Ed sits down with Jared Barnett who is the CEO of Slingshot Memphis. Slingshot, as you may remember from Episode 5 of the podcast, uses a data-driven approach to fight poverty by helping to maximize the effectiveness of impact organizations. Ed’s last conversation with Slingshot Memphis is still one of the most downloaded episodes of the show, so be sure to go back and listen to it if you haven’t already.
Show Links
Ed Gillentine:
EdGillentine.com
Instagram: @journey.to.impact
Slingshot Memphis
www.slingshotmemphis.org
LinkedIn
Instagram: @slingshotmemphis
Email: disrupt@slingshotmemphis.org
Books
Journey To Impact by Ed Gillentine
The Voice of the Heart: by Chip Dodd
Ed sits down with Jared Barnett who is the CEO of Slingshot Memphis. Slingshot, as you may remember from Episode 5 of the podcast, uses a data-driven approach to fight poverty by helping to maximize the effectiveness of impact organizations. Ed’s last conversation with Slingshot Memphis is still one of the most downloaded episodes of the show, so be sure to go back and listen to it if you haven’t already.
Show Links
Ed Gillentine:
EdGillentine.com
Instagram: @journey.to.impact
Slingshot Memphis
www.slingshotmemphis.org
LinkedIn
Instagram: @slingshotmemphis
Email: disrupt@slingshotmemphis.org
Books
Journey To Impact by Ed Gillentine
The Voice of the Heart: by Chip Dodd
Slingshot Interview 2021
Jared Barnett: [00:00:00] The solution is not data, like that alone doesn't work. When you're dealing with poverty alleviation, you're dealing with people and they're not widgets, right? They're not, you know, you can't just kind of say, well, "Hey, I'm just going to tweak this a couple of millimeters and we solve it." Each one is unique, right? And you're creating a customized solution. And so to me, I think what we're hoping to do is provide those with heart, because you have to have that in this work with the analytical resources to then bring the best of the both together.
Journey to Impact Intro: Welcome to the Journey to Impact podcast, where we show you how to turn your unique passion into a strategy to change the world. Today, Ed sits down with Jared Barnett, who is the CEO of Slingshot Memphis. Slingshot, as you may remember from that episode five of the podcast, uses a data driven approach to fight poverty by helping maximize the effectiveness of impact organizations. Ed's last conversation with Slingshot memphis is still one of the most downloaded episodes of the show, so be sure to go back and listen to it if you haven't already. It's time to get off the bench, [00:01:00] let's do this. Here's your host, Ed Gillentine.
Ed Gillentine: Welcome to the Journey to Impact podcast. I'm your host, Ed Gillentine. I'm here with Jared Burnett, the CEO of Slingshot Memphis. Jared, welcome!
Jared Barnett: Hey, thank you. Excited to be here.
Ed Gillentine: So whenever I talk to anybody in Memphis, that's really serious about poverty and moving the needle on poverty, there's three or four people I always say, you gotta talk to. You're one of them and the Slingshot organization. And so I'm really pumped to have you, and I'm looking forward to all the discussion points in the back and forth. But just to give our listeners a little bit of background on Jared, as I mentioned, he's the CEO of Slingshot in Memphis. He got his undergraduate degree in Accounting with a minor in Statistics.
Is that right? So he's super smart from BYU. And he also went ahead because that wasn't enough and got an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Right? One of the most recognized and prestigious schools in the US. [00:02:00] Previously, he worked with McKinsey & Company, and he actually spent several years in Sub-Sahara Africa.
So he's got a really diverse and unique background that I think has prepared you for this role here in a way, maybe that even you didn't imagine. So, let's jump right in. I don't believe you're from Memphis, correct?
Jared Barnett: Correct.
Ed Gillentine: Okay. So give us the Cliff Note version of how you got here.
Jared Barnett: Yeah. A Cliff Note version is I was a vagabond after high school, traveled, you know, to different places looking for different jobs.
Ed Gillentine: Is that how you got the cool hair?
Jared Barnett: That's how I got the cool hair.
Ed Gillentine: Listeners probably can't see it, but it's super cool.
Jared Barnett: Yeah. I picked it up actually in Memphis. Memphis is where I got hair and yeah, just was looking for the right opportunities. I always kind of went where the best job was and that ultimately is kind of what got me to Memphis was a job different than Slingshot Memphis. And then Memphis is what kept me here. And so we've been in a great spot and looked at setting down roots. So I've got several kids they're well ingrained in the community here.
Ed Gillentine: [00:03:00] Awesome.
Jared Barnett: And no intent on moving anytime soon.
Ed Gillentine: Good. So it seems like, and a lot of the people we talk to there's their childhood forms a lot of their approach to impact. Is that true of you as you think back? And if so, like what would you say began to drive you in this direction of wanting to have impact?
Jared Barnett: I might think I'm a little bit inverse. I have become like more risk seeking as I've gotten older instead of less than some of these other funny things. But my childhood was pretty vanilla is how I think about it. But I think the things I took away from that, that have influenced my pursuit of impact was just the work ethic that was instilled in me. So I played three sports through high school. My dad was always big on, you know, less around talent, more around the discipline and work and using the talents you have and giving as best you can.
And then my faith was another big part of that. And so you know, grew up in a very religious and [00:04:00] Christian family and had a strong foundation in Christ and Christ life principles. And so I think that's kind of the foundation that started me, but then I think from there is where I kind of really grew.
It was kind of after I got out of high school. And so I was able to do some two years of mission service for my church.
Ed Gillentine: Oh, wow.
Jared Barnett: Spent kind of two years focused, exclusively on trying to serve others and share my faith with them. The time in Africa was definitely an eye opening experience and really helped me validate some of the things that I thought I might like in my life.
So I, you know, worked in McKinsey & Company for three, two years up to that point in time and had worked in the US. Big, big companies but always felt I was too far away from where, you know, things were happening. So we'd do great things with these companies, but then the people who would benefit from it, you'd never see because it's the consumer or the consumer's children or whatever it might be.
