 Good morning, everyone. It's another wonderful day and we are delighted that you've joined us for another episode of the nonprofit show. We have our friend Al Lovelin back with us talking about the four Ps of capacity building, and I have a sense out that if you and I had chatted about this and we have in the past prior to the pandemic. There are some things that you're going to talk about that maybe have shifted a little so I can't wait to hear what you have to say and how we're going to navigate capacity building. Again, if we haven't met, I'm Julia Patrick, CEO of the American nonprofit Academy. The co host the intrepid nonprofit nerd herself, Jared Ransom is traveling today, but she'll be back with us tomorrow. We want to make sure we thank all of our presenting sponsors without them. We would not be here today. The American nonprofit Academy, American nonprofit Academy, your part time controller, the nonprofit nerd fundraising Academy, the nonprofit Atlas, nonprofit thought leader, and staffing boutique again. These are the folks that help make the nonprofit show come alive every day. Al, I was telling you, and I'm, I've got to check my stats. I think today is our 500th episode. That's like crazy to me that I mean, I haven't done 500 of anything consistently. So, but if you are one of those folks that have been watching us or new to us, and you want to find out what 500 episodes look like and what we've chatted about. You can find our archives on Roku, YouTube TV, Amazon Fire TV and Vimeo. And the really cool thing is that we have actually moved into the podcast space. All of our episodes starting pretty much in the last two months, 30 days are now streaming in podcast format. So depending on where you get your podcasts, you're going to be able to find us. I think we're on about 20 to 22 platforms. Super exciting. But the super exciting thing of the day is our ability to chat without leveling from Strabo. Okay, the four P's of capacity building. Talk to us about why you know about capacity building and what you do in your work a day world. We're going to nonprofit world for about 10 years. And what I found is is that they had abundant need and limited resources. And part of that what I was trying to do is to help them maximize the resources that they had and through time, I came out with the four P's and the four P's are getting the right people in the right positions, found the right processes that get the performance that your organization is looking for. And we can kind of get into that a little bit more. But one of the key things is that you really have to understand each of them because in your cycle, where you are with your organization, things are different. And each one of these things are very similar, but they're very, there's subtle differences to depending on where you're at. And, you know, I would admit they all work together. They weave together. And I'm fascinated about how this is an evolution that has been brought on by the pandemic and all of the things that the pandemic has brought forth. I would imagine if this is a moving target but let's start with vision strategy compete adjust like how are you asking us to look at this. Well, through time as you said, in doing this I worked a lot with one of my partners he's called the strategy expert Scott Romeo, and he always focuses on what's your strategy. And what I always kind of work with my, with my clients with his first you have a vision for what you want your organization to be. And then you create your strategy about how to make that vision a reality. And then once you get your vision I talk about compete is competing is putting that strategy into action. And one of my favorite sayings with Jerry Brown, the former governor of California said, everybody likes to talk strategy because you don't have to do anything. Well, as you know, Julie is that you have to actually go out and do it. And so as nonprofits you go back and you start putting these things into action, and then once you start finding out what happens, then you have to go back and make those adjustments, which is so critical. And when you make those adjustments that you're able to kind of have that process like the call refinement where you begin to refine things. And then that's where you start making that continuous improvement. Now, when you look at this and you, and I love your approach because I think it's, it really does move you away from that strategy is just a bunch of thought, and not necessarily action indeed. How, how is this morphing is this the sort of thing that you go back and revisit every year and maybe change it, or is this kind of one of those flags in the sand and you're going to work at work at work it and not really change it because this is what they agreed upon direction is. I always, I love the term I think I've shared before it's called flexible discipline is that you have the principles that you do but then you're very flexible to adapt. You know, like the one thing that we find is is that especially living through 2020 is that you have to be very flexible with the changes that go on. And part of the performance management pieces I always kind of say is, you know, what are your actions behaviors and timelines, how are you doing against that. And then how was your strategy working. And then the third component of that is to go back and have that conversation about the things that are going on outside around you, because there's so much change and the changes going on so fast is that all these things impact you and you have to always be able to be adaptable and make those changes I'm very much against the lockstep thing because change happens so quickly and you have to be able to think on your feet, especially with nonprofits with all the different things that you have going on in your day to day. You know it's interesting out in the very beginning of the pandemic. Jared and I were