Missions to Movements
This isn't just another nonprofit podcast - it's your weekly invitation to think bigger, take bold risks, and create lasting change in an ever-evolving social impact landscape. Meet Dana Snyder, your guide through the evolving landscape of nonprofit innovation. She's on a mission to help change-makers like you push the boundaries of what's possible in nonprofit marketing and fundraising. Each week, Missions to Movements serves as your personal mastermind session, delivering actionable insights and bold strategies that challenge traditional nonprofit thinking. Dive into revolutionary approaches to digital fundraising, discover how to build magnetic monthly giving programs that create lasting donor relationships, and learn to amplify your voice as a thought leader in the social good space. Whether you're reimagining your organization's impact or forging game-changing partnerships, you'll find the ideas, insights, and inspiration to take your mission further than you've ever imagined. Ready to turn your mission into a movement?
Missions to Movements
Scaling Impact Through Partnerships: The Face Equality & Sephora UK Story
What happens when a nonprofit and a major beauty brand come together to change the narrative on the deeply ingrained biases surrounding facial differences?
You’re about to learn how a BOLD vision turned a dream collaboration with Sephora UK into reality with Phyllida Swift, CEO of Face Equality International.
Phyllida starts by sharing her incredible story of resilience and strength after a car accident. The important work she does today stands at a unique intersection of human rights, disability policy, and representation.
Phyllida breaks down the Face Equality International ambassador program, how they attracted creators like British YouTuber Nikki Lilly, the challenges of navigating tokenism in brand partnerships, and how nonprofits can leverage creators to amplify their mission, too.
Then we dig into Phyllida’s favorite takeaways from their powerful “My Face Is a Masterpiece” campaign with Sephora UK, which included in-store events and training initiatives for beauty professionals, creating a beautiful conversation around beauty and identity.
Resources & Links
Learn more about Face Equality International on their website and Instagram, and connect with Phyllida on LinkedIn. Phyllida also references the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower.
This show is presented by LinkedIn for Nonprofits. We’re so grateful for their partnership. Explore their incredible suite of resources and discounts for nonprofit teams here.
Monthly Giving Awareness Week is May 12-16! Join me, RKD Group, and GivingTuesday for 5 days of FREE resources to help you launch and grow recurring gifts.
Are you still dreaming about building your monthly giving program or refreshing your current one? Applications are now open for my “done with you” Monthly Giving Mastermind. 4 spots are open and we start in July. Click here to apply.
My book, The Monthly Giving Mastermind, is here! Grab a copy here and learn my framework to build, grow, and sustain subscriptions for good.
Let's Connect!
There is increased representation of this community out there in the world. In beauty, in fashion, things are really happening, particularly here in the UK. We partnered with Zebedee Management to do a casting call to increase representation of people with facial differences on their books. So they're a talent agency. And then we had this idea to find a brand to do a campaign with for Face Equality Week, which is each year in May, and Sephora was top of my list.
Speaker 2:I'm Dana Snyder, your host of the Missions to Movements podcast, and my path to philanthropy has been anything but traditional. This show is your weekly mastermind, designed to give you the ideas, insights and support you need to push the boundaries of what's been done before in nonprofit marketing and fundraising. Whether you're looking to build a magnetic monthly giving program, elevate your personal brand or create partnerships that amplify your impact, this space is for you. I'll bring you solo episodes and conversations with industry leaders offering actionable strategies and fresh perspectives that will move you and your mission forward. Let's turn your mission into a movement. Hello everyone, welcome back to Missions to Movements. I hope you're having a beautiful start to your day, end to your day middle of the day, whenever you are listening to this episode.
Speaker 2:Today's guest came from an inspirational LinkedIn post that I saw. A good mutual friend of ours, dean Gillespie at IJM UK, is a new board member of an organization called Face Equality International, and anytime Dean does something, he's a part of something very cool, and immediately I said, oh my gosh, this organization looks amazing. Can you please introduce me to the CEO and will you please ask if they're comfortable coming on the podcast and sharing more about the amazing work that they're doing and so sitting virtually across from me, phyllida Swift, ceo of Face Equality International. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for having me, absolutely, and where are you joining us from?
Speaker 1:I'm in a co-working space in Poole in Dorset, which is southwest of the UK, so I'm about two hours outside of London by the seaside, where I am happiest, amazing, amazing.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you so much for making the time the organization. Please everyone, go to their website and look at it. The work you're doing is incredible. Can you share a little bit about your personal background and the journey that really led you to be CEO of Face Equality International? Because, if I was looking at it right, you've been with the years old at the time.
