What Happens If Your ED Can't Show Up Tomorrow? Nonprofit Emergency Planning | Kannico

Perfect. Okay. All right. So, most of you know me. Uh, you know why I'm here. I am a certified fundraising executive. I'm certified with board source. Uh, I'm certified in nonprofit management. I'm a a certified coach and I do a lot of training, capacity building and um and I work so not only do or do I do a lot of work with nonprofits but I I work with foundations as well. So I serve as an adviser to a major foundation which helps me because I get perspective from let's say from the outside as a as a nonprofit would but also from the inside. So what I can share with you today really connects to both both sides of the table which I think is is relevant and and good to know. So the services that Canico focuses on we do nonprofit formations, reinstatements, management services, organizational audits, sport and leadership training, strategic planning and these are favorite. This is how we pour our energy and love into the nonprofit community. So, let's talk about emergency planning. Forgive me, I have some allergies, so if I have to, you know, occasionally either blow my nose or tap my nose, that's that's what's going on. I'm in Chicago at the moment and everything is blooming. So, allergies are in full full swing. All right. So, here's what happens um with nonprofit organizations. Generally speaking, particularly the smaller ones, particularly the ones that are founder led and founderdriven, they tend to have most of the concentration of the knowledge and the expertise of the organization with one person. And that could be the passwords, it could be the bank access, it could be relationships, the history of how the organization landed where it is. Um, the reason why some of the decisions are made that are currently being made. Why do we use this vendor and not that vendor? Why are we not applying for this grant when it looks like it's a perfect fit for us? That person is often the executive director or the CEO of the organization. Sometimes it's a staff member maybe who's been there for a very long time or often it's a founder who has never fully transitioned out of operations and they've remained in this critical role where they hold the key to so many things. So often the board does not have a plan for what happens if that person doesn't show up tomorrow. uh they haven't really thought about it or if there is a plan, no one's really read it lately. Nobody knows what's going on. Um there's no named successor. For example, if something were to happen, who is the person who steps in? Okay, great. We all know about this and we see the plan, but who's the person who's actually going to take the reigns? So, those are those are big gaps just operations and board. But then when we think about our donors and our funders, so if a leader left today from their role, within a few weeks, donors would notice. They probably wouldn't notice on day one. You could probably keep things going for a little while, but at some point they are going to realize that things feel different. They're not getting the calls or the texts or the communications or the emails. And when they're not getting updates, when they're not feeling connected, that relationship starts to to cool off a little bit and they start to get quiet. And what's the what's the direct result of a donor going quiet and a relationship cooling off? The giving starts to slow down, right? They they they're just they're questioning their gift. They're wondering what is going on on the other side? Why why haven't they heard anything? what is happening? So, there's so many ways that that doubt can be dispelled. It's preventable. Um, it doesn't have to be this way. And what we want to do is talk about what are the things that break down and then what can we do to prevent that? How can we really put these safeguards in place so that we don't get ourselves into a situation like that? All right. Let's see if my There we go. Okay, so these are just a few things of what actually happens when there's a crisis. The first thing is the operations. That's what we always worry about. Will we be able to keep the lights on? Do we know how to pay all the bills? Do we know how to get into the bank account and make payments? Um, are we managing our uh programming effectively, partnerships with programs? Are people waiting on things that had deadlines and timelines? So program programming is is a big a big piece of this. That's the first part that's going to start failing. It's going to start breaking down. The next one is the donor. So let's say that you've been cultivating this donor for the last 6 months and there was a verbal pledge from them, right? there's a commitment that you know is happening or in the case of an organization actually that we're working with there is a donor who's made mention of a planned gift but it's not documented anywhere. No one else knows about it. It's not far enough along that there are any there's any paperwork. It's just that we know that this donor has that intention. But where is that information? What about people who've been giving for years and years and haven't been introduced to anyone else on the team? Right? We've we've done such a good job of nurturing that relationship that we've we've held it close and kept it to ourselves and we didn't want them to feel like, oh, they don't get my attention. I'm introducing them to other people. But actually, that's counterintuitive because then they have no one to go to if for any reason you're not there. So, you know, when they when they start to hear things through the community, um when they're they're sensing that that the energy just isn't there, they're not hearing back from you, um but there isn't direct messaging, you can really start to damage these relationships. And then when we have a team that's working with us and they see that things are changing, either there's been some sort of emergency situation that has happened or we understand that there's maybe, you know, transitions that can happen from one day to the next, they start to feel a little insecure too. And when people feel like everything is going to fall on them or things are going to break down and they start to lose confidence in the mission, the integrity of this organization that they have helped to build, that they have helped to create and be part of every day. They start to lose heart. And I guarantee you, everyone on your team at some point or another has been approached or is being approached about other opportunities or other opportunities are presenting themselves to them and this could be