Given my history as the founder of one of the country's largest event companies, I'm asked often about the mud-obstacle craze. And specifically, I'm asked if it makes good fundraising sense for nonprofits. The short answer is, you have to go where the people are. The longer answer is here, on this post I wrote yesterday for Plenty's blog. Answers await you there!
We have all heard the conventional wisdom on Millenials -- they are overly optimistic, flighty, and entitled. They don't want to work. They have been coddled by overprotective parents.
I spent Saturday with 50 or so members of Northwestern Student Holdings, a student group that owns and operates small businesses on campus. They had just concluded Impact Week, during which the young entrepreneurs partner with local charities to raise money.
I think about how I spent my undergraduate years ... and running a social enterprise wasn't it. These young college students raised several thousand dollars in just a week. They were focused and engaged and inspiring. Their energy was contagious.
If the only experience you have had with someone in their early 20's is through what you've heard from pundits, you owe it to yourself to spend an afternoon with a real live person. Will they look at their cell phone from time to time? Yes, but so will you. On the whole I bet the experience will leave you inspired and optimistic. I know it did for me.
Yesterday I posted to the Plenty blog one of the more powerful and personal pieces I've written in quite a while. It is about Nigeria and Central Africa -- and it is also about you, me, and our role in creating justice. I hope you will give it a few minutes of your time. The text of the article is here.
The first three months of Plenty have been a whirlwind. It is hard for me to believe that we've only been around since the end of November, because in only a few short months I've learned so much from the fantastic team here.
It wasn't easy leaving Event 360, the company I helped found eleven years ago. Event 360 specializes in event fundraising. Through our work we raised nearly a billion dollars for charity. As the CEO, I was responsible for strategy, for presenting a great deal of our client-facing work, and more than anything, for helping drive the values of the company. Event 360 was (and will always be) my baby, and I'm tremendously proud of what I helped accomplish there.
And yet over the last few years I found my goals and aspirations changing. In particular I became increasingly interested in the philanthropic mechanics behind events -- a mechanic we call peer-to-peer fundraising. As my time and attention steadily turned towards constituent analytics. multi-channel approaches, and overall nonprofit strategy, it was harder for me to devote time to large-scale events.
When I finally talked to my partners at Event 360 about leaving, I found willing friends. They saw my evolving interests and supported my desire to do something new.
To say that I started Plenty from the ground-up would be a complete fabrication, because of course no one does anything worth doing by themselves. And in my case I was very fortunate to have six compatriots join me in the launch. From the beginning, we have tried to put as much emphasis on the foundations of our young firm as we have on the compelling work we do with our clients. We wrote Plenty's values together; we picked the brand together; we assess our performance together.
I was reflecting on all of this while I was at the Run-Walk-Ride Conference in Atlanta last week. In a lot of ways, RWR was our coming-out party. Run-Walk-Ride is a tremendously important conference for the peer-to-peer space, and I've been lucky enough to present there for many years. But this year was the first time I attended with a business card that said, "Plenty."
It was fantastic to see the Plenty team share their expertise and energy throughout the sessions. Our group contributed in so many ways, and it was hard not to be struck by the sheer amount of competence and commitment the team brings to the table. But they bring something else, too. They bring a spirit of inclusiveness -- an eagerness to enlist others to create something bigger than themselves.
In the lead-up to the conference, our team was talking about something we could do at our conference booth. If you've ever staffed a sales conference, you know that "the booth" can fill even the most hard-core salespeople with dread. Working at the booth can be tiring; it can be nerve-wracking; it can be mind-numbingly boring. And so coming up with "something for the booth" is the trap of every trade show. It is easy to talk so much about SWAG and tchotchkes that you miss the core purpose of the booth, which of course is to engage with others.
In any case, we were kicking around ideas and a steadily escalating array of giveaways. Finally, someone on the team suggested we do something very basic: Hand out Post-It notes and ask passersby to write down what they are "Happy to have plenty of." It seemed like a corny idea, but no one had a better one, so we went with it.
You know what happened? People walking by the booth were interested to be asked to contribute. They stopped what they were doing and turned towards us. They would laugh and write a silly thought, then pick up another slip of paper and write something more meaningful. It's funny -- often in our desire to connect with others we forget to ask them to engage with us. We forget that they are the most important part of the conversation.
By the end of the conference, our board was covered with notes about abundance and reflections of gratitude.
I can't think of a better metaphor for my first three months at Plenty. We decided, "let's do something meaningful, together," and that was the most important step.
Have you ever asked a child to draw their world? It is interesting to see how the drawings differ depending on the age of the child. A three year-old will give you a few lines and maybe a circle for the sun. A five year-old will add in some people, some green grass, and maybe a rainbow. Or two!
But something happens in grade school. A third-grader will give you a picture of the round earth, and the sun and the moon, and maybe some planets and stars. Theirs is a completely different "world" -- instead of one centered on themselves, the older child draws their conception of a small planet moving around a massive solar system.
I can remember my first trip to the local planetarium. I'm sure I was seven or eight years old at the time. I remember giggling when the lights went off, and then oohing and aahing as the stars lit up. I can even remember Carl Sagan's voice challenging me to reflect on the limitless cosmos. And in that moment was planted the first seed of a frightening and profound thought: "Wow, maybe the world doesn't revolve entirely around me."
Almost all of us learn this lesson at some point in our lives. Most of us start to understand it as kids. The lesson deepens when we are adults, maybe as an outgrowth of tragedy or hardship, or perhaps as a result of immense gratitude. A few of the more preoccupied among us don't fully get it until we are very old. An unlucky few never really get it, and die missing one of the core messages of the universe.
Here's the thing: There are billions of people on the earth, and the fact is that the worries and concerns and goals and priorities each of us carry around don't matter much to anyone we meet, and don't matter at all to the people we don't. We are immeasurably insignificant to the universal machinery.
And yet the other truth is that we each have been given a unique combination of gifts and talents. The limitless cosmos is made of individual stars. As much as you might not want to admit it, you are distinct. There is a role somewhere that only you can play. You are immeasurably important to the universal outcome.
As we enter the new year, I find this duality daunting and inspiring. If my worries don't matter, I must be wary about my own vanities and understand that I will be most useful outside of my own head and in the world at large. And if my part is uniquely important, I must find the courage to push myself past my own doorstep.
As we enter the new year, I have no doubt that you offer something unique and I have no doubt that we need you to offer it. My 2014 wish for us all is that we find the humility to push past our individual conceits and find the courage to unlock our distinctive talents. It is indeed a big universe, but we need as many stars as we can find.
Happy new year!
