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
Building Effective Nonprofit Teams to Drive Change (Featuring 2025 LinkedIn Nonprofit Talent Report)
Building resilient nonprofit teams has never been more crucial. Today I’m bringing you an enlightening conversation recorded LIVE at LinkedIn’s 2025 Nonprofit Talent Impact Summit in D.C.
You’ll hear from Betsy DiMalanta from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Dr. Luisa Boyarski from Georgetown University's Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership about what it actually takes to develop effective teams that can weather uncertainty and how to navigate today's complex talent environment.
If you’re a nonprofit leader, you’ll walk away with fresh ideas on hiring, retaining, and developing talent in the world of AI. Plus, you’ll hear Betsy and Luisa’s three critical pillars for leading through change: communication, co-creation that empowers team members, and clarity around mission.
Listen now to transform how your organization can approach talent development in uncertain times and don’t miss the 2025 LinkedIn Nonprofit Talent Report.
Resources & Links
Connect with Betsy DiMalanta and Dr. Luisa Boyarski on LinkedIn and check out the 2025 LinkedIn Nonprofit Talent Report.
Learn more about Georgetown University's Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership and download their AI Readiness Toolkit for Nonprofits.
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Let's Connect!
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Wow, this has been an incredible month. I really enjoyed celebrating Monthly Giving Awareness Week with everyone. All the resources are still available at monthlygivingweekcom if you haven't checked those out. And to wrap up the month, I wanted to focus on highlighting talent the talent that it takes to do all of the work that you do, all of the impact, all of the programs, all of the monthly giving programs that you run. And so, just a few weeks ago, linkedin for Nonprofits put together two impact summits Nonprofit Talent Edition. They had two action-packed days in New York City and DC. And today you are getting the inside scoop.
Speaker 1:Listen to the keynote chat from DC. It's titled Building Effective Nonprofit Teams to Drive Change. So, in this ever-changing world of work, combined with the rise of AI, limited resources, competing priorities, do you feel seen in this moment? You are faced with immense challenges, but really building resilient workforces dedicated to your cause. So in this conversation, in this keynote, they're going to dive into the current state of the nonprofit talent landscape as really informed by the 2025 Nonprofit Talent Report. So you'll hear from industry experts, learn about the latest talent insights and really leave with a deeper understanding of the opportunities facing nonprofit talent leaders.
Speaker 1:Today and, ariana, you and I posted on LinkedIn right after this. It truly hit the mark by centering the conversations. We don't have often enough Talent retention, culture and equity. I'm very excited for you to listen to this conversation and then in the show notes I also have a link that you can go check out the Nonprofit Talent Report as well. So I hope you enjoy and this starts conversations within your organization and take those conversations to LinkedIn to see what others have to say. Roll the tape.
Speaker 2:Successful organizations who are adopting AI do so by first focusing on pain points, so especially in senior leadership, where maybe senior leadership isn't quite ready to embrace AI. How do you help them see where AI can help them in their day-to-day work before trying to say, oh, let's do this huge AI adoption system across the organization?
Speaker 3:to say, oh, let's do this huge AI adoption system across the organization. Really excited to have Ariane Yunai join us. She is the head of LinkedIn for Nonprofits and she's going to be leading this really important conversation around building effective nonprofit teams. We are going to be joined by a couple of really special guests Betsy DeMolanta, head of global talent acquisition for the Gates Foundation, and Louisa Boyalanta, head of Global Talent Acquisition for the Gates Foundation, and Louisa Boyarsky, director of the Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership, right here at Georgetown University. I'm really excited about this conversation, so please join me. Remember big welcome applause. Please join me in welcoming Ariana and our panelists to the stage. Thank you.
Speaker 4:Hi everyone. It's so good to see you here. Only, I think, about 60 people in the room, all TA professionals at nonprofit organizations, so this is really something special. I think this group is going to pack a punch. I'm really excited to be here and welcome our panelists for a conversation I think is going to be very timely. I hope, as you hear the insights from our panelists, you see yourselves in the conversation, you see your teams in the conversation, and I'm really excited to get to hear some insights from Betsy and Louisa on building effective nonprofit teams to drive change.
