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, where Nonprofit Professionals, philanthropist, world changers and rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
So let's get started. Becky, our friend is back. I
am sitting here thinking in my head, I feel so lucky that we in this community get to sit in the orbit of Lindsay fuller for the next 45 minutes, because from the first 30 seconds that I met this human on Zoom, I felt transported into a different headspace a different mental space, a different emotional space, the energy that she puts into the world into people into healing systems is one of the most beautiful things. And of course, we had to bring her back. She is an alum of the podcast. And I really encourage you to go check out her first episode, which is episode 409, the path to healing both systems and people. But we got to dive into who Lindsey is because we have these two trends that were part of the the 2024 trends series, we're talking about how the sector needs hold leaders. And we're also talking about retention as an inside job. And then when Lindsey came to our sort of unpacking of our trends this year, she kept dropping into the chat these wisdom bombs. And it was like things like healthy people heal systems and healthy systems heal people. And the what she's doing over at the teaching well, and the incredible team that's over there, we just want to dive into that share this incredible knowledge. And we want to get you on the path to feeling whole and feeling like your team can be whole. So here's just a little bit of background about the incredible Lindsay Fuller, She's the Executive Director of the teaching well, which is a nonprofit, wellness collective of educators, school district leaders and healers, aka the angels that walk among us. And they really support schools and other professional ecosystems through this transformational evolution by fostering adult wellness. Yes, did you know as an adult, you should be harnessing and diving into your wellness. And they're doing it at personal, interpersonal and systemic levels. So they've spent like the last three years, Jon, converting the school healing program, to tailor this curriculum to service nonprofits. And they're bringing some mega impact to healing up our sector, especially around building healthy cultures, staff retention, and human centered leadership. So she's here to dive into all of that with us today. Lindsey, my friend, my hero, welcome back. We're so glad you're here. Can you tell?
I'm so glad to be here. This is like it's like old friends coming back. Yeah, it's really it's so good. And it's so exciting to see the ways that your work is evolving, and also the ways that ours are, because truly the nonprofit sector, I'm coming right out of swinging, but the nonprofit sector is just as sick as schools. It's not broken. And I think that's something we've heard a lot is that schools are broken, this education system is broken. And it's actually doing exactly what it was intended to do by design, which was really take care of individuals of privilege and those who are in power and to maintain the status quo. And I get curious about nonprofits, because I'm like, we're here, we're ready to be change agents, all of us have these incredible missions and visions, really dedicated staff. And yet we're again perpetuating kind of these harms against one another, and are anchored under systems that aren't serving us. So I get excited to think about how do we heal it both?
Yeah, I hope people understand that is you're listening to this episode, like we're creating a space to heal, we're creating a space to talk about really hard things, and we're talking about how to navigate it in a way that's healthy for everybody across the board. So I want to start just kind of at the beginning with you. And you know, again, I want to point people back to that episode 409. For Lindsay's full stories, but for listeners who are new, like share a little bit about the work that you're doing right now over at the teaching Well,
yes. So we are really building adult cultures we don't need to heal from and so whether that be in schools and districts at the individual level with educators or with nonprofit or corporate staff, even unwellness is universal. So wellness should be to stress is universal. So wellness shouldn't be too. And we are really trying to repattern the ways that people work together. A lot of the issues we're seeing in schools are adult issues. Yeah. It's how we collaborate. It's how we communicate. It's building policies that work for us, not again stasis. And so at the teaching while we're doing a lot of systems redesign work, but specifically, we're doing personal and professional development for people and their teams. And that's all in service of kids getting what they need. But we're excited we we like to get into what we call no no mud, no lotus, we do the shadow work of really what are the things getting in the way of wellness and sustainability, and building retention focused initiatives so that educators and nonprofit staff can say yes to returning to their important work year over year.
