Episode 111: Funders Follow Street Signs: What are your Coordinates?
Funders don't know you from eve. All they know is what you show them. Words have meaning to the IRS. What are your coordinates? What street will your sign lead funders to? Stop making stuff up. It hurts you in the end. Learn what your lack of knowledge could be doing to your ability to generate revenue and how to change directions so that you lead funders to an organization ready to receive funding.
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🔦 NONPROFIT SPOTLIGHT 🙌🏿
Compton Girls Club Pt. 3
👉🏿https://comptongirls.club/
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🚀 RESOURCES TO HELP YOU RUN A SUCCESSFUL NONPROFIT
How to Price Event Tickets for Profit https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AMsBHQgkIzNsAa9cj3ZU030Yw4r7zJTP/view?usp=drive_link
90 Days to a Profitable Nonprofit https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ofgeHJ2CTVS0t8STMiNqfveaVpWfaK7o/view?usp=sharing
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Podcast Transcript
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to On Air with Amber Wynn, where nonprofit leaders learn 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 (00:20):
Welcome to On Air with Amber Wynn. I'm so excited to be in your space today because today we're talking about how funders look at you. The name of the episode specifically is Funders Follow Street Signs. What are your Coordinates? I chose that topic because a lot of times nonprofit leaders will make stuff up, titles, the names of their organizations, not really understanding that those things are important because they tie to something they mean something. So when I say funders follow street signs, it's like if you're trying to get to a location, you're going to look at the street signs to see which way you're going to go. And so funders follow those. They're like little breadcrumbs and those street signs say something. If you're trying to go east or if you're trying to go west, you're going to look at the street sign to know which direction you're going in.
(01:30):
And here's the thing, as the nonprofit, you determine that you are the one sending out the signals to the funders that says, this is who I am. And who you are either is going to align with what it is they're trying to fund or it's not. Either way, you are in the driver's seat and that's a good thing because if you are in the driver's seat, if you make the wrong turn, you can recalibrate. Y'all know how the GPS works. So when we come back, we are going to talk about funders and how they follow the street signs and your coordinates when we come back.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
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Speaker 2 (02:34):
Welcome back. You're on air with Amber Wynn, and today we are talking about how funders look at your organization and it's called Funders Follow Street Signs. What are your coordinates? And when I mean by coordinates, where are you? Right? Are you on the west side? Are you on the east side? And it's important to understand because here's the thing, you put out what your organization is. What do I mean by that? When you start your nonprofit, you create a name. So you may say it is the Amber Wynn Foundation. In the nonprofit sector, terms have meanings. In the Nonprofit Sector Foundation is typically a grant making entity. So if you start the Wynn foundation, funders are going to look at you as if, oh, okay, so you're giving out and you're like, no, no, no, no, I want grants. So when we talk about coordinates, you have now pointed to a part of a community that is a grant making or if you say, oh, it is the Black Women's Initiative.
(03:49):
Funders don't want to fund initiatives. They want to fund organizations. So if the name of your organization has that, it's an initiative, then they may overlook you because an initiative is a focus. You can have a voter initiative, you can have a diabetes initiative. It is a focus. It is a span of time that you focus on a topic. So you don't want to name your organization an initiative. Likewise, you don't want to name it a project. Funders want to fund an organization, so you may want to name it. I mean, you may have the idea of naming it the Girl Empowerment Initiative. And again, it is the initiative, but this is what you have incorporated your organization as you've incorporated it as a project, the hip hop project or the Girl Empowerment initiative. You may be doing your organization a disservice by creating those coordinates that says, oh, I'm just an initiative, or Oh, I'm just a project.
(05:03):
When in fact you plan on having an organization that's going to last a long time. So think into the future, but most importantly, understand that what you call your organization is tied to something I have people said all the time. Yeah, well, that's what I incorporated in. The reality is if your organization now that does not represent a program, all you have to do is file an amendment. And in the amendments you can say, we were not aware that this word meant this. And so we want to rename the organization so that it is better in alignment with our mission and who we serve and things of that nature. But if you're just thinking about starting your nonprofit, I just want to encourage you to be very intentional about the words that you use in your name because they mean things. So if a funder's looking at your organization and you've entitled it an initiative, then that's what they think.
(06:10):
You are an initiative and not necessarily a program and am bringing this up because I have people push back, but we that I understand that, but when there are more applicants than there is money, funders are not going to take the time to get to know you, to know that it's more than initiative. Well, that's how it started off. Okay, got it. It started off as initiative, but now when you file for your articles, incorporation make it a program. Another one that's becoming very popular is collective. We're a collective and a collective tends to be a whole bunch of organizations that share the same mission. So they come together and everybody has the same amount of resources and they're coming together because they have this shared mission to, but as a collective, it's flat. And that's why a lot of organizations like it. Well, we're a collective.
