 But today, I'm going to be actually doing the show or giving you my wisdom. You call this a master class, but the context and the topic today is attracting younger board members. It's a big deal. Again, I'm Julia Patrick. I'm joined today by Jared Ransom, nonprofit nerd, CEO of the Raven Group. We are here day in and day out because of our amazing sponsors. They include Bloomerang, American Nonprofit Academy, Your Part-Time Controller, Nonprofit Thought Leader, Fundraising Academy at National University, Staffing Boutique, Nonprofit Nerd, and Nonprofit Tech Talk. Hey, we have the super cool app. Download it. You'll be amazed. It will let you see what we're doing every day. It'll give you alerts. It's an e-learning tool. Amazing. And if you missed us, you can find us on wherever you like to download your podcasts as well as your streaming. We are everywhere as Jared Ransom, the Nonprofit Nerd, likes to say, just speak into your smart speaker and we will be on your sofa next to you. That's what I feel like. I still put out that hologram and with AI and everything coming up, it could happen like this. Well, it freaks me out when I speak into my TV remote and say the Nonprofit Show and we come up on all those channels. It's like kind of like, wow. So anyway, hey, Jared Ransom, I don't need to tell you who I am. I'm Julie Patrick, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. Even I get tired of identifying myself and telling everyone that way. It's over to you, my friend. Well, I'm excited to have you here. It's not often that we turn the tables and the mic on one another in the hot seat, as we like to call it, but really board engagement has been a big topic and conversation. I want to say for ages, whether we're complaining about our board, whether we're wanting to increase our board, I actually have two engagements coming up soon, Julia, and they are both around getting the boards to fundraise. So I'm really excited to talk to you about how we can attract a younger board. So to do that, you have tons of experience serving on boards, moderating board conversations and strategic conversations. So let's start off, and if you would, talk to us about this first key topic and I love it. It addresses how we can and should and need to understand the paradigm shift and you have here is benevolence versus impact. So what exactly does that mean? So this is a big deal and it is such a controversial thing when I talk about this because charity is dead in America. Benevolence is dead in America. And this is a concept that we need to embrace. I think it's a better situation than ever. And the difference is that people are not just giving because it's benevolent and it's a charitable thing to do. They are giving because they want structural change. That's right. So for example, instead of saying, well, there's always going to be poor and hungry and we just need to help out where we're in when we can, there's a whole new crop of people. And this is global. This is not just an American phenomenon. It's a major sea change that says, uh-uh. Food insecurity is not appropriate and we have phenomenal food waste. This is a management program. This is a management problem with a solution. And so do you see the difference here when we change the lens of why we're giving while we're, why we are participating? If you as an organization don't understand this or can't embrace this, this is the first stumbling block to building a board that has a younger demographic. And that demographic is coming up and they're, and they're leading. So I, I appreciate this so much because you're right. It's not just, oh, we're going to help the needy, oh poor pitiful charity X, Y and Z. We have an obligation as an American citizen and living in the US to do better. And that's the impact, the benevolence versus, you know, the impact and you're right. You know, our younger donor constituents, our younger donor leaders, our younger, you know, community champions, they're all saying we have an obligation to do more and it is our responsibility to take the charge in this. So I so appreciate that, that key talking point and, and I, I'm curious if that's a conversation that's happening. I'm guessing not around the board table, but definitely should be. It's controversial because when you, I remember, oh my gosh, I wrote an article for the business journal probably close to 10 years ago and the title was Charity Is Dead and it was all about this issue of benevolence versus impact. And oh my God, did my phone ring. People were like, what? I mean, I had major foundations, CEOs of nonprofits. I had all sorts of people that just got into this kerfuffle. And it's, I think it's really important and you're right, Jared, it's a conversation that's hard to have because it seems punitive, but it is not. And if, if our boards and our organizations don't have this conversation, then we will wonder why we're stumbling when it comes to getting young board members. Well, and it talks about the status, the status quo is no longer good enough. You know, you have to do so much more. So, so let's shift then to talk about, you know, also this young group, right, younger donors, they're really looking to do better for themselves, right? Acquire more skill sets. And what we have here is that ability to learn, the ability to grow some connections and make contacts, as well as to improve their overall leadership skills. Talk to us about this and what you're seeing. You know, what's really interesting is that now we are seeing these this younger demographic coming in. And when they're asked to, to be on a board or if they're thinking about going on a board, they're looking to see who's on the board, right? Not just the organization, but they're pulling up that information and saying, OK, yeah, the board roster, who's in leadership? What can I learn? What kind of training is afforded me? They are not expecting to come on to a board fully formed. But here's the thing that's different. They're expected, they're expecting to be trained. And this is about the