remarkably confounded by something that we witnessed and it was a it was a two level reaction to what was happening, and we're talking the early part stages of the pandemic. And there were those organizations that said, we're going to hit the pause button, and we're just going to observe we're going to pull back, we're going to just hang out because this, this too shall pass. And then it was the exact other extreme that it was like, no, we're leaning in, we're pivoting, we're going to be aggressive. It was fascinating to watch, because those folks that hit the pause button, haven't really been able to restart, because there have been false restarts, you know, Absolutely, there's been, there's been so many changes and I, and I really love how you bring that up because the big thing is about having what I like to call productive conversations. You're trying to do what's happening, is it working or is it not, and then also to have that non blame mentality. We know where a lot of cases you go back and you have to blame somebody and that's one of the great part about the great resignation is is that people don't want to work for people that blame them or it's a bad work culture. And when you have a culture that's focused on your vision, and you have a good strategy, then you're able to kind of work with people to get, you know, to where you're trying to go, without the rest of the drama and dysfunction that happens. So I think that's a great piece is that you have to be able to see the future and adapt, and then also do that with that sense of kindness and openness, that really tries to help, you know, grow your organization to achieve your goals but not but not doing it in a very unpleasant way. Right. I love it and I love that you brought that up, because I do agree I think that that's been one of these things people are like, I don't need to do this. You know, you know, I don't need to suffer for my art, as they say in the creative community. Okay, talk about 168 management and what what is that process. Well 168 management is a process where there's 168 hours to week in a week and then I've always said is that along with your nonprofit to run you have your business to run, but you also have your family to raise the keep your community to serve. And then you have to keep your your emotional, spiritual and physical health. So there's seven days a week there's 24 hours a day and that equals 168. And what I do with clients is I help them understand how many hours they want to work in their business, or their nonprofit how much time that they want to spend with their family their community. And then also how much time that they want to spend in their rest and their wellness. And this is key from a nonprofit from two standpoints. One is is that you don't want to burn your employees out and that's one of the great things with a great one is is that, you know, I've run into a lot of people that say I'm not doing this for that anymore and burning myself out, especially some of your younger employees. And then the second thing is that when you're dealing with your board members and your volunteers, it's back to that community and how they serve it's that time that they're serving, and they're carving that out of their busy schedule as well and so you have to be very cognizant of that. And so after you really are kind of like really part of that awareness, then it helps you understand where people are from employees for board members and from volunteers about how you can maximize everything. So do you I love this and I have heard you talk about this before and, and I remember years ago you shared this with me, and it just kind of blew my mind because I realized I was off track, when it came to the percent to where things should be. Do you have kind of some some guidelines for those guardrails of how much time we should be spending the percentages. Well, it all goes back to you being your own personal CEO and what you're trying to achieve, because you wear multiple hats. One of the things that I've always kind of said is that if you think about like a military standpoint is that there's these different fronts that you have, you know, in a battle per se. And so like in life you have multiple hats that you wear and so you know in a lot of cases you're a parent your spouse your member of your community and your member of that, your member of your, your board or your organization and so in a lot of cases is that you have to understand like where are your children in their development, what things you had to do when you were in your relationship there might be something you're passionate about. I think you want to kind of work on how you're improving yourself it's all about where you're at in that season of your life. And so I've always said is that you know life is like a book. You know, we go from chapter to chapter and sometimes we change the chapter and sometime life changes the chapter so you have to really kind of assess where you're at and then the key thing to is always kind of go back and say, What did I want to do, what actually happened, why, and how do I make that change because I'm always about to continuous improvement and getting better. And that's kind of an interesting thing because when you're talking about capacity. We're asking our board members we're asking our leadership our staff our volunteers to do a lot and I would imagine out very few of us have any idea of how we can put it into this 168 sensibility. Absolutely because the thing that I did to is that along with the 168 is I have people think about over a 13 week period. Okay, because again, you know you can't do things in every week like if you want to play golf or if you have a hobby, but over the course of 13 weeks you probably will and so you think about holidays and what happens to a lot of people is that, you know, I call these things the ends right, you know the unexpected the