And so Africa was a chance to try and be a little bit more proximate to the [00:05:00] people who were benefiting from the work and business that I was doing. And I definitely got that experience. And I think that's really what was probably the most pivotal shift and kind of what I started to value in life and how I started to think about my career.
Ed Gillentine: Had you traveled much before going to Africa?
Jared Barnett: No. So again, going back to my vanilla childhood, I had never been East of the Rocky Mountains until after college. Until when I was in college. Sorry. And so kind of stayed on the West Coast is where I grew up, so, California and then spent most of my childhood up in Oregon.
And I think because of that I wanted to explore. I kind of joke with friends that I was born about 150 years too late. I would have loved to be back in like the 1800s, you know, put me on a horse, let me go ride right out in the wild west that's kind of my mentality. And I think some of that was formed by the fact that I didn't have the opportunity to do that growing up. And so I've pursued it as much as I can.
Ed Gillentine: Yeah.
Jared Barnett: Since I've, you know, got out of school.
Ed Gillentine: That makes sense. As you traveled around Africa and other parts of the [00:06:00] world, explain how that was a part of your growth and impact? Right. In my own life, I kind of had everything figured out until I got a little bit older and you realize you don't and a big part of that was going to Ethiopia and seeing not only is there a different culture, but how I view things, how I define success, what poverty is, you know, how to help people, all of that was changed significantly simply by traveling. I wasn't even really thinking about how to help people. I just started observing. Did anything similar happened to you?
Jared Barnett: Absolutely. I, a lot of, I can relate to a lot of what you shared there. I think early on in my career really important things to me were kind of prestige and achieving certain things. And in fact, achievement was probably my, if you want to call it my drug, that was, I always was looking to achieve the next thing and accomplish the next thing. [00:07:00] And I think Africa forced me to kind of rethink some of that. And I didn't, it didn't crystallize while I was there, but as I got back into graduate school and then back into my consulting career, that continued to kind of ruminate with inside me and kind of shape what I started to pursue and do more.
And so that was a big part. I think for me too, a big part of the experience was 1) recognizing that even though it looks very different and feels very different, we're all still humans at the end of the day. And so, you know, a lot of the, the things that, that logic that I would use to kind of pursue the things that I wanted to or experience the things I wanted to that same type logic was applied where a lot of the people that I've met in Africa, but just in such a different situation, that it took me a long time to see that.
And then just seeing the joy that I experienced from helping people and seeing people get opportunities that they didn't have previously [00:08:00] and run with those and just see life-changing type things happen to them was so rewarding for me that I think as I got back into my corporate more, I was in business in Africa, so it was very much kind of for-profit. But as I got back to the U S corporate environment, I didn't find that same level of fulfillment and reward, you know, back in my consulting career and things. And so that was always something that I felt was missing, was just the magnitude of joy and fulfillment you could feel being involved in those opportunities to help people, again, experience things that they might not otherwise have the opportunity to, and then see them transform their lives in ways that just bring them greater happiness and their family greater happiness.
Ed Gillentine: Yeah. I think a lot of times the idea of altruism sort of is looked on with cynicism skepticism here and yet I do feel like that is a part of almost every person I've ever met that has been involved in [00:09:00] impact for I'll say more than six months. It doesn't take long. And there's also a significant faith factor in there.
And then the idea of seeing kind of like your children as they grow up and experience. Seeing other people that you hope you've helped experience that joy themselves. One of my pet peeves about Africa, because Ethiopia is kind of my adopted home and I consider if you can adopt a continent, Africa, my adopted continent.
One of my pet peeves is this perception in the US and maybe Europe, the Western world, that Africans are not very smart and they just like to get stuff large S, money, resources from the West, and they don't really work or they're lazy. Some version of that. I have found that to not be true at all. In your travels around Sub-Sahara Africa and being able to work at the highest levels as well as running into just [00:10:00] in your daily life I'm sure, you know, normal people and even extreme poverty. What, what is your perspective on just the talent level of the Africans that you worked with?
Jared Barnett: The ingenuity that I saw on the continent was mind-boggling.
Ed Gillentine: I love that word, "ingenuity."
Jared Barnett: And so a great example for me is I ran a manufacturing facility. It had equipment that was 30 years old and all of the plans were in Chinese. And most of the maintenance workers there did not have more than a high school diploma, if that, and yet...
Ed Gillentine: Certainly not bilingual probably.
Jared Barnett: None of them could read what it said, but they figured out ways that I would question based on my experience in consulting here in the US that people have similar roles here, wouldn't be able to figure out ways to keep those machines running and just the most creative, inventive ways you could ever think of. For me, I think [00:11:00] a big difference between what we see in the US or Western world and what you see in some of the African countries is the environment that they're given and the opportunities that are there.
And so in terms of just raw talent, there's a ton of it in Africa. I see it all over the place. You see these creative startups that happen. In terms of the infrastructure to develop that talent. It's not the same, right? The quality of schools is very different. The quality of healthcare is very different. The infrastructure in terms of the government and regulations and how they protect certain things is very different.
And so I think, unfortunately, what that does is that creates the environment where you can't benefit from some of that talent that you have, and you're structurally constrained in what you can do. And so that, to me, that's one of the biggest challenges is that there's just as much challenge there's just as much success, but also, you know, we talk about wealth inequality in the US I'd say it's even greater in my personal experience.
I [00:12:00] don't have the statistics on that, but in my personal experience, it was much greater in places like Africa because without some of those systems and structures in place, it was much easier for those with wealth to continue accumulating it at the expense of others, where, and other places where we have minimum wages and other things that you can do some things to try and minimize that gap.
Ed Gillentine: That makes a lot of sense. So one of the cool things about getting to interview you and a lot of people that have been on the podcast is that I get to chase rabbits. That was a hundred percent of rabbit because we need to talk about Slingshot Memphis. You guys are celebrating a pretty significant milestone.
Fifth anniversary. I think .So, congratulations.
Jared Barnett: Thank you.