Speaker 1:I came out of a car accident in Ghana, where I was supposed to be volunteering, with a whole host of different injuries, but the most obvious one was a laceration from the top of my forehead down to the bottom of my cheek and, as I said, I was 22 years old. I was in my university summer break before final year. I was going out at the time I was kind of wanting to do my hair, do my makeup, and I was suddenly confronted in the mirror with a scar which I only ever saw people who look like me on screens in the media as the villain the vulnerable person, never the confident love interest, the beautiful person.
Speaker 1:It was always someone to pity and I hated that. It was that pity, that really kind of or the fear, or the not wanting to be pitied that lit a fire within me to want to go out there and reshape. You know my own narrative, which is how I came into this space, which was essentially sharing my own story.
Speaker 1:So good which was terribly wrong, was awful, said it to the tabloid newspapers, to the daily mail, and that was just an instant regret because they completely sensationalized it and what was supposed to be me being a control freak and reclaiming control was actually completely. I no longer had control of the narrative because they had completely. It was like horror crash oh gosh.
Speaker 1:I just worked tirelessly to stitch her back together and I suddenly had this light bulb moment. Oh gosh. The context of how the community at large so people with facial difference of any kind whether that's something that's acquired, like me, or something that someone is born with, or something that comes and goes like a skin condition the way in which these stories are told out there in the world, and the way in which that translates into people's real life day to day.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:In school, where kids are bullied and they're referred to as Scar or they're referred to as the Joker or hate crime.
Speaker 1:Here in the UK, a third of people have been a victim of hate crime, so it made me want to get involved with different charities. So I started out at Changing Faces UK, where I got involved in some great campaigns there UK, where I got involved in some great campaigns there and then I wanted to go and do something a wee bit different for a period of time, but immediately got poached by Face Equality International, which is the charity that I now run. So it was set up by a burn survivor. His name was James Partridge. He had previously run Changing Faces UK, which still to this day, is the leading charity in the uk supporting people with facial disfigurance differences, and he wanted to take all of those contacts that he had made internationally and basically take the face equality campaign global. He started that in 2018 and we were working together very closely for about 18 months before he died, at which point there was just a period where no one knew what was going to go on and ultimately I took over beginning of 2021.
Speaker 2:Wow, what an incredible story and resilience and just strength. I'm so sorry for someone who's worked in the media and in the PR world. I hate that that happened to you, when you are being so open to go out and share your story and then that's what's portrayed is horrendous and awful and there's so much good that media can do. And then there's that side of it and I'm sure you are still working with media in a CEO role of what you're doing now. Have you seen a difference in how the work that you're doing has been portrayed in the press?
Speaker 1:A hundred percent. I mean I completely and utterly retreated for a period of time and still wanted to get involved and that was why I went and took on a proper role at a charity and actually my job was then to support other people who wanted to share their stories and to try and yeah them through that in a way where they were telling it on their own terms and still to this day very much the case. And it happens people's stories get blown out of context and there still is largely this shock value or stories of people just going about their day to day lives. Then I will no longer have a job. So I have seen some positive moves, but also I've seen quite a lot of yeah.
Speaker 2:On the other spectrum too. Yeah, so for Face Equality International, your mission. What does it encompass? What is the mission, the movement that the organization is continuing to pursue?
Speaker 1:So we run a supportive international community. So we empower and equip anyone who wants to make face equality a reality. So we have an educational program with a membership of other global non-profits. We put on an annual awareness campaign. We position face equality as a human rights issue. So we are the only non-profit with consultative status to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. That actually represents face difference. So without us working as a collective to position this as a human rights priority, it would just continue to get sidelined. I mean face equality as a term, facial difference as a term these aren't publicly kind of widely topics even, especially when it comes to equality. This is a very neglected term area and that's our job is to ensure that it is at the forefront. And by doing that we yeah, we run a supportive community to really amplify the global movement.
Speaker 2:Thank you for what you do and I will say that was part of. I am probably one of those people and, even though I'm in the nonprofit sector, when I saw the organization that he was joining as a board member, I was like what is this? And your curiosity spiked and I was like, oh my gosh, this is so necessary and needed and beautiful what you're doing. And one thing that, because of my digital marketing background, of course, the first things I do is I go to the website, I go to social channels and your digital presence is amazing and so uplifting and inspiring and educational and full of community and engagement and everything that you want a community online to be about with each other. There was a really cool partnership. I'd love to learn more about your annual campaign awareness campaign that you talk about and how that's maybe trickled effect online.