I mean, the work and the timing is just so poignant. And I will get a point our listeners back today, because if we're going to push this episode that Lindsay's already came on, if you want to hear how, what it looks like to not just talk about your values, but to live them out, through the messy elements through what it looks like, in real terms, like, I feel like you really inspired us. And we knew we wanted to come back to you to get your wisdom in this topic at a deeper level. So let's start with the nonprofit stabilization program. I mean, your team spent these years really converting your school healing program work into specifically the nonprofit space that a lot of us listening today know really well. So talk to us about, you know, what inspired that, what's the impact? And what does that process really look like that we could take pieces from?
It was really interesting, because we started to partner organically with a couple of nonprofits and realized really quickly that our curriculum didn't need to be augmented that significantly, that in fact, folks in the nonprofit space need stress resilience, that they too, are coming with employment trauma, and would really benefit from processing that and healing both vicarious and direct traumas, we also know that communication across difference is really, really impacted. And so we have been working with several nonprofits, we're now just starting our third year with them. Because again, our stabilization program is a three to five year commitment to really say, Let's do everything from a landscape analysis of the systems of policies and practices that are in your organization, everything from hiring to supervision, let's think about our communication styles and our conflict orientations and how that's playing out in the ways that we're able to enact our most important work. And what does it mean to have an individual wellness coach that is lifting up trends to the organizational leader, that's like yo, your team, not sure if you're on track here, because folks are burning out. And we need to radically disrupt and shift some of those. And so I think the inspiration for this branch of our work was really that we know it takes a village to support a child. And the same is true if we take a macro lens about what schools and districts need to thrive, right, the whole community needs to wrap around them. When we remove ego, which is hard, hello, and realize that we aren't to the magic bullet. We're not here to save anybody, that there can be more than one solution. And that multiple organizations can work in tandem to wrap around educators. That's where the magic lies. So we're here to link up and stand shoulder to shoulder most of our programs are in educational, adjacent nonprofits, or philanthropic partners at this point where we're like if we can get them well. And there's a whole fleet of us wellness warriors wrapping around this school. This is how we're actually going to enact systemic change. I'm
so dang proud of you. And I'm sitting here thinking, what you just said, seems so basic, it seems like we already know that. And it's making me just question, What the heck are we doing with our lives? Why are we putting ourselves in this spin cycle that we feel completely helpless to get out of, and I want to thank you for hitting, you know, I don't know if it's the stop button or the panic button and saying we're not going to live in work like this anymore. Because we as human beings are falling apart. And I can tell you, we had a mental health survey that we socialized in our community back in October. And I was prepared, I was somewhat prepared for the results. But I was ill prepared for the stories that came with it. And when you ask those questions, and you get into the human to human, you start to peel back an onion that is really disgusting. Inside. And so thank you for talking through these frameworks. And I think one of the things that I really loved about the first time we met which by the way, hit Jon, do you I don't know if I ever told you this, but the first time I met Lindsay, like in the first 30 seconds she was like Can I just like offer up a shared space of a moment to get us centered in this work into put healing and a mantra in this and I was like, huh oh my gosh,
I remember you like I met them. Oh, we totally did. Human today. Yeah. Yeah,
and my body settled, my mind was at ease. And in that is to me how your work is walking each of us through one to one. And I think there's something to that. And I think this notion that you have of humor, human centered leadership is so fascinating. So there is this element to this conversation where we're doing the internal work toward whole leadership and wellness. But there's also this responsibility from our leaders and our organizations to create spaces and cultures that allow employees to show up in a way that feels comfortable for them it to be their true selves, talk to us about human centered approach to leadership and like what nonprofits can take away from that.
