Let’s Hear It

Holiday Re-Release - Shanelle Matthews of the Radical Communicators Network

Here is another one of our favorite interviews - Shanelle Matthews, founder of the Radical Communicators Network, former communications director for the Movement for Black Lives, and now Distinguished Lecturer at the Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership at City College at the City University of New York.

Shanelle is simply amazing and we loved this conversation.

Holiday re-release - the Great Jim Canales

Today, we offer another one of our favorite interviews - a blast from the past with the inimitable Jim Canales, President and Trustee of the Barr Foundation. Jim is charming, funny, and one of they absolute nicest people in philanthropy. If you didn't get a chance to hear this conversation the first time, you're in for a treat.

Holiday re-release Trabian Shorters!

This holiday season we're re-releasing some of our favorite and most popular episodes. Today - Trabian Shorters, one of our leading thinkers on asset framing - defining people by what they're hopes and dreams and what they have to offer. He has been such an important influence on so many of us.

Alison Smart is Changing How We Talk About Climate Change

In our latest episode, we offer a fascinating conversation with Alison Smart, the Executive Director of Probable Futures - a nonprofit climate literacy initiative. Alison shares her organization's approach to democratizing climate science, making climate predictions accessible, and providing practical educational resources for anyone, anywhere, for free.  

Eric and Alison discuss how we can better tackle the grand challenge of climate change, the role of local governments, and how we have to stop raising awareness already. Alison also reminds us that we can still do well in a changing climate and that our planet is still way better than Mars!

Check out this conversation – we learned a ton about how to communicate about climate and we’ll bet that you do too.

Larry Kramer’s Hewlett Foundation Exit Interview

When Larry Kramer announced recently that he was leaving the Hewlett Foundation to run the London School of Economics, it marked the end of an extraordinarily productive tenure as the head of one of the world’s largest and most influential charitable foundations.

In Larry’s nearly twelve years at Hewlett, he helped lead a new era of climate philanthropy, and launched initiatives in transparency, cybersecurity, democracy, racial justice, and economy and society. The guy’s been busy.

He’s also candid, funny, and ridiculously smart. Five years after he last interviewed Larry (for the very first episode of Let’s Hear It) Eric made the pilgrimage to Menlo Park to speak with his former boss about what went right and what went wrong during his time at the foundation, as well as his thoughts on the state of philanthropy, foundation communications, democracy, and, of course, the Beatles.

You *seriously* don’t want to miss this episode with one of the field’s most expansive thinkers.

Jen Carnig, the Brand-Spanking-New Head of Spitfire Strategies

As the new president of the groundbreaking consulting firm Spitfire Strategies, Jen Carnig, who succeeds the legendary Kristen Grimm, might feel a little like whoever takes Megan Rapinoe’s place. It might seem a little daunting and very hard on your hamstrings, but think of the possibilities! Jen may have big shoes to fill, but she’s obviously ready to get busy.

A champion strategist in the areas of advocating for police accountability, community safety, human rights, and exposing the perils of artificial intelligence, Jen has big plans for Spitfire. In addition to her impressive resume, she clearly has the people skills for the job. She is uncommonly kind, thoughtful, and deeply committed, and Jen chats with Eric about the power of listening, how communications is really about relationships, and how hard Spitfire works so that its clients can succeed in their work. Please join her and Eric as they go deep on how to use communications for good.

Ashwath Narayanan is Proof That There’s Hope for the Future

When our guest, Ashwath Narayanan, was 22, he launched Social Currant, a creative agency that is helping nonprofits and issue organizations use social media to reach audiences more effectively. By contrast, when co-host Eric was 22, he was working as a production assistant on low budget horror movies. So there’s that.

Ashwath and his team of six fulltime staffers are working with TikTok and Instagram influencers to encourage young people to drive social movements and inspire political campaigns. In his conversation with Eric, he spoke about how Social Currant uses really sophisticated tools to create and test messages and score huge victories in campaigns that are providing young people with a powerful voice and legitimate influence with decision makers on issues like the child tax credit, health, and many more.

Eric told Kirk that his conversation with Ashwath wasn’t just one of the most interesting conversations he’s had on the show, but in his life. 

If you want learn about how to run a great strategy to reach young people, or if you want to feel better about the kind of talent that is stepping up to make the world better, you really, really, really shouldn’t miss this episode.

