Welcome to Glad You Asked, a show about how active listening can help you build stronger connections with folks in your life, personally and professionally.

Join Martha Schumacher and this episode’s powerhouse guest Nneka Allen of The Empathy Agency for a conversation about accountability, trust, justice, and most of all, love. The ultimate goal of Active Listening is to build trust, and Nneka expertly explains how building trust is a stepping stone toward love. The two explore how understanding the way we each love, along with our core values, can help us to understand the different perspectives we each hold, to truly understand one another and build empathy.

Here are this episode’s questions:

Guest Q from Nneka: What is the nature of the love you carry?

Martha’s Q: Am I showing up with empathy or apathy...or a little of both?

Listener engagement Q from Birgit Smith Burton: Is my gift helping or hurting?

Action Item:

How would YOU answer the question, “What is the nature of the love you carry?” How would you share your answer with someone close to you who may not have the same values? Further, how would they answer, and are you ready to ask them? While it may not be true in every single case, their answers may surprise you - they’ll likely be very personal and, more often than not, bring up universal truths about human bonds and community.

Nneka’s insightful follow-up question: How can we be more trustworthy?

Resources & Links:

Nneka’s substack: https://theempathyagency.substack.com/

The Empathetic Nonprofit Leader Lab: https://courses.theempathyagency.ca/joinus-8b6e357a-8b8c-4d22-9c10-72fb0e83d75f

The Empathetic Power Checklist: https://courses.theempathyagency.ca/offers/q6Jzgya5/checkout

Prentice Hemphill’s book: What it Takes to Heal: How Transforming Ourselves Can Change the World: https://prentishemphill.com/book

Credits:

Glad You Asked is a Hazen Institute for Leadership Training podcast.

Join us on Patreon for more in-depth content.

If you have a question you’d like me to ask on our show, or you’ve used one of the questions from an episode in your life, send Martha Schumacher a message on LinkedIn, or send me an email at [email protected]. Learn more at hazeninc.com.

Produced by Patrick and Benjamin Childers of Odd Conduit Media.

Original music by Bassel & The Supernaturals featuring Herbie Hunkele on trumpet.

What will we find when we dig a bit deeper? I'm Martha Schumacher, and I'm glad you asked. Hello, and welcome to another episode. I'm so happy you're joining us today. Before we get into our conversation, I'd like to share some active listening ideas with you. As you'll hear in my upcoming interview with Nneka Allen, who I'll introduce in a moment, she utilizes a very effective active listening approach. Answering a question

With a question. There are many ways to employ this method, so let's take a moment to walk through a few of them together. We can use the following question as an example. Imagine you're speaking with a potential donor and they ask, How am I supposed to know which organization to support when there are so many options? The mirror or reflective question is one that I use often, as you may have already noticed on this podcast. When someone asks a multifaceted question,

Perhaps one that touches on multiple points, it's helpful to repeat the question back to fully understand what they're asking. You can start the sentence with if I'm hearing you correctly, or to make sure I'm understanding what you're asking, and then repeat the question or a paraphrasing question back to them. In this case, you could say, if I'm hearing you right, and please correct me if I'm off here.

You're looking for tools to help you narrow down your choices so that you can make the best one for you. By the way, paraphrasing is number three on the list of seven active listening key elements. Along those same lines, using follow-up questions for clarification is crucial. And guess what? Clarifying is actually number four on the active listening key element list. We all use words and language differently, so being aligned on definitions and context is

Is really important. In this scenario, you could ask, what does the right organization, quote unquote, look like to you? Let's start from there and then figure out which organizations fit into that mold. Another method is the Socratic approach or the bounce back. This is when you turn the question, or part of it anyway, back toward the person who asked it. In this case, you could ask, what options have you found so far?

And what is it about them that you like? Be thoughtful with this one because sometimes folks just want your opinion and can see the bounce back as deflection. So make sure to add, if you'd like my thoughts first, I'm happy to share. As always, please make sure you're building your questions with care and empathy so that they understand your motivation is simply to understand them. And very important, folks, you might have been thinking about this, especially you fundraisers out there.