Speaker 2:I specifically saw this collaborative partnership. I'm going to mispronounce her last name, probably Tanya Renee is it Messenbach? Yeah, okay, from Burned Beauty and she did these really powerful videos. And then, of course, I went down the wheelhouse and was on her channel and just like listening to her story and just like went down the rabbit hole. Give the listeners some context, maybe, to what I'm talking about and how like that project campaign has really created more of a conversation on equality and representation.
Speaker 1:Of course, yeah, so we work regularly with a network of creators ambassadors. Sonia is actually one of our ambassadors, so she runs an account called burn beauty 2018 and she's massive on tiktok. So there are particular aspects of life where someone with a facial difference will encounter challenges. As a burn survivor, tonya encompasses all of those different areas from being a woman and she uses beauty as a tool for kind of self-expression and there is this perception out there in the world like that, someone with a facial difference wouldn't want to embrace makeup beauty as a tool to get creative and feel like themselves, and that's very much what she stands for and so much of her video content.
Speaker 1:Again, it's not talking about facial difference, it's just talking about what products she likes and what she's been doing. And, yes, it does delve into the deeper topics and this is where she's really able to connect with people on a level who've been through anything in their life, whether it's related to facial difference or not. So she's just a great, eloquent, incredible. Yes, that we just love to amplify her story and there are some great people across our network, again internationally, that they're just creators in their own right and that's what we're all about. So we really try to make sure that people are seen and heard on their own terms. We try and reject that whole either inspiration or pity porn negative narrative. And also where we are so different is that all too often facial difference is solely talked about from a medical standpoint. You know you'll find a lot in the charity world in particular and rightly so where our members are providing vital health care services to this community health equity is just rife.
Speaker 1:We come in to focus on. Well, actually, the issues are out there in society, in the systems, in the lack of laws, in the public attitudes towards this community. All too often, when the onus is on like, this person needs to be fixed with this surgery and this person, needs to have this service to be able to cope in a broken world. That inevitably makes the person feel like they are broken and they need to be, right, completely not our model.
Speaker 1:Our model is that the issues are out there in society and how can we collectively turn our attention and make it easier for people to have that focus how have you structurally mentioned like ambassador program?
Speaker 2:is that ambassador program a group of creators, largely Largely.
Speaker 1:yes, they do have like there is an expectation that they will support our campaigns and our fundraising, but it is generally people with a higher profile who they might be. Some of the better known ones is our patron Nikki Lilly, who is a TV presenter here in the UK. She's actually going to be going to the United Nations Human Rights Council in March.
Speaker 2:Wow amazing yes, how was that built? Like for non-profits listening, that might be like how in the world did you create this ambassador network? How do you get them to say yes and would they commit to?
Speaker 1:I'm humbled that you like our digital presence, because that is our like shining glory, because it started from absolutely nothing and my first role at the charity was running the social channels and thankfully I've handed them over now to someone way better at it than I am. The principles are very much. Something that I'm proud that I have spoken about is like it's it's not medical, it's community-led, it's empowering. So as and when we continue to share stories of people, then the way in which we did that clearly appeals to people who were that bit more vocal and out there and being seen, and there are. Again, a proud moment is that there are people that, as a result of our work, are now also out there getting incredible jobs, working with great businesses, doing cool things.
Speaker 2:So yeah, amazing, so did they. They mostly because of your present. They found you to be more involved yeah, we get tagged in stuff.
Speaker 1:We get invited to be more involved. Yeah, we get tagged in stuff. We get invited to be collaborators on stuff. Especially during our annual awareness campaign, we get a lot of collab invites.
Speaker 2:Amazing, Are they?
Speaker 1:they're like official ambassadors, Like yeah one patron, and then there's like six or seven ambassadors again. That's something that I've recently been able to hand over to our partnerships manager. So she's doing an incredible job of just letting them do their own thing out there in the world. But then, as and when there is an opportunity to bring in the face equality message, then then we do that.
Speaker 2:I love this so much.
Speaker 2:I talked about like this merge, this prediction of content creators and even employee advocacy creators within organizations being a really big focal point of this year is that within your own team, you are thought leaders and can create a more personal, authentic presence to grow the organization's mission and amplify what you're doing. I think every organization should have an ambassador program. It can be local, it can be regional, it could be international, it can be like a trade, like, dependent upon what your cause is. It just depends on like who makes sense to reach a broader group of people who are going to be interested in the message that what you're trying to portray, and so I think this is so brilliant and so smart. So please go look at their social channels for a little bit about what I'm talking about and go follow them.