Speaker 4:So today we're going to be diving into the current state of the nonprofit talent landscape, guided by insights from LinkedIn's 2025 talent report, which we just put out Tons of insights that came from this. This is going to be our guidepost for today's questions and conversation. So let's introduce our panelists, starting with Betsy DeMolanta. Betsy is a seasoned TA professional and HR leader with deep expertise in solving complex talent challenges and building high-performing teams. Betsy's work intersects talent and organizational effectiveness, focusing on workforce planning, executive hiring and change management. Her experience spans both tech and philanthropic sectors, where she has developed scalable, people-centered solutions that drive long-term impact. Welcome, betsy. Thank you, glad to be here. We also have Louisa Boyarsky here joining us as the director of Georgetown University's Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership and Associate Research Professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy, dr Boyarsky leads executive education programs and conducts research on systems change and racial equity. She's developed customized programs for organizations like USAID and the National Urban League and frequently conducts workshops on NGO management and leadership.
Speaker 4:Welcome, louisa. Thank you so much. Excited to be here. All right, so, to kick things off, I'm going to pose the same question to both of you. I'm sure our audience is eager to hear your thoughts on this. We all know this the non-profit sector has undergone a ton of change over the last decades a continuous stream of socio-political crises, natural disasters, a global pandemic all of which has challenged organizations to adapt and adjust like never before. But the one thing that's remained the same through all of this uncertainty, and will continue to remain the same in the years to come, is the need for dedicated, mission-driven talent. Years of great change and volatility within the sector, what is one thing that stood out to you when it comes to building effective teams that are resilient and help drive mission-level success? And I'm going to start with Betsy.
Speaker 5:Great. Well, I'm going to start already by breaking the rules, because I couldn't just think of one thing, given how important it is right now that we're all working with teams in an environment where we need to be really agile. So the three things I'm thinking about right now, the first being communication and how important it is to be constantly communicating to your teams and your employees about what you know, what you're working on and what's going on. I heard a statistic that someone needs to hear something nine times before they really understand it, and so for me as a leader, while it may feel repetitive, I appreciate that for my team to help them move through the change, that repetition is really important.
Speaker 5:The second piece is co-creation. So thinking about where, as we're going through change, can you bring in your team to help them co-create? They will feel more empowered if they've had an opportunity to weigh in and help build some of that change that they're navigating. The third piece is around clarity. So I don't know about you all, a lot of folks on my team right now are looking for certainty, certainty about their job, certainty about their finances. I can't provide them that certainty, but I can give them clarity around what I know I can give them clarity around the mission and the values of our organization, and so I think about, as a leader, what is that postcard from the future I am painting for them and how can I provide them that clarity to help them move through the changes that we're navigating?
Speaker 4:Beautiful. So that was repetition, co-creation.
Speaker 5:Communication, co-creation and clarity. There you go Three Cs, Three Cs.
Speaker 2:No, that's so important, betsy, and especially this piece around leading with mission and vision. One thing that we know about being a leader in uncertain times is that, as you said, you can't necessarily promise knowing what the future is going to look like, but reminding everybody that we have this bigger vision and goalpost of where we're going, and while the interim maybe in the next couple of years will be uncertain and disrupting, how do we keep our eye on that North Star and use that as a way to keep reminding folks about the importance of our work and the impact that we are having in community? So I've got three as well. I thought about it a little bit more like proactively, what could you be doing before we get into a crisis situation or an uncertain time to prepare a team to be more resilient? And so one thing that I've seen a lot is that cross-functional training can be so important, because when we get into disruptive situations, that's often when you also see changes in personnel or availability of people to be on the job, and so if you wait until then, it's too late, and that means your development team, maybe only certain people, own certain relationships, and that's problematic. You may have certain key partnerships where you only have one person who's that lead and they haven't shared that relationship and built trust with other people on your team. So how are you thinking about making your team more cross-functional, making sure people can step in for each other if they need to step out? It's a good practice regardless, but it really helps in these times to be more resilient. Another piece of that is also just having a really good knowledge management system so that people know where they can find information if certain folks are out of the office and can't easily be contacted.
