In this episode, Pooya Pourak, a design strategist, shares how human-centered design principles can be used to create meaningful connections with donors during the interview process. By focusing on curiosity and connection, nonprofits can build trust and rapport with donors, uncover their motivations, and create customized engagement plans that align with their values. Pooya also shares tips for making the donor interview process more engaging and enjoyable. Overall, this episode emphasizes the importance of using human-centered design to build deeper relationships with donors and create more effective fundraising strategies.
To connect with Pooya: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pooyapourak/
“It’s not research, it’s engagement” – Pooya Pourak
Episode Transcript
RHEA WONG 00:00
Welcome to Nonprofit Lowdown! I’m your host, Rhea Wong. Hey, podcast listeners! Rhea Wong with you, once again with Nonprofit Lowdown. Today, my guest is Pooya Pourak. He is the CEO and Co-Founder of MatchNice, which is a social impact tech startup with the goal of helping nonprofits make more money online.
RHEA WONG 00:18
We love that. Pooya is also a fellow podcaster. But he started his career as a human-centered designer. And so today, we’re going to talk about what human-centered design is, how it relates to fundraising, and specifically how we can use interviews with donors to improve our fundraising. So Pooya, welcome to the show.
POOYA POURAK 00:37
Rhea, it’s great to be here. Thanks for having me.
RHEA WONG 00:40
It’s such a pleasure. I got a chance to be on your show. Now, it’s fun to have you on mine. Before we jump into the nitty-gritty details, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you became involved in the nonprofit sector?
POOYA POURAK 00:52
Absolutely! So my quick life story, in a nutshell, both of my parents are from Iran. I was born in Dubai. I grew up in Finland until I was eight years old. I moved to Atlanta in 96 and I became a US citizen in 2007. I graduated with my Industrial Systems Engineering degree from Georgia Tech.
POOYA POURAK 01:11
I started my career in the private sector with Delta Airlines where I did everything from continuous improvement to data analytics and customer experience. It was my Hallmark at the organization where we connected all 80,000 employees at the time to real-time feedback from customers. And that really thrusted my career into the space of listening to people, and helping organizations take action on that feedback. So from Delta, we moved to Atlanta.
POOYA POURAK 01:43
We then moved to Philadelphia, where I worked for a couple of software startups. And I did the same thing really helping B2B and B2C organizations. I listened to feedback from their customers, and their employees, and put that into action, largely in kind of the digital space. But also when it comes to communication, training process, and technology overall. During that time, I’ve always been volunteering with nonprofits.
POOYA POURAK 02:09
And when I look back at the tapestry of my career experiences, the common thread for me has always been connecting with and helping others. And I’ve found this interesting kind of magic that has happened when I’ve been clear on that purpose for myself, and my career has gotten me closer and closer to that. So I worked for Deloitte Consulting for just over two and a half years, and I still consult with them part-time in state and local government, where I was able to use all these skills that I’ve gained to help our government listen to individuals around health and human services or Medicaid food assistance, energy assistance programs, and take their feedback to improve services.
POOYA POURAK 02:54
And while I was doing that, I was volunteering at this nonprofit organization called Beat the Streets Philadelphia. And while I was there, I saw this opportunity to make a connection between their organization and other nonprofits that provided career coaching, and career matching services. And I said, oh, my gosh! Here’s an incredible partnership opportunity.
POOYA POURAK 03:16
There are over a million and a half nonprofits in the US alone. How many more partnerships could there be? And what if the answer to maximizing impact was actually creating these connections and connecting the dots? That’s what thrusted my career into the nonprofit sector just that one question. And we said, what can I do to help the sector get to that space of collaboration? The pandemic started and then we looked at the space and we said funding is the number one issue right now.
POOYA POURAK 03:46
How can we be a part of that solution? And so we launched MatchNice in 2020, with the goal of helping nonprofits raise more money online by being transparent with donors about what they’re working on, and the impact of their work and empowering donors to choose where their money goes.
POOYA POURAK 04:04
So that’s quite a bit of a journey to share. But my heart is very much in the mission of the sector. I feel like the people in the nonprofit sector like, one of my favorite types of people, everyone’s in it, not for the money. It’s for the impact. It’s for the greater good. And that’s very much core to who I am as well.