Ed Gillentine: On your website, it says that the mission of Slingshot Memphis is to create a demonstrable reduction in poverty by promoting a results driven poverty fighting ecosystem. So, unpack that for a minute. What is Slingshot Memphis and why do you guys exist?
Jared Barnett: [00:13:00] Yeah. Great question. So we think of Slingshot Memphis as a poverty fighting center of influence. To us what that means is that we are able to help uncover things and share things in a way that has previously been unavailable and then use that to help influence others or empower others to be more effective at how they try and alleviate poverty.
So I guess we see ourselves as an enabler and a power and what we call the poverty fighting ecosystem here in the city. The reason we exist is because unlike business, where you have all sorts of financial metrics and other things to understand if a company is being successful, or sports, where you have all sorts of metrics to understand if an athlete is performing well or not, we don't have those agreed upon metrics when it comes to measuring poverty effectiveness. And so we've developed a methodology that allows us to do that objectively, consistently. And we then go in and conduct what we call impact studies on different poverty fighting organizations. That allows us to [00:14:00] understand where are they most effective, where are there opportunities to be more effective, that then empowers that organization to figure out what can they focus on,
what would allow them to be more effective? That allows philanthropists and others to figure out where can their resources be best used to help achieve the outcomes that they want. And we can transition. Our goal is to kind of create this movement where it's, we can't just be us. We're not going to solve or fix anything on our own, but getting the city, all of the, the poverty fighting ecosystem behind this idea of what are the outcomes that people are experiencing?
How can we understand those? How do we make sure those are the most effective and largest outcomes as possible? And we think of outcomes as things that improve the quality of someone's life. And we typically measure that through either health or income. How do we transition to that? Where we have the resources, we have the metrics, we have the framework to think about that and get others to adopt that so that we can say, okay, yes, you're serving 500 people and that's awesome, but how well are you serving them? [00:15:00] And that's the part that we're really trying to help people get to is that second part of how well are you serving them? How effective is it helping them change the trajectory of their lives and get them access to opportunities that will allow them to leave poverty. And that's what we're trying to accomplish is really getting infrastructure in place that sophistication, all of the things that you've seen in other industries, we want to bring that to how we alleviate poverty and empower others so that they have that information and resources available to achieve their aspirations.
Ed Gillentine: Give us kind of an example of that idea of an impact study. You go into an organization and you start helping them understand what's working, what's not. The idea of monetizing impact, which is a scary idea to a lot of people. They have an impression maybe that that could be a bad thing, but maybe if you can, give us flush out an example of one of the partners y'all have worked with and how the impact study has helped them.
Jared Barnett: I think I'll start with just a quick [00:16:00] overview of what the impact study is and then I'll dive into an example. And so, the impact study is typically. The first time we work with a organization we do what we call a baseline impact study, and that typically takes three to four months. And the reason it takes so long is because we really try and get in a strong understanding. We do a lot of research analysis to really make sure that we have a good understanding of that organization and the impact that they're having.
We start by building a foundation of our understanding of that organization. So we spend a couple of meetings going with them around. Let's learn a little more about your organization. Let's really dive deep into the programs or services that you provide and make sure we understand all of the nuances. We then produce what we call program maps and impact trees.
Program map provides kind of a visual depiction of the programming. So you kind of see the flow and the different interventions that a participant in that program would experience. And then an impact tree is where we then kind of develop the theoretical outcomes that a participant would experience.
So if you are going through an early childhood education program, [00:17:00] what would be the outcomes that you would anticipate a student in that early childhood program would experience? And so we develop that. That then allows us to then do the second phase, which is where we kind of call it an evidence collection process.
And so we have four dimensions in our impact study, we do a benefit cost analysis, which is quantitative. We do a systems level change assessment. We assess the use of best practices and we assess the measurement infrastructure of an organization. And so we go through multiple meetings where we gather that information from the organization.
We then go and do external research and review studies that have been done and try and calibrate, you know, what are those best practices for what they're trying to do? What, you know, what can be proven to create outcomes for others and work through that process. And as part of that, you know, the benefit cost analysis, we are able to either take the organization's existing data that they collect and research that's been done that validates if [00:18:00] you have this type of service and it's done this way, research shows that people experience these types of outcomes.
They tend to see an improvement in their income. They have higher employment. They see an improvement in health related to mental health, if they're receiving certain services there. And so we were able to kind of use that combination of the organization's data and research to then monetize those benefits.
And for all of the finance people that might be listening, we do that with all of the best practices for finance. So we take an account time value of money. We have discount factors and multiples and other things that go into that formula that allow us to do that. With again, incorporating the best of analytics to try and be really rigorous and thoughtful about that.
And then after we go through the evidence collection phase, the last phase then is the synthesis. And so that's where we then validate all the evidence with the organization. So for us, this is an evidence-based impact study. So we want to make sure that any conclusions we reach that the evidence we use is accurate.
So we always allow the organizations to help us validate the evidence is accurate, but then we do the [00:19:00] conclusions on our own to ensure the objectivity of those. And we've developed some very detailed rubrics that help us do that for each of those four dimensions and allow us then to kind of reach the conclusions around where are their strengths, where are there opportunities for greater impact? And then we can aggregate those into ultimately the results for each of those dimensions that we share with these organizations. And so that's kind of the process that we go through. And so again, that takes about three to four months, and then every year thereafter we do an update which is typically much shorter because in those updates, we focus just on the things that have changed since the previous year.
And so that allows us to kind of on an annual basis, keep a running assessment of that organization and we share that annually as well with the community here. So an example, I think of an organization that we've done this with is the Purdue Center of Hope, which is based within the Salvation Army here in the city.
They're actually one of the first four organizations we started working with. And in the course of working with them, we help them realize that they're one of the only organizations in [00:20:00] the city that allow shelters for mothers and their children. And so they're able to kind of keep the family unit together in a way that a lot of instances aren't. A lot of times those children would have to go to foster care while the mother is there.
