Episode Transcript
[00:00:06] Speaker A: Welcome to the Leadership Window podcast with Patrick Jinx. Each week, through a social sector lens, Patrick interviews leaders and experts and puts us in touch with trends and tips for leading effectively. Patrick is an LSI certified leadership coach, a member of the Forbes Coaches Council of bestselling author, award winning photographer, and professional speaker.
And now here's Patrick.
[00:00:35] Speaker B: Hello everyone. Welcome to the Leadership Window podcast. This is episode 41.
Can't believe it's 41 episodes already and it hasn't even been, I don't even think six months. We started this in October and it's just been a blast. So another great episode today with Tricia Richardson, who's the CEO of an organization here in my home state of South Carolina called SC Thrive. You heard a little bit about them in our episode a couple of weeks ago with my interview with Shannon from SC thrive, and they do so many things. I'm not going to pack in a really long introduction here, but we're going to have fun talking with Tricia. Before we do that, I want to remind everyone that a sponsor of this podcast is leadership Systems Incorporated. Dr. Jim Smith has been on our program before. He is a 30 year coach and trainer at the center for Creative Leadership. He founded Leadership Systems, I think, in 1992. He's my coach, he's my trainer. LSI is where I got my coaching certification and we continue to partner with leadership systems, mostly on the corporate side of our coaching work. Here at the Jinx perspective, we work almost exclusively with nonprofits, but leadership systems is where you go if you want to learn how to coach, whether it's in your own business, you want to become a better manager by applying a coaching skill, or you're thinking about becoming a coach as a profession, LSI is definitely the place to go, and they've got some exclusive opportunities, pricing discounts exclusively for listeners of this podcast. So here's Michael Wallace to tell us a little more about that.
[00:02:17] Speaker C: Hey, this is Michael Wallace with leadership systems Incorporated. And on behalf of LSI, I want to say thanks for supporting our friend Patrick Jinx and the Leadership Window podcast. We've been partnering with Patrick for many years and we are so proud to have him represent us as an LSI certified executive coach. As a mutual friend, we'd like to offer you exclusive rates on some of the same training that Patrick has received over the years, as well as some new experiences that we've been developing. Head over to leadershipsystems.com slash Jinx to see the upcoming training events on our calendar and register today to keep learning and growing again. That's leadershipsystems.com Slash Jinx J I n K S for exclusive pricing on LSI's virtual and in person training events. Thanks a lot.
[00:02:58] Speaker B: And when you go to that website, you might notice that the dates for some of the events that they have on there are already passed or they're coming up real close. Keep an eye on that page because those dates update. They continue cycling through those coaching trainings, and if there's one that's already passed, just look, there'll be a new one coming along soon and they offer the discounts all the way around. So appreciate Michael and Jim and all the folks at LSI.
Tricia, it is so awesome to have you right here in the home studio with us for this. I've been looking forward to it. Spent the day, part of the day with your team yesterday, part of your team, your huge team that you have. And I tell you what, every time I'm with your team, I'm inspired. They're always fully engaged. They are hungry to grow as leaders and to excel in what they do. And we're going to talk about it. But I happen to know that just speaks volumes of your leadership because that's a culture that you're setting in the organization. So for our listeners, our relationship and partnership with SC Thrive as an organization is very strong. We've done a lot of different things with them. They do a tremendous amount of work in the state. Patricia, thanks for coming and I'm excited that you're finally here with us.
[00:04:20] Speaker A: Thanks for having me, Patrick. I'm excited to be here with you as well.
[00:04:23] Speaker B: Well, we have more to talk about than we have time for, I'm sure, because we're going to talk about leadership and what you and I sat down yesterday after our event and I mean, 30 minutes went by before we knew it and we're just talking about leadership. That happens.
And you also have been associated with LSI. You came with me a few years ago up to Charlote, to their leadership coaching training and got a little piece of that yourself. So we'll talk a little bit about that, too. I'm interested in how you're applying a coaching model in your organization, but start by just telling us who you are for our listeners to get to know you a little bit better, particularly just the way your journey, your leadership journey has kind of led you to this point. How did you get here?
[00:05:14] Speaker A: I was thinking about that because pondering as I get a little bit older, processing how did I end up here? And a couple of things I didn't really have a choice. As a child growing up in a military family, my father and mother both led. My dad led troops and he led across the country and across the world. And my mom was that stabilizing factor at home, but she was leading women and showing us how to do a variety of things from financial aspect to leading in the American Red Cross. So as I was thinking about that, I said, you know, I really didn't have an option, did I, to lead? So I've been leading since I was about eleven or twelve, actually.
[00:05:54] Speaker B: That's been a pretty common theme with a lot of the people that have been on the show. Just the parental influence when your parents are leaders. My mom was certainly a leader in the home and like you, I had a military background too. So dad was in the army and a leader in the army.
And it's not so much that they sort of tell you how to lead, they just more show you how to lead and they create an expectation. This is who we are.
[00:06:22] Speaker A: This is who we are. And part of your job is you live in a community, you give to that community whatever gifts you do have to offer.
[00:06:29] Speaker B: What did your mom do with the Red Cross?
