Latest / We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits / 439. The Power of the Collective for Systems Change - Anne Marie Burgoyne

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439. The Power of the Collective for Systems Change - Anne Marie Burgoyne · We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Hey, I'm John.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: And I'm Becky.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: And this is the We Are For Good podcast.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: Nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions and the growing pressure to do more, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: We're here to learn with you from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories, all to create an impact uprising.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: So welcome to the Good Community.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: We're nonprofit professionals, philanthropists, world changers and rabbit fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: So let's get started, becky, we get to be the rabbit fans today.
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: Okay, can I take everybody back to before we started?
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: We Are For Good.
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: And John asked me this really profound question one day and he was like what is your goal?
• 0:49
  Speaker 3: What is your goal here?
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: And I remember looking at you, john, and saying my goal is like just to sit at the feet of a stranger and hear their story.
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: And today we get to sit at the feet of, like one of the most badass woman storytellers of all time.
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: I mean, we have been counting down the days that we get to meet Anne Marie Burgoyne.
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: She is the managing director of social innovation at a little known group called the Emerson Collective.
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: You might know that name.
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: It was started by Lorraine Pal Jobs And let me just tell you about Emerson.
• 1:23
  Speaker 3: I think that there is a perception about it, but for us they are such conveners conveners of entrepreneurs and academics and artists and do-gooders, community leaders and they're pulling all of these voices and ideas and solutions together to spur this measurable and lasting change, and I love that.
• 1:45
  Speaker 3: They are working to find the greatest difference possible that really aligns with us.
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: John too, like we call it the impact uprising.
• 1:52
  Speaker 3: We are here to ignite do-gooders, and it's just a joy to be able to sit in the wake of Anne Marie and her thought leadership, and so I want to give a little bit of background on Anne Marie, because she really is the manager of all the investment process.
• 2:07
  Speaker 3: We're going to get into the fact that she was an investment banker Hello in her early days, but she does that for nonprofits and for-profits, social entrepreneurs and innovators in this wide array of sectors, including education, immigration, social justice and the environment all causes that are very near and dear to our hearts.
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: And she also works with the diverse team in Emerson to assure that partner organizations can access their capacity building, their amplification and advocacy support.
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: And so, as a woman who has served on more than 30 boards, she's been a nonprofit ED.
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: She's been in the trenches, just like all of us y'all She has been in early childhood and disabilities, to climate change and building emerging leaders.
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: And when our friend Abby Felix said you got to know Anne Marie, we jumped at the chance and we are just so humbled to get to know you.
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: So today we're going to be talking about the power of the collective for systems change.
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: You know, our final core value at We Are For Good is community, is everything, and we are bringing in, just a wholehearted human who is going to walk us through, how they've already done that.
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: So, anne Marie, mom, just incredible human being, get into our house.
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: We're so excited that you're here.
• 3:20
  Speaker 4: I am honored to be here And I have to say, for a moment, when you said rabid fans, i thought you said rabid fans And we had a number of rabid's as children And so I thought, oh, they're rabid fans too.
• 3:31
  Speaker 4: But I am glad to be here.
• 3:33
  Speaker 4: I'm very, very glad to talk about the power of community, which I believe in very deeply, and I also think I love your, your belief that we are in the midst of a possibility and an unmoving amplification of an uprising.
• 3:48
  Speaker 4: I really do believe that people that know that change is possible and that change that is about all of us being better seen and understood and represented is possible, and I really believe it is about believing that change begins to occur.
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: So I'm very excited by that.
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: I mean, she's already reflecting our other values back to us that it's not about the giving, it's about the belief.
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: We believe that believers are so much more powerful than donors because they're bringing much more to the table, and I'm we agree with you.
• 4:22
  Speaker 3: We think we are standing in the possibility of a moment of the greatest radical shift that we could see across sectors for good.
• 4:30
  Speaker 3: And just so you know, i am a huge rabbit fan And if you've not read Watershift Down, you would be a rabbit fan as well.
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: So before we get into all of this, like, we just want to get to know you, amory, you as a human being, like.
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: Tell us where you grew up, tell us what kind of led you to this work for justice and equalization and amplification.
• 4:50
  Speaker 3: Let us know, little Amory.
• 4:52
  Speaker 4: Oh gosh, little Amory.
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: So I grew up in Pennsylvania, half of my life in the eastern side of Pennsylvania, the suburbs of Philadelphia, half in the western side of Pennsylvania, the suburbs of Pittsburgh, and then I went to college in Philly, so I kind of worked my way across the state.
• 5:08
  Speaker 4: I think this has always been true of me.
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: I was very outspoken and I was also very polite and a rule follower And so was always trying to find that path, and I think it was in part because I was the oldest daughter in a pretty conservative family.
• 5:23
  Speaker 4: I came from a Catholic background, and so there really was a belief that there were things you did that were right and wrong.
• 5:30
  Speaker 4: I came from a very loving family, but my dad struggled to keep a job for a long time, and so that's why we moved, that's why we made certain choices we did as a family, and so I think where my work comes from is this is a sense that, like empathy is the engine that creates possibility.
• 5:53
  Speaker 4: I think like it isn't finding empathy that you understand and there's an understanding that you find solutions.
• 5:58
  Speaker 4: And I also think there's a part where you recognize at least this is how I think about it Everyone comes from a place that is both complicated and has past and has like sort of hope, and but we all get mixed up sometimes in what is complicated, because that is, i think, what holds us back And so, finding a place without having to know what that is Like.
