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Unknown
I am a very stereotypical millennial in which I want you to tell me the rules, and in exchange I will tell you which ones I would like to

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Unknown
follow. But the rules.

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Unknown
Right? Yeah, yeah, I’m a geriatric millennial, but I’m going to keep keep making myself

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Unknown
Hello and welcome to Think Fresh, a podcast brought to you by the Nova marketing collective. Creative. Coming to you from our Ideas Institute and here to talk about all things marketing. Insights on new trends, innovative ideas and marketing tools you can use in your day to day life and whatever else we deem relevant.

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Unknown
I’m Jen Neumann, de novo CEO and your host.

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Unknown
Today we’re going to talk about small teams and mighty strategies.

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Unknown
Ryan’s not on the podcast this month. Today Jill Mast is my co-host. And we are joined by Andy Kendall from Hand in Hand or very special guest. And gentlemen, welcome to link Rush. Thank you for having me here. So we always open up the podcast with a little chit chat.

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Unknown
And Ryan tries really hard to make this a sports podcast. He’s kind of new to sports. He’s just trying really hard to like. So he’s like sporting. He sports adjacent, adjacent. That’s a great way to put it. But I do have to ask, like, where are you guys in the World Cup?

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Unknown
I was in and out. My kids had some interest and I like any opportunity to have a social event.

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Unknown
So that is I love sports in that there is food and camaraderie and drinks and sanctioned yelling. So I think those are like really a recipe for a good night. So I did the last game I was only in and out of because I was dropping my kids up, but I saw some sort of half time situation

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Unknown
that was interesting.

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Unknown
I would also describe it as interesting. Okay, so besides, I do want to talk about Madonna here because, I mean, she looks younger than when she first arrived on the scene. I think I’m on Earth. Yes. And I was like, wow, that’s some really talented plastic surgery or whatever that. But like I said to my husband, I’m

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Unknown
how many performers do they have names?

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Unknown
Where as you know, typically for the Super Bowl you have one, right? And it’s a big deal that Madonna beats Justin Bieber, which actually be cry for some reason. And now I’m forgetting, oh shit, here I was the other one. I saw that one and some rapper that I had to look up because I’d never heard of

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Unknown
It was star studded. Yes, but the World Cup audience is in the billions globally, whereas I don’t remember what it is for the super bullets in the millions. It’s just it’s a way bigger audience. But yet there was no like Super Bowl level advertising that happened. Right. That’s interesting. That is interesting because the Super Bowl is one shot that’s either there or not.

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Unknown
And the World Cup has games for weeks. Yeah. In multiple countries. And that’s that’s my take. It could be running the same big ad on multiple and almost need to have an international audience to do it. They do. Although I don’t know, I feel like the the United States woke up to soccer or football and was like, hey, those men are beautiful.

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Unknown
This is true. A lot of really cool human interest stories also came out. It was. And it also felt like there was a real

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Unknown
attempt at messaging around unity and connection. Or maybe that is just like me desiring that that I noted it, but it felt like there was a

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Unknown
pull that that the United States just showed up.

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Unknown
Well, for our international audience and our international visitors, and they love our ranch dressing. That was Scotland, the Scottish people in Boston. They drank all the beer and the pictures and the video that came out of that. I absolutely loved the Scottish people in Boston. That was my favorite thing about the World Cup was just watching all the kilts, and it was.

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Unknown
I mean, that’s kind of what you anyway. But that was that was Men in Kilts, This is another podcast. Okay. Affection for the show Outlander. I do love a character in Outlander today. Okay, so I just I thought that was kind of. It was I didn’t look at it so much from a sports perspective as I did.

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Unknown
This is just a really interesting way for the world to come together, and I think that people kind of craving it in a way. Oh for sure, yeah, I agree.

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Unknown
today we want to talk a little bit about as as the title would imply these small teams but mighty strategies.

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Unknown
And so Andy why don’t you tell us a little bit about Hand in Hand and then we’ll get right into it.

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Unknown
Sure. Well Hand in hand began in 2000. Two parents said, hey, our children with disabilities, man, wouldn’t it be great if they had a place to belong? And so in 2000, we did a one week summer camp and our founder said, I wasn’t sure if anyone would show up, and there was a line outside the door at the Y to sign up.

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Unknown
So they thought were really on to something, and we’ve expanded since then. We’ve just continued to respond to parent and community need. We have night and weekend recreation programs, inclusive childcare, six weeks to 16 years after school teen programs, adult day programs, and job coaching and development. We just

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Unknown
last week wrapped up our 27th year of summer camp, so we’re still continuing that.

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Unknown
Thank you. It is. It is an honor and also extraordinarily terrifying to carry on the legacy of these families.

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Unknown
that’s what we do. And I also say I get paid to make really stupid business decisions. The care industry has almost no or literally negative margins anyway, especially in child care. And so we’re already in a difficult industry.

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Unknown
But every program we operate was created because parents say, hey, we have a need. We’ve identified a gap. Will you help us fill it? And we’ve said, yes, the gap only exists because there is no payer source for it, right? Or the risk is too high to do it. And we’ve continued to say yes. And that requires us then to fundraise about a third of our budget.

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Unknown
And how I ended up coming to this team anyway, as we got to work with you professionally, is saying, how do we continue to fundraise and differentiate ourselves and tell our incredible story so that we can continue fundraising to meet to meet the needs of those we serve?

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Unknown
Well, we’re so glad you do it. It is such a need.

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Unknown
And you know, we’re based in two bits here. You’re based out of the Quad Cities. We have a really sort of a similar, similar organization here, the art which have up to them they do

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Unknown
amazing. Oh, and tress is an incredible leader. She is lovely. Yes. She’s so great. And they have such a good team. You know, this type of work tends to be really regionalized, doesn’t it?

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Unknown
Because you have to be where the people are. This isn’t something you can administer from California.

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Unknown
Right, right. Absolutely. You need to be in your community to understand the unique needs of your community. And those are we talked to I talked to Teresa here. I talked to individuals in Iowa City, Muscatine, Dubuque, and we all are the same and entirely different as well on our needs and what our community is asking for.

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Unknown
One thing that is amazing about your team two is they are just so talented. There’s a number of nonprofits that we work with and or or any types of clients where their internal teams maybe don’t have quite the level of the skill set that your team has.

