Nonprofit Nation with Julia Campbell

What It Means to Practice Outrageous Kindness with Kristina Joy Carlson

May 29, 2024 Julia Campbell Season 2 Episode 144
What It Means to Practice Outrageous Kindness with Kristina Joy Carlson
Nonprofit Nation with Julia Campbell
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Nonprofit Nation with Julia Campbell
What It Means to Practice Outrageous Kindness with Kristina Joy Carlson
May 29, 2024 Season 2 Episode 144
Julia Campbell

Economic instability, wars, climate change, and a changing labor landscape have left businesses, organizations, and individuals feeling helpless and defeated. In actuality, too many people and organizations are lacking clarity and purpose. Maybe “outrageous kindness” is the change catalyst we need.

My guest is Kristina Joy Carlson, CFRE, renowned philanthropy expert, entrepreneur, and speaker. A sought-after speaker and co-author of the best-selling Essential Principles for Fundraising Success, Kristina doesn’t just help institutions raise money; she facilitates the transformation of people’s lives, organizations, and the world through outrageous kindness.

We discuss Kristina’s signature KIND Method—a roadmap to a better life and a triple bottom line for businesses and nonprofits.

About Kristina Joy Carlson

A sought-after speaker and co-author of the best-selling Essential Principles for Fundraising Success, Kristina Joy Carlson doesn’t just help organizations raise money; she facilitates the transformation of people’s lives, organizations, and the world through a practice of outrageous kindness. 

Three decades in fundraising and entrepreneurship and an almost decade-long gauntlet of personal loss have taught Kristina she always has control over her purpose, perspective, and actions. Leveraging that wisdom, she helps nonprofit institutions across the globe secure the philanthropic resources they need to maximize their impact, including Habitat for Humanity International, World Vision International, and Susan Komen. 

Founder of the KIND Method and Managing Director of Global Philanthropy at Carter, Kristina guides transformational capital campaigns, advises on 8-figure gifts and grants, creates bespoke training programs, and develops innovative technologies for some of the world’s largest nonprofit organizations. She also helps maximize the philanthropic engagement of former US Presidents and other heads of state, Fortune 500 CEOs, Forbes 400 individuals, faith leaders, celebrities, and everyday people. 

Through her roles at Carter Global, Ketchum, and FundraisingINFO.com, Kristina has supported thousands of organizations worldwide, providing counsel on major campaigns in healthcare, education, the arts, youth organizations, national and international organizations, and smaller grassroots organizations. Her mission is to inspire leaders, philanthropists, and professionals to practice outrageous kindness as they define and take mission-critical actions, create accountability systems, and experience the magic of philanthropy. With a master’s degree in Community Economic Development from New Hampshire College, Kristina lives in Oxford, Mississippi, where she starts each morning with Tazo Awake black tea and a quick round of Plants vs. Zombies.


Connect with Kristina on LinkedIn
Visit the OutrageousKindness Website
Carter Global | Kristina Joy Carlson

Take my free masterclass: 3 Must-Have Elements of Social Media Content that Converts

Show Notes Transcript

Economic instability, wars, climate change, and a changing labor landscape have left businesses, organizations, and individuals feeling helpless and defeated. In actuality, too many people and organizations are lacking clarity and purpose. Maybe “outrageous kindness” is the change catalyst we need.

My guest is Kristina Joy Carlson, CFRE, renowned philanthropy expert, entrepreneur, and speaker. A sought-after speaker and co-author of the best-selling Essential Principles for Fundraising Success, Kristina doesn’t just help institutions raise money; she facilitates the transformation of people’s lives, organizations, and the world through outrageous kindness.

We discuss Kristina’s signature KIND Method—a roadmap to a better life and a triple bottom line for businesses and nonprofits.

About Kristina Joy Carlson

A sought-after speaker and co-author of the best-selling Essential Principles for Fundraising Success, Kristina Joy Carlson doesn’t just help organizations raise money; she facilitates the transformation of people’s lives, organizations, and the world through a practice of outrageous kindness. 

Three decades in fundraising and entrepreneurship and an almost decade-long gauntlet of personal loss have taught Kristina she always has control over her purpose, perspective, and actions. Leveraging that wisdom, she helps nonprofit institutions across the globe secure the philanthropic resources they need to maximize their impact, including Habitat for Humanity International, World Vision International, and Susan Komen. 

