Lessons Learned in 2022 and Predictions for 2023

0:05 All right we're gonna get started welcome everybody to the final Building Forward ... for the year I'm really
0:13 excited to have y'all here ... you know the drill it's a 25 minute conversation
0:19 starting my timer ... and we're just here to talk about uh
0:24 reflections of the year and predictions going forward so I'm going to pull in each of my amazing team members to hear
0:31 from them ... what they learned this year and what they think might happen next year so
0:37 with that I should probably introduce myself my name is Emily Barany and I'm the founder and CEO of Visionality and
0:44 I'm really excited to introduce our first co-star for the day Brianne
0:50 Breanne why don't you join me hello my friend always show up with the bright
0:56 blue background Breanne what did you learn this year
1:04 foreign so I think one of the biggest things I learned this year is a reminder that
1:09 progress isn't linear we spent a lot of time working on
1:14 growing as a company and creating all these steps of defining lanes and jobs
1:19 and and really making big ... progress and strides forward
1:25 and then things happen and all of that kind of flew out the window for a period of time
1:31 and that is so can be so demoralizing right when when you're like really on
1:36 the track and you're starting to to like see those Milestones get ticked away and
1:42 then something sets you back it's just disappointing but it's totally effective
1:48 life and business and nonprofits yeah and it doesn't mean that we're going
1:54 backwards and we can't still reach those goals it just means reprioritizing and does this mean
2:00 success now and how do we use those same ... goal posts in the future if we need
2:08 to adjust them and so ... you know a lot of our work just went on pause and now
2:14 that we have more staff again like we can finish the work and keep going
2:19 forward keep it more you know I was talking with a colleague of mine recently and her about a setback
2:27 that I was having professionally and what she said to me was like Emily this is the middle of the story and that just
2:35 like really that just really hit for me this is the middle of the story and it can so
2:42 , I... I think it's beneficial to have that big Zoom back well and I think especially for you and me Brienne
2:47 because we work primarily in the operations side our big wins are years
2:54 in the making right like those massive payoffs that we can measure and recognize is from work that we put in
3:00 years ago so it can be hard it's beneficial to take that big step
3:06 back and to say look where we were a year ago and like
3:11 it was a million little baby steps that got us here so it cannot feel like big progress but like when you take a zoom
3:17 back it just feels exactly you just kind of have to be able to move between looking at the micro details of what's
3:24 happening right now and stepping back and looking at the whole picture I love it I love it well what do you
3:31 think is going to happen next year what's your what's your grand prediction for 2023
3:36 I think that a lot of organizations are going to find themselves like stepping
3:42 back into having to look at those big pictures again ... and just kind of like as they were
3:48 you know the past couple years coming out of covid like still oh this is what
3:54 happened and how we shifted and needing to take those back and like redefine success and what that looks like from
4:01 what they had planned to do and where they are now and like re-route their
4:08 path of growth well and I find that too sometimes it takes like a big disruption to be a
4:16 catalyst to shed things that aren't serving you any more and like they're things that you're you're comfortable
4:22 with and maybe they're quasi-working for you but without like a big
4:28 a big shake-up like you don't have the motivation to shed some things and so I
4:34 I'm similar to you I'm looking forward to seeing what Visionality and what
4:39 other organizations choose to shed going forward as we continue to build out of covid
4:45 yeah I love it well thank you so much Brianne ... happy holidays and our next
4:52 guest star is my colleague Nico ... Nico good to see you necklace
5:00 Nico what ... did you give me just one thing that you learned this year
5:06 boy one thing I learned ... there's so many
5:12 ... one thing I learned this year that will also serve as my advice for next year is
5:19 to not be afraid to throw things at the wall and see what sticks and kind of discard things that don't
5:25 ... with a number of my clients there were ... very like
5:31 funding needs that sort of came out of nowhere like we need to do X before this day or else why bad thing will happen
5:38 and it's like okay we'll shoot and kind of have to drop everything and sort of game plan quickly and in that you can
5:45 sort of try different things in different ... I don't know communication Styles
5:51 solicitation Styles whatever you name it to see what is working and having to be
5:58 quickly kind of assessing what is working what it's not and not be afraid to throw out the things that don't work
