Let’s Hear It

When federal funding for nonprofits started disappearing last year, the Marguerite Casey Foundation didn't put out a pithy statement, they pulled out their checkbook. The foundation cranked up its grantmaking from around $30 million to $130 million in a single year. Now the foundation has pledged half a billion dollars over the next decade, 50% more than it gave the decade before.

Carmen Rojas, the foundation's president and CEO, says its mission matters more than the size of its endowment, and the guy who has to manage the money and write those checks, VP of Investment and Operations Daniel Gould, is just fine with it.

On this episode of Let's Hear It, Eric talks with Carmen and Dan about how the Marguerite Casey Foundation pulled it off – from working with their board, managing the money, and creating a culture that believes that compounding the foundation’s benefit to the community is way better than compounding the interest on their endowment.  

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Eric went to the Communications Network annual conference for 21 years in a row, so he knows a little bit about what makes this gathering special.

In this bonus episode, Eric is joined by Communications Network CEO Sean Gibbons, VP of Events and Community Carrie Clyne, and Director of Strategic Projects and Partnerships Erica Pelletreau two weeks before ComNet26 in San Diego.

And this conference comes at a critical time. It's been a very hard year to do communications for good. Nonprofits are losing funding at the same time more people need their help. New research from the Center for Effective Philanthropy reveals that grantees think that their funders are out of touch with their needs.

In San Diego, communicators from foundations and nonprofits from around the world will come together to learn from each other, teach each other, and make some lifetime friendships. Can't make it to San Diego? Stick around to find out how you can still be part of it.

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This podcast exists because Kirk Brown had what Eric thinks was a very stupid idea, to start a podcast about foundation and nonprofit communications. Seven years later, they're still at it.

Our guests today, Emily Shaw and Bridget Conley, started the podcast Disrupting Peace because Bridget had a very good idea: create a podcast to take on the question of why peace hasn't worked, and find ways to address those challenges. Bridget is the research director at the World Peace Foundation. Emily is the crack producer who helped her build the show.

Organizations are always looking for new ways to use communications to advance their mission, and sooner or later the question comes up, "Should we start a podcast?" So this episode is for every foundation, nonprofit, consultant, or anyone else out there sitting on a podcast idea and wondering if it's worth doing.

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Show Notes

Our guests and their work

The people and ideas they referenced

We are delighted to have College Futures Foundation CEO Eloy Ortiz Oakley back on the show to talk about one of our favorite subjects – the value of a college degree or certificate. Eloy joined us to talk about a new study College Futures commissioned from Georgetown University's Center on Education and the Workforce that makes a powerful case about how valuable a college education is, not only to students, but to California’s economy.

The conversation also offers a perfect example of how a foundation can use research to move policy makers and other decisionmakers to action.

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Fiona Guthrie spent decades reporting stories as a broadcast journalist and later served as Director of Story at the Ford Foundation. Now, she’s using storytelling to help free people who are wrongfully imprisoned, including those on death row.

In this episode, Eric talks with Fiona about the extraordinary career that led her to the Innocence Project, one of the country’s leading advocates for the wrongfully convicted.

They discuss why it’s essential for an organization to stay relentlessly focused on its mission while helping build a broader movement for justice—and how storytelling can shape every aspect of a communications strategy.

Jen Ford Reedy has spent more than a decade leading the Bush Foundation, and over that time she has come to a conclusion that should be a challenge to the field—nobody actually has to be good at philanthropy. There's no license needed, no regulators keeping them accountable, and no market that punishes funders for doing it badly. You can just write checks, get celebrated for your generosity, and never once answer the question of whether any of it actually worked.

Her new book, Please Be Good at Philanthropy, out on July 21, 2026 from Disruption Books, argues that good intentions aren't enough, and that philanthropy can do real harm when it's done badly. Jen talks with Eric about why she thinks being good at this work is a skill you have to learn, not something you arrive at already knowing, no matter how successful you've been elsewhere. They acknowledge the challenges funders face in getting honest feedback, especially from grantees who don’t want to risk the relationship. And they discuss the importance of being honest about what didn’t work, without blaming grantees.

After the interview, Eric and Kirk chew on what philanthropy actually owes the people it serves, and concede that maybe they should please be good at podcasting while they’re at it.

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Sean Kelly is one of the sharpest marketing minds Eric has ever met — and he's spent his career doing something all arts organizations dearly want to do: truly understand what their audiences want, align it with their own artistic vision, and set ticket prices accordingly.

Sean is the founder of Vatic, a dynamic pricing company for performing arts organizations. His genius is his ability to look at a mountain of data and pull out the story it's trying to tell — then use that story to fill auditoriums and strengthen arts organizations.

If you work in or fund the arts, clear your calendar. But any nonprofit communicator can learn a ton from Sean. His ability to truly understand what his audience wants – and needs – is a great lesson for us all.

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On the latest Let's Hear It, Eric sits down with Marc Moorghen, VP of Marketing and Communications at Lever for Change.

Founded by the MacArthur Foundation, Lever for Change connects donors with bold ideas through massive open calls. In just six years, Marc and his team have helped move $2.5 billion to nonprofits — including MacKenzie Scott's $640 million Yield Giving Open Call and Pivotal's $250 million Action for Women's Health.

Eric and Marc get into how Lever for Change flips the traditional philanthropic "do not disturb" sign on its head, why unrestricted and open-call funding is finally going mainstream, and what it looks like when a foundation actually invites the unsolicited big idea.

Also: a hearty plug for Stuart Ewen's PR!: A Social History of Spin — the book that put Marc on this path in the first place. (Kirk has thoughts.)

Listen now — and please follow, rate, and review Let's Hear It wherever you get your podcasts. And listen for the opportunity to win a prize!

A lot of people who work in nonprofits and foundations eventually get the tickle. You know the one. What if I just... went out on my own?

Regan Douglass did something about it. After years as a communications leader at PolicyLink, California Humanities, and the College Futures Foundation, she pulled the ripcord and launched Sparkwise Communications. Two years in, no regrets.

In this episode, Eric sits down with Regan to discuss what it actually takes to go independent — how thick your stomach lining needs to be, how to structure your business, how to smell the tuna fish sandwich wrapped in a red flag before you sign the contract, and how to hold onto your own voice when you've spent years inhabiting someone else's.

This one's for everyone who's been sitting on the egg. It's time to let it hatch.

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Glen Galaich is the CEO of the Stupski Foundation — and he just wrote a book that bites the hand that feeds him and serves it up in a 236-page meal.

Control: Why Big Giving Falls Short, out today, makes an argument as simple as it is explosive: when a donor takes a tax deduction to give money away, they've made a deal with the public. That money isn't theirs anymore. But the system we've built lets donors park billions in foundations and donor-advised funds indefinitely — dribbling out 5 cents on the dollar while the rest sits on Wall Street going absolutely nowhere.

Glen isn't an outside critic. He's a sitting foundation CEO who spent years reinforcing every rule he's now trying to break. Eric read an early draft, argued with him about it, and told him his central framing was too polite. Glen ignored him. They pick up that conversation here.

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