Yeah, absolutely. And I want to name just for a moment teacher speak, right, we differentiate, that's the word if you're a parent, if you're an educator, if you're just out in the streets, you've probably heard the word differentiation, we know that not every kid needs the same thing to learn. And so why haven't we adjusted yet to recognize that not every adult needs the same thing to heal. And when we do somatic work at the mind, the body and the spirit when we say we are human centered leaders, and that we're going to build systems, again, that work for us work with us. We're saying, we recognize the unique gifts, we want to amplify them. We recognize that we're human beings, not human doings, right that the capitalistic, you know, energies that push us towards just producing more and more overriding our stress and fatigue cues. That's not in service of us enacting our mission, it actually slows progress, it pulls us further and further away from the desired impact. And so some of the ways that we think about human centered leadership is really, how do we honor the humanity and tend to some of the more challenging dynamics in socio emotional learning, it's often referred to as the soft skills, which I find really ironic, because they're the hardest skills, self management, responsible decision making, right? Social awareness, those things, especially if you're coming out of a setting where that hasn't been cultivated. And you haven't practiced having difficult conversations around race, or across difference, it's going to be really difficult for you to collaborate on, you know, your project plan. So we have really started building some audits within our organization, and then with other nonprofits, and I really want to encourage folks, it feels like you don't have time. Right? You don't get here. Yeah, I don't have time to do an audit, Lindsay, like, I don't want to pay for an additional service start small. We built a pro black audit, we were looking at five different measures. And we were really asking ourselves, if we believe in equity, then those who are typically on the margins should be at the center in our organization. We did everything from analyzing the margins around pay equity within our organization, to looking at non traditional policy accommodations that we knew would honor black folks like a kinship preference in our bereavement policy. What does that mean? It means that typical bereavement and grief which we know is nonlinear, right, it doesn't happen, you're not over it one day. But often those policies don't speak to the family structures that are reflected in black culture. So we rewrote our bereavement policy to include folks like godparents, right to include aunties and cousins. So that you don't have to justify that you need to go and tend to a grief incident in your family system. When we have these communal kind of collectivist approaches to parenting in the black community. We call it kinship. Right. And so, that's a small modification, we also removed the requirement to produce documentation. Do you know how many grief and bereavement policies require you to produce an obituary to justify taking time off?
Are you serious? No, I did not know. Almost
every schooling system that we work with nonprofits. I know this is a very specific conversation, but it is these small policies actually have huge impacts. And so we remove that have dehumanizing that you need to produce proof that that's where you went. That is an example of human centered leadership to say, I'm so sorry, you've gone through this transition. You deserve the space, we will make the space and you do not need to prove to us and justify your healing process. And that inside work trickles out to the outside when we're able to better humanize our clients who go through grief incidences.
Gosh, I mean, heart pain, you know, hearing that and it seems so I think Becky lifted this earlier, just like it seems so obvious when you state it like that. But we all know how these structures work that it's not centering humanity. It's censoring. And how do we get whatever In result, you know, at what cost, whatever cost comes from that. So I'm loving the practical of these policies. Do you have other human centered policies that we could talk about? How can I listeners put some of these ideas? I love the bereavement piece. But what are some others for leadership to be thoughtful about?