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Unknown
So that was one of the things when our team got to work with your team that we really enjoyed is it felt like we got to bring our strengths and your team got to bring their strengths, and it was just kind of a really symbiotic relationship.

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Unknown
And where you didn’t want to spend money and invest was the tactical things that your team already had covered. You looked to us to have a little bit more of those higher level strategic decisions and creative ideas and push further than where you were before. And that’s one of the things that I loved from your team. And when we got to work together as well.

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Unknown
How do you balance when you’re talking about like day to day alignment with vision, looking forward when you look at the goals and the vision and then the day to day. How do you work to balance those when you’re thinking, planning and strategy? What what’s your approach?

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Unknown
I think that’s a really excellent question and I’m just stopping. So my long winded answer is medium winded.

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Unknown
I mean, because I hesitate to give a

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Unknown
an answer that sounds like it’s from a business book, but it’s true. You have to you have to have a target, right? We all have to sit together and say, what are we working towards? You’re rowing the same direction and we have to have goals and everyone has to know what is your role on this bus?

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Unknown
And we use the same analogies at every business, you know, uses are the right people on the bus. Are they in the right seats? And if you’re in the right seat, you know your business. So the individual who writes grants knows her business and knows what her goals are. We actually also recently published a success guide that we’re using with our staff in onboarding that explains each staff members role to achieve our overall organizational impact.

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Unknown
So it’s on a pyramid actually, which starts with here is what our vision is as an organization. And then we talk about roles responsibilities, impact, each person rights and individual impact statement and how that feeds to the outcome of the stories that we get to tell.

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Unknown
So I think it’s it’s really knowing what what are you doing here and why are you doing it?

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Unknown
And so coming back to mission connecting mission to. So when you rolled these out, do you do a quarterly check in, monthly check in or are they just responsible for the on their own? It is. It becomes their supervisor’s responsibility to use that language in day to day coaching and interactions,

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Unknown
as well as to use it at annual reviews.

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Unknown
So that is like the formal touchpoint. I think having shared language is essential. And so creating that language, introducing that vocabulary at the beginning and then using it day to day helps us to set that culture and understanding.

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Unknown
You talked about the roles and responsibilities and individuals.

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Unknown
You also talked about the the opportunity to make bad business decisions, all the profit, like you’re doing things that, you know, no normal business would do it because there’s not a path to profitability there. Right? You think about strategies that you employ and knowing that you are you’re not you’re not trying to make a profit, but you also can’t be negative, right?

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Unknown
Lose money. You have to be able to to fundraise and have revenue sources that allow you to continue those programs. How do you use strategy to prioritize around that?

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Unknown
I guess I’m going back to shared language, because I’m thinking the exercise we most recently did in strategic planning is we were assessing our programs, and it is easy to go to the bottom line of a programs, right. We’re a nonprofit. I have a friend years ago that said,

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Unknown
I don’t like to call it a nonprofit. I like calling it a not for profit, but we can make a profit, right?

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Unknown
That’s just a small nuance in words that reminds us that I’m not going to personally benefit from the profits our mission is. So we said, how do we assess our programs? And so we came up with not this huge formal formula, but we said, one is the new program or the current program mission aligned? If it’s not, then we have no business doing it.

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Unknown
Two is it unique to the Quad Cities? Are there other people are already doing it and feeling that need because then why would we fill it to three? Is budget neutral or positive? And so that is a programmatic decision. But we all came together and said what is the filter we’re going to use to say yes or no?

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Unknown
I

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Unknown
I am a very stereotypical millennial in which I want you to tell me the rules, and in exchange I will tell you which ones I would like to

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Unknown
follow. But the rules.

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Unknown
Right? Yeah, yeah, I’m a geriatric millennial, but I’m going to keep keep making myself

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Unknown
I think that similar framework works. You know, you all have to sit at the table and say, what is it that we’re doing and how are we going to share? What filter are we using to do this to make decisions together? So that can also be said on expansion business decisions, infrastructure, marketing, messaging is what what are we trying to do here?

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Unknown
And by working with your team we get your expertise on like Angie, that’s really great. But you just try to do 27 different things with one message. So could we choose maybe two things?

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Unknown
that is where I need somebody else at the table. It’s always tempting to put 10 pounds in that 5 pound pocket. Absolutely. Yes. When budgets are tight.

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Unknown
Right.

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Unknown
although you’re a very successful nonprofit, if that doesn’t mean unlimited budget. Right. So, you know, we always say whether whether it’s a social media post or a video, it’s it’s distill it down to the singular message and stay on topic so that we’re not falling into that trap of but we can only make this one video.

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Unknown
So just put it all together,

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Unknown
right, right, right. You’re in it every day. So it’s nice to have a partner that’s not necessarily on a day to day basis like to to the level that you write, write and say that’s all great. But this is what really resonates. This is sticks out to somebody that’s not

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Unknown
that doesn’t walk in the door every single day.

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Unknown
And I like that part of it because you can gut check us in and say, but this is what’s important to. But I think that that’s the nice part about having that kind of a partnership. Sure, absolutely.

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Unknown
Before we started, I was talking about even when a board member or a donor or a volunteer or just your average person in the community, a parent comes to you and says, you should do this, right.

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Unknown
So we call it you’re getting should on should do this. How do you use your mission and vision to determine whether you should jump on that opportunity? That’s yeah to you.

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Unknown
Most of the opportunities that get presented are in fundraising, just maybe a golf outing, a little gala, you know, just a little something. Yeah. No problem.

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Unknown
so years ago, when our one person who helped with fundraising and myself sat down, we created a year long fundraising plan.

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Unknown
And the plan helps execute on our end, especially as our team has is has more capacity now to do exactly what we say we’re going to do. The most useful thing that plan is, is a reason to say no. Because then I’m going to say, Jill, that is such a good idea. Let me put it on the list to be considered next year, because we already got our plan together this year.

00:15:12:10 – 00:15:30:21
Unknown
And so when you have a roadmap, it just gives you gives you all the reasons to say no, because that roadmap was already put together with our stakeholders. We already thought about it. We already decided against that. But we can put it in the parking lot for another day and that has been incredibly helpful. The same for a strategic plan.