a time when somebody decides to explore that. So, if there's a plan, if we feel safe, if we feel secure, and it's not safe and secure that I might keep my job or not keep my job, but if if I'm worried because I realize everything is just going to turn upside down when someone leaves or someone isn't there and we don't have a plan, that job becomes very stressful, far less appealing to me, a lot more work, and it it erodess even the integrity of team members feeling like they can um they can be promoted that they can move up in roles. You sort of feel a little bit like the ground has been shaken under you because you don't have a path anymore. Right now you're just in the same boat as everyone else because there's no plan. Institutional knowledge is huge. This is the one that I worry about so much because there is um information that is people know about that's in their head. The reason we didn't go after that grant the report the grant report that the funer didn't like so they stopped funding us two years ago. Um history of donors history of and even people that have been hired even team members. So all of these things, this is institutional knowledge that leaves and it can just happen that quickly. And then of course if the board goes into crisis mode, it's really especially if they're under pressure, they don't have the right information, uh it's really really hard for them to do a great job and set them up for success as well. And of course they are a volunteer board, right? So, traditionally, this is a volunteer board and they've never had to do any of this. Um, you know, they're happy being a governance board and suddenly they're being asked to step in. So, it's it's not that anyone had any bad intentions. It's just that we've overlooked some critical elements of leadership. I mean, that's what it comes down to. And leadership means putting safeguards in place, protecting your organization, protecting your people, your donors, the people you serve, and your board, your board members. And so if you have a plan in place, you can take care of that. And we're going to get into the plan in a minute, but the plan is not hard to put together. This is not complicated. You could do it in a day. You could sit down and bang it out and you'd have a plan. So, the most important areas that need to be protected, operations just sounds like it's operations, it's admin, except when payroll is due and uh who's supposed to run payroll because that person isn't there. No one else has the login. So, that's that's a crisis and we certainly don't want to jeopardize people's compensation. That's a problem. financial access. That's a problem. Um I've had I I mean I have heard of boards where no one on the board has signatory access to a bank account and something happened and suddenly it was only the executive director who had their name on on the bank account and able to sign. And so the president of the board couldn't couldn't can't move a single dollar, can't pay a bill, can't can't do anything because everything is held in in one place with one person. So just think about what that means on a day-to-day, week-toeek basis about your ability to function as an organization, right? So critical piece technology. So we have we have passwords, we have donor databases, we have email accounts, only one person can get in there. Um they feel like they are small things, but when you add them all up, this becomes a significant significant amount of information and the last thing you want is to have an organization locked out of its own information, systems, history, etc. And then I mentioned donor relationships. So are those being held by one individual? And what can we do to change that? A relationship with a donor should be an organizational asset. That's not an individual's asset. That's not me, CEO or ED, my asset. That relationship that that relationship belongs to the organization and it needs to be protected. And I will say that um I'm I'm aware of an organization right now who lost someone in a leadership role who had built up a lot of trust and much of that trust depended on them specifically and the organization is losing $50,000 gifts right now as a result because there's this gray area. No one stepped in immediately. Uh there isn't an individual establishing the relationship. the board has not gotten involved and it's it's a tremendous loss and it's such a shame because it it could so easily be prevented. It can easily be prevented and some of the things we've talked about even in our nurturing of donor relationships like invite them to a board meeting, tell them to sit in on the last 15 minutes of your board meeting. I mean these are ways that you can start to engage the rest of your team in relationships with donors. If you're having a coffee meeting, bring a staff member. Bring a development director, bring a volunteer. They don't have to be paid staff members. Bring someone who's critical to the organization. So really looking at ways that you can expand the individuals that that person has a relationship with. And then if we think about um external communications, you know, I have seen organizations go completely silent during a disruption because nobody knew what to say and nobody knew who was authorized to say it. But the worst thing you can do is is not say anything at all because the silence does not come across as caution or as it comes across as complete chaos. I mean, silence is not a good sign when si when things are breaking down or when there's an emergency. So, we want to be sure that we are really building in these these safeguards. Who handles the external communications? Where is all of this information being kept? Right? So, that's where we come to um this emergency readiness plan. I'm going to mute for one second so I can blow my nose. Forgive me. Do we have questions or comments so far? >> Not yet. Not yet. >> I'm going to take a breath and have a sip of my coffee. Well, I invite questions and comments up to this point. U but I think what I've spoken about everybody probably knows deep down already, right? Like we don't necessarily want to acknowledge it, but we know it. And and trust me, I've gone through this with Kate, too. We think about this a lot. What happens if in fact we just had a whole uh move from one Google Drive to another and it was it's it's painful but we've had to do it because everything was sitting in my personal Google Drive and that does not make sense for a business. Does not make sense for a nonprofit. So an emergency readiness plan can be put together in one board meeting in one afternoon in one day. you sit down and you put this