[00:06:31] Speaker A: She actually ended up being a worldwide trainer, instructor trainer for water safety. She set the book policy. She set some of the training policies nationally and internationally.
[00:06:41] Speaker B: Wow, that's a big deal.
[00:06:43] Speaker A: It was a pretty big deal as a volunteer. 39 years of service to the American Red Cross.
[00:06:48] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:06:48] Speaker A: Tons of hours, all free.
[00:06:50] Speaker B: That is incredible. So that's not just leading as a vocation, that's a passion right there. That's serving.
[00:06:57] Speaker A: Absolutely. Serving is a definite passion for her.
[00:07:00] Speaker B: Very good. Well, I can see where that kind of came from. So how about your professional journey? You're leading an organization and you know, my next question in a minute is going to be, tell us about the organization. But you're leading a big statewide network with a lot of moving parts and a lot of complexity to try to solve social problems in South Carolina and primarily give people access to some critical services that they need.
So how did you end up there though? A leader like you? I mean, you're brilliant. You've got tons of leadership capability. You could have gone anywhere, done anything. How'd you end up here?
[00:07:36] Speaker A: I think a variety of things led me to here. I started with the american red Cross myself because there were no teaching positions. I was going to be a PE teacher when I got out of college and there was a lack of people being able to learn how to swim in the state and it was a really big issue. So we started a massive learn to swim program, and that was a lot of moving parts. And people were like, I was using hotel rooms, and so people just didn't really get what I was doing. But I really do see the connectivity in the community and did that, then went to Girl Scouts, then we moved to Colorado. And I really got refined at a church and how you can lead not only in your church, but in the community. And so when we moved back, I had no idea what I was going to do, and so I just got involved volunteering, started the Palmetta half marathon with my church, and that kind of led to a bunch of different things, and it was all about creating connectivity. And then we connected the dots to the benefit bank at office of rural Health at the time. And that's how I ended up in that position, and then kind of grew up from there. And then when Graham said politely, we appreciate what you're doing, but it's time for you to move out. You're way beyond rule, so can you move to another entity? We tried and then started SC thrive in 2014.
[00:08:53] Speaker B: And you've been the CEO from the beginning of that?
[00:08:58] Speaker A: From the beginning of that in 2014? Yes, sir.
[00:09:00] Speaker B: Yeah. What would you say is different today? I mean, other than COVID, what do you think is different in the seven years that you've been there? How have things changed in terms of your body of work, in leadership, and your challenge?
[00:09:15] Speaker A: And know, when I first started, even under the program of the benefit bank, under Office of Rural Health, there's a lot of learning to do because I'd been out of the nonprofit sector, been in the church world, trying to bridge the gap between those two. And then just that idea of the principles are the same from the beginning. You need to have structure. You need to communicate to people. You need to bring people together. Part of your job is just listening. And I think doing that helped us grow, and then we've just experienced exponential growth since the day we started. And I have learned that I have to get out and do this more. So thanks for pushing me, Patrick. I appreciate that. I much prefer getting my hands in doing the work, but there's a need for helping people understand, even today, on a Zoom call, giving people some historical background, even in the last ten years, and really helping them understand how all the pieces connect together so that they can move the agenda forward with their part of what they do.
[00:10:18] Speaker B: Yeah, no, I think it's great.
I think you could do more of it because you're good at it. And there's nothing like the CEO out there publicly casting the vision, helping people understand it, because it's going to be super inspiring coming from you. It always is.
So let's do that. Let's talk about SC thrive, because I'm still trying to figure out, and I've been partnering with you for a while, so I know for our listeners it can be a complicated thing what you're doing. Obviously you are a nonprofit organization, but you're statewide. How would you describe this organization to someone over dinner who had no clue?
[00:11:00] Speaker A: I think the best way to describe it is that we bring a technology platform that connects people as if they were coming into a building with services. And we lean on the expertise of all the other organizations who are out there doing the specific things that they work on, whether it's food security, housing, financial security, whatever it is. We bring that together on a technology platform and then we do massive outreach around that. We train people to the platform, but also train people to some of the programs that are available statewide to do that. So Snap, Medicaid, taxes, things like that. And that has been our strength. And then we look for gaps across the state and we fill in direct service where the gaps are. And I think that's probably the biggest misnomer about what we do. We're not coming to take over. We're trying to provide actual practical help for organizations who don't maybe have the money or the time or the people to learn a new program, seek out the best technology, participate in training or do training for their staff members.
[00:12:08] Speaker B: So if people are familiar with the sector at all, and particularly statewide organizations, you might think of. I naturally think of united way because of my background. We might think of an association like together SC, which is sort of the nonprofit association for helping nonprofits in the state with all kinds of things and putting on a conference and various things. What's different?
How would you describe the biggest differentiator in what SC thrive is doing that nobody else can do?