Please be careful as many people have philanthropic advisors. You want to make sure that any counsel you provide is couched first and foremost in terms of them prioritizing seeking out counsel from that expert. Okay, so this brings us to today's engagement questions. Coming back round to empathy, the prompt I bring to the table is, am I showing up with empathy or apathy? Or a little of both?

Honest self-examination is crucial to active listening, and observing where we land on the empathy/slash apathy scale can ground us and help us move back toward empathy. Our listener question today comes from Birgit Smith Burton. She asks philanthropic donors to ask themselves: Is my gift helping or hurting? This question helps bring purpose back into the conversation around giving, focusing on the giving intent.

And the implications of what you're giving, how you're giving it, how it will be received, and why. And to be crystal clear, we're not just talking about financial gifts made to an organization. It's about giving our time, our emotional support, our anything and everything. And our guest, Nneka Allen, asks, What is the nature of the love you carry? This is a huge question with so many layers.

So instead of trying to spell it all out here, let's get into our conversation about accountability, trust, justice, and most of all love in this episode of Glad You Asked.

Welcome to Glad You Asked, a show about how active listening can help you build stronger connections with folks in your life, personally and professionally. I'm Martha Schumacher, and I've spent my career asking leaders, funders, donors, and community members thoughtful questions to help find the real reasons behind why they do what they do. And when you pursue these deeper connections, you ultimately arrive at the heart of what really matters, establishing trust.

On each episode of Glad You Asked, we'll explore three questions: one from our guest, one from a listener, and one from me. During a conversation with mission-driven leaders, we'll test how each question, each compelling prompt, makes active listening possible and deepens our relationships. Afterwards, we'll take a look at how effective our questions were in guiding a meaningful conversation and leave you with a call to action so you can use these questions in your own work.

and life. Now let's meet our guest.

Well, folks, here we go. Nneka is so many things. She is a relationship builder, a stone catcher. I love this, a freedom fighter, and a storyteller. Nneka is also an amazing coach. I can absolutely attest to that at the Empathy Agency. She's also an author and a teacher. And on top of that, she's a new, I hope I'm saying it right, nena.

Excellent.

So welcome, Nneka.

I'm so glad to be here, Martha. Thank you. And thank you for honoring my newest role, Nena, my as a grandmother, for those who might not be familiar with that term.

Yeah, I love that. Well, so we've been talking about this for a while. So I'm really, really happy to have you here today. And as we do on every episode of Glad You Asked, we're going to walk through three questions and we're going to kind of give our own thoughts, but also open it up around thinking about what audiences might be best engaged by each of these questions. So are you ready? All right, let's go for it.

We have.

Yeah. I'm ready. Looking forward to it.

Yay, good. Me too. Me too. Let's have some fun. So we're gonna start with your question, Nneka. And if you wanna take it away and throw out your question and give us your thoughts on it, we'd love it.

Sure.

Yeah, absolutely. So my question was, what is the nature of the love you carry? And I love this question because it opens us up to I think more than just how we think about it in our mind, but we can also think about our answers through our senses, you know, what does our love, you know, smell like, sound like, taste like, you know, just to become more clear about the the the nature of the love we we carry.

And when I think about love, I always think about trust. You know, it's hard to love without trust. And you know, I want my love to be rooted in trust. And I have a little story about that that I think just illuminates this point really well. When my daughter Destiny was maybe seven or eight years old, she wanted to go to Bogning. And I didn't have time to take her, but my brother.

Mm, mm, mm.

And his my younger brother and his girlfriend at the time were at the house and she was talking them into taking her to Bogging. And they were, you know, doing a real negotiation because my brother was saying, you know, I got some things I gotta do, so the window of time is short and I won't be able to bring you back home. Your mom will have to come and pick you up. And she was, you know,

making all her n negotiations and she was like, No problem, no problem. And he was like, Are you sure? You know, because at such and such a time I gotta go. And I was not I was an earshot. I wasn't in the conversation, I was just in earshot. And then I heard her say to my brother, because his insinuation is, I'll have to leave you there. And so she said, My mother will not leave me. And I love that story because

Ha ha ha.

Yeah

It so vividly expresses the trust that she had in me as her mother. She didn't have to ask me. She didn't turn to me and like she knew without a shadow of a doubt that if they went to Bognan and my brother had to leave at whatever time, that I would be there to pick her up. Right. And so the story just illuminates, you know, that inter

Mm.

