Latest / We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits / 438. Assets-Based Approach: Creating New Narratives in Leadership and Philanthropy - Darren Isom

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438. Assets-Based Approach: Creating New Narratives in Leadership and Philanthropy - Darren Isom · 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 rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: So let's get started.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Hey Becky, What's happening?
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: Well, i've lost my voice a little bit, so I'm going to have that Phoebe Buffet like sexy voice thing going on.
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: Today It's happening, when we finally fulfill my dreams of talking to someone at Bridge Span and having that conversation be about leadership and equity and inclusion Like my heart's just so full right now.
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Like you've already lost your voice because you're so excited about this conversation.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Like you've had it in advance.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: I mean this is beautiful.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: So I mean it is a big day around here.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: We are so excited to have Darren Isom on the podcast.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: He's a partner in the San Francisco office of the Bridge I'm going to mispronounce Bridgeman right off the gate at the Bridge Span Group And today we're going to have this really evolved conversation.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: We're going to talk about creating new narratives in leadership and philanthropy And you know we like to lean head on into these conversations to give you the tools, to give you the words, to give you the language to really lean into conversations.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: That didn't, honestly happen a lot in our career, but we hope this is a safe place where there's no wrong questions.
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: There's just an open hand, open heart as we talk about this.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: But Darren's just this incredible voice.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Not only does he do this work through Bridge Span and if you're not familiar with them, let me just say through this global social impact consulting and advisory firm that works with some of the most influential nonprofits, ngos, philanthropists all driving social impact.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: Tons of free resources, tons of thought leadership.
• 1:57
  Speaker 3: I have such a philanthropic crush on them.
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: They're so great.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: So here's the deal.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: We have Darren coming in today and he spends a lot of time thinking and dreaming and talking about this space.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: In fact, he even has a podcast called Dreaming in Color Creating New Narratives in Leadership, and these are incredible conversations and we're going to talk deep about what they're talking about.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: What leaders of color are experiencing, how are they leveraging their unique assets and abilities to create impact.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: Darren's no stranger to sharing his thoughts.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: I mean you may have seen him in the Harvard Business Review, this Stanford Social Innovation Review, all these places that he's always pouring his insights, pouring his heart.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: And he has just had this incredible career before coming to Bridge Span too.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: So he was the founder and executive director of Memphis Music Initiative, which was a five-year $20 million grant-making community arts development initiative.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: He is our people, he loves the arts, and before that he worked in the art design and public programming, the director of the Times Square Alliance, both planning and implementing programming for public art Thank you very much And performance initiatives throughout the Times Square District.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: I mean, i could talk all day.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: And, darren, i'm so fascinated by your background, but he is a seventh generation New Orleans native.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: It is a delight to have you on the podcast today.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: My friend, get into this house.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: No, it's wonderful to be here.
• 3:12
  Speaker 5: Thank you, man.
• 3:12
  Speaker 5: You're really doing a great job of blowing me up.
• 3:14
  Speaker 5: I feel really important right now.
• 3:17
  Speaker 5: This is great.
• 3:17
  Speaker 5: Well, you should, it's great to be here.
• 3:20
  Speaker 5: And it's also great to have this conversation when we're having a Juneteenth, so it's a great time to talk and chat and just give you some insights on the world and the way things are working these days.
• 3:29
  Speaker 5: I also love a Becky.
• 3:30
  Speaker 5: I appreciate your Bridge Span crush.
• 3:32
  Speaker 5: I joke all the time for the cooks out there that I think of Bridge Span as being kind of the Ina Garten of the social sector, the way you.
• 3:37
  Speaker 5: You know if you want to bake a chicken, you like to Google.
• 3:39
  Speaker 5: Ina Garten and bake chicken.
• 3:40
  Speaker 5: Whatever comes up, you know it's going to be good.
• 3:41
  Speaker 5: People do the same with Bridge Span right, and so it's why it's important for us to be putting these, these pieces and this language out there around equity and philanthropy, equity and nonprofit work and what social innovation looks like, in a way that's meaningful and important.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: So Darren, we love to just give background to these conversations that you know your story.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: You're growing up, you're upbringing, probably very much poured into what you're living and what you're pouring into in your work.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: So we catch us up.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: I mean, tell us a little bit about the formative moments that led you into this work that you're doing today.
• 4:08
  Speaker 5: You know.
• 4:09
  Speaker 5: funny enough, i think, because I was talking with someone younger younger, it's a middle-aged black guy here, right, i was talking with someone younger last week, a 20-something-year-old young professional in the philanthropy space, and he was asking about you know how you ended up where you are and what's the story there?
• 4:22
  Speaker 5: and what's great about getting older is that you're able to look back at life and create this really seamless narrative, which seems so intentional, about how you ended up where you ended up.
• 4:31
  Speaker 5: And, funny enough, it was more serendipitous for me, right, i think that you end up doing some really cool stuff and over time you can create these great stories about them.
• 4:39
  Speaker 5: I am a New Orleans boy.
• 4:41
  Speaker 5: I'm a seven-generation New Orleans native, which I say very proudly.
• 4:43
  Speaker 5: My family's been in New Orleans since the 1790s.
• 4:44
  Speaker 5: That said, i'm a New Orleans that expatriated to California.
• 4:49
  Speaker 5: California is home now.
• 4:50
  Speaker 5: They've been in California now for some 15 years.
• 4:52
  Speaker 5: I'm minus at five-year work in Memphis, where I was still living in California and working in Memphis, but my husband's.
• 4:57
  Speaker 5: Californian, is from down Santa Cruz, so you know it's 100% California now and I can't imagine living in New Orleans, you're stuck.
• 5:02
  Speaker 5: Yeah, they call it Holtel.
• 5:04
  Speaker 5: California.
• 5:05
  Speaker 5: For a reason It's really a problem.
• 5:06
  Speaker 5: And so I do think for me I tell one story, as you know well, a few stories, two points that kind of shifted my career.
• 5:13
  Speaker 5: You know I'd done.
• 5:15
  Speaker 5: I went to Howard for undergrad, as all the good boys have, and went to grad school in Paris and studied at Sion's Po which I'm on the board of now We have an event coming up this week in New York And studied for immigration policy and did all these really cool things from a Fulbright perspective.
• 5:27
  Speaker 5: And I finished my Fulbright and my dad came over for my graduation and he said you know, wonderful studies, time to justify all of them, time to justify those studies, which means get a good job.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Black that came with came through.
• 5:39
  Speaker 5: I'm glad you've been enjoying yourself studying in France again.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: However it's time to get a job.
• 5:44
  Speaker 5: Wonderful.
• 5:44
  Speaker 5: I'm so proud of you.
• 5:45
  Speaker 5: Now it's time to get a job.
• 5:46
  Speaker 5: and ended up in finance, so random as who was hiring in 2000,.
• 5:50
  Speaker 5: right, and one big life transition for me was September 11th.