[00:12:42] Speaker A: I think one of the differentiators that we focus on direct service individuals, we focus on professional development for a single mom who maybe didn't have a degree, who got helped by a small nonprofit and ended up working as their intake worker, but has no background and experience to do that. So we help provide that, but maybe not necessarily don't want to go to the level of community health worker or something like that. And so that's kind of our niche. And our niche is also looking at what the state policies are and practices are and what are some things that we can change at the state level without actually having to go to the legislation level or advocacy level. And we're able to help change state policy internally without having to go through a bunch of stuff. Just ask the question, why do we do it this way? And then everybody starts digging. And sometimes it's a simple, I don't know, let's see if we can change it. And it's a yes. And other times it's, oh, because XYZ happened over here. So I think that niche of having our hands in a variety of things and sitting at a lot and a lot of meetings and listening to what's everybody doing and why aren't we moving forward as a state? Why are we still hunkering down, being last in some things than we shouldn't be last in?
[00:13:59] Speaker B: And what are some of the examples of, you mentioned the development for the single mom SC thrive took on a big rental assistance initiative, for example, this past year. What are maybe two or three of the biggest examples of the core work like that that you're doing, the social issues that you're actually addressing and helping to solve with those.
[00:14:22] Speaker A: So I think speed is one of the things that we're really good at. And it's not always easy to do speed fast. I mean, do speed well, fast.
We got a call from a connection that said, hey, we need to roll out this money, we need to get it out. You all have a call center, you have people who can do training. So we said, okay, we'll take this on, but you need to guide us in the process. They gave us some parameters and we were able to give out a lot of money to a lot of people who were going to get evicted in a very short period of time. So we did everything from putting the branding together, doing the marketing for it, to actually taking the calls, doing the eligibility requirements, if you will, gathering the data. And then from that point we even did the finances where we gave out the money. So soup to nuts, we did the whole process in that aspect for housing, but we were just needed for a short period of time. And now the longer period, we're still helping a little bit with housing in one area that they needed help in, in Lexington. But this is a longer issue and so we try to help where we can and then let the experts make sure that they have the time and capacity to continue on with that.
[00:15:33] Speaker B: All right, well, you just nailed the first issue we can talk about, and I hadn't planned on talking about this, but you brought it up. So here we go.
One of the things our listeners have heard me lament over and over and over. And people who know me, including you, have probably heard me say that the nonprofit sector and the organizations within it move with excruciatingly slow pace. It takes us forever to do things. I remember looking at the minutes of an organization I led in the early two thousand s, and I'm reading the minutes from 1965, and they're having the same conversations.
And some of what they had wanted to do still weren't done. Wow, 1965. I'm like, well, okay, that's a long project timeline there. I think you're out of room on your Gantt chart, but the sector generally just does move slow. We have boards. We have to get approved for things. We have stakeholders. Everybody wants consensus. We have policy in our way. We have a lot of moving parts. So you said you're good at speed. How are you good at speed? What are you doing differently than the rest of the nonprofit sector that allows you to move more quickly and be more responsive and agile to take on opportunities like this? What are the principles of picking up speed?
[00:17:00] Speaker A: Well, when we were launched, when the whole program of the benefit bank was launched, we had some foundational money, but what came along with that was you need to become sustainable pretty quickly. And so we pushed to make sure that we had enough operational cash to be able to make adjustments, or if one of the state agencies paid slow, we were able to do that. So having good, sound financial practices is a key to speed, because then you have the money to be able to do some of the things you need to do. And so we were good with that. And helping boards understand that you don't have to spend every dime of it. You should hold some so that you can do some of these projects. We also asked to do pilots for different organizations and say, can we pilot this and just try it? Would you help us in this process? And so we did a lot of pilots and ask, and we're real honest about, hey, this is not working. Can we readjust? And we continue to readjust. And so we're constantly looking at how things go. We train our people. We spend a good bit of money on training our staff in a variety of things that they need to do their job. And apparently that's not high on a lot of people's list. And that actually comes from my dad.
He said, sometimes you walk into a place and you just sit down and be quiet and listen and find the right people. And so that's what we did. A lot of you find the right. People who have the ends in the communities, so it doesn't take as long to do that community building. You partner with them and they get you in the community, and then you have to prove yourself by a good quality product, good instructors, good trainers, and feedback is a key part of that communication.
[00:18:42] Speaker B: Well, you make it sound like it just happened that way and that it's really easy, but that takes intentional leadership. I mean, what I hear you saying is at least a couple of things. One is you built an infrastructure for speed. So the fact that you are financially stable and capable allows you that. There's the agility, so you have it built. You're positioned to be able to take on those opportunities. So there's a trust factor that comes with an external partner because they know you're solid, you've got the infrastructure, you've got the capacity, which is the other side, surrounding yourself with competent people who can do it and who have the connections in the community. I heard you say that. So we've got the people that have the networking and the connections and the competence. So I'm thinking of, and it feels like this comes up in about every episode, but I'm thinking about Covey's trust framework. In fact, his book is the speed of trust. And there's an economic formula that he presents, which is when trust is high, speed is fast and costs are lower, and when trust is low, costs go up and speed slows down.
And it sounds like exactly what you're describing in your organization. If I were to sum up what I just heard, I think I just heard we're fast because we've built trust.