Founder of the KIND Method and Managing Director of Global Philanthropy at Carter, Kristina guides transformational capital campaigns, advises on 8-figure gifts and grants, creates bespoke training programs, and develops innovative technologies for some of the world’s largest nonprofit organizations. She also helps maximize the philanthropic engagement of former US Presidents and other heads of state, Fortune 500 CEOs, Forbes 400 individuals, faith leaders, celebrities, and everyday people. 

Through her roles at Carter Global, Ketchum, and FundraisingINFO.com, Kristina has supported thousands of organizations worldwide, providing counsel on major campaigns in healthcare, education, the arts, youth organizations, national and international organizations, and smaller grassroots organizations. Her mission is to inspire leaders, philanthropists, and professionals to practice outrageous kindness as they define and take mission-critical actions, create accountability systems, and experience the magic of philanthropy. With a master’s degree in Community Economic Development from New Hampshire College, Kristina lives in Oxford, Mississippi, where she starts each morning with Tazo Awake black tea and a quick round of Plants vs. Zombies.


Connect with Kristina on LinkedIn
Visit the OutrageousKindness Website
Carter Global | Kristina Joy Carlson

Take my free masterclass: 3 Must-Have Elements of Social Media Content that Converts

A massive transfer of wealth is right around the corner, and your constituent base is changing. Are your fundraising efforts ready? This episode is sponsored by Qgive by Bloomerang, an online fundraising solution that helps thousands of nonprofits raise money for their causes through online giving and event registration, forums, text fundraising, peer to peer campaigns, and auction events. Q gives tools help fundraisers like you raise more. Q give surveyed donors of all ages to create the brand new generational Giving Report, a comprehensive guide to help you best connect with constituents of all generations. To learn how new generations want to support you, hear from you, and stay connected with you, head to jcsocialmarketing.com qgive. That's jcsocialmarketing.com qgiv to be notified when the report is released and to receive your free copy onto the show. Hello and welcome to Nonprofit Nation. I'm your host, Julia Campbell, and I'm going to sit down with nonprofit industry experts, fundraisers, marketers, and everyone in between to get real and discuss what it takes to build that movement that you've been dreaming of. I created the nonprofit Nation podcast to share practical wisdom and strategies to help you confidently find your voice, definitively grow your audience, and effectively build your movement. If you're a nonprofit newbie or an experienced professional who's looking to get more visibility, reach more people, and create even more impact, then you're in the right place. Let's get started. Welcome and welcome back to Nonprofit NatIOn. And I'm just so excited that you chose to be one of my listeners today. This is Julia Campbell, and the topic today, it's really going to be, it's going to be something very interesting. I promise there's a framework involved, but we're going to talk about the theory and the philosophy of outrageous kindness and what that means and sort of how to put that into practice so that we can build our organizations and grow them and create even more impact. And my guest today is Christina Joy Carlson, CFRE, a renowned philanthropy expert, entrepreneur, and speaker. A sought after speaker and co author of the best selling essential principles for fundraising success, which many of you have probably read. Christina doesn't just help institutions raise money. She facilitates the transformation of people's lives, organizations, and the world through outrageous kindness. Through her roles at Carter Global Ketchum and fundraisinginfo.com dot, Christina has supported thousands of organizations worldwide, providing counsel on major campaigns in healthcare, education, the arts, youth, national and international organizations, and smaller grassroots organizations. And her mission is to inspire leaders, philanthropists, and professionals to practice this theory of outrageous kindness as they define and take mission critical actions, create accountability systems and experience. I love this experience. The magic of philanthropy. I love those words. They're fantastic. Christina, welcome to the podcast. Thanks, Julia. I'm excited to be here and get a chance to talk with you. Yes. So how did you get started in fundraising work? Well, I believe I'm a bit of a unicorn in this space, as it's all I've ever done. My father was a fundraiser, a minister, and a philanthropic advisor, and I grew up traveling with him, working in his offices during school breaks, and most importantly, building a fundamental understanding that helping others find meaningful ways to invest their time, talent, and treasure is one of the greatest honors you can have in life. So I started my career with Ketchum, which was at the time the largest capital campaign consulting firm in the US. And after a few other stops, including a successful entrepreneurial endeavor in fundraising, I ultimately went on to be Ketchum's only female president in its hundred plus year history. Amazing. That's fantastic. And we're celebrating women's History Month as we record this. Yeah. So that's good connection. I love that. So how did you come upon this theory of outrageous kindness? And what is it? Because I feel like it's going to sort of frame our entire discussion today. Yeah. So, you know, everybody has the capability of making a difference in their daily lives, but sometimes we get stymied because we think it has to be done in big, broad strokes. Right? That if we're not willing to run into a building burning building or somehow do something, you know, really big, we