RHEA WONG 04:24
There’s so much to unpack here. But I agree with you. As a sector, I’ve just met the most incredible, generous kind people who obviously are in it to do something good for the world. So let’s talk a little bit about what you said, with respect to donors because I think the thing as fundraisers that we struggle with is really listening to our donors and understanding what it is they’re telling us because so often, I think it’s filtered through the lens of our own agendas. What does it really mean to interview a donor and listen?
POOYA POURAK 05:00
I think the concept is really simple. And I think you’ve done a really incredible job on your podcast and everything that you’re doing to emphasize that at the end of the day, what’s core, and what’s most important is building real relationships. And the concept of doing interviews is an extension and an emphasis on your relationship with your donors. It’s simple. It’s asking for, and connecting with the people that are supporting your mission and just asking for feedback.
POOYA POURAK 05:33
So human-centered design is, there’s this whole art and science to it. There’s discovery where you’re actually listening to feedback. There’s the definition phase, where you’re making sense of everything that you heard. There’s the development phase, where you’re starting to come up with ideas and actions that you can take and then deliver. We actually said, hey! We heard you and here’s what we do.
POOYA POURAK 05:54
And then guess what, you come all the way back to the beginning, say, hey! Here’s what we did. What do you think? Now, when it comes to the nonprofit sector, I found that there’s not as much of this feedback loop in place with all stakeholders. It’s not just donors. It’s also our teams that we’re working with. Hey, what are you seeing on the frontline when you’re serving the members of our community? It’s talking to the members of the community as well and saying, hey! Here’s what we’re doing and helping. What else might serve you better?
POOYA POURAK 06:26
What are some of the challenges and some of the opportunities? It’s connecting with the and partners, your volunteers, and for this conversation, I think we want to focus on donors. It’s understanding their perspective. What is it that is motivating them to give? But also establishing this just connection to say that, hey! We’re not just this transactional organization where you donate to us and you get this automated email receipt, or maybe even a handwritten note.
POOYA POURAK 06:55
That’s nice. I’m going to pick up the phone, and we’re going to have a conversation, whether that’s face-to-face or by any other means, and I want to hear your story. What matters to you? And how we can get you more involved. It’s really about that conversation and relationship, the human connection at the center of it all.
RHEA WONG 07:15
I love that so much. But I’m just gonna play devil’s advocate for a second because I like to, but I think with donors, we’ve hit a maximum level of distrust and cynicism. And so how are we able to connect with donors who many times are reluctant to meet? Because they think that there’s some sort of ulterior motive? What are the mechanisms by which we can actually invite people into a conversation?
POOYA POURAK 07:43
It’s a really true, real point. I think the first point is to ask for permission for feedback and to make your intent about what you’re looking for very clear from the beginning. You don’t want this interview to be, hey! I’d love your feedback on this and then sneak in an appeal or ask for a $1,000 check, or whatever that is.
POOYA POURAK 08:11
One of the tactics that we’ve done, I’m on the board of a nonprofit in St. Louis called City League. And we’ve put all that I’m sharing, and to use, is we looked at our donor list. And we started with a very personalized “thank you” email to those donors, and then asked, would you be willing to connect with us for five to 15 minutes over a phone call to share your feedback about your donor experience. And that we’re using your feedback to help inform our fundraising strategy as well as our programming for this year.
POOYA POURAK 08:53
So it’s very clear from the beginning what you’re looking for. And you’re making it easy for people to give feedback. So in that email, one of the best practices is to include a calendar, like a meeting that someone can book time on your calendar. In 2023, people don’t like to get called. Putting the power and the decision of whether the donor wants to engage and provide that feedback in their court.
POOYA POURAK 09:22
I think this is the first thing that you could do to build trust and be very clear about what the expectations for that conversation are and the kind of feedback that you’re looking for. And then be sure to follow through on what you’re saying and not sneak in this kind of appeal as part of that. That will come down the road but the interview is not really the space to be doing that.
RHEA WONG 09:44
Yeah! That’s such an excellent point. Because as you know it, I love it, a dating analogy, and these initial conversations I would characterize as the getting to know you, call it dating phase. You don’t ask someone to marry after the first date. But actually, you mentioned something really important that I want to highlight here, which is this concept of the donor experience.
