Nonprofit Power Podcast

I hear from Nonprofit leaders all the time about how frustrating it is that they've explained their work to decisionmakers a million times and they still don't get it. And you respond by going out an…

Just about everywhere I go, folks are having some version of the conversation about how we're all responding to the crazy (stuff) that is going on in our world. How we’re responding both as citizens …

We are in a time where more and more, for a lot of decisionmakers, pressure is a necessary component to our advocacy. At the same time, we're operating in an environment where some decisionmakers, in…

Have you ever been frustrated by a decisionmaker who doesn't acknowledge your expertise and therefore doesn't take your advice? Or have you ever hesitated to brand yourself as an expert?

These may see…

It's time to talk about a hidden flaw in one of the most common messaging strategies that we're all using. And that, if we're not aware of it, can really come back and bite us.

Here's how that winds …

Members of Congress are on their way home as we speak, for basically a month long recess, which is known in Congressional speak as a district work period. I want to make sure you have everything you …

The stakes are really high with advocacy messaging these days, especially for nonprofits. Effective messaging is so critical to every aspect of engaging decisionmakers. At any point in the process, n…

Our personal growth as an advocate and as a leader is probably the single most important ingredient for our advocacy success. And yet, it’s one of the things we most often overlook. We don't give eno…

One of the biggest frustrations that I hear from Nonprofit leaders is that much too often for comfort, decisionmakers fail to recognize or value our expertise. And when that happens, they're not list…

Here’s an uncomfortable truth:  Money and policy decisionmakers do not care about your services. 

This uncomfortable truth is a source of frustration for so many Nonprofit leaders, and it doesn't have…

The potential for massive cuts to Medicaid and SNAP moved one step closer to reality when the Senate voted its version of the big ugly bill out of committee. The good news is there are still quite a …

I have a really important question I want to ask you. How satisfied are you, really, with the advocacy results that you're currently getting? 

Chances are, you're frustrated with at least one of the m…

I was on the road working with a client last week. And the CEO there asked me the most awesome question that I was super excited to answer. The minute we had the conversation, I knew it was one that …

When you're in a conversation with a decisionmaker and it's not going the way you want, they're not engaging, they're not leaning in, or they're not getting what you need them to get. You can tell th…

There is nothing more timely than the issue of saving Medicaid. We are in a moment of both extreme threat but also extreme opportunity. I know it would be very easy to think that there’s nothing we c…

How do we all be okay when so much is not okay in the world?

There's so much bad, scary, overwhelming stuff going on constantly that it’s really hard sometimes to just get out of bed in the morning. N…

If you’ve got great messaging and it’s still not causing decisionmakers to engage with you, chances are you’re dealing with one of the most common advocacy pitfalls that happens to a lot of nonprofit…

There is a lot of fear in the air, and I think it's important that we as nonprofit leaders take a hard look at that and get clear about what we're going to do with it.

The first thing is we have to ac…

It's time to talk about one of the most frustrating things that can get in an advocate's way: when you've got a decisionmaker that, no matter what you do or say, no matter how hard you push them, it …

There has never been a time when the influence of nonprofit leaders was more needed. In particular, we need to have influence with the money and policy decision makers that hold the power to help or …