Yeah, yeah.

connection between love and trust.

Wow. And well, first of all, go destiny. You said she was what, seven or eight? Seven or seven or eight going on twenty, right? Or yeah, right, right. my gosh. I also love that well, of course, the trust between you and trust to me when it comes to really anything we could be talking about regarding active listening, for example, the focus and the heart of this show.

She was supposed seven she was supposed seven or eight or something. That part, yes. Old soul.

Mm.

It really does always come back to trust, I feel, when we're having these conversations, because if you don't trust that what the person across from you is saying is real, is authentic, is, you know, above board, I I don't know, you know, it's gonna take a long time, if ever, to really be able to develop a level of trust where it's gonna be even worthwhile, you know, having such a conversation.

Mm-hmm.

And of course, I also love the mama, mama-daughter bond there on on your on on that story because she she knew and it and it probably I hope it warmed your heart and made you feel good to know that she knew and knows that she can trust you and that you'll be there for her. The one other thing I want to say about this question, it's so juicy. You know, I feel like just asking, just saying the words, what is the nature of the love you carry?

Yes.

Absolutely.

It's kind of disarming in the best possible way. You know, you think about, for example, whether it's an interview, whether it's someone, you know, talking to you about something that, you know, maybe isn't very personal, suddenly you're making things very personal and you're just you're again authenticity, you're keeping it real. You're getting to a very real place. So I'm gonna ask you, Nneka, what is the nature of the love you carry?

Yeah.

Well, it's trusting. I mean it's it starts and it is rooted in trust. And I think, you know, trust isn't just one thing. Trust is, you know, a variety of things. Am I reliable? Am I confidential? You know, am I accountable? Do I have integrity? There's a whole bunch of pieces to trust. So it's not just one thing, but I think we can't love unless we trust. And recently you probably know I wrote about

Yes.

The nature of the love we carry. And I asked the question, you know, what would it be like if we brought the familial love we have for our loved ones into our work, into the charitable sector? How would that transform us? How would that make the love we carry as a sector different, fuller, more robust, more attentive, more healing?

And so then that brings us to the question, how can we be more trustworthy?

That's right. And and one of the things, just so you know, that we've done on a couple of our other episodes as well is to say what's essentially either the follow-up question or what are adjacent question, you know, how do you dig even deeper? And that feels to me like a great way to dig deeper and to follow up. What about the trustworthiness piece?

So I have a couple of thoughts. So I've discovered that there are people in two camps. There's the people who give trust up front, they give all the trust up front. And people are free to spend it. And when it's gone, well. And then there's the other camp that is firmly saying, no, you're gonna have to earn this trust. And there's nothing wrong. Both camps, there's it's not a judgment, it's just a noticing of the two camps.

Mm.

And I think it's important to understand, well, w which camp do I fall in. I happen to be in the camp of I'm gonna give you the trust up front, and when you spend it, it's gonna be a hard time for you after that. You know? I think that trust is a fragile commodity that's earned and re-earned. So it's not something you have and you hold and then you just have it forever. No, it's something, it's it's it's a commodity, right? So it moves. I think that trust is observed.

Mm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

It is experienced. Right?

Is that a little bit about the actions speak louder than words, for example? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right.

One hundred percent, right? We know when someone's reliable. We know what accountability looks like when it's happening in front of us, right? We also know what integrity looks like. We can name that, we can we can touch that. We know what non-judgment is, we feel non-judgment, you know. We feel generosity, which is also a component of trust, right?

Yeah, yeah, wow. Yes. Of trust. That's right. Trust is a large umbrella, isn't it? My goodness. I by the way, I just want to come back for a moment to this idea of the two camps. Do you feel that there are times, probably millions of times, maybe every day, when some when the two camps, you know, when you'll get two people, one of whom is in one camp, one of whom whom is in the other.

Mm-hmm.

Yes.

And they're finding it hard, if not impossible, to communicate with each other. And they maybe don't even realize why, right? Maybe they're not even fully aware that it's because they're coming at it from, you know, pretty different, if not completely opposite mindsets, right?

Yeah.