topic. OK, so let's say you're asked to join a food bank. They're going to want to learn more about food insecurity, not just about what's going on, you know, with the management structure. They're going to want to learn how to fundraise. They're going to want to learn about policies and management in the nonprofit sector, which are probably coming to that board being younger, not knowing this, but this is the key. They expect to be engaged in education. Remember, these are the most educated demographics that we have ever had in our country. They also have the debt to prove that. That's another story. But, you know, they are lifelong learners. They're not just I graduated from college. I'm done. They are moving through this. And so if you as a board and an organization are not providing that, it's going to be a big problem, big problem. No, are you seeing advocacy work as well as top of the list for these, you know, group to a certain extent? I think that that's still part of a professional journey. And it's a little bit harder. And that oftentimes comes with a little bit older board member. But advocacy to this younger sector is a little different. And generally, it's navigated through social media. And so I think that's where you have that piece. Are there is this going to be the group that is comfortable going down and talking to legislators or getting up in front of groups and, you know, being a champion for that cost? Maybe not. But holy cow, Katie, bar the door on social media. They will advocate and sometimes that's a problem because they've got to be, again, trained up, right? They got to know what to say and how to say it and how to navigate the conversation. So I'm feeling like that onboarding of new board members, maybe the mentorship programs that we've talked about before on here, where, you know, you have a new board member teamed up with an existing board member or an experienced board member. Are you seeing that as something that this, you know, the young board new board members are really seeking to be a part of? You know, that's one of the big demographic demographic shifts that I think is fascinating that a lot of times we haven't witnessed, especially in the last one hundred and twenty five, ten hundred and fifty years of America, there's been like, oh, they're an old fogey. They don't know what they I'm not interested. Right. It's all youth culture. But with these younger demographics, the mills, gen Z's, they like that wisdom quotient, right? They want to spend time with their grandparents. They want to spend time with their elders. It's really interesting. And so if you are smart enough to be an organization that has an emeritus board, this is like gold, where you can tag them up to retired board members, board members with wisdom to give you some of those generational, you know, opportunities, right? Opportunities. And so, yeah, I think it's an important thing. And I think this is important anyway. Mentoring is where it's at, baby. Yes, absolutely. That's a big one. And I feel like that also goes into, you know, the justice diversity, equity, inclusion. That's so many of this, you know, constituent, I say constituency, but, you know, community champion base are really looking to so share with us, Julia, what you're seeing by way of, you know, how we can attract younger board members to come serve, you know, for our mission, advocate for our cause. But what is it exactly that they're looking to for this connection to justice, diversity, equity, inclusion, you know, values as well as opportunity, right? You know, I think the biggest thing is, do you remember? Jared, I say, do you remember like it was decades ago? It was only like three, two and a half years ago. But with, you know, the DEI and then moving into adding that Jay in there, which is justice, such an important thing. Everybody got their panties into twist about putting a black box on social media, right? And there was a lot of conversation about that because while it was maybe the right thing to do, it was not the only thing to do. Right. And if you participated in that, yay team. But the reality is, what were you doing to move the needle? Go back to that word impact, right? What else? That was like a benevolent thing. This is a perfect example. That was a benevolent thing to do. Like you're riding the wave and you're looking like a social justice warrior. But what were you really doing? Right. What are you doing on top of that? Right. And so I think that's where this conversation leads. It's not enough to tell your new board members or prospective board members, hey, we believe in Jedi here and we practice it. They want to see things like policies. Those might be investment policies. They want to know about the demographics of who you serve, who's on your board. They want to know things just beyond that, that board diversity of, you know, gender and age. They want to know more specific things. They want to know about languages. They want to know about economic parity. Okay. It's a big issue. And these are hard things to talk about. And so not that they're expecting to have everything fleshed out and solved. That's not the thing. They want to see the journey. They want to see the management plan of how an organization is talking about this and dealing with this. So, Julia, I have to share because, you know, we've both been around the block long, long enough. We've heard some stories. So when that big push went out, right, a couple of years ago, and I do remember, right, you know, really looking at how we are showing up in this space for justice, diversity, equity, inclusion, as well as access, right? Yes, we have to go beyond that. But I have to tell you, I have heard from so many different organizations as well as, you know, colleague consultants saying that when, you know, they these organizations staked that flag in the ground, they lost some board members, right? But there was actually some board members that said, I didn't sign up for this. This is maybe too much of a heavy lift or maybe it was