I have a couple of others. Definitely follow me on LinkedIn, y'all. Because I am on a journey to humanize parents. I am a newly parent of three, oh Lord sent help. And we really committed even before I had gone back to the drawing board around family planning. I thought a lot about how do we build family friendly policies that are inclusive of folks in different genders different sexual orientations? Right? How do we make it possible for someone to re enter into work safely, gradually, knowing that their hormones, their mental health, their finances, their really every life system is being shaken up. And so we have several policies that we've created around the first year of life. For example, any mandatory travel required of me, I'm able to travel with my baby and care provider. And the teaching Well, pays for that care providers, lodging, and food, I do have to cover travel, but that's hugely liberatory. And so it means that at retreats, it means that work trips and those overnighters, I'm not disrupting my nursing journey. I'm not disrupting the essential bonding. And we know that my mental health, not just my baby's well being are impacted by our ability to connect every culture, honestly, across the globe, that is retained many of its early practices around nurturing, recognize that babies want to be like glue on a parent. And so we've made that possible. And for folks who find it really overwhelming to travel with their baby, there are programs that we're willing to cover that will overnight your breast milk. And this is these are very specific to nursing parents, right. But you can literally like storks service, send your breast milk every day, the route back to your home for your child to have that. And that's just hugely transformative. Another example, I'll give you all one more, a human centered policy is around our private practice work. And this is contentious. I know this, I've been told by its UC, I've been told by multiple other executive directors and maybe my boss, that this is a wild idea. But let me talk to you about it. So we know that in nonprofits, many folks would like to be paid more. Right? We are abundant with ideas, but not always with salaries. And to retain talent, we recognize that various financial dynamics are going to come into play with our employees. And when I got here, I really wanted to think differently about how do we encourage folks to have financial autonomy, while still staying and honoring the work of the teaching while as their primary focus. I was watching as many of my friends not even just in this organization who work in nonprofits were having to hide that they had private practices or second and third jobs. We know that teachers are working multiple jobs, and it's a dirty secret. And we should be paying everybody more, don't get me wrong. And in the meantime, what are folks, options for pursuing? Maybe it's not even just for finances, but alternative passions, right? I don't want to lose this part of myself. And for many of us in the teaching well is continuing to work with students because we're an adult focused organization. And so we've built a private practice policy that enables folks, so long as in their evaluation, they are meeting or thriving on all of their indicators for the next six months before their next performance review, to pursue private practice work on the clock. And we have internal discussions, and calibration moments where we say as long as our client's needs are being met, and as long as our internal team, teammates are feeling supported, and feeling your presence, why couldn't you schedule a training that you're doing with a different organization during your work week, during standard work hours, you don't need to put in PTO for it. But we do expect that it's not in the shadows. So it should be in your calendar. And it is supervisory approved, because it's not something we're sneaking around doing. We want everyone to be liberated and free. And so we're really trying to challenge the way that we do work so that folks can stay and be retained. And I just encourage folks to think about it. And it doesn't come without risks. So hit me up if you have questions, because it is, in fact, something that takes revision and flexibility, you know, Yeah,
but you're leading so much into the evolution of it. And I And I'm one I want to say, good on your leadership, or your board or your boss, to give you the space in this agency to explore, because I still remember the first conversation we had about the way that you onboard your staff, which is so human, and I, and I just keep thinking that everybody listening, including myself as like, I want to go work at the teaching, well, that feels like a safe, safe place. That and I and I want to be extremely real. And I want to share something personal here. As you were giving these examples. I'm not kidding, I had a flood of visuals come back in my head that are personal to me of Jon, I'm sure you remember this, Julie may remember it too. I mean, I was on maternity leave with a one month old when my CEO asked me to come back and help run a gala. And I said yes, because I didn't feel like I had a choice. And I'm literally pumping in the back of the room while Bruno Mars is playing. And we're raising money. And I mean, it was just a wild moment. And I remember not being able not feeling like I could go to a friend's funeral, a friend's parents funeral because I had a really important campaign meeting. And my boss did not give me safety. And I just didn't have the words. And I didn't have the awareness to know that my gut was telling me something was wrong. But I was just kind of falling in line. And so I share all of that with our audience. And I'm sure everyone has stories that are very similar and nonprofit, to say, that way does not feel good. And it hasn't felt good for years. This is a way that feels much better. And I think the way that you're coming at it from a leadership perspective, and I want to talk about that, because I feel like you have such insights in your career about the differences between supervising and coaching. We've talked about this a little bit. And I want you to break down that difference here. Because I think it has a massive rippling effect on how to become a whole leader.