unplanned the unwanted the things that come hit you at certain points. And so what happens is that you book yourself to be so busy that those things happen and then the wheels come off and that's where the stress comes in. And so it's always kind of going back and assessing things and then, you know, everybody's probably watched a movie before like with the uncut version, you know where they go back and they had the things that didn't make the movies and so you always have to kind of think about your life kind of like as a director and say what's not going to, you know, make the cutting what's going to go on the cutting room floor and sometimes you have to cut things out. And one of the great things that I always say is no for now. I'm going to delay this till things work out. It's not a hard note but it's but it's ability to kind of move on. And that's a thing to it and worth especially at nonprofits because they have what I call yes site is that you keep saying yes because you're so into things but then you don't realize how much work you have on your plate and that's one of the first things that that you burn them out. And so it's really about sequencing and understanding what you're able to lift because the last analogy that I'll have is kind of think about if you've ever bench pressed before, and kind of, you know, that 35 or 25 pound weight once you start lifting sometimes that grows. And so I've always said where do you and you and your organization capable of lifting and how are you paying attention to that. And then also how are you communicating that to your board and to your volunteers and especially to your donors. You know it's really interesting. I love this idea and I think if you, for me, a lot of boards are successful when they understand what they need to do. Right. It's meeting expectations. And it seems to me your 168 management process would allow your board members and your leadership to understand what is their capacity so that you can navigate the reality of that vision you know and I love what you just said no for now. That's magical thinking, because I feel like you lose board engagement when people aren't meeting the expectations or those around them aren't meeting expectations. It's easier to walk away to say yeah, this doesn't work. But understanding why it's not working or how you could get it to work is pretty amazing. Are you seeing boards do this. Absolutely and I like the key thing is what I call there is reality gaps is that if you have a reality gap. How do you close that reality gap and it's that conversation about listening, understanding what people are doing. You know, because a lot of cases some people come from the boards might come in from a for profit board where it's more like a get it done mentality and if you drive and you work hard enough but one thing that the nonprofits is they don't get that six figure, you know, bonus at the end of the year that makes it all worthwhile. They keep working hard that they have the passion and heart to do things but you know a lot of times people don't understand that and that's where you got to make sure is that you're seeing the same reality. Yeah, I love that you said that because that is such a huge issue. I feel like we have, we know this, the nonprofit to the profit sector has a completely different vocabulary, a different operational purview and in how we understand how you lead and how you manage. It's really hard for a lot of board members that come from that for profit space to sit sit there, make judgments, make directives and then not understand how it doesn't flow or how it doesn't work. Especially with the executive director of organizations because I've always found that that's the loneliest position there is because you know your boards are your boss and then you have to manage your staff and you're caught in between the two and you really have to kind of weigh both those both those areas and you have to understand, you know, you have to get your people to do those things but then you have to also go back and understand to the board about what's getting done and what people are getting done. That's amazing. So, you know, when we talk about those four P's of capacity, and, and let's go through those again as we move into communicating about the board, right. People. Yeah, positions positions, getting the right people to do the right thing. And then for and then performance management, how are they performing. And it's so key because if you think about people right. One thing nonprofits, you know, what I've always said is you can't really go out and hire a great person you have to create them, and you create them by working with them and, and making them better because you know you can't go out and you don't have a budget to go out and hire someone for $120,000 a year, you know, per se that you have to go out and you have to find people then you mold them in your organization. The second thing with the positions is is that a lot of times with positions what I found is is that, you know, you have a position that might only have a shelf life for about a year or two for somebody because they have ambition themselves. What happens is is that, you know, you have to have the right procedures for that position because you're bringing people in. And then you, and then to an organization is everybody who starts at the bottom of the pyramid per se can't work their way up. And so you have to have the right process and procedures in place to kind of, you know, for that position to have people understand what they're working on. And then like with performance is you have to understand what you're trying to do why you're trying to do it and what the results are. And one of the key things, especially for when you're having a conversation with the board is is that I remember like one time when I first started working this the funding person had dropped off by about 30% and