Speaker 2:Talking about partnerships good segue. I saw you also teamed up with Ambeauty Sephora UK for Lunch and Learns as part of your training program. Can you talk about how did this collaboration come to be and what has it led to for, like, new opportunities of just awareness?
Speaker 1:So At the end of 2023, we'd had a big focus on research for a year. We did a big human rights piece of research and it was focused on loads of middle income countries. We had a big head down research focus this year and then, going into the new year, we were choosing our words for the year and I wrote on a big piece of paper in front of my desk commercial. And I wrote on a big piece of paper in front of my desk commercial and because I was thinking there is increased representation of this community out there in the world, in beauty, in fashion, things are really happening, particularly here in the UK, with thanks to agencies like Zebedee management, who have had kind of. They were the ones that were responsible for gucci hiring a model with down syndrome for the first time.
Speaker 1:So we really wanted to be part of that conversation, but in a way where we're also helping brands to represent kind of inclusion. Yes, out, because it's all very well and good being seen to be representative, but it can be seen to be tokenistic. And then I myself have been on photo shoots where everything from the outside looks great but actually from you know, you look at the cast and the crew and it's all not necessarily representative and then the narrative as a result can sometimes be tokenistic and not quite right. So we partnered with Zebedee management to do a casting call to increase representation of people with facial differences on their books. So they're a talent agency.
Speaker 1:And then we had this idea to find a brand to do a campaign with for face equality week, which is each year in May, and Sepora was top of my list. They were on my vision board. Yes, because I knew that they were known for being very inclusive. And I wanted a beauty brand specifically because that again is a historic area where every single woman that you speak to or any gender for that matter if you're walking into a beauty hall and you have a facial difference, everyone you speak to has a experience of someone making an assumption. I myself have had someone kind of plaster me with foundation and just without asking me any questions, and that can be an incredibly difficult experience and everybody should be able to walk into a beauty hall and just have all the products they want and they should be seen in the campaign. So we did a partnership with them. We called it my face is a masterpiece, which was the love it headlines for last face of quality week.
Speaker 1:We loved it so much that we're keeping it this year as well. They put on store events where they invited members of the community to come along. Wait quick pause.
Speaker 2:Okay, I am loving this so much because you put it on your vision board and then you made it happen, and I think this is something where organizations can get so bogged down. It's like how would we ever, how could this ever happen? And how did that connection happen? Did you know somebody there?
Speaker 1:Yes, zebradi were already casting for there.
Speaker 2:Okay, Okay, yeah, so through another partnership had an inroad to make the ask.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but we also got very lucky because I had previously met their head of brand on a different photo shoot, who now was responsible for their purpose program relationships it was relationships and the stars just aligned and it was just the most iconic, probably, moment of my career to date was just landing that and the partnership continues. They want to have training for their in-house staff yes.
Speaker 1:They're opening up a store every month this year in the UK because they were brand new to the UK last year as well. Oh, wow, I didn't know that. Yeah, so they have. You know the sunflower scheme around disabilities. They have all of these different kind of inclusion schemes for their staff to make sure that as and when anyone goes into their stores, they have a positive experience, and we're talking about having training specifically on facial difference across their stores, starting in the UK. But they're a global brand and yes.
Speaker 1:I was in Asia a couple of months ago and speaking to a small cleft charity there and telling them about the Sephora partnership, and they were like, wow, that would be amazing.
Speaker 2:Please come and do that here so I know, can it happen here? That's the dream that's the dream now. Let's not make it not a dream, let's make it a reality. Like who do we need to contact to do that? Is the UK team making conversations? Now I'm just scheming with you.
Speaker 1:I probably shouldn't be saying this in a public space, but yeah, the head of brand for UK is about to move to Paris, so Europe next.
Speaker 2:Yes, let's go. Oh, it's so good. I love hearing these things and it's like global scale. I mean, people are coming in every day and if they can feel and the person doing the makeup will feel so much more empowered also to be able to help someone and, like, you're already beautiful without any makeup or anything on, but if you can feel that heightened sense of joy and having someone just get it.
Speaker 1:Yes, and there are genuine considerations. Like most people with a facial difference me with scarring skin conditions, you know vitiligo, spf is fundamental. So we're signing a big petition at the moment to have spf on the who essential medicines list for conditions like albinism and vitiligo. So there are aspects of health and beauty and some of the things that are essential and tips and tricks that where a scar is waxy, for example, an eyebrow pencil won't necessarily work if the makeup artist knows that, and they can apply the way that's empowering.