You may have noticed, also, that we have a brand-spanking-new LinkedIn page! Please give us a follow and use it to learn more about our guests, contact us with questions or feedback, and connect with other listeners.  Oh, and please tell your friends and rate us on whatever podcast platform you use. It really matters!

Stacy Palmer of the Chronicle of Philanthropy Reflects on Thirty Five Years as a Watchdog and Cheerleader for the Field

On our latest episode of Let’s Hear It, we’ve snagged a giant in philanthropy. Our guest this week may well know more about philanthropy than any human walking the planet. Stacy Palmer created the Chronicle of Philanthropy thirty-five years ago, and since then her publication has simultaneously been philanthropy’s watchdog and its cheerleader (as it has served as a dating app of sorts between fundraisers and grantmakers).

 

Stacy speaks with Eric about what she’s learned over this time, what philanthropy does well, and how it can improve. Eric and Stacy discuss the shifting role of communications at foundations, congressional regulation (or lack thereof), how coverage of the field has changed, and the influence of living donors like Bill and Melinda Gates and MacKenzie Scott on philanthropy, among other topics in this entertaining and wide-ranging conversation.

 

If you care about raising money, giving it away, or communicating about any of it, don't miss this conversation!

Dena Kimball and David Brotherton on the Kendeda Fund’s Epic Journey

Spending out, spending down, sunsetting – whatever you call it, it’s a tricky business.

This year the Kendeda Fund will close its doors, having provided over one billion dollars in funding over the past thirty years. Their causes included girls’ rights, preventing gun violence, environmental sustainability, advancing racial equity, and supporting veterans, among others.

Kendeda began as an anonymous grantmaking effort by Diana Blank, who eventually decided to turn the reins over to her daughter Dena Kimball and to allow the foundation to communicate freely about its work. To do this, they turned to David Brotherton, a consultant with a long history in foundations and communications, to help the organization step into the light.

Dena and David sit down with Eric in a freewheeling conversation about the decision to go public, spend out, and about what they learned along the way.

To learn more about their great work, stay tuned for their updated website and in the meantime check out Kendeda’s new podcast, Stories from the Kendeda Fund.

Going Commando with Nima Shirazi of Spitfire Strategies and Citations Needed

Going Commando with Nima Shirazi of Spitfire Strategies and Citations Needed

This week on Let’s Hear It, cynical-ish and salty-tongued Nima Shirazi of Spitfire Strategies and the hit podcast Citations Needed endures a slightly arduous, minorly torturous time behind the mic with Eric.

Nima’s career is full of exciting experiences, including his current job as a vice president at Spitfire Strategies and drumming in rock bands, and especially Citations Needed. Nima and his co-host Adam Johnson set up shop at the intersection of power, politics, propaganda, and the press (pretty peppy party, Pete) – no small feat, as it happens.

Nima’s show explores the many ways that media language infiltrates our daily lives and how pernicious those terms can be. For instance, did you know that the term “officer-involved shooting” was created in the 70s by the LAPD to describe officers killing members of the public? Nima uses his experience on the podcast to keep him honest-er in his work and his approach to communications.

We wouldn’t call him the biggest optimist in the room, but you’ll appreciate Nima’s thoughts about how progressive organizations can use communications to change dangerous narratives. Listen now to hear how (how now, brown cow? Okay, we’ll stop). 

Tony Proscio Deconstructs Word Salad in the Philanthropic Jargon Space

We have an impactful episode deep-diving into how Tony Proscio, a thought leader in this space, has moved the needle on the innovation of language in nonprofit and foundation work. He and Eric partner to get granular on staying transparent with folks from the donor pipeline to the board room.

*record scratch* Just kidding!

This week on Let’s Hear It, Eric and legendary former strategic planning consultant and jargon denouncer Tony Proscio sit down to grouch about why foundations and nonprofits can’t just say what they mean. Tony, a personal hero of Eric’s, should be required reading for anyone working in communications. His three books, entitled “In Other Words: A Plea for Plain Speaking in Foundations; When Words Fail: How the Public Interest Becomes Neither Public Nor Interesting; and Bad Words for Good: How Foundations Garble Their Message and Lose Their Audience” decry the current trend toward using jargon when plain words are needed and why this obfuscation has led us to our current gerund pileup.

Fear not – the episode isn’t all Eric and Tony doing their best impressions of the two crabby Muppets in the balcony. Tony has some hopeful words to say about how people working in nonprofit and foundation communications can improve, including how technology has brought us closer to clarity and authenticity. Just don’t try to find him online.