• 5:54
  Speaker 5: I was a 20-something year old young professional working in New York, four blocks from the World Trade Center towers when they fell, standing outside looking at them getting ready for a 10-30 conference call, with no sense of anything, oh dear.
• 6:04
  Speaker 5: And as I covered with the first building, you know, like you said, it's a New York story that wasn't unique.
• 6:10
  Speaker 5: but now it's unique because I'm old and I'm not living in New York anymore.
• 6:12
  Speaker 5: but everyone had their New York September 11 story.
• 6:14
  Speaker 5: But I joke about how the next day my boss called great guy and he said make sure I was, okay, sure I was, and he wanted me to call my projects and let them know they were going to be late.
• 6:25
  Speaker 5: I'm like I'm sure these folks have TVs.
• 6:28
  Speaker 5: Our projects are going to be late, right, and I hung up the phone It was an actual phone and told my friends I was with.
• 6:35
  Speaker 5: I was like, okay, well, dying at work is inevitable.
• 6:37
  Speaker 5: I should probably enjoy what I do for a living, which is the most generation X thing anyone could ever say, right, yeah, and left that job some six months later and started going back, started working again in the nonprofit sector, which I'd worked through in college and grad school even, but hadn't done professionally since grad school, working with the development organizations in Brooklyn, working with some community foundations Incubator Foundation, blue Ridge Foundation, which became part of Robinhood just doing really cool work.
• 7:06
  Speaker 5: And so that's been for me, you know, getting back to nonprofit sectors where I felt a sense of calling, where I felt like I had a sense of place and where I felt like I had the most to offer the world.
• 7:17
  Speaker 5: And I do not judge anyone who goes into the private sector.
• 7:21
  Speaker 5: I do quietly.
• 7:23
  Speaker 5: I do quietly, but you know, i think you should.
• 7:27
  Speaker 5: I think that one of the biggest luxuries my grandmother would always say when I left for college went to Howard for undergrad.
• 7:32
  Speaker 5: my grandmother sat me down and reminded me of the importance of an education and why an education was important.
• 7:37
  Speaker 5: And as my grandfather looked into the room, it's like you know why you go to college?
• 7:40
  Speaker 5: and my grandfather peaked in it's like to make money.
• 7:41
  Speaker 5: And I was like no, no, no, you don't go to college to make money, you go to college to have choices, because choices are the ultimate luxury in life, right?
• 7:49
  Speaker 5: And so for me, this work is all about having the choice to do the work that I find compelling, that I find interesting, and also to put my brilliant mind in a space where I think it's needed.
• 7:56
  Speaker 5: We're in a capitalist system.
• 7:58
  Speaker 5: Making money is not art right, and so I think that that's, i mean, you know, no shade, once again, shade right, but actually being able to solve for some of the really crushing issues that are stopping us from reaching out full potential as a society and stopping large groups from being actually incorporated and elevated within the culture and the world.
• 8:18
  Speaker 5: I think that's where my calling has been and the work that I enjoy.
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: I'm so glad we're having this conversation and a couple just reflections.
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: One, Grandma Isom knows what's up, she did know.
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: Let's just say that, like, that was a very profound statement and that is a gift and a privilege for any of us who have the ability to have choices.
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: Two lucky us.
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: Lucky us that you came over and poured in in the way that you did, because we're looking at the richness of what you have built down.
• 8:48
  Speaker 5: Oh, thank you, That's really great.
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: And in your work And I really look at specifically your podcast Streaming in Color, which is creating new narratives and leaderships, and you have had these powerful conversations with leaders of color to share how they have leveraged.
• 9:03
  Speaker 3: You know all of their unique assets and abilities.
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: You know to drive impact and to talk about what success looks like.
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: I want you to talk just about how you create these new narratives and leadership and what this has awakened and enlightened in your mind.
• 9:18
  Speaker 3: Talk to us about, like, what inspired you to start this podcast and what you've learned along the way 100%.
• 9:25
  Speaker 5: So great question.
• 9:25
  Speaker 5: I also want to pivot just quickly and offer a quick anecdote, a quick story that I share all the time.
• 9:31
  Speaker 5: And I lived in New York, lived in New York for many years some eight years live in New York And before moving out to the West Coast, i had a really good friend who lived in the city, was an artist as all New Yorkers do, he's an artist friend And she had this wonderful exhibit on catcalling And it was about how women are catcalled in the streets And what was interesting about that exhibit.
• 9:52
  Speaker 5: you know, it was like a.
• 9:53
  Speaker 5: it was a hall where you were walking through and people were basically video screaming at the camera what people had screamed at them.
• 10:03
  Speaker 5: And you're this gay guy, right, i don't catcall for obvious reasons, right.
• 10:08
  Speaker 5: And men don't catcall women around me, Right.
• 10:13
  Speaker 5: and so there's a whole world that's such a reality for others that you have no insights into.
• 10:18
  Speaker 5: it was so jarring from site.
• 10:20
  Speaker 5: wait, you deal with this every day, no matter what you're wearing, like this is a thing, right.
• 10:25
  Speaker 5: And so I mean that's a loose story, but I say that there's.
• 10:28
  Speaker 5: there's so many of us live realities that others don't get to peek into, right, and so I think it's important for us to use the story in this narrative work, to make sure that people can tell their stories in a way that's meaningful and compelling, because these are new narratives for some, but not for people who are living them.
• 10:43
  Speaker 5: it's only there they know Right, and so our ability to actually give people the space to talk about their lives, talk about their identities, give them really the space to honor their stories, i think it's really meaningful and powerful and that's what the podcast is for me.
• 10:56
  Speaker 5: I joke all the time that people can't see, but you guys can see within the work itself that, like you know, you have the various recordings happening Within the work we have recorded on different lines.
• 11:07
  Speaker 5: I'm laughing half the time through the whole podcast.
• 11:09
  Speaker 5: people are absolutely hilarious.
• 11:11
  Speaker 5: the stories are wonderful.
• 11:12
  Speaker 5: No, they're just hilarious, they're hilarious, and these conversations have been so healing for me.
• 11:18
  Speaker 5: Actually, you know, through this process, being able to hear these people tell their stories, tell how they calibrate life, the meaning that they've gotten from their grandmothers, from their grandma Lewis's Right, and the words that actually have allowed them to to sort within the professional space, and so it's been really uplifting for me.
• 11:34
  Speaker 5: That said, the whole thought process behind the podcast Was that you know where, bridgeman, we love, we got, we love knowledge, and we produce all the articles, like you mentioned, hbr, ssir, we do all the things, we're all excellent writers, so that stuff is true, and so the articles come out fairly effortlessly and seamlessly and thoughtfully.
• 11:50
  Speaker 5: However, there's nothing as impressive as a good story.
• 11:54
  Speaker 5: There's nothing as impressive giving people the space to talk about how they've calibrated their life experiences And how they've actually find some degree of joy and hope in the world that we're in, and so that's been the podcast.