RHEA WONG 10:06
Because I think, in general, and I’m not gonna say all but I think in general, most nonprofits don’t put enough thought into the donor experience. And they talk about things like moves management, which are often things that I as a nonprofit will do to my donors or do to my constituents, as opposed to thinking about it from the human-centered perspective of what is the experience that I’m having as a donor with the organization? So can you talk a little bit about how to use feedback in constructing a donor experience?
POOYA POURAK 10:41
Yeah! It starts with the donor at the center in this case, and we’re really coming back to that relationship focus, trying to understand that individual’s background. So I’ll give you a sense of the discussion guide that we’re using at City League, in understanding the donor’s current experience. And using that feedback then to evaluate the experience that we’re creating at the organization and how we might improve that.
POOYA POURAK 11:11
So first and foremost, just starting with that hearty, genuine, thank you for that individual. You don’t want these interview interviews to be scripted or sound robotic or sound like it’s a call center agent calling you asking questions like, where did you learn to give? What is it that shapes you’re giving? Where were you taught to be generous? Like, you’re opening that space for your donor to share their personal story and experience around giving, asking what their personal connection is to your mission.
POOYA POURAK 11:44
What is it that is so compelling about what we’re doing that actually made you want to give to us and really go deeper into that giving motivation? And I’m happy to share some of the insights that we’ve learned from doing this later on. As we look at the programming of your organization, is there any one particular program or initiative that your nonprofit is leading, if it’s varied, that is like, of particular interest to your donor? So now we’re getting more specific on the interests and ways that your donor might want to engage in your organization beyond just writing a check, and just keeping it open. Keeping the feedback open.
POOYA POURAK 12:29
So, asking a question, are there any other questions that you wish I would have asked you? But to bring it back to the donor experience, one of the best ways that nonprofits can learn about what makes a great donor experience is to ask their donors to tell them about a time that they donated to an organization and felt really good about it. And like an experience, that route in their minds stands as the best donation experience that they’ve had, and to understand the elements of what made that experience so powerful and connected, and then seek ways for you to emulate that in your own authentic way.
RHEA WONG 13:15
That’s so smart. I know lots of folks on this call are listening to this podcast. We’ll think, Pooya, that sounds great. I don’t have time for that. How do I do that at scale? So how many people do you recommend that you do these interviews with? And who do you choose? Is it a section of your donor base? Are they people that you’re trying to cultivate into a higher gift? Who do I talk to?
POOYA POURAK 13:36
Yeah! Let’s talk about some of those misconceptions. Because I think one of them is that donor interviews are hard or that they’re really time-consuming. It’s really not. It’s knowing your list of donors having their contact information, drafting a very simple permission-type email with your calendar link, and setting up a call. These are people who have donated to your organization.
POOYA POURAK 13:58
They clearly believe in what you’re doing. And very likely they’re going to be willing to jump on a call for you. So if there’s any fear around, I don’t know, people love to give their feedback and opinions. People love being asked questions, especially about a cause that they’ve donated to and care about. That’s the first thing is I don’t know. It’s like really super tough time and resource intensive. Now, if you have a list of a thousand donors, do you want to talk to all thousand of them? Probably not.
POOYA POURAK 14:28
You may not have the time to do that. So think about segmenting your donors into a couple of major categories. Your major gift donors are great to talk to you and maybe the questions that you ask your major gift donors are a little bit heavier on like the program areas and getting their feedback on programs and what it is that they’d like to see going forward and to the other group is just like your individual donors.
POOYA POURAK 14:54
The smaller gift donor contributors and really understanding what it is that motivates them to give. And then also, if you’ve got grants or foundations that are supporting your cause, another great segment of folks to talk to you. So I’d say if you’re just starting out, just start with one interview. Just get on the phone with one of your donors. We’ll call whether it’s in person or over the phone and just start there, and you’re gonna go, oh, my gosh! That was amazing. I feel really good. My donor feels really good.
POOYA POURAK 15:26
I can do this. And the thing is you don’t need to do a hundred interviews in a week. This is a continuous process. And ideally, you’ve got that connection with your donors to where you can keep the continuous pulse of feedback coming in. And remember, this is research, but it’s not research. It’s really about your relationship, the cultivation that you’re doing here. And it’s a really great way to help move your organization from this transactional to a more relational experience.