Enjoy this great discussion, and remember: no empty calorie words. 

Tara Dorabji on the Power of Art and the Art of Power

As long as there has been art, there have been artists using their creativity to try to transform society for the better.

On the latest episode of Let’s Hear It, Eric speaks with Tara Dorabji, Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer at the Center for Cultural Power, an organization dedicated to harnessing the power of creativity.

Tara Dorabji and her colleagues Erin Potts and Dr. Melanie Meinzer have crafted an extraordinary new report – Building Narratives of Joy: Experimenting with Transformational Narratives – that digs into the intricacies of shifting mindsets and fostering belonging through art.

Tara speaks with Eric about how she got kicked out of the farmer’s market for being too political, how she facilitated a conversation with a Japanese anti-nuclear advocate that brought a Livermore Labs PR person to tears, and how the Lego superhero Vax Man helped dramatically increase vaccination rates among Latino youth in California’s Central Valley.

Yep, narrative can do all that. Join us for this great conversation.

Making Reparations a Reality: Blazing a Trail to Racial Repair with Trevor Smith

Join us in this thought-provoking and inspiring episode as we welcome Trevor Smith, the Director of Narrative Change at Liberation Ventures, an organization helping to strengthen the movement for Black-led racial repair.  

Trevor is a writer, researcher, and strategist focused on the topics of racial inequality, wealth inequality, reparations, and narrative change. He is also the creator, curator, and editor of an amazing newsletter – Reparations Daily (ish).

Trevor talks with Eric about the growing movement calling for reparations as a catalyst for true racial repair. He invites us to reflect on how we can all work toward a new narrative on reparations, and how we can create a democracy that is inclusive, empathetic, and centered on principles of justice.

So, whether you're passionate about social justice, interested in narrative change, or simply eager to learn more about the path to a more equitable society, this episode promises to leave you inspired and informed.

Designing the Office Space for the Aftertimes - Emily Krone Phillips of the Spencer Foundation and Francis Court of Wondersphere

Let’s face it, most of us will never work the way we did before COVID. The office is different, and how we learn, share, and connect are different. So what are we going to do about it?

Emily Krone Phillips, the Communications Director at the Spencer Foundation, working with her colleague Francis Court of the design firm Wondersphere, decided to revolutionize the Spencer Foundation's office space to adapt to the post-COVID work world. 

Join us for a really fun and lively discussion about space, communications, and work in the Aftertimes as Eric interviews Emily and Francis about how they took your standard-issue foundation office and redesigned it into a hub for collaboration, learning, and community engagement.

For all of you out there trying to figure out how we’re going to work together in this crazy new environment (so, basically, everybody), don’t miss this episode. It may just change how you think about the "office". 

Alan Jenkins asks, “What if the 1/6 Insurrection Succeeded? – in a Comic Book

Harvard Law professor Alan Jenkins has argued cases before the Supreme Court, made grants at the Ford Foundation, co-founded a national narrative change nonprofit, and now has co-authored...a comic book.

But not just any comic book. 1/6: The Graphic Novel is a powerful and chilling reminder that great communications and great advocacy takes many forms. He and his co-author Gan Golan and artist Will Rosado give us a dramatic new look into what happened on that terrible day and what might have happened had the insurrectionists prevailed.

Alan speaks with Eric about his love of comic books and a career that has been at the intersection of storytelling, law, and social justice for positive change. Don’t miss this terrific conversation with one of our field’s most creative and incisive communicators.  

Marta Tellado of Consumer Reports – Our Privacy is a Setting, and it Needs to be a Right

Marta Tellado’s new book Buyer Aware: Harnessing our Consumer Power for a Safe, Fair, and Transparent Marketplace is both an amazingly useful tool for today’s consumer to navigate the rat’s nest that is the modern marketplace and a manifesto for consumer freedom in the age of digital everything.

Marta talks with Eric about the dangers of the lack of standards in today’s digital world and how we can reawaken the “sleeping giant” of collective consumer power.

And for you nonprofits and foundations professionals out there, your audiences and your constituents are actually consumers first – making dozens of decisions every day that affect the success of your missions and your organizations. Hear how Marta is working to bring these two powerful worlds together.

Jacob Harold’s New Book Will Make Your Head Hurt (in a good way)!