And so as we help them understand that as we looked at the benefits that they'recreating for their different services, we realized that there is a disproportionate benefit they're creating for these children who are able to avoid entering the foster care system. And that has helped the Purdue Center now adjust some of their plans.
So they've recently expanded to provide additional support and services for the youth that are in there residing with them in a way that they wouldn't have done before. Because the understanding wasn't there. It's not anything to say about them. It's just there wasn't a way to understand that, there wasn't a way to measure that, that was commonly accepted for them to do.
And so by helping provide those insights, it's now helped Purdue Center adjust its programming in a way where it's providing [00:21:00] a service that is unique to the city. There's not a lot of alternatives where there are a lot of kind of just traditional shelter alternatives, and allow them to really emphasize that unique value proposition that they provide the city in a way again, disproportionately provides benefits for those that get to go through. And so that was a neat opportunity for us to as we went through that and helping them understand the benefit cost ratio, the use of best practices, it was able to help them have additional information to inform their decision making and how they structured their programming.
Ed Gillentine: In a sense, it sounds like it was an area where you got a lot more bang for your buck, but there's no way to figure it out unless you did the research.
What, and and I'm also guessing that a piece of information like that other organizations would want to know, and maybe that's a best practice that then could expand influence, expand this particular practice, to help the beneficiaries. But that leads me to another question. [00:22:00] What's the response of organizations that you guys have talked to because this is a pretty rigorous process. What's the response been sort of across the board, do they like it? Do they not like it? Is it a little bit like, you know, going to the doctor and getting your annual physical, you know, you gotta do it and you know, it's helpful, but it's not very fun. What's that been like?
Jared Barnett: Yeah. So like anything with a group. So we work with 30 organizations right now. There's varients within that, but I'd say the vast majority of the organizations we work with value the opportunity to kind of step out of their day to day and reflect on their organization and the way that our process allows them to do.
And so just that alone we've gotten feedback is really valuable because it pulls them out of the day to day. It allows them to think about these things. And then obviously the insights that we come to discover and figure out as we go through this also then helps them as well. And so, for the vast majority of the organizations we work with, they find it, you know, they'll all [00:23:00] admit that it does take time. It's not, you know, I'm going to just kind of check some boxes and call that good, but it is empowering when they go through that. And a lot of times we've gotten feedback that it's been helpful as they've thought about strategic planning, as they thought about particular decisions they're making and they can in a way, use the work that we've done together with them to shortchange the time they have to spend on some of these other things, because they now have insights that they didn't use to have. So rather than trying to figure out, oh, what should we do? Why should we do that? Or having to go research a bunch of things on their own, which you know, there's not a lot of time as a nonprofit typically to do that, nor do a lot of nonprofits have, you know, people who are focused on research.
That's not an often a skill set that you need when you're trying to help people with specific things on a day-to-day basis. We're able to help give them resources to then make some of these other things they do more efficient and more effective. And so, you know, it, to us, the hope is that we're continuing to try and get more and more efficient in how we do our work, because we want to make sure that we're thoughtful of their time, the [00:24:00] organizations that we work with, but we also think there's value in getting into the weeds on some of these things that are really important and fundamental and understanding again, the impact that's being achieved.
Ed Gillentine: So one of the challenges I suspect in working with poverty, or probably any sort of impact genre, if you will, is that there's this idea of you want it to be scalable, right? But I think common sense tells us there are some times where scalability, getting bigger, is not necessary. Have you guys bumped up into that with some of your organizations where you've actually said, you know what, you guys might need to scale back or focus? Have you seen any of that?
Jared Barnett: Absolutely. It's it's one of the things that I think just from inertia has become kind of pervasive across the poverty funding ecosystem has this concept of well, how many people you're working with and let's do more of it. We found through a lot of the research we've done around best practices and what [00:25:00] drives impact is it's less around how many people you're working with and more around the depth that you're working with the individuals and the effect like the quality of what you're providing not as more so than how many they're getting out. And so we've definitely had opportunities where we've identified some opportunities for greater impact to consider, rather than doing, you know, a program that's two days a week and having two of those going on at one time, the people that you're working with benefit more having a four or five day a week program. Now that means you would be serving less people.
Ed Gillentine: Right.
Jared Barnett: But the idea here is serve less people better and then find the resources to serve more. And part of that is one of the reasons we've found and this is true in any environment, but especially in the nonprofits where resource constraints are much more real and challenging because you don't have as often a natural way of we'll just sell more products.
Ed Gillentine: Right.
Jared Barnett: The thing is that as you grow with constrained resources inherently, you have to do less because there's just less of you to go around. And [00:26:00] so I like to use the example of a personal trainer. I know if I'm trying to get fit and really get in shape, and I'm working with a personal trainer an hour a day, I've got a customized meal plan, they've prepared in a very specific workout regimes for me, that by doing that every day, six days a week, I have a very high probability that I'm going to get into good shape, which is the goal of me working with that personal trainer.
And which is what we want everyone who's helping alleviate poverty because how do we help them get out of poverty? But if that personal trainer I'm working with says, Hey, you know what? I want to scale, I want to get bigger, but I don't have the resources to hire anybody. So I'm just going to get bigger. And they start working, maybe it was 10. I was one of 10 to start with and now they're working with a hundred. Well, there goes my customized meal plan. There goes my customized, you know, workout regime, I'm going to get a standard meal plan or maybe a couple of meal plans I can choose from, and I might get, you know, a couple of workout things that I might have to figure out how to put them together.
And my day in the gym with the trainer? Gone. Maybe I get a day a week or a day every other week. If you just [00:27:00] look at those, the probability of me reaching my fitness goals in a situation where it's not customized for me, where I'm not getting that attention from the personal trainer. It drops dramatically.
And so that's kind of how we think about it a lot of times. And that's not always the case. I kind of refrain from generalizations because there are situations in any case that prove things wrong. But in most cases, the research we've found suggests that doing something better and more intense and higher quality with individuals tends to create much greater poverty fighting outcomes than serving fewer people with less quality services.
