Episode 15: Strengthening Your Nonprofit: Minding the Gap, Coaching for Success
Did you start your nonprofit with passion, not realizing all the things you didn’t know you needed to know about nonprofits? Quickly close that gap by leveraging the knowledge and skills of a coach who can save you wasted hours and time by helping you create a clear path toward success.
LINKS
SmallBizPro
Nonprofit Elite
Link to Sunni’s website: Cassava Coaching
NONPROFIT SPOTLIGHT: The Giving Spirit
Podcast Transcript
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Welcome to On Air with Amber Wynn, where nonprofit leaders learned to fuse passion and commitment with proven business strategies to create long-term funding, impact, and sustainability. And now here's your host and resident Philanthrepreneur, Amber Wynn.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Hello fam, it's Amber Wynn, your resident Philanthrepreneur, and you're On Air with Amber. And today I'm excited because we just wrapped up our whole series on the Nonprofit Success Path. And now we're gonna start moving into specific topics. And I'm excited to have in studio today DeBorah Smith, known to all who know and love her as Sunni because she brings sunshine into any space that she walks into. So I'm told. <laugh> And today's topic is called Minding the Gap, Coaching for Success. And I decided to start talking about coaching because especially in this space, we have people who are well-intentioned who love their communities and start nonprofits without any experience, without any knowledge. And sometimes you can help mine that gap between what you don't know and what you should know with a little help from your friends. And coaching, for me personally, has exponentially helped me to scale my business.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
And remember, a nonprofit is a business. It's just a business with a philanthropic purpose. And so I wanted to share just a little bit of my journey because even though I'm a for-profit, running a business is different than knowing nonprofit. I know nonprofit management like the back of my hand. I go to bed, wake up in the morning thinking about nonprofits, and it's what I do. But running a business is totally different than what I know and what I do. And a lot of the times, that's the same situation for nonprofit funders. You may know how to teach etiquette, you may know how to teach people how to be engineers or whatever, but running a nonprofit, running a business is a whole lot different. So for me, it was extremely important that I got some help because I was struggling and I'm Type A and I'm an overachiever, and I wasn't getting to the place where I wanted to get.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
I was frustrated and I started to question myself, and I started looking for someone who can help me, someone who's been through the process, someone who has the talent, the knowledge, and the skills to say, Amber, you're going in the wrong direction. Or, Amber have you thought about this? Or Amber, try this. Now, there's a difference between a coach and a consultant. The type of coach that I had was actually a consultant. She was a person who had been down the path that I'd been through. But having worked with Sunni, I can tell you that there are a lot of benefits of being with the coach, especially in the nonprofit sector because and she'll explain this a little bit later, you have the opportunity to grow, right? And as a nonprofit leader, that's important. Grow in confidence, grow in skills, but really just grow. So when we come back, because you know how we do, we have a sponsor, when we come back, we're gonna jump into the fastest way to scale and minding the gap. So we'll be right back.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
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Speaker 3 (04:14):
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Speaker 2 (05:00):
Welcome back. You're on air with Amber, your resident Philanthrepreneur. In today's episode, we are talking about Minding the Gap, Coaching for Success, and we have in studio with us today, Sunni Smith, Coach extraordinaire. I'm so excited to have her with us here. And for those of you just joining, we're talking about really understanding how to scale your business cuz a nonprofit is a business. Starting a business is different than clocking a nine to five. And when you clock a nine to five, the infrastructure's already there for you. But when you start a business, when you start your organization, there's so many things that you need to consider. So many things that you need to do. There's so many things that you don't know, that you don't know. And having a coach to help get you through that process is something that I personally have found to be of an extreme value.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