together. Now, you also can have a succession plan which is a little bit different and I think that's a bit more forward thinking. That would be more transitional. What happens? How do we handle who's our recruiting firm? If if our CEO or ED gives us notice, how long are we requesting for them from them? What needs to be put in place? But if it's an emergency readiness plan, that could be a one or two page document that you put together. And really, it needs to include and and by the way, you don't need a consultant to do this. You don't need to have a special retreat. You don't need an attorney. You you can sit down and do this yourself because this is all information that you have. You just have to be honest and willing to share all of that knowledge as well. So, the first thing we need is who's going to step into that role by name and what is their authority? What are they allowed to do? Are they allowed to sign checks? I say sign checks. Approve payments and dispersements, approve payroll. Is that person allowed to do that? And if not, who is? Because there is going to have to be someone. So maybe this is a two-person approach, right? Perhaps it's your board president with a backup person. That works too. I'm actually the backup person for an organization that I used to manage that I was the CEO of. and I'm the number two backup person physically. So, I know where keys are. I know where um physical documents are and I'm on their advisory board. So, I'm I'm a volunteer, but I'm a trusted person. I've been around for a very long time and so I am I'm the second backup. Um so, you never know. Maybe you have two people as as for backup. People travel. I mean, summer's coming up, people go back up north. You just never know if you're going to be able to reach that that board chair or board president or the person who's been designated. So, who's going to step in? You need to have all passwords and account access. It has to be documented. Uh if you want to get a password holder or Last Pass or whatever it is, one of those systems to to keep track of all the passwords, that's fine. But, um you must must have all of that documented. It cannot just be you holding that information. Um, you know, I I know that that's that's our our instinct is to just use what's easiest and have it autopop populate on our computer, but you're going to have to really sit down and and make some decisions about what type of information needs to be shared. all of your relationship people. So, your key contact list, major donors, funders, vendors, board members, all of that information, even for former board members, people that you can trust, volunteers, all of that needs to be documented with email, phone number, ideally with city, state, so you have a geographic idea of where people are. Um, obviously, if you've got board members and they're out of state, that's not necessarily going to help you. If you have a physical need, if you have a facility communication protocol, what does that look like? Who talks to the team? Who's the one who speaks to the team about what's going on? Who speaks to the board? Who speaks to the public? Who speaks to donors? Who speaks to program staff? All of those things are really important. And then what's the order of priority of what you're sharing, right? Um, honestly, a calm email that explains that something has transpired is is far better than multiple emails, um, dripping information, silence. So, just be thoughtful and intentional and figure out what that's going to look like. And then, of course, the location of everything. Where is everything located? Right? If we have a brokerage account, who do we have that brokerage account with? and who's our contact person there? You're going to get a gift of stock. The holidays are coming up. We need to know these things. It's probably good to know anyway. And then what are the gaps? So, these are some of the things that we often see, but you know, uh sometimes we just haven't had a chance to address them. The first one, we have a plan. We know there's a plan. We had to create it when we got accredited or we had to create it whenever. uh but the board's never read it or the named successor doesn't know that they are the named successor. They are the person who's going to be stepping in. They need to know that passwords are stored only in the ED's phone. No one else has bank signing authority. Um and then sometimes there's a plan, we just haven't looked at it. And unfortunately, this is something that needs to be kept up to date. I mean this should probably be reviewed quarterly because things change constantly and we have boards departing uh you know leaving their board service we have new people coming on all of that's really really important so the institutional knowledge is a piece see if I can advance this uh the institutional knowledge is something that we all have a responsibility to protect in an organization. So, think about where where all of this is and what it looks like. So, let's say we have an executive director who's worked with an organization for eight or nine years and they have a planned departure. They've decided to transition out. They're retiring. And so, we've given it a year. We all think, "Oh, this is wonderful. They've given us a year's notice. Fantastic. new ED comes in, they're smart, they're qualified, they know the organization, they have experience, and then a few months in, a funer reaches out, a foundation reaches out to discuss um renewing a grant, a significant grant, but the ED doesn't know that this grant was almost lost two years before because maybe there was a misunderstanding or we didn't re our timeline with the reporting didn't work out. And so without knowing that this relationship is so fragile and has gone through this change over time and needs to be handled very very delicately and very carefully, um you could have a new ED come in and just kind of railroad their way in and just, you know, talk with very high expectations and sort of make assumptions about the situation and really destroy destroy a a delicate relationship. And that can happen with donors, too. You know, we have I mean, I've I've sat in on donor conversations where someone new to the conversation who didn't know the history simply came out and said, "Well, we're we're hoping you're going to make a $100,000 gift today." And the donor just laughed in our face. It was so embarrassing. and I was there and I was very young in this industry at the time and I just almost died um because he said, "Well, what on earth makes you think that I am going to give you $100,000?" And then and these are seasoned