 it's fry yay and I am so excited um and I am thrilled for this to be another ask and answer show we are receiving phenomenal questions uh from many of our viewers so thank you so much to each and every one of you and also thanks to our presenting sponsors you see them right in front of you on the screen I always like to say you know do us a favor go find them on the internet interwebs internet interwebs they're not hard to find they are very active very front and center all of these companies are out here supporting the great work that you do and they really are here to support you so they're supporting us they are keeping the lights on as we like to say you know they're really here diving into these conversations and episodes 313 14 plus so we're really getting up there in age and these sponsors have been with us along the way and they are here to be with you along your way and your journey especially as we move into the COVID rebound and I'm so grateful for Julia for having the crystal ball of March of 2020 last year to say you know what there's going to be this long time I mean I'm acting like you actually knew what was happening there's going to be this long time shelter in place quarantine and we need to show up to be of service in a consistent way for our community I'm first seeing this is going to be a long time show but let's just call it two weeks and it has been such a beautiful journey such a beautiful roller coaster I'm not so much roller coaster here with the show but as we continue to bring up all of the current events Julia that us personally our sector our community our families have continued to navigate for you know the last year and a half so I'm so excited to play with you each and every day I'm Jared Ransom the non-profit nerd CEO of the Raven Group and as I say I get to play with you each and every day today is my last day for a week I will be back I want you to know I will be back um actually I think I'm doing the show Monday Monday morning and then and then I'm like set and sale so this is my last fry yay until I come back from vacation I love it I think it's great we are going to miss you but we will carry on and we will see you on Monday we have my seat would you would you just take my seat we will we will be here yeah have some exciting news about ask an answer which will probably be revealing next week when you come back but it has to do with um actually a sponsorship that um a partnership that we we've created with ask an answer and we're not exactly supposed to be other way other way talking about it but it kind of involves maybe somebody here on this screen um anyway we're very excited about it very very excited about it as you know um we get crazy questions all the time people email us people ask us when we're out and about I mean and that's only going to escalate now that we're going to be out and about more so anyway let's start off with Antoine from Chicago Illinois we're finally working on our budgets for 2022 and we want to add a line for personal development training since we've never done anything like this what would be a modest starting point we are a small non-profit and have a staff of 14 we've had this question before we have and I just want to honor the fact Antoine that this is of conversation so thank you for seeing this as an opportunity and something of importance to add to your budget I'm really glad to hear that that is coming up in conversation for your 22 budget um and I don't have a you know I don't have that perfect answer but what I would like to say is I would actually recommend that instead of making it a line item for personal development training let's do it for training so that would include personal development professional development a variety of training right and I think in even as we talk about the Jedi space justice equity diversity inclusion you might want to include some training in there therefore it would not technically fall under personal development but I would really go back to the executive team I would also question and survey all 14 people every single person including other stakeholders right so your board I would include your board in the survey I would also include your key volunteers so beyond those board volunteers and ask them where would you like additional training where would you like additional support gather some of that data first and foremost Antoine and then help to figure out okay based off of these results these are the top trainings that we are looking to offer in the new year and then figure out maybe ballpark what those trainings um cost and investments look like I love that I love your whole approach I don't have anything else to add to that other than when when the when you brought this up um I realized going back into my mind here the deep cavernous mind of all this time spent blurs um you know I always think of like personal development training and all that has technically been for those involved in development like sales sales training how to raise more money you know if we haven't done a good job in the nonprofit sector of training the whole body of our organization and looking at some of these things so um I love what you said and I too believe Antoine that in some times you just got to get on the board in in a budget you got to get on the board you got to get into the budget and then even though it might be super modest then you can start you know moving forward and as you're moving through on the budgeting process maybe something opens up in q4 because you've under you know estimated or under-expensed out other items so I have a recommendation for for you Antoine as well as all of you listening the community foundations of your community may actually provide training for this so I was able to secure 20 hours of a consultancy's time to provide governance training to the board so to the board and to the new hire executive director free of charge completely covered from this community foundation those exist in you know in every community so I would reach out and see what's available by way of a partnership and a collaboration secondarily when you look at this ask a couple of your your peers in the in the community right maybe a food bank maybe a homeless shelter maybe an animal shelter are they equally striving for some of this training and perhaps you could pull together your resources and bring connections to the table so for instance I have a really dear friend of mine that does Jedi work and so she's really been working in the nonprofit space