts for all these gifts, you can see that there's a lot of hands that go into the work that we do. We need to create pause to celebrate wins together. I just like a quick little story here about something that we used to have. In our office, we used to have these ridiculous green cowbells. Do you remember these? Julie?

Yes, available on Amazon? To search for your favorite color and cowbell?

Yeah. And so we would all be in our offices where you know, our offices were kind of in an L shape as they go down the hallway. But anytime anyone heard the cowbell go off, it was like every single person, no matter what they were doing, would come out of their office, we would all kind of peek our heads out. And then someone would announce something really extraordinary that happened, whether it was our gift processor, who had just gotten an amazing gift, whether it was a gift officer that close something. So that's just an example of something really small. It was I mean, I some people would call that dumb and innocuous. But I actually think that any way that you can find a way to pull the team together to get centered in your why and to make every person feel like they're an integral part of that celebration is going to be a win.

Yeah. Okay, the last principle, I think this is so important, we've got to remove the ego. And you know, if you think about partnerships of how they work, when people come to the table, just really subscribe to the bigger reasons that you're there, and you're not so obsessed with protecting or preserving your ego. Like, that's when really dynamic conversations are going to happen. And your team feels that you know, and I think it can be crippling to nonprofits, when it's about the leadership of the organization, it's got to be about the clear why. And so we talk about this to through the lens of not being so focused on tactics, but really being focused on the bigger picture. That's why we don't get really set that you have to have a certain event look a certain way every year because your mission is accomplishing what your mission is, your mission is not just to produce events, you know. And so getting clear on those removing the ego, removing that kind of traditional layer of, well, I get the most cloud because I've been here the longest, that's just got to go away. And it's going to create this place where people want to pour into and know that their ideas matter.

I love that. And I also think that people probably are thinking, well, we're remote right now, or we're in a hybrid approach. And it's hard to get everybody together, hey, these things can be accomplished digitally. We do this as a company all the time, there are ways that we can still connect. And it's a time for you to kind of just give a shout out. That's one simple thing, you know, to have to someone on your team about something that they did that helped you move the needle on something. So play well in the sandbox, ask for partnerships and know that it's going to create so much good within your office, it's going to have a trickle effect. So I want to break down some of the benefits of this. And play nicely in the sandbox really is great for efficiency. Everybody knows, who knows me knows I love efficiency, I like things to move quickly. I do not like slow play. Clearly, when you listen to this podcast, I don't even take a breath. from one sentence to the next. Julie knows that because she edits my talks. But this is really something that's going to help you move more quickly and be more efficient.

And we're going to share some disruptive ideas today. But not doing this is blocking your ability to make the biggest impact possible. Why staying in your lane completely staying in the silos that we've built, we're blocking our ability to have a bigger social impact I mission,

I agree with you. And I also think in the vein of efficiency, it's really about working smarter, not harder. And if you can find ways to scale what you do, in a way that can help you move more quickly, it's going to give you space and time to do what we always talk about, which is try stuff, dream, innovate. And I just think that is a great hallmark of sharing the workload.

Yeah. So if you're really subscribed to this, and you believe what we've already laid out that developments a team sport that everyone matters, then you have to be bought in that everyone gets to be part of the celebration. It's easy in development to focus on the gift officer when they get the gift. But we all know there's so many people that play into that. And you're leaving a ton of cultivation opportunity with your team with the people that are running the mission aspect of your organization if you're not pulling everybody together and celebrating the wins of your organization.

This reminds me so much of this conversation that we had with Mark Lanham, Episode 101. A couple seasons back mark is the Senior Director of donor relations at Brown University. And of course, our donor relations friends would have a unique lens on partnerships and something that he said really resonated with us and it was if we can't get our internal relationships, right, we are going to have a problem with our external relationships. And I think no one knows that better than our donor relations teams because they're trying to manage all the pieces from ops from frontline frontline fundraisers. And he's right. If we can start working on the harmonious relationships and the integrations that exist in our organizations, then only good things can come from the richness of the relationships that flow out from that.