Absolutely. This is where it's really important to be self-aware and to be willing to be vulnerable in that you can share with someone sort of like where you're coming from, you know? Because when we can make the implicit explicit, we can understand each other better. You know, we may not agree, we may not even like it. But if I understand, trust for you.

has to be earned. And you understand for me, I'm just gonna lavish the trust on you right now. But if you if you know if you fritter it away, you know, it's gone, you know. It helps us know, how to engage. You know, my daughter happens to be in that other camp, right? And so it's it's fascinating to just, you know, observe how that is different for her.

That's right. It's gone.

interesting. Okay. Yes. Yeah.

And you know, there's this really interesting balancing that I find happens now that we were both adults and now we live together again. There's a balancing effect I think that happens, at least for me. I don't know if she's influenced. I don't know to what extent she's influenced by my sort of orientation around trust. But I I I feel that, you know, mine is my I am influenced by the way she sort of approaches it. and I think that's good, you know.

Ha ha ha.

Well, per usual with you and I, right? We could stay on this question the rest of the episode. No problem. We will we will need to go to question two. However, I have one other thought of the on this that I'd love to hear. One of the things you and I have worked on really over the years now together that I'm so appreciative of in your coaching role has been around this idea of values alignment and especially around saying, What are, you know, my top values? Like how I being able to

No problem.

get that very long kind of laundry list of values out there that that you first shared with me. And then, you know, starting to whittle down, whittle down and get to what are my two. I bring this up in this case because again, in the nature of the love you carry, I feel that values alignment piece fits in perfectly with trust. And of course, just in general with how you love, why you love, and and right. And so I I'm I'm wondering if you have any

Mm-hmm.

Yes.

Yeah.

Thoughts on that around values alignment and and the love you carry.

Well, I think absolutely. I think our values, our top values in particular, shape so much of how we move through the world, like how we are with one another. And so when we're thinking about the nature of the love we carry, our values bear like significant weight on, you know, the texture of that love. When we think about love, we often think about it through the way we orient ourselves around it.

Yes, right. And then we want to project that onto everyone else. Yes? Is that where you're going? Okay.

Right. That's where and and so, you know, if other people around us, if we are able to understand how their values shape their love, it gives us the capacity to have to engage in cognitive empathy, taking a new perspective of love, right? And I think that's really valuable and really important as we understand there's not one way to love.

Yes.

and the nature of love looks a bunch of different ways depending on again the values we bring to it.

I love that. And I think before we move on, I will just add one thing when you talked about cognitive empathy is that let's make sure that we put into the show notes for this episode empathetic.

The the empathetic nonprofit leaders checklist. Yes, yes, yes. Absolutely.

There we go. There we go. I love that. So we'll make sure to share that out because I know that I've already found that to be incredibly helpful. And I remember that cognitive empathy, it's, you know, that that whole concept is right up front. All right. Well, Nneka, me too. So the next question we're going to turn to is an engagement question that I brought to the table today.

I love it.

And it's really a question that I think we all, any of us, any audience, any, you know, whether you're a formal leader, an informal leader, whatever your role is and wherever you are kind of in your life journey, is this question to ask yourself, which is, am I showing up with empathy or apathy or a little of both? What do you think about that?

Mm-hmm.

So I actually think sympathy is what comes up for me. And sympathy is often one of those things that goes unnoticed, but it's actually a real indication of disconnection. So empathy is on one end, apathy perhaps on the other end of a spectrum, but sympathy plays a role somewhere in between, I suppose. sympathy says I feel sorry for you.

Mm. Mm.

Mm, mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

You're removed from it, you're not in it, you're away from it. Empathy says I feel with you. And so I think sympathy in some ways can be more sinister.

Mm. Mm-hmm.

I mean, I'm it's not to diminish the the impact of apathy, because I think particularly when we think on a systemic level, the role of apathy in getting people to sign up for things that politically we might not want for the general society can be quite dangerous. So it's not to diminish apathy. But I think we see sympathy play a role more frequently in our lives.

Mm, mm.

And and because it is a signal of disconnection, and I don't know that a lot of people recognize that, you know? When something happens to us, we want to know that we we're being seen and we're being heard and that we're not alone. We want empathy. We want someone to feel with us, feel with us, right? Not stand from a distance and say, sorry, that happened to you. You know? And the su and the part that's not said out loud is.