• 12:07
  Speaker 5: It's been our opportunity to show the world what wonderful people are out there And how they're thinking about the work itself, and you know one of the stories that you know.
• 12:16
  Speaker 5: It's really meaningful to me and I didn't show this in the podcast and maybe I've shown it in one of the later versions of the podcast separately.
• 12:22
  Speaker 5: But one of the first people I interviewed was over she did who was a queer icon and just really great person and thinker, was also close friend and ally.
• 12:29
  Speaker 5: We lost, early or late last year, cancer.
• 12:33
  Speaker 5: That said, the whole world lost.
• 12:36
  Speaker 5: It was a big loss for all of us.
• 12:37
  Speaker 5: That said, about a year or so ago there was a Don's a color network event.
• 12:40
  Speaker 5: All these smart, thoughtful people of color work in the philanthropy space.
• 12:45
  Speaker 5: Some of us philanthropy from our own Pockets, others were managing funds for others and we know we spent three days talking about all the world's problems and how we're going to solve them.
• 12:54
  Speaker 5: And her she made couldn't attend because of time.
• 12:57
  Speaker 5: She was going through chemo but she ended.
• 12:58
  Speaker 5: She came up for the last session And she looked out on the room and we look battered, completely right, because we've been talking about a lot of stuff, heavy stuff in the world's a mess.
• 13:05
  Speaker 5: And she said I know you guys feel dispirited and I know you may feel disempowered or overwhelmed, but I just want you guys to know That this is what winning looks like.
• 13:16
  Speaker 5: Winning looks like chaos And I want you to look around the room and I want you guys to know that this is what a winning team looks like.
• 13:23
  Speaker 5: So keep pushing at the work, and for me, the podcast has been opportunity for me to show the world the winning team that we have, fighting for the things that we want to achieve.
• 13:34
  Speaker 5: It's the world's a complete mess, but these folks are brilliant.
• 13:36
  Speaker 5: They're so thoughtful and we couldn't have a better team to be fighting on our side, and so it's.
• 13:42
  Speaker 5: For me, it's been a really hope filled process Wonderful conversations, reminders that we are it, don't it?
• 13:50
  Speaker 5: don't feel like we're winning.
• 13:51
  Speaker 5: I know every time we glance over at Florida in our summer, tummy rumbles, but we are winning from an impact perspective and a success perspective.
• 13:56
  Speaker 5: It's just important for us to keep going, keep pushing at the work and and elevating the folks that are doing the work and have the answers.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: Goodness, i mean just what another chapter that in reflection, it just looks like man.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: what a confirming quote you know in your life that really sucks about this next moment.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: I just I know you spend a lot of time talking about this intersection, of how you know leadership and identity can really be intertwined, and it's so powerful and I think it's something that I think we all wrestle with, but I think it's something you've explored a lot.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: What have you learned from that?
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: specifically talking with leaders of color.
• 15:07
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 15:08
  Speaker 5: So, john is a great question, i think, one that's really interesting.
• 15:11
  Speaker 5: I think that, from a transitional perspective, as a society, we definitely at some point recognize important diversity And recognize important of having diverse folks around the table.
• 15:20
  Speaker 5: We struggle to some degree getting from what I call and I'm going to totally age myself like a Benetton Ed right, like a diversity for the sake of diversity, right, all the colors right, and we've never actually been able to talk about yet.
• 15:34
  Speaker 5: Diversity exists for a reason.
• 15:35
  Speaker 5: Like people of color bring different skills, we haven't been able to talk about those differences in a way that's asset based, right, and so I think so much of our work is about how do we explore the difference that you bring to the world and to the thinking in a way that's meaningful and powerful, and I would talk about that in a way that is really much so asset based, because I talk all the time, the world's a mess right now.
• 15:57
  Speaker 5: We America is not going to smart white boy, it's way out of its current situation, like with the smart white boys have been working on it for a long time.
• 16:03
  Speaker 5: It ain't working, right.
• 16:05
  Speaker 5: We need a fuller team of folks who can know.
• 16:08
  Speaker 5: No easy button here, right.
• 16:09
  Speaker 5: We just can't keep doing the same stuff with the same people, right?
• 16:11
  Speaker 5: And so how do we bring in folks with different sets of capabilities and skills and reflection points to drive the work itself?
• 16:16
  Speaker 5: And that's where, you know, we did this piece around really, you know, understanding what we can all learn from leaders of color.
• 16:22
  Speaker 5: We know that we want to bring them around and have them at the table, just for diversity and optics perspective, but that's, that's only a start and it's problematic, right?
• 16:29
  Speaker 5: How do we actually think about what insights, what skills they have that are really critical from a success perspective not nice to have, but critical if we want to get to the impact that we have and that we want to achieve?
• 16:44
  Speaker 5: And so, with that, you know, the piece really explored all the things that leaders of color bring by navigating the life.
• 16:51
  Speaker 5: They're not born with these traits, right.
• 16:53
  Speaker 5: That's how they're treated throughout the world, how they navigate the world.
• 16:55
  Speaker 5: They develop a different set of skills, right.
• 16:56
  Speaker 5: They develop a different set of muscles, and how do we take advantage of those?
• 17:00
  Speaker 5: And what we saw is that there were some really clear differences, in the best way possible, as you thought about values and belief systems that drove them and meditated them, talked about the life experiences and their attachment to their communities.
• 17:12
  Speaker 5: This idea of America can be very individualistic.
• 17:14
  Speaker 5: People of color, folks that come from marginalized groups.
• 17:17
  Speaker 5: They really see huge importance in being connected to a community and the role of community in driving impact and driving how they see the world.
• 17:25
  Speaker 5: And with that as well came a whole set of skills from motivation, relationships and networks, skill sets and behaviors things that people brought to the work, that they brought it differentially right.
• 17:36
  Speaker 5: It made them different at the work, it made them better at the work, it made the impact more high-achieving.
• 17:40
  Speaker 5: It also made it more sustaining.
• 17:42
  Speaker 5: And so the question became how do we as organizations give them the space to carry out that work and to use those values in a way that's important and meaningful and to really value those things as the key to impact?
• 17:53
  Speaker 5: One of the conversations, of one of the most meaningful conversations I had during those talks with the various leaders, was one with David Thomas.
• 17:59
  Speaker 5: He's the president of Morehouse College, super smart guy, and it's one of those conversations where you're the partner on the team and the team's taking notes frivolously Good British band teams take really good notes right And for the paper itself and he starts dropping gems and I was like shoot, let me take out my notebook and start taking notes myself.
• 18:18
  Speaker 5: Right, It happens.
• 18:20
  Speaker 5: And so it's like, oh, this is like, this is some good stuff here, right, i gotta write this down in my own personal journal, right?