[00:20:04] Speaker A: Absolutely. And there's still areas where we haven't built trust, so we have to continue to do that. And I think it's twofold. It's building trust with your community, but it's also building trust with your staff, and it's also knowing your staff. I think one of the things that I learned, I took a test recently and I'd love to remember the name of it. I want to say Kresky is the name, but it might not be on I'm quickstart, so I'm high on this quick start, and it was very frustrating to my key staff because I was like, go, go, let's do this. I'm a driver, let's move it forward. And they were having a hard time catch up. We did this kind of talk through what everybody was, and it made it a lot easier. Some people are fact finders, some people are the, you can call it what you want, disc, whatever assessment you want to use. But it really helped them see that, okay, she wants us to move forward with it, and we have to bring these parts to it, and we also have to stop her and ask questions, and otherwise she's just going to keep rolling. And I think it took a while. And I'll use Allie as an example. She's my CFO. I think the first two, three years of our relationship, she just didn't know what to think of me. And she was like, this woman is not in her right mind. And then that has flipped in the last two years. She says, I get you, and now I stop you and ask the questions and then see where you're thinking about going and then add my perspective. And I think that trust building takes time, but you also have to let people be who they are in that process and work best with the collective. Does that make sense?
[00:21:34] Speaker B: It makes perfect sense.
Our good friend, he's one of our coaching associates here at the jinx perspective, and I'm pretty sure you know him, Tim or his. One of his employees told me once when I was coaching them, they were talking about, you know, kind of like, you like, go do this. We can do it, you can do it. We're capable. Let's go make this happen. Right? Project after project, innovation after innovation.
And he said, it's tough to keep up with sometimes, and your bandwidth gets stretched, and he's got to figure out the capacity that we have.
And I said, well, so why do you think that happens? He goes, because we keep doing it.
[00:22:19] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:22:21] Speaker B: Everything he's asked us to do, we've done. And until we can't do it anymore, he's going to keep pushing us because we obviously haven't hit the limit yet. And so he's going to keep pushing. And then I think of Marty Linsky's definition of leadership. Disappointing your own people at a rate they can absorb, so you can't pass that absorption rate. If you move too fast, the wheels fall off or the people fall out or jump out or whatever, but you move fast, and you do that by trust building. So how do you build trust?
What are the key tenets that you're employing and that you're helping to set a culture for, to create that trust among particularly external stakeholders. But, yeah, you also mentioned you got to have the trust of your staff. So how do you build that? What are your techniques for that?
[00:23:09] Speaker A: I think externally, when we talk to our outreach staff specifically, it's about showing up, doing what you say you're going to do and listening, not pushing who we are, what we do at se thrive. It's more about, tell me about your organization. What are your needs?
What are things that cause you stress every day in the work that they're doing because they're meeting one on one with the clients and so really understand and learn their program and what they do and then find ways to help them. And then if there's a way to connect what we do with what they're doing, then let's help them get that connected and be that resource for them. So showing up is the biggest thing and finding the right people in the community. If there's no right person in the community, then it's our job to be the right person in the community to make sure we connect the dots. And so that's kind of the external piece. And I think the internal piece is also vulnerability and honesty, pretty much putting it out there. And I think it's becoming more the norm for a lot more people these days. However, it still can be a wall for many because there was such a, no, you can't do this at this level. You can't say this. You have to act this way, say this. And I just got to be real, and my team knows I'm real. And I was pretty intentional about what I want to do with se thrive as a woman, specifically, I wanted to be a place where mothers can work and be a mother and do the things they want to do with their kids. So how do we create policies, practices that that can happen? And the same thing, if it's a single father or fathers have that role, we do that as well. But that was a big deal for me because I was blessed to be able to do that in a few of my jobs. And that made all the difference in the world. And especially as a single mom, it made a huge difference for me.
[00:24:53] Speaker B: Well, one of the things that we were stressing with your team yesterday was the fact that people want to know that their supervisor cares about them as people, not just positions.
[00:25:06] Speaker A: Right.
[00:25:07] Speaker B: And that's what you're talking about here is you've shown that. You've demonstrated that. Look, I understand we're not just financial directors and program coordinators. We're mothers and we're spouses and we're people.
[00:25:22] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:25:23] Speaker B: And if you want us to operate at full function and peak performance in the organization, you got to let us operate and fully function as people. And why wouldn't those two come together? One of the things I did a video episode a few months back about the work life balance.
And I've always found it interesting. I get why people want to separate work from life.
05:00 is sacred, right? Like this me time now, I never was able to really do that. To me, I am who I am and that's who I am when I'm at work, and that's who I am when I'm at home. And yeah, there's activities that are appropriate for environments and contexts. But in terms of a complete separation of work life, I don't know, maybe you haven't found your fulfillment if you can't find that work, because to me they just blend together. I don't know how you can separate them. I don't know that I'd want to.
[00:26:18] Speaker A: And I'd struggle with that. I think that's the question that I get from staff members sometimes. Do you ever turn it off? And I said, yeah, I make sure that I have time to spend with my family and I engage with them and I do the things I want to. But if I'm seeking something, then I'm going to keep reading and looking and finding. And that's passion for me because I believe in the mission of what we're doing. So I'm okay with that. So I don't give people a hard time. If they end up working till the evening. If they're going to solve a problem or fix something, then let them do it. But at the same time, if you need something, you need to communicate, hey, I've been putting in a lot of hours, can I do this or that? And so we try to blend that. The bottom line is, though, the work still has to be done so you can be a family, but we have to have that balance of, you've still got to get the work done, we still have to meet our goals and requirements from the different grants and things like that.