seasoned board members. I mean, but this one was very out of touch with what this donor had intended. And that's the problem. Somebody knew along the way, but we didn't know and he didn't know. And so he then explained he'd had this whole history of explaining that no, he was going to give a $25,000 scholarship every year. That's it. He this was for a private school. That was all he was doing. It was awful. I mean, it was it was so embarrassing, but it can be prevented. Again, if we've got this documentation, if you're putting your notes in Bloomerang or whatever your CRM is, you're tracking every conversation, every detail, even things that seem insignificant are so important. you know, someone has a a child getting married and they've mentioned it, you put that in your database because that's part of the institutional history that somebody can look in there and say, "Oh, Fred, I see that your daughter was getting married last time you spoke with, you know, Kirsten. So, how did that go? Where are they living? How was the honey?" I mean, it just gives you an opportunity to really stay on top of things and and enrich these relationships. So institutional knowledge is critical. You really really have to make sure that that you're you're taking care of the things that need to be looked after internally as far as infrastructure. And so there's some great great ways that you can do this. I I love the fact that um people can be cross-trained and you can build some of this redundancy and reduce dependency overall because if you have people with shared knowledge, first of all, it gives you a little more efficiency and flexibility in your organization. And I'm not saying that we have two people doing the same job. That's not what I'm saying. And I realize we a lot of us immediately think, oh, but we don't have the money. We can't afford it. There's no way somebody has the time to spend doing this. It's just impossible for us to spare someone to cross trainin or to learn how to navigate these different things. But actually, you you can you can find a way to do it. Maybe it's a couple of people on the team. One is learning one aspect, one is learning the other, right? But I think this redundancy having two people understanding these critical functions is is is so important and and make it a I mean this can be part of professional development. This can be an incentive in your organization. There's no reason why this can't be something positive that you can then um really sort of help people to continue to develop themselves and their own skill sets and offer this as an incentive as an opportunity to continue to grow and build their own leadership skills. Um we talked about the shared access already. So that's critical. Making sure that this bank signing authority, which by the way for nonprofits should be more than one person anyway. And you should have some financial policies that dictate how all of this is handled. Um, ultimately I would say having a policy for your emergency plan is critical regardless and it should include all of these things that we're talking about today. But if nothing else, if you can get started with your one or twopage plan, emergency plan, you're way ahead of the game. uh introducing board members and staff to major donors. Now, just starting that process, making sure that those relationships are shared, that uh people know who they are, you're you're you know, invite in invite your board members to take a donor out to lunch and meet them. You know, th those are relationships that are easy for the board members to pick up because they're basically thanking people, right? We always know that it's it's so much easier to thank people and spend time with them when they've made a gift than when we're trying to prospect them and we're trying to get them to give regularly. Written procedures, so SOPs for the recurring tasks. The great thing is that these days everything can be documented so easily with AI. You could do Loom videos of how things are done and have those Loom videos constitute a little training manual. Um, I know there's some great training programs out there as well using video, using voice only. So, think about how you can just anything that gets done more than once that that is a a t a recurring task really does need to be documented. Board members need to be aware of who the foundations are, what the timelines are for upcoming grants and reporting. They can need to feel comfortable with understanding the revenue from the grants and the expenses from the grants in case they're called to task and they're be they're asked specifically about a particular grant and the expenditures associated with the grant. That's really really important. You do not want your board members in the dark when it comes to details about foundation relationships. It's really important and you know there's no reason why you can't uh send an email to your contact person at the foundation and say I just want you to to introduce you to our board member. Uh this is this person would be stepping in should anything happen and I'm not able to show up to work for any reason. Just want you to know that there's a second point of contact. Crucial, crucial, crucial. I know it seems so obvious, but it really is important. And then regular knowledge transfer that has to be ongoing. Things change constantly, constantly. So at your staff meeting, at your team meeting, at your volunteer meeting, board meetings, um this just needs to be you just devote 10 minutes to it. Just say, "We've made some changes to our emergency plan. Want to highlight these two things. Please take note of that. Any questions? So important. So let's think about what the board needs. So if we have a breakdown in our system, let's say there's a medical emergency, we have team members asking who's going to be making decisions. they're probably going to reach out to the board first, unless there's a a chief operating officer or someone who's functioning in a in a a leadership role to replace the CEO or ED. Um, often donors start to hear things pretty much right away. I mean, word travels fast and when you get close to your donors, they typically know that things are happening with you. Um, and then you also have programming. Programming knocking on the door saying, "What are we doing about this? What are we doing about that? Are we canceling this? How can we pay this bill? I have a check that was supposed to be um available to me this afternoon. So, the board members, you know, if we think about who they are, think about your board, your board of directors. Think about them walking in on a Tuesday morning