Speaker 1:It's just something that everybody should be able to have access to and a positive experience. Yes.
Speaker 2:So I have to ask I love listening to you have the dreams and turn them into reality and I think sometimes, like we kind of like started this call with, things can feel really dark and things can feel really heavy. I just see you so innovative, passionate, dreamer, going after what might not feel possible and like getting it done. How do you do that? How do you, as a leader, embody that and what would be? I know you're laughing, but seriously, like I think, what would be your recommendation to other leaders in this space that are feeling maybe constrained to have these ideas, these innovative ideas, and to go after them?
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I am very lucky because I have lived experience and I wholeheartedly live and breathe what I do and increasingly, as we grow as an organization, we now have more credibility to be able to go out there and pitch these big ideas, and I love that. I love taking a big, complex problem and coming up with a plan. Delivery side of it is less.
Speaker 1:My passion to detail is definitely something that I am lacking, but it is just about believing in it and not getting knocked back when someone says no, because ultimately someone else will say hell, yes that's right that's a mutual benefit, like the way in which we try and partner with these organizations, yes, is for the benefit of the facial difference community, but there is, of course, a benefit to a business, a brand, as well. So that's front and center and when you are doing something fun and exciting and for social good in the context of the world right now. It's an even bigger win when you find a business that wants to do good in this world.
Speaker 2:That's right? No, absolutely. And like thoughtfully integrate it into the stores and into the trainings of their employees, like through and through. I think that's so powerful. Okay, so I have limited time left with you and so I just want to ask, like I'm sure there's a million things on your radar, maybe a vision board of this year, but would you share, like, are there a key couple focus areas? I'm just like over here rooting for you and be like whatever's on your vision board this year is going to happen.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we have a campaign called Visibly Invisible, so it's encompassing three prongs where our community is historically overlooked. So the first of which is digital inclusion and AI. So facial recognition simply does not work for diverse faces. So, whether it's passport gates, whether it's opening up your phone, whether it's social media, censoring you and not recognizing your face as human, that's a big issue. We have a survey coming out on that. Second of which is the policy issue.
Speaker 1:So facial difference is not universally regarded as a disability worldwide, either socially or legally. There's a big kind of gray area as to where it sits and there's always this perception that it's cosmetic. And yet that UN disability Convention is inclusive of appearance effects and conditions, and so we're putting out a position paper for people that believe in that to sign. We've got the ex-special rapporteur on disability as the first signature on that position paper, so we're taking that to the United Nations with our patron. She will be talking about cyber bullying and digital inclusion and should be on the main disability panel at the human rights council, which is epic.
Speaker 1:Final thing is workplace training. So recruitment, bullying in the workplace, just the way in which someone is overlooked, all too often based purely on their appearance or kept to the back office. In the context of DEI, right now, it is interesting timing to be launching a workplace training program, but all the more reason to be doing it. I guess that's right. The businesses that do care. Again, this is an issue that is within disability policy and yet it's not really integrated, it's not really understood. So we want to work with more businesses with our lunch and learn sessions, so we're training up members of the community who will be paid as consultants to go out there into the world amazing to deliver these sessions.
Speaker 1:so that's what's going on, just a few things.
Speaker 2:Just a couple of things, nothing, not too busy. This year I don't think it's just a quiet one, just a quiet one, amazing, I mean. Okay, how can listeners, if they're as revved up as I am, how can they get involved? How can they support? Where can they learn more?
Speaker 1:If you're a business or a brand, we want to partner with you. We want to be trained. If you're in the non-profit sector, we always are looking to make friends. We're all in this together. We need support. If you're an organization that works with people with facial differences, come and be a member of the alliance. Come and let us make it easier for you to advocate can be really lonely, isolating, challenging, and we want to make it easier. So anyone we also have resources on our website for literally any type of person out there. Just get involved, get on our mailing list.
Speaker 2:Amazing Philida. This has been such a joy. Thank you so much for being here and for all the work that you do. I can't wait to see what all of 2025 has to hold for you. Thank you so much for being here and for all the work that you do. I can't wait to see what all of 2025 has to hold for you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for tuning into today's episode of Missions to Movements. If you enjoyed our conversation and found it helpful, I would love for you to take a moment to leave a review. Wherever you're listening. Your feedback helps us reach more change makers like you and continue bringing impactful stories and strategies to the show. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button, too, so you'll never miss an episode. And until next time, keep turning your mission into a movement.