And it's helped me to scale. It's helped me to save money. And I'm gonna tell you a coach is not cheap. But when I look at all of the things that I was doing, starting stopping, starting stopping, starting stopping, I actually saved a lot of money because it became this straight road. And it helped save time because I was starting stopping, starting stopping, and then I just got frustrated. But what my coach was able to do was to help me stay on point and stay on track. So I'd like to introduce to you guys, Sunni Smith, welcome to the studio. Thanks so much for having me, Amber. Yes. Yes. And so we're gonna jump right in. Before we get started, can you share with us the difference between what a coach is, what a consultant is, and maybe even what a mentor is? Yeah, that's very helpful because a lot of people do get very confused about those terms and they use them interchangeably.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
I think they do intersect <affirmative>, but that doesn't mean that they convey or they mean the same thing. I love your analogy or your metaphor about minding the gap because coaching, first of all, in very simple terms means move; helping someone get from point A to point B. Like you think of the old fashioned coach with the horses and the stage coach <laugh>. Well, that coach may run into roadblocks, gaps, rivers. How are you going to stay on course and get to your final destination? Well, that's what a coach is for. That person supports you side by side, you co-create, co-discover, and helps you get from point A to point B in very simple terms. Okay. Now a mentor partly comes from the concept of apprenticeship. When you have a mentor, it is someone who specifically has been through what you've gone through and can tell you at least in terms of their area.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Let's say you are starting a, and I hate the word nonprofit, I call it a for purpose. That's right. Business. As you said, it's a business, but it's not that you can't make a profit, but let's say someone has a housing non-profit that provides homes or spaces to live. And for people who are, what is, it's not called homeless anymore, unhoused, unhoused or housing deficient or whatever. That person could be a mentor to you because they've been in the system, they've done it, they have seen the ins and outs, they know the context, they can help you with networking, et cetera. Now, coach can do that too, <affirmative>, but that's not the primary purpose of a coach, nor is it the primary purpose of that coach to tell you what to do. A coach brings out in you and empowers you to get to point B without telling you, you must do this.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
This is the way you've gotta go and making decisions for you. Because what happens when that coach is gone? If the consultant is gone, you become dependent on someone telling you what to do. In this way, you're growing and you're learning, and you're expanding and developing all the time. And that focuses on what I do most of the time, which is leadership in executive coaching, <affirmative>, people who are leaders in positions, and sometimes they don't even know they're leaders and they are. So it's gaining those skills, knowing how to apply them, finding within yourself the strength, the confidence, and the focus to actually move yourself forward. It builds you in a capacity way that I don't think consulting does all the time. Now, that's interesting because I am a consultant, and you're absolutely right. I come in, I assess the situation, and I provide results.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
For example, if you're a nonprofit leader, I look at where your gaps are. If you don't have a clear concise mission, if you don't have an annual budget, I come in and I say, This is what you need to do. Give me these three things so that I can help you create this package. And now you have it. But that's all you get. Right? But we've worked together of course, and I've done consulting too, Amber. So in your example that you just gave a person may have really had a problem with numbers and have a fear or a hesitancy in dealing with budgets. <affirmative> And that's not something they're comfortable really talking about. Well, with a coach, you can explore what that's based in and what's the fear. And they in a confidential way, can actually share what it is that's bothering them. The other part of it is they may have other pressures going on <affirmative>.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
It may not be their lack of skill around mathematics or numbers, but it may be that they have other pressures involved with their business or working with certain people, working with an accountant. The accountant doesn't communicate well with them. Got it. This is something that they can bring to a coaching session and the coach can support them in finding ways to communicate better, to make sure even that they decide to fire that accountant, find another one, right? Maybe they're a little bit timid about doing that. So the coach is there to support, not necessarily in conflict with the consultant, The consultants on time. They know that you need to do A, B, C, and D, but getting there sometimes isn't as easy as it seems. The other thing, sometimes coaches are just there to listen. You know, don't wanna bring your frustrations home to your partner or your family.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