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

And thank God it's not me.

Right. So it makes the person feel even worse. Wow. I I think particularly in management roles, right? If you're managing staff day to day and if if you're to your point acting sympathetic but not empathetic to and and you know, there the number of scenarios we could come up with are myriad, right? Whether it's they're having a health issue themselves, maybe they have a family member who's having a health issue, you know, whatever there's so many different scenarios where

Mm.

an employee comes to their manager, to the to their supervisor, their direct supervisor, right? With something, it's going to be pretty clear pretty quickly whether that person who is their direct supervisor really does care and is going to try to work with them together to help them or whether they are being performative. I really appreciate that reframing of the question because I I think it's a really good point that, you know, apathy exists. Of course it

Yes.

Mm-hmm.

That's right.

can be quite prevalent and and of course can be very damaging. I almost feel like we're saying here that, you know, sympathy is kind of the dangerous well, I was about to say relative or sister or brother, whatever, of empathy, and and that we need to really be vigilant about making sure that we're not slipping into that, into that area. Is there anything else you want to, I mean, it's funny because

Mm-hmm, mm hmm. Yeah.

Yes.

I think you might have figured out pretty quickly when I gave you these questions before the show that I intentionally made sure that I had one question with the word empathy in it. after all, folks, Nneka is the head of an agency called the Empathy Agency, and there's a reason for that. So I didn't know if there was anything else you wanted to kind of, you know, even expand on beyond the question around empathy and around how we can show up as great active listeners and using empathy.

Yeah.

That's right.

Yeah. You know, t two things, you know, I like the example that you gave about, you know, whether or not a leader is actually truly being empathetic or not, because it had me thinking, I would imagine it's rare to experience apathy in the relationship between a manager and their staff person. Right. And I'm not saying it's I don't I'm not saying it doesn't happen. I'm sure it does happen. I don't know that it's prevalent.

Mm, hm, mm, mm.

I'm prepared to be wrong about that, but I do think that sympathy and empathy have a greater chance of showing up in that relationship. So empathy is the precursor to love, right? It sets the the groundwork for love to flourish, and our you know, it's our ability to again be with people in their pain.

to be with people in their reality. And that is never convenient, I've found. It's certainly not convenient in a capitalist society.

Mm.

Mm-mm. Does not fit into that model, does it?

No. It doesn't. It requires time. It's often inconvenient. It you know, life happens and we know all kinds of awful things happen to people at the most inconvenient times, right? And then, you know, we're called on to be present to that, right? And so we have to slow down. We have to take time. And it's not easy to be with people.

Right.

in difficult situations or to be with people in painful situations or after they've been hurt, you know? And and so it calls on us to sacrifice, calls on us to stretch ourselves.

And it requires us to be okay with being uncomfortable.

Be feeling less in control, right? Yeah, so I wonder about that because to me that I think that's how then so many of the kind of communication breakdowns, the communication issues tend to bubble up is around folks feeling that loss of control.

That part. Absolutely.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But there's gifts in the connection that comes through empathy.

my goodness, that moment of just letting go. I you know, I think that idea again of letting go of saying, I don't have to be in control in this moment. What can I just do to help this person right now in in these circumstances? It's not an o it's not always an easy thing to do. And it's not always easy to know what to do, right?

Yeah. Well, you know, there's no substitute for just being. You know, being with people, being present with people. You know, that all by itself has deep value. You know? Witnessing another person's pain, being present in it with them, you know, acknowledging what is happening.

That's right. That's right.

Yes. Yep.

That's right.

Yeah.

Wen and not trying to bring solutions.

Yes, yes, that's right. Especially when often it can't be solved. And it may it may never be fully solved for that matter, right? Yes, yes, yes. Exactly.

Yep.

But we can bring service and so and we can ask, What do you need? What can I do? How can I how can I help you?

That's right. How can I be of service? How can I help you? And you know, the reality, right, for those listening is they may have an answer and they may not right then, right? I mean, that's okay. I think even just by asking. So coming back again to actively listening, you know, to kind of bring it all back to that once again, just showing that empathy by actually asking them, what can I do to help? Goes a long way, right?

