I hear from so many nonprofit leaders who want to establish themselves as thought leaders in their niche.  But the whole process around how you do that tends to be shrouded in mystery.  It’s time to demystify!  There are 7 basic ingredients, and today we break them down and give you a roadmap to becoming a thought leader.

In this episode, we reveal:

• What thought leadership can do for you
• Individual as thought leader vs organization as thought leader – how and when to choose
• How thought leaders think and operate
• The 7 essential ingredients to becoming a thought leader
• One thing you can do today to move closer to becoming a thought leader  

I would love to hear your story of your journey to thought leadership, and how it's going.

You can connect with me on LinkedIn or send me a message at the podcast website. Both are great ways to reach me, and I would love to hear your thoughts. 

Identity is one of those things that we really tend to take for granted. We often don't recognize just how much of an impact it's having on how we show up in all aspects of life.

When we think to ourselves, “I am…” or “I am a…” Whatever follows, however we finish those sentences, is far more important than we often realize. Because they speak to our identity as we see it. 

And our identity drives our perspective, our priorities, and perhaps most importantly, it drives how we show up. 

We tend to think of identities as fixed. They simply are who we are. But it's not so simple after all. The fact is, we can choose which identities we want to operate from. 

The identities we choose to operate from as Nonprofit leaders has a lot of implications for how we show up, and what kind of impact we have, especially in our advocacy work.

In this episode, we share:

• The four essential identities that make the biggest impact on your advocacy success
• Why those identities can often cause discomfort for many Nonprofit leaders
• Commonly occurring identities that will reduce your advocacy 
• How to identify any identities you’re currently operating from that may not be serving you
• How to begin to operate from the identities that will serve you most effectively as an advocate and as an leader 

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

There is no question that voting rights are under extraordinary attack right now in this country. And the people being targeted are pretty much one and the same as the people most of us serve.

This is not entirely new, as we know. There have been attempts for years to systematically erode people's voting rights. And there have been multiple attempts at voter suppression in all kinds of ways. We've watched that unfold across the news and in our own lived experience in many of our states.

But all of that voter suppression agenda, and not just voter suppression, but attacks on the very notion of allowing entire groups of people to have any sort of say in who their elected representatives will be. That level of attack has exploded in the wake of the most recent disastrous Supreme Court decision, dismantling key parts of the Voting Rights Act. 

It would be really tempting to just get super demoralized about all of that and say, this is depressing and overwhelming, and I can't deal. There's nothing we can do. We're toast. 

The only way that’s true is if we don't do anything.

The fact is there is quite a bit we can do. And our clients' votes have never been more important for how their future will be written.

In this episode, we share:

• The two main agendas driving voter suppression and attacks on representation
• Why mid-election redistricting may not work out the way its instigators are hoping
• Three things you can do right now to ensure that every client and volunteer will have their vote counted on Election Day
• How to make sure no one gets tripped up by ID requirements when voting
• The best one-stop resource for all the information you need to help your clients make sure their vote is counted
• How to put together a powerful set of voting resources for clients and volunteers, even when your bandwidth is limited

Link:

Your one-stop resource for all the important voting rules in your state:

Vote411.org

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

Last week, I tackled how to diagnose exactly what's going on when funders say they love you, but they're still not investing at the correct level. In that conversation (Episode 145) we laid some really important groundwork to help you map out exactly where the problem is occurring, how it’s manifesting with each decisionmaker, and what exactly is causing it.

Today, as promised, we'll get into how you fix it.

You won't be surprised to learn that this is almost entirely about messaging. But there's some really interesting quirks about how we adjust that, based on the diagnosis we arrived at when we were analyzing which causes of this problem are at play with any given funder. 

The good news is, we’re focusing on short bits of messaging that are strategically designed to address each of the common causes. With six key sentences, you can build the core of the messaging you’ll need to move those funders toward the high-level investment your work deserves.. 