The coach is there to hear and to listen to you, just sometimes express your frustration, right? Other people, your family and friends may wanna solve your problem. Yeah. Well, the coach is not there to solve. The coach is there to hear and to really help you sort through whatever is the challenge that you're facing. That's very interesting. And I think in the nonprofit sector, and you can attest to this because you have worked in this space, a lot of times the nonprofit leader holds the world on their shoulders. Absolutely. And I know being a consultant had plenty of people want to unload, and that's not my area <laugh>, but I get it. It's because you're doing everything, especially in the early stages when you may not have a Board who can co-create and partner with you. And just to have someone there to probably help direct you and like you said, give you that confidence.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
As I stated earlier, you may be excellent in teaching someone etiquette or teaching some tutoring or whatever, but not necessarily have that confidence in running a business. Now, I will tell you, I didn't know what I didn't know, and running a business is a beast, but my personality is such that you are not gonna break me <affirmative>. But I also invest in my business. I also believe that in order for me to get somewhere, if I don't know I'm, I'm gonna pay a coach because I know the value and I know it's gonna get me somewhere that's I'm supposed to be. So, can you talk to us a little bit about where you see a Founder, an Executive Director, a small business could benefit from coaching? Well, I tell you, one of the things I started to mention in the beginning is that a lot of my coaching focus, and there are lots of different kind of coaches, they're relationship coaches, there are career coaches, there are career transition coaches.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
So you have to really decide what kind of coaching you need or you want. But I often encounter individuals, especially creative people, <affirmative> as I said, who don't know that they are leaders. And I call these the accidental CEOs. They come into a situation where they are so talented that their career starts to take off <affirmative>, which means they have to employ a lot of people, even in a nonprofit situation, eventually a part-time virtual assistant, someone to do research for you, write grants, et cetera, et cetera. Right. So you immediately step into this role of supervising people and talking to people, having conversations, and they're not ready for it. And I think that's where a coach can really help in that sense, because that accidental CEO also has to take on the business of their talent. Do you understand? Yeah. I've even talked to musicians and what they're about is that music <laugh>, which is wonderful.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
But they also, if they decide they don't wanna perform, that means a ripple effect happens. Producers are in the same way. If you're not in that studio, what happens? There are a lot of people depending on you. And that's a lot of pressure. So having a coach to talk to, to sort things out, to say, I really don't wanna go on stage. I mean today is not it, I can't handle it. And work through that, help that person set up boundaries. Also, as I said before, managers, attorneys, all that kind of thing. Sometimes they're not giving you what you want. <affirmative>, a consultant may not. How do you fire that person? How do you let them go without the acrimony? And it's a really difficult thing when you get in that position to have to cut off somebody else's income. I mean, it's just literally right that or your family suddenly wants to get part of your career <laugh>, and you wanna set up a nonprofit to help them stay out of your main business, which is your talent; whether you're a dancer or a musician or an actor. So I work with people around those issues too. Well, I have a background in the law and also in counseling. So a lot of that helps me understand the different roles that people take in someone's career and supporting them and what they should and should not be doing. Right. So for those of you just joining us, we're talking with Sunni Smith about Minding the Gap in coaching. And we're gonna pause now for another sponsor break. But when we come back we are going to finish our conversation about coaching.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
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Speaker 2 (17:51):
Welcome back. You're On Air with Amber Wynn, your resident philanthreprenuer, and today we are talking about Minding the Gap, Coaching for success. In studio with me is Sunni Smith, and we are just really excited to be able to share resources for nonprofit leaders, small business leaders, anybody who is in a leadership position, and you may feel stuck or you may feel hesitant, or you may feel unsure. And how a coach can help get you from point A to point B, helping you mind that gap, that space where you're not quite sure how to do what it is that you aren't sure what you need to do. This is the point in our session when you, our listener, gets to ask a question. And the question for today is, how do I find a coach? So we're gonna ask the expert. Sunni, how are listeners in the nonprofit sector or small business or whatever, how would you go about finding a coach?