00:15:30:22 – 00:16:09:14
Unknown
I like living documents, so at our last accreditation they asked us for a strategic plan and I had probably 16 different documents and they were like, but what’s your strategic plan? Well, that’s every time we updated it, right? It is a I don’t need a document that is going to stay forever and ever and never be opened. We at least 2 or 3 times a year would update that plan not to veer off course, but there are outside pressures that may change priorities or may open up a new road to get somewhere where we say we knew this was our destination, we just decided to take a different path.

00:16:09:16 – 00:16:35:13
Unknown
Oh for sure, change overnight. Something that you could once count on might be gone. Something new like that that you’re eligible for. So I’ve always been a big believer that a strategic plan should be a living document that it’s looked at regularly, gets measured against and isn’t just, you know, now I’m dating myself in some way, shape or form, but printed and put in a vice and then put it on the shelf.

00:16:35:13 – 00:16:38:10
Unknown
I don’t think anybody still prints and puts them in binders anymore,

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Unknown
but not if they’re actually executing them. Right. Such a you love opportunity, you love ideas, you love innovation.

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Unknown
So having that type of a personality and a strategic plan, how do you make the decision on what’s worth your time and what’s not? How do you how do you decide when to veer from the plan?

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Unknown
think you have to build a team that you trust internally and externally, whether those are board members or I have three individuals. One is a founder, two or emeritus board members who have long retired, who I ask for business advice. I send our strategic plan. I say, tear this apart,

00:17:14:16 – 00:17:17:18
Unknown
so you need external people and you also have to know yourself.

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Unknown
My team knows that I’m an external processor and so they had to learn also. That wasn’t a directive from Angie. That was just an idea. And to build enough trust to challenge me and we often say, is the juice worth the squeeze in the office? And that is often a that’s a nice idea, Angie, and the same for everyone else, right?

00:17:36:11 – 00:17:41:16
Unknown
Or we’ll say, let’s put it on the calendar and think about that next year or two down there were too far down the path.

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Unknown
Right now. This year is very similar. I have a very similar I would say I’m a I’m a top think yes thing to talk. And it’s it’s definitely an adjustment for people when they come on our team because I am

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Unknown
like there’s an idea I would say 99 bad ideas a day, maybe one good one if I’m lucky.

00:18:02:01 – 00:18:09:13
Unknown
But that doesn’t mean that we’re going to do any of those. Honestly, sometimes a bad idea. Can we do it right? And I don’t have to ask

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Unknown
do right. But I want to. I want to just get it out like word, vomit it out. I also have a huge action bias. And so that is self-discipline for me because I’m immediately, well, I’m gonna solve this problem or I’m going to take action.

00:18:22:02 – 00:18:35:10
Unknown
And that that can be a challenge. But my team also has to learn to be like, but do you have to do that? Or I have to say. Am I should I be the one doing this?

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Unknown
What if we didn’t have those people in those leaders driving with ideas and just lots of them? I mean, we wouldn’t move forward at all. So I think that’s a huge. Does your team react to that? Well, do they do they know that you’re a processor that way. And they they feel like they can push back and they can say, maybe not that with this.

00:18:53:13 – 00:18:58:05
Unknown
Yes. Yeah. I also think it takes a while though to build that trust with the team. Right.

00:18:58:08 – 00:19:15:19
Unknown
I’m a challenger. I’ve mentioned that before. I want to be challenged. And so it can be scary for some people who are more internal to learn to challenge. So then in return, if I have an internal processor and I have a lot of individuals who are introverts, I have to learn.

00:19:15:19 – 00:19:24:10
Unknown
I’m going to walk away and come back to this tomorrow. They’re going to come up with a better idea. They just need some time to do it. My husband is the same way, so I get to practice that at home where I’m like, do you have any ideas?

00:19:24:10 – 00:19:30:15
Unknown
And he’s like, I just need some time, right? Right. I’m like, come on.

00:19:30:17 – 00:19:46:11
Unknown
Right, right. I’ve already ordered the supplies, asked for some estimates, and he’s like, I didn’t even agree to the plan. That’s really familiar.

00:19:46:13 – 00:20:04:22
Unknown
Is often my test. I should be like, I’m like, oh yeah, is the juice worth the squeeze? That’s going to be my new question to generate. But yeah, but I mean, with your personality like that, a lot of ideas, does that mean you’re a little bit more of a risk taker when it comes to messaging, marketing, new ideas, fundraising?

00:20:05:00 – 00:20:05:20
Unknown
Absolutely.

00:20:06:00 – 00:20:31:22
Unknown
think that I would not be I would not consider myself a risk taker in the for profit industry. The nonprofit industry is often drowning in a scarcity mindset. And so when we came to you and I was in Des Moines, I remember when I spoke to the first time, but prior to that, I had gone to our board and said, and things were looking rocky ahead.

00:20:31:22 – 00:20:49:09
Unknown
We weren’t sure what was going to be happening with any funding programs, especially tied to Medicaid. And we do a lot of Medicaid disability payments. And I saw, boy, is it going to get noisier than ever. It’s noisy anyway, right? How are you, the brand that is seen ahead of everybody else? Or how how are people aware of you?

00:20:49:09 – 00:21:10:00
Unknown
But it’s going to get very noisy with people who are very scared. How do I get ahead of that? And so that’s when I went to the board. I said, we have never invested in professional marketing. We need help in this area, and I want to go down the road before we are one of a thousand people saying me, me, me and pitch to the board.

00:21:10:00 – 00:21:25:10
Unknown
Here’s, here’s what I want to do. I know it’s out of budget. I know we’re going to run a loss for a couple of years, but it will pay off. We need to build a stronger foundation. And that was seen as risky by a lot of my colleagues who were like, really? You’re going to spend money on marketing.

00:21:25:10 – 00:21:42:17
Unknown
That’s where you’re going to spend it now. And what we spent money on is telling our stories on ensuring people understood what we did, on building visibility and a foundation. And so for many, that would have been really risky to me. It was a natural business move.

00:21:42:19 – 00:21:47:08
Unknown
Well, have you been able to measure that? That’s really hard, right?

00:21:47:10 – 00:21:53:09
Unknown
So then I called Jill and I’m like, could you give me some numbers? That’s actually.

00:21:53:11 – 00:22:02:15
Unknown
Tell us how it works. Right. We I mean, we do have those numbers. There’s also the Quad Cities is a small community and.

