🎆 Happy 2023! Before we dive into the new year, let’s recap my 5 most popular Nonprofit Lowdown episodes from 2022.
These insightful convos cover everything from ditching toxic fundraising tactics to navigating across generations in the workplace and beyond. I’ve compiled the very best nuggets of wisdom to inspire you to find greater connection and community in the year ahead.
We touch on themes like the power of deep listening, building trust through questions vs demands, understanding generational differences with empathy, and more. Each guest brings a unique lens but underscores the same core truth:
Fundraising works best when we lead with shared humanity, not organizational needs.
I’m committed to helping this industry unlearn bad habits in 2023 so we can build authentic, equitable partnerships between nonprofits and philanthropists. And have a lot more fun while we’re at it! 😊
If these greatest hits resonate, make sure to subscribe and stick around as we continue the conversation this year. Thank you for joining me on this mission to create better fundraiser-donor relationships rooted in care.
Listen to the full episode here and get inspired for the year to come! 🎧
Important Links:
#219 – Listening + Speaking with Intent with Jason Frazell – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/219-listening-speaking-with-intent-with-jason-frazell/id1436858854?i=1000593176725
#223 – Negotiating like a Hostage Negotiator with Troy Smith – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/223-negotiating-like-a-hostage-negotiator-with-troy-smith/id1436858854?i=1000598249006
#224 – Why Major Donor Processes Suck and What to Do Instead with Greg Warner – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/224-why-major-donor-processes-suck-and-what-to-do/id1436858854?i=1000599328901
#243 – Gen Z staff, Gen X leaders with Darren Isom – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/243-gen-z-staff-gen-x-leaders-with-darren-isom/id1436858854?i=1000619122514
#257 – How to Stop Chasing Donors and 10x Your Thinking with Brooke Richie-Babbage, Cindy Wagman and Jess Campbell – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/257-how-to-stop-chasing-donors-and-10x-your-thinking/id1436858854?i=1000630681751
Episode Transcript
RHEA 0:00
Welcome to Nonprofit Lowdown. I’m your host, Rhea Wong.
Friends, Ria here. This is our last episode of 2023 and what a year it has been. I thought it would be fun to put together an episode of our top five most listened to episodes of 2023 for a fun look back. Also, I just wanted to thank you so much for listening.
This is such a labor of love for me. It is a ton of fun for me to produce and I really thank you for listening.
Whether you are new to non-profit low down or have been a longtime listener, it would be wonderful. If you could pop onto apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts and give me a positive review.
Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
I hope you and yours are enjoying a wonderful, safe, and happy holiday season. See you soon.
Episode 219 listening and speaking with intent with Jason Frazell.
JASON FRAZELL 0:58
I’m going to talk about three levels of listening.
Level one. You’re listening through your, for your own agenda, which is where most humans listen for most of the time. So I would assert that those that are live with us here and for the podcast, you’re listening through your own agenda. What’s valuable? What can I use? What can I tactically take away? And by the way, none of these levels are wrong.
There’s a tremendous amount of value in listening through that lens. What’s valuable? Give you an example here. An overarching example is listening through the lens of value. How is this valuable? How is this not valuable? This is how most people listen to most people. Oh, is this when Ria comes in and gives me a pitch on why I should work with her?
Do I believe that she is going to provide enough value that I’m going to invest? Great. Cause that’s easy for most people. And it removes the ability to see outside of the value conversation because value is subjective. So now we’re talking about sales, we’re talking about fundraising, value is subjective.
So if you go, is it valuable enough? That’s your own interpretation of the value. And that’s great. And there’s a lot of use to that. So number one is you’re listening through your, for your own agenda. What’s in it for you? Where can, and so like people listen with all sorts of agendas. Let me give you a few people can listen for.
I’m right. I like to listen for that one. People can listen for, Oh, I’m wrong. Some people. Have a pull towards, oh, how can I be wrong? And that ends, that usually comes from a not enough type of context. So like, where else can I listen to this to prove that I’m not enough? This is where imposter syndrome comes from.
So if you have imposter syndrome, you know what that is. And you go into a room and you share some things. And you’re listening for like, where am I? Do I not belong here? You’re going to spot those places where you think you don’t belong. Some people will listen for, how am I alone? Like, how am I not likable?
How am I not agreeable? And then there’s all sorts of other ways to listen. So you can just be thinking about, so the practice I’d have for everybody here is, as you’re going out and listening and doing the work that you do and doing this in your personal life, what are you listening for? So that’s listening level one, and that’s the level that we all get trained on.
What I want to point out here too, which you alluded to is confirmation bias, right? So to go back to our earlier point, if we have beliefs about the world that I’m not enough, I don’t belong, I don’t get to have the things I want, I will then pick up all of the confirmation that is true because like my brain is primed to look for those things.
Yeah. The technical term, technical coaching jargon is context. And what we say is context is definitive. So if you have a context that you’re not good enough, or you have a context that. Your startup can’t raise capital. The thing about being human, that’s both brilliant and challenging is our ego likes to be right, no matter what we say to it.
So if you say, Hey, you know what, I’m unlovable or Hey, I’m a great leader. Your ego, subconscious ego is going to be consciously looking for proof of that thing. So think about it for those who have a relationship of any type, like a romantic relationship. If you think of your partner as. Think about their most annoying trait, like the thing that annoys you the most.
And then you think about, they’re not very clean. I’m just going to make one up. They’re not clean. What are you reliably going to do? You’re going to spot very easily all the ways where they’re not clean. It’s gonna be much harder for you to spot where they might actually be doing a good job with that.
Or where they, oh, like they actually have done the thing. So this is one of the challenges in romantic relationships is we have strong context about our partners and then we’re always looking for the proof of them because our ego likes to be right about it. Yeah.