• 6:23
  Speaker 4: I also think there's a feeling we have sometimes, like it isn't understanding people's stories, that we can be empathetic, and my belief is that you just have to know that there's a story there and that's where your empathy comes from.
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: Because, like, i think what's interesting is, as a funder and I have been blessed to be in the funding community now for almost 20 years Lots of questions that I'll ask you about your mission, about your work, about your impact, about your data, but I won't necessarily ask you about your life.
• 6:47
  Speaker 4: That doesn't touch your work, because I also want to respect that.
• 6:50
  Speaker 4: There are places you want to need to hold dear And if you share those with me, i am honored.
• 6:56
  Speaker 4: I, once I know those things, i'll ask you about your kids.
• 6:59
  Speaker 4: I'll ask you about those things, but I won't unless you let me into that place, but I will know that it has affected you and that it is why you are driven to do what you do.
• 7:09
  Speaker 4: There's almost that like empathy through unknown belief that I think can really make that place where you allow kindness to happen.
• 7:19
  Speaker 4: But what I believe is, at some point you don't need to know everyone's entire history, they do not need to unburden themselves to you for you to have empathy and kindness toward them.
• 7:29
  Speaker 4: And it is in us holding that belief that each of us has something they are wrestling down but also comes to their work with really, really powerful, good, strong intent.
• 7:41
  Speaker 4: If we can find each other and we can like lock arms together, that's where problem solving comes from, that sense of empathy and kindness and belief.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: Man, i mean we're such kindred spirits with the way that you've led into this conversation and honestly just made us feel as people too, just in your warmth and the way that you approach your work.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: So I know that the power of the collective is really vital to y'all And I think when I read about your work it just again reminds me of like this is how we do this.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: It's not showing up thinking that any one person's the answer.
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: It's the power of how do we do this and lock, step and lock arm together.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: So I wanna give you space to tell a little bit about the history of Emerson, because we've heard a little bit of the story.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: but what inspired Lorraine to begin this work and what does it look like now?
• 8:27
  Speaker 4: It's so interesting.
• 8:28
  Speaker 4: So, to give you a frame, i was the eighth person at Emerson Collective and now the collective has over 300 people.
• 8:34
  Speaker 4: Oh my gosh.
• 8:35
  Speaker 4: So it has grown in, obviously, size, but in strength and in complexity and in possibility over time too.
• 8:44
  Speaker 4: And one of the things I loved about joining the collective and I had been at JPritzard's Kaplan for quite a long time and had really loved the philanthropic possibilities there But one of the things I appreciated when I went to Emerson was I said to Lorraine I don't think the money always has to be the answer or the first thing.
• 9:03
  Speaker 4: And one of the things I appreciated was she knew she wanted to create an organization that would take on social change.
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: She'd been doing quiet philanthropy for a long time, but it wasn't the second or third person she hired that was focused on philanthropy.
• 9:17
  Speaker 4: They were focused on policy and politics or convening or investing or other tools of social change.
• 9:24
  Speaker 4: And so when I joined, what was really interesting was it meant that the dollar wasn't always the first solution.
• 9:30
  Speaker 4: It wasn't.
• 9:32
  Speaker 4: We have something we call beyond the grant, and so our question really is we know we need to give you a grant.
• 9:40
  Speaker 4: It's part of what we do philanthropically.
• 9:41
  Speaker 4: We wanna honor your time, we wanna honor your possibilities, but what we're really trying to figure out is, given what Emerson has connectivity to or is able to provide, what will be useful to you, and how do we provide that in a way that has optionality, so you don't feel pressured, you don't feel like you're using your time or your scarce resources in a way that later you feel frustrated by.
• 10:03
  Speaker 4: But, at the same time, if you leave an experience or an opportunity and you think I have grown as a leader or my team is stronger or my understanding of my possibility, of my work has been improved, that's what we're trying to seek out And that's why we call it beyond the grant.
• 10:20
  Speaker 4: And so what I appreciated for Lorraine was she not only thought about beyond the grant in that philanthropic context, which is where I think about it day to day, but she thought about it.
• 10:30
  Speaker 4: If we have this broader possibility for social change, we're really very ring fenced.
• 10:36
  Speaker 4: If we were only a foundation in what tasks we could take on, i could see that.
• 10:40
  Speaker 4: But by being in a position to have a team that focuses on marketing and communications and storytelling and branding and another that is very, very strong and capable at convening another that's able to focus on advocacy and not feel like that they have limitations around that.
• 10:56
  Speaker 4: We have a team that focuses on fellowships, which allows us to not only look at the unit of change as an organization, but the unit of change is an individual.
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: We have a technology team, which has been very interesting because over time, there really is a divide in our society around those who have access to tech and not tech, and I think we think about that in terms of individuals and communities.
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: I think we think about it less in terms of institutions, because if you look at nonprofits, the technology they have access to and there's actually both a cost and a knowledge issue involved in that is much more limited, and so the divides become much bigger between the institutions that are serving the people and communities that are also really disconnected from technology, and the rest of the like, the society that's sitting out there.
• 11:46
  Speaker 4: And so what's been great about our tech team is they bring sets of expertise how to build a strong CRM, how to access various data sets that, if you lay them on top of your existing data sets, you would be more knowledgeable about who you might serve or how you might serve them better More fundamental pieces around.