Mm-hmm That's right. That's okay. That is okay.

It really does.

Anything else on this? Again, yet another one we could absolutely spend the rest of our time on.

I mean I could go don't don't invite me to go off, Martha.

All right. Well, I will then go ahead and and move to our third and final question. The time is, of course, flying as it always does with you, my friend. So this listener engagement question came from one of our faves, and that would be Birgit Smith Burton. and she is asking this question. She's saying philanthropic donors should really be asking themselves this question.

Yes.

And the question is, is my gift helping or hurting?

You got me on this question. You had me thinking about a whole bunch of different things. So so so let me say this. And actually I should say my sister had me go in on this question as it came from Beergit. so thank you for passing it along for this conversation. I'm I'm grateful. So the answer is obviously subjective. And I recently wrote about the necessity of the subjective being.

Wow, good.

Yeah, yeah.

In the context of an objective reality, in order for more complete answers to emerge. And so with that in mind, I have to step back from this question and ask: well, what do you think the purpose of philanthropy is? Right? For me, you know, philanthropy is always about manifesting greater justice in the world.

Mm, mm.

Yeah.

And so from that perspective, understanding that that's where I'm coming from, I can then use that as a gauge to answer the question is my gift helping or hurting, right? And I really love what activists and author Prentice Hemp Hill wrote. They wrote the kind of change we are after is cellular as well as institutional, is personal and intimate, collective as well as cultural.

Mm, mm, mm.

We are making love synonymous with justice. And so the way I would reshape the question is is our gift making love synonymous with justice?

Mm. And by the way, I hope it's okay to share coming back to values. Those are right there. Those are your two top values. Love and justice.

They sure are. Explains all the reasons why I got in trouble when I was younger. Let me tell you. Some of the reasons why I get in trouble now too, to tell the truth. But Yes, yes.

Are you is that those are your top values, right? Yeah, yeah. Wow, there is so much. Well, there's just so much to unpack in that. And then of course, the and tell me again, Prentice Hemphill, the number the number of concepts, even just in that brief quote, right? I mean, is is mind blowing. So it sounds to me like the

Prentice Hempel

yes.

question, the kind of the second question that you posed is yet again like we did with the last question, you've got almost an ancillary or adjacent is a better word, question that you're posing that then makes it possible for you, at least for your own purposes, right? And in your own space, can then guide you around, hmm, is my gift hurting or helping or helping or hurting? I'm gonna add one more thing to this.

I immediately went to this whole idea of when you're an in-house fundraiser, but frankly, even an in-house person, just period. This idea of mission creep, right? Of the idea of when a philanthropist will come and maybe it's someone who's been giving to you, maybe they've never given to you. You know exactly you, you are just nodding your head vigorously. and they want to fund something and it is not part of your mission. It's not part of your vision, and it's not even maybe part of your values.

Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

But it might be mission adjacent-ish. And as ever, right, we're constantly, especially these days, we're trying to get those those resources, those financial resources to fund our organization and to be able to continue to serve folks. And so it's tempting, and it happens all the time, unfortunately, to take that gift and perhaps not even have any conversation with that donor about the fact that you have now just created more work, likely.

For some, if not all, of the folks on staff, including perhaps the executive director who accepted the gift, you know, that was kind of where my brain I I think you went a lot you went a lot deeper, which I'm not surprised about, because you you always do and I it's one of my favorite things about you. I think I went a little more like I found myself in that moment when Birgit asked the question, thinking about what would it be like to be in house.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

when that happens and I think it still happens a lot. So that's just another kind of thought to add to this in terms of helping or hurting.

Absolutely. And you know, I firmly believe, I mean, I know lots of people will say this is just that's this is that's not practical, you know, it it's just not the world we live in. But I think this is the world we ought to live in. And and that world is when donors come to our organizations and offer us gifts to do things that are not in the pocket of our mission that we should be tapping.

Our sister and brother organizations who are doing that work so that they can deliver on the promise, you know, that this donor the change that the donor wants to make. the and and that is also about justice, frankly. And so that's the world I think we absolutely want to be living in. I also think that.

Amen.

Yes. Yes.

Unless we're able to answer that question, you know, what is the purpose of philanthropy?