RHEA WONG 15:57
Yeah! A couple of points there that I just really want to lift up. And this, I really recommend that folks listen to my interview with Greg Warner because he talks about this. But this isn’t to your point, or research experience. This is an engagement experience, right? This is an opportunity to learn. And then the other thing I would just lift up for people is and again, Jason Frazell’s interview really points to this. He talks about the three levels of listening, and I’d love for you to speak a little bit more about that as a human-centered designer.
RHEA WONG 16:28
But he talked about level one listening being about and listening with an agenda. Level two listening is listening with no agenda, just seeing what’s here. And level three listening is I’m listening for what’s not being said. And I think so often, especially when we’re busy, we’re like, got stuff to do. We’re just in that level one listening of okay, what I’m just looking for the gems. Can you talk about the art of listening?
POOYA POURAK 16:54
Yes! I think the art of listening starts with listening more than your talker, and not getting defensive, either. This isn’t your time to try to justify any kind of points that maybe there are concerns. It’s your time to acknowledge what you’re hearing. And to really reflect back on those points that you are hearing. There is a time and place for you to follow up and say, hey, I really appreciate your feedback. I’m going to love to keep in touch and show you how we’re going to take action on what you heard or really close the loop in that.
POOYA POURAK 17:28
So I think the other part of what you said, I really liked the three levels. One of the ways we think about this in human-centered design is an iceberg. In this example of the donor research, and donor interviews that we’re doing, the tip of the iceberg is we want to really better connect with and understand our donors and their experience and how we can improve that. The base of the iceberg, the much larger portion of that is everything else. So it’s like their personal story.
POOYA POURAK 17:58
It’s their experience with other organizations. It’s what really motivates and drives them. It’s their feedback and recommendations on how they believe your programming could be different, or how the ideas that they have. And the point here that I want to make as well is doing an interview. And I think maybe some of the reservations that nonprofit leaders might have about doing this is that asking for feedback is not the same as making a commitment. You’re there to listen and take these suggestions and no ceiling.
POOYA POURAK 18:34
This isn’t the time to say okay, we’re not going to do that. We don’t have the budget for that, or we don’t have the resources to do that right now. It’s thank you for your feedback. That’s really great. I want to take that back and see what we can do. And guess what, here’s an example. I was doing research on my research questions with another amazing nonprofit leader, Aaron. And let’s say you’re a sports nonprofit, and the donor says, hey, I would love if we had medals that we gave to the student-athletes at the end of the season to recognize them. Instead of saying we don’t have the budget for that.
POOYA POURAK 19:07
You could say that’s a really great idea. Let me take that back. And guess what, you can circle back with that donor a week, two weeks later, and say, hey, we looked at your suggestion, and it would take us $500 to do medals per team. This is the budget that it would take to make that happen. Now is an appropriate time to maybe ask for that appeal. That’s specific to that individual’s feedback. Open-ended questions are really the key and the art to soliciting and giving the reins to the donor to share their feedback. But I hope that was helpful.
RHEA WONG 19:41
The interesting point that I really want to make sure we highlight is that closing the feedback loop is really critical because if people take the time to tell you what they think and their opinion and so forth, they don’t get the sort of ending of the story as it were, they probably won’t do to it again. It’s going to feel unsatisfying to them. Even if the loopback is like, hey, we considered what you suggested. And we decided not to. But here’s why. You really have to do that feedback close.
POOYA POURAK 20:13
Yeah! It’s so important. One of the things I always tell my clients that I’m working with in human-centered design, this feedback is completely useless if you don’t put it into action, or raise awareness of the inputs that you’re getting. And ultimately, it is really important that you take action, even if you don’t implement the feedback to go back and say, here’s what we heard.
POOYA POURAK 20:33
And here’s our roadmap or what we’re doing, and hey, we can’t do this right now but thank you. That is really important. And it makes the individuals that you’ve connected with feel heard and feel empowered. There are a lot of different ways to do that, as a nonprofit leader. Maybe it becomes part of your case statement where you have a section, where you’re sharing results from these interviews that you’ve conducted with your donors or even with your partners, your volunteers, and the people that you’re serving, ideally.
POOYA POURAK 21:06
And saying, this is what you said, and this is what we’re doing about it. Think of it as you’re planting this really beautiful seed in this relationship with the person you’re talking to. And the feedback that they’re giving you is an opportunity for you to follow back up with that person and build trust, whether or not you actually commit to taking that action. The follow-up is so important. And I’m really glad you brought it back to that.