to their desk, their computer, they're getting their cup of coffee, and they start getting bombarded. And maybe it's the board president or the board chair and the secretary and the treasurer. Maybe it's just the executive committee and they start getting these emails. Are could they handle that and could they handle it smoothly? Could things continue functioning effectively or would everything just go into a complete panic? And I'd say it's probably the second one. But maybe maybe you have some things in place already. But let's give them everything we can to secure them where they are and for them to know what they can access, when they can access it, what messaging is going out, who are the key players. So they need to know who is the person who is going to be filling the role as the leader in the short term. Who is that person? And maybe they are not the interim leader. Maybe they are taking on parts of a role and maybe it's two people or three people. Okay, who are those people? What exactly are they doing and what are they authorized to do? Where is the emergency plan and how do they get to it and when was it last updated? Who are the major funders and how do those relationships exist? What do they look like? How do we communicate with those people? Is it via email? Is it via text? Is it phone? What does that look like? How often do they like to hear from us? Not like to hear from us. The financial picture, invoices, upcoming payments and donations, pledges, pledges that you're anticipating. What if this person is out for 6 months and you have pledges that are supposed to come in or you have recurring gifts that are um the credit card is expired and and now you're expecting those those recurring gifts and you don't know how to fix that. And then how the communication channels should work, right? Who's communicating? What are we communicating? Uh what is the messaging that we want to be sure that is out there? But but also with our influence, right? So the board is going to be making decisions about how they want to put forward information and communicate things, but who's handling that part? How does it go out? Is it only in an email? Do we need to make some phone calls? Who is making those phone calls? Even within the board itself, there are many boards that do not use WhatsApp, text, they only use email and show up for board meetings. Well, not having an up-to-date list of phone numbers and making sure they all work and making sure that people are answering their phones, that's really important, too. So, what does that emergency tree look like, right? What if it's a board with 15 people on it? Is the board president gonna call all 15? Do we have an emergency tree? Uh, does the board president call three people? Those three people call three people. And so we work our way through the list. And then the board has a responsibility for ensuring that there's an emergency plan. They are investors in this organization. They're not just writing checks. Uh they're not just sitting on the board. They're not just inviting people to gallas and events. They have made a significant time, energy, and resource commitment to this organization and they have a responsibility that comes with that, a very serious responsibility. So, ensuring that there's an emergency plan that it's updated and it's being reviewed, that there is a second signatory on the bank account, that is critical. They're checking in on their governance just to make sure that everything is up to date. There's nothing that could fall through the cracks. Policies, for example. They are holding donor relationships at the board level, meaning they have an they have an interest in those relationships and they're actively engaged in them. They're interested. And if you want to split them up, that's fine. You can say, "Well, we've got these top six donors that really need nurturing. Everybody take one. That's your person, right? If you don't hit it off with that person, we can try something else later. But figure out a way that you can make sure that those donor relationships are not just held with the executive director or CEO. And especially if when someone says to you, "Oh, let's put together a spreadsheet of your major donors." And you go to your phone and your personal contacts and start pulling out people's phone numbers. That's a sure sign of a a potential problem in the future because that means that those that contact information is held with you and you only. It's not in Bloomerang or in your CRM. Sorry, I keep mentioning Bloomerang. I'm in there way too much, but in your CRM. So, and then now is the time to put this plan in place. I mean, does everyone have some time coming up this summer? Is it going to slow down for most of you? I'm hoping it will slow down a little bit. You will probably have a couple of days that you can set aside. You can set aside two hours a day and just work through a plan. And I I have a little something for you at the end of this that's going to be your guide to put that plan together. Okay. So, we are not looking right now in this conversation. Oh, jump shot the gun. Um, let's see if I didn't talk about any of these things. I think I did. So, I wanted to jump into your 30-day readiness plan. And again, we are not looking for a comprehensive booklet. We're not looking for a full succession planning process. Do we want to have one? Yes. But right now, let's start with this. Let's make sure that we have something to move the organization from complete chaos. Our person is out sick. They could be out sick for six months. We don't know what to do to having the security of knowing, okay, it's not ideal. We're calling on a few more volunteers than we'd like to, but this is what's going to work. This is what's going to get us through a crisis period. And then if there has to be a check-in point at 30 days, at 60 days, if this draws on, you need to make some other decisions, you can fold that in too. So what I would say is the first week is is is not about strategy for you. This is about awareness and access. So right now, if you were to start this process over a 30-day, you know, 30-day period, and you say, "Okay, I just want to start and do a chip away at it. I'll do a little bit week one, a little bit week two, little bit weeks three and four, and in 30 days I'll have a plan. Start with just who is the person that would be stepping in or the people. Create your master password and access document. Make sure that things credentials exist somewhere outside of someone's telephone and check on your banking. That would be a great first step. If you could knock that out, you're