In a way that is clear, we can literally find ourselves, you know, asking the question, is my gift helping or hurting? in the context of, for instance, people who already have access and resources. And so this is just gonna provide them with some more. And so the question is, well, that's not hurting, but is that actually helping? Who are we helping?

Right.

Right. That's right. Yes.

You know? you might remember I showed you my reflective and symbiotic fundraising model. And justice is the driver of that. That's the philanthropic relationship that I believe in. That philanthropy serves justice. And justice is the ultimate objective. And so if that's the objective, we can actually answer the question, is my gift helping or hurting?

Yes, yes.

Yeah. Yep.

Yes.

I love that. And I almost just want to leave it there. However, I want to amplify something you just said before before we close out today on a recent episode of Glad You Asked. We actually talked about an affordable housing group I've worked with who a donor wanted to give to them, but that donor really was much more focused in on homelessness, which is different, right, than affordable housing.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

And God love them, that nonprofit did exactly what you were saying, basically introduced them to another. And that of course raised the credibility of the affordable housing group with the donor because they I I think maybe in some ways we're a leaving maybe a little too shocked that that happened. And that relationship continues.

Love that.

Yes. Yes.

You know, so so I just to me it's it's a small yet significant example, I think, of exactly what you are saying. So all right. Well, Nneka, anything else on that?

Absolutely.

Well, I just I just think this came to me as I was listening to you. You know, we c in our sector we cannot I believe this is true in our personal lives too, but in the sector we can't chase money. We need to chase change. And change that is chained to justice, right?

Yes, and not change for change's sake. Change, yeah, real change, right? Yeah, I love that. Well, I'm going to end today a little bit differently, folks, than I normally do. At least end the the my guest segment of Glad You Asked Today. And I've had this conversation with you, Nneka, one on one. So I want folks to know that. And it it I've actually had it, it's been a while since we first had that conversation.

That's right.

Yes.

But I do want to go on record here today with Nneka's permission. And that is in my role as AFP Global Chair, which believe it or not, was six years ago. I just can't believe that. But I I had a moment, I had a period when I did not actively listen well enough. In other words, I didn't pay close enough attention to what was happening in your leadership role.

Nneka in Toronto. And I want to really go on record here and sincerely apologize to you for not reaching out, for not digging deeper, and for not getting to the bottom of what was happening. And so I just want to say here today, I am so sorry.

Mm-hmm.

Thank you, Martha. Thank you. I appreciate your honesty and your accountability.

Well, thank you for accepting my apology, Nneka. And I am just so grateful for today. I I hope folks here today through this episode, the beauty and the the robustness and the there are just too many words. The amazing person who I've gotten to know over now I think Nneka, we have been you know working together, yeah, with you as my coach for probably two to three, maybe even a little more than three years.

Couple years.

Yeah.

I appreciate you and I really appreciate you coming on today.

The feeling is mutual, Martha, and thank you for just opening up a beautiful space. Really beautiful questions to dig into. We could have been here for another couple of hours just, you know, waxing poetic about love and generosity and trust and empathy. It's so good. and thank you for, you know, how you ended this call. I think you know, healing can come in a lot of forms and you've just contributed a little bit more to my own. Thank you.

Hmm.

Thank you, my friend.

Hmm, listening back to this episode with Nneka, there is so much depth and richness in what she shares. For starters, I keep reflecting back on her follow-up questions, including, what if we brought the love we have for our loved ones into the sector? And how can we be more trustworthy? On trustworthiness, which is at the heart of active listening, our ultimate goal is to build trust.

And Nneka wisely points out that trust is observed and experienced. Ultimately, that actions speak louder than words. Feels like this is the perfect moment for Maya Angelou's famous and spot-on quote, When someone shows you who they really are, believe them. Amen to that. Nneka also highlights vulnerability. In other words, how you feel about trust and how crucial it is to make the implicit explicit.

And she focuses on cognitive empathy, making such a great point about how there is no one way to love. So powerful. And make sure to check out the show notes for her excellent and thorough nonprofit leaders empathetic power checklist. Our listener question today is directed at donors, though it can easily apply to our personal and professional lives as well. Birgit asks, Is my gift helping or hurting?

