Hey friends, we're mixing things up as we close out season five of the podcast by sharing some of our favorite combos that Jon and I have had guesting on other podcasts,
We had the honor of joining our friend Katie Appold on Nonprofit Hub's amazing podcast Good to Growth. Be sure to subscribe and add it to your queue. In this episode, we dive into the themes emerging from the nonprofit sector in 2022. And everything's on the table from next gen donors to batch working for efficiency, the overhead myth and mental health.
We hope you enjoy.
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, philanthropist, world changers and rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
So let's get started.
So one thing you can count on Jon and Becky for is real insight into real nonprofit issues. And we are going to dig into everything because we are talking about nonprofit trends, the good, the bad, and everything else. Let's get started. Jon, and Becky, thank you so much. You had me on your program, I don't know, six months or so ago. And I had the best time. I laughed and laughed and laughed. And so it's only fitting that we bring that joy over here.
We loved having you love what you guys are doing over at Nonprofit Hub, and anything we can do to amplify your good work is a good day for us.
Seriously, such a huge honor. And we got the best feedback on your episode. People just loved it.
Oh, cool. Yay. Love that, well, this is going to be the same. So for our audience, tell us a little bit and I want to hear from both of you a little bit of your background, how you got into this work. And what We Are For Good is all about.
Well, I'll start and because I'm the elder statesman of the two of us and Jon's my little brother kind of virtually. But I got my start in nonprofits spent my whole life as a nonprofit purist, mostly in the marketing and public relations side, got hired really early on to run my alma mater's marketing department started at Oklahoma State University's Foundation. And about a year into that journey as I was kind of wandering through the desert, I call it because I didn't know what I was doing. I mean, just experiencing huge impostor syndrome, I stumbled upon this amazing graphic design intern who walked into my office whose name was Jonathan McCoy, wearing a tie and his portfolio was more impressive than anything that we had in our entire office. And so I hired him. We just synced as human beings and our values are spouse... we're not married to each other. But our spouses are very dear friends, we're all have just been on a just really aligned journey our whole lives like work to run a million dollar marketing budget, launch a billion dollar campaign and then we had complete shell shock and we moved to Oklahoma City, and started working for Oklahoma's largest not for profit health care system there and went from 150 employees down to 10. And figured out how to wear all the hats and did some annual giving there, donor engagement, I led the mark, the major gifts team was a major gift officer kind of just wherever needed us to fill in. So that's kind of a little bit about my background story. And we're based out of Edmond, Oklahoma.
Amazing. Jon an intern with a tie, love that.
And like this dorky portfolio walking in, you know, I appreciate that she gave me this opportunity. Because I thought she had it all together. I love that now she was just this 20 year old that didn't know what she was doing. Like it feels really great. But you know, we just kind of always talked about what's going to be next because we love philanthropy, like it is just like our heart song. We love the transformation that not just the impact that I feel like most people talk about, but like what it does to the giver and the donor. And we just think that the world can positively change if we can get more people involved in their personal philanthropy that connects to their story and to their life and their values and all those things. And so we just kind of kept looking for what's gonna be this next step. And I'm like this, I binge listened to podcasts, and I love entrepreneurship. And I just was kind of tracking this space. And I'm like, I think the nonprofit sector is really void of a lot of that thinking, you know, because we're scarcity minded, and we're kind of locked in a box. And it's always about budgets. And so we just kind of had this idea like, what if we, you know, jumped ship and started this podcast where we started to talk to innovative people that are doing kind of this entrepreneurial minded work in the nonprofit space and that just kind of snowballed. It's now that We Are For Good podcast and it has just been the funnest journey, is that a word, funessed?
Most fun. You're the designer. I'm the writer. It's totally cool.
But, um, yeah. So I mean, that's just been this way that we were able to step out and really claim our space because we love and know philanthropy. And we just applied that to a business because we don't know how to run a business. But we do know how to build a movement. And that's what this has always been about is creating a movement around really this impact uprising we want to see in the sector.
That is a beautiful mission.
Thank you.
Love it. Love it. Okay, so you, I mean, you mentioned you talk to innovative people, you talk to entrepreneurs, all of which have some impact on the nonprofit space. What some common common themes that you've heard for 2022?