Many of us spend a career doing something, gathering stories, ideas, skills, and things like that and think to ourselves, “Hmmm. All this stuff I’ve learned might make a good book,” and then go right back to the brewpub for another Hazy IPA.

Not Jacob Harold. Mind you, Jacob has had quite a rather distinguished career – he’s been a community organizer, a Bridgespan consultant, a Hewlett Foundation grantmaker, the CEO of Guidestar, and the co-founder of Candid, among other things. After stepping down from Candid, Jacob endeavored to write it all down – not in a self-congratulatory memoir (which is what Eric hopes to do when he gets home from the brewpub), but in an extremely comprehensive and articulate guide to doing good in the 21st century. The book, The Toolbox: Strategies for Crafting Social Impact is quite simply one of the very best guides of its kind that we have seen.

Eric sits down with his former colleague to discuss Jacob’s career and how to apply the nine tools for social change, and Eric tells Jacob why the book made his head hurt (in a good way).

Using The Science of Storytelling to Change the Narrative on Poverty and Wealth: Shanelle Matthews of Radcomms and Annie Neimand of Third Sector

If you aren't at the table, you’re on the menu, Shanelle Matthews and Annie Neimand remind us. In their new report, Broke: How the Nonprofit and Philanthropic Sectors Are Talking About Poverty—And How We Can Do Better, they note, “The stories we’re currently told about how the rich got rich, why the poor stay poor, and why people can’t “move up” place the blame on individuals instead of systems. This creates a vast network of oppression, propping up business as usual and allowing the rich to remain rich, while others suffer.”

Shanelle and Annie resolved to provide us with the tools we need to tell more accurate and liberating stories about poverty and wealth. This project was a collaboration between The Radical Communicators Network, the Center for Public Interest Communications, and the creative design agency Milli, and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Shanelle is the Communications Director for the Movement for Black Lives, the founder of the Radical Communicators Network, and our first repeat guest! She was joined by Annie Neimand of Third Sector, who at the time was the Research Director at the Center for Public Interest Communications at the university of Florida in Gainesville and is the first relative of a previous guest (her uncle Rich) to appear on the show.

 

Shanelle and Annie had a great conversation with Eric about the research project they designed and their terrific new resource to advance new narratives about poverty and wealth.

Ken Weine of the Metropolitan Museum of Art Has a Very Important Person on the Line

Ken Weine blows our mind. As the Chief Communications Officer and Senior Vice President for External Affairs at one of the most famous and (dare we say it?) important cultural, social, and historical institutions on the planet, he oversees the marketing and media for 43 exhibitions a year, not to mention the famous Costume Gala, debates around cultural appropriation, the challenge of removing donors’ names from the museum, regular protests on the steps of the museum, and on the day we spoke, a very important visitor. And that’s a semi-normal day.

Ken spoke with Eric about how he keeps all the plates spinning, and how he continues to try to breathe new life into a 150-year-old institution (maybe someone will name their child after him thanks to his amazing idea of Date Night at the Met!). More than that, we hear from one of the finest in the business about how we can use communications to significantly advance the goals of any organization.  

Jenn Hoos Rothberg of Einhorn Collaborative Dares You to Hope

If you work in the social sector, you know how hard this moment is.

You would be forgiven for feeling that our social and political world is spinning hopelessly out of control. Go ahead, belly up to the bar, or the ice cream section of your local supermarket, or whatever you do when you get that feeling.

On the other hand, Jenn Hoos Rothberg, the Executive Director of Einhorn Collaborative – a charitable foundation based in New York – might just give you a bit of hope.

She’s not naïve. She knows that things are tough. Trust is down and skepticism is up. People don't feel seen, heard, or valued, wherever they land on the ideological spectrum.                                                                                                            

Jenn says that we’re in a crisis of connection – we’re more alienated, lonely, and polarized than ever.

The result, of course, is tragic for the things many folks care about – the environment, women’s health, racial justice, hunger – you name it.

At Einhorn, she has launched an extraordinary new project called “A Call to Connection: Rediscovering the Transformative Power of Relationships.” She spoke with Eric out about how she is partnering with leaders in multiple sectors to better understand how vital human connection is to effectively address the challenges of our time.

We’re as cynical as the next pair of podcast hosts, but we hope this is one of those conversations that we hope will inspire you to engage and connect and feel good about what we can accomplish together.