RHEA 4:28
Quick question. So what if my belief system is I’m awesome, I’m incredible, and I look around for confirmation of that. What’s the fine line between, I hate the term positive thinking, positive reinforcement and being a psychopath?
JASON 4:41
Yeah, first of all, I don’t know anybody who has that thought pattern all the time, and I work with some pretty senior people who, if they were here, would be like, that person makes a ton of money and they do really well.
They don’t think that way all the time. None of us do. I know I don’t. I’m pretty sure you don’t, Ria. And we live in New York, where people like to put that on, but when you do think, yeah, you’re gonna be looking for proof of it, close the big deal. Closed a big, I closed a big donor. Oh, we got a big win.
There’s nothing wrong with that. Where it becomes toxic in my opinion, and let’s do something very timely. I don’t know anything about him other than what I see in the news, but Elon Musk seems to have a context about himself that has him removed from some other being a good human is what I would call it and what would be possible if he could combine all that into one thing, almost infinitesimal resources and the ability to influence people and markets and also do it like with kindness.
In any way he has to do the amazing. So that’s, and I’m not saying he’s a psychopath. I don’t know, but it’s, it becomes where you think you’re so good. I do believe pride cometh before the false. So people that think they’re so good. generally will get theirs and people that are unwilling to be humble as well.
So humbleness is a context. Oh, I’m humble. It’s a context I grew up with in Midwest. That’s the way I grew up is we were humble. So even if we’re, we think we’re good, we don’t talk about it. That’s a context. If you are like different that you’re like, I am just good, then nothing wrong with that. You’re always going to be looking for proof of how you can prove to people that you are really good.
And also those people. Generally don’t believe that about themselves if you got them behind closed doors or you were able to get inside their own self talk.
RHEA 6:20
Alright, and the other thing I just want to say about level one listening is it feels like that’s the transactional level, right? It’s, I want this.
I give you X, you give me Y, right? And that’s, it’s a very superficial. So what’s the next level of listening?
JASON 6:35
Yeah. Next level of listening is listening through curiosity, through the context or the filter of curiosity. So let’s take an example with you and I right here, right now on this podcast and on this webinar.
Yeah. So the transactional level on listening, Oh, she wants me to answer in question for the audience, which is true. And by the way, these stack on top of each other, not mutually exclusive, where you go, I’m only a level two listener. Now that is a hard, that is a impossible thing to do. But the curiosity I have then is what’s the value for you all in my answer here?
And that’s a curiosity to have for myself. Curiously asking, we’re going to talk about this too, is what do I want you all to know and how much of it is it about me with my own agenda and what I actually believe to be true? So this is an example where level two listening also you can do with yourself.
Which I think we’re gonna, we’re gonna talk about this a little bit later. But for example, if you’re talking about fundraising and you’re talking to a big donor and they’re telling you all the reasons that they think you might be the right place for them to put their money, they’re not telling you everything.
Almost 100 percent of the time that the curiosity would be, Oh, I’m telling you because it makes important, I care about this cause most people, not all, most people go, Oh, I’m so glad you care about this cause. When are we getting your check? What is it about this cause that you’re so passionate about?
Curiosity based question. The thing I’ll say to everybody is one of the things I learned in coaching is you don’t really ever ask why questions because why generally implies some sort of judgment. Why are you doing this? Why are we on this podcast? Why are you all here today? And how questions, what is it about this nonprofit that has you passionate?
How would you like your money to make a difference? Like those are questions that don’t have a lens of judgment. It’s purely like a curiosity based question. And so I think that I always like to have takeaways, my agenda. From level one is, I just want you to have takeaways. So where can you get more curious about what’s being said?
And that’s, I know that’s going to lead us to point number three, but level two listening is from curiosity, doing your best to remove your agenda and just being present. This is also when people are like, Oh my gosh, she’s such a good listener. It’s usually because that person is listening from level two, not level one.
RHEA 8:50
I just want to earmark here for those who are out there fundraising is it’s often hard to get into level two or even level three listening when you feel the pressure of I got to close a gift, right? So how do we manage the sort of anxiety that we might feel to get, really transactional because I have pressures to close a gift because it feels like level two and level three are really about letting a moment unfold.
JASON 9:16
Yeah, very challenging when you are under, and let’s talk about our friend, Dr. Eugene again, when you’re in survival state, which is we need this check to come in by the end of the month, or we can’t make payroll, just using a random example here, you’re going to be in survival state most likely because you’re literally, your brain actually believes that’s surviving, not dying in certain ways.
So it’s hard because level one is easy for all of us because we’re trained in it. So you’re going to naturally go there. So I don’t have a good answer for you on the how to because the how to would be unique to each person in the way that they process. What I would say is meditation, getting present to what’s true for you, breath work, like things that would calm you.
Is one of the things that get you present and into your executive state, because in your executive state, you’re going to realize we do need that check, but we’re actually going to survive. And there’s other opportunities and there’s other things there. So I know for me, I find, especially in my sales group, before I knew any of this lovely stuff, which would’ve been really helpful a few years ago. Yeah. At the end of the quarter when your boss says, we need this to come in, you’re in pure survival mode and you’re gonna be listening for it.
How quickly can I close this deal? How quickly can I close this donor? What’s the buying sign they’re going to say? And unless the people listening here are just much more skilled at this, at me, a yes isn’t always a yes and a yes in level one is usually gonna feel like a yes. Oh my gosh, we got it. And then with no curiosity, you’re like, oh, they’re actually not the decision maker.
They now need to go talk to the board. We I think anybody who’s ever raised money, either through sales or if their nonprofit work will know a yes is not a yes when you’re talking to people who have other decision makers and getting curious, even the curiosity question. Great. So who else in the organization is really passionate about this?
Who else would we need to talk to? Is that, so that’s, at a nutshell, like that’s level two is curiosity based question.