6:04 that's what I learned this year yeah just put a lot of stuff out there and maybe like a lot of lower lift things
6:12 measure the results quickly throw out what doesn't work and duplicate on what
6:18 is working yeah and you might even run into a case where
6:23 you could throw something out and you you don't think it's working and you look in hindsight well maybe maybe we
6:28 should go back to that another time if something similar to this arises I don't think it's a bad thing to be constantly
6:36 looking back in kind of just always in assessment mode yeah I love that which
6:41 just like goes back to your like marching orders which is like database
6:47 database database have a clean database so that you can measure your results you can track like people's progress of
6:53 giving and and that whole thing Nico I know that ... a handful of times this year you some of your clients had unmet
7:01 funding needs and they had to go out to the community and say like we're doing all this work but we have a gap um
7:08 between our program needs and the fundraising that we have talk me through like how that feels for an organization
7:15 because it's it's scary to say we don't have enough money to do this work yeah I think scary is the right way to
7:22 put it ... it might be a little embarrassing just to be like we're not we are our mission is to do X and we can
7:30 do X because we're missing y amount of dollars like that it might feel for some like a personal
7:36 failure ... even though it most likely in most about 98 of cases it's not a personal
7:42 failure but yeah it can be a little it can be a little humbling and humiliating to say like we're just not
7:49 able to do what we want to do or what we need to do because we're missing the funds ... but just kind of leading with that
7:55 sort of honesty I think can really resonate with some folks and they
8:00 people want to help and want to I want to give where they can so if you say we need help
8:05 ... and are and you're sure you can assure people that you're going to do the help or you're going to do what you
8:12 say you're going to do with the help that they're going to give you ... people will really respond to that need they really do
8:18 ... well and we saw so much of that during covid where ... some of our clients you know the
8:24 demand for their programs just like went off the charts and so I think I'm hoping
8:30 that covet helped some of us get more comfortable saying we have a gap in funding because it's actually great news
8:37 like our program is so successful that we need to expand it like that that's a
8:44 that's a cool thing to say but it still is a tough it can be a tough message
8:50 yeah absolutely it can be tough to say like yeah I think on one hand things are good
8:55 because the programs we provide are in so so in demand that we need more
9:01 resources at the same time like it's also these basic services that we
9:06 could be providing more and people need them and that's which is not so much of a good thing so that's a fine that's a
9:12 fine ... tightrope to walk and it's easy to follow one side or the other but again
9:18 see what sticks and some people might respond to message a or message B but
9:25 you can kind of ... as long as you're constantly assessing and not being afraid to change things on the Fly then
9:30 I think you should be okay awesome what great advice thank you so much of course our next
9:37 guest star is Llewellyn I'm so glad to have you on
9:43 Building forward so tell me what you observed ... this
9:48 last year and what your prediction is for the next year yeah so in 2022 the nature of my work
9:56 shifted in a really exciting way and not only was I doing operations for Visionality as I've been doing these
10:02 past eight years but I also really got into a driver's seat on client work and so my observation comes from both of
10:10 those seats and it's about hiring so it's about the fact that the great
10:16 resignation has really shaken up the situation for hiring in the non-profit
10:22 field and as we all know one of the factors that plays really heavily into
10:27 the great resignation is people who are leaving their jobs because they're looking for more meaningful work well if
10:33 you're looking for a more meaningful work where do you turn you turn to the non-profit sector
10:38 but the difference is that I think candidates who have been in that
10:45 journey of looking for more meaningful work in the non-profit sector are not this time compared to the Past are not
10:52 accepting of a lower wage so they're bringing that into the
10:58 negotiations and ... it is it's causing a shake-up in what
11:05 non-profits need to pay in order to make good hires
11:10 it's so interesting I was ... at an event last night actually and I was talking to
11:16 somebody and I shared you know we we're so excited we just brought on three new staff members and the
11:24 and I don't remember what the question was but but , I... I was like well yeah you
11:29 know a lot of people are just changing jobs you know they're they're changing
11:35 jobs and he's like well what did you do to like attract people and I was like
11:40 well I compensate them fairly I treat them kindly and by the way we bumped up