• 12:39
  Speaker 4: We just had a webinar last week and over 170 people came to a webinar on AI and how AI will affect the nonprofit sector.
• 12:46
  Speaker 4: We have an AI day coming up, where a number of nonprofits are going to get to sit down with AI experts for a day and a half to find, to figure out how to understand the AIA as an existential threat but, equally importantly, how to use AIA as a tool to do their work more effectively.
• 13:01
  Speaker 4: So the tech piece has been very interesting.
• 13:03
  Speaker 4: So I think for us, we're really asking that narrow question what's beyond the grant?
• 13:07
  Speaker 4: And then, as an institution and organization, we're asking the question what is the possibility when a number of different tools can be leveraged concurrently around what are really thorny hard broken systems in education and immigration, in environmental justice and climate justice.
• 13:23
  Speaker 4: That's really where we spend our days.
• 13:26
  Speaker 3: I mean, john, are you feeling like Emery just succinctly rolled up all of our 2023 trends into that answer that we spread out over a three month period?
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: I heard marketing is mission.
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: I heard humanized the digital experience.
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: I heard community is core.
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: I heard lock arms for impact.
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: I mean, there's so much that can be realized when you this is a very technical term, emery in our community try stuff which is our phrase for innovation and really leaning into thinking about your work differently and thinking about how you curate the voices and the ideas, because we know, because we've worked in nonprofit and I say we as a collective here at We Are For Good that the solutions to the most systemic problems reside in the communities, where they are The people who are experiencing them.
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: So it demands cognitive diversity in these areas, and I would like to just double click with you a little bit on your impact, because I'm looking at the areas in which you're serving And these are very heady, very big topics.
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: We're talking about climate, we're talking about racial justice, we're talking about gun safety And there's just so much, and so I wanted you to talk about what have you guys been focusing on and talk about what your impact has looked like today.
• 14:53
  Speaker 4: It's interesting, and as I unpack this response, i will probably move between our philanthropic portfolio and Emerson Collective, which is kind of logical and appropriate When I think about our education work and the fulcrum there is around high schools.
• 15:08
  Speaker 4: And so I think one of the things we've always believed is that young people who've been failed by their education system there is a temptation to believe that by the time they get to high school, if they haven't gathered a set of literacy and numeracy skills, it may well be too late for them.
• 15:26
  Speaker 4: And that's been a place we've really pushed back Many, many years ago.
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: It's their 25th anniversary.
• 15:31
  Speaker 4: So about 25 years ago LaRine started College Track, which is an organization that supports young people to get to and through high school and college, and we have locations in the Bay Area, dc, new Orleans, colorado.
• 15:45
  Speaker 4: But that organization has brought thousands of young people through that program And I think our realization has been that in many ways our public systems don't have infrastructure that, by providing that infrastructure, enables young people who have historically not been seen as strong or capable, as being astonishingly strong and capable and simply not in a situation that allowed them to thrive.
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: And so then that rolled us over time into our XQ work, which is our high school redesign work.
• 16:20
  Speaker 4: We have a number of high schools across the US that are part of that program, plus DC public schools, new York public schools, schools in Tulsa, schools in Rhode Island.
• 16:29
  Speaker 4: So that set of schools and districts that have made the choice to relook at the design of high school and make it less about time and seats and more about learning skills and having experiences And really learning how to problem solve, using data, using design knowledge in ways that actually allow students to do just fine on standardized tests but, equally importantly, help them to understand the world they're navigating And, whether they choose to go to college, whether they choose other choices, to give them that sense of both confidence and skill to move forward in their lives.
• 17:07
  Speaker 4: And it's been exciting to watch whole districts come to XQ and say we want to engage here.
• 17:13
  Speaker 4: It's also encouraged us to look at programs like College Track that are also in after school spaces Brotherhood, sister, saul in New York, thread in Baltimore.
• 17:23
  Speaker 4: So that's what that portfolio has looked like over time And I think it's also then created conversations at universities, which has been exciting.
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: That asks how do we relook at how we bring students from high school to college?
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: What skills are we actually seeking?
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: What does it mean to be ready for college?
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: What does it mean to be a leader when you come into a college campus environment?
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: So lots of impact there, which is as much about the sort of numeric, how a model grows and then how the structures and systems around that opportunity respond differently.
• 17:58
  Speaker 4: When I look at our work around environment and climate and the justice aspects of that and I will say this in particular is a really big movement time It is fair to say that there is no one reason why there is so much federal funding now available for infrastructure creation.
• 18:16
  Speaker 4: But I will say it's very powerful.
• 18:19
  Speaker 4: The leaders that were able to voice the importance of much of that money coming back into communities that have historically not gotten infrastructure dollars.
• 18:27
  Speaker 4: And I do think that when I look at leaders in our environmental justice portfolio, catherine Flowers, for example there are voices and in bringing people to community to see what it looks like to live in a community that doesn't actually have adequate sanitation systems And to bring that to Washington TC and to have a conversation about what it means to.
• 18:49
  Speaker 4: In the same way, there's disproportionate impacts of climate change.
• 18:52
  Speaker 4: What does it mean to have disproportionate allocation of resources to communities that have never gotten those kinds of resources before, and how those voices make a difference.
• 19:01
  Speaker 4: And it's been exciting then to watch some of those portfolios of work pivot, because the skills to advocate for opportunity are different than the skills to receive resources and to bring those resources into community and to use them, and so there's a whole interesting pivot that's happening in those portfolios to answer a new set of questions, to sometimes find new and different leaders in organizations, and then also to help organizations that have historically been doing work to also pivot.