Speaker 2 (18:59):
Okay, one of the things I wanna mention is that coaching's a fairly new concept. I mean you know about coaches who coach sports, football, right? Soccer or whatever. Sometimes people know about voice coaches, for instance, <affirmative> and actors use coaches. <affirmative> This is a little bit of a different kind of coach, this coaching profession. I didn't know much about it myself 20 years ago and had to discover. But there is as I said, a lot of different kinds of coaches. Life coaches, I've heard of life coaches a lot. Yes. Regardless of what kind of coach you're looking for, I think you need to start by making sure that they have had some official coach training. Anybody could hang their shingle out and say, I'm a coach, but just like, you know, can't say I'm a doctor or I'm a lawyer without. And the profession is moving towards that kind of accreditation.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
So you can find coaches who have gone through specific coach training and one of the big organizations in the United States is called the ICF, okay. The International Coach Federation, they have a website. You can go on there and look up coaches in your area. And the ones that have been certified, they have three levels and ACC professional coaches, a PCC, and then a Master coach. So you'll see MCC. So if you're getting a coach, at least you know that they've gone through some basic fundamental training and been accredited. There are other organizations internationally too. One is in Europe and that's the EMCC. But I would really recommend that that's where you start. Or even if you know of a coach, ask them where they receive their training and are they certified as a coach. So that's a really initial protection I think that you need. The other thing is see if you can find a coach, call them up.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
If they can't work with you, ask them to recommend someone else. <affirmative>. So again, you and I know that there are people who specialize in nonprofit or for purpose organizations and coaches that focus on that. We both taught in a graduate program in nonprofit management. So we have a really good background in it. So really ask those questions, look at their resume, go to their website, et cetera, and really check it out, get some references, ask them to give you a couple of people that they've coached. Some coaching sessions last at least a minimum of three months. <affirmative> Some can last for years. They're long term. I have a client I've been coaching for four years. Oh wow. But it's not a dependent situation. During that four years, she's had three different jobs, <laugh>, and she's had four different promotions. So we've coached with her through those transitions and transformations.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Got it, Got it. All right. So I think it's important for me just to point out that again, coaching's not cheap. It's not cheap. But as a nonprofit leader, as a business owner, it is important that you invest in your business. It's important that you invest in yourself as a leader. Because when you have the tools and the skills, when you have the infrastructure, that means that your business is gonna be successful. I believe in investing in me, cuz I'm worth it. And my goal is to make my life easier. So if there's someone out there who can help make my life easier, who can help me to streamline processes, who can help me to get out of my way. Sometimes being type A isn't all good. We are people who get things done, but I have a tendency to kind of steamroll people that's not always good <laugh>.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
And so having a coach or having someone there to say, Okay, Amber, if you really want consensus, if you really wanna, those things are helpful. So I think it's important just for you as a nonprofit leader to determine where it is you want to take your organization. But it's also important to understand that it's not gonna come easy. Running a nonprofit, a for purpose business requires time, energy work, but it also requires financial investment, would you say? Absolutely. Time is money. <laugh> That part. So, this is the time in our episode when I do what I love to do best, which is to spotlight a nonprofit. As I've said before, nonprofits are in the weeds doing the work, grinding, and a lot of time they don't come up. And you need to come up and you need to toot your horn a little bit so that number one, your clients can find you. Number two, Funders can find you. Number three, Collaborators can find you. So today's nonprofit spotlight is The Giving Spirit.
Speaker 5 (24:02):
We have a motto. We give someone everything that we'll take for them to survive where they stand. There's a tremendous amount of people and families and children and moms with babies out there that have no place to go. And so survival to us meant more than just food and a blanket. It meant to give someone hope that they could then take the next step for someone to consider themselves worthy of care. They need to have things that are beyond just food and warmth. They need to have toiletries and hygiene products to feel like they're presentable. Even for an interview, for a shelter, let alone a job. The kit is just a bridge or a conduit for true random acts of kindness. Yes, but also for true education and for bringing both the homeless back into the boat with us in terms of humanity, but also extending ourselves to understand the plight of a lot of these folks is not what it might seem to us. When they start having a conversation with us and opening up to us, it's like watching snow melt off a beautiful tree that's been covered with snow for so long. And sometimes it'll take your breath away when you understand their life story.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