11:48 our vacation accrual we bumped up our paid days off we're closing our our office ... over the holidays and he was
11:55 like perks I said perks and he's like that works yes that works but it but the
12:03 basis is that you have to be in the same ballpark on compensation like what you said is exactly right no longer are
12:10 people willing to make a fraction because they're doing good work yeah it
12:18 feels like a redefinition a redefinition of perks to requirements
12:24 requirements requirements there's no conversation to be had it on that
12:30 negotiating table yeah yeah I love it any other predictions for the
12:36 rest of the year yeah I really think that this is going to and I will say
12:41 that it's a prediction that's really ... tied with a hope for me is that I
12:46 hope that the reality of these hiring processes that have led to these
12:51 conversations between candidates and hiring managers is going to trickle more
12:57 and more and more into the boardrooms and bring validity to the conversation
13:02 about competitive wages for non-profit employees and on my prediction and hope
13:10 is that at every level in that conversation people are going to step up the board members are going to be open
13:16 to that conversation that leadership is going to present this information to
13:21 boards in a Savvy way that is that speaks board language talks about return
13:27 on investment it quantifies what it takes and to turn over employee versus
13:32 actual really recruit and retain the ones that you have and this is maybe the
13:37 hardest one of all I really hope that non-profit staff members who have chosen
13:44 a career of service like that will own their value and be brave to ask for the
13:52 wages that they deserve and not even if they enter the non-profit service 10
13:58 years ago 20 years ago that they will still be brave in joining the conversation and saying yes I am worth
14:06 it I deserve a competitive wages yeah so that's a phenomenon called wage
14:11 compression where someone who entered years ago maybe when the pay brackets
14:16 were lower ... and maybe has just gotten in incremental raises but then all of a
14:23 sudden now that the the standards are higher someone comes in
14:29 at a higher rate than somebody who who has tenure at the organization and so
14:36 yeah it can be really a tough ... moment to say like we've got this
14:42 amazing candidate that we want to offer a job to but what must come
14:49 ... with that is to adjust other people's wages accordingly and account for their
14:57 tenure at the organization it can it can be a tough conversation but it's equity
15:03 and I'll wrap it up with just one other Factor playing into this as of January 1st organizations with five or more
15:09 employees are required to post their salary ranges on their job descriptions hopefully your organization has already
15:16 been doing that regardless of your size because that's the right thing to do to have an honest starting point with your
15:23 employees but that is that's going to add to this conversation about wage compression if ... all of a sudden you
15:31 are in an organization where employees have not had that awareness about salaries with their colleagues and you
15:38 you want to get ahead of that and you do not want to alienate the employees that have worked with you so for a long time
15:45 well and and that can be a challenge because you can you know bring bring
15:50 people up to the sort of new wage band but then there are further opportunities to reward tenure maybe it's a one-time
15:58 thank you bonus maybe it's greater vacation and accrual you know um
16:04 grade like priority on ... professional development opportunities but there does need to be
16:10 this recognition Beyond we're going to bring everyone into the same ballpark but also
16:17 to make good on on the investment that that employee has made
16:22 ... just to you know make everyone feel a little better yeah and do the right thing do the right thing
16:29 yeah be kind thank you so much Llewellyn okay our
16:35 next guest star is my colleague Delaney Delaney I'm so glad to have you
16:44 what did you learn this year well mine actually fits in with pretty much the
16:51 conversation so far ... I learned about the massive importance of adaptability
16:57 ... so I started a Visionality in mid-August and you guys were in the middle of a pretty big transition and
17:05 hiring like trying to hire three new people and onboarding is already always
17:11 such a big undertaking so with that
17:16 transition it was like even more massive ... and but despite that like the team
17:23 really came together everyone was really able to work together ... we were able to lean into each other
17:29 and count on each other ... everyone was like handed off we were handing projects
17:36 kind of back and forth we did what we needed to do ... and everyone
17:41 trusted each other to get done what needed to get done which was awesome for
17:46 me because the last couple years I've spent as a contractor just working on my
17:51 own you know which you know I've I've been able to adapt to different teams in that way but
17:58 it was nice to be a part of a team for like a longer period of time and see how these