may end up feeling like there's nothing for us to do. And yet, in my experience, real change happens not with those big moments, but with what we do every day. I think back to one of the very first global campaigns I worked on was back in the nineties for Habitat for Humanity International. And I had the opportunity as part of that, to get to know Millard Fuller, who was the founder of Habitat. And when he passed away, I remember reading an editorial about his life, and if you're familiar at all with his life's history, he had had a very successful business career, had made millions and gave it all away and started habitat. And the article I was reading about him was just, you know, oh, this great thing he did. And I wrote a response to the editor at the time to say, you know, that's great. But the beauty of habitat has always been that everyone can do something. You know, pick up a hammer, hit one nail. You know, even the homeowners themselves were invited to be a part of making the change in their own lives and in the community in which they live. So it's just that concept of making sure we're doing the little things that create the big change. I love that you wrote a response. You wrote a letter to the editor about this. Yeah. I just felt so moved because having reflected upon, you know, Millard's life work, I don't think he would have wanted anyone to think, unless you're willing to sacrifice everything you have, you know, you can't make change in other people's lives. I mean, the whole idea behind habitat is we can all do something, right? There's a role for each of us in helping to make the world a better place. I agree. And I worry and think that sometimes people that are not working in philanthropy tend to think the same way they think, or they think that you have to be Mackenzie Scott or Bill Gates in order to really push the needle and make a difference. And I try to talk to laypeople and friends and family and people, people that don't work in the sector and that don't work in fundraising and say, no, like, $5 makes a difference. Sharing on Facebook, like, just spreading the word, making phone calls, stuffing envelopes, like painting a room in the shelter, like, all of that makes a difference. Absolutely. And when I look at some of the corporate teams that we work with and try to help them be more productive and get better results, often we find that it's this lack of awareness, this lack of understanding that we all have something to bring to the table. Right. That there is something for everyone to do on a team, and we've just got to find what that is and help them unpack it. So I want to talk about this personal practice that I read about on your website, and you say you have a personal practice of asking for something every day. And I want you to maybe tell us about this and then give maybe nonprofits some advice to get what they need. Absolutely. So here's the thing. Asking is, in my experience, it's a muscle, and you have to use it or it goes away. And especially for people working in the nonprofit space. Right. And I don't know about you, but I've known a lot of people who bring so much passion and energy to their working nonprofits, and they're a bit of superheroes, and they're so used to doing everything themselves. Right. And having been an entrepreneur, I know that feeling that, like, oh, if I got to get, I got to get it done. So I have to do it. And what you do when, when you get that mentality is you really limit the impact that you can have. You limit your results because you've only, you know, said only you can do these things. And so, you know, it is that muscle. It's something that once you get to practicing it regularly, you get better outcomes. You help other people find ways to be helpful. And I don't know about you, Julia, but in my experience, most people want to help. They want to make a difference with their lives, but they just don't know how. They're looking for ways to do that. Sometimes even in work, they don't quite know what to do. So if we're not asking others, if we're not inviting others to be a part of what we're trying to accomplish, you know, it impacts our ability to get it done. It impacts our view of things, right? If all we see when we look at a problem or even a solution is our way of thinking about it, we're really limiting what might happen. So asking just has such a wonderful. Whether you're asking for advice, asking for money, asking for help, it just really, you know, exponentially changes outcomes for you. And I have lots of little stories about how I practice it every day. Sometimes I ask for silly little things. You know, I was recently traveling and I went in this cute little shop and, oh, I found all these wonderful things, you know, that I wanted to bring home. But when the lady rang it up, it was like, oh, maybe a little too much. So I just said, hey, well, do you have an out of town discount? Why not? What's the worst they can say is no? Yeah, she took 25% off my ticket because I asked, right? Yep. I agree. I think we need to do a better job not only advocating for ourselves personally, like you just did, and then why not just ask? Why do you think we're so bad at asking for what we need? Well, so I find particularly within organizations, but even in our own minds, we have a culture of assumptions, right? We make assumptions about what people are going to say or not say. We make assumptions on how groups of people will or will not react. I can't tell you, and I'm sure you've heard our board's not a fundraising board, or our board can't do that, or our board's no good at fundraising, or, I mean, just. Or that donors not going to give, or, you know, we just make up these stories in our own minds or within our teams or our organizations about what people outcomes are going to be before we really dive in and look at data and give people an opportunity to respond. We learn so much more when we