[00:27:09] Speaker B: That's the word balance, right? That's the tricky word, sort of. On the topic of balance, I don't know if you've seen this model.
It's a model that I use. I had an executive coach when I was up in Pennsylvania, and he was just outstanding. And one of the things he shared with me, it was my second CEO position, but it was a big jump in scale from my first one.
And what he shared with me was that he shared the a and the e. Alignment and engagement. All right, so, okay, ae, alignment and engagement. And he said, alignment are those things where they're the more functional, operational things. Budgeting is alignment. The chart is alignment. The strategic plan is alignment. The operational plan is alignment, making sure you're in sync with your partners externally, all alignment. Then there's engagement, and that's the people side of the work, not the task side of the work. It's the connecting with your donors and it's engaging your employees and it's developing relationships with your board. And he said what you want to move to as a CEO, and you could argue this, but I thought it was a good construct to even think about. He says, right now, when you start this out, you're kind of capital a little e.
You're more on alignment right now.
You're orienting to the work and the mission and the strategy and what are the things I need to do as a CEO?
Pretty quickly you want to switch that to be a capital E little a, where your job as a CEO is more about that engagement and that inspiration and the vision casting, and you've got other people. And again, the whole point for me was I was now leading an organization that had a larger, had some depth in terms of staff. And he said, let your people do more of the alignment pieces and let you focus more on engagement. And I really liked that. It was a good framework. It helped me focus on what kinds of things I needed to do. And as the years went by, sometime later I realized there's actually a missing piece to that model, which is there's an internal and external dimension of those.
So I built a matrix for internal engagement. External engagement, internal alignment. External alignment. So internal engagement, obviously the things we just talked about, external engagement, again might be donors or community stakeholders or influencers. External alignment that's getting collective impact is all about external alignment, having a shared vision and a common agenda and getting your infrastructure in place. So what I ask CEOs a lot is which quadrant do you spend most of your bandwidth as a CEO, most of your energy. And then I ask them, where do you think you should be spending it? It might be the same spot your dot might fall. You might feel like, now I'm right where I need to be.
Or you might say, right now I'm spending a lot of time on internal alignment. I'd like to shift to external engagement. I'd like to move in that direction.
This is what I want to talk with you some about, because I think in your organization, if that matrix ever applied, at least from my view, it really applies there because you've got a critical set of external stakeholders and obviously a core nuclear set of internal stakeholders. Where do you spend most of your time and where are you trying to move. And maybe it's cyclical, maybe it kind of depends on what's going on in the organization. But as you think through that model, are you seeing yourself in it? What thoughts come to your mind in terms of your.
[00:31:10] Speaker A: I think that as starting out as a director of outreach for the program when we started, I spent a lot of time on the external, really trying to understand who South Carolina was and at least my territory, my 17 counties that I had at the time, and then it grew to statewide. And so I built a lot of relationships there. And I found I'm a connector by nature. And so I found, which, by the way, I didn't realize was a skill until I was about 47.
I didn't understand that everybody wasn't like that. And so for me, that was a really good aha. Moment in making sure that I connected with the connectors of the community and people who had influence in the community. And so I could still get the pulse if I had to focus on internal, because we were growing rapidly at the time, too. So we had a lot of internal meetings. And so it was almost a balance of the two. But then you miss out on developing your external partners and you miss out on developing your internal partners. So it's almost like a four way balance you have to kind of shoot. And so from what you were talking about, the cyclical aspect of it, I think is a key for us because it depends on the program, it depends on what is going on. The time. My bent would be to be with people and do people development all the time. That is my love and my heart.
But as I've grown up in this role as a CEO, because I never started out, that wasn't my aspirational list. To become a CEO of an organization, I had to develop these other skills and making sure all the alignment fit together. Understanding the finance piece of it and really understanding it. It's not like you can just show me a piece of paper and talk it to me. I want to feel it and understand it so that I can really grab hold of it and then be a support for you down the road or other people as I'm developing them. Because if I just move through it and don't learn it, then how am I going to develop other people to take it on so that one day maybe I can go do something different. Who knows?
[00:33:01] Speaker B: That's really good. Really good. Because it's like the disc assessment you mentioned a little bit ago, people who are low C's, which I'm not going to walk through the disc assessment with everybody. A lot of our listeners know it, but I'll just cut to the chase.
Some of the words associated with C are cautious, careful, conscientious. Right. The very detail oriented, process oriented accuracy. Get it right. And so people who profile low on the d sometimes will walk around going, yeah, I'm just not good at the detail. But that's not what it is actually saying. It's not saying what you're good at and not good at. It says what your default tendency is, where your natural inclination is. So you don't naturally focus on the details. It doesn't mean you're not competent to do it. And that's what I was picking up as you were talking.
Your external engagement. Well, your engagement internally and externally, is a natural gift.
[00:34:02] Speaker A: That is kind of, what is it? Somebody said to me, I was volunteering, and somebody gave me this gift, and I'll never forget it because it really meant a lot to me because it summed up in words. It says, it's a rare person who can take care of hearts while taking care of business.