• 19:29
  Speaker 4: And there's nothing more frustrating than being a person who led the charge for one thing and then, as that charge has success to be told well, you were part of the last chapter, so that's been.
• 19:39
  Speaker 4: Another piece of the work is how do you then pull people along into that next chapter?
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: I mean, ann Marie, when we were researching, we ran across this quote that I just feel like I need to lift, because you're saying this and it's like, oh, it's just vibing with the values that you all embody, but this was a Ralph Waldo Emerson quote.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: That's in one soul, in your soul, there are resources for the world.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: I mean how beautiful of just this abundance idea and just the power of the individuals as part of the collective too, and so I want to give you light, because I mean what you're sharing shows that you all are really great at asking questions, the bigger, right questions and being curious.
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: But what are those mindsets?
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Because a lot of people listening are wanting to figure out.
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: What are the mindsets that we need to cultivate to have this type of impact, to get to this type of solution.
• 20:23
  Speaker 4: I appreciate that question.
• 20:25
  Speaker 4: I mean, i will start by saying one of the things I really appreciate about Loreen bringing Ralph Waldo Emerson into the zeitgeist of Emerson collective is his writing on both self-reliance and on nature is really quite profound And if you ever go to a website that has quotes, ralph Waldo Emerson has just buckets of excellent quotes that are as relevant today as they were when he penned them, and I really appreciate that.
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: He even has a book called Nature.
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: It's probably like 200 years old or something.
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: At this point.
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: Check it out And it is perfect And it's not literal in every sense.
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: It's so many metaphors, so, yes, keep going.
• 21:02
  Speaker 4: I just think if he were someone that walked into the present, there are things that would probably confuse and surprise him, but I think he could survive and thrive And we could learn from him.
• 21:10
  Speaker 4: That would be very exciting.
• 21:11
  Speaker 4: But to answer your question, john, i think we have really thought a lot about a couple frames.
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: I mean, one is really seeking out leaders who are proximate to the work they do.
• 21:26
  Speaker 4: And I want to highlight, proximity presents itself in many different ways.
• 21:32
  Speaker 4: That can be about where you came from, and what I've learned over the time is different people describe came from in different ways.
• 21:41
  Speaker 4: It could be like where you grew up.
• 21:43
  Speaker 4: It could be where you visited your grandma in the summer.
• 21:45
  Speaker 4: It could be where you went to college.
• 21:46
  Speaker 4: It could be that very first job you had.
• 21:49
  Speaker 4: So I also want to say proximity is very much different for different people.
• 21:54
  Speaker 4: But we look for people who, when we say why do you do this work And it seems like such a silly question It usually goes back to something deeply personal, which is true for many people but not for all, and we really are trying to find the people that they say.
• 22:08
  Speaker 4: This grounds me because And not just the leader, but the team, the board.
• 22:14
  Speaker 4: We really do ask questions to understand who's surrounding the work.
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: I think another thing that we've tried to bring is a belief, and it's a very simple mechanism.
• 22:24
  Speaker 4: We primarily make general operating grants that are multiple years, and we do that because our belief is that we want to support what you're doing.
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: We don't want to come and say, well, we really like your work in Denver Or we really like your work with seniors.
• 22:39
  Speaker 4: We pretty much just believe the most important thing we can do is value your work, the way you've conceived of it, and so if we come to a place where we feel like this is not a fit, we'd rather say to you this is not a fit than hey, this is not a fit, but if you could torque yourself into the smaller box, that would be a fit.
• 22:57
  Speaker 4: And so, oh my gosh, i feel so sane.
• 23:00
  Speaker 4: Part of that really is about this piece around building community by bringing together leaders and groups of leaders who all then have started the work and are doing the work because that's where they want to be and that's what we're supporting.
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: I'll also share a story that was.
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: I also think we bring a lot of optimism to the work and when we go back to this piece we talked about earlier about belief, and we gathered a group last year or last week of folks who are independent bookstores and we're exploring the question of what would it look like if independent bookstores could become hybrid in their structure so that they could have a nonprofit, which would then allow them to bring in dollars for the incredibly strong community work and program work that they historically do at a financial loss.
• 23:47
  Speaker 4: And I was talking to one of the bookstore leaders at the end and I made a comment like oh my gosh, you all love each other so much.
• 23:54
  Speaker 4: I'm so glad you got to meet each other by coming together.
• 23:56
  Speaker 4: And what she said was oh, i've known these people for years.
• 23:59
  Speaker 4: However, i see them differently now because I used to see when I would come together in a community of booksellers, we basically saw ourselves as people who ran failed businesses and we all had this shared belief that the businesses we ran were important and what you've now told us is that we are the leaders of successful community creation engines.
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: And by seeing myself differently and by seeing this group of peers differently, it's, it's re-engaged, the possibility of my work and my work with these people.
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: So what you're seeing is not like meeting people for the first time, it's seeing myself and and everyone else differently for the first time and I was really struck by that and I will say it was.
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: It's not the first time that's happened.
• 24:46
  Speaker 4: So, for example, and but different flavors, like last year, we did a grant round that we called climate special grant round, because we're not super creative sometimes at naming things, but clarity is what that grant exactly?
• 24:59
  Speaker 4: I mean, everybody knew what it was about.