Yeah, I appreciate that. And I just also want to validate your share, and you're not alone. All of us, many of us have vicarious or direct trauma coming from employment. And that's a part of what we recognize. And so there's a whole nother episode on human centered evaluation systems, because just the repatterning that's required, and that I witnessed when I arrived at the teaching well, but in other spaces as well of folks bracing, right and coming with like five pages of data and evidence to prove their scores and how we actually need to reframe we often say the teaching wall and mighty solar incredible. Deputy Director says, we don't weaponize data here. And we have to remind our team, you're not here to prove to us, we've already hired you because we know you're incredibly talented. This is about learning and growth. And so to your question, when we think about supervision and coaching, this is one of the things I'm most passionate about. When it comes to human centered leadership. I hear organizations that have one or the other, or have supervision inside of their organization, but they contract out all of their coaching, right, and so they're not actually developing in their org leadership. But to me, supervision is about the teammate. Their growth, and reflecting on their impact in the organization. Coaching is about how they carry out that work, live the values, enact the mission with others outside of the space. And I believe to truly thrive, we need both, and that there should be a tiered model articulated in your organization. What I mean by a tiered model is if you are new to a role, ie you've been promoted, or if you are new to the organization in the teaching, while we offer a one year gradual release model, that means weekly supervision for a full hour, which folks are like what I get that much time, yes, a full hour dedicated to you, your growth, how you're transitioning into the organization, composting, any impostor syndrome, that's present, right? And then also, you're matched with one or sometimes more coaches inside the organization, who are not your supervisor, so that you can continue to dive into your growth areas, and not have that feel evaluative. And so we do that, and are allowing folks to actually have someone to shadow to observe them training to co facilitate trainings for the entire first year. And then after that first year, we shift to bi monthly supervision. Jen, so twice a month. But it's really about saying, We're investing in you, your growth is important, right? We want you to feel safe here. And we want you to feel nourished. And we want you to know that actually, we see you and we're going to tailor learning to your needs, so that you can show up and just amplify all of your gifts. It
speaks to like this village mentality too. And I think you kind of casually said, sometimes we go outside of our organization for these things. And they're even in these small organizations where it doesn't feel like there's paths. And I think that's a reason that people go outside. This is like an opportunity to say there is superpower their talents, there's people with giftings, in your organization that could pour into people in this way. And learning and growth is just such a vibrant way to live in just how you show up in today's world. So I just feel like it all kind of feeds itself to Lindsey, like I love the job model this so beautifully. You know, it's really cool. And
one of our one of our values is collective liberation, right. And that means also, I'm responsible for distributed leadership. This isn't the Lindsay show, the teaching well, is a full squad of gifted people. And when we're able to learn together, and grow together, across positions across teammates, this organization and the mission will go far beyond what I can take it to, you know, I deeply believe in my team. And so we do give stipends, and folks do get coaching outside of our organization as well. But the moment we are not providing it in our org, I'd be worried. Yeah.
Well, I mean, I think this all leads to building a vibrant, healthy culture, and staff retention. So I mean, this is like a flag, we're putting in the ground to say we're talking we're forcing this topic all year early here, that we believe retention is an inside job, meaning, the way our organizations are wired is part of the reason people are not staying or they're not happy or fulfilled in this work. So I want to talk about some of the findings y'all have seen about hiring and onboarding, you shared a little bit on this on the last time you came to the podcast, but it's so rich, that I want to hear about your work and research. We're
seeing a lot across the nation, one of the best ways to increase your staff retention is to hire strong, we need to be bringing in folks and get crystal clear. When I arrived, there weren't job descriptions for every position. Oh, we're working with a lot of nonprofits that don't have job descriptions. I know you're like that's not true, or socializing, job descriptions. And then when folks take the job, that's not what you said I was going to be working on. Beyond that, though, we also need what we call a hiring profile. So when you do an analysis of the current sales that are coming through your, the gifts across your current team gaps, or what's causing unsustainable findings within your organization, you need to build a hiring profile. And so we go through an exercise with our clients. And we do it inside of our organization as well, where we articulate the non negotiable skills and experience that are required, not just the JD, the JD is what folks do once they're here, but we need to make sure we get the right people inside our org. Yeah. And that hiring profile, then has us look at those non negotiables and translate them and adjust our questions and our hiring tasks to make sure that we're really clear that who