And it was from a lead volunteer that I was working with, and it meant a lot to me. It meant, okay, I got the business done, but I also took care of them in the process. And so, as leaders, we have to remember to do both because it's not one or the other. You got to get it done, but you got to take care of your people along the way.
[00:34:34] Speaker B: Right. But more conscientious about one than you do the other, because the engaging comes natural. That's the natural gift, the alignment piece. You just have to be more intentional and work at it. I always tell people in school when I took either statistics or anything mathy or financy or any of that, I still made the a's. It just took me ten times the effort. Absolutely as the others. So it wasn't a matter of competence, it was a matter of natural inclination and how I think and how things are. So I think it's a really important note for leaders, is to say, don't be careful what you tell yourself, oh, I'm just not good at communicating, or I'm just not a good speaker, or I'm not good with details.
Those words mean something, and they might not be accurate.
[00:35:29] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:35:30] Speaker B: It might not be I'm not practiced at speaking, or I don't spend a lot of time managing detail, but to say I'm just not good at them. Sometimes if we're not careful, we'll let that be a cop out.
[00:35:42] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely.
[00:35:43] Speaker B: And we'll just avoid the things we need to be able to do. I'm reading a book.
Our listeners can't see it, but you can.
Flexible leadership by Gary Euchel. And it's exactly what he talks about is you can't say, well, yeah, just don't do the detail. Well, if you're a CEO, yeah, you need to have big picture, but you better be good at some detail.
[00:36:08] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:36:09] Speaker B: You better be able to understand the financial workings of the organization. You might not have to have an accounting degree and be able to calculate a credit ratio without a calculator, but you ought to understand the basics of it. So I think that's good.
Tricia, this podcast is leadership through a social sector lens.
What do you think are some of the biggest challenges in the sector when it comes to leadership?
What do you see?
Because you interact with a lot of nonprofits, you have invested in a number of them, I happen to know, with their own executive coaching and helping build a bench of leadership in their teams. What are you finding and experiencing in terms of the challenges that nonprofits face specifically as it relates to leadership?
[00:37:09] Speaker A: I think because of how, one reason is because of how funding comes down, sometimes that can be such a divisive thing. If I share my this with you, will I get that next round of funding? Because now, you know my this. I think I hear that come over and over again. Honest conversations don't happen, really, because sometimes funding gets in the way. And I think if we had more honest conversations collectively, we would be able to see the bigger picture and see our specific role. Maybe in this grant is a small one, but in that grant, it's much larger. And so just helping people be honest about what's going on in the world, because nothing's perfect. I mean, SC thrive, we've had our stumbles and bumbles, and we've made a lot of mistakes along the way, but you get back up and you keep trying and you look for the next thing that somebody might need to help them move forward. And I think that's probably, I would say it's bigger than you think, and even that communication to the next level of leadership. So when they're a new person going into the meeting, because there's a lot of change, both at the state agencies and hospitals and in nonprofits, it's ever flowing, and then you have a core few people who stay the same. But that communication gap, it's like you have to redo it at a new meeting, when new people come on, you have to explain, well, here's the history, or here's why. This is the way it is. How do we get past that faster to help them say the past really doesn't matter in this aspect. This is the goal of where we want to go and what we want to do. So I think a couple of those things, that communication to all levels when transition happens and just understanding that we all know we need funding, how do we get better at sharing that or giving that or whatever that is?
[00:38:56] Speaker B: You know, when I learned that was when I was working with United Way, and my United Way career happened along the time when the national network was really shifting its focus from being a federated fundraising agency for a bunch of nonprofits to being like a real collective impact deal with bigger issues, get to root causes, these kinds of things. And so as we were shifting and we changed the brand, we found ourselves talking about the new United Way against the old United Way, and we found ourselves going, well, now, okay. In fact, when we would give our sort of elevator speech, we would say, well, you might know United Way historically as such and such, but today we're more about this this.
And someone told me once in a meeting, just spoke up and said, listen, I don't know what you're talking about when you keep saying the old United way. I got here a year ago. I don't know the old United way, and I don't know why it's relevant.
Wow. How important is that? So I'm thinking, well, it's relevant because you need reference on why we're doing what we're doing. But no, to them it wasn't relevant. It's like, just, what are we doing exactly?
[00:40:12] Speaker A: How can I help?
[00:40:12] Speaker B: Yeah, and how can I help? And so that was sort of a little bit of an eye opener for me. I think there's value in the past, there's reference in the past, and there's deference to the past at times. But you got to be careful with that because sometimes it can go too far and you can just spend too much time talking and thinking about it and someone finally says, hey, I know, but this new model, let's just make this the model now. Let's go. So I thought that was good.
Just real quickly, Tricia, I would love some of your talk, a little bit about your policy work. And by policy work, I mean, I think you mentioned a while ago the ability to influence state policy without being, like, lobbying in the legislature and those kinds of things. But policy is important to you. Systems are important to you and your work. What's some of the work that you're doing there and how you go about it.