00:22:02:17 – 00:22:17:23
Unknown
You begin to get invited to things, your brand start. People start saying things to you about it, your reaches further. Ultimately, we’re raising more money and also our programs are more full. We have tripled in size since 2020.

00:22:18:00 – 00:22:40:06
Unknown
We are. We opened a new program last September and we had 8 to 12 individuals. And by the September we’ll be up to 20. So we’ve doubled that program size, right. So that is all part of that messaging. We’ve also become more efficient in the story that we tell. We understand what do people want to hear, what do they need to hear

00:22:40:08 – 00:22:42:12
Unknown
and how are our audience is different?

00:22:42:12 – 00:23:02:09
Unknown
Am I talking to a legislator? Am I talking to a donor? Am I talking to a community member that helps us tell the right story? The first time? When you guys see matrix and you have so many stories, you serve so many people and they all have amazing stories and having a little bit of discernment in there to pick out the ones that might resonate with each audience

00:23:02:11 – 00:23:07:07
Unknown
and be able to tell those, like you said, a little more efficiently, maybe a little more emotionally.

00:23:07:09 – 00:23:27:17
Unknown
And then also, I don’t think we should ignore that. We did just a little teeny brand globe, right? Yes. Yeah. To get us into the to 2026 and beyond. And I think the, the, the focus on the storytelling and how we tell those stories and the little brand glow up plus some placement and then your team is so highly visible.

00:23:27:18 – 00:23:49:15
Unknown
All of those things together really worked well. They all supported each other and just got you a lot of inroads that did help with fundraising world, more brand awareness. So I think that all of those things together, but the storytelling piece is just critical, especially in a nonprofit like yours, where it is just human centered and just beautiful humans, they’re so wonderful.

00:23:49:15 – 00:23:53:08
Unknown
You have such heartwarming stories, and you do such good work that, you know,

00:23:53:12 – 00:24:03:23
Unknown
that’s the way that you’re going to win. That’s the way that you’re going to grow the impact that you make sure. Well, thank you for saying that. I love hearing the stories. I love being close to the work I shared. When I got here, we had two weeks of camp.

00:24:03:23 – 00:24:25:21
Unknown
I was out there three times. It’s always funny when I show up in hat, you know, t shirt, shorts and a hat and staff don’t know who I am and we’re just in it where, and I get to hear those stories firsthand. But something stories that, you know, I came from Girl Scouts before I became a part of the novella.

00:24:25:23 – 00:24:35:03
Unknown
My favorite stories come from camp. Oh, yes. Yeah. Right, right. You’re there. And we had several

00:24:35:05 – 00:24:50:15
Unknown
happened to be moms this year. We had four kids who had never been to camp, and moms who were overcome emotionally crying every day, saying they’ve never had this opportunity. And one mom said, we just moved here nine months ago, and we’ve been disinvited from a lot of things.

00:24:50:17 – 00:25:17:21
Unknown
This is the first time he’s been able to stay. And what does that mean when you are part of that? But I think I’m lucky I got to go to program a few times. I’m distance from programs now, which is a challenge of losing. I think people are afraid to lose connection. I think it’s really about losing control and so that can be frightening to build strong, build bigger and move further away so that you can expand.

00:25:18:03 – 00:25:43:02
Unknown
But I also hear organizations who struggle getting those stories, and I think it has to be a culture of stories. So you have to hear stories to understand how stories are important. You have to ask your staff, but also it’s not up to that teacher or that direct support professional to have worked all day and then come back and be like, Jill, I have a great story for you, right?

00:25:43:03 – 00:26:09:16
Unknown
It’s up to those of us who get the opportunity to amplify the story, to find them. And you don’t have to have that moment where that mom was crying. That’s incredibly meaningful. I we’ve talked about this a lot in our in our shop, and I walk through program to leave my office every day. And I saw kids building with boxes, and they were building homes for their stuffed animals and they were building airplanes.

00:26:09:16 – 00:26:31:00
Unknown
And we have children who are nonverbal. We have children with significant motor challenges. And we have typically developing, you know, we have this huge diversity. And I thought, this is beautiful. This is childhood. There’s so much joy and imagination. And that wasn’t one big moment. That was me walking through and paying attention. And I think that sometimes what we miss.

00:26:31:00 – 00:26:51:12
Unknown
But then you have to teach people. So then I typed that up in a team’s message. I said, guys, my way out. Do you know what I saw today? And that is how our development team learned how to tell stories. You just pay attention and start naming what you see. And then I called a donor and I said, I just left work, and I want to share my joy with you because you make this possible.

00:26:51:12 – 00:27:09:01
Unknown
And eventually that story about using boxes became our entire year end appeal. And there was no staff member who told me the story. I just simply observed it on my way out. So I think those are things that sometimes a non-profits we forget. We don’t. Don’t make it so hard. Your work is in action every day and you learn,

00:27:09:04 – 00:27:11:03
Unknown
you learn storytelling as part of your mission.

00:27:11:03 – 00:27:20:00
Unknown
I called it gratitude and or gratitude and mission. Like just storytelling and being grateful for the impact you get to make. Almost every nonprofit or not for profit

00:27:20:04 – 00:27:38:18
Unknown
really has that content rich environment that they can pull from. It’s just whether you’re understanding what those stories are and you’re seeing them and you’re thinking, how does this play into something that resonates with a donor, something that resonates with community members?

00:27:38:20 – 00:28:03:20
Unknown
Joe was talking about sort of all these things that make it the right environment for your marketing and your fundraising to be successful together. Those things don’t exist if you don’t have any. The ability to see it and communicate with your, in this case, external marketing team, that can help you tell that story. But you also have the staff members who share it and you can speak to it, and you have the donors who want to run with it.

00:28:03:20 – 00:28:21:14
Unknown
And the board members want to, you know, promote it. You know, hiring an external marketing team or an internal marketing team will only get you so far unless you have this collective. We need to do this together. We’ll take all these different pieces and we’ll put them together. Together? Sure.

00:28:21:17 – 00:28:26:03
Unknown
I do think that you’ve got some special sauce there about that.