In this episode, we share:

• Why some funders seem impervious to the information you’ve been sharing with them
• The most common messaging mistake you may be making as you to try to fix the problem
• How to create shorthand concepts that will help funders get the true value of your work
• Four key principles for creating shorthand messaging that sticks 
• How to disrupt the mistaken ideas funders likely have about your work
• The six sentences you need to turn around the misconceptions that are keeping funders from investing in your work at the proper level

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

I want to talk about a problem that is way more common than you might think. The one where funders say they love you, but still under-invest in your work.

Chances are good you know exactly what I’m talking about. You've got these various decisionmakers, and often this is particularly a problem with elected officials. But it cuts across all types of decisionmakers. Whether it's electeds or government agency decisionmakers, foundations, corporate funders, all of them.

They know something about your organization, they have some understanding of the work that you do, and they think it's a wonderful service that's important in the community. And they're really glad you're here. They love you to pieces.

But still, they continue to under-invest in your work. So what the heck is going on? What is up with that?

I’m going to help you get to the bottom of that.

In this episode, we share:

• The four main causes of under-investment when the decisionmaker says they love you
• The messaging strategy you may have been using that’s backfiring and contributing to the problem
• The two-part puzzle we have to solve to begin to fix the problem
• How to identify key patterns that provide the clues to a solution
• How to map those patterns so you can triage the most critical items that need your attention first

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

We all know that stories are important when we're engaging decisionmakers. But we don't always know what story is going to be the right story. And how to tell that story in a way that is really going to pull that decisionmaker in, and actually move them closer to yes.

So often I hear from Nonprofit leaders who tell me they brought what they thought was their best story to a conversation with a decisionmaker, and it didn't really seem to shift anything. It's not that it didn't land at all, but it didn't seem to get any traction either.

We want every part of our messaging to be designed specifically to pull that decisionmaker in, and move them closer to yes. Your stories are absolutely no exception. In fact, they can be one of the most powerful tools in your toolkit, if you know how to use them to greatest effect.

In this episode, we share:

• The differences between a story that sells, and one that doesn’t
• How to make sure the story you tell is the right one for this particular decisionmaker
• The first thing you must do before you begin crafting a story
• How to use story to teach a needed lesson to a decisionmaker, that they will actually learn
• How to use story to dismantle a decisionmaker’s unhelpful beliefs
• How to create vivid metaphors that stick in the decisionmaker’s mind
• How to build an element of unpredictability into your story that keeps the decisionmaker engaged

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

Tell me if this has ever happened to you. You were solid with your messaging. You had that dialed in, and you'd engaged the decisionmaker and gotten them to the point where they're interested in your stuff. 

And then when you pivoted to the pitch and named the price, they didn't buy.

Maybe they said things like, maybe next year. Or, I'm not sure this is right for us at this time. Or some other thing that tried to let you down gently, but didn't result in the investment you were asking for.

I hear some version of this scenario from Nonprofit leaders all the time. And when I have them replay the lead-up and the pitch for me, it almost always turns out they were making the same big mistake that lots of folks make, that winds up trampling their great messaging and reducing its effectiveness.

When we're able to fix that, the results change pretty fast. But the catch is, it's really hard to analyze that mistake yourself, because it's very likely something you're doing completely unconsciously. So the first thing we have to do is notice it before we can get to work on fixing it. 

Today, I'm going walk you through how this set of mistakes shows up and some things you can do right away to start solving this problem.

In this episode, I’m sharing:

• The wrong conclusion so many people draw when their big ask fails to get a yes
• How an attempt to make it easier for the decisionmaker to hear a big ask is actually planting doubt
• Three common language and voice shifts during the ask that cause the decisionmaker to back away 
• Two simple ways to identify the language and voice mistakes you’re making 
• How to uncover the hidden obstacles that are causing these mistakes
• The 3-step process to fixing the mistakes that are costing you the most in your ask

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

For a change I want to share what it feels like for me to be on the receiving end of some amazing coaching. There's so much value in working with great coaches. They help me stretch my sense of what’s possible, they ask the right questions to get to the heart of what’s in the way, and they help open the path to achieving those stretch goals. 