I love this question.
I do too! We're not going to unpack them all, we rolled them all into eight themes that we were seeing this year, and I'll just highlight a couple of, or at least one or two, and Jon, you can take one or two. But I think one of the most prevalent themes we've found is culture is everything right now. And I think, nonprofit in really social impact, who is just feeling the fatigue of trying to sustain and adapt and grow and pivot so quickly, during pandemic, and it was, it's not within our wheelhouse to move quickly, and to make decisions that have immediate impact. And so I think we were feeling kind of the fatigue of everyone in that. And but we noticed that cultures were inclusivity. And there was a lot of transparent communication, where there was fun and rituals and mental health balance and pouring into professional development, these kinds of things elevated some of these organizations that are not experiencing a lot of that burnout and compassion fatigue. And so we've been really dialed into what makes a great culture and how is it more than your retreats and having pizza you know, on occasion. It's like, how do you bake it in to the DNA? And it's about shifting power dynamics, it's making sure that your board is on exactly the same page as your staff. You're all in lockstep. And so that's one that I would lift. Jon, I'm really curious to hear which one you lift out.
I mean, it's hard to to narrow it. But I think one that's really disrupted my mindset, because you know, I lead our healthcare philanthropy, for the last decade of our life, most of that time I was leading annual giving, and so really focused on growing the donor base and running events and like sitting running a gala at the back, you know, with our like, widgets and stuff. And I think this shift that's happening, the cultural shift is mirrored kind of in the donor side, because we're seeing like, as cultures come alive, that's attracting donors also to like minded value. I mean, we're all going through this reckoning of like, what, what really matters in our life, what do we want to spend our life doing? And so I love that we're seeing that on the donor side. And this is the trend is that donor behavior matters more than amount in the people that you're engaging? It's what actions are they taking, that you need to be paying attention to where they're either testing or coming into the circle to see what giving it your organization's like, you're seeing what the impact like you're seeing how it feels. Those are the kinds of transformational people that we really need to watch less than just if we just pull out report of like, who gave over a million dollars, it's gonna be these three people, the same three people, but you're missing the people that have incredible capital that's not just money, they may have incredible social capital. Yes. And like so these movements that we're seeing happening, where you can get 1000s of people behind it, that person may not have any money in the bank, you know, but they could have the most powerful social capital. And so love that that trend. And we've worked a lot with Lynne Wester I know, she's been connected with y'all, too. She's great thinker. But she's really given some strategies behind how do you actually activate on that? And it's about having a donor relations program that sees people and is really watching for the small shifts and the small movements and pouring that into how your program supports people to so I love that trend and I think it's a reckoning that we've been hoping for all these decades, because we always want to, you know, we're gonna flip the pyramid over. And and I think that that's happening in a lot of ways right now. So it's really exciting time.
Especially with like this next generation of donors. I mean, we did a, I'm trying to remember what the episode was it was several months ago, but all about the next generation of philanthropy in social capital is...
Isn't it exciting?
Yes, yeah. I mean, because we can't be limited to what our impact is, we should look at how much how can we create a movement. I love that. I love that.
I'll just piggyback on that too, because I can't help it. But it's like, when you look at like Gen Z and you look at the way that they want to engage. I mean, we've been hard wired and I'll tell you, I've been a fundraiser for 20 years. I'm trying to unwind this mindset that the KPI is the gift and the financial commitment and that is what we chase but we're finding even with Gen Z, if we can onboard them very early, and in a very engaging, transparent, authentic experience, where they feel our mission, they feel like they want to be a part of it, they put you in their budget, you know, their family budget at the beginning, they don't even think about, it's like their Netflix, you know, subscription that just kind of flows on their credit card. And all of a sudden, the more that you engage, the giving grows, as their income capacity grows, and their affinity grows, and it just is about moving into more spaces than financial, it's about network because they're not gonna be able to give a lot right now, but they have great influence in their network. So peer to peer becomes really interesting. We're just geeked out about how we're watching the sector shift, and those that are really innovating it are winning in this game. So it's really exciting time.