RHEA WONG 21:38
Yeah! I think trust-building is ultimately the key to all of this, right? If you don’t have trust, you don’t have a transaction. Talk to me a little bit about it, you and I spoke on your podcast, and I think I talked about how I want a one-woman, mission two ditch the pitch. I think fundraisers are taught to like have their pitch deck ready, and their five-minute elevator pitch. I personally have never felt that worked.
RHEA WONG 21:54
I think it’s obviously important that you have all of your information in your mind, organized ready to go. But I’ve never raised money or built a relationship on the back of some magical combination of words. So I’ve said, so talk to me a little bit about your perspective on the pitch.
POOYA POURAK 22:23
Oh, gosh! As a startup founder myself, I can attest to everything you just said. It’s not the pitch deck that gets the investment or the donation at the end of the day. And this is one of the insights that we’ve gotten when we asked donors, what is it that motivated you to give? It’s always a personal connection to the cause, the mission, and the person. People give to people. People give to causes.
POOYA POURAK 22:51
So a better approach to saying, hi, thanks for dedicating 30 minutes of your time. I’m going to use that 20 minutes of that talking through these slides and presentations. And then at the end, I’ll give you some space to ask questions. They’re gonna tune off as soon as you do that. Keep it conversational. Ask those questions that get to the root of the connection, the heart of why someone would want to invest in you and your organization, and you’ll do much better.
POOYA POURAK 23:23
And also this isn’t a one-and-done like, I just did this donor interview. In the next call, I’m gonna get a donation. No! It’s not a linear process. It’s this continuous fostering and nurturing of the relationship. And ideally, like the best investments in rehab, I’m curious if you’ve had this experience, you don’t even have to ask. People just get to the point where they’re like, how do I give? Do you just take my money? This isn’t great.
RHEA WONG 23:50
Yeah! I definitely had that. But I didn’t really tend to like to ask. What’s occurring to me is having worked for Delta, I’m assuming that you also had the chance to speak with people who were not very happy with Delta. So talk to me about the role of people who are disgruntled or unhappy with the work that you’re doing. What is the value there? Because I think so often, the impulse may be like, I don’t want to talk to those people because they don’t like us or they’re mad about something that we did.
POOYA POURAK 24:19
They are going to be the most useful. Honestly, it’s really great to hear what’s working. And you need to know that to continue to reinforce those types of actions. But running into the fire is where you grow. And it’s also very uncomfortable. But the more comfortable you become, and the more that you’re able to take action, the better the experience. At Delta, we used a metric called Net Promoter Score, where we looked at people who are promoters of the brand, and how likely you are to recommend versus detractors.
POOYA POURAK 24:52
People who gave a really low score and what we found is that if you engage those detractors and listen to them, and then actually take action on what their feedback was, and work on service recovery for that next experience, it is way easier to turn someone who is a detractor into a promoter than it is to turn someone who’s just neutral about your brand into your promoter. It’s really being vulnerable and open to that feedback.
POOYA POURAK 25:26
It’s being comfortable with acknowledging that not everything is sunshine and roses, and really respecting that perspective, and ultimately, working to improve that experience. And that doesn’t just apply to donors. That’s your team. It’s the people you serve. It’s the partners that you’re working with, as well as volunteers. And you’ll get very specific feedback. It’s almost always going to be very targeted to a specific moment of truth in the journey of that individual with your organization. And you’ll know exactly what you need to do to make that difference.
RHEA WONG 26:09
That’s so good. And I think the point of people who are upset is indicating that there’s a level of care there, even if they’re mad. There’s emotion there, which I think is where the fire is, to your point, as opposed to, if I feel mad about something, I’m not going to get excited about it or that upset about it. It’s a mess. So talk to us a little bit about the insights that you’ve learned during this process with the group that you’re with.
RHEA WONG 26:36
There’s a lot that’s coming out. I think one of the biggest and most significant impacts and changes from just conducting these donor interviews with this nonprofit that I’m on the board of City League is the internal change of becoming comfortable with getting feedback. This is a muscle of exercise that you do. And it can be really scary to want to get on a phone call or connect with your donors or any one of your stakeholders.