Ed Gillentine: Yeah. Well, I'm really glad to hear that you guys are not only seeing that, but expressing it in the non-profit community and to the funders because I feel like there's just this huge focus on scalability due to technology.
And there are times I think when that's incredibly impactful, I [00:28:00] think about, you know, a financial app, like a bank app, in Sub-Sahara Africa. Right. That'd be crazy impactful, right? If they can figure out how to do that, and that's driven primarily by technology, but I think there are many, many instances when exactly what you said is true.
One of the things that as you've talked has sort of stood out to me, is this, this idea of metrics, this idea of, of looking at impact a little bit through the lens of finance and business. And one reason I think that's important is because most of the funders come from a for-profit background. And I have talked to many, many people who give to charities because they feel pressured.
They rarely get excited about it because they feel like the same [00:29:00] rigor that they view their business or their for-profit environment, for some reason doesn't translate to the not-for-profit. And I think of the old metric of how much money did you raise, right? That used to be like the only metric that anybody ever really looked at in philanthropy.
And while it is a metric, it's typically nowhere near the most important one. And certainly should be one of, at least several. So as you guys have progressed over the last five years, and you've got the impact studies, which I think are amazing, we're gonna post a couple in the notes and I would highly encourage people to go check it out, just to see the format and information that's on there. But as y'all have progressed, what has been the funding communities' response to the information you guys are providing?
Jared Barnett: It's evolved, I think. [00:30:00] Right? So with anything new, there is always just like, okay, well, you guys are doing this, but how do we know if it's legitimate? Right? Like how are you doing that? And so like any startup organization we've gone through numerous iterations of trying something, refining it, trying it again, refining it, to try and get something that we feel comfortable with.
And one of the great things I got to do before I stepped into this CEO role was help take the work that the team had done and really bring with the teams, you know, support that, the structure around that for how do we do that consistently? How do we bring the experience I had from my days at McKinsey and the rigor and structure we took, how do we bring that to what we're doing?
Because the team had developed things to a spot where we could do that now. And so the rigor that we bring, which is also one of our core values, is respected now by many of the relationships, the foundations, and philanthropists that we have relationships with and they respect that we've put the time into this.
It's [00:31:00] not a, you know, I'm going to stick my thumb up in the air and see where the wind's blowing, but we've really invested to try and do this well. And we've been supported by philanthropists and foundations who see the same vision for what this can do. And it's been great because now we have all I'll focus on foundations in particular, because that's an easy group to talk about.
It's relatively small. A lot of the organizations, the foundations that we have relationships ask for those impact studies, as they think about their investment decisions, because it's another tool for them to consider as you think about this. We've worked with and had conversations, a couple of the large corporations, multinational corporations here in the city and their philanthropy arms.
And one of those conversations led the fact of, hey, like you're doing what we need to do. Like if I just let Slingshot do this, then I can focus on other things. As we think about accomplishing that corporation's philanthropic aspirations. We even have foundations that don't support us financially in any way who are asking the organizations that they fund if they have a Slingshot impact [00:32:00] study. And so definitely seeing a good reception there on an individual and family level philanthropy. A lot of people recognize how this helps and, you know, we've taken it from, we used to have a, the only thing we had was like a 70 page PowerPoint, which is very academic, lots of footnotes it's great, but very dense.
Ed Gillentine: I love that by the way.
Jared Barnett: Not surprised, by someone who likes to analyze companies.
Ed Gillentine: Right.
Jared Barnett: But, you know, and then last year in 2020, we created kind of a summary version of that, which is more bullet point centric. It was intended more for the organizations and their leadership, you know, what are they going to do with this?
And now we have a one-page front and back version. They all have the same impact study. They all have the same research and rigor behind it, but it's just in how we present it. And so these new impact profile summaries is what we're calling them. These one-page front and back. Really just distill things down into its core kind of key components for, where is the impact they're having, what's the trajectory of that, have they improved in their effectiveness or regressed? And then for [00:33:00] those four dimensions that I highlighted earlier, kind of what are the key points there that stand out both in terms of their strengths and their opportunities there. And so that has been helpful. It also helps because we come up with opportunities for greater impact.
And investors love that because that then allows them to focus on something that they know will improve the poverty fighting impact of that organization. So rather than kind of saying, you know, hey, like let me think of a project that might be good for you. Or have you think of a project that might be good for you?
Why don't we do that in conjunction with this really kind of standardized approach of understanding the impact and say, well, why don't we do it with that? Because we know based on what Slingshot's rubric says, if we can address this, that should improve that organization's poverty fighting effectiveness.
And so it also is a tool for them, not just to understand what's working and what's not, but also how to make it more effective.
Ed Gillentine: It's always amazing to me that you can take the same businessman or businesswoman and the rigor that they approach their business with and [00:34:00] maybe it's just because they've not had an impact report or something similar to that. They just sort of jettison that when they start working with a nonprofit and I've always thought it's a little bit insane that we put all of this effort into say, building a portfolio for a client and you deal with the risk and you deal with diversification.
And, you know, you have, you've got a S and P 500, which is 500 of the biggest companies in America, but clearly not the best. Right? And so you don't just go buy every single one of them. Right? You want to be intentional. And I think that same approach should take place in philanthropy and charity. And so I love what you guys are doing because I think it allows people to take a look at what's really going on.
Data-driven get away from the, well, how much money did we raise at that fundraiser? And it helps me as I'm sort of counseling and leading and helping people strategize about [00:35:00] their philanthropic portfolio, it helps me sort of reinforce the idea that you need to be strategic. So I, I love all of that data.
I think it's really important. Even the 70 pager I think was fantastic. In the book, we talk a little bit about the idea of the rich know-it-all. And so in my mind when I bump up into that person, you know the example I always use is, is somebody that made their money, I don't know, building metal buildings in, you know, rural name, the state, right.