00:28:26:04 – 00:28:46:17
Unknown
I think it’s all it’s by design, though, as you say that. I was thinking one of the cautions I sometimes we talk about as once a month a lot of nonprofit leaders go out for drinks. It’s real surprise. And we talk about, well, could you outsource that? But you have to be clear about what you’re asking for when you outsource, right?

00:28:46:18 – 00:29:09:09
Unknown
So when we’re outsourcing marketing and messaging, we’re asking for a partner. And I think too often when you have a small team and you’re trying to execute something big, the thought is you’ll just buy something. I’ll buy a consultant. Well, how’s that going to get the information? If your team is not ready to build a pipeline to feed them and create some trust, you’re not going to get what you’re asking for.

00:29:09:10 – 00:29:27:04
Unknown
Now, sometimes I outsource things because I don’t want to touch it like the printer. I don’t want to touch a printer. I do not care about extensions and drivers. I don’t care about any of that. I don’t want to touch it. But in this particular instance, you have to know that it doesn’t take it did not take the work away.

00:29:27:05 – 00:29:37:04
Unknown
It made your work better. I love the partner talking about having a partner, because I think when we first started working together, we did have a couple of little like hiccups

00:29:37:06 – 00:29:51:23
Unknown
you know, we had to have trust in each other and honesty about what our expectations were. We hadn’t. You’re like I mentioned earlier, your team is so capable that sometimes our team comes in and we do everything from start to finish, and you didn’t need us or want us to do that.

00:29:51:23 – 00:30:11:11
Unknown
That’s not where you wanted your investment to go. So having that level of trust, the communication lines wide open and a level of honesty and where we can just say, that’s not what I want from you. I want this from you, this level of thinking. I want, you know, so as we’ve as our relationship has evolved and our teams have gotten really comfortable with each other, we can just have those conversations.

00:30:11:11 – 00:30:27:16
Unknown
And it’s nice because you can say, we can say, what if we provide this and you guys take it and execute the rest and know it’s perfect and the expectation is there, the responsibilities there, we know who owns who what. And I think that makes it so much more effective and efficient use of your investment.

00:30:27:19 – 00:30:41:06
Unknown
I agree, and I think if nonprofit leaders think of it like building a coalition in any other way, nonprofit businesses are so good at collaborating and working together.

00:30:41:06 – 00:30:44:00
Unknown
I have been part of building so many coalitions.

00:30:44:00 – 00:30:55:16
Unknown
If we think of that same intentionality of relationship building as we do with outsourcing parts of our business, like they’re not different parts, right? Like whether you’re building a coalition

00:30:55:18 – 00:31:05:19
Unknown
or a partnership to solve community issues, or you’re building a partnership to tell the story of your impact, the same intentionality has to go into it.

00:31:05:21 – 00:31:34:19
Unknown
Messaging and marketing. It’s not just telling the story of these really wonderful people that we help. We’re telling the story of how it also benefits the community. Because if you’re looking at funding cuts and you need to reach legislators, if you’re looking at building coalitions with other nonprofits, if you’re looking at expanding your space, if you’re looking at donations and corporate partners, how do you work to tell that story about, you know, employment, workforce development, people being able to have a place where their children can go so that the mom and dad can go work.

00:31:34:19 – 00:31:37:17
Unknown
How do you tell those stories?

00:31:37:19 – 00:31:45:10
Unknown
You just did, right? You just do your strategy, I guess.

00:31:45:12 – 00:31:50:14
Unknown
You have to talk to the audience you want, right? So when I talk to

00:31:50:16 – 00:32:04:19
Unknown
city leadership, who no longer has young children and does not have grandchildren yet, that that has never been in their mind, right. So I have to serve it to them on a platter and say, do you understand that childcare is an economic engine and is workforce development?

00:32:04:19 – 00:32:22:22
Unknown
And so we cannot assume that people know those things. You have to be very, very straightforward with it and tell us succinctly, right. So I think it’s knowing your audience and knowing that information about what do you

00:32:22:22 – 00:32:32:11
Unknown
do. A really good example of that is work with Iowa. We work with the Women’s Foundation, and some of this has been in volunteer capacity over the years, too.

00:32:32:12 – 00:32:36:06
Unknown
But when we first started talking about childcare

00:32:36:11 – 00:33:06:09
Unknown
and the importance of childcare, we were thinking about it very specifically from the mother’s perspective, right. The family’s perspective. But we were going to legislators and business owners with these fliers that have lots of little kids on, lots of smiling, cute, adorable, adorable. They didn’t give a crap. Not because they’re heartless people, but because their job is to keep their businesses going, or to create laws that help businesses prosper in Iowa.

00:33:06:09 – 00:33:32:14
Unknown
And changing that and reframing it for them into a workforce issue, and taking away the pictures of cute little kids and putting, you know, workers. Those was a really significant step in how they were able to begin to shift the narrative toward child care. It’s not a mom and kid issue. It is all of our issues because it affects our state’s economy, right?

00:33:32:17 – 00:34:04:10
Unknown
That is what it is. So reframing it into something that your audience understands is really important. And you have that multiple different ways, right? Because what you do can impact workforce. What you do can impact education. What you do can impact just a family’s health, right, and ability to thrive. So you are working with multiple audiences and you know, we call it messaging matrix and in our language here in Nova.

00:34:04:12 – 00:34:28:04
Unknown
But it really is. It’s like picking that that approach that, you know, is going to resonate. And some of that’s probably right in your head. It’s like I’m talking to this donor and they are a studio, I’m talking to this donor and she is super active in this group or this audience over here. And I need her to understand that you always have to pick that out of your head on the right and talk about

00:34:28:07 – 00:34:35:17
Unknown
You have to be nuanced in understanding who you’re talking to and what they want to walk away with. I one of the things in small teams,

00:34:35:17 – 00:34:52:14
Unknown
that I think is important is protecting yourself from chaos. And that’s true of probably any business, right? But in small teams in particular, the issues of chaos that come to you are like programmatic, literally a toilet just, you know, flooded in the over the ceiling.

00:34:52:14 – 00:35:11:07
Unknown
This law is going through federally this, you know, like you just never know. Right. And protecting yourself to be able to make decisions. And so it is well known that on my team, when something chaotic comes up, as long as everyone’s okay, my response is usually to laugh. And that can be offensive. But it’s actually a physiological reminder like everything’s figurative.