• 18:24
  Speaker 5: And he offered the key to success for people of color and folks that come from marginalized communities professionally right, and the first piece was one understanding what makes you different and how you see the world, how you've navigated the world, all those things, and being proud of it.
• 18:41
  Speaker 5: The second was finding yourself in an organization or a company that sees what makes you different as critical to success Not a nice to have, but without that thing they cannot be successful.
• 18:54
  Speaker 5: And the third, which was actually the one that made me pull out my notebook, because all the others resonated true.
• 18:59
  Speaker 5: The third was surrounding yourself with people who encourage you to hold on to your difference in service of success for the organization and for yourself, right, and so so much of this work is not about not only giving people, from a bridge band perspective, understanding of how those assets and those skills are critical to success we seek within the nonprofit sector and the social sector, but it's also about, through the podcast and other articles, giving people a sense of community in the space.
• 19:27
  Speaker 5: And then another there are others working on this on the same impact goals in a way that's meaningful and powerful, and other folks that are able to work with them and talk with them about what success might look like and how they can group together and make it happen, and so that's really kind of as we think about both the podcast and also the articles that we're writing.
• 19:42
  Speaker 5: It's really getting people the skills they need to.
• 19:45
  Speaker 5: As I say all the time, how do you unlock, how do you unlock BIPOC Genius?
• 19:53
  Speaker 5: It's not just having the genius itself.
• 19:55
  Speaker 5: How do you give people the space to unlock that genius?
• 19:57
  Speaker 5: So that's the work that we're doing and trying to drive.
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: I mean, when you first said Dave Thomas, I was thinking of the founder of Wendy's, but this is something I can connect to.
• 20:08
  Speaker 5: Well, that's Dave Thomas.
• 20:08
  Speaker 5: This was David Thomas.
• 20:10
  Speaker 3: Y'all.
• 20:10
  Speaker 3: There is so much to be learned here.
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: And if I can share something a little bit personal, you know I'm a white woman in the middle of Oklahoma with two daughters, and when they were born and I've shared this on the podcast before I wanted a phrase for them that was so simple, about how they could see differences and see that they were beautiful.
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: And so we came up with this phrase different is great, and it was so easy to apply the first time ever when we were binge listening to Wicked the musical, because immediately a two year old can say I don't understand why they're not being nice to her because she has green skin when different is great and everything she's bringing to the table is great, and I just think the celebration of differences and two grandma choices is a beautiful thing.
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: And so I think you have taken a topic which, sadly, can be divisive in this world when we talk about DEI or you know and even belonging.
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: But I want you all to see what Darren's just said here, which is it's not just diversity of people, it's diversity of thought.
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: We talk about cognitive diversity all the time on this podcast and what a luxury that is to get to understand someone else's lived experience.
• 21:32
  Speaker 3: But I think the way that diversity of ideas, the diversity of where we've come from and our traditions and our cultures, this is a beautiful thing.
• 21:42
  Speaker 5: Oh, it's, it's no, no, it's such a beautiful thing, and I think it's it's even more than beautiful.
• 21:46
  Speaker 5: It's critical, right, that we are able to in many ways, practice some degree of radical empathy, right.
• 21:53
  Speaker 5: And so you know it's, and I tell, tell folks all the time that my family in New Orleans, now for nine generations And I was, interestingly enough, the only generation to go to integrated schools, right of those nine, so they were de jure, so they were legally segregated.
• 22:08
  Speaker 5: Before me My parents actually met desegregating a high school in New Orleans.
• 22:13
  Speaker 5: Right, they were from very different backgrounds, black families, but very different backgrounds, eight blocks away from each other, but very different worlds.
• 22:18
  Speaker 5: And that was from, like, old, wealthy black New Orleans group in Black Pearl Mom was a mom, went to college and came back and was the president of the Mary Sue Lewis Lachizlaya Church.
• 22:28
  Speaker 5: He never worked.
• 22:29
  Speaker 5: My grandfather's a chemical engineer, responsible, multi-generational chemical engineer right, responsible for putting asbestos in pain, as he joked.
• 22:37
  Speaker 5: We didn't know it was a bad idea at the time.
• 22:39
  Speaker 5: It seemed really reasonable, made it less flammable and smooth, which was most important, right.
• 22:44
  Speaker 5: So, and my mom, on the other hand, was, you know, my dad was one of two kids 11 years apart And my mom was, you know, one of six kids And my grandmother was a house.
• 22:52
  Speaker 5: My maternal grandmother, my grandma Lucinda, was a housekeeper.
• 22:55
  Speaker 5: My grandfather was a bricklayer, right.
• 22:56
  Speaker 5: So these two, they grew up in Pigeon Towns.
• 22:58
  Speaker 5: They brought eight blocks away, eight blocks away, but worlds away.
• 23:00
  Speaker 5: They would have never met otherwise.
• 23:02
  Speaker 5: And so I think that there's, you know, there's power in my generation and that I'm a Gen X.
• 23:07
  Speaker 5: There I joke all the time that Gen X should be called the Sesame Street generation.
• 23:11
  Speaker 5: We're coming out of the civil rights movement, our parents set us down in front of Sesame Street and we thought all that crap was normal.
• 23:15
  Speaker 5: We thought that was.
• 23:16
  Speaker 5: we thought everybody was holding hands.
• 23:18
  Speaker 5: We were coming out of the civil rights movement.
• 23:19
  Speaker 5: We just loaded them and beating people in the streets and and and the hosting people.
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: Darren, I just figured out.
• 23:23
  Speaker 3: It wasn't that way about four years ago.
• 23:25
  Speaker 5: Oh, I have all types of stories about how and I went to these super duper like progressive schools.
• 23:31
  Speaker 5: They were doing the most, they were really trying to make it happen right, and so we were offered some extreme gifts and the way of thinking about diversity and equity and normalizing diversity and equity and understanding that people come from different backgrounds And that's not only a nice to have, that's a must have, that's what America is right.
• 23:47
  Speaker 5: And so how do you make sure that normalized narrative becomes one that others normalizes?
• 23:51
  Speaker 5: well, particularly as you see others pushing back?
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: I was at a wonderful convening this past week with Nicolana Jones speaking, and she mentioned how the current pushback around DEI and equity, all those things, is expected.
• 24:07
  Speaker 5: She's like we've been in a world where, if you use a movie reference, a matrix reference, we've all been given the red pill over the past few years, and so we all see what's behind the scenes from a work perspective, an era perspective, we all see the inequities that are really driving this country and that need to be addressed, and people just want you to take the blue pill again.
• 24:27
  Speaker 5: Just take the blue pill again, right, you know.
• 24:29
  Speaker 5: So I think that there is a need for us to make sure that we live into this moment and are really taking advantage of all the assets that we bring And, more importantly, see those assets as being the only way that we can live into who we are as a country And I think, that's tough work, but it's important work and that's why we're here.
• 24:50
  Speaker 5: And that's what winning looks like when we do that And when we embrace that.