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: So we've reached out to just organizations in the portfolio and said climate is everywhere and climate is not only our existential threat, climate is our real threat.
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: So we're not saying, please create a mission creep project, but if you've all been sitting around as a team and asking yourself if we had a little bit of money and we're watching this climate thing, this is what we would do.
• 25:22
  Speaker 4: Tell us what that is.
• 25:24
  Speaker 4: We'll give you money for it and it's restricted grant, admittedly.
• 25:28
  Speaker 4: We'll pick 20 organizations and we'll gather you together in a cohort to, for a couple years, explore what it would mean to be climate leaders coming from a place of non historically, non-climate focused work.
• 25:40
  Speaker 4: And we brought that group of people together and it was really, and it was funny because somebody who was fairly new to the team said do you think we should, like you know, encourage people to work together or do something to make that happen?
• 25:52
  Speaker 4: and my response was now, that'll happen by itself and it and it does because when, when, when people find that shared possibility, they they actually find it all by themselves.
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: And, granted, we'll do things like curate lunch tables or curate tables to be in conversation about something, because we have theories that if people find each other, that energy would, would, would, would, spark.
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: And then a third example we also have a group that focuses on urban gardens that focus on high school youth, and we have about 12 or 15 of them around the US and we brought them together for a gathering and sometimes we offer this thing again not not super creative called the travel grant program, which means if you are in a cohort during the time of the cohort, you can travel to the locations of other people's work in the cohort.
• 26:37
  Speaker 4: So you can see it, because we believe that actually, like, you can show people pictures of gardens and bookstores all day long, but if you're really a bookseller, you don't get the book, so you don't get the bookstore till you walk around the bookstore, and if you're a garden person, that's like a couple acres of land.
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: The only way to experience that is to walk the acreage with the other people, and so a number of folks recently have three of those urban gardens that are in New York and so people from Chicago and San Francisco, a bunch of people, all went to New York together and they visited the three New York gardens together and I think it was transformative and and again goes back to that piece where it is in seeing your work through the possibility of something larger.
• 27:17
  Speaker 4: It really allows you to see the power of your work in a much more narrow way, and that you're, that you're part of.
• 27:23
  Speaker 4: You know you go back to movements.
• 27:25
  Speaker 4: I really think a lot of these, these move this is like a that particularly thing is a liberatory movement around food and around food access and around us being able to be much more sustainable in the place where we are.
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: That's pretty powerful.
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: I want to give you a compliment here because you're you're talking and I'm, and I'm watching as you're talking, about this network and this intersection and how just the tentacles of the network are going out and they just ripple, ripple, ripple as people find their people and as they feel seen.
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: I think that you know it absolutely shows me that Emerson Collective despite, like perhaps this celebrity you know around Lorraine's name or what people think you are you have built this sense of empowerment and you have released control in the most beautiful way and I love that.
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: You've held really tight to your values and what you know of yourself and have you know what you know of the change you want to see.
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: But the way that you have gathered and the way that you have empowered and I tell you as a recovering major gift officer, thank you for those multi-level, multi-year grants, because those allow us to have some runway.
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: But it feels like you're reimagining the possibility of how we gather, how we impact, how we flex our philanthropy and the fact that you put mindsets all back to somebody being seen seen for who they are, what they can bring is a really beautiful thing and I think this is the way to me, this is the way that we need to move forward in collective co-building and we do it in community, whether physically yes, we, we want that physical, because there's something different when you walk through the garden and you can smell basil and you are the lavender or whatever it is and you can actually be a part of it.
• 29:17
  Speaker 3: But just the ability for people to come together and the things that they're passionate about in any way and bringing those skill sets is incredibly powerful.
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: So I just want to thank you for how beautifully you have built this, because it is a model for, i think, all of us about what is the potential and I and I think I want to talk to you about this frictionless philanthropy that you all have coined, because we've done a big push this year into reimagining the funder's mindset and I'm like you all haven't reimagined it.
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: You reimagined it years ago.
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: Now you're living it out.
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: And I want to go deeper into what you've discovered here, because Emerson Collective just embraced this beautiful and evolved partnership model that you call frictionless philanthropy and it's deepening impact and relationship with your grantees.
• 30:07
  Speaker 3: Talk to us about this model and talk about how you've seen it benefit your partners and your mission, as you sort of empower these mindsets of belonging and feeling seen.
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: Would love to hear your thoughts on it.
• 30:20
  Speaker 4: No, thank you for that.
• 30:21
  Speaker 4: And so the thought around frictionless philanthropy was we try to do pretty thoughtful diligence when we bring a new organization into the portfolio, and so then our feeling was, if we've done that and we really want to be in conversation and we're not naive enough to know that money in a conversation doesn't always change the conversation then there have to be times in the relationship that leave open the possibility for building greater trust and just being in conversation.
• 30:54
  Speaker 4: And so There's a set of opportunities that we offer, and I'll explain a little bit how we offer them.
• 31:01
  Speaker 4: But the feeling was that they needed to not be about being in conversation and choosing.
• 31:07
  Speaker 4: They needed to be about offering and folks choosing to opt in or not.
• 31:10
  Speaker 4: And that's where the frictionless philanthropy comes in.
• 31:13
  Speaker 4: If you're in a general operating grant with us, a multi-year general operating grant with us then during that time we offer you things and you can choose to take them or not take them, and they're all cost-free.