moving along. One would be the documentation. So, now we're talking about the communication. So, we want an emergency communication plan. Uh we want to list our top 10 donors. Do by the way, is anyone or everyone, anyone, I don't know, familiar with whisper flow? I may have mentioned it before, but has anyone heard of Whisper Flow? Can you give me a thumbs up if you have? Okay. Well, I've got one. Thank goodness. Tanaka's Tanaka is saying yes. Anybody else? Have you heard of Whisper Flow? Okay. Cano team. All right. Awesome. Okay. Whisperflow. Kico team. Okay. Well, good. I'm glad my Kico team is using the software that I recommend. So, Whisperflow is this wonderful transcription service. And I know you can do voice record, but voice records verbatim, right? With no punctuation, no grammar. Whisper flow types as though and formats everything that you say. And so you could open a Google doc and start just blabbing away about your donors, the relationship, how to reach them, their children, their their spouse, where they like to travel to, when they gave their last gift. You could just do a huge download and it'll transcribe it. It's going to format it pretty nicely, including bullet points. I mean, it writes letters. Dear Kirsten, it formats it. Best regards, emails, everything. So, take a look at Whisper Flow. Whisper flow. And when you're doing things like this where you're just trying to get stuff out of your head, using something like that is great. Now, you could also just use voice record. It's just going to make one big run-on sentence, but you know, you can put that into AI and it can sort it out for you. But let's find easy ways to do this. This does not have to be hard. You can find some shortcuts. So, list your top 10 donors. Who's in charge of those relationships? When were they last communicated with? That's really important because if they weren't communicated with since last summer, because summer is when you normally do your outreach and you send out and then something happens and this summer goes by, you have missed a huge window with your donors who were expecting an impact report or a phone call or coffee with with Alice or, you know, tea with Lulu or lunch with Francisco. I mean, these donors are they we get them used to us. we get them used to our relationship and so it's really a disservice if we haven't put that information somewhere so that it can be picked up and I'm not saying that we can easily replace each other I'm just saying Alice is out for god forbid I'm sorry Alice but Alice steps away for a few months wellies can pick up the phone and say hey I just wanted to reach out Bob and Mary um I know that Alice is has been out for a little bit she'll be back soon we're so excited but um in the meantime time. I wanted to check in. How are you both doing? How are your travels? And would you like to come in and just spend a little time with us and I can give you some updates on what we're working on? But, you know, it's it's it's an open acknowledgement, but then you've got some ways that you can continue to develop these relationships. We want to do that before we get to an emergency situation. And then, of course, create your emergency your emergency document. So create it. Put it somewhere. Do something. Find a place. A place that's and just start chipping away. Just start chipping away. Even if every day you just put in a few bits and pieces and then you consolidate it all with AI, you're doing great. And then week three and four, I would say talk to your board, get it on the agenda to talk about this emergency plan. Start with one crossraining assignment. one thing, one thing that someone does that no one else has access to or that you do and no one has access to and start doing some cross trainining. And and by the way, you know, I just I just sort of alluded to that, but it maybe it's not you that's out for 6 months. Maybe it's your COO and they're critical to the organization. So, I think this is something that we have to think about for every role. With Kico, we try and do that. We try and have everyone know how to do at least one or two other people's job in case something were to happen. Doesn't mean you have to be good at it. Just at least be able to know your way around and find things. And then identify two board members. So minimum two board members who can start building some donor relationships, can pursue uh some of those funer relationships. And this is, you know, this isn't a project. This isn't something we're looking to complete. Yes, we want to have our ready readiness plan, but this is about building your your internal fortitude as an organization, your resilience, your ability to bounce back when things happen because that's what's going to make your organization successful in the long term. And we don't want to have this up and down and up and down. Oh, things were fine and then somebody stepped away for a week and we went down and then this and back up. No, let's try for some continuity, a nice steady upward upward motion, right? And the way we do that is if we can bounce back from these things. If we can really be resilient when things happen. And and also, you know, there's nothing like having the confidence to say, "We have an emergency readiness plan. You want to see it? I have a plan." Having your board know that. New board members coming in, make it part of your orientation and your onboarding. We had a I I was speaking to an organization recently that told me now this goes back to succession plan, but it's all the same concept. Uh that told me that they were in the last stages of approval for a major grant and they were declined because they didn't have a succession plan. But here's the catch. They weren't asked if they had a succession plan. They weren't asked in their preliminary grant documents, but the organization, the the funer asked it in subsequent conversations, just in passing, very superficially, just said, "Oh, so what would the succession plan be?" And they said, "Well, you know, we don't actually have something documented." They lost the grant because of that. I mean, they theyounded them to find out what the reason was. And finally it came out that it was because they didn't have a documented documented succession plan, never mind an emergency readiness plan. Well, it seems a bit harsh, but in a way from a fun perspective, I can understand. Uh it does seem a bit harsh, but if they're if they're protecting their investment, that's in their best interest. So, okay. So, let's talk about takeaways and let's talk about um a guide that we can give you to help you through this. So, access um