we're bringing in, is prepared to embody our values and enact our work. What I'm finding as a real challenging trend in our nonprofit sector is that our hiring process is not sustainable. We like to think it is at the teaching well, and we've actually gotten that feedback, start to finish. It's one month. What when we review the apps, we do correct, we do one week where it is round one interviews, they are let me know within 2436 hours if they're moving to the next round. That's next round is the following week. So when folks enter our process, we've asked them to hold times. And then if we can't decide because there are multiple type candidates that are just phenomenal, which happens, right? That's a good problem to have. There's a third round where it just comes to me but we are complete, we know who we are going to be making offers to within a month. And I'm watching as organizations are spanning a six month term to hire brutal, where there's seven rounds. I'm like pump the brakes, y'all. That is a job. When your hiring process feels like a part time job to your candidates, you're out of balance. And we are seeing incredible talent drop out of these inhumane, long hiring processes. And I'm inviting all of us as executive directors as hiring managers to really radically consider how do we show up as human centered leaders when it comes to a sustainable hiring process. I'm also noticing you can see it in LinkedIn, people are spilling the tea, where I'm going through and I'm being asked to create an app or I'm generating this huge learning task for this organization. And then they're keeping it and they're using it. And it's free labor. Be cautious about how you're enacting your values in the way that you are bringing folks in.
Lindsay, I love you so much. I'm so glad you are in this world, I am so glad that the grid and the Moxie that is within you, that I've seen within the first two minutes of meeting you that it comes out in this expression of, of teaching and learning and honestly, unlearning. And I want to thank you for being so generous with what you're finding, and what's working and in what's not working. Because we're gonna have to iterate this stuff, because it is so ingrained in our cultures in in these organizations that in our systems, it's in our systems. And so I just thank you for all of this and you, you piqued our interest with something that you kind of dropped. And I don't I don't know what this is, and I can't wait to hear you explain this. But you talk about that you all have this pre HR intervention that you've seen in practice. And I want to know what that is. And I wanted an example of it, because I think it's going to blow our minds. I'm
gonna get there. Can I give a pro tip before we do, though,
please give pro tip. All right, Jon.
I'm hearing it everywhere. It's gotten real sexy. Everyone is using the term bring your whole selves to work. Because I am on a mission right now, to say we need to be much more cautious about that. It's being weaponized, especially for folks on the margins. And in particular, what we're hearing is that a lot of black women are receiving that invitation, and then are also receiving a write up, or a memo, or defer a formal conversation around professionalism and professionalism is already racialized in this country, and tends to have white supremacist undertones. To be clear, I don't wanna mince my words on that. And so, at the teaching, well, we have coined a term professional authenticity. And we spent quite a bit of time as a team articulating what that means at any given season in our organization. It means bringing your gifts, bringing authenticity, not feeling like you need to code switch, but also being mindful of team dynamics and professional expectations. So we actually talk about what does it mean and what is it not? Right, being able to come in and, and there is such a thing as that's your personal business and TMI, in a work meeting, there is such a thing. Yeah, right. And when it starts to create discomfort for others, and they don't know how to address that, you're going to create tensions within the organization. And also, when we say we don't want to code switch, that doesn't mean we get to, you know, come through and use racial slurs, because that's what you do in your home. Right. And so we need to actually tease out and this will look different for every organization, but I welcome you to consider actually have a series of conversations with your teams. What does professional authenticity mean? What does that mean and break it down? Really go into examples, case studies scenarios, we've spent quite a bit of time, as Selena May, one of our teammates would say, quantifying what it means to self manage to self Express, but also to consider collective care and impact on our teammates. Right? So I just want to invite that concept in and now to your pre HR interventions, huh? Here we go. Let me just tell you that. So the amount of times we hear clients say, well, it's okay, we're going to bring in HR. And that as if that is like a sign of relief. First of all, shout out to all the HR professionals. Yeah, because folks in HR are not well, they have not been well, their to do lists are far too long. They are not here. As fixers, the Olivia Pope's of your organization, HR is tired, sent HR on a vacation. And let's also be really clear. In the majority of cases that we're observing, when HR is brought in the relationship is ruptured far beyond what a standard repair process will heal. In other words, once you brought in HR, things are pretty bad. And if you're expecting that to be an intervention, where folks are now collaborating with ease with joy with trust, you're mistaken. And so increasingly, the teaching well is creating programming that we call pre HR interventions. We do restorative mediations, but we are a neutral third point that's bringing in