It's so good. We love our donor relations friends. So let's transition out of principles into some case studies. Because like I said, we've gotten, we get to see so many people doing this really well. And we want to lift and point a light on them. And one conversation that happened a couple of seasons ago, was with Kyson bunda Wong, he is with philanthropy together. And their focus is on giving circles. And you know, if you don't if you're not familiar with giving circles to me, it is truly like the most beautiful picture of people playing well together in the sandbox. It's the idea of gathering people of like values like minded that want to make an impact, and realizing that their personal philanthropy may not make as big of an impact as what it could if we pull together. So how does this apply as organizations is that we need to be looking for these groups? I mean, how can you resist a group of like minded people with shared values that want to make a collective impact? We should absolutely be pressing in and partnering, and just supporting those efforts. So find those in your community. And it's truly revolutionary that this movements happening. Yeah, and

you could go back to caissons episode and dive deeper into that it's episode 107. I think the other one that I want to bring up that I just geeked out over was that St. Jude's play live. And this was such a unique take, I thought on fundraising, but everybody knows St. Jude, everybody knows the incredible mission that they have they they have such brand equity, just as a major brand, and that the stories are so compelling. And they understand that kids in the hospital play a lot of video games, because they're laying in their beds, they're getting treatments. So they paired up with these gamers and content creators for July 8, which was like video gameplay day. And they put these gamers and content creators together with their kids. They paired it with fundraising. So everybody who was playing online at this time was playing, they were talking about St. Jude's mission and they were fundraising one day more than $4 million. That's an incredible external partnership right there.

That's so cool. And I also think of Tanisha Nash Laird, She is the CEO of the Newark Symphony Hall. She was episode 133. But what she's doing really revolutionary in this idea of playing well in the Sandbox is she, you know, was faced with launching a capital campaign, the building really needed a lot of renovations and work. But she didn't approach it like a normal campaign. She thought, how can I get there all the people together, because our community needs a vibrant center, our people in our community need employment. And so putting together a plan that truly involves people from an employment perspective to build the facility or to renovate the facility into you also activate that same community with fundraising and partnerships and businesses coming together. Like this is the ultimate Sam Oh, my gosh, what she did was unbelievable. And it's like even government to like, there's just so many layers, and it's like, she went in with an open hand because she knew the vision of what she wanted, but she was not married to who would come to the table to make it happen. And she is rocking it go follow

Tanisha. Okay, so the next case study is feeding Tampa Bay. And this was one of our first episodes, when we first launched it was episode 14. And we were having this conversation with them. They were in the middle of the pandemic, they were probably six months and, and they realized something about their mission delivery there. They're basically the Regional Food Bank of Tampa. And they were trying to meet the needs during a pandemic when things were locked down. And they ended up seeing some synergy with a fellow nonprofit in their community called Trinity cafe. And feeding Tampa Bay said hey, we can bring the food if you can bring the space and all of a sudden the two organizations ended up merging. And I love so much that their CEO Thomas Mann's had this great quote, and he said, you could come to any one of our locations, get a healthy nutritious meal with dignity. And then you might be able to access a mobile pantry on a bi weekly, monthly basis to get food to take home. Or you can like use the Wi Fi at Trinity cafe. That was such a smart talk about taking ego out of it, marriage of nonprofit missions, and they are doing so much more than they ever could have done if they were separate. And

can we just riff and say why is there not more conversation of mergers happening? Why why you know, how often do we talk we don't think enough like a business in the nonprofit world. Because this happens in the business world all the time. You know, it's like we have a shared vision. We have a shared value at any level. Let's see if we could work together more strongly. So I would love to challenge the industry. I think,

too, and I love this concept of if you can be agnostic about how you're going to get there, if you can both come in, again, check your ego at the door and say, here's what we have to bring, what do you have to bring, and you're literally taking the best parts of your mission. Like, I just have ridiculous optimism that it can be something bigger than we ever dreamed.