RHEA 11:09
And the thing I just wanna flag here is so often the way that we’re taught to fundraise or to do sales is like the A, B, C, always be closing paradigm. It does not work. And it feels really disgusting because we’re actually not creating relationships and connections.
We’re looking at people like they’re walking checkbooks. And so I think we have to help the field unlearn all of these bad toxic habits.
JASON 11:33
I saw an article on LinkedIn yesterday about this. How a lot of people who recruit for sales are having trouble with the newest generation coming out of college because of the negative connotation around it, because that’s still the thing.
But the truth of it is I always relate to my salesperson, you’re a salesperson too. Like I, you can buy things for me, it’s my services is that you all can find out a lot about me. Before you ever talk to me, you can find out about 90% of what you. on the internet about most things, including nonprofits or donors.
Like it’s mostly out there. So the days of having, like having the salesperson be your go-to for information is gone. So for me, all I have really have is to build a relationship with you and make sure it’s a good fit, and that gets really challenging when you’re under a timeline. When you’re in survival State, I’m not gonna say, oh yeah, if you can just do level two listening, it’s gonna be easier.
It’s not gonna be easy. That’s why it’s a constant practice. And it’s never gonna be perfect. So it’s just something to continue to practice and be, quite frankly, Rhea to be. The awareness that it exists is usually a game changer for a lot of people. That there actually is another thing to do or another way to listen.
RHEA 12:38
Yeah. For anyone listening on the podcast, they know that I am on a single woman mission to ditch the pitch. I think we teach nonprofits that you need a pitch and like the 10, like the five second elevator pitch. And I have never raised money off the back of a pitch. There’s no magical combination of words that I am going to say to get you to write a check.
It’s about relationship. It’s about. Marrying the work that we’re doing with who you believe you are in the world and the value and impact you wanna have. And it’s an invitation, right? It’s a combining of resources. Not a extractive I do this, you do that. Level one is listening with an agenda. Level two is listening with curiosity. What’s the magical level three?
JASON 13:22
Yeah, the, oh my gosh, it’s so magical. It’s actually not magical. It’s just something that most people, I’m just gonna speak for myself that I wasn’t really aware of is listening to the, so the way we, what we call this in coaching is listening to the whole of the client, how you would say this in the real world outside of jargon is paying attention to what’s going on.
With a client’s body language, their energy and their space around them. So think about everybody listening. I want you to think about the time you had a sales call or a pitch, like you said, a pitch or a donor meeting and you’re with the person and it all sounded good, but you knew. But there was something wacky with the energy we.
I would be shocked if everybody listening hasn’t been there, something wacky or maybe it’s frenetic or maybe they’re extra relaxed. Listening through that lens. And then coaching specifically, and this is really a coaching thing. If you were my client here, Rianne, and I saw you really light up about something that we talked about, I would say, Hey, I you really, it felt like you really lit up there.
Is there anything to explore? The way you would do this in a sales context would be, Hey, you seem really passionate like it lands for me, like you’re really passionate about this. Is there anything you’d like to tell me about? Noticing what’s going on with the body like, and humans were pretty bad, and most humans are pretty bad at hiding excitement and pretty bad about hiding disappointment or frustration.
Most of us, we like to think we’re good. We got the stone cold face. We don’t show any emotion, but humans are notorious for microexpressions. Where we can’t actually hide those things. Dogs do microexpressions all the time. We do them as humans and we can’t control them. That’s the whole purpose behind them.
Now, I’m not saying you have to become an expert on microexpressions. I’m not an expert on it, but [00:15:00] noticing also, I think for people that are doing fundraising and then nonprofit world, the thing that really you can pay attention to is where do the words not align with the energy of the. . And one of the things that I do not believe the education system ever trains us for is how to pay attention to the whole of a person and the energy of per of a person.
I think most of us intuitively we’re pretty aware of the energy. When you meet somebody you’re like, just oh, this is my person. There’s an energetic match there. And I’m not talking romantic, just Hey, I wanna get to know this person.
Or you meet someone and you’re like, Ooh, this is not my person. It’s another place where you can pay attention to what’s coming up and what’s in this space that might have you limit possibility there. Remember, and this is where you say, Hey, it seems like with a, what’s nice about coaching is you have a relationship with a person.
So you say, Hey, something just. I’m just noticing that something for me lands is off today. Is there anything we need to address? You can do that in a sales context. You seem like you’re really busy. Is now a good time to have this conversation? And this is where again, you can do this on Zoom or any virtual platform in person.
It’s even better. And I will offer this too. The whole of the space can be what’s going on around them. So is their office, does their office feel fren? , there’s a lot of stuff everywhere. Is it Barron that generally will say, like people’s space will say something about them? You just wanna be careful. You don’t interpret over-interpret it.
But it generally says something about us, like when we’re, especially when we’re in our space, like it means something about us. And so paying attention to all those. If you take one, you’re always gonna be listening for an agenda because that’s what our brain does in certain ways.
Where can I become more curious? About what’s being said or also what’s not being said. What’s the underlying meaning of the words? What am I curious about? And then what’s happening that isn’t what’s happening outside of the words being expressed? Combining those three allows you to go much deeper and build relationships with people and get to their truth much faster.
In what I think is in a way that’s in an ethically and it’s ethical and in actually in integrity because you’re actually meeting people where they’re at as opposed to Rhea. You said this, the idea of like sales, like here’s all these techniques that you can do and psychological and make the pain so high that they have to do it.
That can work. But what’s likely to happen is they’re likely to not be a donor for the next year or the year after. If they don’t feel that, or in sales, they’re likely to not rebuy from you. in a long nutshell. It’s a big nut nutshell. Those are the three levels of listening. Again, if you wanna know more about that, it’s the Proactive Training Institute.
You can look up three levels of listening. If you Google that.