I've just come back from an amazing retreat where I got to spend two full days with my favorite coaches and peers. There were about 150 of us total hanging out together for two days. Sharing breakthroughs, helping each other have more breakthroughs, and helping each other figure out what the next big thing is. What's the next win? Where do we want to stretch next?

I got to thinking about how much impact this experience has on my success in my work, and in my life. And I wanted to share that with you because I think there are lessons for everyone there.

In this episode, I'm sharing:

• How to know when a blind spot or hidden obstacle is in your way
• The lesson those hidden obstacles are trying to get you to learn
• How fear or worry about an unwanted outcome can derail your vision of the big impact you want to make 
• Two success hacks to help you reach your goals faster and more consistently
• How to create a great peer-coaching and accountability relationship that will accelerate your results
• Why getting comfortable with being uncomfortable can be your secret to success

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

What if you only had 60 seconds to capture the attention of that decisionmaker? You're in the room with somebody important and you need something from them. From the moment you walk in the door, the risk that they’re not going to engage goes up for every second that you’re not actively engaging them. 

60 to 90 seconds is not an exaggeration. And you know, it's not that they won't be polite and listen. Of course they will. But there's a huge difference between polite listening and being fully engaged, captivated by what you're saying. 

And we want captivated.

The truth is for any encounter, whether it's an in-the-room meeting or over zoom, the first minute or two sets the tone. It tells the decisionmaker what to expect from you energetically, and it tells them where they can operate from energetically.

Is it going to be okay for them to just kind of lean back and listen and be somewhat detached? Or are they going to be all the way in on this? 

How you open the conversation can determine how everything goes after that.

In this episode, we share:

• Why typical introductions and openings fail to engage 
• The extra benefits you get by using an unconventional opening in your first encounter with a decisionmaker
• Four high-engagement models you can use for your opening with a decisionmaker right away
• Two common mistakes that will torpedo your high-engagement opening, and how to avoid them
• How to use data in your opening to get the decisionmaker leaning in and asking great questions
• How to train yourself to handle any interruption to your opening and turn it into a big opportunity

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!

Right now, maybe more than ever, it's so important for Nonprofit leaders to be as effective in our advocacy work as possible, while dealing with the fact that we have super-limited bandwidth. So anything we can do to be faster and more efficient and more effective getting to those results, the better.

I had a call with a client a few days ago that was a case study in all the things that can make us crazy when we're advocating with government decisionmakers in particular. Whether we're looking for a policy change or funding or both, it seems like the process and the path are rarely clear and certainly never easy.

A lot of times it can feel like a long and cumbersome process, especially if you don't have a full-time government relations person on staff. Which frankly, most nonprofits don't. I hear from a lot of clients their frustration with overly complex systems that have a million moving parts and are hard to decipher. Opaque decisionmaking structures where it sometimes feels impossible to figure out who's really in charge of the decisions you're trying to affect.

It's enough to make you want to give up before you even start.

I'm here to tell you that even when you're a full-time advocate, those roadblocks and challenges still crop up all the time. The difference is we know some tricks to cut through the fog and get on the shortest path to the results we want. 

Today I'm sharing with you my three favorite shortcuts for doing just that.

In this episode, we share:

• The one place you should always start from to get faster advocacy results
• Two magic questions that will buy you more progress than any others
• How taking these three shortcuts can result in more and stronger strategic relationships
• The key to avoiding unseen holes in your dream policy that will come back to bite you
• How to use AI effectively in your advocacy work

Help spread the word! If you found value in this episode, I’d be grateful if you would leave a review on iTunes or wherever you listen. Your reviews help other nonprofit leaders find the podcast.  Thanks!!