Speaker 2:The second thing is creating space for creativity and innovation. In a time like this, we have to be creative, we have to be thinking outside of the box, but when you're stressed and you're anxious, it's really hard to do that, unless it's already somewhat part of your DNA. So how are we thinking about creating those spaces in our organizations where people are given the time to think creatively, to innovate? That can be maybe one Friday a month where you have that time to come together and to share these ideas that have come up across your staff. It could be having a certain percent in the budget every year that says, hey, you know what? Yes, we need to fund our current programming, but how do we provide funding as well for new ideas? I will say I've been talking to colleagues at Georgetown and we're all seeing this as a really important time of innovation for the university. And how are we letting people know that it's important to be taking these risks at this time? But also, how do we make sure that people feel supported by the organization to do that?
Speaker 2:And then the third piece and this is more of an immediate what's happening now in this time of change, is we need to allow time for staff to feel grief and loss when we have to make change or close down programming.
Speaker 2:And we've had a series of community convenings here in the DC area, led by my center recently, and what we've been hearing from folks is that they're pretty certain that the whole nonprofit sector is not going to survive this, and that means we have to think seriously about mergers and acquisitions, about strategic partnerships, about thinking about how do we continue to serve communities, but maybe in a very different way than we've done it before, and that is going to come with grief and loss. There are real emotions that are built up in having to make those kinds of very serious pivots and it's important that we understand that and make the space for that, because if you don't, it is really hard to avoid burnout among staff when you're asking them to create that change. So making sure we're not moving too quickly to act, understanding that people really need that time to process.
Speaker 4:That's so important, and we're going to talk a lot more about innovation and about the changing landscape, so let's stay on the topic of uncomfortable technologies coming our way.
Speaker 4:Luisa, I want to hear a little bit from you so you are training the next generation of students who are going to be entering the nonprofit sector, shaping the future and leveraging many of today's emerging technologies, like AI, which we're all going to be talking about a lot today, and I want to hear from you. We know our nonprofit customers are benefiting from some of our tools generative AI features to help with repetitive tasks like candidate searches and outreach, allowing recruiting professionals to focus on interviewing, screening candidates and other important tasks that are involved in the TA process. We're also seeing customers empower their teams to use LinkedIn Learning's new AI features to develop customized on-demand learning paths, freeing up time for their L&D teams to focus on more strategic work. So let's bring it back to you. So let's talk about as your students learn and develop the skills they need to lead effective nonprofits. How are they thinking about leveraging AI in their current or future roles, and how are they thinking about how that applies to managing their own teams one day?
Speaker 2:Yeah, really great question, and I'll note that we have future leaders who are part of our graduate programs at the McCourt School, but in my center we actually work with current leaders in the nonprofit sector, and so we're seeing in real time how nonprofit leaders are adapting and adjusting. We just put together an AI toolkit for nonprofit leaders and in doing that, we interviewed a bunch of nonprofits and did some mini case studies, and the one thing that we found was that successful organizations who are adopting AI do so by first focusing on pain points. So, especially in senior leadership, where maybe senior leadership isn't quite ready to embrace AI, how do you help them see where AI can help them in their day-to-day work before trying to say, oh, let's do this huge AI adoption system across the organization? And so, for example, one of our alums of our program was saying he had been practicing using AI within his own department, but when he brought it up to the senior leader, they were pretty reticent. A lot of nonprofits are really concerned about security and data security related to AI, but also biases and what that might do to data analysis, and so he said well, instead of starting there, he said well, what is it that's most challenging for you in your day-to-day work. And she said, oh my gosh, it is so hard to find documents in our knowledge management system. And he said, well, you know AI can help with that, right? And so by showing her how AI could solve the problem that she was facing, it made her much more open to talking about okay, how else can we use AI? So I think what I'm hearing, then, is you can't just have a one approach fits all for how to adopt AI in an organization, because that's when you're not really listening to each individual's needs and interests and also concerns.