ask. In fact, I'm sure you've heard the saying, you know, you really learn the truth when you ask people people stuff, especially if it relates to money. You ask for money, you find out the truth. And people love to give advice. They love to give their stories. They would like to give their perspective. You know, people like to be heard. So if that's something you're asking for, and I know that asking for money, especially, I mean, I grew up in, you know, western culture, northeastern, very yankee. You know, I grew up in Massachusetts. And you don't talk about money. You don't talk about how much you make. You don't talk about how much you give. You don't talk about how much things cost. It's just not something that we talk about here. So that's like the culture I grew up in, and that is very challenging for fundraising because you have to have these conversations and, you know, asking people for help is also just not part of the culture here. Like, it's sort of pull yourself up by your bootstraps and, you know, we all come from the pilgrims, and it's that, that sort of culture. So I think that is something maybe we have to look internally and externally and evaluate, like, the cultural norms, like you just said, the culture of assumptions. So that's really interesting. So the personal practice of asking for something every day, I have not heard that, and I really like it. Email someone, call someone, text someone, and ask for whether it's something really small or something really big. So just flexing that muscle and using that muscle. Yeah. So I can even think about. Oh, I'm sorry, Julie. No, I just think about. I was sitting once with a CEO of a really huge nonprofit, and she had just had this brilliant idea about something they could do. And there was others in the room, her c suite, if you will. And she got done sharing her idea, and she looked at everybody and said, you know, well, what do you think? And most everybody was saying, yes, yes, yes, yes. That's great. That's great. And she got to me and she says, well, what do you think? And I said, you know, it really doesn't matter what I think. I think we need to find out what some of your donors and some of your supporters and some of your constituents think. We need to ask. We need to dig in and find out and test this idea. And I'm getting a little ahead of myself because that's part of how we practice outrageous kindness with the kind method. But you just have to be willing to say, maybe all the great ideas aren't inside your head, maybe all the ability to get done if you embrace, really embrace that mission. Here's what we know from years and decades of experience working with nonprofits, especially if you want your mission to really, and your purpose and your vision and all that really come to light, really come to fruition, the more people you have that are involved, that are connected, that are sharing, the more successful you're going to be. So the only way that's going to happen is by asking, by inviting people to be a part of what you're trying to accomplish. And that takes asking whether it's for money or time, or advice, or their networks, or their sharing of information, or just whatever they can bring to the table to help you make it happen. We can't assume that people are just going to choose us or pick us or find us by some miracle. We need to be much more proactive in going out and seeking what we need. And that's my theme for the year, being proactive. So let's dive into your signature framework. And my listeners know I love a framework. It's called the kind method. So before we dive into what it is, let's talk about how it came about. And what was the gap that you saw that the kind method fills? And, like, how do you use it with your clients? Sure. Absolutely. Well, you know, the kind method is based on years of experience working with people. But also, I had about a ten year gauntlet of loss and disease and all kinds of things that really forced me to get focused on the things that could be done to continue to have an impact in spite of all that was going on in my own life. So it's really a combination of my own personal journey and experiences working with organizations over many decades. Okay, and let's dive into it. So I know it's an acronym, K I n D. So let's. And we've added a second D. Yeah, so we've added a second D. So let me just. I thought that was a typo on my. No, on my part. Okay. No, no. So we'll talk about it a little bit. You know, so kind. So, to be outrageously kind, first you have to be willing to know more. And in this day and age, oh, that's so difficult because the algorithms of social media so limit your content. If you're not careful, you're only gonna be hearing voices and ideas and thoughts that already align with your own. And we see this in organizations all the time. And that gets back to that culture of assumptions. We build up this storyline of what's gonna happen before we even do it, or we build up a storyline about who will or will not support us without really looking at the data to support our assumptions. So knowing more, being open to knowing more, being open to other ideas, other voices, etcetera, the I in the kind method is impact. You've got to know what your intended impact is. What are you trying to accomplish? And I know for a lot of nonprofits, that's a challenge, really articulating your purpose and your case for support in a way that is unique and really gets to what you're going to do to accomplish your mission. So identifying that impact is so important. The end is navigating or normalizing change. The one thing that is constant in our world right now is change. And if you don't have processes and methods for dealing with disruptions and changes, I don't know about you, Julia, but anyone I talk to who runs a business, or a team, or an organization or volunteers, they know. Sometimes we don't even know who's showing up to work today and