So, if you'd like to contribute or you'd like to volunteer, The Giving Spirit nonprofit collects over 70 individual items to provide sustenance to people who are challenged in their situation. So if you'd like to check them out, go to their website thegivingspirit.org, or you can email them at info@thegivingspirit.org or give them a call at (310) 943-6460. So today's episode has been about Minding the Gap, Coaching for Success, and my very first in studio guest is Sunni Smith, Coach Extraordinaire. And she's been sharing with us a lot of information about the value of a coach and the difference between a consultant and a mentor and a coach. Is there anything that you'd like to share with our guests about coaching? Something that I didn't think to ask you <laugh>? Well, one of the things I think that's important for people and especially sometimes communities of color, is that there's a resistance to thinking that you're going into therapy.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
And coaching is not therapy. I have been a counselor and coaching is very future focused. It is not focused on the problems you had in the past or your relationship with your mother or your sister. Well no, I'm not putting that down. I know, I know, I know. I mean because mental health is something that's really important. It's real. But coaching is very current and future focused. A coach may ask you some questions about where this attitude came from or your idea about something, but it's all about moving you forward. Got it. So sometimes just that dispels this idea of something's wrong with you. You’re broken. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So that's one of the things I really wanna put out there that for me as a coach, one of the greatest things is having a session with someone and at the end them saying, Wow, that was really helpful <laugh>.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
And that does happen for me frequently, and it's what I keeps my engine going and keeps fueling what I do on a daily basis. So look for someone who you connect with. There are coaches of color, there are certainly women coaches, male coaches. You might wanna find someone who really you click with. In the beginning you can have what's called a Chemistry Call or a Chemistry Zoom Call. So you can get to see that person, kind of get a feeling for how they coach, what their style is like, and whether you can connect with them. And sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. So don't be afraid to say I'm not comfortable or why you're not comfortable. Again, this is a very confidential, I wanna emphasize that, relationship. And a coach does not go out and tell anybody what you said, even if it's an employer <affirmative> about what happened in the coaching session.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Cuz I've been hired by employers to coach specific people in leadership or in executive positions and what goes on between me and that client is totally confidential. I will tell often the employer, there's progress being made and I feel like the person is moving towards assuming more comfort level with dealing with employees or whatever the challenge was, but not anything that goes on in that. That's one of the tenants of a certified coach. Certified. They have ethical standards that they must maintain. So please look for that. They shouldn't be romantically involved with a client. All these other kinds of things, which most professions have <affirmative> ethical standards, but you will find people who go outside of them. But you need someone who really is in your corner supporting you, walking with you, hopefully shoulder to shoulder, getting you from point A to point B. Well, Sunni, why don't you share with my listeners your contact information, the name of your business and where they can contact you?
Speaker 2 (29:36):
Well, it's cassavacoaching.com. <affirmative>. And so Cassava Coaching is the name of my business. And I can tell you that the name cassava came from a personal connection with my Caribbean roots and it represents, it symbolically represents, total utility. And cassava is a plant and something that can be used for food, for all kinds of things, right? Yeah. So that's where it came to me. It was my father's favorite dish. So that was helpful. My telephone number from my office is (323) 999-4842. And then also my website is www.cassavacoaching.com. All right, so for those of you who are interested in coaching. You have a budget for coaching. <laugh> You want to mind that gap. Fill that gap with someone who can help steer you and guide you. Don't be afraid to do the research to find a coach that is good for you.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
It may, may not be Sunni. Yes, that's true. And one of the things people need to realize is that if you're in an employment situation, often if you're an executive or manager position, your employer will pay for the coaching. So you mentioned if you have the money for it, often I have many clients that it's part of their negotiation when they took the job and it's part of their professional development that comes out of that budget. Nice. That's good to know. All right, so that's all for today. I'd like to thank my in studio guest, Sunni Smith, for joining us. Thank you. And I will see you in our next episode. Remember, at the end of the day, you are the foundation of your organization, so you have to take care of you. I'm gonna be here to support you. I'm going to be here to give you the resources, but you have to take ownership of your constitution. You have to take ownership of your business. So just think about that and think about why you want to invest in you and why you want to invest in your business. Because if you invest in you, you're gonna be stronger. If you invest in your business, then it's gonna grow. And at the end of the day, we know that the world needs nonprofits. So let's hang in there, you guys. I got you. I got your back. I'm your girl. Thank you for spending time with me. Thank you, Sunni. Thank you, Amber.
Speaker 1 (32:06):
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe and leave a review on iTunes. Head over to www.amberwynn.net/podcast for the links and resources mentioned in today's podcast. See you next time.