• 31:25
  Speaker 4: So, for example, we have a curated menu of opportunities management training, access to legal counsel, storytelling and op-ed writing, access to various software and hardware, governance coaching And you can choose to use all of them or none of them.
• 31:47
  Speaker 4: Most of them are with external vendors, and you send us the receipt and we send you dollars for it, and that was our way of really saying like, if this is interesting to you.
• 31:55
  Speaker 4: And our biggest learning is we need to do a good job of making sure people know what's available, know they can ask questions about it without then having to use it, making sure that if they choose to use it, they use it in a way that is not time consuming and doesn't in some way make someone feel frustrated rather than joyful.
• 32:12
  Speaker 4: So that's a piece of it.
• 32:14
  Speaker 4: And then there's a piece where we have an internally curated menu, coaching, support from an accountant, and the frictionless philanthropy helps there too, because for the team of people who work on our team, by remembering that they're in a position to be able to offer those things at any time, it keeps that fresh and possible, and so it's a good reminder, not only for the grantee partner.
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: This is frictionless, this is always available for people on our team to also be in that same mindset.
• 32:42
  Speaker 4: And then the other pieces are even a bigger curation set.
• 32:44
  Speaker 4: We provide eight or nine trainings a year with folks that focus on governance or fund development or how to grow your impact, and we really try to thoughtfully curate the list of who's invited to those.
• 32:58
  Speaker 4: We try to make it across our portfolio.
• 33:00
  Speaker 4: So to us it would be a fail if you didn't look across that room and realize there's people here who focus on education, immigrant justice, climate justice and environmental justice, health equity.
• 33:10
  Speaker 4: Like you want to look around and say I don't know very many of these people because this is actually not my usual group.
• 33:16
  Speaker 4: This is a group with breadth and I'm going to meet new people and I'm going to understand my work differently as a result.
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: And then that's a curated opportunity too.
• 33:24
  Speaker 4: And that's surprisingly, if you come to those and I'm really proud of this our community team is so good.
• 33:29
  Speaker 4: People have told us, from the second they arrived till the second they leave, they feel so welcome.
• 33:33
  Speaker 4: The food is beautiful, the location is wonderful, the kindness is your show.
• 33:37
  Speaker 4: Those things really do matter, and so that's what frictionalist philanthropy is is trying to have these various sets of opportunities that are curated in different ways, that you feel comfortable and excited to explore And that then, in the end, really should be of great benefit and of no cost emotional, time, financial, for sure.
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: I mean I just love this wraparound and the evolved way that y'all do that.
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: I mean it's all about capacity, sustainability, relationships, kind of all those things converging.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: And we've curated some conversations around funders and we just believe that just as fast as the nonprofit space, which is the space Becky and I came out of for the last 20 years, is changing so rapidly, the funder and the mindsets that it takes to be a funder in this moment has to evolve too.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: And I know we're starting to run out of time but I want to hear just quickly what are your thoughts?
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: You work with a lot of funders through your work.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: What are some ways that funders could evolve and modernize their work to move faster with nonprofits and grow a bigger impact?
• 34:39
  Speaker 4: So I talked to folks about this a lot and I think there's actually many ways that could happen.
• 34:44
  Speaker 4: I mean, i think if everybody at least explored what it would mean to provide general operating support, i think that would really be very helpful.
• 34:52
  Speaker 4: Thank you, i think.
• 34:53
  Speaker 4: Yeah, i think asking the question if you are able to give a two-year grant in this cycle, can you do a three-year grant in the next?
• 35:00
  Speaker 4: Like even elongation matters, fewer transaction costs, just more well, less stress because of more of a sense of what the front roadway looks like.
• 35:11
  Speaker 4: I think that could be a piece When people say to our team and one thing I want to highlight here is when you do your work anonymously and you do it with a level of care with which we do it, you end up having a team of people who are very humble and to work very hard, because seamless experiences typically are because someone is watching And I don't mean that in a weird way, i mean that in a kindness way Someone is really asking is everyone here having an experience that is a good one?
• 35:48
  Speaker 4: And we'll have meetings after.
• 35:49
  Speaker 4: This will be so silly, but I'll use this as an example.
• 35:52
  Speaker 4: We'll have meetings after convenings and ask what could have gone better, and so, like one of the things now we do is like we've made all the bathrooms during convenings ones that men and women or whatever your selection set is Actually can I just reword that?
• 36:06
  Speaker 4: I'm going to go back.
• 36:06
  Speaker 4: We've made a choice that our bathrooms during convenings are accessible to whomever needs to use them, because our realization was some lines were bigger than other lines, and that was one of those moments where we felt like this is not making for a good experience and this is something entirely in our control to make better, and so we spend a lot of time on the experience.
• 36:25
  Speaker 4: So another thing I'll often say to people is they'll say we should just do what Emerson Collective does, and my response is you should do what you would do best.
• 36:33
  Speaker 4: So what are the things and it could come from different places What are the things that for you, your team, your leader, your board?
• 36:43
  Speaker 4: what assets did they have?
• 36:45
  Speaker 4: What is their social connectivity?
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: Where is their energy?
• 36:48
  Speaker 4: Where is the superpower of what they know and understand?
• 36:51
  Speaker 4: start there.
• 36:52
  Speaker 4: Or sure, you could take our curated list of offerings, but maybe ask the question what do the people in our portfolio most need, desire and want?