Okay, the other one that comes to mind was Alfonsina. She's the leader of rising above the storms, just an incredible organization that kind of was born out of, you know, the Rwandan genocide and the communities there that were just left with so much under privilege and opportunity. And so she created these really unique partnerships, you know, she was an employee of Cisco, and Cisco really stepped up to the plate. And the way that she thought about partnerships was different. And I think this is something we can all learn from, is that it's not transactional, you know, you could have gone to Cisco for maybe a gift, or a one time gift or an event sponsorship. But she looked at it as how could you know, they provide access to technology or to the employees, even board members came out of this relationship with Cisco. And that, to me is, is playing well in the sandbox, because you're not just looking one dimensionally at relationships, you're looking at all the different ways that you can kind of go further.

And I got to give Cisco a shout out for that, because they heard her story. And they put her on the stage at a shareholder meeting and said, Tell us the story about you saving your siblings in Rwanda, both of her parents were killed, she was charged with taking care and raising the siblings. It's an incredible episode, Episode 81, if you want to go listen to it, but Cisco gave her that platform to share. And from that she got so many more employees that ended up pouring into her mission. And I love that Cisco didn't just say, here are the charities we support as an organization. They said, if this means something to you go latch on and we support you. Wait, give Cisco. Okay, the last one that we're going to talk about is I just thought was such a unique partnership at Southern smoke. And if you didn't listen this episode, it's episode number 48. These are a group of people who worked in the restaurant industry, they saw a gap. And it started with helping someone who had MS who is a really important chef. down in Houston, they ended up partnering with food festivals, restaurants, influencers, like the Emerald CAHSEE Foundation. And these were people who literally just stepped up, filled a need. And I loved when we sat down and talked with them about how they were providing this nonprofit support to people who work in the restaurant industry during COVID. It was such a unique story. But right after they were on the episode, some famous restaurant tour, who was playing Who Wants to Be a Millionaire won the million dollar prize and gave it to southern smoke because they he was so inspired by their work to support dishwashers, and servers and sous chefs. And this is the kind of influence you can have when you pair your partnerships with someone beat on yourself.

Okay, have we convinced you that you need to play well, here's the thing, I feel like there's a moment happening, you know, and we see this in a lot of different things in the industry right now, as a result of the pandemic, and all of us kind of shifting values. But I hope that this conversation is resonating and connecting, because we see it as a moment when everyone's just really subscribed to bigger ideas right now. And it's past the, you know, the self preservation of a mission just for the sake of the mission. We're trying to really do big things. We're trying to move together as an industry and solve the things that our organizations exist to solve. And we just honestly think that time is now. And so as we move into some pro tips around that this conversation, these are the things that I think can really bring us together. And again, like I think what we're saying here is the time is not to do this. And the first is share what's working. So look around what is working in your organization. It's incumbent on you to share that with other people. And the podcast here, we hope is a lighthouse for that, that we're you know, sending out signals of things that are working in other organizations, but you to just stand up wherever you're at if you see something that's working, it's so powerful to share. And I think Stan together Foundation has done this really well. Evan Feinberg was on the podcast a few weeks ago, they're almost like an incubator of sorts to like, find the organizations that are doing something incredibly well making an impact and then putting gasoline on it and really trying to light it on fire to take it to the next level. Well, we only can do that if we know it's working you know. So it's, it's on you to share what's really working in that you think could really change the world for what you've seen and let's, let's put it on a bigger platform. And I

would almost add a word on the end of that which is share what's working now. I just think the world is different it post pandemic and we need to know what is working for organism nations now so we can scale up and meet this moment. Okay, so the next pro tip is prioritize well being and caring for each other first. So if your people are healthy, if they feel like they, you care about them as an organization, as a boss, as a human being as a co worker, if they think they you care about their mental health, about their safety and security, everything that flows from that is going to be much more harmonious in the office, it's going to bring greater collaboration. And it's going to just create a healthy work environment, whether you're virtual or whether you're actually in the office. So prioritize that well being and love each other. Well,

yes. Okay. I think this points to figure out the things that really matter, and try to become a lot more flexible with the stuff that doesn't. If the pandemics taught us something, it's like, everybody has different needs, they have different personal values, they have different family situations. And if we try to step into a more, creating a more equitable workplace and trying to create a place that people want to pour their time, like, we have to lean into flexible options, just because you work really well, sitting at a desk, we're actually laughing about this today, I can work until four in the morning sitting at my desk, like I like sitting in my office chair, on the cold metal desk, I don't know why it's all the lights about me. And even with the lights on, Becky tells me she sits by the fireplace under a blanket with her laptop actually seems more human. So I know what that means. But you know, I wouldn't want somebody to force me to go sit on the couch to work because to me, it's more uncomfortable. But that's just a dumb example of like, does it matter? Like if you're doing the work and you're able to get it done, we need to be flexible with how that's delivered, that allows us to play better and strengthen each other.

