Some interview questions to get at the important stuff:
“What grounds you?”
“What are you best at?”
“Tell me about at time you changed someone’s mind.”
“At your core, what makes you tick?”
“What does generosity mean to you?”
Degrees and smarts are nice, but they’re almost easy to come by. Being the kind of person who drives and leads (no matter what your job title) is much more compelling.
A long time ago, I decided to take some time off from school to go live in Spain. I dutifully bought a copy of “Spanish in 15 Minutes a Day” and had worked my way through the first chapter when I found myself on a bus in Boston, returning from a school where I volunteered once a week.
Two guys sitting a few rows behind me having a conversation in Spanish. I strained to understand, and quickly became frustrated that I could barely catch two words of what they were saying.
This of course made no sense at all. I hadn’t (yet) actually done the work of learning to speak Spanish, I’d just decided that I was going to learn the language, yet there I was beating myself up for not understanding these guys.
It’s tempting when we find ourselves in new situations – new countries, new jobs, among a new peer set or just at a cocktail party or a conference where we don’t feel comfortable – to beat ourselves up for not being more…something (connected, outgoing, fluent, knowledgeable of local customs). It’s tempting to forget that we are who we are – nothing more, nothing less.
The point of the new situation is that it’s new, that we don’t yet have what it takes to be the best at this new thing – and that’s why we’re there. The only positive response to that feeling of discomfort, of inadequacy, is to decide to put in the time it takes to get better.
Sin eso, nunca aprendemos a hacerlo mejor.
How’s this for an idea: creating a film school in the heart of the Kibera slum.
How’s this for a first impression: drive down a narrow dirt alley, pull the parking break, open the iron gate and duck through the narrow entrance of a small, unremarkable building that opens onto a simple room with pale fluorescent light, a simple table and some plastic chairs….and a brand new iMac computer.
In the next room, a young man from Kibera is editing a clip for Kibera TV, which tells stories about what’s really going on in Kibera – all the videos are available on YouTube.
This is all the work of the Hot Sun Foundation, whose founder Nathan Collett, made the award-winning film Kibera Kid and whose latest feature film, Togetherness Supreme, is screening in Nairobi tomorrow night and is on the film festival circuit.
You can listen to the splashy CNN story here, but I was more moved by Josphat, one of the young men who has been trained in film-making, scriptwriting and video editing by the HotSun foundation. This is a 40 second video I shot of him yesterday talking to our group – his personality, his energy, his love of film overwhelmed me and filled me with joy.
A few weeks ago I emailed a Pakistani colleague to ask for her advice about which organization – among those recommended by Acumen Fund – to give to for flood relief.
While looking at the recommended organizations, I found myself thinking about all the things one thinks about in these situations: how much of the money will go directly to help people? How credible and well-managed is the organization? What kind of difference will this make in people’s lives?
All normal questions, though in some way they felt absurd upon further reflection. I gave what I could give because of the tragedy that these floods represent, because of the tens of millions of people whose lives have been uprooted and whose homes and livelihoods have been destroyed. I gave as an act of solidarity, as a too-small act of expression of my shared humanity with those who are suffering.
But the actual gift – its monetary value – in the context of everything, is tiny, is miniscule, is quite literally a drop in the bucket. It’s like casting a vote in an election – something totally irrational in terms of my ability to affect an outcome, but something that is fundamental as an expression of my rights as a citizen, an act in support of democracy, and a statement of my values.
In this way, the act of giving is an act of self-expression, a statement of my values and obligations as a citizen of the world, and, perhaps most importantly, an act of generosity. And generosity is act that expects nothing in return.
This made me wonder again what was going on when I was pondering the potential efficacy of my gift. Was I, in some way, unable fully to let go of the notion that “this is my money that I worked hard to earn, and I’m only parting with it in exchange for something tangible that I’m getting” (in this case for someone else).
This may be where I – where we – get tripped up. The thing that we’re used to doing, that we’ve been trained to do, is to buy stuff. We part with money and in exchange we get…… whatever it is that we get.
Maybe philanthropy is something completely different, maybe it’s a sheep in wolf’s clothing: an act of self-expression disguised as a transaction. In which case we’ve got the order all wrong – we cannot first go through all the learned calculations of what-am-I-getting-for-my-money but instead have to start with ourselves, who we are, and who we want to be.
I worry that in our pursuit of better, smarter philanthropy, we run the risk of trading in soft-heartedness for hard-headedness, and in so doing everyone ends up coming up short – because this is a false choice, one we don’t have to make. Of course we want money to go the furthest, we want to support the best organizations, we want to make change. But the “we” in the equation matters a lot. We, people who give (and people who ask others to give), are affected by our own actions. We are also striving to be the best version of ourselves. And we, in the act of giving (the way we approach it, the reasons for our actions, the way we let these actions change us) have a chance to take another step towards becoming the person we hope to be.