• 37:03
  Speaker 4: maybe start there, And so I honestly think there's lots of places to have as a beachhead.
• 37:10
  Speaker 4: We convene a certain way.
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: You may actually gather different people in different ways to different purposes, but you can make the experience an excellent one.
• 37:20
  Speaker 4: The beginning question is what is the begin with the end in mind?
• 37:27
  Speaker 4: I'll often hear folks explain this isn't really how my donor thinks about it, or I would need to justify this in this way.
• 37:35
  Speaker 4: I often brainstorm with people a lot too around that how I might frame this conversation, how I would describe how, over the years, we believe that we have been helpful and impactful.
• 37:47
  Speaker 4: I recognize for some people that they really are trying to convince others, and then sometimes I'll also say to people what do you really think is in your power and your purview?
• 37:59
  Speaker 4: and it might be more than you think, because that's another piece where I think folks realize how we choose to ask for or not ask for reporting, for example.
• 38:11
  Speaker 4: One of the things we do is we have a call every year with every grantee partner and we open it up to the entire collective as a way to create allyship across the collective and to allow people in the collective who might be in the finance department or the HR department or the Marcom team or the tech team, to understand better the mission-based work of the people we work with.
• 38:33
  Speaker 4: You could do that.
• 38:34
  Speaker 4: You could absolutely enable the mission-based work that you are really in a position to get to support to flourish in the bigger place that is the ecosystem of your workplace, and maybe then things would happen that you don't even expect yet, because in learning and knowing, different possibilities could emerge.
• 38:54
  Speaker 4: I mean, it's been fun like over the years our legal team at Emerson Collective has done some excellent pro bono work for folks in the portfolio because they got exposed to them through these calls and then said we think we could help with this.
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: So part of it, john, i feel like, is there are some structural things that are hard.
• 39:13
  Speaker 4: I also think there are some easy things you could try, and then I think there's some places where, in change happening, more change could happen too.
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: I just think the way that you're approaching this, emery, is that was so hopeful, that was so empowering, it was so caring, and thread that I've noticed in everything that you've said is this care.
• 39:38
  Speaker 3: And I want to connect that to what that output is on the nonprofit side, because when you're working at the margins all the time, it's not just budgetary margins, it's time, it's energy, and the amount of burnout and compassion fatigue that we're seeing right now is at an epic level.
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: And so when you have a funder that thinks about how do I create ease, how do I create moving to impact faster, i think the reporting piece is really, really interesting.
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: It is the way that we need to work and live, and I think you've given some excellent pro tips here about how to start, but I feel the shift in the sector and even the way we're thinking in the conversation.
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: So thank you so much for that, and you know that we believe storytelling is one of the most powerful ways that humans can connect, and we're wondering if you have a story where philanthropy has intersected in your life in a powerful way that you might want to share with us today.
• 40:39
  Speaker 4: It's so interesting, i guess this is what I would share.
• 40:42
  Speaker 4: So I was a Girl Scout for many years and I was a Brownie and I was a junior, and I was a cadet and I was a senior and a bluebird and I was a first-class Girl Scout And I kind of did the whole thing And, as you asked the question, i've never really thought about this.
• 40:59
  Speaker 4: I'm certain that was philanthropically supported I mean, i'm certain that it was, even though there's, of course, so many rich parts of that that are also about volunteers like my mom was a cookie mom But of course, all those people in my neighborhood who bought cookies from me, they were also engaged in the civic experience of supporting Girl Scouts.
• 41:19
  Speaker 4: But it's interesting because I feel like the residuals of me being a Girl Scout have stayed with me a lot, like there's moments when I'll be cooking or camping or creating something.
• 41:32
  Speaker 4: I'm not a great creator, but creating something moderately artistic, and I'll think the first time I was exposed to this was when I did a Girl Scout badge.
• 41:39
  Speaker 4: Or there's women who at the time were girls, who I still spend time with, and I've been working on a photo project with my mom and I'll look at these photos And I think, oh my gosh, like these are the girls that were in my Brownie troupe, or these were the girls that I went camping with when I was in middle school.
• 41:56
  Speaker 4: So I guess, if I were to think about it because it was both a long thread.
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: It was a very civically engaged thread.
• 42:02
  Speaker 4: It was a thread that was about self discovery, like that's.
• 42:06
  Speaker 4: What I kind of, in hindsight, think is so great about the Girl Scouts was they exposed me to all these things Because I think they really wanted girls to become well-rounded people.
• 42:18
  Speaker 4: And then I'll finish by saying a number of years ago, before I pivoted into philanthropy, i had a time when I actually did a consulting project for the Girl Scouts, for Girl Scouts National, for about six months, and it was interesting because the Girl Scouts were trying to figure out in some ways what their mission was.
• 42:35
  Speaker 4: And that was both because I was being asked of them And I think it was also because the Boy Scouts were really struggling.
• 42:41
  Speaker 4: And the Girl Scouts were trying to ask how are we different Because they are, and what do we bring with that into the future?
• 42:48
  Speaker 4: And what was interesting was I was, you know, a moderately recently minted MBA And one of my questions was OK, strategy is as much about what you do as what you don't do.
• 42:58
  Speaker 4: What do you not?
• 43:01
  Speaker 4: But in certain contexts they served young men in rural communities where there wasn't another troop or a boy didn't want to be part of the Boy Scouts.
• 43:09
  Speaker 4: They served young people in carceral facilities, they served young people in schools and not in schools and in churches.