just too uncomfortable. So where are you seeing, you know, really this issue? And I know that even as I'm saying this, like this is controversial, but where are you seeing this issue from the young supporters coming in to maybe an established older board generation? How is that dynamic playing out? It's really interesting because in you and I talk about this on camera, I probably talk about it more off camera, but there's a 20 year difference between you and I. And I know clutch the poils, but you know, what's really interesting about it is that there are expectations and behaviors that you have that I do not and that I'm not aware of just because it's a generational thing. And so that's what plays out. So you have a lot of younger board members will come into a meeting and they will hear something and they'll be like, Holy cow, totally inappropriate. And I cannot go in my mind to this next level because I'm so freaked out about what was said, right? That's kind of a cultural shift that we're in. And we're just going to have to navigate that with courageous conversations. This is where strong board leadership really comes into play. You got to have a board chair who's willing to say to speak up, speak the truth. This is my whole thing, Jared. You don't all have to agree and you don't all have to be freaked out and make a solution apparent. I think you'd need to embrace and you need to acknowledge, right? And to say, Hey, we're not perfect. And this is like this is a new day and where you were saying things differently and the willingness, right? The willingness to lean in. Yeah, I think that's that's really interesting. And thank you for addressing that because, you know, even our age difference, Julia, there are younger, even younger, you know, board members joining. And I'm 20 years their senior, you know, really looking at that. And so every generation is just changing the paradigm in so many ways, right? So we don't have a lot of time and we know because we do this conversation day in and day out. But I would love for you to address, you know, really what the modern management style is looking like for, you know, attracting young board, because not only do we want to attract them, I'm assuming we also want to keep them. We want to retain them. Exactly to look at strong digital, you know, operations and platforms, softwares. Exactly. So this is one of the things I want to finish with, and this is a really interesting piece because you're dealing with a demographic that is used to, you know, project based management communication in a digital space. And so they want and expect to work in this environment. And this is the thing, you know, these demographics, they're not nine to five years, they're really 24 seven. And we have really bashed them as slackers, but they're not. They're working morning, noon and night, but it's through a digital interface. And so they expect to be able to take and retrieve these things that they've learned and these practices that they've learned in school and in the work in the workforce to their board service. So if you're not using a board portal, if you're not having a board liaison, these are stumbling blocks like no other. And this is the problem, Jared. You have like an older demographic, an older board, and they're like, we can't figure out how to get the board notes. Right. Tell them to me. Right. And then you have the younger people that are like, wait a minute. Every single board meeting for the next 16 to 18 months should already be on the calendar. Oh, absolutely. Right. I mean, so you have these like big time communication shifts. And it was really bad at the start of the pandemic. It has gotten better. But this is something that you have to address with your younger board members. And I would say, Jared, honest to goodness. You know, this is like we're talking 50 year olds down. The average board age is well in that mid to higher 60s and nonprofits across America. And when you talk to certain sectors, like cultural organizations, when you talk about even for profit, like in the financial services, those numbers go up even higher and they go into the 70s. So you're talking about a generational shift that is around technology. But this is a stumbling block. I mean, if if you're trying to recruit folks that are super busy and working in this digital world, if you don't have that ready to go, you might attract them, but you're going to lose them after six to 12 months. Yeah. Well, I think about, you know, right now culturally as a society, we want things at our fingertips, right? Like we want them now. We want them, you know, to be easily accessible. And I'm thinking, you know, at AFP icon where we just, you know, I just came back from that whole conference was on an app. There was no printed program, you know? And so even looking at the nonprofit show, we're on an app. You look at project management, whether it's Slack or Monday.com or so many other project management tools, there's a way to access information immediately and at your own convenience, right? And so the other thing too, I just want to address because I love that you mentioned, mail this to me, right? Like, like snail mail is what I presume. Yeah, such a nomadic culture and that's a growing nomadic culture. There is no oftentimes a dedicated mailing address, right? Right. So it's really true, Jared. And I think that's an important thing because, you know, we've been talking about this with our donors, about our donors. Yeah, you've got to reach them in their email box. You've got to get to them where they are, when they are, how they are. And for some weird reason, we haven't really been talking about this with our boards. And so our donors are on boards. Our donors are, you know, they we want our donors to be engaged with our boards and with board culture, whether it's not, whether it's our organization or somebody else in our community. I mean, we know that as a society and as managers and stewards of nonprofits that the better our boards are, the better our organizations