somatic practices that's bringing in human centered communication protocols. We are doing healing circles, we're doing treaty work, because sometimes you're not going to heal and be friends. And you know, you don't have to be friends with everyone at work. But you do need to collaborate, and you do need to have an understanding of how you'll partner, it might be exploring boundaries individually, and then brokering those together. And so we really try and in support our clients withholding those difficult conversations before the HR department is brought in, because what ensues is often disciplinary action, and disempowerment and a reactivation of employment trauma, and there may be identity markers that come into play, whether it be positionality, whether it be age, gender race, that further muddies the water, and impacts our ability to see clearly and move forward as a united front, one of my former bosses would say we don't have to agree, but we do have to align. And that's been a mantra I've really held, as I've moved through my career. And so call us up, y'all don't just over rely on HR,
let me just say this. I mean, we're blessed to live in this moment in time. And this is a chance that we do not have to be surrounded by this echo chamber that we may be used to be in these small circles, Lindsey is sharing these kinds of thoughts, these kinds of challenging questions, these disrupting the status quo, centering humanity, available to all for free on LinkedIn, like, we can build our own personal board of directors by getting in community, whether you can sit across in the same space of Lindsay or just be able to follow her and wrestle with these topics. Because if we're going to shift the sector, it's we're gonna have to each take responsibility for what we can control. And it comes down to these small human to human issues that are fixable that aren't that actually, you know, difficult when we can take it a piece at a time. And so to do that in community, like I just feel grateful that you came back and just grateful that you are pushing the boundaries that are there because they need to be pushed, and so really appreciate your lens, as always, Lindsey? Well, I mean, we are starting to wind down and I want to give you space to share story. You know, we talk about moments of philanthropy that stay with us that kind of raucous in our journeys. I wonder if you would have a story you want to take us back to today from your journey. Yeah,
I was so glad to share last time and for y'all to follow up with Liz. Hey, Liz. She's just Incredibles. I want to Oh, yeah. Hold on. Let's take a minute. Hey, Liz. Hi, Liz. We love the Markle Foundation. We want to take a moment to just give thanks to many of our funders, we have so many incredible loyal philanthropic partners. And one I'd love to amplify as Dana at the rainin Foundation. She is a next level leader and we had crossed paths. Back when I was still in district work. She is a huge champion for the science of reading and literacy attainment. And she is a rock star for Oakland. And you know, I am here to serve across the nation, but Oakland is my heart. And so we've really linked up she has since joined our board, which is phenomenal because she is such an activator. But two things that she's done that I think are really incredible. And I want to encourage board members everywhere and funders everywhere. In this philanthropic landscape. You may not have the money to give it this moment. But what you have are your connections, philanthropy talks, your network is strong. Take the time to write custom emails connecting organizations. When we dropped our annual report. within 24 hours, Dana emailed and was like I am so inspired by your impact. I've got these six funders are you in communication with them. And I was like only one she was like, give me a moment. And she wrote custom emails to each of those funders connecting the teaching while with them and saying, Here's what I think would resonate most about their mission, their values, their vision and their impact. You've got to talk to Lindsay. And the way that that felt, don't get me wrong. She is blessing us also with funding, but she sees beyond the financial gift and is able to amplify the work, move the work forward and build this coalition around her grantees. That is game changing, really game changing. The other thing that I want to name is that some folks are surprised that she's funding our work because when you look at her portfolio It's almost exclusively literacy organizations. And this is where we realized, again, this village, this collectivist approach to stabilizing community that she is willing to fund the teaching well, because she will get a greater return of investment on the rest of her portfolio when she has retention focused initiatives. So she said, Lindsay, I'm deeply connected to these schools, we are funding all of their early literacy work, hundreds of 1000s of dollars of investment are going into training the staff. But if they leave, kids aren't going to learn to read, we have to restart the initiative from a change management from a training from a coaching, even a hiring perspective. So we are now building this kind of movement together, where she will fund the literacy work, and she will fund the teaching well, and we can use her gifts to offset the cost of our programming. Because when we retain the folks that we have invested in, then children are going to thrive. And this is how we do the coalition and the community village approach to funding. So I'm just so grateful to her a shout out to Dana, and really encouraging folks that think, oh, I don't know if that type of work is something I do? does it enhance the rest of your portfolio? Does it get you closer to your funding vision and mission? Link up? Times are tough, but we can do a lot of great when we link when we are in solidarity.