Okay, I have to thread one more. But it's happening on the corporate side, too, you know, because we grew up just sliding across the sponsor packet to will you please buy a table, and let's hope they buy a bigger table this year than last. And it's like, money is like the smallest common denominator for partnership nowadays, you know, it's like you can activate an employee base around something, you can get an in kind, you can actually infiltrate the actual organization as you value align, and it's all about value alliances, I think everything we see chases back to values, and it's like, how good is this, like, this should be our moment, as nonprofit, we've been living this out for decades, like people are wanting to find more focus and attention on the things that matter most. And heck, we've been doing that, you know, it's like, this is our moment. I'm just so excited about it.
So I totally agree. Do you think that nonprofit boards, I mean, I think more diversity is needed in terms of younger leaders in order to really cultivate this though, too, because, Becky, you mentioned the KPIs, I mean, excuse the language, but there's no other word for a board of good old boys, they're not gonna, they're not gonna award that. So we need to make that shift as well, at the leadership side.
I'm so geeked out that you mentioned boards, because we're seeing just another reckoning happening specifically in the DEI space of nonprofit on boards. And having these boards of our good old boys is is actually prohibiting us from a lot of different things that we're seeing play out in nonprofit. First of all, it's not attracting diverse candidates to come work with us. And it's not attracting diverse candidates who want to join our board. It's not being representative of the populations that we serve. And we're finding that that is so important that your board needs to reflect that beneficiary of your mission. Because how in the world could we ever relate? I mean, we have a great friend that we'd even recommend if anybody's interested in this to go check out. Christal Cherry, she's The Board Pro out of Atlanta, you know her? And she Yeah, we love her so much. But she talks about, you know, she's on a homeless organization's board. And she said, we literally have someone on our board who used to be homeless, because that lived experience is so critical to making sure that we are ethically moving in a space that has dignity, and that we're really dignifying the person that we're serving. And so we're really geeked out about really shifting how we talk to boards, how we recruit how we train them, a lot of them don't want to be involved in ask and we should respect that they have other gifts to our point, you know about the changing of corporate landscape, they have networks, they have influence, they have employees and companies they have all kinds of things beyond just what they can give or get. And so it's it's such an exciting time. And we are really linked in to the board conversation because we know that has a trickle down effect to every part of the organization, as well.
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One of the themes that I'm hearing all the time, and this is nothing new, this is not a COVID thing, this is just a nonprofit thing is the lack of time or a lack of capacity. You know, I had a conversation with somebody recently, and she shared that you know, you have time for what you prioritize. And in the conversation, we were actually talking about marketing, nonprofit marketing. How do we how do we help nonprofits to prioritize what matters? And I know you guys are both marketing gurus. So I'm gonna ask you specifically about that. How do we make the time? How do we find it? How do we manifest capacity?
Yeah, I mean, I love this question. We feel this question. I mean, we're a team of three that, you know, jumped into the deep end to start, We Are For Good. But for us, like marketing is like a lifeline. And I think I want to throw this together with the themes, because I think it's important is value aligned marketing is a lifeline, because to us, it is our tangible expression of our mission, like we are well aware in any nonprofit could apply this philosophy to how we show up and how we serve in our social channels. And the things that probably seem like let's give that to the intern is also an expansion of our mission. And so we view that as kind of part of our core belief is like, we're here to serve people. And so I think if you can kind of shift your mindset around that, you're not just trying to usher people to donations, you're trying to accomplish your mission. So it may be changing a lot of mindsets. You know, in the actual like, time piece, I feel like there is a gross under use of the tech that's available to us in the sector. And, you know, we're agnostic in terms of which tech platform we'd like to advise people to we, you know, there's a lot of great, wonderful people in the space that have poured their lives into building these solutions. But the bigger problem is people actually using it. And I think, you know, we've talked to the our friends at Now It Matters, Tim Lockie and Tracy Kronzak, they talk a lot about it's like the human stack is more important than the tech stack, because it's more of the problem with us and our inability to embrace it, or to lean into it, go to some trainings and learn how to use it. And I think of my own career, I didn't leverage our CRM, I didn't leverage the automations, I was doing so much one off laborious work, whenever they're designed and built to help you kind of do some of these tasks that are really burdensome. And so I do think I would take a hard look at like, what, where are you spending your time? And what is kind of the bigger question that you're trying to achieve? And then overlay that with what tools are available that may take some required listening and learning from me to like, figure out, because we do this all the time. We're trying to you know, manufacture time, and it's an impossible task, but little efficiencies, like totally, like do stack up and they're like our lifeline for us as a small business. That's trying to like do way too much, you know, in a small amount of time.