And then they sell it. And all of a sudden, you know, they're worth 50 or a hundred million dollar. Never been to an art museum and immediately they become experts on all things, fine arts, right? That sort of idea. But with you guys, and I'm going to get back on the side of the impact organization, I would think that some of this data, when you get the rich know-it-all, coming to you saying, you need to do this. I [00:36:00] think it would be helpful for the nonprofit to push back and say, "We appreciate you, Mr. Donor. We really think that your dollars would be helpful, but this is what we're doing. We've got data to back it up. We're going to keep going this direction. And if that's not a fit for you, that's okay." Have y'all seen that come into play yet? Are you that deeply ingrained in some of these conversations with the impact organizations?
Jared Barnett: I would say yes. And I might even expand that too, because you see people who have been successful and they've had a process or approach to be successful and it worked great right in that environment. One of the things I've learned in Africa was a great example of this for me, is that you've got to contextualize that right.
For each situation. And so what, what made me successful in the US did not necessarily, like doing the same thing in Africa did not, did not work. Now, there's similar principles, right? There's similar concepts around that, but you've got to customize it. And so I think what our impact studies have helped [00:37:00] organizations do is they can take bias, whatever that is, and they can create a way to pull people together and cut through some of that bias.
And so you see it in terms of, you know, I'm the expert because I've made a bunch of money and I think I know what I'm doing. You can take that with someone who's doing this with an infinite amount of heart, but they really haven't invested the time to understand the research and some of the things behind that.
Having something that's grounded in the evidence of that organization, the evidence of the research that exists around what they're doing, that brings both a quantitative and qualitative perspective that allows these organizations to kind of pull those different stakeholders, whether they're investors, board members, or influencers for that organization and can kind of ground them and get rid of some of the bias that just inherently exists in humans.
And so for me, one of the things I believe with this is that the solution is not data like that alone doesn't work. I think when you're dealing with poverty alleviation, you're dealing with people [00:38:00] and they're not widgets, right? They're not, you know, you can't just kind of say, well, Hey, I'm just going to tweak this a couple of millimeters, and then we solve it.
Each one is unique, right? And you're creating a customized solution because each person has a different personality, different life experiences, different current situations that they're in. And so to me, I think what we're hoping to do is provide those with heart cause you have to have that in this work, with the analytical resources to then kind of bring the best of the both together.
And so I think, you know, for those that have more than analytical mindset, we now have a way to leverage their skills and abilities in a way that just didn't exist. I don't blame nonprofits. I don't blame foundations. It's just, this hasn't existed as, as a way to kind of consistently measure this and do it in an objective evidence-based way.
And then those who are passionate about this and they know it's their real love is to do this, we can supplement that to help them do that from a more informed way so that the the outcomes that they [00:39:00] hope are experienced have a higher probability of happening when you pull in the data and the research and other things.
Ed Gillentine: I like how you said that, and it's good to be reminded where we're working with humans, with people, and they're unique and they're not widgets. And also feel like it was, I don't know, it kind of clicked for me that what Slingshot is doing is it's kind of this melding of heart and analytics in a way that is practical and that we can use.
And that is open to morphing and changing over the years as the context changes. So you can tell in my notes, I've got about a million different ways to go, but we don't have that much time. If you think about Slingshot helping funders and fighters, I think that's how you guys differentiate on your website.
What would be your takeaway that you would tell a funder and a fighter, if you will, out of this [00:40:00] conversation.
Jared Barnett: For funders or anyone who would invest in alleviating poverty, ask the right questions, understand what's happening to the people who are participating in these programs, right? What are they experiencing?
What's changing in their lives as a result of this, you know, that's, that's the outcome. A lot of times in business, right? You hear about, well, what's the bottom line. Right. You hear like, how is it driving revenue? How is it driving profit? That's kind of the idea. Well, for us the bottom line is how is someone's life changing for the better, in a way that allows them to no longer have the same severity of poverty they may be experiencing when they start.
And so, as, as funders and investors think about this, that would be our thing. We believe we provide a lot of tools and resources to help them do that, but we don't believe we have a monopoly on that. There's other ways to think about it. There's you know, you can take what we do and do some of that on your own, and we'd encourage you know, foundations and investors to do that.
And so that would be kind of the idea there is really focused on what's [00:41:00] happening to those people's lives and make the investment decisions based on that. For the fighters we now refer to them primarily as poverty fighting organizations. Cause we want to kind of broaden that a little bit.
Ed Gillentine: Yeah.
Jared Barnett: But those that work directly with people who are experiencing poverty, continue bringing the heart that they have to it, they do some of the most challenging work I've ever seen. And I've worked with lots and lots of corporations, large and small US. It i s really hard. It is, you know, you think that oh, I'm going to go do work at a nonprofit.
It's going to be, you know, this kumbaya party. And everything's great. It's really hard because you're seeing the challenges that people face every single day as you go and do that work. And so the thing I would say there is always again, asking yourself, how can we be more effective at that? What tools and resources can we use to couple with what we're already doing to become more effective. And so just as we think about continual improvement, you know, when it comes to being more profitable or when it comes to being, you know, a better person, [00:42:00] how can we do that in our efforts to alleviate poverty? Right. And what are those things that we can do?
What additional things can we pull in that maybe we don't have right now. You know, one of my concerns is that you can't, there's not a silver bullet when it comes to alleviating poverty. That is my personal opinion here. And there's not even one or two things that you can do that will fix most of it because poverty is this interconnected combination of factors that.
You have to kind of think of it like as an ecosystem, right? And each individual is in an ecosystem, then you have to think about the different things that are influencing them. And so the other part of this I'd say too, is just being mindful of what are the opportunities to be really excellent at what that organization does, and then let others be really excellent at what they're doing and find ways to create pathways between those so that we don't have an organization, that's doing something and because of the resource constraints, they can't do it as well as another organization. That's their best thing. They've already researched the best practices. And so in a way that we do have to work [00:43:00] together, as we think about this, and as we try and address it, because again, as much as I think education might be helpful, or healthcare, or transportation, or other things by itself, it has limits and what it can accomplish, but together right? You start to get that compounding effect and that's when the cool stuff happens.