I just thank you for the stories that matter. I thank you for sharing tools. And I wonder like, what are you going to tie a bow on this? Lindsey? What's your one good thing like pull up, pull something out, you're gonna hit us with a phrase I know is gonna go into my notes tab on my phone of things on my blog about later. So
all right, this one good thing, huh? I understand. For those of you I'm speaking to you directly, who think I've got to leave my organization. I'm not well here, there's too much to change. And that might be your path. But also Kancil culture doesn't work in healthy teams. The grass ain't always greener, y'all. And healing is messy. So the moment you, your colleagues, and the leadership in your organization, choose each other and make time for healing. Create the space in your agendas to have difficult conversations about contentious topics that you're facing the org that you want, that you're looking to thrive in, you have to be a part of building it. And so I really am inviting us to reflect where is this magical space where we can work, I mean, outside of the teaching. Now, of course, where is the magical space where everything is perfect. We're looking for this instant gratification. And we're exhausted, we're fatigued, we're burnt out. And we have that employment trauma. But when you find a team, that you feel values aligned, decide to choose each other and build the organization you don't need to heal from. You might be where you're supposed to be. You just need to paradigm shift how you all exist together. So before you jump ship, really look and see, can we tend to soil together? Can we get this grass greener? How do we plant the seeds to have a thriving garden and you can't replace great teammates. So be the leaders you need and consider staying Monsey
Fuller, I mean, I just truly want to create like a pause to like, sit with that.
It literally makes me cry. It's so good. And it's the world that I want us to live in. And I think thank you for holding space for not saying give up and run, cut and run. Because I do think there's an evaluation of so many different parts. And it starts with you. And it starts with asking brave questions. So thank you appreciate that so much.
I mean, you are a gift, my friend to those right around you and your community and your team. But you're a gift to our entire sector and world. And like I've already mentioned, I mean, being in community with Lindsay is for the taking like she is available and is a resource and just this heartbeat that you can connect to. And so I wanted you to share you know what's the best places for people to reach out to get serve and connect with the teaching? Well, to understand how y'all could maybe partner connect with organizations and just your favorite place to hang out online. We got LinkedIn but if there's others, let us know.
Yeah, you'll also find the teaching well, at our website, the teaching while.org. You'll also see us on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, we've got a podcast in the making maybe coming like I know, I know I know some tea. We'll be talking to y'all I'm excited about it, I have a lot of things to say. And my team's like, open your mouth and share. So you show that might be coming up. But I definitely would say that if you are interested in partnering and partnering, we call really broad. We're not just talking about client work, we're talking about coalition building, you can also email us at info at the teaching while.org. And reach out, we're ready.
You're worthy of feeling whole, every single one of you. Thank you for the warm mom hug that you just brought into this conversation. I appreciate the challenging moments, and I appreciate the real talk. Please go fine, Lindsey. And thank you again, for coming back. You know, you're gonna come back again and again. And again. Sorry.
But you're such an honor. Thanks so much for being here, friends, and 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
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