RHEA WONG 27:07
So just even the act of doing these interviews can lead to a significant mindset shift for your organization to be more comfortable, to be more receptive, and to involve your communities in a more relationship-oriented way. So I think that the first insight is just this act of doing these interviews with your stakeholders will shift your perspective and culture in positive ways. I’ll give a couple of specific insights and examples. One that is already said. it’s super obvious.
RHEA WONG 27:43
People give to people when we were asking why, what is it that motivated you to give? Why did you decide to donate? It was almost always a personal connection to the mission, the cause, or a person that they know. You had a really pretty website and a pitch deck. That was awesome. It was thank you. I just really appreciate Allison’s cousins. She’s doing amazing work in our community. I really believe in her. She took the time to write me this now. So it’s, again, coming back to the relationship.
RHEA WONG 28:15
That is what’s going to nurture and build those donations. I’ll give an example because we’re focused on donors, but I think it’s super important. And maybe like primary, when you think about interviews, as well, is talking to the people that you serve. So for City League, they’re serving middle school student-athletes. And one of the things that we heard in doing surveys and interviews with the students was there’s this student who’s been bullied before. They’re part of the program. And now that they’re part of these sports programs. They built a community in a team and that stopped.
RHEA WONG 28:49
So now we know that hey! This programming isn’t just creating access to sports. It’s fundamentally shifting the health of a student individual. And there’s this segment of our population that we’re serving that really needs us, and how do we use this information to engage more parents and create programming that is really maximizing this holistic impact that we’re looking to create? So those are just a couple examples of some of the bigger insights that we’ve learned from these interviews. But again, it’s really about those relationships.
RHEA WONG 29:26
I’m thinking about Henry Ford right now. And he said something to the effect of if we’d asked people what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse. So I’m thinking about what is the tension if there is a tension between the feedback that you’re getting from folks and say, a visionary founder who may be seeing something that other people haven’t seen yet.
POOYA POURAK 29:52
This is a great question. In human-centered design, we look at the intersection of what people want and what we can actually do, and what is aligned with our mission. So we look at the Venn diagram of what’s desirable, and what is the feedback that we’re hearing. What is viable? What is aligned with our mission, our scope and programming that we’re doing. And what is feasible?
POOYA POURAK 30:19
Can we implement this thing that they’re asking at all? Is it even possible? So I do think it’s a mistake to be super reflexive to the feedback that you’re getting. Everything should always work through your team. You don’t want to start creating fire drills at your board to say, hey! I heard this thing from this one donor. We need to put this into effect. No! You need to look at it through, first and foremost, the lens of your mission and your values I think. And then really collaborate, right?
POOYA POURAK 30:49
It’s not a one-way street feedback that involves your board and involves your team. It’s really your organization coming together and saying, this is really important feedback. What insight does this drive? What can we learn from this? And then what are the opportunities in front of us? And what actions can we take?
POOYA POURAK 31:11
So it’s never really a one-to-one, sometimes it is. We heard this is what we’re doing. Ideally, you’re looking at the feedback you’re collecting from the hole and saying, here’s what we learned. And here are the opportunities in front of us. And then here’s what’s feasible and viable, and aligns with our mission and what we can actually deliver.
RHEA WONG 31:34
I think it’s such an interesting point. And look, I’m guilty of this, too, of designing in a vacuum, like designing without the input of our donors or our constituents. I’m wondering, why is that? Is it a capacity issue? Is it philosophic? Why are we failing to solicit feedback from our community?
POOYA POURAK 31:56
It takes effort. It takes thoughtful effort to do that. Having applied human-centered design, and many projects in government and the private sector, the biggest reason people don’t do it is that they think that it’s just too time-consuming that we know the answers. What’s the problem with that? We’re building solutions, and programming strategies, from an inside-out perspective.
POOYA POURAK 32:20
We’re putting our ideas and saying this is what you end up putting it out there. What this human-centered design approach says is, before he does that, it’s good to have those goals. It’s good to have your concepts, and those ideas, but start with an understanding of the needs, the challenges, and the experiences of the people you’re working with. and serving and build from that understanding. I’d be totally lying if I said, if it wasn’t an investment of time and effort to make this kind of interview and research happen.
POOYA POURAK 32:59
But what’s the opportunity cost of you not doing that, this is one of the biggest difficult selling points around doing this kind of research. In technology in the private sector or government, when we don’t take the time to capture feedback, we usually end up rolling out solutions that then have a lot of challenges, adoption becomes an issue. People aren’t really bought into it because it’s, oh! I didn’t know this was coming down the pipe, or, we didn’t think about this use case.