they were questioning her ability to get results. And what had happened was it just fluked happen was that two big donors, you know, their timeline for for donations had dropped off, and she had an underneath that she had an 80% retention rate it was up 30% from the year before. And if she hadn't done that, then it would have been a big would have been a big disaster. Yeah. And so one of those things about kind of understanding the performance management piece of what they were doing and why, then allow them to understand that she was having a great year not a bad year if you were just looking at the top line numbers. Wow. So, let's dig into that a little bit more because I think that anyone who has been on a board, the easiest and the most frequent thing is to demonize those fundraisers and the directors of development that's why we have such a an abysmal tracking rate I think AFP says the average development director last 14 months, which is just dreadful to even consider, but talk to us about communicating with the board and the business review concept. One thing I always say is that, you know, you can do a lot of great things, but you probably can't bench press 400 pounds. And a lot of times that, you know, like when you really go back with boards as they expect people to bench press 400 pounds and it's more about where I was saying before about that three about that. There's three different areas is that you talk about what are the actions and behaviors and timelines and like what I've talked before about fund development. You know, how do you see this happening like what's your intellectual vision of how are we going to talk with back to the strategy piece right so we're going to go out we're going to talk to a certain number of people they're going to give a certain amount. And this is then going to roll into us achieving our goals and so if a person goes out and they do all those those things possible, you know, you can't force somebody to give something to you. And if we're in poor economic times and things happen it's more about why things are happening and so you kind of get that for profit get it get it done mentality at any cost. And a lot of people don't want to pay that price especially with the stress that comes in so it's very much saying this is what we're doing and this is what we're hitting it and here's how we're adapting. And of course, it's developing the relationships and it's all about having that time in place to be able to make sure that people are doing the right things and again, from a standpoint from the board is is that you then have the controls in place that people are doing those things, and that you're always kind of a conversation about results like I one of my favorite sayings is that results aren't aren't everything they're the only thing, but how you get their matters and so in today's world. It's important to have the right style and the right substance, whatever you're having that communication with people and then you understand that because I think when you understand what people are going through. Then it really kind of helps you make those little changes that helps improve things and so it's more of a nurturing and helping version of blame mentality. Right. You know it seems to me when I hear you talking about this that you know the disconnect. I read I wonder and I think about this a lot. How many board members really understand development, and do they even understand capacity even the concept. And how, how are we what are your what are your thoughts are we doing a good enough job communicating to our boards and educating them in essence so that they can. I think one of the key things is really going back and having that strategy and understanding so when you go back and talk about the vision and strategy is, this is what we're going to try to do. And then we've gone back and we've done that, and then it's kind of going back and saying these are the things that we've learned. And one of the key things to with that is is that, you know, everything's not success isn't guaranteed. You know one of the things I like to say is that you can't guarantee success but you can guarantee the best chance for success. And one of the key things is really kind of understanding, you know, like I've not to get too much new weeds but there's a pestle analysis where you kind of understand what's going in the politics, economics, you know, societal changes, economic changes, technological changes that happen. And so kind of understanding all those things that are going around because, especially in fund development is, is if you know the beginning of 2020, you know, like people were kind of conserving their cash and so they might not have been giving out at such a rate because your assumptions from years ago are completely different than they are now. And so that shouldn't be the fund person's problem if those things are going on so it's like, you know, you got to be thinking about these things. And then also, you can't continue to do things that aren't working. So you always got to go back and make that change and, and then kind of because people don't. You begin to become protective, rather than trying to find that right solution. This has been amazing. And as we, we don't have a lot of time left. I love your thought process, and I love the methodology that you're using, but I've got to ask, who's doing this work. Frankly, I don't see a lot of boards that could actually be doing this high level thinking, especially right now, when they're screwing around trying to deal with all the things to your point the 168 that they're trying to do. Do you see this as a leadership issue, more from the CEO and maybe the board chair or select committee or what are your thoughts on how do we navigate this. That's a great question and that's like where one of the things that I've, and very much about is that monthly business review