RHEA 17:30
Jason, I love this so much because really at the end of the day, whether you’re in sales or in fundraising or whatever you’re doing, it’s about trust building. And people will not trust you if they don’t feel like you care about them, that you’re noticing things about them, that you’re listening to them.
Episode 223 negotiating like a hostage negotiator with Troy Smith.
What’s really striking to me in the methods that you teach is it’s really about letting a conversation unfold, letting people unfurl and not putting your own agenda per se.
Obviously the agenda is get the hostages out safely, but it’s not. You’re not trying to force something happening in some kind of way. Would you agree with that? Can you tell me a little bit about, about that theory behind it?
TROY SMITH 18:19
Yeah, so we don’t espouse saying yes, get, yes, that’s a car sales, salesman mentality, the way we look at it.
If you go to a car dealership, first thing they say, Oh, you like this car? You go, Oh yeah, nice. They can say, Oh, get in it. You need to turn it on, just drive it, man. You smell that nice new leather. It smells good, doesn’t it? Yeah. It rides good, doesn’t it? You’re in, they’re just hitting you for yes.
And then you get out of the car. And before they even know if you can really afford it, Hey, you ready to sign? You’re ready to sign on you. And you’re like, wait a minute. That’s why it’s called a test drive. I may want to test drive 20, 30 cars. So we give the people, yes, it’s commitment. We believe in saying no, getting a no.
So no it’s protection. So instead of saying, Hey, you’re willing to do this, aren’t you? And they’re really, they don’t know if they’re really willing to do it. We say, would you be against, would you be against doing that? And they’re like, no, now they had a choice. They felt like they had a choice coming up with if they wanted to do it or not, they weren’t forced into a position.
Where they had to commit to something that they may not have wanted to commit to. That’s how we operate. We feel like 75 to 80 percent of the conversation should be about the other person. How do you get to know people? If you don’t be quiet and listen and find out what’s going on in their work, you’re making decisions based on.
Faulty information. You don’t have all the data and you make a decision. That’s not a good way to do business. So find out about the individual, find out what makes them tick. Why are they in a situation or why they feel the way they feel. And people just want to be heard and understood. And if you can demonstrate that you’re a good listener and that you realize, understand the lay of the land from their perspective, they’re going to want to do, they’re going to want to reciprocate that opportunity to get to know you better.
RHEA 19:57
I love that so much. And actually, could you walk us through the five levels of listening because I find that to be a really interesting and helpful.
TROY 20:03
That’s a good question. We talk about the five levels of listening. You got the intermittent listening. You’re just listening and half paying attention.
It’s like somebody’s on their cell phone and they’re texting and they’re just listening just intermittently. Then you have the listening for rebuttal. Which is the second level. And that’s where most people are at when they’re in, when they’re talking to people or listening, they’re listening just to hear something that they can go and say, I can rebuttal that I can dispute that.
Or I can have opposition. Then it’s listening for their, for logic. What is that person’s logic? Why, what makes them feel the way they feel or say what they say? And then it’s for the logic and emotion. And when you listen for what the emotion is behind the logic, then you start to realize, okay, there’s, it’s a little deeper than.
Then what you may have thought, and then it’s the highest level listening and the highest level is when you’re listening at the highest level, you’ve so tuned in that you’re focused on everything they’re saying. And that’s a hard way to be. The fifth level is the toughest level to be at. You can, I’ve yet to see anybody be able to do it for 24 or for 12 hours, it is so intense, you don’t realize how much energy you’re expending.
And when you’re at that level, you’re dialed in, you’re dialed into everything they’re saying. It’s not, you’re not saying you agree with them, but you’re letting them know that you’re focused on what’s important to them.
RHEA 21:23
Yeah. That’s so critical. So I’m wondering, Troy, I love what you said that 75 to 80 percent should be them talking, but how does that, how do you keep it from becoming an interrogation?
Because if you’re like serving up question after question, then it becomes a little bit like, Whoa, okay. Is this a third degree or what? What are some tactics that we can use to make it so it feels like a conversation, not like I’m, like, launching questions at you?
TROY 21:50
I love that question. We don’t want to, we don’t want it to feel like a conversation.
We want it to be a conversation. Just to have a conversation with the other side. If you’re trying hard to make it feel like a conversation is going to come across as almost raw. But sit there like you and I were talking before we came up on the screen and we were just having a conversation about getting to know each other.
How you got to where you’re at, how I got to where I’m at, and just a mutual trust and agreement with each other that we respected with each other. When you’re in that conversation with somebody, it’s all a little difficult. When we talk about a negotiation, it’s a difficult conversation. Take that opportunity to not be so focused on what you want to say next.
That you’re listening to the other side and you do that, we have, we call the negotiation nine skills, labeling, mirroring, we talk about dynamic silence. Those aren’t a quick two plus one. They work together. There are three of the quick best skills that you can use to get started and you’ll start to see an improvement in the way you’re talking to people and the way people are talking to you because they’re feeling, starting to feel like, man, this person is genuinely trying to figure out what’s important to me, what matters to me.
And you make it about. I’ll give an example we, when I say 75 to 80 percent of the conversation, we talk about labeling, we label their emotions, we label the dynamics, what are we seeing, what are their ethics, if they’re telling us, they’re telling us no, but they’re shaking their head yes, you hit them with, instead of saying, you’re lying, they may not be lying.
It seems there’s something else going on. You didn’t, you weren’t direct. You’d say, it seems like, so they go, no, it’s nothing else going on. Or normally they’ll tell you, yeah, I’m having a little problem with this or that. And they’ll tell you what they’ll give you more information. But when you hit them with direct questions, like you said, almost like an interrogation, it doesn’t feel like a conversation.
It feels like you’re just beating them up for information. You’re not trying to get to know them. And if they feel that way, they’re not going to give you the, they’re not going to, you’re not going to build that trust. And if you don’t build that trust based influence with them, they’re not going to listen to you.