• 43:17
  Speaker 4: And I got to this kind of crazy point in this experience where I said I believe I have failed because I believe you serve everywhere And I am so proud of that, like my business side doesn't really know where to go with that.
• 43:34
  Speaker 4: But my side that believes mission is important is deeply touched by that And so I had forgotten most of the stories I'm telling you until this very moment.
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: But I'll say the Girl Scouts because I think that they really they deliver.
• 43:48
  Speaker 4: I think they still really deliver, they delivered for me.
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: I mean, what a beautiful way to tie up this conversation And I even think of our mutual friend Abby Faelic, of like just the importance of this self discovery, the way, the thing that connected us initially is like this thread that's been part of your life and is in your work now.
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: So thank you for taking us back.
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: I'm like I got to get my girls and Girl Scouts like you are the ambassador, absolutely.
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: And I don't care what diet I'm on in February or March, i'm saving it for a box of tag along.
• 44:20
  Speaker 4: So those he does also the tag logs, although it's been minced if you put them in the freezer.
• 44:26
  Speaker 3: Pro tip.
• 44:28
  Speaker 4: Pro tip.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: OK, well, i mean, this is.
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: this is saddening us to ask our final question for you, But we like to end every episode with a one good thing.
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: You know, you have such a wealth of experience with a mantra or a life hack or just a piece of wisdom you'd share with us today.
• 44:42
  Speaker 4: I'm thinking about some of the conversations I have with my girls.
• 44:45
  Speaker 4: I have two girls, a 16 year old and a 20 year old, so a smack dab in the middle of high school and a smack dab in the middle of college.
• 44:53
  Speaker 4: And I think the thing I say pretty often is something in the frame of have you have?
• 45:01
  Speaker 4: have you asked enough questions?
• 45:02
  Speaker 4: And and I say this because whether it is they're frustrated with somebody, have you asked them questions?
• 45:10
  Speaker 4: Do you really understand why it is they're saying what they're saying, or thinking what they're thinking, or doing what they're doing, or whether they're struggling with something academic?
• 45:20
  Speaker 4: and and it's kind of a different question, but it's the same question because then asking questions is about admitting you and understand, or actually digging down and figuring out what you do understand to know than what you don't understand.
• 45:35
  Speaker 4: But again it comes back to have you asked enough questions.
• 45:41
  Speaker 4: And then I think there's another piece you know, the things that are like the known.
• 45:45
  Speaker 4: There's also like the not known yet, like going to office hours of a faculty person is a lot about going in and starting a conversation, and if you're not sure how to start a conversation, you always start it with a question, because then you're opening up to what that person wants to share or what they know that you would like to know too.
• 46:06
  Speaker 4: So I guess for me it's really been about Question asking as a way of building rapport, as a way of learning, as a way of being humble, and then, and of course, the reciprocal of that is being a gracious question responder, which means you have to be a good listener.
• 46:25
  Speaker 4: This means you don't actually hear a question.
• 46:27
  Speaker 4: You know it's like funny, like when you watch, you know that game show and they'll say phrase it as a question.
• 46:33
  Speaker 4: Like, sometimes people don't phrase it as a question, but it really still is a question and you should have the grace to hear it.
• 46:37
  Speaker 4: And hearing, when you're asked a question, to the shades of meaning and nuance of a question, like make sure that the answer is the question they were asking, because that's the best way to honor a question, is to really find the depth and the complexity of what someone wants to want to bring it to them.
• 46:54
  Speaker 4: But I guess I'd say that's been the journey.
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: I'd say No one is surprised that Amory brought it back to empathy, curiosity, love, hope, empowerment.
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: So, amory, people are going to want to get to know how to connect with you.
• 47:10
  Speaker 3: They're going to want to know more about Emerson Collective.
• 47:13
  Speaker 3: Tell us where you hang out online or how they can connect with you all right now.
• 47:17
  Speaker 4: I mean, Emerson Collective has a website.
• 47:19
  Speaker 4: I'm on Twitter, which I'm kind of fortified to admit.
• 47:23
  Speaker 4: I'm in LinkedIn and probably LinkedIn is the best way to find me.
• 47:28
  Speaker 4: I visit there the most and I dare to give my email address.
• 47:31
  Speaker 4: I feel like that could be like a very, very rookie move, but that's out there too.
• 47:37
  Speaker 4: I do email everybody that emails me.
• 47:39
  Speaker 4: I return all my email.
• 47:41
  Speaker 3: I just want to thank you for your humanity, for your open-heartedness, your open hands, your open mind, the way that you are architecting this beautiful world that we're all trying to navigate, as someone that's just like us, just trying to do our part in our part of the world.
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: It is a beautiful, beautiful thing.
• 48:01
  Speaker 3: I hope everyone got as much out of this as I knew I would, as I was sitting in Anne-Marie's feet.
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: Oh gosh thank you.
• 48:07
  Speaker 3: Thank you, my friend, for all of this.
• 48:08
  Speaker 3: I hope our paths cross many more times in the future.
• 48:11
  Speaker 3: Thank you both very much.
• 48:13
  Speaker 4: I appreciated it and I enjoyed it, and I learned some things about myself, which is always a gift too.
• 48:17
  Speaker 4: Thank you.
• 48:20
  Speaker 5: Hey friends, thanks so much for being here.
• 48:21
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• 48:22
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• 48:27
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• 48:54
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