Ed Gillentine: Yeah. And I can tell you get fired up about that. And it reminds me too, of the idea of a flourishing community, right? It takes everybody, it takes, it takes the fine arts, just like it takes a research at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, just like it takes Memphis Inner City Rugby, just like Advance Memphis, all these different organizations and passions, and you're right. Everybody's passionate about education or food or whatever it is, but they all gotta work together. And I think that's when you first started talking, you talked about how Slingshot wants to be a center of influence.
And so in my own mind, I envisioned, you know, drawing on a white board Slingshot in the middle and all these tangled webs. Whether they're directly connected or not, there's this [00:44:00] connection where you guys are making those connections to people whether it's formal or informal. So where do you see Slingshot in five years? We're celebrating a five-year anniversary where you see Slingshot in five more years?
Jared Barnett: Yeah. In five years, I see us kind of having solidified the center of influence concept. Right now we work with 30 organizations. In five years, we'll be working with over a hundred organizations. Our goal is to get sufficient scale and each part of the poverty fighting ecosystem that we can share insights and perspectives and research, not just for individual organizations, which is what we do right now in our impact studies, but that we can do that for parts of the ecosystem.
So we can say afterschool programs, right? We've now worked with enough, we've researched enough, we've done enough, you know, benefit cost analysis, that we can say here's what the benchmarks are for benefit cost ratios for afterschool programs, right? Here's your median, mean, high, lows. You want to know if you're outside of that, then you know, you're doing great.
If you're on the upper end or you got some, you know, really things to think about if you're on the lower end. You [00:45:00] know, same with the research, right. We can start to share that. Like one of our goals is to have our website become this hub of poverty fighting resources. Right? We want it to be like, I know if I'm going to go shopping these days, right.
I can go to Amazon and find just about anything I want. We want people to be able to come to our website and say, hey, I want to figure out how to be more effective at alleviating poverty in Memphis. We have things on our website where they can come and find what they need to do that, whether it's research.
So we'll have curated research that is available, we'll have insights, we'll have benchmarks, we'll have other things that are there and so that's kind of for Slingshot, where we want to get to is to that level where we now have the resources and a nice, easy to digest way that helps empower whether it's the city or county governments, whether it's foundations or individual philanthropists or nonprofits, they're going to find something that allows them to be more effective at what they do.
And then we also, at the end of the day too want to have a change. And so in five years, right, I see that the organizations we're working with have become more [00:46:00] effective at what they do. That's the ultimate goal is that because that then leads to, you know, our vision for what we do is that, you know, anyone in Memphis, regardless of their social or economic circumstances will have equitable access to opportunities for success.
And so to do that you need to, we need to, have these different parts of the ecosystem working as efficiently as possible in order to unlock those doors and those pathways for people experiencing poverty.
Ed Gillentine: I love that. So kind of full circle all the way back to outcomes. I mean, at some point you got to have outcomes, right? To make it work. Are there any events you guys have coming up on the books? I know COVID has made it challenging, but are there any events you guys are planning to sort of celebrate this year and the success that you guys have had so far.
Jared Barnett: Yes is the answer on all that front. So COVID has definitely impacted some of the plans that we've wanted to do just like every other organization. And yes, we have some events coming up. We do. To us, it's less around celebrating us as an organization, but it's more on celebrating this movement of let's be more outcomes focused. [00:47:00] Let's have the resources to help us be more effective at what we're trying to accomplish.
And so in November and December, we're going to be doing events, small group events or virtual events, to kind of share that in a more comprehensive way. We'll have an event likely later, November or December where we're going to kind of highlight, Hey, what's, what's happened so far as part of this movement, the last five years, you know, more around what we think is going to happen in the next five years and helping people understand that and understand how they can participate in that. And you know, participation a lot of times, and in the nonprofit space people think, oh, that just means I have to give you a check. That's not the case for us. Like, obviously we are a nonprofit ourselves, so our operations are supported by the philanthropic gifts of others.
But what we mean is participate, right? Use our work in your decisions. You know, we have Giving Tuesday coming up and all people have a lot of times in Q4 is where we make our philanthropic decisions. We have our impact study these impact profile summaries on our website. Use those as you think about the [00:48:00] decisions you make if you're interested in the organizations we're working with, I can give you additional information to help you think about how you might give and also help you think about who you might volunteer with or how you might volunteer with them depending on where their strengths are and where their opportunities are and you know, can you leverage your strengths to either make a strength better or to help address an opportunity? And so those are some of the things that are kind of coming up in the short-term is you know, a couple events and using our material to help as you think about your philanthropic decisions here for this last part of the year.
Ed Gillentine: That's fantastic. Well, I know you guys are excited and if anybody wanted to connect and find out more how they could get involved, particularly in the next three or four months as some of these things shake out. How would they find out information on that?
Jared Barnett: They could follow us on our social media platforms. We have LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram, and that way you can stay in touch with us. Yeah, you can also connect with us via our email list. If you go to our website, slingshotmemphis.org, there's a place to register to be a part of our email list and we regularly use that. [00:49:00] You can also just reach out to us directly. So our email is disrupt@slingshotmemphis.org. And if you're excited, please reach out.
We're always looking at to help in whatever ways we can and know that we need more help ourselves, right. We're not the perfect solution. And there's lots of opportunities for us to refine what we're doing. So we're always looking to get better. I love that. I love the fact that you guys are open to other people's insight.
Ed Gillentine: Philanthropy can get kind of siloed can't it. Well, even though it's COVID, and there's only three of us in the room now four, we did want to celebrate with a cake for the fifth anniversary. So we'll just enjoy the cake now and I'm not gonna sing happy anniversary on the air, but congratulations for five years!
Now you're not quite off the hook. Okay. Before we have the cake I have what we call the lightning round. Okay. So you just got to buckle up and get ready for some intense questions. I'm going to start you off a little bit easier. Okay. What's your favorite ice cream?
Jared Barnett: Vanilla Heath Bar Crunch by Ben and Jerry's.