They’re not going to be willing to help.
RHEA 23:53
If I could summarize, labeling is by just putting a label on the dynamic. Hey, it seems like you’re nervous about something or seems like whatever. It seems like there’s more here to say. Can you walk us through dynamic silence and mirroring? What are those techniques?
What are those techniques? Yeah. Could you just explain a little bit about what is mirroring and what is dynamic silence and how to use it? I see what you did there. You just gamed me. You got it.
TROY 24:23
See, and you, that’s how I like to teach. You asked me about mirroring, I hit you with the mirror and you responded without even realizing that you were being hit with the mirror.
You said, yeah, I want you, I want to know a little bit more about the mirroring and the dynamic silence. And I stayed silent. I allowed you to carry on the conversation and then you realized what I did. So mirroring all of this, take it normally the last one to three words of something somebody says, and just with the inflection, if I say it with an awkward inflection, mirroring.
It sounds like I’m curious and I need more information, or if I say mirroring, I’m letting you know that I understand, I get it. The dynamic silence we tell people in your head, don’t play, don’t treat a negotiation or a conversation like a tennis match. They hit something and you hit it right back. Take a second to think about what they actually said.
002, and then respond. That let people know you’re listening more and that you’ve actually given it some thought. You didn’t just respond off the cuff, and they respect that.
RHEA 25:29
Very good. I’d love to talk to you about the ways of communication. So the thing that really blew my mind is the percentages of when we communicate, only a small percentage is actually the words that we say.
A larger percentage is our tone of voice. And an even larger percentage is our body language. Can you talk a little bit about the ways that’s relevant to the work that you do or the work that we might do out in the field when we’re asking for gifts?
TROY 25:56
Yeah, we talk about content delivery and syntax. The content is normally 7 percent of what, is what you say.
The delivery is how you say it. The syntax is the body language. What are you seeing? We tell people to listen with your eyes. Don’t just hear somebody say something and your subconscious mind is screaming at you. They’re not telling you everything. They’re telling you something different than what you really, what you’re hearing.
And you just go with that versus paying attention and listening with your eyes and seeing that they’re telling you things. However, the way they’re saying it doesn’t match what they’re saying.
RHEA 26:31
Episode 224. Why major donor processes suck and what to do instead with Greg Warner.
GREG WARNER 26:39
The best salespeople, and this translates into fundraising, are the ones that take a particular interest in the individual whom they’re working with, and they ask questions, much like a psychologist, or a doctor, or a lawyer, CPA, to help people come to conclusions that are right for them.
Now, Dr. James, Dr. Russell James, if anybody on here knows of him, and he’s an amazing researcher for this sector, he calls it Socratic fundraising. The behavioral science is clear and sound in that. It’s questions that generate results.
It’s not presentations, persuasions, manipulations, or the short way that I love to invent terms for the sector, but I call them drive by solicitations or ambush asks, which is what most administrators, sadly, I have found, drive too many staff to do. And there, that kind of behavior is driving people away.
And I know there’s a lot of talk about donor advised funds and family foundations, and we even want to change laws with real in relation to that. If you keep taking a hammer and hammering your donors in the face with drive by solicitations and ambush asks, and I know that’s the New Jersey in me coming out.
I, I am very visceral in. My beliefs of this, but if you keep taking a hammer and whacking them with these kinds of behaviors, the only people who are going to be happy about it in this world are the administrators, but they’ll be out of a job eventually because the revenue won’t be coming in. And what the donors do rightfully is they find a better value proposition.
In giving money to family foundations and donor advised funds, they can maintain their anonymity, they can enjoy, and this is the afterglow I was talking about that I was unhappy with. This is happening in massive quantities and people are seeing the revenue and they’re upset about it, but they’re blaming the donors and the bank, which is the most thing you can do.
Because it’s not their fault. If you provide a better value proposition and a donor experience, that’s worth a million dollars, the donor will not be able to help themselves, but to trip over themselves, to give the money to your cause and cry tears of joy for having been given the opportunity to do it with you.
RHEA 29:25
Can I go back, there’s so much to unpack, a lot to unpack, but I just want to go back to this idea of questions being the way into the relationship, into the conversation. And I, as fundraisers, we’re taught to listen for the get right, listen for the, but the problem is that. We’re also not taught how to listen and so I talk about this a lot that there are really three levels of listening the first Level of listening which unfortunately is how a lot of us operate is listening with an agenda I’m listening to hear what I want to hear to manipulate the situation Second level of listening is listening with no agenda really letting what’s here breathe and the third level is listening For what’s not being said that’s when you’re It’s when you’re listening for tones, it’s when you’re listening for body language.
You’re sensing the energy. And I don’t know what the question here is, other than I, I think when we put the stories and the needs of the donor ahead of our own agenda, is that when we see the transformation?
GREG 30:26
I’m taking a deep breath because, and please don’t take this the wrong way, or you can, I don’t give a shit.
All that gets in the way of humanity. We need to ask questions because we’re human and that we recognize that the other person we’re talking to is a human being. You have to have a degree of, you have to have a desire to understand the humanity of that individual and especially their original identity in their life story.
So let me say it like this, and I’ve done a lot of work personally. On what is the meaning of life, or how do you determine the meaning of life? Now I’m going to get very philosophical here, but the reason is very important because the biggest gifts, the most consequential decisions for givers and the most transformative donations to any organization happen not for any transactional or reciprocal reason, but because someone is trying to find meaning in their life.
That’s heavy. So if you’re going to be involved in helping someone with wealth find meaning in their life, you have to understand that one of the big components of finding meaning in life is that everybody wants to tell themselves the hero story. We all walk around wanting to tell ourselves that I’m a good father, I’m a good friend, I’m a good son, I’m a good CEO.