Yeah, I'll I'll give some tactics because Jon is the high P. Myers Briggs. I'm high J. So I'm more the doer. He's philosophical. But I mean, just to piggyback on some of that, I mean, we think batch work is game changing. That's an entrepreneurial hack. I mean, we drop three episodes a week, which everybody thinks is insane, including me and Julie, but not Jon. He wanted five a week. And so we batch on Thursdays we do four every Thursday. And while we do that Julia's writing the show notes while the interview is going on, Julie's our producer, we do all the intros and outros and we can truly batch over a week's more than a week's worth of episodes in one day. And that still gives us four other days to lean into the other parts of our digital ecosystem. And so I think batching your work is a really helpful tip. If you're trying to do contact reports, do two hours every you know every other Friday, block it on your calendar and write them all once you get in flow. There's something very automated about that. I think I just think of automations that you can use in tech. I mean, we use Zapier, we use Tailwind to you to post our social media, and I just think it's really about working smarter, and not harder and taking a hard look and stepping back and saying, Where is the bulk of my time going? And you know, we just talked about this on an episode that's dropping for us today, when we were kind of talking about the great resignation. And what we're seeing and how people in for profit are a little intimidated and fearful to come over to nonprofit because you have to wear so many hats, I'm using my air quotes, as I say that it gives, it doesn't give the sense of focus that you can get. And so it's really incumbent upon our leaders, to allow our staff to stay in their zone of genius, and allow them to really focus to what you said earlier on what's most important, what's prioritize, and a donor relations person should not be doing all of the donor relations plus the events plus the feeds into annual giving all at one time, you know, they need to stay in their zone of genius and really pour into that, and they're going to be so much more effective. And we just think that there are really cool hacks, like if one more we really believe in content syndication. And this is this concept of taking one really strong piece of content, it could be an impact report, it could be your ED speech at a gala, it could be in something that you've written in a donor letter, and we break it apart, you can take a quote and use that as a social media graphic, you can take the image and socialize it and tell a story with it. And it's really about creating a bunch of content out of already existing content. And you're just putting a focus on it. That's not the whole enchilada, but you're really breaking it apart, and you're socializing it, which is really cool. Because if you can do that in a social setting, people then give feedback, then you have testimony, then you have engagement, you have story of people sharing and tagging people, there's so many benefits to that. So those are just a couple of quick facts that we have too.
I love that. Amen, amen on all of that. And you guys know, I mean, we have a tiny team too, tiny for the scope of what we're what we're running. And it's funny, because one of my board members actually questioned our I, our IT software, you know, line item in the budget, because it is our largest line item other than payroll. And they just couldn't fathom, you know, why do you need so much technology? Like, well, because we have five people.
Right? That's our online services tab in our budget. It's just crazy. But it's like we're a digital company. You know, of course, that's our where our investments are.
But we're doing the work of 25 people and technology and batching and syndication and thinking outside the box. And that's how it gets done. Amazing, amazing tips.
And I'll just say don't be scared of technology. I will I mean, I'm 20 years in this business. It was clunky. It's been clunky for quite a while but the last four to five years. I mean, there are free CRMs, we're seeing people offer free crypto, if you're if you don't know how to do crypto, totally cool. There are, a Pledge does crypto free crypto every.org does free crypto, there are great tech out there that can truly help you move more quickly and let you stay in your lane.
If I can say something about batching because it's just like a pro tip because I think it's easy to set everything on autopilot. I think there's a danger in that too. Because especially with social because social by nature is community centric. And it's social, you know, like so while the post can be automatic. If you're going to only take a few minutes of time like to go in and engage on this post. And Katie, Katie, I see you do this all the time. Yeah, you're really good. It's like on LinkedIn, it's everything to tag somebody to say, Hey, I think you would enjoy this. And it's like, if that's gonna be two minutes, but you're not spending the two minutes writing the posts like that was done whenever but the engagement you can't fabricate and so I think we don't want to miss that and being so automated that we miss these really powerful engaging moments that could take our syndicated content to the next level.