truth be told she was my first fundraising boss and now she's doing justice in an equity work and so she works with a variety of nonprofits at one time to really maximize that dollar so that you know and I don't want to say her pricing because I don't really know it but let's just say you want to you want to do something for $5,000 could you bring in a partnership another collaboration in your community Antoine to help meet the needs of your training but also you're now making a bigger impact in your community wow you are the nonprofit nerd thanks sister get out of those glasses and wear them proudly yeah I love what you just said I think that's genius for so many reasons that collaborative smarter smarter not harder yeah oh my gosh hashtag hashtag smarter not harder hey you know what in my office I have a little sign that says that for more than 20 years I like it not that I always follow it but it's there sister okay Ernie from Nashville Tennessee we have several employees who feel we should have some public statements policies that address some of the social movements we're experiencing in our community who writes these and how enforceable are they we have a small organization and only have a part-time HR person great question Ernie I'm thinking Ernie is that HR person Ernie might end up I don't know but uh so several employees who feel there should have some public statement policy I just talked to an organization here in my local community and the CEO actually shared with me very transparently they have not made a stand they have not publicly made a statement and it's not because they don't want to it's because they want to be very intentional in doing so and so they told me you know they were talking to me about being their strategic planner for the year and that's a service that I provide and I asked and I said if this is an initiative that you want to address in in the strategic planning that's not me I'm not that expert now I could bring in my friend that I I recently referenced an Antoine's answer but really about being intentional um and so you know I'm so glad that you have employees who feel that you should put some of this together I would absolutely pull them together for a conversation and continuously ask who else should be at the table whose voice should we be hearing from who has who has not chimed in right I would recommend taking taking your time in doing this the right way and then once you do make that statement what what is your what is your thereafter how are you following up with that right because we have talked Julia so much through the show it's not just about making a statement it's what you're doing after the statement that really counts and really matters so when it comes to actually writing this I would I would encourage you to look at maybe a small task force this also brings together your employees it provides buy-in it provides collaboration it has all that feel good stuff and then I would also address this you know with HR to say here's what we have what does this look like yeah because you know effort and if you're going to do this and you're going to do you know there's something about making a public statement and especially today think about this this is crazy I just just popped into my head you know today is the official Juneteenth federal holiday that was just you know put together very quickly and initiated for today okay so I mean it wasn't put together quickly I mean it's been a congressional concern but it's moved to the forefront long story short you know now there are going to be policies that your organization is going to need to address is this a paid holiday is this a day of service what are the costs associated with this how do you recognize it all of these things and so these are bigger to your point they're bigger issues if you're going to be meaningful if you're just going to sign something that you copy off the internet that says yeah we don't like to do bad things okay that's not I mean how impactful is that going to be but if you are moving forward in a policy format that's a different thing and to your point Jared you need to be very thoughtful and very strategic about it because then it becomes something that you measure yourself by absolutely and so yeah they're they're real costs associated with this too so okay Ernie I love that you asked this question and I would love to know what this journey looks like for you and your organization um okay oh you know what this is a good one I don't even know what the question is but I just saw name withheld state withheld so my favorite it is your favorite yes so in Spanish we use the word cheese mad it's um it means it's like a gossip it's too gossip I just have to tell you yeah okay it's cheese mad we have a former board member who will be running for state office in the fall of 2021 he wants to come and address our team at an upcoming staff meeting what should we do thank you but no thank you you know I feel like we have had a similar question about someone running for office and on the board should they resign from the board during that time of of campaigning so I'm going to say quite similarly here name withheld state withheld um so you have a former board member who will be running for state office and they want to address your team um fairness equality access if if this person does it you then need to allow the others to do it um so I would say thanks but no thanks um what we would be willing to do is to make sure our staff is aware of your campaign and would be happy to share your website or maybe even your current calendar of events but we are not able to have you into the office to maybe um you know uh persuade or influence our company I agree you cannot do this um it is it's really depending on your what level that so this is for state office okay so they're very very strict guidelines for running for office where you can what you can do and what you can't do how about this idea if this board member knows your sector and they are committed to whatever it is your cause is maybe come up with a sector-wide roundtable of all of those candidates to discuss this issue so for example let's say you are this you work in uh animal welfare um maybe you get a roundtable closer to the primary or after the primary you know towards the general whatever and have that roundtable discussion but include all the other shelter or animal welfare services in that pick a neutral spot you know you could do a community room you can do a church um that has community