(07:09):
There is no one person in charge. That's fine until it's time to submit a grant because who is in charge? If I am writing this grant or this check to someone, who am I writing it to? And if there's an issue, who am I reaching out to? You have seven co-directors because it is a collective. So when I tell you that funders follow street signs, what are your coordinates? Where are you leading your funder to? Because if it's not that two story house with three bedrooms in a bathroom, then they're not interested. They're not interested in a bungalow. So it's really, really important. A lot of my nonprofits have issues and they don't understand why. It's because you don't even make it past the eligibility criteria. When I say I want an organization and you submit and you are a project or your initiative because it says it in your name, I'm going to automatically move you to that no pile.
(08:10):
I'm going to move you to that no pile because I know what I want. I want an organization. I don't want an initiative, I don't want a project. I want something that reflects long-term commitment into the community, and that's an organization. So I just wanted to share that with you because a lot of times we start, we think the program is sexy, the program title is sexy, it represents where we are versus you looking into the future into where you want to be. So if you want to eliminate one of those red flags, if you want to make sure that you're on that other side of the eligibility criteria, just really think about things like that because in the nonprofit sector, words have meaning a foundation especially, it's usually associated with a family foundation who is a grant making entity. So just be careful about that.
(09:05):
If you're not sure about names and if you're not sure about what a funder expects, no worries. I got you. I have curated a roadmap specifically for a nonprofit founders and executive directors who have the best intentions, who have the best hearts, but they just don't know how to run a nonprofit. This is how you're going to get to your success is by understanding all of those little nuances, especially for those individuals who come from corporate. Yes, you have business experience, but the nonprofit sector is a different beast. So I'm going to encourage you to really spend time learning how to run a nonprofit and if you have no idea, if you're overwhelmed about how to do it, when to do it, I got you. Let's take a look at 90 days to a Profitable nonprofit. Are you struggling to fund your programs? Can't get a grant to save your life?
(10:05):
Most consultants will share the what of how to start a nonprofit or how to fundraise. They may even share the why, but they don't share the how because that's where they make their money. Now, I'm not hating. I'm a businesswoman too, but I've been where you are trying to make the world a better place, struggling to keep the doors open up to the wee hours of the night writing grants and doing whatever needed to be done. And because I've walked in your shoes, I'm not here to make you spend your will, waste your time or your hard earned money. We ain't got time for that. The world needs you. I'm here to show you how to transform that pit. You keep dumping your hard earned money into a profitable nonprofit. I take my 30 years of nonprofit experience as a founder, executive director, program developer, grant writer in funder, giving out over $7 million annually in grants, and I save you literally thousands of dollars in hundreds of hours.
(11:06):
I walk you through setting up your nonprofit organization so that you can be generating enough revenue to cover your monthly expenses in just 90 days. How would that feel? Not paying bills from your personal bank account. I share my insider secret tips, tricks of the trade and provide you with a step-by-step roadmap on how to turn your bootstrap organization into a profitable nonprofit. Within six months, you could be generating enough revenue to pay your salary or fully fund your programs. The choice is yours, but you have to get the blueprint, and it took me three years to develop it, but it's here and it's going to change your life. Join my other successful clients who are just like you full of passion and determination, but they had no idea all that it takes to run and fund a successful nonprofit. Now they're winning grants and drawing a salary and they know what it is that they're supposed to be doing to run a successful nonprofit.
(12:07):
They're no longer making it up as they go. They have the roadmap and they're clear about next steps, and I want that for you too. So what do you get in this course? You'll walk away with knowledge, products, processes and systems, not just a bunch of promises, but exactly what you need to turn your organization into a profitable nonprofit. I promise you don't need grants. What you need is a solid infrastructure, and this course is going to give you all of that and more. And what's more it comes with the money back guarantee. So go ahead, click the link below to register for this course. Welcome back to On Air with Amber Wynn. You're here with your girl and Philanthrepreneur, Amber Wynn, and today we've been talking about your coordinates, meaning what is it that the title of your organization says about your organization to funders when there are more applicants than there is money.