Absolutely. Little, little tiny things with big big rewards big impact.
Yep.
I want to go deeper on technology. Because we have, we've I don't know what it is there's just gotten a lot of feedback lately where people don't know what to pursue because there's so many options. And it's funny, the person who made me think of this question she said to their segmenting, there's retargeting, she's like I know there's like five things I should be doing.
Oh, I feel her
Yeah. How do we prioritize? What do you guys see is like, like, I don't want to say base level but like, these are the things that we should all be doing?
Yeah, well, what comes to mind immediately first is just this I'm sorry, I'm tone setting again right watch this, is that we have to have this fundamental belief in the power of professional development. And I mean, y'all's organization is all about professional development. So I know this is in your core to that But like, you have to believe that making this investment in myself to grow is going to be worth so much longer than me trying to figure it out. I mean, from the King and Queen, trying to figure it out for 15 years in development, some courses, especially there's so many people in this space now that are experts, I think you'd like Dana Snyder in launching social ads. I could spend days and weeks googling about what's matters. Or I could take Dana's class and learn how to do ads and afternoon and be like producing. And so we have to like think about that, like, once we prioritize, how can we like cut off the time to deploying, whatever it is, and I'm so all about that. There's a lot of free tools, all the CRMs now have their own, like knowledge base and workshops and things like that, I think, that people just aren't really leaning into. But that more time, we're trying to just spin our wheels and figure it out on ourself. Like, that's what we did in the 90s. Like now is like, we need to just find the people that can be our guide and help us cut off, you know, months of learning, in my view. And so I think that's a fundamental place that I would start. But yeah, but.
I'll just add one little one on there just I feel like I'm tactic girl today. But if if you've never heard of Pond, and you're feeling very intimidated by tech, we really encourage you to go to joinpond.com. I mean, all you have to do is kind of just tell them, what they're looking for and they will literally bring you your suitors. It is like the Bachelor inverted.
So if you go to cause camp, you get credits and stuff too right? This is all good.
Yeah, you do.
You can your Pond dollars for our membership or Cause Camp.
Yeah, it's like if you even just by interacting and pouring into learning about technology, you can actually earn dollars to do things. I love that you brought the Cause Camp connection up. But I mean for someone who is so intimidated by it does not understand the language does not understanding all the ings to your to your point. Pon kind of does that for you. And they're just a we love Mitch Stein. He's such a great founder and good human. And yeah, I would say start there. If you're looking at ground zero, and you're looking for a place to start.
Absolutely, totally agree with pond. I also I have learned so much from Dana Synder because we have her on webinars, which we always demand. And she taught at Cause Camp 2022. And I'm guessing she'll show up at 2023.
Yeah, that's great.
Amazing.
Okay, so it also seems keeping with the trend thing. So time is a thing. Technology is a thing. Crises are a thing. Now, I mean, I know I know, nonprofits live in the tyranny of the urgent and everyday is some upheaval that we can't anticipate. But major things like COVID, and war and economic booms and busts, like it all feels like it's more frequent. What tips do you have for nonprofit pros to just kind of maintain their sanity to maintain some some levelness in the midst of all this?