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: I really want to go deeper into this narrative piece because Bridgespan Group I mean your team you did this study of 12 place-based funders about what they learned by leaning more into equitable giving practices And we would love for you to kind of unpack that for us and talk more about some of those equitable impact findings that you all saw that sort of listed to the surface.
• 25:18
  Speaker 5: Yeah, and so I can talk about those at ASEM, if you like.
• 25:21
  Speaker 5: I mean, the funny thing is that nothing here is really very new.
• 25:24
  Speaker 5: It's all pretty straightforward.
• 25:25
  Speaker 5: Once again, the Bridgespan Packaging very often helps.
• 25:28
  Speaker 5: I think just putting it out there in a nice neat list is really helpful for folks.
• 25:31
  Speaker 5: But these are the answers to Phil's been saying the answers for a really long time, and so that work also worked out in that study happened during COVID, right.
• 25:39
  Speaker 5: So that was we were literally on the phone with folks every two weeks in the middle of what COVID and then what became.
• 25:46
  Speaker 5: we had a whole civil rights movement as well, right 2020, it's worth noting And so I think the goal there was to really understand if you are a funder or a nonprofit organization thinking about supporting more equitable practices, what does that work look like and what are the outcomes you hope to achieve there?
• 26:05
  Speaker 5: And I think first it was really understanding what the process looked like, right.
• 26:08
  Speaker 5: And so here it was important for folks to look internally, particularly as place-based funders, to really understand what were their institutional practices and mindsets that would allow them to live into more anti-racist work.
• 26:19
  Speaker 5: So you have to really start internally.
• 26:22
  Speaker 5: And there was another wonderful quote from this past weekend.
• 26:26
  Speaker 5: Someone was saying no one wants us to stop talking about slavery more than black Americans.
• 26:31
  Speaker 5: We're about as done as talk about slavery as everyone else.
• 26:35
  Speaker 5: right, but literally understanding from a reparations perspective, from a thought perspective, where you are, from a mindset perspective.
• 26:41
  Speaker 5: So looking internally for what, as white funders, as funders of people of color, whatever the case may be, to understand the mindsets that you engage in, really understanding as well what is the expertise that exists within your communities that you need to be elevated, right?
• 26:56
  Speaker 5: And so how do you think about assets-based approaches when you think about the work itself?
• 27:00
  Speaker 5: So often within the philanthropic world, we come in assuming we have the answers right And employing and using outside models as a way of driving the answer And, ultimately, any good philanthropic answer, any good impact answer, is going back to Inagart.
• 27:15
  Speaker 5: It's a good recipe And the recipe has to be based on what the person already has in their cupboard, right?
• 27:20
  Speaker 5: You can't come in with a whole set of activities and processes that involve a whole different set of ingredients.
• 27:25
  Speaker 5: right, you have to figure out what the person has to work with and how do you elevate that in a way that's meaningful and important.
• 27:29
  Speaker 5: So really understanding what's the part that exists within the community and the space that you work with, and how do you elevate those practices in a way that makes sense and really gives the community a sense of belonging in the answer, right?
• 27:40
  Speaker 5: So something not just being done to them, being done by them for themselves, right within the work itself.
• 27:46
  Speaker 5: I think also that all led to this conversation around how do you build power and how do you seed power as funders in the world itself, and so that comes in different forms, right?
• 27:54
  Speaker 5: And so at BridgeBand, we play the very important role of nomenclator, and nomenclating has two definitions.
• 27:59
  Speaker 5: The nomenclator was definitely the person who comes up with the words and the language for things, right, so they name things.
• 28:05
  Speaker 5: and the power of naming The nomenclator is also from a historical reference.
• 28:08
  Speaker 5: The nomenclator was a person who was stood in the King's court and when you walked in with your name card, he read out your name, right, so he was basically announcing you to the world, right?
• 28:15
  Speaker 5: And so I think for so many of us in the space, we have to think about how we're using words in a way that reflects where the world is and elevates people from an asset space perspective.
• 28:23
  Speaker 5: as to answer and as to owning the answer from an impact perspective as well.
• 28:26
  Speaker 5: But also, who are we naming as the answer bearers, right?
• 28:31
  Speaker 5: Who are we drawing out as best practices in the world?
• 28:33
  Speaker 5: Which narratives are we normalizing, right?
• 28:37
  Speaker 5: I think what's interesting within the podcast is how many of us, becky, going back to the stories that we were normalized.
• 28:43
  Speaker 5: as I get older, i am so much more appreciative of all of the narratives that my parents helped me normalize The things that I thought were completely I had no idea right, that I was living in kind of a bubble.
• 28:54
  Speaker 5: I was so happy for those wonderful bubbles because they allowed me to kind of normalize things in a way that gives me the power, gives me the grace and gives me the perspective to carry out the work in the world that's meaningful and for me to help normalize those narratives for others as well.
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: I like you so much.
• 29:11
  Speaker 5: Oh stop.
• 29:13
  Speaker 3: I just want to give you a French bracelet.
• 29:15
  Speaker 5: Oh, thank you, you are such an extraordinary human.
• 29:17
  Speaker 5: I'll pass you my address.
• 29:18
  Speaker 5: I love French bracelets actually.
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: Do it.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: I love beaded ones even more so.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: So okay, darren, I just think of what beautiful contexts and beautiful words you're putting to these big, heavy conversations.
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: And at BridgeSpan, you all have the ability to talk to funders.
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: I mean, you're a convener of funders too.
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: What do you see as this narrative changing around people of how they're approaching funding?
• 29:41
  Speaker 5: I think that, ultimately, the answers there are very clear.
• 29:44
  Speaker 5: One, as funders, fund folks in unrestricted ways, right.
• 29:50
  Speaker 5: Fund them in ways that allow them to develop the capacity to drive the work itself, that doesn't lock them into programs that you think of as important, right.
• 29:58
  Speaker 5: So fund unrestricted and fund big.
• 30:02
  Speaker 5: I am a big proponent of philanthropic inflation.
• 30:06
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 30:07
  Speaker 5: We live in a country of people who are billionaires.
• 30:10
  Speaker 5: A billion dollars.
• 30:11
  Speaker 5: Americans have no sense of money or numbers.
• 30:13
  Speaker 5: A billion dollars is a thousand millions.
• 30:17
  Speaker 5: We have people that are worth $20,000 million and we're arguing over $50,000 grants.
• 30:24
  Speaker 5: Are you kidding me?
• 30:25
  Speaker 5: Your baseline should be a million dollars, just on general principle, right.
• 30:30
  Speaker 5: And so how do we have funders give away more money in a way that's meaningful and powerful?
• 30:36
  Speaker 5: And also, how do we have funders recognize that if you've amassed a billion dollars, you've probably done some harm to the world?
• 30:43
  Speaker 5: And so how do you use your philanthropy to repair the harm that you've created in amassing a billion dollars?