00:35:11:09 – 00:35:16:17
Unknown
This seems big in this moment, but in a week I’m going to think this is hilarious. So I’m just going to laugh now,

00:35:16:22 – 00:35:25:16
Unknown
okay? Right. Let’s just I mean, you cannot make this stuff up, right? And then I say, all right, give me the facts. Let’s start with the facts

00:35:25:18 – 00:35:32:13
Unknown
one by one and let’s manage by facts. Too often, what we think is chaos is our interpretation of what’s going on and not the facts.

00:35:32:14 – 00:35:51:02
Unknown
Right. And so I look at facts, help us solve emotions, help us care. And so when I’m telling stories, that’s the thing I need to hook you with emotions. I need you to understand this. But facts are what’s going to solve this problem. And the fact is there is a problem because there’s a shortage of child care, which immediately impacts a shortage of workforce.

00:35:51:02 – 00:36:02:17
Unknown
And so I think when you operate with that mindset of I care about you or I care about what we’re doing, and I can be very emotive about it, but I have to have the facts to navigate this. It’s important.

00:36:02:17 – 00:36:10:16
Unknown
One thing to Jen was talking about different messages and different audiences. We did the It’s Ours campaign this last year and so we hit,

00:36:10:16 – 00:36:12:08
Unknown
you know, we have all of the audiences.

00:36:12:08 – 00:36:29:19
Unknown
It could be donors, it could be parents. It could be, you know, people who are just stakeholders in other ways. It can be workers. We hit all of these different elements of the issue. But and we provided a sense of ownership for everyone when they were looking at hand in hand. And so the overarching message is really simple and it’s very universal.

00:36:29:19 – 00:36:53:04
Unknown
It’s very ownership based. And then we broke it down into vignettes that were specific to each of those audiences. So you could use them if you were presenting to a donor group or to a company or to a corporation. We can target them differently in advertising. So, you know, when we talk about having a message that’s overarching and then breaking it down into those different audiences and touching on their pain points or their different needs, I think that was a really good example of that, too.

00:36:53:04 – 00:37:12:20
Unknown
And it was a it was the way that we were able to utilize your team. Right? Like, you have the expertise creating this overarching vision and the vignettes and helping us narrow in on them. And now we can execute on day to day things using that same framework that, you know, the same ideas, and it just helps us maximize our dollars and our impact.

00:37:13:00 – 00:37:29:09
Unknown
when you came to your board and you said that we’ve never invested in professional marketing assistance and ensure you get pushed back, what were the things that helped them understand why you were coming to them with a specific need and have French?

00:37:29:10 – 00:37:59:12
Unknown
I think it was the real examples of the challenges we’d already seen coming, and the conversation about what was next. And I think people, they want to help, they want to make a difference. They want to do the right thing, but they don’t know what to do. So being able to go to this obvious group of people who are well invested in what we’re doing and say, I’m telling you, it’s scary.

00:37:59:12 – 00:38:19:21
Unknown
I’m telling you that I don’t know. I’m telling you that everyone’s saying what your contingency plan if funds get cut, and I say, I cannot have 27 contingency plans, my plan is to do the next right thing every day. I’m offering you one point of control. And one thing we can control is trying to develop a stronger foundation and get ahead of this before it gets too noisy.

00:38:19:21 – 00:38:39:09
Unknown
And I think people were were open to that saying, okay, this is this is a solution. At that time, they said it’s a potential solution. It may not work. And I was very honest as well, saying this may not work. If it doesn’t, it’s a significant amount of money in a year’s time. It’s not over the lifespan of the organization.

00:38:39:09 – 00:38:48:00
Unknown
If it does work, the outcome is incredible. And so I think it’s also storytelling then as well. So a little bit of fact, a little bit of emotion.

00:38:48:02 – 00:38:54:07
Unknown
You have a lot of stakeholders. You have a board, you have donors, you have families, you have empathy,

00:38:54:09 – 00:39:02:21
Unknown
you have us, you have other partners that everybody plays a role in hand in hand success. How do they take some of the load off your small team internally,

00:39:03:01 – 00:39:15:12
Unknown
I think you have to be explicit what you’re asking for, right? I mean, they’re going to take a load naturally if they’re paid to do it or not, but especially volunteers. You’re saying I need you to do this. This is what I need you to help

00:39:15:16 – 00:39:19:09
Unknown
because you did this. This is what the difference it’s going to make.

00:39:19:10 – 00:39:34:12
Unknown
And then, you know, you’ve said before the relationship we’ve been able to develop with your team and to say, we don’t hire de novo to just outsource work. We hire them to make our work better.

00:39:34:14 – 00:39:47:09
Unknown
And also gorgeous, super fun, super fun. And being very clear about that and and knowing what you’re what you need from people

00:39:47:11 – 00:39:56:23
Unknown
so that we run into this with nonprofits and we do work with a significant number of nonprofits, but they often have to be a nonprofit of a certain size.

00:39:57:00 – 00:40:23:10
Unknown
Right? Right. Which is unfortunate. If I just had my way, I think we would, you know, just do free marketing for all of you. Right? But we don’t we’re not even a not for profit. So we bring into this where it’s competing needs sometimes. And I do think it’s really forward thinking when a CEO or, you know, the person that comes to us thinks about the fact that they’re looking for that strategic partner, not necessarily.

00:40:23:12 – 00:40:49:02
Unknown
I mean, execution can be very important. Execution, at least on the creative and production side of it. That might not be something your team can do, but thinking really about like, what do we mean done? What stories do we need to tell? And then investing in that aspect of it can be really powerful. But I think that’s a hard one for nonprofit leaders to sell to their board.

00:40:49:04 – 00:41:07:17
Unknown
You have a small team. That’s what we’ve been talking about. Sometimes they have to be a Swiss Army knife, right? To wear lots of hats. That’s not unique to hand in hand. That’s every nonprofit and lots of for profit businesses. So how do you keep them engaged and energized? How do they avoid burnout? What do you do with your team?

00:41:07:19 – 00:41:15:09
Unknown
Well, I think you had you have to like that kind of work, right? You have to be willing to switch gears. And there’s people

00:41:15:12 – 00:41:30:12
Unknown
who would prefer not to do that. And that’s okay. In a small business, for profit or not, you you have to be willing to be in program or fixing something or whatever it is. And I think you need to be worry of it.