I love that you brought that up as an example. That's hilarious and actually very accurate. Okay, we've already kind of rift on this a little bit, but I got to keep going with it, which the next one is celebrate together, you need to find ways to celebrate as a team. And I don't mean just celebrate the wins of the organization. I mean, we need to celebrate each other. If somebody has a birthday, that is such an easy way to like pull the team together and just have some food. I'm Italian, it's like all good things happen around the table. And when you're eating, you know, celebrate big team wins. If you have a new integration that comes online, we've talked to a couple people who are getting on a new CRM s right now, celebrate when that actually launches when your website launches. If somebody has a baby, celebrate that. This is like an incredible way that you guys can just foster not only the professional relationship that you have, but the personal relationship too. And I know there are schools of thought about how those lines should not be crossed. But we're in the human business folks. And if we don't get to know each other as human beings, the people that we work with, we can't just know our donors. Well, we've got to know our staff, and our friends and our colleagues well, so find time to get together, break some bread or some pasta together and celebrate anything that comes up. It's going to foster great team camaraderie,

you know, something I've seen that also fosters team camaraderie is this idea of getting on one internal communication platform. And that can look like Slack that can look like WhatsApp which truly truth be told, we didn't really know what WhatsApp was before the podcast started. Or actually, before we worked with this organization, water for, they have this really progressive way of using a centralized communication tool. You know, they're a global organization. So they have people in Africa that are running the businesses of delivering water to communities. They've got people here that are fundraising and working at a front desk. And to get everybody on one platform sharing stories to Becky's point, celebrating small things. It builds this global community that's instantaneous. And what we saw this really play out is, you know, waterforce, able to use WhatsApp, real time all day long. And it's built this really cool, powerful global community for them, but also gets donors into the story. And so how that looks is somebody on the front line, delivering water could send a picture of something that's happening that day, or a new well being installed, send that video out. And instantly everybody in the organization gets to be part of that story. This can be applied at higher ed, why aren't we taking pictures of a cool scholarship luncheon that's happening and sending that out to the entire team, because maybe the front desk person could have a really powerful conversation with someone walking through the door. And just point back to that thing that they just saw come through on their communication tool. Same with the frontline development officer. There's just so much power in being in the loop. And that's what this is about. It's about allowing people to feel part of the team and seen and it's so easy to do that by just getting on I guess what's up.

I think if we really break this down to its most basic form, it's about core value number one, showing that everyone matters into communicating all the time. And I think our last little pro tip jives with that very well and it's publicize and publicly celebrate your successes with your Team. And what do I mean by that if you are really playing into the global community, social media is just rife for wanting to celebrate along with you. I can think of times where we would get like those little tiny handheld confetti cannons, every time we would get a major gift for our campaign, and everybody in the office would shoot one off, and we would do a boomerang, that is such an easy thing to throw up on social and say, oh my gosh, we just got an amazing gift for our campaign. You don't even have to say who the donor is. But say we are so thrilled. This is one of those moments why we are so glad to be in this mission. And we appreciate you all. Put that out on your social channel. If you send out an email celebrating somebody on your team forward that to your board, a pull them into the celebration, not only is it going to elevate your team member and make them feel special, but it truly is showing that it takes a team dynamic to be able to execute our mission. So just

like imagine what can happen in this sandbox, the size of our missions, where we invite all the kids. There's no pretense there's no nobody's welcome. We're not going in with ego.

No one's kicking sand in anybody's faces and trying to take the little fun or can we go?

Yes, imagine what is possible. And especially if you juxtapose that next to the opposite of that of working in silos. It sounds like a boring playground honestly does. But it's like this is an opportunity. The world is our sandbox. Let's get together and make some incredible things happen.

We believe in you and when you know you can do it.

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 Boris boom