[00:41:09] Speaker A: From a policy standpoint, I think we just look at the practice and then go back and ask the questions to the different entities and agencies to say, why is this here? Can we change this? Is there something we can do? And you have to sometimes keep asking until you get the answer. I think it was six months before I got an answer on something. And that's the nature of how government works, unfortunately. But sometimes they've got so much going on and changes that you just don't get the answer that you're looking for, but you keep after it. I don't know that from a policy standpoint. I haven't got to that level. That's probably the policy and advocacy. The words in general sometimes make me a little nervous because I'm just such a practical let's do this, and why can't we do this, and how do we move this forward aspect? And so I think it's mostly asking questions and then looking at our own practices. Why are we doing this? We ran up against something the other day that was a policy with a lot of things that are changing. So we reevaluated and remembered collectively why we have to have this policy in here and how it relates to several things of the work that we do. And so I think every organization needs to take a look at it. Just because you've been doing it that way for ten years or longer, why is there a different, better way to serve your population? And I think from a policy standpoint that way, I think that's a big issue. And then communicating, why does it take ten meetings to come up with a word change? Does that really matter? What is the point that we're trying to get across? When you're looking at advocacy, why don't you just call up the person you need to talk to and have a conversation with them, and then they might have a better idea of how you should write that policy to get it to pass.
[00:42:55] Speaker B: You're giving me a sense of where the speed comes from in your organization.
Yeah. Warren Berger, in his book a more beautiful question, frames out a three question path to sort of innovative thinking. And the first one is why? But the second and the third ones are critical, too. The second one is what if?
And they fit within every example you just gave of why can't we do this? What if we could? Or what if there was no or what if we had or what if we just, right. There's the what if. And then that third question is how might we.
[00:43:34] Speaker A: Right.
[00:43:36] Speaker B: And I think this is how you think. In fact, I think this is a good time for me to ask you to tell our listeners about your new facility, because it's more than just a new, nice new offices.
I think you have a story to tell through the why, what if and how might we on this building, because you're seeing lots of different uses and purposes that can just absolutely maximize and multiply what a building can actually be for an organization. But it's a big celebration, for one thing, that you landed this amazing space. I think nonprofits like yours ought to have excellent space to work within, and you do. But tell that story, because I think it's inspiring, particularly in what's possible for the building.
[00:44:21] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely.
Let's see. March 6 of 2020, we signed onto a building. We found out six months earlier that we had to leave the facility that we were in. And our contract at our, we had two buildings, and our contract on rent at the other building was up in a year. And so we went looking and found this beautiful building. And I thought, there's no way we can do it. But my CFO found a way for us to get a great deal, one you don't pass up. It's a once in a lifetime opportunity to get a 30,000 square foot building.
And then we thought, gosh, how are we going to fill this? And then once we moved in, we went, oh, we're halfway there already. And we knew we needed training space, so we built training space. And then we started looking at the extra rooms that we had said, who else could use this? And so we started talking to some different nonprofits, and we had several people that looked. And we have community health workers Institute, and Pasos are going to join us in ours. And so all the spaces will be used for the most part. On top of that, we have 10,000 square foot warehouse. And so in talking about food security that we're doing as a statewide group right now, we found some avenues where there could be a collaborative partnership for the warehouse because it has cold storage. So how do we pay for the cold storage? We're talking about solar, we're writing grants for these different things, writing planning grants, and pulled the right people together to have this conversation about how do we use every inch of this facility for the purposes of moving people forward, which is our mission.
[00:45:51] Speaker B: That's incredible.
And for our listeners. Tricia took me on a tour of the facility yesterday and just is like, oh, my gosh, there's so many things you can do with this.
You can be a staging area during disasters. You can just do all kinds of things that fit your mission. As Tricia, I know there's so much more about your work and about leadership we could talk about. I am interested. I ask all of my guests a couple of questions, and one of them because I'm always curious and I'm always inspired by the stories. Who would you say are one or two people in your early life or career that you would say have in some way shaped your view of leadership and your philosophy on leadership?
[00:46:38] Speaker A: Well, I already spoke about my parents as being one of those people, but I also had a, I was the shy child in my family.
Exactly. The very shy child. I would get up on stage and cry. Let me just say that. And when I was a freshman sophomore in high school, Dr. Pendarvis, who was administrator at my high school, he asked me to join JC ambassadors. And basically my job was to get out and go talk about the school to the different business people in the community of Junction City, Kansas. Now, it's not a massive area, but Junction City, Kansas it was. And so he really impacted me on the thought process that I could get up in front of people and speak, even though it's not my bent and I don't like to do it.
That was my first entree into maybe there's something to this.
I was dyslexic. I didn't read till the third grade, and my mom really fought hard. Everybody thought I was not smart. And my mom said she's very smart, she just can't read. So we worked to figure that out. And with my mom and the nurse who took it upon herself to really focus on how can she get people to read, that was a turning point for me because I have a love for reading now and I devour it when I can. Any book you recommend, I'm like going out and buying it and reading it because I just love that aspect of it. So I think those two are big focuses. And then as I grew through my leadership, it became the church. And then you've done a lot for me. I've coached with you, but I've also listening to you is how I connected with you at the very first meeting. I think it was together. SC when I saw you, I said, I got to connect with this guy. I love what you're saying and how you're growing people because leadership is such a huge vacuum right now for people. And so anytime I can learn from other leaders and Charles Weathers and Forrest were huge influences in the beginning of my career with SC thrive, and then I asked different leaders where they are, and I think you can take something from everybody. So there's so many people that built into me.