00:41:30:16 – 00:41:44:21
Unknown
Is the right person doing the right work at the right time? Are we utilizing our resource as well? And I had a team member is I think about Swiss Army knives. And for many years it was just myself and one other person doing all fundraising volunteers, events

00:41:44:21 – 00:41:50:20
Unknown
in grant writing and marketing and messaging. And she said, no, I think that was it.

00:41:50:22 – 00:42:15:08
Unknown
And she said, Angie, I’ve applied somewhere else. And I said, tell me more about that. And she said, I’m tired of going. And inch deep into my wife said, I get it, I get it. And she has very specific skills or very solid skills in grant writing, in writing and messaging. She didn’t love the other aspects of her job, and she felt like she could never dig into the things she was really good at, which provides value and fills her

00:42:15:10 – 00:42:33:23
Unknown
I said, well, that’s I get that. I’ll make it. And she needed more money, which was totally fair. And I said, okay, how long do I have? And she was gracious. And I said, could you give me five months? I need five months to figure this out. I’ll give you the raise now. And I need you to write your dream job description.

00:42:33:23 – 00:42:42:21
Unknown
Tell me exactly what you would want to do, and then let’s look at what’s left and create a new job description. So that was another time where I had to go to the board and say, okay, here’s what I have.

00:42:42:21 – 00:42:48:22
Unknown
so we wrote a new job description for her. She is still with us. Four years later, we wrote another job description for a new team member.

00:42:48:22 – 00:43:05:13
Unknown
We have more than doubled the amount that we’ve raised. We’ve leveled up in so many different areas, and I think sometimes people would say, well, how are you ever going to replace this team member? Because that’s fair. Her skill set is incredibly unique. Not a lot of people would cross over, but I haven’t had to worry about that in four years.

00:43:05:16 – 00:43:07:13
Unknown
I’ll cross that bridge when I get there,

00:43:07:15 – 00:43:20:19
Unknown
don’t stay pigeonholed because that’s what the job description told you. Or that’s what the Facebook group of nonprofit executives is best practice. That doesn’t mean you get a cherry pick, only your favorite parts of your job, because I would just do things like this every day.

00:43:20:21 – 00:43:28:06
Unknown
to lean into the strengths in your small team and say, how can we make sure that you spend 90% of your time doing that?

00:43:28:08 – 00:43:47:22
Unknown
We have a newer team member who has experience in video editing and doing a lot of cool stuff like that. Her job doesn’t have a lot of that in it day to day, but we make sure to give her some what what opportunities can we give her that still allows her to exercise that? So I think that’s important and that can seem scary.

00:43:47:23 – 00:44:03:09
Unknown
And like I said, the risk could be people would say, Angie, you just created a job. You could never backfill. That’s true. I don’t know how long she’s going to be with us, though. And it’s not a problem. Right. It’s I think that’s important. I think businesses can take a page out of that playbook. It’s it’s

00:44:03:13 – 00:44:16:23
Unknown
in working genius Farleigh that is helping people do the work that gives them energy, that lights them up and they aren’t going to be better producers and teammates as a result of leaning into that.

00:44:16:23 – 00:44:40:09
Unknown
Whereas if you have them in something that drains them constantly, then ultimately, I mean, that’s that’s one of the best ways to burn people up. The way to really burn people out is to just kind of have them coasting along with that, really playing into what they’re capable of doing. They’re they’re confident they can do it. Like you said, she could go and inch deep in a mile wide and she could do that for a while.

00:44:40:09 – 00:44:51:08
Unknown
But ultimately she’s a person who likes to dive deeper, solid things and be able to figure it out. So you have to if you want to keep that individual, you have to find ways to play.

00:44:51:09 – 00:44:58:18
Unknown
think for a lot of people it becomes like a moral affront as well. Like I don’t feel safe morally because I know I’m not doing my best work.

00:44:58:19 – 00:45:10:21
Unknown
People want to do good work. And she was saying, I can do better work in these areas. If you give me more time, and it feels uncomfortable for me to keep giving you work that is beneath my potential because I’m so distracted.

00:45:10:22 – 00:45:17:00
Unknown
That’s a great point. Like I said, I think a lot of businesses could learn from that, from that approach to so.

00:45:17:02 – 00:45:27:21
Unknown
But a lot of small businesses do that too. At the same time, it’s it’s small businesses are so much more nimble than the bigger ones right now that doesn’t fit your job description. But I think you should find another job.

00:45:27:23 – 00:45:34:02
Unknown
Or let’s change the JavaScript. Yeah, right. How do you align what they want to do, what their passions are with what the business needs?

00:45:34:03 – 00:45:52:08
Unknown
You said right now you’re doing description having the ability to do that. And I mean I think that’s part of you being innovative okay. If this doesn’t work, we need you. How do we make that work for us? And I think it’s paid off. It has it. She’s still on the team. She’s a exceptional team member. And she’s doing great.

00:45:52:09 – 00:45:57:21
Unknown
Yeah, yeah. Producing. Love that. Yeah. Listening to this. Right.

00:45:57:23 – 00:46:17:19
Unknown
so for Creative Brief, which is something we usually do where we like dive into a campaign or a commercial. Sometimes it’s like, oh my God, can you believe what this the kind of thing. And sometimes we’ll put it up on the screen. We’re not doing Creative Breeze today, but I kind of wanted to do a version of something I’ve heard on another podcast where they call it unpaid.

00:46:17:19 – 00:46:27:16
Unknown
Advertisement. So think about something in your life that you’re just like, man, if everybody knew about this, I could be so much better.

00:46:27:18 – 00:46:40:19
Unknown
mine is not actually all that useful to other people, but I because I’m a 90 years old and obsessed with the rain levels, so I paid. Advertisement is called raindrop where I am president.

00:46:40:20 – 00:46:57:12
Unknown
Now we do a perfectly own a farm, so we care about. Okay, I appreciate your justification, but it allowed. I don’t know what it is. It’s a scarcity mindset about what it really is. Oh, sure. Worried about drought? I don’t know

00:46:57:17 – 00:47:06:23
Unknown
So my my unpaid advertisement is for raindrop, which there is a free there’s a free version of that app and it will tell you about.

00:47:07:00 – 00:47:09:18
Unknown
And I’ve tested it with a physical rain gauge.