• 30:50
  Speaker 5: And that's a different way of thinking about philanthropy.
• 30:53
  Speaker 5: It's almost like carbon maneuvering, right.
• 30:55
  Speaker 5: But really, how do you think about the role that you must play and, in some ways, healing the world that you've heard in some ways, and amassing that much money And that's a very different way to think about philanthropy, but I think it's a meaningful way for folks who are really driving impact to really think about it in a personal way.
• 31:12
  Speaker 5: That's reparative as a philanthropist in the work itself.
• 31:14
  Speaker 5: So big grants that are unrestricted over longer periods of time, right?
• 31:19
  Speaker 5: So really you have to be able to be with folks.
• 31:21
  Speaker 5: If you want people to do great things, you have to be supportive of them.
• 31:24
  Speaker 5: How do you think about being a funder who is a long-term funding partner, right, and then engaged in the work and the answer?
• 31:31
  Speaker 5: there's a wonderful Ted Liu, who's a program officer at Libra Foundation, says that good funders should think of themselves as taking a ride with their grantees, in which they're paying for the gas, right?
• 31:44
  Speaker 5: And so really, how do you think about the role you have in sticking with grantees?
• 31:50
  Speaker 5: over time, recognizing the answer may change and you have to give them the space to do that and be thoughtful about that as well.
• 31:56
  Speaker 5: And more importantly, or most importantly, particularly as we talk about this conversation around seeding power, we have very often funders who are saying, oh, i want to fund them in a way that's important, but I don't want to have any, i want to sit back and let this happen and I want to see power completely.
• 32:11
  Speaker 5: You have to be aware of your positionality in the world, right, your voice matters.
• 32:17
  Speaker 5: So it's a question of, yes, fund them, restrict it big ways.
• 32:20
  Speaker 5: That gives them a lot of space.
• 32:21
  Speaker 5: But also, how do you use your power and your positionality in the space that you have it to make sure their answers are being shared across the field and that they have the space to keep doing the work itself?
• 32:30
  Speaker 5: So you have to play advocate for the organizations that you're supporting, because you have to make sure that your positionality, your power, isn't wasted.
• 32:37
  Speaker 5: Right, and that's where you think about good funding, being a good funding partner And all those things.
• 32:43
  Speaker 5: With respect of what are the natural ingredients that people have within the space that they're working in.
• 32:46
  Speaker 5: How do you elevate the assets of leaders in the space itself?
• 32:51
  Speaker 5: I think all those things come together just to create really great trust-based philanthropy in a way that's very much so impact-driven.
• 32:57
  Speaker 5: No one's saying to throw money out the door.
• 32:59
  Speaker 5: Right, you're investing in ideas that make sense with people who have the answers.
• 33:04
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 33:05
  Speaker 5: When I worked in the private sector, we would spend three days interviewing three-year-olds on products, right?
• 33:12
  Speaker 5: Oh my gosh, I thought you know you have to launch a product, the three-year-old has to be excited about it right.
• 33:16
  Speaker 5: But the number of programs and practices we put out in underserved communities without ever interviewing the folks in the communities it's absurd, right.
• 33:27
  Speaker 4: And so how do?
• 33:28
  Speaker 5: you really center the people who are impacted by the issues.
• 33:31
  Speaker 5: To drive the answers based on their assets is important.
• 33:35
  Speaker 5: One final point, which is kind of a loose point, but it comes, and this is actually something I've learned within the work itself Liz Thompson, who runs the 1954 project really thoughtful, signal-thundered and amazing work, equitable funding and education.
• 33:50
  Speaker 5: And named after 1954, of course, supreme Court decision desegregating schools, which did some good things but also actually stripped black leaders of the leadership of the education conversation because once it was integrated, the black education conversation became led by the white leaders.
• 34:06
  Speaker 5: Right, we're responsible now for all those things.
• 34:09
  Speaker 5: She talked about in her project with her, the importance of leveraging love in the work itself.
• 34:16
  Speaker 5: And as I'm a West Coaster, so I'm all about throwing love into bridge band decks, right, but having this come from a Chicago native carrying out the work, it was so meaningful because she talked about how so often in this space, we carry out strategy work, we carry out philanthropic work, but the work is missing love.
• 34:32
  Speaker 5: It's impact-oriented, whatever that means.
• 34:35
  Speaker 5: It's efficacy-oriented, whatever that means, but it's absent love.
• 34:39
  Speaker 5: But when you center love in the work itself and when you actually love the communities that you're trying to uphold, the communities that you're trying to serve, the communities that you're trying to drive impact with.
• 34:48
  Speaker 5: When you work from a space of love, you work differently, right, you're more efficient than you could ever be, and you also honor the groups that you're working with.
• 34:57
  Speaker 5: And, as Liz always says, all that's done in love is done well, right.
• 35:02
  Speaker 5: And so how do we actually work from a place of love when we carry out the work with these communities?
• 35:05
  Speaker 5: Because we'll get a better answer, that's more high impact and also that's just more sustainable.
• 35:11
  Speaker 3: Don't you just feel like it all comes back to that at the end?
• 35:14
  Speaker 3: I mean literally the word philanthropy, the love of mankind.
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: That has been at the nucleus of our work since the beginning, and so I very much appreciate this.
• 35:25
  Speaker 3: And just really quickly, i wanna go to this notion of sustainable investments, because you have seen a particular emphasis on endowing black led nonprofits, and all of us who've worked in the space we know that endowments are often lacking for social change nonprofits, even more so for black led organizations.
• 35:46
  Speaker 3: So talk to us about how endowing black led nonprofits not only changes this narrative we're talking about inequitable impact but it's also helping us confront some of society's most pressing issues.
• 35:58
  Speaker 3: What have you seen, darren?
• 36:00
  Speaker 5: In all of our work with high net worth funders and large foundations, we hold to the tenants that you see across the board and that we've noted here this idea of large, unrestricted gifts.
• 36:13
  Speaker 5: This is best practices when it comes to grant making and that we carry out with all of our clients from a philanthropic perspective large unrestricted gifts that really allow organizations to own the narrative around strategy and impact and that allows them, in many ways, to put forth the answer they know is the answer.
• 36:32
  Speaker 5: I think that what we see very often is that organizations are playing what I like to call a strategic telephone game, where they have a sense of what the answer is, but then the funder wants something specific and different, which isn't really what they think the answer is, but they need the money.
• 36:49
  Speaker 5: And so how do you actually give organizations and organizational leaders the opportunities to really drive the work that they know is the work itself and to learn from the community and the work and, from a power perspective, to honor the voice of the community as the answer to the work itself?
• 37:04
  Speaker 5: And so, with that all said, the work that we were doing around endowing black-light organizations.
• 37:10
  Speaker 5: It's really critical.
• 37:12
  Speaker 5: Ultimately, money is a source of power, right.