That’s our calibrator. There’s other components to finding meaning in life, like belonging and spirituality and having a sense of purpose. But the hero narrative is very important when it comes to this giving decision and for the donor, if that’s so important that they can only find meaning in life through giving, or that’s a component of how they’re going to find meaning in their life.
Then the next question is who’s going to help them do that. Okay. Because wealthy people don’t sit around thinking about how to give away their money. So they find meaning in life all the time. But as I just explained, that’s what’s going on. They have this deep desire in their humanity to live on in the minds of others or to even if they’re giving anonymously, they know I’m a good person.
That’s my hero narrative. I don’t have to tell anybody. Thank you. But myself, and I feel like I have meaning in my life because I know this. What that means is that if that’s the case, and we know that, and that’s why we see philanthropists giving away all the money that they earned all over their life and all the trials and everything, the blood, sweat, and tears they went through to acquire that.
And I know, cause I’m a CEO entrepreneur who’s still putting my house on the line. To keep this company growing because I don’t want to take private equity money. I don’t like that stuff. Anyway, we bleed Most wealthy people are first generation wealthy they are not dynastic Like they’re made out to look like and they’re not evil like they’re made out to be in the movies and disney movies Especially make the rich person is always even no, they’re not evil They’re trying to find meaning in their life after they’ve accomplished so much and acquired so much and they want to actually give it away and then they’ll cry tears of joy doing it.
And we’ve all seen that. And what they need, so I’m finally answering your question, is a guide. They need a guide, a mentor. They need what they need from a family office. They get it. They get a wealth manager, right? They need a doctor every once in a while when they’re getting old and they, arthritis or whatever.
They need a CPA. And all these people guide them and they take the position as their guide. With confidence. Saying, I do this all the time. You don’t. You’re good at acquiring wealth. I’m help, good at helping people give it away. Fundraisers need to be treated with exponentially more respect and better training to help them understand their role in the life narrative of amazingly, potentially philanthropic, successful, high capacity people.
And if we treat ourselves and we treat our staff, we treat Fundraisers, even the young ones who are learning, letting them know that, no, this isn’t about acting wealth from people. This isn’t about manipulating, targeting prospect, identifying. And I’m so offended by that. And the way that we research these people to try and determine their wealth.
It makes me nauseous.
RHEA 35:21
And not only that, let’s be real, if you’re a person of real actual wealth, there are plenty of ways to hide your wealth. That’s not, to your point, it’s creepy. If you have a conversation with someone and you somehow Google stalk them and their whole lives and they know the name of their dogs, it’s okay.
Calm down, stalker.
GREG 35:38
Can you imagine on a first visit, you drop your folder and a whole bunch of prospect research falls out in their living room that says. Target, ask them for 50, 000. It’s if you wouldn’t be comfortable with that falling out of your folder in front of your donor, then it’s not right to have it. If you want to know about the donor and their capacity, just ask them.
RHEA 36:05
Episode 243 gen Z staff, gen X leaders with Darren Isom.
DARREN ISOM 36:12
I think that we’re having a huge generational shift within the workplace right now.
And we’re seeing, and I’m going to be very candid here. We’re seeing baby boomers are finally stepping down. God bless them. I don’t know why they won’t work this hard for this long, but they’re finally stepping down from the role. And I joke as a Gen Xer that it’s the millennials that are stepping into power.
They’re the next generation of leaders within organizations themselves. And as a Gen Xer, my job, there’s a baton being passed. And my job is just to make sure that baton is not dropped. I ain’t trying to hold the baton. Gen X does not want to be here. We want, we really don’t want to be here. But we have to, just the way the numbers work and the generational, we have to work for seven years in leadership roles.
And so we’re thinking about really how do we. And those are two generations that think very differently.
RHEA 36:53
So wait, let’s pause here because I think it’s really interesting. Do you think Gen X has an identity crisis? What’s it for Gen X er to do?
DARREN 37:02
For the record, Gen X does not have an identity crisis. Gen X is fine.
Completely fine. I think that Gen X has been overlooked for so long. We are so fine with being overlooked. We have no problems with that. Are we like the middle children of the generational family? The middle child. I think that we’re the neighbor’s child that’s invited to dinner. And, but I do think that Gen X holds a specific and an interesting spot in the sense that Gen X as a generation has always served at the will of another generation.
When we were young professionals, we served at the will of baby boomers. We were all groomed under baby boomers, but the baby boomers need it. We have a sense, we’ve normalized a sense of leadership that comes with baby boomers. We then are now in a space where we’re actually serving at the will of millennials and Gen Z folks.
And what that means is that interestingly enough, you work in spaces where there are demands from a work perspective that are seemingly. Yes, I guess they’re fine demands. I don’t think that generations that came after us realized how much the workplace has shifted and how sincerely we as Gen Xers have tried to shape workplaces that do not repeat the toxic work environments that we worked at.
And so this is where you’ll hear people mumble about like Bridgespan, but in, in different places where you work from a consulting perspective, Oh, the workspace feels toxic and it’s, Oh, honey, you don’t know what toxic work environment, but I got toxic for you. This is so the opposite of toxic. To some degree, but it’s all about perspectives.
And so I think that there’s something to be said about how do we both as a generation. Acknowledge and celebrate the progress we’ve made from a leadership perspective, from an organizational perspective, at the same time, realizing that we’re still on a path to developing a more critical and more critical, more engaged work environment.
So there’s that.
RHEA 38:45
I just, I want to pause here because I’m, I full disclosure, I am a, the tail end of Gen X. I have feelings about the young people. I think about Chuck Klosterman’s book about the 90s, where he says every generation feels that the generation that comes after them is lazier and softer.
And he’s that’s a good thing because we’ve created the context and the conditions by which their worlds are actually. easier, and so it would be a problem if they were harder than we were. So I was like, okay, that’s a good perspective. But I want to talk here about, and I’m just going to say like data point of one, but I felt really confused by my younger staff.