I'm so glad you asked this question. Thank you for asking this question. Because we think one of the elephants in the room with nonprofit is just this commitment to mental health, and comp and addressing compassion, fatigue and burnout. And I'll just share like a quick little personal story. I mean, I was in the grind of being a major gift officer, working in nonprofits, wearing all the hats. And if you're type A and put too much pressure on yourself, like I do historically, in my life, you know, I just hit a ceiling in 2019. And I truly I Jon, it makes Jon uncomfortable even though I joke about it said that I lost my marbles and I had a complete mental collapse. And it had been building and we could not pinpoint what it was. I mean, ruling out just crazy things like tumors and MS And I shared the story on our podcast of what happened to me because I wanted people to understand what it looks like and what the warning signs are and how to get ahead of it because I was so shocked that it would happen to me. And I felt myself come alive. And I mean I found myself and jump to We Are For Good once I truly hit that rock bottom and moved out. But it's like we have got to be building cultures, systems, environments where people feel psychological safety. I mean, we've talked about this a lot on the podcast, we have an entire podcast week dedicated to mental health. And we are we continue to be so shocked by the amount of people in nonprofit who quietly, they don't come out very publicly and say it but quietly, confess that they have gone through this that they are going through this. And so leaders you've got to check in with your people. That's not Number one, and it's not. And if you say, how are you doing, and they say, Fine, that's just not good enough. And we've got to be providing resources, you know, for how to work through through burnout. I mean, I think having flexible work hours or flexible work arrangements, you know whether somebody can work from home remotely. I mean, you talk about time, if you take commuting time out, I mean, I live 30 minutes from my old office. And so that's an hour of time, I could actually get back, and I'm at home, and I'm in my yoga pants, and my dog is here. And, you know, it's just, there's something calming and centering about that. And so I really just encourage anyone who's working through this, to have conversations, to bring in speakers about this, to pour into maybe a little bit of professional development, have a day off. I take my kids at once a year, get a mental health day, where they can literally come to me and say life is too much. And they're little, like they're eight and 11. And but we're talking about listening to your body and looking for signs, that life is just too much, and our work is hard. And what's going on with social justice, wars, everything that you're talking about. It is fatiguing, and we're in a marathon, and there is no way to sprint through this and survive. So thank you for lifting that. And Jon, feel free to jump in and add anything else we've talked about.
Becky, thank you for sharing.
Oh you're welcome. It's my joy to do it.
Yeah, you are not alone. Oh, my goodness.
Oh my goodness. I mean, I think I get to be kind of just a friend. And back to Becky in that journey. And I will just say, to complement what she said is community, you know, like, and I know y'all put a lot of focus on this Nonprofit Hub, we have a lot of focus in our world, too, because the only way to like transverse all of this craziness and to manage it all is to have like minded peers that can like lift you up and support you and make you feel not alone in the journey. And the world is so connected now. Like, you've got to find people you know, that you have support to. So I agree with all the things that the leaders need to pour into. And it's really something that's on every factor, I think of the equity equation on every level that pours into this too, but just how to just go find some people that you feel connected to, because it helps a ton, just to talk through things.
And here's my practical tip. I mean, we had a great leader that came on to our podcast, and we talked a lot about mentoring and coaching. And I think they said it's so well. And if you have the funding to do any part of this, I really encourage you to do it for your staff. But a therapist helps you look backwards, I pick up my own therapy, you know, but a mentor helps you work through the present. And a coach is going to help you work through aspirationally where you want to be. And so they're they're saying luminary leaders have all three. And they're going all the time. I don't know if all of us feel like we have the bandwidth to pour into all three all the time. But I do think that that is something if you could even pick one we talk a lot about how do you make a one degree change. You know, in your day in your work, make a one degree change, pick something. And really, I want to just say to everybody listening, you are worthy of taking a break, you're worthy of having this time invested in you in doing this inner work. And it's actually going to help trigger so many more wonderful things in your life, not just in your job, but in your personal relationships in your communities to Jon's point, so we think it pays many dividends, and the leaders that can see that on the front end, and the individuals that could feel brave enough to express that to their leader. They're the ones that are really thriving.
Ah, so needed. I just want to like loop this on our website, because this is the message that everybody needs to hear. Absolutely. And I mean, one thing I've struggled with and this is this is super compartmentalizing, but I think there's some wisdom in it. Your job, no matter how noble it is, is a job. It is not your life. Your title is not your worth, and a board or a donor or your team do not dictate your value. A job is a job.
I'm putting on my party hat please say it again and again. Yes.
Louder for people in the back.
Yeah, I know. I know. It's hard when you're doing such mission critical work, but it's man, it's truth.
Its truth. I feel like that's what snowballed to is like it is like mission work. So we're like, oh, I just need to give more I need to stay late. I need to do all these things. Give out my cell phone number, all these things that ultimately just completely drain and deplete us and then pull us out of being able to do it. Yeah, you're right on.
Okay, so this has all been good. But when we rebranded the podcast used to be called the Hubcast, which was kind of cheesy and people thought it was like an automotive so we now call it the Good to Growth podcast because we know nonprofits are already doing good, we're gonna help them grow. So we always ask for a bit of good news, something you see trending happening, something you just want nonprofits to know.