rooms community foundations oftentimes have community rooms to serve that type of a discussion um and then put that together but I think it's not a healthy thing um now would you put it together as the organization or would you ask the candidate to put that together no you would do the the organization because the organization would then all the organization like say the the sector coalition um sectors yeah coalition so in other words they would pre-do the questions they would find the room they would get the media you know involved um they would get different members or stakeholders to ask different questions on the moderator who's experienced in political responses yeah so I mean I think you could really bolster it and the reason why I like that is because gosh how amazing is it for you to have a candidate who understands your service area right and so to get other candidates to learn to become educated about why it's important for them to be addressing your cause on their platform this is a huge win but you have to be very very careful because you don't want to put yourself nor do you want to put the candidate any candidate into a position where it becomes you know negative or unsavory as we like to say in politics cool this is a real that's a great question thank you name with health you know how me how I love that well as we talk about our pandemics and the political divide is one of those and it's not just at the national platform it really does go all the way through into our local community so okay um Shelby from Indianapolis in Indiana just wrote in this is more of a comment or suggestion we have just added a lunch and learning session where we asked staff members to talk about their past nonprofit experiences and share best practices it has been fascinating and super informative to learn what other nonprofits are doing good oh Shelby that is super cool um I used to and I love seeing this when I would hold team meetings with my team this is when I was an employee chief development officer that kind of position I would ask each one of my team members every time we met right like to take turns and to share a best practice similar to this Shelby based off of what they're working on so for instance our database administrator would share with us why it's important that we collect whatever data and put it into the system timely properly you know all those good things and I'm sure that our dear friend uh we're issues here on yours uh Sasha who is here going to speak um that was really cool but then we also had someone that was really in charge of individual giving talk about you know what it is that that they bring to the table what is the best practice that they use and I use that as an opportunity of um of continued growth learning and sharing and uh so I love that you're doing this Shelby I think that's really cool and I think um you know really if you can focus this in on what are those things that your team going back to asking your team I'm really big on this I want are I want you to deliver what is wanted right that is why surveys happen that's why Bloomering Steven Shaddock just launched a technology survey that he's asking everyone to participate in I want you to go to your entire team your entire organization and ask them what they would like to learn more about you can give them choices you know for instance check all that apply and then have an other so that at least the check all that apply Shelby also provides the opportunity to ignite um creativity and other ideas so then it gives the the participants an opportunity to say oh this made me think of this and therefore jot that down and then I would I would do it that way great people want to know how do we do grassroots front fundraising people want to know about you know how do we do volunteer engagement love to share with you what I had um successfully done at a previous organization I love that I think it's brilliant and I think the thing that I like about it and when listening to you it really kind of amplified this message and that is that so often in the nonprofit sector you know the burden of keeping the lights on is squarely placed on the back of the development team and if we are not sharing with our organization that everyone is part of development everyone is a fundraiser um it just creates more churn and burn it creates hardship um it separates our organizations in a really unhealthy way and so I love this idea for all of us to kind of know what's going on I mean I think we can learn a lot from the facility management folks that are sitting next to the you know accounting team absolutely so I love this good job Shelby and you know what if you have um a uh a suggestion or question or comment we want to hear it because um yeah we want to share those things I mean our survey will go out again in the fall so we practice what we preach too and it's it's been really cool to see that and I'm just a huge advocate for that you are and you're good about that you really are okay we run this comes from ooh the volunteer team Pittsburgh uh pick smart pay a okay we run a domestic violence shelter and have a security policy that volunteers need to sign we have added social media policies or a social media policy but we are having problems with volunteers posting about their volunteer work they're proud to work with us which is great but problematic any ideas this is such a great question because you know what this is one of the big things about volunteer services I mean people want to post I'm volunteering I did this you know I mean this is a big part of it in fact I think it's such a critical piece of the pie for volunteer services to have a media wall in where they register or check in their volunteers because that media wall and it doesn't have to be big will get used one of my favorite media walls ever ever ever that I've seen and I thought it was kind of bold and even when I see it I'm very shocked is um this is as the st. Vincent de paul chapter or conference excuse me a phoenix it's the largest st. Vincent de paul um conference on the planet and they have a giant cutout of the current pope that when you stand next to it looks like you're standing next to the pope with their background and it's just it's a hoot but it's it's really cool to see the volunteers that come in and they're like oh I'm going to get my picture photo with the pope yeah let's start my you know my service so anyway this is one of those things it's great but in the the um domestic violence world this is a