Ed Gillentine: Ben and [00:50:00] Jerry's, all right. Vanilla Heath Bar Crunch. You know, it's been a minute since I had that because it has, as I recall, I do extensive research on this. I mean, you're doing effective research on poverty fighting. I do it on ice cream and donuts. I recall that they were pretty large chunks of Heath bar in that.
Jared Barnett: It's sometimes about half the size, yeah. The Coffee Heath Bar Crunch is now the more prevalent version. So I have trouble finding the vanilla, but the vanilla with chocolate in it is just an amazing combination.
Ed Gillentine: I was in the Ben and Jerry's store over by the theater the other day and they had like four coolers of special edition ice cream and I won't tell you how much I bought. Favorite donut? This is kind of a loaded question since you're in Memphis.
Jared Barnett: Maple bar.
Ed Gillentine: Awesome. Well, where do you go in Memphis to get that though?
Jared Barnett: So, most frequently...
Ed Gillentine: Or maybe not in Memphis. Maybe, maybe you found the donut because you've traveled extensively, especially in your vagabond years. I'm assuming you did a lot of donut research.
Jared Barnett: Gibson's is kind of where we go most [00:51:00] frequently to get our donuts both for Slingshot and for personally.
Ed Gillentine: Absolutely. There is no better. I kinda set you up for that one. Okay. We'll get a little bit more serious. What's your favorite quote? Or one of your favorite quotes that you would share with our listeners?
Jared Barnett: Yeah. I can take it a lot of contexts. The one that comes to my mind first is "Don't tear a fence down until you know why it was built." Yeah, I think there's a lot of, especially as a professional services professional, it's easy to go in and find you'll poke holes in something.
But the advice I've been given is go in and understand first, learn, figure out why, and Africa taught me this because when I went there, I just like, well, it doesn't make any sense. Why are you doing that? And then as you learn, you realize that makes a lot of sense. And so that's been something that just stuck with me is this idea of really make sure that you learn first before you jump to conclusions.
Ed Gillentine: I think I may steal that one. One book, if you could recommend one book and it could be personal, it could be impact, it could be whatever.
Jared Barnett: Yeah. So, right now it would be a book called The Voice of the Heart by Chip God. And so it's been an amazing book to kind of help me think [00:52:00] about how I express my feelings, how I really embrace that part of me.
I've been very kind of work, work, work driven, very kind of analytical. This book has really helped me think about how do I ensure I incorporate my heart into what I do and has been a game changer for me as I've thought about that both personally and professionally.
Ed Gillentine: Yeah. You know, it's interesting because when you, I think when you're learning stuff personally, most of the time it's going to translate into how you see your work, especially going back to fighting poverty. There's humans involved and they have hearts and to have emotion. So that's really good. I'm going to go get that one. Give us the name of one person who significantly influenced your life 30 seconds or less. Why?
Jared Barnett: Yes. So I'll go back to my high school coach for football and baseball my sophomore year. So I just moved to a new high school, he was the coach for both the JV baseball and and football teams and was one of the first people who I think saw me as a [00:53:00] person and not just as a student or as an athlete. I hadn't had a lot of that growing up, you know, I'd always been, you know I'm a good student or I'm a, this, or I'm a, that.
And really helped me kind of feel comfortable being myself which is weird because I wouldn't think of that. He's a great coach as well. He helped me be a great football player. I was a quarterback on the football team and centerfielder on the baseball team and had a lot of fun doing that, but the thing that sticks with me is how he made me feel.
And how he gave me confidence to be who I was instead of feeling like I had to conform to some you know, image of what people expected. So it just was really liberating for me and then has stuck with me as I've thought about how I try and live my life since then.
Ed Gillentine: Yeah. I love that. And I'm a kind of land the plane by sort of recapping what you said at the very end. Takeaways, right? Ask the right questions and continue to bring the heart. Right? And I love the brief story about your coach because it gets back to us as humans. Right? And [00:54:00] balancing the heart with the analytics and all of those things. So I can't tell you how much I appreciate you being here. It's been a lot of fun. You guys, I mean, five years of what you're doing, that was I mean it's paradigm shifting and y'all have already had some really crazy impact, but I'm most stoked about sitting here with you in five more years and starting to see the catalytic impact that you guys have had. So thanks for coming.
Jared Barnett: Thank you so much, Ed. I really appreciate it and grateful for the opportunity to chat with you and chat more about Slingshot and how we're trying to help here in the community.
Ed Gillentine: Absolutely. Once again, happy fifth anniversary. We'll jump into the cake here in a minute. For our listeners, hopefully this has been helpful. It's been a lot of fun for us to do and to talk about. You can learn more about impact at edgillentine.com and it's a great resource we hope for impact articles, white papers, website links, like links to Slingshot, Memphis and other resources that we hope are going to help you on your journey to impact. You can also purchase the book, Journey to Impact, on any major [00:55:00] digital platform if you like ebook. You can get a hardback or paperback either at our website, amazon.com or barnesandnoble.com and randomly, I found it at target.com the other day. So if you're a target person and get 5% off, maybe you want to buy it there.
You can also go to our website to listen to our past podcasts and other interviews, and we would love it if you would leave your reviews. We would love your feedback and we do our best to tailor the shows to what you want to hear. So again, thanks for listening. And until next time, all the best.
Journey to Impact Outro: Thank you for listening. We love your feedback. So please let us know what you thought about this episode, as well as what you'd like to hear more of in the future. For more information, impact resources, or to purchase a copy of the book, Journey to Impact, visit edgillentine.com. That's E D G I L L E N T I N E.com. The book is also available through Amazon, Barnes and Noble or target.com. For Ed [00:56:00] Gillentine speaking inquiries or advertising opportunities, send us an email at ajourneytoimpact@gmail.com. This has been a presentation of the Journey to Impact podcast team Executive Producer, Ed Gillentine, Associate Producer, Meredith Taylor, produced and edited by Joey Woodruff, special thanks to Stephen Chandler.