we are all more dependent on one person than we realize. It just that's just reality. This plan is not optional. There needs to be access. There needs to be password sharing. There needs to be all of these things that cannot just be in one person's head. It has to be documented and you must have the inclusion of the board members in this process. They have to understand how serious it is. So there is a kind of a part that you're going to own. There's a part that you're going to then bring in the team with and then there's a part that really sits with the board. And first we want them to understand the seriousness of it. And then we want them to be supportive and participate in this process. And you know this is something that a lot of board members they they talk about how they don't want to fund raise and they don't want to prospect. Okay. Well this is something you can do. This is great. This would be an incredible help to me if you could support me with this. The relationships remember those donor relationships though those are organizational assets. They are not dependent and should not be dependent on a single relationship with an individual. We want cross trainining. We want distributed knowledge and we have to protect this organization that we've worked so hard to build and maintain and we continue to champion every day and we struggle to raise funds for every day. We struggle to speak for those voices that we're representing. And you know this is this is just part of the job. This is part of the job. This is part of protecting what you have built and what you're working on and the important work that's being done. So Chi, I would like you um if you wouldn't mind, I'm going to stop sharing and um Chy, would you mind sharing the um first the succession planning the the longer PDF? We'll send these out to you all afterwards so that you have something that you can reference and you can use. I'm g to get out of this screen sharing. There we go. Okay. Uh the other one, can you share the other one, please? The succession planning. Yeah. Okay. So, this is a succession planning road map and um this is several pages long. Do you want to flip through it? It's very comprehensive and this is what you should be using as your long-term document. Uh this is something that is just it has it's very comprehensive. It really has everything you need. It has a checklist, right? So you can kind of check things off as you go. And then let's flip to the other one. So that's your long-term guide. The other one, and these are just examples. You can create your own. You can go into to AI and ask it to create you something. This is a one-pager. It's an emergency readiness plan. Um if we are you able to Oh, I guess you can all you can all expand that size on your screen if you like. Okay, there you go. Um but it just it just really has some great ways to just you just fill in information. Okay. Things they can do, things they can't do, the access that they have, uh where those credentials are stored. So, again, very simple, probably enough for now to get you through. Um, thanks cheaty. That's great. And what I would do, this is what I would do. I would take that when you get it because you're going to get it in your in your email. We're going to send you both. What I would do is I would take it and upload it to Claude and I would say, "Claude, create an interactive form that I can easily fill in um on my on my screen and save as a PDF and tailor it to my organization because I don't need this and I don't need this, but I do need this or I need two spaces for this." Honestly, if you did that, you'll have this readymade emergency plan that you can save as a PDF. And if you ask Claude to create that that form for you, you get there's an HTML uh code, a URL that comes with it and you can redo it. You can even save it. You can go back into it. You can put new information into it. So think about easy, effective, efficient ways. Use Whisper Flow for your dictation so that you can speed up. We speak so much faster than we type. Honestly, we really do. I know a lot of us type really fast. I did my Mava speak and typing class way back when. I'm pretty good at typing, but still the speaking so much faster. So, think about something like Whisper Flow. I realize there's a little bit of a cost associated, but and then use Claude or use ChatBT. Have these tools to help you have it customize a document for you that's going to be relevant to you. Um, you could even just speak into Chat PT or Claude and say, "This is the document I'm looking to complete. please fill in with the information that I provide you with and it'll fill it in for you. So, great great tools and and and u you know efficient uses of AI out there to help us uh be much better at what we're doing. All right. Does anyone have questions or comments? Claudia, I just wrote in the chat. >> Yes, I see that. I've come from large organizations and so now I'm running this >> um two different small organizations >> and I'm the only staff person. >> So it's a succession plan around the board and the board being like what the >> the board and volunteers. Do you have some critical volunteers that um that are heavily involved that you trust? >> Yes, but they would be board members. So, >> okay. >> One organization. >> So, I would say board. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. It's going to lean mostly on the board and that's okay. That's okay. Um, Jen, thank you for the question, Claudia. Jen, um, tech cool to write SOP manuals. Have you tried Claude Co-work? I love Claude Co-work and it can be working in the background. Claude is pretty good, too. Um, you may make some headway with perplexity. uh not pick uh notebook LM is pretty good with things like that. But my first go-to would be Claude Co-work and uh I would give it all of the documents and all of the materials that I wanted it to consolidate and ask it to work and I would just put it to work. I'd say create these five SOPs based on these drafts that I have for you and >> what if you don't really have a like you're just starting from scratch like >> I would turn on my whisper flow and I would just start babbling about my SOPs. Okay, but but you can but no sorry you know what I I apologize. Let me back up. I would go into Claude and I would say this is what I want to do. create the questions for me that would be required for me to create a comprehensive SOP on whatever it is that I want to do and have it ask you the questions and then have it put together the SOP for you >> and especially if you can come up with a sample. If you have a template that you've seen online