• 37:16
  Speaker 5: And so how do you make sure those organizations that are the most critical to success and impact in the work itself have the funds to be enduring institutions?
• 37:28
  Speaker 5: And I think this is a very interesting as we were both carrying out the work, i think there were some things that were quite jar I'm a proud Howardite, someone to Howard for undergrad.
• 37:37
  Speaker 5: We were looking at endowments of black universities almost as a parallel, for just as we thought about white organizations and endowments, and so Howard is one of 107 historical black colleges and universities.
• 37:47
  Speaker 5: Howard has the largest endowment of all those organizations at 800 million.
• 37:51
  Speaker 5: 800 million, 800 million, right.
• 37:55
  Speaker 5: That number is larger than the top 20 other endowments combined.
• 38:00
  Speaker 5: And what was more interesting is that Howard's endowment of 800 million is still less than Amherst, a small.
• 38:09
  Speaker 5: I mean, amherst is great, i've great friends with Amherst right.
• 38:11
  Speaker 5: A small liberal arts school in western mass.
• 38:13
  Speaker 5: 1.2 billion, amherst's 1.2 billion is more than all 107 in Circle of Light College endowments combined, right.
• 38:23
  Speaker 5: And so this is when you see kind of how the number.
• 38:26
  Speaker 5: Oh, it's painful.
• 38:26
  Speaker 5: It's all quite intentional though, right.
• 38:28
  Speaker 5: So America's doing exactly what it was designed to do, unfortunately, right.
• 38:32
  Speaker 5: And so for us the idea of endowments was really interesting in that.
• 38:36
  Speaker 5: How do we know this is a tried and tested way to give people power over their organizations, to be able to be enduring institutions and to honor the fact that people are enduring institutions.
• 38:46
  Speaker 5: And so how do we make sure that those organizations that we know are handling the toughest issues and have proven their worth over time are able to do that in a way that's meaningful?
• 38:55
  Speaker 5: The fact that organizations like the NWCP or the Urban League, that they don't have endowments Does it make any sense whatsoever?
• 39:01
  Speaker 5: None right.
• 39:02
  Speaker 3: They don't have endowments.
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: Whoa, whoa, whoa, it's got the presence.
• 39:06
  Speaker 5: And so I think that here the answer for us was really thinking about how do we both give foundations and those that are granting funds permission as silly as it may sound to endow organizations as something that's part of their toolkit right, As something that they think about, And also, how do we give nonprofits a way of thinking about the work itself And even with that work, as we were talking with nonprofits, it was interesting that we had to I wouldn't say teach them, because they don't teach them anything, if anything we're learning in every conversation It was interesting to remind them of the things that they should bring to the conversation that allow them to have those conversations around endowments, This piece of really thinking about having a number in mind, Like what is a number you would have in your back pocket, The way you know your mortgage payment every month and your Starbucks coffee order amount, like how do you have that number in mind?
• 39:53
  Speaker 5: If I were to establish endowments, how much it would be and how much I would need from you.
• 39:55
  Speaker 5: Like pricing with pride right Around the work itself Price with pride, always right, And the work that you're doing.
• 40:01
  Speaker 5: How do you understand that, your proximity to the communities that you're hoping to uphold and to serve right is your biggest asset, And how you leverage that asset and granting funds from organizations themselves.
• 40:12
  Speaker 5: I think there were others that were very interesting as well.
• 40:15
  Speaker 5: This idea of like there are a lot of myths or a lot of narratives we've worked within a non-profit security problematic.
• 40:19
  Speaker 5: This one that a good nonprofit should put itself out of business sounds so honorable, right.
• 40:25
  Speaker 5: I don't wanna be in 10 years, i wanna have solved the issue.
• 40:28
  Speaker 5: As I say all the time on my podcast, my uncle used to always say that oppression in this country is clever.
• 40:33
  Speaker 5: It's highly unlikely that you're gonna solve for these things in 10 years.
• 40:36
  Speaker 5: right, things change.
• 40:38
  Speaker 5: how they look changes, right.
• 40:40
  Speaker 5: We have to have organizations that are enduring, institutions that are gonna be able to shift as the issue changes and are able to fight across the issue as it changes as well.
• 40:50
  Speaker 5: And so, really, how do you avoid some of this language that, in many ways, really doesn't set you up to be a sustainable organization or forces you to disinvest in your organizational structure and sake of programs and all those things?
• 41:01
  Speaker 5: You have to be around, if nothing else, you have to be around in the future right To fight the fight.
• 41:06
  Speaker 5: So I think those are all things that were really important for us to think about the work itself.
• 41:10
  Speaker 5: And, ultimately, how do we think about giving organizations a possibility of an endowment as a way of carrying out the work over a long-term period of time, or something that they should feel comfortable asking for in building right?
• 41:21
  Speaker 5: Not just comfortable, but feel compelled to do it?
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: I mean, in just having this conversation, just challenging the status quo and asking these bigger questions like this is what we need to be doing.
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: This is the type of work we need to be pouring into as we figure out how to meet these ever-changing problems.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: So, darren, you get to be in this cool seat.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: I think of you and your perch over here getting to talk to all these kind of fascinating leaders, all these interesting stories, funders.
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: There's gotta be an intersection where philanthropy is stuck with you and your journey.
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: It can be personal, it can be through your work at BridgeSpan, but take us back to a moment that will be with you forever.
• 41:57
  Speaker 5: You know I have so many wonderful moments from a philanthropy perspective and where I've just learned so much within the work itself and where the work is so meaningful.
• 42:04
  Speaker 5: I think that you know one of the interesting conversations that I throw out all the time my team is probably sick of hearing this conversation piece was one talking with.
• 42:17
  Speaker 5: I was working in Memphis at the time I was interviewing, doing interviews in South Memphis, interviewing some of the Soulsville a Black neighborhood, historically underserved neighborhood in the city itself.
• 42:29
  Speaker 5: And I was working at the time for a foundation that was interested in doing more arts investments across the city and trying to figure out what was the best way to bring people into various arts institutions.
• 42:40
  Speaker 5: And I'd done this work before.
• 42:42
  Speaker 5: So you used to hearing your aunt's grandmother why she hasn't visited a certain institution and she gives you the three answers that you hear all the time One is too far away, two, it is too expensive to visit and three, she's not even sure what they do from a content perspective.
• 42:58
  Speaker 5: And so for each of those you have an answer like a whole set of toolkits, you know, like well, make pop-ups in a neighborhood, right.
• 43:03
  Speaker 5: Or like really solid, like Black History Month programming right from a content perspective or give them free cards?
• 43:08
  Speaker 5: right?
• 43:08
  Speaker 5: And as I was walking away, i'm sure being the Black consultant asking these questions, she offered a fourth answer which I never heard before.
• 43:14
  Speaker 5: Right, and that fourth answer was oh, that place isn't really for us.
• 43:19
  Speaker 5: If too many of us should, it's gonna be a problem.