Cause I was like, I feel like you’re asking me to do all of these things. Therapist, mom, whatever. I’m your boss. Like I, I cannot be responsible for your emotional wellbeing. And yet I also feel like with this, there’s like a therapy creep, therapy speak, creep into the workplace. Like I feel triggered and I feel whatever.
And I’m just like, I can’t, I am here to be a boss to you and to tell you what to do. I am not here to be your mom or your therapist or all the things. So I don’t know, but the question here is what is happening?
DARREN 39:51
What is happening? So I can tell you my perspective. Once again, an end of one. My perspective on things and what the perspective I’m sharing with you is I am sharing how to move through the current situation.
And so we can have another conversation with cocktails about, because it’s a lot, it can feel like gaslighting to me. Although like I have never felt like a Republican more than in conversations with Young new staff where I know my guy from New Orleans, let me out in California. And, but literally sometimes the questions are requests.
And so I’ll give a very vivid examples, having conversations with someone about an organizational dress code and they were, Oh, what’s our organizational dress code? I was like, organizational dress code. It’s very straightforward. It’s two principles, business casual and dress to match the formality of the client.
Client’s wearing a jacket, wear a jacket. If the client is wearing t shirts and flip flops, our rates are a bit too high for you to be walking around in t shirts and flip flops, I would suggest a polo and running shoes. And the client was, and the consultant or the associate consultant was asking from a, an equity perspective, as a BeGlad, a member of the queer group, which I lead, our affinity group, and they asked, what if I, as a cis male, male presenting, want to wear a dress to a client meeting?
And I was like, once again, our dress code is business casual and dress to match the formality of the client. I would suggest going to ANTL or not forever 21. That’s just me as a gay guy giving you oral advice, right? The dress code doesn’t really have any perspective on that. And the pushback was we don’t really feel as if this dress code offers, encourages us to live into our gender identity and gives us full permission to do that.
And this is where I realized it was such a complete shift because one I’m sitting and I’m being like, I don’t know how to tell you this, but. You’re coming out of college where you just paid someone for four years to affirm your identity. You’re at a workspace where we pay you to develop deliverables and we want you to be affirmed in your identity because you develop better deliverables, but we’re not in the identity affirming business.
And as I’m saying this, I’m like, good lord, what kind of Republican do I sound like?
RHEA 41:47
I know. And yet it’s, I had to, now this is going to like devolve, but I had to staffer why tights were not appropriate as pants. And particularly on a day that the board was coming into the office for a board meeting. I was like, I just, it’s just, I don’t know how to explain to you that tights are not pants.
I don’t know.
DARREN 42:06
I do wonder though, how much of that is talk about what we’ve normalized as good management and good leadership is not the same for different generations and how what’s requested of us may in some ways trigger things that we should be talking about with our therapists. For me, genetics, my parents basically went to work.
And drop me off at my grandparents where I watched Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers. And my mother calls us all the time to figure it out. Figure yourself out, figure it out yourself generation. We had to figure all this stuff out on our own. Like your parents would offer. I wouldn’t call it advice. I wouldn’t call it guidance.
They offered encouragement. Oh, I’m sure you’ll figure it out. This is my mother’s advice for everything. Oh, tough choices. Sleep on it. I’m sure you’ll figure it out. And, but that’s it. The week became parents. That were very directive, right? That were very hands on and that, whereas we found power and ambiguity in space, this generation, and I’m speaking in broad strokes for the sake of conversation, obviously, because there are exceptions in every rule, right?
They want to see things, they need clarity. In a way that we’re not used to giving and even feel gaslighted to give. What do you, I don’t know, figure it out. And it’s actually, no, let’s stop and think about one, why that’s triggering and two, how that may in some ways be a gift for this generation. Cause I think it forces us to codify how we think about things and the work itself.
And so that’s one point. So I think that there’s something around that piece. I do think there is interestingly enough. And this is where I also feel gaslit, particularly with something like the dress code asking as a queer person, how do we engage in the dress code? You are talking to a partner that on any given client meeting, maybe wearing a kaftan or a bow, like full on bluffs, right?
And so for you to be talking, asking me about the dress code in a way is that I’m like pushing a problematic dress code is do you see, read the room, right? And it’s very easy. It makes you feel like the man all of a sudden. And it also doesn’t recognize the fact that, yes, our dress code has two tenants because lesbians in the eighties have fought this fight for you.
The dress code used to be extremely directive, right? Women wore pantyhose and skirts and heels and even wear pantsuits, right? And so you’re fighting where there’s no fight. Yeah. Like where there’s no fight, save your energy for a real fight here. It’s a generation that really wants to engage and really wants to fight, but fighting in the wrong way.
In mind. You have a gaslighting as well.
RHEA 44:33
Oh, yeah. So many things, Jared. Okay, wait. I also want to talk about, I’m just going to say it, I’m turning into this, the weaponization of race.
DARREN 44:41
Oh my goodness. The weaponization of race. Let’s stop there for a second. I do think we see across the sector, and I’m going to be very candid from a racial perspective.
I think that we see, particularly within organizations that actually may not be the most diverse organizations where organizations have made huge leaps. And putting people of color, particularly black women and leadership roles, right? So Lee, and now we have junior staff, particularly white junior staff, hijacking movement language against their black manager.
And this is what the, are you talking to me about equity? And are you taught what? Talking about gaslighting, you just sit back and you’re like, wait, excuse me?
RHEA 45:27
Episode 257. How to stop chasing donors and 10 X, your thinking with Brooke Ritchie, Babbage, Cindy Wagman, and Jess Campbell.
Cindy, I know you have a lot to say on this topic of your ideal donor and why it is that we spend so much time chasing down people who just are not that into us.