18:05 projects play out not just like jump in okay I'm done leave so it was really
18:11 nice like teamwork and adaptability have been huge for me this year I love it well and it is tricky to
18:18 ... because when a new team member comes in there is a loss of productivity right because the the the Newbie needs to
18:26 maybe learn the tools or learn the voice of the client or learn the workflow or
18:31 personalities of the organization or the clan or or whatever and so that ... brief
18:37 reduction in productivity can sometimes be so uncomfortable that
18:43 you just circumvent it right and you don't give the our newbies the the
18:48 opportunity to come up to speed and like I know that in the moment it can feel like the right
18:55 choice like oh I'll just do this myself but that actually does such a disservice to the new person coming on but also the
19:02 team as a whole like we all need the opportunity to learn and to to come into
19:08 an organization yeah yeah there's definitely a balance ... there there's like a fine line to
19:15 walk because I've come into places where they've given me something to work on
19:22 and very little Direction and they're not there to answer questions and then
19:27 I've come into places where you know they don't want to hand things off and it does have to be somewhere in
19:34 the middle there because you need to be able to trust the person that they can take the job and they'll ask the
19:40 questions that need to be asked when they have them yeah yeah well would you
19:46 pick them for next year ... so I think this is going to be a huge
19:51 Drive in hiring ... this flexibility and adaptability on both for both the
19:58 candidates and the organizations ... so I think that the organizations are
20:04 going to have to identify the adaptability that they possess or
20:10 don't possess and either ... work together to grow that like teamwork adaptability you know process
20:19 ... and for employees they need to really look at projects they worked on that they've
20:25 been able to use that and Market that effectively because it's gonna be you
20:31 know with like Llewellyn was talking about ... the great resignation
20:37 there is going to be a lot of transition it already has started happening and
20:42 it's going to continue so people are going to have to step in where they're needed I love that yeah thank you so much
20:51 so now it's your turn Emily ... okay I know this year's been nothing but adapting to the situation there's been a
20:57 lot of transition so what have you learned yes so I'm just gonna piggyback
21:02 right off of what you were talking about and I'm so glad that it's ... you and I having this conversation because the the
21:10 primary driver for us bringing you in-house right because you were one of our like trusted Partners
21:16 ... helping us with a lot of projects over a number of years and we asked you to come in-house as an employee because
21:23 one of our employees Taryn ... had a baby and so you know we we
21:31 in order to adapt to this changing situation that that yippee skippy our
21:36 employees gonna be out for a while to have a baby ... we adapted and we made this big change
21:43 and we brought you in-house we brought you in-house really early because we
21:51 didn't want we just we just needed it to be
21:56 tight we needed you to be fully up to speed when ... Taryn went out on
22:02 maternity and then what happened Delaney she went on maternity a week early
22:10 and so , I... I just think that doubles down on like adaptability but also just like
22:16 embracing that things are not going to be perfect ... and and being
22:23 leading with an Adaptive mindset makes things not being perfect like not scary
22:30 anymore because it's it's so much less about like oh I know exactly what I'm doing to reconfigure anything out like I
22:38 don't know what the next challenge is but I know that this is the right team to figure it out yeah and that's been your motto a lot uh
22:47 through just making Visionality work yeah just figure it out
22:55 how do you think that's gonna move forward into next year yeah I so I have
23:02 , I... I agree with you that staff is going to continue to turn over we need to
23:08 destigmatize what it means for the employer when a staff member takes a different job
23:14 ... it it doesn't mean that you are a bad employer or your company is a a Bad
23:21 Company people move jobs for many different very positive reasons and so
23:29 that was a lesson that I continue to try to learn and accept that you know people
23:36 people change jobs for incredible reasons and
23:42 ... one big learning moment for me this year was changing the way that I saw
23:47 transition we had two very key staff members take other opportunities this
23:52 year and I continue to work really hard to see that as a celebration of them and
23:59 of movement in their careers and so we created this term called graduating an
24:05 employee and and what I've heard is when you are leaving a job your last few days
24:11 feel like your funeral they it just feels really weird everyone's talking about you like you're not there and so
24:18 we decided to turn it into a graduation party and it was really fun so