I'd like to share an anecdote that relates to this question on a personal level and also touches on empathy and control. Recently, I was with some close friends and a large group of people, and one of my friends just fell apart. She started crying in this huge crowd, and I just went over to her and hugged her. I'll admit it, even for me, and I'm a pretty tactile person, I had to push myself out of my comfort zone to do that.

Some of our other friends did the same. At that moment, I think we were all just thinking, okay, what does she truly need right now? What was really helpful is that a couple of days later, I heard from her that that was exactly what she really needed in that moment. But I think a really hard thing is that where our brains go is to fix it, to solve it. We often want to take charge and or simply get that safe feeling of control back.

By the way, not that we're ever really in control, and that's a myth worth covering perhaps another day. I think that idea again of letting go of saying, What can I just do to help this person right now in dealing with their circumstances? It's not always an easy thing to do, and it's not always easy to know what to do. But if we ask ourselves, is my gift, the interaction that I'm offering, helping or hurting?

We can come closer to achieving a helpful exchange. So, to reiterate, there is just no substitute for just being present with people. This comes up again and again, as it did in our most recent episode with Michelle. Being present is the goal to not only help others, but to be truly happy ourselves. It may seem intimidating, overthinking whether a gift, for example, is the right one.

Or any given action is the appropriate one, and that's where questions that help us stay grounded in the moment come into play. Instead of always trying to bring solutions, thinking three steps ahead, assuming we can read someone's mind, instead we can bring service. Try asking, for example, what do you need? What can I do? How may I help you? When I asked Nneka my query, Am I showing up with empathy or apathy?

Or a little of both, her thoughtful response took us a third route down the fraught, arm's length road of sympathy. Why is that fraught? Well, here's why. In Nneka's July 8th Empathy Agency Substack, Beyond Words, the real test of anti racism in organizations, I noticed the connections between her post and our conversation. Not only is it powerful and beautifully written as always.

But there is also a section near the end that focuses on principles and values, where she highlights how important it is to explain what these principles actually mean in practice, and to do so using meaningful prompts. She underscores that eloquent organizational commitments often strive for sympathy, not empathy, and since they're usually written using active language, the organizational leaders can often believe that they're doing enough.

But even if the wording is on point, to quote Nneka, words don't create change, they set an expectation of action. And without proper guidelines paired with congruent behavior by leaders, the words become meaningless and only stand as performative gestures to check a box. She goes on to share how we can remedy this by truly examining the core values we wish to uphold, creating an honest set of guidelines and

And then working every day to uphold those values. As Nneka also writes, we must move away from the transactional toward the relational. This doesn't come easy, and that's why we engage with experts who can help us. For example, as I referenced a few times in this episode, Nneka is my coach and has been so for the past three years. While we've covered a wide range of topics, our main focus has been on equity.

And I'm forever grateful for all she's taught me about how to be a better, more present, and more authentic ally. In closing, Nneka's beautiful, thought-provoking, and mind-shifting question, What is the nature of the love you carry? is at the heart of your action item for this week. How would you answer this question? And how would you share your answer with someone close to you who may not have the same values? Further.

How do you think they would answer? And are you ready to ask them? While it may not be true in every single case, their answers may surprise you. They'll likely be very personal, and more often than not, will bring up universal truths about human bonds and community. I'm really hoping you'll feel a connection you may not have experienced with them before. And ultimately, I'm betting you'll be glad you ask.

Thanks for listening to Glad You Asked, a Hazen Institute for Leadership Training podcast. If you enjoy the show, come find me on Patreon for more in depth content. You can also follow me on LinkedIn. This show is produced by the amazing Patrick and Benjamin Childers of Odd Conduit Media. Please check the show notes for our guest links, today's questions, and more information. A massive heartfelt shout out to my father.

Hazen Schumacher, who taught me the power of audio storytelling through his weekly radio show, Jazz Revisited, and to Basil and the Supernaturals, featuring Kevin Thompson and Herbie Hunkley for our show's music. If you have a question you'd like me to put out there on our show, send me a message on LinkedIn or send me an email at hello at hazeninc.com. Have you used a question from our show in your life? If so, drop us a line and tell us how it went.

You can also learn more about my work at hazeninc.com. Tune in next time to keep exploring active listening on another episode of Glad You Asked.