A few years ago a good friend of mine started a greeting card business with all sorts of quirky cards for very specific events – buying a new Xbox; embarrassing faux-pas at the office holiday party; most sleepless nights in a row with a new baby…. When he took the cards to buyers, they all told him that the cards were great, but what they needed to see were more birthday cards, anniversary cards, and Valentine ’s Day cards.
The question he asked and we all need to ask today is: do I want to be in the business of trying to create the best birthday card ever? Do I want to toil away and hope beyond hope that I’ll rise to the top – using the same tools and tactics as everyone else, but doing it just a little bit better?
You know:
Sure everyone does email campaigns, but ours is going to stand out a bit more because we’re going to tweak the headlines and up our open rates…
Sure everyone creates annual reports, but ours will be snappier, crisper, more memorable…
Sure everyone writes a quarterly email that no one reads, but this is what everyone expects, so we have to do it too…
Really? You actually don’t need to do those things that everyone else does, and you certainly, certainly don’t need to do them in the WAY everyone does them (please!).
You don’t need to spend your organizational energy on things that “people expect.” Who are these “people” anyway? What exactly do they expect? Why?
Maybe these expectations are out there, and maybe they’re right, but I’d pressure test that a lot before spending organizational energy on creating another me-too thing that’s fighting for its life to be just-a-bit-above-average.
The chance that you write the world’s best, most memorable birthday card are pretty slim. But creating the funniest “office party holiday gift card” ever – and getting that card in front of the people who buy and sell holiday gifts…well that sounds a lot more possible and a lot more fun.
If you’re advocating for a shift, a new initiative that you’re pushing for from below, it helps to know what signs to look for (or not look for) as you gauge your progress.
In the beginning, any kind of new anything that’s not driven from the top will look like it’s not going anywhere. With this knowledge in hand, it’s a lot easier not to give up.
Change from below can follow two paths, not three:
It’s 3 that gets us into trouble….the unstated assumption that if something’s going to get somewhere tomorrow we’ll see significant progress today in terms of the support we’re getting (funding, encouragement, approvals) and the external indicators of success. Carrying this mental model around is the best way to ensure that you give up just when things are about to turn your way.
(by the way, the same thinking can be applied to work/salary/promotions, which often follow a step-change pattern when, of course, skills and responsibilities grow in a much more continuous way.)
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I wanted to share this note that came out yesterday from Acumen Fund Country Director Aun Rahman about the floods in Pakistan.
It’s shocking how muted the global response has been to this crisis, one in which 20 MILLION people, most of them poor, have been displaced and are now homeless.
And for more context on the floods:
Here’s the letter:
Dear friends,
The world has been slow to react to the enormity of the floods in Pakistan. Acumen Fund wants to help change that, and in the process take a small step toward changing the way the world sees Pakistan.
I know that all of us have been putting our thoughts and actions towards flood relief and rehabilitation. To create greater awareness globally on what is happening on the ground in Pakistan, Acumen Fund has launched a website www.ontheground.pk to capture both news and first hand experiences about the impact of the flood as well as the flood relief efforts.
The website allows you to post your stories or photographs in Pakistan as well as news updates regarding the flood. This information will build a compelling tapestry of what is happening on the ground in Pakistan, and will reach out to the global Acumen Fund community.
Please share what you are hearing or doing on www.ontheground.pk. Doing so will help demonstrate to the world that people (Pakistanis and non-Pakistanis) are taking action to help. We are rolling this out to our global community and leveraging Acumen Fund’s networks outside of Pakistan to get the word out and advocate for action!
At the same time, do help spread the word about this. Anyone is free to post what they are seeing/doing on the site. I believe that our message to the world will be stronger if we all come together to share what we are doing.
After all, Pakistan needs the world to act now.
Sincerely,
Aun Rahman
Country Director, Pakistan | Acumen Fund
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Last month I was in the Strand bookstore and bought two books by Haruki Makamuri, What I Talk about When I Talk About Running and The Wind Up Bird Chronicle. When I got to the register, I was surprised how strange it felt to physically buy a book in this digital age.
A few weeks later I was in Hudson News at the San Francisco Airport. There with the other best-selling books was Michael Lewis’ The Big Short which I’d seen in probably 30 other store windows and thought about buying. I figured with a long flight ahead and the knowledge that my laptop would die before I got to New York, I may as well pony up for the book.
But it cost $27.95 in hardcover.
Though I’d only read ONE book on my wife’s Kindle and I don’t own an iPad, suddenly I felt my iPhone burning a hole in my pocket. I looked The Big Short up on the two free apps I have on my iPhone (iBooks and the Kindle app), and it was available in both places for about $10. And on top of that I had the realization that NOT owning the printed hardcopy of this big, bulky book was a plus….along with the prospect of saving 2/3rd off the cover price.