POOYA POURAK 33:27
Or, we didn’t really take into account this segment of the people we’re serving. So when you do take that initial setup, and thoughtful approach to understanding the needs of the people, and using that to help inform and enhance your strategy, you’re getting ahead of all a lot of those landmines that typically come when you’re looking to actually implement these programs out in the world.
RHEA WONG 33:54
So what I’m hearing is you’re actually saving time by implementing this on the front end. So tactically speaking, a couple of questions here, when you say that it does take time and effort, how much time, how much effort and who is actually conducting these interviews? So that was like three questions at once. Let’s start with that.
POOYA POURAK 34:15
Yeah! I think everyone, there’s a sliding scale in terms of how much time it could take you to, I wish donors you want to contact. Let’s just say you want to start with one or ten. Let’s just start with a list of 10 people. Let’s timebox that activity until a 30-minute exercise of who we want to talk to. Two, hey, let’s draft an email that is personalized to that donor coming from the person who has a relationship with that donor. Right?
POOYA POURAK 34:43
If I just got a phone call from someone that I don’t know or an email from someone at this nonprofit that I don’t know, I’m much less likely to respond. I’m much more likely to question the intent and what this is about. Whereas if it’s like hey, I donated to Alison, as soon as she reaches out to me, oh, warm connection and warm entrance. But to answer your question directly, the person who’s doing the research, or the interviews and reaching out shouldn’t be the person that the donor has as their “primary point of contact” if that exists.
POOYA POURAK 35:17
So let’s say 15 minutes to identify who your first-time donors are, let’s say 30 minutes to draft this template of an email to actually send to your donors, you send all of that out, and then 15 minutes for these conversations. And then you’re just taking notes. Ideally, you’re taking notes and writing down exactly what you hear. We don’t want to introduce our own bias into what we’re hearing.
POOYA POURAK 35:39
If you can capture the exact quote of what that person is saying, you’re really honoring the spirit of the feedback that you’re hearing. So for those that might be thinking about starting an initiative like this, I think honestly, if you just dedicated a few hours in a week, you could get through 10 donor interviews pretty easily.
POOYA POURAK 36:04
Now, the beauty of this is that when you do it the first time, every other subsequent time becomes easier and more natural, more comfortable, and faster. What you then do with that feedback is another exercise in and of itself. But it’s hard to put into the exact time boxing, but it’s a few hours a week to just even listen is sufficient.
RHEA WONG 36:25
So I want to talk about what we do with the feedback. But before we do that, just thinking about implementation, how might you train people to do good interviews? Because I do think there is an art to being a good interviewer. And we’ll say, and I’m sure you might find this to be the case. But after 220 podcast interviews I’ve done, I’m a much better listener now than I was that episode one. And it’s always changing. So how do you train people to be good interviewers and to be sensitive to the information that they are gathering?
POOYA POURAK 37:02
It’s a really good question. And I think that there are people in your nonprofit organization that is just naturally going to be better at these types of interviews and conversations. Maybe your IT person isn’t the best person not to generalize tech folks on the line. But people who are in that conversational community facing role development leaders, we’re constantly in these positions of having conversations. And ideally, if you’re good at what you’re doing, you know how to listen.
POOYA POURAK 37:40
So I think the first layer to that question, Rhea, is people who are naturally good at connecting with others in your nonprofit, you want them at the forefront of these kinds of initiatives. Things to keep in mind as you’re conducting interviews, as I said, you definitely want to give more space for your interview to the person you’re talking to. A good rule of thumb is maybe 20% of the time you’re talking and 80% of the time. They’re talking about reflecting back what you hear is a really simple tactic that makes few people feel really heard, like, oh! I hear you.
POOYA POURAK 38:25
This is what you just said. That’s a really good point. Just that one little simple thing can take your interviews into a much more positive space. Also, keep in mind that this is a space and time for discovery for you to learn. This isn’t the time for you to start brainstorming ideas of here’s what we can do. And this is the exact action that we can take. And it’s not your time to throw in all the reasons why you can’t implement something. You’re just taking feedback in and it’s a gift to be getting simple information.