with your board where you go back and you have those sessions. I really strongly suggest having quarterly sessions where, you know, your month to month or your tactical but then you're quarterly about how your strategy is working. And because in a lot of cases you're always thinking about the day to day but not the top of the line things and so one of the key things is a very much go back and everybody focuses on what the actions and behaviors part but the other part about like the strategy is is that how are the things that we did two or three months ago, are they bearing fruit. And one of the things too if you think about, you know, like, I was at an event once with a guy talked about planning a tomato about how impatient he was. But planning a tomato plant takes about 120 days for those seeds to be the bearing fruit and sometimes especially we're talking about fun development is is that sometimes it's that conversation that you've had with somebody and nurturing that conversation that takes that time for a while. And so you have to set those expectations and people have to have, you know, you have to throw out what you think, and go back and really kind of say what's the strategy and how is it supposed to work. Because one of my favorite sayings is that there's multiple ways to the mountaintop and the views all the same but there's so many different ways of doing that so you have to really kind of create that synergy between the executive director and the board, the CEO and the board. And I think that, you know, we do get into the weeds as boards, you know, we have really captured a use of the CEO dashboard, we get so into that and we look at these metric pieces and then we don't really think about the strategy. It's a measurement and it's something that's really important. But I think sometimes it's, we look at those and it's like a yay or nay you did good you did bad move on, right, versus like what you're saying, really be thinking about this. I love that you've added out to the concept of a quarterly situation and boy, if, if ever that was needed, it's right now. Absolutely, one of the things of one of the clients that I had was that we talked every quarter and the first thing that I would do in every session was what did we say last time. What did we do, what did we learn. And then it's that one of the things that I love is an upward corkscrew where you keep getting better as each time you go through these passes. And then it kind of, it eliminates that it creates trust because then you're able to see the things that are happening and then one thing I always say about, you know, for those of us that have played pool before it's calling your shot right so you go back and say, this is where I'm going to go back and have the ball go in. And then you see how things work and it really begins to kind of develop that confidence. And then to like one of the key things is that it's those audibles that you make during the first quarter because you want to have people be able to think about what's that there's little things that there's little changes that happen I made a little tweak and this is how it worked because you want to have those people that are out working to have that ability that flexibility, especially now in the environment that's changing so much. Amazing. Well, and I think to your point, I mean, think change is the one thing that we can anticipate. It's always around us. And especially in the nonprofit sector. It really, really does occur more frequently and we can't just turn a blind eye to it. Wow, Al you've been amazing again everybody I'm Julia Patrick, Jared ransom my co host will be back with us tomorrow. I want to make sure that you have the opportunity to see ours information. Check out Strabo dot Strabo code calm, you have a lot of really great website out with a lot of information. And we've touched on so many principles today that really can help lead your team or your group, but lead yourself. And I think that's really, you got to do the heavy lifting internally, oftentimes before you can, you know, take your hands off of you and so some of these things you've done are just amazing. 168 man. That's the number, the magical lesson in the number. I've heard you say this before, and I don't know how or why I let it go. I lost that frame, and I love that frame that to me is magical thinking. And one last thing is a little trivia question for you it was the first one the first person that I tested this with was your part Jared ransom so. Okay. Well then, that's super cool. Well I'm going to have to ask her about that, because it's really a great way to look at a lot of choices that you make areas where you can improve. And I love, love, love this concept so check out our friend out leveling here at struggle code calm. I think you're going to find that there are a lot of tools and a lot of opportunities to help you increase your capacity understand those four p's and navigate yourself to greater success with less stress. That's the game changer. Again, we want to thank all of our presenting sponsors without them we would not be here learning as we do every day. And if I'm not mistaken out I think this is the 500th episode I'm ashamed that I can't verify that but we're pretty ding dang close. And again, we want to thank those folks that help us, each and every day. Fundraising Academy the nonprofit nerd, your part time controller, the American nonprofit Academy staffing boutique nonprofit thought leader and the nonprofit Atlas. Hey, Al, it has been such a pleasure to have you back with us today. So much the opportunity to speak to I enjoyed it a lot. Well, it's a lot of fun. You always get my brain thinking and that is a good and sometimes scary thing my friends. Everybody, as we end every episode, we want to remind you and ourselves, stay well, so you can do well. We'll see you back here tomorrow everyone. Thanks so much out.