So I downloaded it.
One of the toughest nuts to crack is figuring out which trends, which behaviors that seem so engrained actually have the ability to turn on a dime. Think iPhones in a Blackberry world; Google search in the days of Yahoo; ebooks today; money transfer through phones in Kenya; texting; wearing seatbelts; smoking; digital photography…
The examples that move fastest are all digital, but wholescale transformation happens all around us. Reading primarily printed books (or printed anything) is going to seem quaint in 10 years’ time. And how long, do you think, before every book comes with a free ebook download? Before you feel like you’re missing out when you read a magazine, because you can’t click on the photos? Our kids will hear you talk about this stuff the way I heard my parents talk about black and white TV.
The ultimate opportunity for leverage is to spot or create things that slowly, quietly, unexpectedly, have the potential to go from “that’s crazy” to “how did we live without it” on a dime. And most of the hard work happens during the “that’s crazy” part of the curve, which requires more than vision – it requires mettle.
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A few weeks ago I wrote a post about the “inefficient” nonprofit marketplace that asked two questions: whether the nonprofit marketplace is any more inefficient than other markets (mutual funds, cosmetics); and whether improving the quality of information available about nonprofits will have a significant effect on the efficiency with which capital is allocated in the sector.
This post led to a great conversation with an active philanthropist and nonprofit Board member I’ve gotten to know who, it just so happens, is an investor herself and knows lots of active, successful investors.
Her observations, and the resulting questions, are the right ones.
She observes that people around her who are overwhelmingly deliberate about how they manage their investment capital are, in her words, quite often not deliberate at all about how they manage their philanthropic capital. Put another way, the majority of capital deployed for investment is deployed with the intention of maximizing financial return (whether or not that in fact happens due to systematic biases, crummy products, etc.), and it’s not clear that the majority of funding that she observes going into nonprofits even has the intention of maximizing social impact.
This brings me back to the great post by Renata Rafferty on Dinosaur Philanthropy from the Tactical Philanthropy Blog. Renata writes:
Those of “us” on the “cutting edge” of philanthropy…tend to navel gaze, looking ever more deeply into how our groovy new ways of thinking about philanthropy are….well, groovy.
On-the-ground reality in everyday communities, however, is more about gala slippers on the ground than eco-friendly boots on the ground. I live in an extraordinarily wealthy community, where millions change hands between individuals and families….and influence plays a HUGE role in where the money goes – but the influence has little to do with a real understanding or examination of community needs, community assets, and who is doing fine and deserving work…
Sometimes I feel like one of the few left on the dock watching the philanthropy boat sail away, leaving behind the well-intentioned, kind, caring, wealthy people who are so generous with their giving, but who just aren’t part of the “cool crowd.”
This all brings me back to my hope that we’ll right-size our expectations and the promises we make as we charge ahead (rightly) with efforts to improve the availability of information about the effectiveness of different charities. This is important, necessary work that will lay the foundation for how we think about and understand charities in the future. AND at the same time it is completely possible that the direct impact of this work on Renata’s “dinosaur philanthropists” (an intentionally provocative name to be sure) is that of a tree falling in the forest that no one is around to hear.
What I think we need also need are strategies that look hard at where most of the philanthropic (especially individual) philanthropic money is, how giving decisions for this money is made, and from there to think about actions that are likely to have direct impact on THIS crowd.
Put another way, solving the data transparency problem is absolutely important, but it’s kind of like giving a screwdriver to an investment banker – it’s not the tool she uses to do her work.
Say you need to make a big change.
If that’s the case (and it isn’t always the case, but sometimes it is) then what? Once you know you need to make a major change, once you decide that what you’ve been doing isn’t enough to get you where you need to go, do you assume that the road to get there is going to be as smooth as the one you’ve been on?
It’s somewhere you haven’t gone before, right? That makes it unexplored territory.
Rocky roads are bumpy, uncomfortable to ride on, and they have no road signs. So things might be a little unpleasant along the way. You’ll crash into each other some. And all of a sudden it’s up to you, not the road, to figure out after the first few miles if you’re going in the right direction or if, in fact, you’ve veered off the path and are headed in the wrong direction.
But turning around because the road is rocky – because the new behaviors and tactics feel uncomfortable or awkward; because it doesn’t work right the first time; because it’s not the way you’re used to doing things – that’s a non-starter. Because that will get you back on the path you were on, and you’ve already seen where that leads – it’s not the right destination, right?
It’s not always better to veer off course, but when you decide to do it, be prepared for the bumpy right, tell people what to expect going in, and commit to staying on the path (even if you change tactics along the way) for long enough to figure out if you are in fact heading in the right direction.
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