POOYA POURAK 39:00
I think just those three simple rules of some people are more naturally able to connect with folks at your organization. You know who those folks are. Ideally, the ones that have a relationship with the donor. It makes it much easier to reflect back on what you hear. And three, just keep in mind that this is the time for your donor, or whoever you’re speaking to, to share their feedback. And it’s not the time to be throwing out all the reasons why you can or can’t.
RHEA WONG 39:30
Last question for me. This has been so informative. So thank you for that. So let’s say we collect all of this feedback, right? What do we do with it then? Do we have a meeting? Do we do some kind of analysis? What do we do with all this?
POOYA POURAK 39:43
I think it’s a more intuitive process than I’m going to make it sound. Honestly, you could have five phone interviews. You don’t even need to have taken notes or anything. You just will know. Okay, here are 1, 2, or 3 things that we can do you based on what I heard from all these people. Let’s do it. So that’s the minimum viable kind of approach to this just your intuition. You’re connecting with people. You hear what they said, and you just will naturally know what the opportunities are to move forward.
POOYA POURAK 40:15
Now, there are much more rigorous ways of going about this. The first starts with taking really good notes. So when you’re on the phone, take those, direct quotes to the questions that you’re asking, and having those quotes in a really great place maybe enhancing your donor records and a donor management system to build on enriching your donor profiles is a great way to store this data and use it over and over as you’re building that relationship with your donors. But ultimately, you want to move from the raw feedback that you’re getting into the aha moments, where are the insights? Where are the key takeaways that you’re hearing?
POOYA POURAK 40:54
Whether it’s from one conversation, or ideally, the things that float to the surface from multiple commerce, I’m hearing this over and over again. Those are your insights and themes of things that you’re hearing. And then we move from that to what can we do about this? A great way of doing this kind of taking action on research is to have a debrief with your team, whether that’s your board, or whoever is at the strategic level or tactical level of making decisions at your organization to say, we’re going to take an hour.
POOYA POURAK 41:27
We’re going to spend 20 minutes of that just talking through what I heard, or what we heard in these interviews. People are going to jump in and say, oh, yeah! I’ve heard that before, though. We’re going to elaborate on some of that and really understand the root causes. And then the next phase of this meeting, we’re going to talk about where are the takeaways and opportunities for us based on this feedback.
POOYA POURAK 41:52
And then maybe that meeting ends there. And we’re gonna pick this back up another time because it can be a lot to go through this. But if you want to take it further, then you say, what can we do about this? We have this much budget dedicated to this and we can take this initiative, or we can maybe change the way that we’re communicating with our donors. And now you’re developing an action plan.
POOYA POURAK 42:13
And coming back to your very smart and important question earlier, is once you’ve heard what you’ve heard, once you’ve defined the opportunities, once you’ve decided what you are going to do, or what you will not prioritize at this moment, taking the time to follow back up with those individuals and saying, thank you so much for your feedback. Here’s what we learned.
POOYA POURAK 42:39
And here’s what we plan to do in the future. It’s really important to sum all that up discovery, listen to the people you’re working with and serving, and define and make sense of what you heard. Come up with themes, and develop opportunities, ways that you can implement that action, and then ultimately deliver and go back and follow up with those people who took the time to share the feedback with you.
RHEA WONG 43:09
Thank you so much. Would you be willing to share some of the research questions with our listeners?
POOYA POURAK 43:16
Absolutely! I’ve got that and actually plan to publish a blog post here in the coming week or so that kind of summarizes a lot of this. That could be a very helpful resource for your listeners. So I’ll be sure to follow up with you and link that back out. But I’m happy to share some of those questions and our follow-up as well.
RHEA WONG 43:36
I will make sure to put that in the show notes for people listening online. And I will also make sure to put your LinkedIn profile if folks want to reach out to you. So please, thank you so much for everything. Anything else before we sign off?
POOYA POURAK 43:50
Just the big thank you for everything that you’re doing, Rhea, to push the sector in this positive way and the awareness that you’re raising to all of these amazing opportunities and challenging the status quo. It’s just you. It’s people like you that make the world a better place. And I just want to say thank you.
RHEA WONG 44:15
I appreciate you. And actually, before we got on the call, I was to say I was singing your praises. I think the fact that you’re bringing so much of your own expertise and personal experience into making nonprofits better is really inspirational. So thanks so much. Have a great week, everyone. Take care!
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