CINDY WAGMAN 45:48
In our organizations, we have this feeling that the money is out there and we just need to tap into it. And so often, we use the wrong lens. To think of who or where the right sources are, [00:46:00] or who are the right board members for us, or what have you. We often try to look for people who have excess, right?
Oprah has lots of money, she should just give it to us. Especially in Canada, all the banks have so much money, they should give it to us. And we use money and what we think of as capacity as the lens in which we look at who should be supporting us or who should be involved in our organization. Instead, we need to be looking at who cares, who gives a fuck.
That is the most important starting point. Don’t waste your time on the people or organizations or ways that people can get involved. If they’re not even at the same table, your job, especially when it comes to fundraising is not to convince someone that your mission is worthwhile. It’s to find the people who know that it’s worthwhile and to bring them into your organization.
Don’t look at capacity. Don’t look at that board member. Can they make this many introductions for us or give this amount? You want to find the people who are passionate and excited and convinced that you’re meant to know each other and be in the same orbit, and then work with them to figure out the best way to build that support, to invest in the work that you’re doing, in whatever that means for them.
RHEA 47:11
Jess? Asked about the role of fear. A lot of times, the reason why we keep chasing after people who frankly are not that into us is that we have fear about what happens if they don’t, what happens if they say no, what happens if it’s the last funder I ever get.
BROOKE RICHIE-BABBAGE 47:27
I’m going to answer the question through the lens of my own experience as a founder, because I’ve Navigated fear in that role for many a year.
I’ll say is that, and for those of you who are founders out there, I’m sure that this will resonate. When I started building my organization, it felt very tied to me as a person, right? I founded the organization. I was very passionate about the mission. It was really personal for me. And that meant that there was a fear that if I asked somebody for a donation and they said, no, it wasn’t that they were saying this just isn’t the vision for change that I have in the world.
Which is fine. It’s that they were saying this thing that you’re building isn’t good. This thing that you’ve dedicated your passion that you believe in, these people you’re hiring, this thing that you care a lot about, this work. I just don’t see it. I don’t buy it. I don’t believe enough in it. And that felt awful.
That felt like a rejection of me personally. It wasn’t, I know that now, but at the time, nobody wants to put themselves in a situation where they’re going to be rejected, but I would do instead of saying, Oh, I need to figure out how to soothe that fear or change the narrative in my head for a while, I would find other things to do instead of actually getting out there and building relationships with donors.
I wouldn’t even talk to potential donors because I was like, if they say, but wait, what are you doing? That was so terrifying. I’d say, you know what, I’ll be ready to talk to donors when our marketing material is done, or I’ll be ready to talk to donors when we’ve revamped our website. And when everything was perfect, then I’ll be ready.
When they cannot reject me, then I’ll be ready. And it was really only as I came to do two things. One, and this is whether you’re a founder or not, N E D, understanding that the work and the mission and the organization are not, were not me. I was building an institution. I was building an organism. That was wholly separate from me as a person and my worth and my vision and my value.
And that sounds blue and deep, but it’s real. The second thing I had to do was realize that this institution that I was building, this vision for change and impact in the world that I felt very strongly about, just wasn’t going to resonate with everybody. And that’s normal. And that’s fine. And that my job If I met somebody and said, Hey, will you join this work with me and invest?
And they were like, not my thing was to realize, Oh, okay. It’s not about me. It’s just not their thing. They’re just not that into me. And to take my pretty elsewhere and to find the people who are like, what you’re building is beautiful. I love what you’re building. Can I join you?
RHEA 49:51
I so often think that this.
Wasting their pretty is based in scarcity and this belief that I’m never going to be able to talk to somebody of capacity again, or this is the last thing, but we talked about desperation just is not cute. It’s a stinky perfume that nobody wants a part of. How do we leverage our email list to figure out who actually wants to be in community with us?
Because I feel like if we’re spending all the time like being thirsty and chasing and desperate, that’s not cute.
JESS CAMPBELL 50:22
I’ll even go beyond email because I think that as fundraisers, we need to present and give people an opportunity to raise their hand, to create action. And if you’re just, as Brooke was mentioning, fiddling around with your website or you’re redesigning your logo for an umpteenth time, you’re not creating ways for people to show that they have a hand to raise.
Couple of ways that you can do that is I believe and I know Cindy’s a huge proponent of consistency, and that can be across a variety of channels. Whether that’s you committing, come hell or high water, every time a gift comes in, you are going to thank your donor within 48 hours. Boom, you do it, no matter what.
It’s your email communication. prompts where people either have to click links that you can see on the back end or you use text like hit reply to Let me know and they actually respond to your emails Maybe you pull a list off of your CRM and you say who are the 40 people that gave this time last year?
But I haven’t talked to you in a while you pick up the phone You reach out for no reason other than to say, Hey, or maybe you tell them a story. Oh my God, our stories never, ever get old. How do you create engagement across social media? I’m listing all these things. I’m not saying you have to do all of them.
I’m giving them examples and whatever makes sense for your organization. Do that. I would say less is more and consistency is above. All. So if all you can really handle is phone calls at this moment, just do the phone calls, or if all you can do is commit to bi weekly email newsletters, just do that. And then once you get that under your belt, turn up the dial a bit, turn up the dial from there as you grow in capacity, but no one is just going to find what they can’t see, and I wish that everyone out there really remembered that.
Because people are busy. You, unfortunately, are not their priority. And so you have to create moments for them and poke them on the shoulder, so to speak, so that they can yeah, remember that, engage back, reply back. The people that want to be there, will be there.
RHEA 52:32
Thanks so much for a great year. Everybody we’ll make sure that all of the links to the full episodes are in the show notes. And if you’re so inclined, I would love if you would write me a review on apple podcasts, if you listen and like this podcast, Happy holidays.
And see you in 2024.
Thanks for come by.
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