or something that you like and you can give it a sample to follow, that's even better or you have an existing one. Um, but that's the that's really if you can have the AI ask you the questions and prompt you to feed it the information. That's probably the most effective way because you're not going to remember everything. That's the problem is, you know, we do these downloads now and we're like, "Oh, did I miss something? Yeah, I probably did." And if you run it through AI, you're like, "Oh, yep. I sure did. There were three things that I should have included." >> Yeah. I think we we struggle a lot with there's there's many if then then that kind of scenarios. >> Do you have a suggestion for how to how to outlay that in a simple the simplest way for someone else? >> Yes. So I would have a written SOP and I would ask um AI to create a a mind map for you. >> Okay. And you can do that in Excel, you can do that in Miro, you can do that in even I think there's something called mindmap. I used to use something called mind map and it would just do all the if thens. Um but so I would create the SOP and then I would say I I need a a visual representation of this in a map form and you'll have to play with it a little bit but you'll you'll get something that'll work. >> All right. Thank you. >> Absolutely. I like the if then. That's a really good suggestion by the way. And the other thing we didn't talk about was succession uh planning committees. So if you have a larger organization, that's something that two or three people can be involved in. They can help support you with the succession planning by by being a committee and and um they may not have to activate very often. Hopefully they don't, but at least there's someone who's overseeing um the process, the manuals, the system, what we're doing for for uh succession planning. Yeah. But I like the if then because you know if like for example if this absence is going to be less than a week this is the process. If the absence extends more than a week or up to a month this would be the process. I mean, there are some um dependent scenarios, right, that that really we have to look at and we have to be we have to be prepared for because if we're going to activate full scale, um boy, I hope it's a situation that warrants it and it wasn't someone that that was out for two days and then oh, they recovered and they're back and now we've we've kind of turned things upside down by by going all in with our our emergency plan. So, a little bit of prudence on that is good. Um, one other quick thing I want to mention unless anyone has other questions. Um, Cheety, can you share the flyer please? So, Chi's on our team. I asked him to support me today so I don't fumble around trying to um share flyers. So, we have two things we wanted to mention. the Nonprofit Council of Delray Beach. For those of you who are in South Florida in Palm Beach County, there is a wonderful event. They do this every year. It's June 11th and 12th. The speakers dinner is the 11th. The 12th is a dayong seminar of learning. It is going to be fantastic. So Vicky Pew and I are going to be teaching on board development, board engagement, and board governance. So everything to do with your board. and Jackie McLaclin of Chasen, which is they're a fantastic bookkeeping and accounting firm. She is going to be speaking about the finances. She's going to be speaking about what you need to know as a leader, what your board needs to know, how to set things up, uh what what are the reports that you should be running on a regular basis, what are the gray areas, what are the things you should be careful with. So, if you're interested in that, um, please please look for that on the Delray Chamber website to sign up. Uh, and then we have one other thing for anyone who joins us from Latin America. I don't know if we have anyone here today. We have an event coming up in San Salvador on the 27th of May. I will be speaking to a group in um in downtown San Salvador and this is for NOS's. We're going to be talking about sustainability. We're going to be talking about fiscal sponsorship. We're going to be talking about expanding their reach uh in the US. So, if anyone's going to be around or if any of you are there or you know someone there, please um everyone is welcome. So, just wanted to share those two upcoming events because I I we do a lot and I realize that I I I don't always share them. So, just wanted everyone to be aware. Okay. Thanks so much, Ty. All right. And then, of course, the next webinar will be Aaron Master Antonio as I mentioned earlier. So, that'll be on June 9th. And in the meantime, if you need anything, if I can help with anything, um, thank you. You can thank you. Um, please reach out if there's something. I mean, I've I've probably seen a lot of situations. I might be able to point you in the right direction. Um, there are other consultants that do a lot of this work as well. There's some really great ones that could hold your hand and walk you through a process if you needed it. Um, it's not just always us. I'm not, you know, saying we're the we're the end- all beall. There are great great people out there that can help support you. So, don't try and do this on your own. We're here for you. You can always pick up the phone and give us a call or schedule a meeting with us. We're happy to share any knowledge and any information that we have. And in the meantime, thank you all for being here. Does anyone have any other comments or questions. And who's going to get started? Just just step one. Just step one. All right. Awesome. Can Can you take me off spotlight so I can see um I can see everyone? Okay. Anyone else? I saw Tammy. Anyone else gonna give this a shot and give it a just just try one thing? Try one thing. All right, Karen. Okay, wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, great. Thank you. Um, do we have the link for the workshop? Lulis is asking for a link to the workshop. It's scary when you think about it. How much rests on your shoulders? It is scary. So yeah, just start chipping away. I'm telling you, you will not regret it. It'll give you such peace of mind and your board will be so happy. So all right, that's all we have for today. Thank you all so so much. I appreciate all of you for being here. I hope you got some value out of today. I know some of it is redundant and we know it already, but maybe we just need to be reminded, right? And of course, I'm always a resource for all of you. Um, so thank you again. We will see you June 9th if we don't see you before then. And as always, reach out if we can support you in any way. Thanks.