security issue literally people can lose their lives over this I have found that when you explain this to the volunteers then they understand I don't believe in my heart of hearts that most people realize that when they go to give service in this type of a campus that it can be perilous or that it can imperil other people men women and children so um I think you just have to be you know very uh concise precise and you have to explain up front up front and even if you're ready if you can pre-register or whatever I think it's critical to communicate this I really really do now you this is another thing you can do is you can have a social media wall whereby you get the logo and all that but then you ask them not to disclose that location or whatever and if you're having off campus events definitely I mean that's that's great that media wall for social media great investment sorry Jared I've just been like I know I was wondering if I was going to get a chance I'll be like and seen so I love this I love the social media wall absolutely I love uh you know the reiteration that you cannot share the address and um and so I that needs to be on the onboarding of the volunteer engagement right so it really needs to be part of that communication have them sign it have them understand it I'm thinking just as you know employees do that as well as sexual harassment and other very serious um you know challenges that is something just very very serious that needs to be taken um you know into really sensitive thought but I also think about you know again the way I coach is make this as easy as possible for other people so set the tone and a couple of ways that I would do that is one I would give them examples of what is appropriate and what's not appropriate what is an appropriate post and what is an inappropriate post so that they can literally see what that looks like I would also give them samples of what they could say here's a sound bite here's a stat here's you know here's what you can post and how we would like for you to post share that with them literally spoon feed them with that information um it could be maybe they came in for a mentorship program here's what you can say through your volunteer opportunity as a mentorship program maybe you came in to be with the nursery here's what you can say you know um maybe you have an opportunity to say you know no cell phones are you know kind of like at the gym you know you walk into the locker room and it's like no photography in the locker room thankfully but maybe it's the same thing where it's like you know you drop your phone that can't go with you onto the campus the other thing I want to add into this is hopefully you send out a volunteer newsletter or some kind of electronic communication to your volunteers use that advantageously to remind them you know on a regular basis maybe not every newsletter but every every so often the importance of not sharing you know certain posts or language locations and faces but use those tools that already exist to remind so that we are now being preventative as opposed to reactive right I love that you know I I'm I'm so appreciative that you brought that up because I was in a situation where I was touring a shelter that went into emergency lockdown and it scared the crap out of me I did not know what was going on and I'll confess I had no idea that that this could happen you know I was thinking it was a safe place and all that but I didn't realize that they had external threats trying to get onto their campus to literally cause harm to the people that were in shelter I mean that's how naive I was and you know those that team bless their hearts they knew what to do and they went into action and it was very secure but it was it was frightening and you know I I look back at it now I could have easily been somebody that revealed this location without intent a male intent I just I didn't know right I didn't know yeah education is the key well and I think that's also important right like if you have a Lyft or Uber driver taking you or if you have a friend dropping you off or a family member dropping you off it's really important as a volunteer manager to make sure that you're in compliance and in communication with your volunteers of what is appropriate not just in social media posting but sharing the location yeah exactly it's a whole dynamic that most people just don't ever understand and unfortunately if you do understand it you know it all too well reasons why again I am delighted that we could have this time together Jared you always get my juices going I'm excited yes I love it Jared is going to be enjoying a birthday event today be safe wear your sunscreen I have it packed I have that in a big wide brim hat I will be back on Monday so I'm excited for that and then I jump on a plane to enjoy my birthday which is on Tuesday so also practicing self-care taking some vacation so that I can relax and recharge come back renewed rejuvenated and ready to rock it wow well you know what I love that you do this you're an inspiration to me in so many ways but yeah I think it's super cool and I'm really excited that we'll get to get you back for one more day before we have a little bit of some time off Monday I'll be back Monday yeah if you think Fridays are kooky wait till Monday hey if you've got questions for us go ahead and reach out this is such an interesting piece of the nonprofit show we love it we don't always have the answers we're excited when you share your thoughts and when we can engage other people with this so you really got four main ways to get ahold of us check out our book club we've been adding new books in fact an author just contacted me last night that we're going to be getting in on an upcoming show she's just written a book about loving your board and I'm like well we need to have you on the show can't wait to read that I know it's not a hoot so anyway check out the American nonprofit academy book club it's on our website again to our presenting sponsors without you we would not be here we are very excited to announce that we have just re-signed moves management bloomerang and staffing boutique to go forward with us for the rest of the year and again those are three organizations that have been really supportive of the work at the nonprofit show so we are incredibly filled with gratitude for that hey what a great week be safe don't get sunburned that's my my advice to you my friend and stay well so you can do well we'll see you back here have a great weekend everyone