24:26 ... so that's my hope that I'm putting into the universe for next year is that we destigmatize turnover we de-vilify
24:35 our employees when they take their next great opportunity and instead celebrate
24:40 it because you know whatever whatever I did as an employer built them and and supported them to
24:47 take their to be able to say yes to their next big step
24:52 yeah I love that see and that goes back to the beginning when you're talking about the middle of the story like this
24:59 was the middle of their story it's the middle that's fine I love it thank you so much Delaney
25:06 thank you so now it is my great pleasure to introduce our three team of newbies
25:14 that's what we have coined them are our newbies so Visionality took a really big
25:20 leap forward and we hired three new employees we went from a team of ... six
25:27 to a team of nine which is a big jump so I would love to actually invite all of our newbies onto the screen and ... first
25:35 introduce you but then also give you an opportunity to share what your hopes are for next year so
25:45 please join me Katie I see you first so so you're on
25:52 Deck everyone this is our brand new colleague Katie we're so glad to have you what what's your hope what's your
26:00 prediction for next year I think as we're like truly navigating
26:06 out of covid right now I'm really looking forward to making like long-term fundraising plans for people now that we
26:13 have a little bit more stability ... and things are longer lasting
26:18 because we've been in this time of just like flexibility adapting canceling
26:24 things trying something new but I feel like we're getting back to a point where we can do ... something sustainable and and really
26:31 work with what we are now calling The New Normal yes love it love it thank you
26:37 so much all right Jeanette it's your turn everyone please meet Jeanette
26:42 ... what is your hope what is your prediction for next year well my hope
26:49 ... is that with this with this big change in my life that I'm going to bring together my personal and
26:56 professional goals together to live a really balanced good life and I've resonated with everything that ... you
27:04 know our team members have said that ... it's work that matters it's making
27:09 decisions for your life based on your own values and that
27:14 ... the knowledge that we have control over our lives and we can make changes for the positive and so I'm really
27:20 looking forward to being my best professionally and giving back and sharing what I know with other team
27:26 members and also learning so much which I've already done learned so much from all of you and then being good to myself
27:34 I love that so much and it echoes ... Angela and I had a meeting just before
27:39 this sort of of like how covid and working from home and doing all this
27:44 Zoom has sort of humanized all of us like we all have pets or families or a bad
27:53 hair day or whatever and and so I love what you said about sort of Leaning into
27:59 having an integrated life you don't have a work a work Jeanette and a home
28:04 Jeanette you have Jeanette and all pieces of Jeannette need to work together for you to be happy
28:11 yeah exactly I love it thank you so much oh one more thought yeah excited about
28:16 strategic planning because what you have all said about post covid I think strategic planning is going to end up
28:23 changing a bit I'm excited to see how ... how it affects our organizational
28:30 values of our clients and ... I think the surveys and questioning
28:36 that we do is going to bring back more interesting and I'm really I'm really
28:41 interested to see how our strategic planning is going to change and evolve
28:46 postcovid I am too yeah Angela it's your turn what are your
28:52 predictions for 2023 so my prediction is really just looking
28:58 forward to Bringing people together that's the core of who I am is bringing people together
29:04 ... being resourceful ... with Visionality or the different boards I serve on and different
29:09 committees and really bringing people together strength in the community as a whole and while doing that entering a
29:16 year full of gratitude you know I'm grateful that we live on this you know Tri-County area this this County that's
29:22 amazing Ventura County and Santa Barbara that are beautiful and we're very fortunate so I'm just going into the
29:29 year with a lot of gratitude I love it I love it thank you so much and you guys
29:34 we are so glad to have you on the team couldn't have come a moment too soon and
29:40 I can't wait to see what we all get to do together next year thank you all very much
29:46 so I wanna as we always do open it up to anybody else who might want to hop on
29:52 camera or or just unmute yourself and let me know what predictions you have
29:58 for 2023 or what's a a big surprising lesson that you learned this year
30:07 I normally put a filler question in here so that we don't have an awkward silence so
30:13 someone let's maybe we have
30:19 we have nothing and that's okay too so Happy New Year we did it it was a tough
30:27 one but it was a good one and ... I'm looking forward to seeing y'all in the
30:32 New Year so... See ya!