Oh, my gosh, I love this one. So, you know, we've mentioned, you know, we batch on Thursdays. So we just today's a Friday, the day that we're recording, and we just came off a four back to back interviews, and it can be a lot, you know, but I will tell you like the hope that I felt like we both like got teary eyed yesterday, of just the power in this very moment, like it has been so hard. And there's been so many challenges. But the reckoning that's happening that's pushing people into our missions, like I only see hope, like I see hope, as the walls are coming down between businesses and for profit nonprofit, of just trying to get aligned on the same page, the next chapter of this CSI, corporate social impact is going to be so powerful. So it's a time for us to step in as nonprofits in the power that we have, and have these crazy amazing partnerships moving forward, I just think the moment is rife. Like I feel so much optimism.
I think something that I'm so excited about is Jon mentioned, we just batch these four episodes. And we saw this recurring theme of transparent relationships, and trust based relationships that are emerging. And I just think what MacKenzie Scott has done to just blow the lid off of restricted giving and to give unrestricted gifts, setting a town that she's doing a lot of research into cultural vibrancy in organizations, the health of the employees, as well as the ed the financial health, she's just going through and in setting this new course for us, which feels so much better. And it's allowing us to, to kind of beat back at that overhead myth, that plagues nonprofit. And so all of a sudden, we're looking at donors, and we're saying, If you trust us, if you believe in this mission, then know that your unrestricted dollars are going to go to the place where we can do the most good, and then we're going to put it in a place that can accelerate the fastest because what is holding us back the most our slowness, our scarcity mindset and our inability to innovate. And to me, those are the three and nonprofit. And having that kind of a mindset and teaching and training your donors to think about it in that way is going to allow us to scale and try things that we've never tried before. And just one quick pro tip for anybody that's looking for something again, really practical and tactical. Tell the story of now, right now, I would say that just like as a storyteller, I see that as such low hanging fruit for an organization, tell the story of what your nonprofit has been through in this pandemic, tell it rawly, do not talk like a corporate robot, throw in, you know, some levity, throw in some really big, some true sucker punches that have happened to your organization. And then at the end, come out of it with hope, cast your vision, and then it's incumbent upon you to keep sharing that vision and bringing people along, I think, too much. We're too pretty in what we're doing in our shops, and we try to make it look very Norman Rockwell. And it's like, that's not real. And it's hard to connect with that, you know, especially online, you can just sniff out somebody who's really inauthentic. And so I just think telling the story of now and letting that be a launching pad to your storytelling of how you're going to launch that vision and how you need people to pour in with their time with their resources with their networks with their influence, whatever they can do. I think that is such low hanging fruit, get online, if you're not online, digitally, you are going to you are in 1.0, and web 3.0 is coming. So please get online and engage socially, your people are there your people are not just in your physical neighborhood or community. They are global right now and they want to hear about your mission.
Oh, that is so good. So good.
Katie, you're so affirming.
And a great wrap to an episode about themes because authenticity, transparency and hope. I love that. I love that. What a great, what a great cap. Jon and Becky, it is always a joy to see you and just talk to you.
Oh we adore you.
Thank you so much for taking the time to help us. Yeah, keep the hope.
Absolutely. And thanks for how you're pouring into our sector. We so appreciate it. You're our allies.
Yep, it's such an honor to be here. Thank you, Katie.
I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Jon and Becky from We Are For Good. I have to say the hardest part about interviewing them is stopping the laughter before we hit record. Such a delight, and have everything we talked about the thing that stuck with me the most is the need for our community right now. So if you are feeling that if you are feeling alone or like there's just no one with the same perspective or familiarity with what you're going through, please check out our nonprofit membership to the Cause Network. This is a community of people who are all pursuing professional development. They all want to further their career, but we're all dealing with the same issues. It's a great community. It's easy to use, and I think it'll boost your confidence as well as teach you a thing or two. I know it has me. You can join the cause network by going to nonprofithub.org and clicking on membership.
Thanks for joining us for today's episode. For more tools, tips and techniques on fundraising, marketing and all things nonprofit be sure to check out nonprofithub.org We hope you'll join us next week for another episode of The Good to Growth podcast on Nonprofit Hub radio.