are, right? And so we must kind of start to align ourselves to these conversations and this reality. I think, Jared, my personal opinion is a lot of this has not been discussed because our boards only meet every month or every other month or whatever, right? Where our donors, it's like every day there, we're worried about them, right? And I feel like that's why this conversation has been a little stalled. But I'm here to deliver the harsh message that if we as managers of our nonprofits don't think about this before we start to really try to attract these younger board members, we're going to be frustrated because, one, they're frustrated, they're not participating and we're not keeping them. We're not retaining them. They're going off onto other boards and we'll be like, well, what the heck? You know, we made all these investments and they've left us, right? Like millennials. I mean, that's how the conversation is going to go, right? Yeah, yeah, it has absolutely. I want to address this. We have a viewer that wrote in and I appreciate this so much. And they say to us, the reality is that when I was younger, I did not have the time to be on a board and commit to it as I am able now being retired. That's a great point. We attract younger people, but once they understand the time commitment, we lose them. So I appreciate this so much. I'll add to this, Julia, and I know you've got information as well, is, you know, it really has to do with setting the expectations from the onset, right? And so making sure that they understand how long are the meetings? What are the expectations between meetings? Are you requiring any additional committee time, volunteer time? You know, so for me, I really see that as before the onboarding. It comes with the conversations of recruiting and discussing that potential board meeting, but what are you seeing to address that issue? So I see something totally exciting and something completely different. And that is that corporate America and even small business America is understanding that if they get their team members and not, we're not talking C-suite, we're moving this down through the ranks. If we get them on boards, they are becoming educated. They're becoming engaged. They're staying with their organization. There are now, in fact, we had on Jake. Oh, help me out. Oh, yes. Oh, my God, a company. Jake from, he was Team Rubicon. Team Rubicon, Rubicon has now started a tech company to track volunteer hours. These corporate America is embracing this concept of getting their leadership onto boards. They're embracing it with money, with time served, with matching grants, really, really leaning into this. And so it's easier to find young people that can go to those board meetings during the day and they're being supported by their employers. So this is, again, a shifting dynamic. And there's new software coming out that actually helps these board members within the corporate world structure that and track it and manage it. And so it's very exciting to me. So I agree that it looks on the outside like it's easier to do it when you're retired, but I would argue that you're going to see a lot more support for it. You know, I'm so glad you mentioned that, Julia, because that is a big push, but we've also seen over the last three, three and a half years, that's also the draw for many companies to attract your new employees is we allow you to be involved. In fact, we encourage you to be involved in the community in a variety of ways. And I think if we maybe flip the script in that way, then we're addressing it from the onset. So much good information. I'm not surprised because I'm so I always learned so much from you. Again, for those of you watching and listening, Julia Patrick was in the hot seat, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy, sharing with us today what it's like to attract younger board members to serve our mission, to advocate for our, you know, our cause and really drive impact. That's the big takeaway from today. So, Julia, thank you for all of your service to our community, the greater community, the global community and all that you do. It's just really inspiring. So thank you for that. Again, I'm genuine. I learned so much from you and your your sage advice. So thank you so much. Hey, you bet. If you are in, if you just happen to be in Maui in the early part of December, I'm going to be speaking at the Q's conference. And this is a really interesting organization. It's the National Credit Union Executive Society. It's actually a global organization, but they are so freaked out about this just for their boards of credit unions across the world, Witcher, by the way, nonprofits, that's right. They've had me, they've invited me to come to spend some time in 30 minutes. This is a cursory thing. I will be working and when I do these these pieces, they're like full days, right? So I mean, there's a lot to digest. I just painted a really light picture. And so thank you for letting me go as fast as I could. It's always fun to be here with you. And we're also so extremely grateful to have the continued support and investment from our amazing sponsors. So thank you for that as well. I just want to give a shout out to Bloomerang, National University with Fundraising Academy, Your Part-Time Controller, Staffing Boutique and let's see, Nonprofit Tech Talk, Nonprofit Nerd, American Nonprofit Academy. Hey, all of our episodes are on so many platforms. The easiest thing is to simply say, you know, into your smartphone, cue up the non-profit show and we will pull up for you. So again, thank you so very much to our amazing sponsors that allow us these conversations and allow us to flip the script, turn the tables and put one of us in the hot seat every so often. So thank you, Julia, for taking that lead today. And for all of you that joined us today, we are so glad that you did. We hope that you'll join us again tomorrow. And until then, as we end every episode, we invite you, encourage you to please stay well so you can continue to do well. Thanks, Julia.