what's going to happen. And, you know, there's just so much disruption in people's lives. So you've got to be willing and able to navigate those things and normalize change in your processes and in your ability to get things done. And that gets us to the two d's, right? The big d is you've got to deliver. And that's getting back to my own ten year gauntlet of stuff. At the end of the day, no matter what was happening, I still wanted to get something done right. I still wanted to know there was something I did that was measurable and work towards the things I was trying to accomplish and that deliver. Again, getting back to the constant change in people's lives, there are so many reasons why individuals, teams, companies, why you can't get something done right. And you can just start litany of things. So delivering, actually getting it done right, really just distinguishes who you are, your nonprofit, and being able to talk about those things, being able to talk about what you've accomplished, so important. And then the second d, which is just at the heart of everything, and that is you have to dance, you have to enjoy it along the way, because work is hard, life is hard, lots of things going on. Find a way to enjoy it every day, if you can. I tell nonprofit professionals, especially if you wake up in the morning and you don't have a story in your heart that touches you, that ignites your passion about why you're doing what you're doing. You need to stop and remember that. Get that, call a colleague, call a friend, call a donor, call a volunteer, call somebody. Right. That can help you remember why you're doing what you're doing and celebrate that and dance along the way. So that's the kind method, no more. Identify your impact, navigate, normalize, change, deliver, and then dance along the way. Wow. I want to unpack each one of these, but k the know more. What are some strategies that you use personally? Because I know I fall into this trap as well. I'm sure a lot of us do. I read the same newsletters, I listen to the same news station. I now YouTube knows exactly the kind of content I want, TikTok all of my social media feeds. How do you break out of that bubble? What are some strategies we can use? Yeah, so I'll talk about it from an organizational perspective and then also from just a personal perspective as well. You know, from an organizational perspective, really being committed to looking at data I think is so important. That's the only, you know, thing that we can use to really, again, break down that culture of assumptions. So if you don't have a lot of data, if you don't have a lot of information about your organization and your impact and what you're doing, who your donors are, who your donors might be, surveys or so powerful, right. Using survey tools, interviewing people is another thing that is so important, finding third parties to partner with you, to talk to your constituents and get information and being committed to it. You know, I've worked with a lot of founders who start out thinking this is the solution, and by opening up their minds and inviting collaboration and other energies, that solution gets better, right? It gets stronger. So those are just some ways, right, that we find organizations can know more about what they're doing, but it's got to be a commitment to data, to metrics, right? To what are we measuring? That gets a little bit into the eye, the impact and the intentions. But, you know, having clear goals and measuring where you are with those will give you more knowledge about what's working and what's not. That can be coupled, of course, with conversations, you know, in my own. Just being curious. Yeah, I'm sorry, just being curious. Yeah, absolutely being curious. And some of it's too, within organizations, you know, really looking at how are meetings held? How do you really invite collaboration? How do you really invite, do you really invite input? Are you just trying to say you did so you can get it done and move on to the next thing. What are your board meetings like? You know, are they dog and pony shows, as a lot of them are, or are we really having conversations and are we really open to other ideas that board members have, or do we just kind of push them aside and say, oh, that's not going to work, you know, staff knows better, let's move on, you know, kind of thing. So you have to look at how are you running your meetings? How are you inviting engagement, and are you truly open to it? That is so important. Is it just performative, or is this a meeting that could have just been an agenda and a bunch of reports sent? Is it just reading from a report, or is it actually inviting collaboration and conversation? And I agree. I think that's really important for the first letter for Kay. So for I identifying impact, this is something, I think, that is incredibly challenging for nonprofits because I work with clients. I'm sure you do as well, where the vision is a world without homelessness, a world without poverty, a world without racism, a world without hunger, and then the mission is sort of their little corner of the world and how they're going to tackle that problem. So when we are identifying impact for ourselves, do you have any tips on how we can better do that and how we can better report out about our impact? Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, to your examples, it's that case for support. What are you trying to accomplish? You know, how are you going to accomplish it? Where does it start? Because otherwise, you know, we like to say a vision without that, a mission without that, it's just a hallucination, right? If you don't have some measurable targets and some sense of priority and strategic, you know, direction that you're going to report on and measure yourself against, it really is just, you know, a hallucination, if you will. So I think that's so important to really work at not only defining it, but building alignment around those things, you know, making sure everybody's on the same page. And that's where we see a lot of organizations get into trouble because they start chasing grant money, or maybe they have one person that's just really passionate about this, that or the other thing, and it diverts resources from the strategic priorities that are really going to move the needle. So it's not only defining it, but it's that alignment and getting everybody on the same page as it relates to what we're trying to accomplish, which becomes so important. N is something I believe and I know that all of us have had to do a lot of, in the last few years navigating change, especially in this, you know, post Covid or Covid adjacent world, post pandemic world. How have you seen nonprofits navigating change since COVID Like, what do we need to really be watching out for here? Yeah, well, that's a great, that's a great question. And I think one of the biggest things we have seen in this environment is just how easy it is for organizations to lose track of where they're trying to go and where they're trying to make their impact. And, you know, especially during COVID and anytime there's a big crisis or a big event, you know, we'll sometimes see organizations trying to align themselves with that thing instead of keeping to the core of who they are and what they're very best at, at that moment. So, you know, again, just that constant commitment to the impact you're trying to make. So important in terms of, you know, navigating and normalizing, you know, some of that does require different kinds of processes and practices. You know, doing a five year plan these days, not so sure. You know, that's necessarily something we can look at. I think in terms of, you know, just operations and infrastructure, it has become so vitally important that there's succession planning at organization, that there's redundancy of roles. Right. Because people are fluid. People's lives are fluid. Things change. You know, you've got to have that plan b, that plan c, that plan D. If somebody can't show up that day or, or whatever it is, there's just so much fluidity. You've got to make sure you're committed to that. And, you know, I think that's a real important role that boards of nonprofits need to play these days, is just really making sure the organization is thinking about succession no matter how small it is. Right? Who's next? What happens if this person or this group of people leave or can't work for a while? What happens? You know, so that's, that's a big piece of it. That case for support, staying consistent, making sure there's redundancy to your people, especially, especially your leaders, so important. And then thinking about, you know, regular meetings, regular review of where you are towards your goals, towards your impact statements. Right. And making adjustments as you need to. It's interesting how all of these really do go back to looking at your data and looking at your information, because in terms of navigating change, when I first heard you say that I thought of succession planning, I thought of the workforce turnover that's going to be happening in the next few years. But I also thought of the changing economic climate and how individual donations are down and donors are changing and different generations are changing. And how can you look at your donors and really evaluate where you are or think about what are some better ways that we can be retaining more of our donors or functioning in this climate that is so volatile? So I love navigate change. I'm going to use all of these, by the way, for myself, for my personal business. Now. D is the hardest one for me personally as myself as an entrepreneur, because I love the no more, oh, I will do research all day. I call it procrastile learning. I will like talk to clients all day, I will research, I will take webinars, I will read, I will share impact, I will look at what I'm doing, I will try to navigate the changes around me, the deliver. That's where the rubber meets the road. That's literally where we just have to put our boots on and go to work. So what is your advice for a really busy nonprofit director or maybe director of development that has 10,000 things on their plate? Like how do you find, how do you help them prioritize or what are some tips and advice you can give? Yeah, so I think I mentioned, you know, I've had some entrepreneurial experience and there's nothing like a startup, right, to just create 80,000 things to do in a day. Yes. So my practice has always been to really look at what are the three most important things I need to get done in a week. But even breaking it down, what are the three most important things I need to do today and making sure I tackle those first. I don't always get to all three. There's no way. Sometimes I only get half of one done, but at least I'm making progress on those things because there's so much change, because there's so much fluidity. Your day can get away from you in no time. You can go down a social media rabbit hole and come up 3 hours later and not know what happened. Right. You can get in a meeting and all of a sudden, you know, it's gotten really good, but it's gone way longer than expected. So trying to have a discipline around, you know, really prioritizing what are the most important things. And this gets back a little bit to that, asking for something every day. My father used to say to me all the time, you know, one of the tricks in life is pushing yourself to find the things that you are uniquely able and experienced and gifted to do and then building people. Building up people around you to help do the rest. I love it. Yeah. So to deliver, you know, you have to get in that habit of asking other people to do those other things. What are those other things that, you know, and I'm. I'm at a point in my life, in my career, I could delegate. D could be