(13:08):
You want to do your very best to make sure you make it past the eligibility screening and how you represent your organization is important. Are you an initiative? Are you a project? Are you a collective? So just wanted you to be somewhat thoughtful about that. Now we've come to the portion of the episode where you get to ask me your questions. You can reach out to me on any of my socials. You can email me at amber@amberwynn.net to get your questions answered. Today's question comes from Angie Angie from Boyle Heights, and she hit me up on Instagram. Here's her question. My board president has a nasty habit of giving my staff assignments. It's annoying and undermines me as the executive director. When I approached him about it, he said as the president, he had the authority to speak to staff as he saw fit. After all, he is my supervisor.
(14:09):
It creates so much chaos in the organization because I'll ask my staff to do something, but they'll say, I can't because the president has asked me to do this thing. What can I do? Okay, Angie, in normal circumstances, I would say pull out your job descriptions and show your board that his duties are very specific in the job description. In the summary, it should say that the board's responsibility is oversight, oversight of the organization and to support the executive director. That should be sufficient to say, because in your job description it should say that the executive director is responsible for operations in the day-to-day. So that's a clear delineation, but given the response of your president, I would say to invite a reputable nonprofit consultant to come in because obviously there are some dynamics there with authority and power. So to have an objective and make sure that this person is seasoned right to come in and do a training and not specifically a training for the president, but a board training.
(15:33):
You want to have a conversation with the consultant to let them know which issues you're dealing with so that they can tackle it in that training. That's how I would approach it. If an executive director reached out to me, I would say, okay, what we're going to do is we're going to have board training. We'll say that it is about roles and responsibilities or strategic planning, and I would include in that training, okay, we're going to just cover the roles and responsibilities, the difference between the governing entity and the day-to-day team, the operations team, and I would and your professional should point out, okay, it is the board's responsibility to oversee the executive director. There's a clear delineation as the board, you should not be talking to staff. You should not be giving them assignments that is overstepping your boundaries. And I would say that, I would say that is the executive director's responsibility.
(16:36):
And you stepping over that line creates confusion. And your job description says here that you're responsible for oversight. Now, the only time that a staff member really should be talking to the board is if they're invited to the board meetings or if for example, you don't have an HR department and the executive director is doing something egregious, then they have the right to then report that to the board because there's no entity there like human resources to address that complaint. Otherwise, the chain of command is that the staff member is going to take their directions from the executive director and that needs to be made clear. So in normal circumstances, I would just say pull out the job description, but I think there needs to be some type of reset. So I would recommend that you bring in a consultant to do that reset for you.
(17:33):
All right. Again, if any of you have any questions that you'd like for me to answer, feel free to hit me up on my socials and I'll be sure to answer your questions on air. Now we're going to move to my favorite time of the episode where I get to shine the light on my amazing nonprofit leaders. I've expanded to include those individuals who support our nonprofit leaders. I've done several of these interviews, so be sure to visit my YouTube channel where you can take a look at the full episodes in their entirety. This week we are on part three with Compton's Girl Club and we're talking to the executive director, Chrystani Heinrich, and she's talking about all of the work that she's doing in the organization. So let's pause and look at session three of Compton Girls Club.
Speaker 4 (18:39):
So with Compton Girls Club, we're not just girl open to just girls. We're girls and gender nonconforming folks. And when I was in high school, it wasn't programs like that for us in the hood. I went to Crenshaw, I was in the hood, but parents weren't having it. If you were too different or if something was odd, it was never a safe space for kids to just show up as themselves and be just themselves. And so I think our classes are a lot different because we do open ourselves up to different types of folks. We do provide classes that are beyond just cheerleading, dance, and sports. We're offering things that kids in neighborhoods that don't look like ours are doing, and we're making sure they have the best. We're not giving you raggedy laptops if we're doing a computer class, we're buying you a brand new Mac and we're learning on that because that's the industry standard. We don't need you to have perfect grade. We don't need you to be student of the month. We just need you to show up and be willing to learn something for a couple of hours, something new that you may have never had access to.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
Welcome back to On Air with Amber Wynn. We've been talking about funders, how funders follow street signs and what is exactly is your sign saying to the funder? Be sure to take a look at your title, making sure that it aligns with just the nomenclature of the sector. Also, if you'd like to be featured in one of my nonprofit spotlights, like our current nonprofit Compton Girls Club, hit me up on one of my socials. I'd be ecstatically happy, to feature you on my nonprofit spotlight. If you also support nonprofits, if you have a consulting service, if you are a grant writer, if you are an accountant and you support nonprofits, I'd like to feature you as well. My goal is to make sure that our community is best supported, so this is how I'm able to give back. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for spending time with me today. If you enjoyed today's topic, be sure to share it with your community. Be sure to like and subscribe. And until next week, be sure to take care of yourself, like you take care of your community. See you next time.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
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.