• 43:22
  Speaker 5: Right, like the sense of a lack of belonging in the space.
• 43:25
  Speaker 5: And that really stuck for a number of different reasons One, because I knew exactly what she meant by that place isn't really for us.
• 43:31
  Speaker 5: They say they may want us, but if too many of us show up, you know, it's gonna be a problem.
• 43:34
  Speaker 5: And two, I also recognize how much of that sense of belonging is important across all the sectors and all the worlds that we work in, because, ultimately, if you have a sense of belonging in a space, you will cross town, you will pay whatever the cost may be and you will go see things that aren't very interesting because you should be there.
• 43:53
  Speaker 5: How do we get people a sense of belonging in all of the spaces that we're in?
• 43:57
  Speaker 5: And not a belonging because it's nice to have you.
• 44:00
  Speaker 5: It's sense of belonging because we need you.
• 44:02
  Speaker 5: We're gonna fix this country.
• 44:04
  Speaker 5: We need these folks to carry out the work and the thinking and to really unlock their genes.
• 44:08
  Speaker 5: So that sits really strongly with me.
• 44:10
  Speaker 5: From a philanthropic perspective, how do we make sure people understand the sense of belonging that we have?
• 44:14
  Speaker 5: How do we make sure that philanthropy is seen, is not just this pale, male and stale space, right?
• 44:21
  Speaker 5: How do we make sure that people understand that philanthropy is a diverse space of people carrying out the work itself, or should be, if we're gonna try to have the impact that we hope to seek?
• 44:29
  Speaker 5: Because if a broader group of people have a sense of belonging in the conversation, not only will it be a more fun conversation, honestly and fun counts for something around here, right But I also think it'll be a more high impact conversation and a more loving conversation.
• 44:42
  Speaker 5: So there's that for sure.
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: I agree with you, darren, and I really appreciate that story And, to be on brand, as you're repeating the story that you say to your team all the time, i'll say the story that I repeat here all the time, which is just, we have to think differently And we have to embrace things that are different.
• 45:05
  Speaker 5: I wanna jump in there because I think it's really powerful.
• 45:07
  Speaker 5: For us at Bridgepan, what's interesting is that we have our multi-initiative and racial equity, but what's very clear with us is that racial equity, from a philanthropic perspective, is the best answer.
• 45:14
  Speaker 5: All of our work centers are racial equity right.
• 45:17
  Speaker 5: So it's not just a nice to have it.
• 45:18
  Speaker 5: Some must have within the work itself, and I hope that this conversation is seen as a North Star conversation.
• 45:23
  Speaker 5: It's a reminder of a North Star that we carry out through all of our conversations in the work itself.
• 45:27
  Speaker 5: I think it's all really powerful and really meaningful as well within the work itself.
• 45:31
  Speaker 5: I do also want to remind folks that once again, when we talk about equity, when we talk about bringing in other voices, when we talk about bringing in other perspectives, this is the only way that we're gonna get to the answer Right.
• 45:46
  Speaker 5: This is critical from an answer perspective.
• 45:49
  Speaker 5: We have to have a fuller team with fuller perspectives, and I joke in the podcast all the time that.
• 45:54
  Speaker 5: So I tell the story of my great-grandfather.
• 45:56
  Speaker 5: My grandma.
• 45:57
  Speaker 5: Lois's father was gay and divorced his wife at some point in the 30s and lived with his partner in the French Quarter in New Orleans in the 40s And he had a partner.
• 46:07
  Speaker 5: His partner, his life partner, was a Cuban-American, and my grandmother used to tell stories all the time about how the Cuban-American at the table, all these black Americans, multi-generational New Orleans would remind them of what it meant to be an American right And what it meant to be American was being living in a space of abundance and recognizing that all things were possible.
• 46:29
  Speaker 5: Right, we're American for, crying out loud, we can do all this.
• 46:32
  Speaker 5: The whole point of being American right, this is American optimism that comes from someplace, and so I think that, as we think about these issues that we're trying to solve, we have to hold on to that sense of optimism that hold on to that sense of, in many ways, the opportunities that exist and really live into all the wonderful assets that we have as a country itself.
• 46:52
  Speaker 5: And I know that you guys wanted me to share at some point one good thing and this is what I was looking for, searching quickly for the quote that I want to share that.
• 46:59
  Speaker 5: This is a wonderful quote that I found at some point on Black Twitter.
• 47:01
  Speaker 5: I can't even attribute it to anyone, i'm just a tribute to Black Twitter, because it's a wonderful forced to attribute things to, and the quote is we seldom admit the seductive comfort of hopelessness.
• 47:10
  Speaker 5: It saves us from ambiguity, it has an answer for every question.
• 47:14
  Speaker 5: There's just no point.
• 47:15
  Speaker 5: Hope, on the other hand, is messy.
• 47:17
  Speaker 5: If it might all work out, then we have things to do.
• 47:20
  Speaker 5: We must weather the possibility of happiness, and so it's been wonderful to chat with you guys and talk about weathering the possibility of happiness, which is not just the possibility but the certainty of happiness, and pushing forth in the work and the thinking.
• 47:36
  Speaker 5: So thank you so much for your time.
• 47:38
  Speaker 5: It's been wonderful.
• 47:39
  Speaker 3: We've enjoyed it so much too, and we know people are gonna wanna connect with you, darren, so please drop all of the ways that people can connect with you.
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: Where are you hanging out online?
• 47:48
  Speaker 3: Where can they learn more about the podcast of Bridgespan?
• 47:51
  Speaker 5: All this stuff you can find on Bridgespan's website.
• 47:53
  Speaker 5: You can look up Dreaming.
• 47:54
  Speaker 5: Please go to Dreaming and Color.
• 47:55
  Speaker 5: They're fun conversations.
• 47:56
  Speaker 5: We have another season coming up sometime soon as well, so it's season three, and so you can go to Bridgespan website.
• 48:02
  Speaker 5: Learn more about our multi-unit ship and racial equity at Bridgespan and what that work looks like.
• 48:06
  Speaker 5: Learn more about the podcast.
• 48:08
  Speaker 5: As always, i'm on LinkedIn.
• 48:09
  Speaker 5: Linkedin is bumping these days, but folks can feel free to reach me through LinkedIn, through Bridgespan's website, if they wanna talk more about the work We can share, more about the work that we're doing as well.
• 48:18
  Speaker 3: Thank you, Darren.
• 48:19
  Speaker 5: No, thank you, You guys are awesome.
• 48:20
  Speaker 5: This was fun.
• 48:21
  Speaker 5: This was a fun podcast.
• 48:24
  Speaker 4: Hey friends, thanks so much for being here.
• 48:25
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• 48:26
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• 48:31
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• 48:34
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• 48:58
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• 48:58
  Speaker 4: I'm our producer, julie Comfort, and our theme song is Sunday by Remy Borsbu.