00:47:09:19 – 00:47:25:04
Unknown
It’s pretty accurate. But that’s my that’s my unpaid that is your unpaid ad I love it your life that you’re like God of everybody. But I do also an app any list which is free. But now we’ve we’ve graduated to paid.

00:47:25:06 – 00:47:29:11
Unknown
You can have shared lists. So we have a shared grocery list and a shared target list.

00:47:29:11 – 00:47:43:19
Unknown
And it’s on my son’s iPad, my husband’s phone, mine. And so anytime at your home and you run out of something, you throw it on the grocery list, and whoever’s at the store then knows everything you need. When you upgrade to paid. You can also have your recipes in there,

00:47:43:19 – 00:48:02:17
Unknown
just have the file extension. It puts it right into any list and all your food, and then you can put it on your weekly meal calendar and touch the ingredients that goes to your meal, to your grocery list. It is it’s like $14 a year. Oh, that’s is incredible. That is like my life hack that saves so many runs to the store.

00:48:02:17 – 00:48:17:23
Unknown
And also like if you’re going to complain that I didn’t get the store, you didn’t put on the list, own your responsibilities.

00:48:18:01 – 00:48:30:17
Unknown
Do you have an unpaid advertisement? So I’m really, really late to this game. But you know, my kids did The hydrous last and the Stanleys and the circles and they a Wallace. So we have a million of wall of water bottles. I saw you walked in with one.

00:48:30:20 – 00:48:38:23
Unknown
And last week we were at the store and there was one sitting on the shelf, and it wasn’t even a color I would normally like pick, but it said $5.

00:48:38:23 – 00:48:55:08
Unknown
And I’m like, you know what? I have this really cheap plastic water bottle that’s like, no brand melted in the dishwasher, partially leaks, and I was like, I’m gonna get myself a water bottle. So I bought this, a wallet, which was actually $30 when I got to the checkout. That’s a whole other story. But I bought it and I used it this weekend for the first time.

00:48:55:08 – 00:48:56:19
Unknown
And I am a convert. And

00:48:56:19 – 00:49:13:14
Unknown
I was is the new water bottle. And I understand why there’s seven other ones sitting on my account for my kids, but I have my own and they can’t touch it. And you love yours, but I do. I love it, and I was volunteering at the John Deere Classic, super hot. It was terribly hot.

00:49:13:15 – 00:49:26:06
Unknown
Every morning I would fill it with ice, tiny bit of water. I’d leave it in my car there. Still ice. At the end of the day, I can have cold water the whole way home. It was. It’s great. The cap snaps down and then my the 11 year old was like, and then you push the handle down, mom.

00:49:26:07 – 00:49:47:14
Unknown
And that locks it so you can’t accidentally spill it in your personal. Okay, I’m in. I think your life hack is actually just following along with the trends. Jill a year later, yes, maybe that for coffee though, because twice now I have dumped an entire. But I carried this big bag and it’s my life. It’s in it, and it’s big enough that I can fit one of my, like, thermal mugs.

00:49:47:14 – 00:49:48:09
Unknown
And then I’m

00:49:48:13 – 00:49:59:20
Unknown
like a chain smoker when it comes to coffee. It’s like, oh, there’s this much left. I better fill it up again, fill it away to the top. I get in the car and multiple times it has dumped over in the bottom of my leather bag.

00:49:59:22 – 00:50:03:22
Unknown
I left because I feel this also love black coffee.

00:50:03:22 – 00:50:22:00
Unknown
I cannot like when I make coffee runs for my team. I’m like, you have to write out what you want to order because I don’t know how to say the things. I don’t know how to order, that I know how to order something. Right. Half pump. No. Give me black coffee. That’s it. Light ice. Because I’d like to drink it right away because I have an immediate gratification problem.

00:50:22:01 – 00:50:42:02
Unknown
Jen also will get in her car with an open coffee mug, so don’t let her trick into it. We’ve gotten in the car like, literally no lid. Did you just set it on like, oh, that’s a really bad idea. So we were I just replaced my car and one of the options for the seats, and I would have gotten the car earlier had I ordered this because it was more common.

00:50:42:03 – 00:51:10:07
Unknown
Is there white card? Well, not white, but like, oh, are you freaking copy? Every day of my life I should only wear brown, right? Yes, we are identical people, so they are identical people. I bought a cream sweater last year in our little merch store and my entire team was like, that’s adorable. Why? And they do get coffee on it the first day.

00:51:10:09 – 00:51:37:01
Unknown
So I need like, you know, wala version. Yes, yes. Probably do it for the new product expansion. That’s what they mean. There we go. If you’re listening, Ola, which I’m sure you are. Obviously we have tens of listeners. I’m sure the Wallace product development team is definitely listening to this and thinking, let’s save her life. Yes. Yeah, I know you heard it here first.

00:51:37:01 – 00:51:51:10
Unknown
So that’s how it was paid. I love it on the fly section that we created just for this podcast with you. Oh that’s great. I feel so special. I want to thank you so much for joining us today. It was great to have you on the podcast. I hope it was fun. This is so fun.

00:51:51:10 – 00:52:07:05
Unknown
thank you for having me. Thank you for working with our team. I keep I cannot and I do tell everybody I’m like one of those people that I love connections and telling really good stories. And I might complain about a business, but I like wouldn’t pass that on unless it was like harmful to another business.

00:52:07:05 – 00:52:08:21
Unknown
But if it’s a great business, I’m like,

00:52:09:00 – 00:52:24:13
Unknown
tell everybody. So I’m telling people about you all the time because you have you did not come to us and say, this is what we do. Do you want to buy it? You said, what do you need? And those are completely different things and is why we’re successful in our partnership.

00:52:24:13 – 00:52:42:16
Unknown
And I can’t wait to see what the next year is going to bring. And yeah, it’s cool things already happening and it’s exciting. So thank you for having me. Thank you. I appreciate it very much. Yeah, yeah. It is like staring at this screen. It’s so you got to have like feel energy. Otherwise it’s just awkward. This is great.

00:52:42:17 – 00:52:48:12
Unknown
Yeah. Thank you, thank you. I will come back. Yes. All right. Okay. Thank you.

00:52:48:14 – 00:52:49:20
Unknown
Are we swearing on this or now?