delegated, yes, delegate. That's another d. Right. We could add, but, you know, there's a lot of things I can do, but there are other people that can do those things so much better, which. Like your website. Yes. And beauty and passion that, you know, I need to find them and let them do that and value that and then dance with them, that they get it done so I can focus on the things that I can do really well and deliver on those. Absolutely. That's so funny you said that. Yeah, I know. I have a friend of mine who is a dear friend who runs an accounting firm. She is obsessed with, like, finding tax returns where no one else can find them and looking at excel spreadsheets and looking at your monthly expenses and do. She's just a brilliant mind with attention to detail, to numbers, and that is not one of my strengths. And I'm thinking, I would hate this if I woke up every morning and had to do this. But she absolutely loves it. Right. She thrives on it, and it's what she was clearly put on this earth to do. So I completely agree. I think we try to do all the things we should focus on, you know, our unique strengths and what we can bring to the work. So I do have one more question, and it sort of relates to the little d when you talk about dance, but I really believe in the power of listening, and I know you speak on the power of listening. So what is your advice for us? Like, living in this noisy, divisive, crowded world, like, how can we become better listeners? Hopefully dance with the. Dance with the work. Yeah. You know, it really starts with the belief that the person or the group you're listening to has value and has something to share. And we are so polarized in our society, so many encampments. Right. That we like to label people as this, that, or the other thing. And in doing so, we kind of belittle what their perspective might be. So, you know, I could give you a long list of. In fact, I tell people all the time, if you ever go on my social media and start looking at my contacts and my friends, you'd think, oh, my gosh, she's all over the map. I can't tell her political party, I can't tell her religious belief because she's got friends all over the place. And that's exactly it. You know, unless you're willing to really believe that everyone, right, no matter what their label, what label you've put them on, has something to add that's valuable, it's. You're not going to listen. You're not going to listen with true intent because you're going to assume, getting back to that culture of assumptions, that you're going to assume you already know what they're going to say, right. And you already are going to disagree with them, or you're already thinking about your arguments or your, you know, reasons why. And I think, you know, that has application to everyone everywhere, but particularly for fundraisers, you know, people who are out asking for money to support important causes, learning how to ask good questions, learning how to listen to those responses and really dig into those responses. So instead of sitting there and thinking about what you're going to say next, right. I like to think, what. What more do I want to ask about what they're saying? How do I want to better understand what they're saying? What is it within whatever they're sharing that I'm making assumptions about? I say this all the time. Words matter. And what a word means to me and what it means to you could be very different things. One of my favorite examples of that is the word fundraising. You know, when you say fundraising or a fundraising campaign for every person in the room, that's how many ideas you're going to have about what that means and what you should do with it. So making sure you really understand what people mean when they use certain words, you know, and being willing to take the time to do that, it takes time to really listen and to really understand. Wow, I love that. That's such wisdom. And really helpful. Especially, you know, we are recording this. It's an election year, and I think tensions are especially high. But also, for nonprofits trying to get heard amongst all of the noise, maybe it's better to sit back a little bit and listen and take that perspective first before kind of jumping in the fray. So that's so helpful. Now, Christina, where can people find more about you, learn more about how to work with you, connect with you? Yeah, absolutely. So I'm so excited. Our website, outrageous kindness.com, is getting ready to launch. So within the next couple weeks, we're gonna have that up and running people can. It will be ready for my listeners. It will definitely. If it's in two weeks, it will be ready by the time this is live. Outrageous. Outrageouskindness.com. and that'll take them to my LinkedIn page. My work with nonprofits is with my the company I'm partnered with, Carter Global. So that website is Carter Global. Love people to connect there. We do work with nonprofits in the area of fundraising, organizational and strategic planning, and governance, of course. Fantastic. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate you being here, telling us about the kind method, and let's all go and spread some outrageous kindness into the world. Absolutely. Julia, thank you for having me on your podcast. Well, hey there. I wanted to say thank you for tuning into my show and for listening all the way to the end. If you really enjoyed today's conversation, make sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast app and you'll get new episodes downloaded as soon as they come out. I would love if you left me a rating or a review, because this tells other people that my podcast is worth listening to, and then me and my guests can reach even more earbuds and create even more impact. So that's pretty much it. I'll be back soon with a brand new episode, but until then, you can find me on Instagram. Uliacambel 77 keep changing the world, you nonprofit unicorn.