[00:48:41] Speaker B: Well, what resonates, I think, the most about everything you just said is the influence on you and your leadership happened when people believed in you, when you might not have believed in yourself. I mean, asking someone who's shy to go be an ambassador or saying, no, she's not dumb, she just has a reading disability, she can get through this, she's smart. So you have people saying out loud, oh, totally, yeah, go do this, you'd be great at it.
It's amazing how something seemingly so small can really, especially at a younger age, really influence you and go, oh, okay, wait, maybe I actually can do this.
Where did I forget that I couldn't? And then suddenly you realize, wow, I'm really good at this.
That's great.
I do have one more big question for you, but before I ask that one, I'd like to be able to make sure that our listeners know how to learn more about SC thrive and particularly maybe a little bit more about this technology platform. Because one of the things that you are doing, obviously, is helping people access services that they might need. And the problem with having an access platform is people have to know about it.
[00:49:59] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:50:00] Speaker B: We got this great platform. Yeah, who would have known? How do I found out about it and how do you help people connect to it? So, yeah, just make sure we'll put whatever on our website too, in terms of a link. I mean, obviously scthrive.org. But is there any other information you would share in terms of helping people access what you're trying to provide?
[00:50:22] Speaker A: Absolutely. We had a platform called the Benefit bank, which was an application completion tool, and that was great. But we learned that there needs to be case management and learning management and a variety of things added to that aspect of it, and that hospitals, FQHCs, free clinics needed other aspects to the system, so you needed the ability to API into it. So 2019, we actually rolled out ThriveHub, and it's not perfect, but the idea is the system would be adopted statewide and it sits outside of the government and outside of healthcare. And so people own their data, and that's a big deal in this world. There's lots of systems out there. Not all of them do everything. We tried to encompass everything we could in the system so that you could connect and do your grants and whatever it is you needed to do to really do the work that you do, because you all are the experts, the nonprofits are the experts out there in what they do. So how do we help them do that? So thrivehub has the ability to do it, and it's ever changing. So we want feedback from people and we're having more and more people adopt it statewide, which there's the strength in it. Sharing the data, really looking at the picture of are we moving people forward as a state? And so that was the intent of the system. It's not a money maker. It's not anything like that. It is really a system to help you do what you do best across the state. And there are opportunities with our partner, technology partner, to do this nationally. And so we're open to that as well.
[00:51:48] Speaker B: How is it or is it different from the two one one sort of information and referral that two one one have around the country?
[00:51:57] Speaker A: So typically in the two one one, people call in and then connect you to the resources, even though they're adding and changing a few things about it on a national level, it's actually a component of what we do. So we have that piece in there. But also people can self refer, can be more specific about the referrals, can direct their referrals. And so all of that can be done through a technology platform or face to face. And there's the difference. It's not just a call center. You get connection out in the community and you got to have both.
[00:52:27] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. So it's more interactive and engaged at a deeper level.
[00:52:31] Speaker A: Correct.
[00:52:32] Speaker B: Powerful.
Anything else we need to know about SC thrive, by the way. So the thrive hub, how do somebody ever find that?
[00:52:41] Speaker A: They can contact us through the website. We'll get them connected with a regional coordinator in their area and they will help them work through that process.
[00:52:49] Speaker B: Okay. All right. So you got to get plugged into this. It's not just go to thrivehub.org and you're set. Correct. Okay. All right. But scthrive.org is the main website for the organization, and we encourage people to check that out and all the amazing work that you're doing.
Here's the final question. It's one we ask everybody. If you had 20 seconds to tell the whole world of leaders what you thought the most important tenet of leadership is based on your experience, the Tricia Richardson point of view on leadership, what would it be?
[00:53:22] Speaker A: Never stop growing, never stop communicating with people around you, but just be an avid learner of the best leadership principles, techniques, things like that, that will help you move forward. And then share it. Don't hold onto it. You've got to share it with other people for them to grab onto it and want to become a better leader and want to become a lifelong learner.
[00:53:46] Speaker B: We were talking a little bit about that yesterday in your office about the place that you get to when you feel like either I'm not growing or I'm not growing. There's not that space right now that I'm feeling to grow. And sometimes it shows up as I'm kind of maybe losing my vision or my passion for the organization. So I love that advice. Don't stop growing. It applies to any leader, anywhere, anytime. Just don't stop growing. And when you stop growing, you're kind of done, right? Absolutely, Trish, I appreciate it. I do see you as someone who is just on a tremendous growth trajectory, it seems like all the time.
And that inspires me because I want to be as well. Thanks for coming on the show.
[00:54:34] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:54:34] Speaker B: It was amazing. I appreciate our friendship.
[00:54:36] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:54:37] Speaker B: And our professional engagement together.
All right, folks, that's it for now. Check out scthrive.org, learn more about what they're doing. And I think next week, Ron Harvey will be back with us. One of our earliest guests came on one of our best episodes, too. So stay tuned to that. In the meantime, lead on.
Me.