Speaker 2:But the other thing that we found in this toolkit is there are three areas that we're really seeing AI being adopted in the nonprofit space. So the first is an operational efficiency, and a lot of that is what you were just talking about. Right, how do we make a lot of these tasks that are repetitive easier to do? But we also have opportunities to use AI in service delivery and in advocacy. So we're seeing that organizations are using AI to do data analysis, to do program assessment and real-time evaluation. So we, just at our community convenings, had people note-taking at tables. So we, just at our community convenings, had people note-taking at tables. We put those notes through AI as well, as advocacy groups are using it to draft social media posts and calls to action. Doing that initial draft, it just pulls things out faster, and if you train your AI well, it can really make a big difference really quickly.
Speaker 2:So we're putting together this sign-on letter, and one of our partners was like, oh, we'll just run it through the AI tool that we've been training on nonprofit fundraising and development and we'll see what it puts. And it just did a great job. It just took all of the things we were saying but made it soundbites and made it focused and made sure that it was punchy, and I was like man, this was great. So opportunities there. And then the last piece is in decision making, and so we're looking at AI to help with scenario modeling Hugely important right now as we're trying to consider what are different futures for our organizations, looking at data analysis that can be used for decision making as well as financial forecasting.
Speaker 2:So lots of great ways to be using AI. Just the importance, though, of remembering to have really clear AI policies so staff know when do we want you to be using AI, when do we not? What does that mean in terms of which data we want you to put through AI which do we not? And then, lastly, ensuring that there's ongoing training, because it's changing all the time, ensuring that there's ongoing training because it's changing all the time.
Speaker 4:This is so valuable, and one of the things that we learned in our nonprofit talent report is that the demand for AI skills has increased by 2.6, yet the supply has only increased by two times. So the fact that we're upskilling our students and future nonprofit leaders to be ready to face that change is so important. So, betsy, we're going to bring it to you next and talk a little bit about how this applies to the TA side of the house. We all know there's a growing need for AI fluency across a sector. We just covered quite a bit of that From your perspective at the Gates Foundation. What's working when it comes to attracting and retaining talent with AI capabilities, especially when competing with sectors that have deeper pockets? And are there specific roles or skills you've prioritized to help your team stay future ready without?
Speaker 5:losing sight of your mission. Yeah, happy to answer that, but before I do, I actually just want to build Louisa off what you were saying, because I think at the Gates Foundation there's some real-life examples of how you're talking about best practices. Some of the things we've done to try and encourage employees to embrace AI is one as a foundation, we've set principles for how to use AI, but with those principles we also set guardrails, so things like data privacy and how we want to make sure that if we're trying these things, we're doing it in a really thoughtful way. And then we've set check-ins, so we have monthly times for employees both to share how they're trying AI, but also to provide education and trainings and tips and tricks to help people as they're on this journey. And I think what's so important about the model that we are trying at the Gates Foundation is it's empowering the employees, which then increases trust for people to try and adopt and use new things.
Speaker 5:So, from the recruiting perspective on the AI side, what I'll share and I experienced this both when I was recruiting in the tech industry as well as now in the nonprofit side it's really important, as you're thinking about AI talent, to think about what talent requires familiarity with AI. Versus what roles are AI roles? Thinking about how to use it, how to encourage our teams to use it? But that is very different from an individual that actually needs to have the technical expertise to develop AI solutions, and so I'd encourage you all to think about that differentiation, because it's in that differentiation where you can customize your recruiting and your talent management strategies to address those more competitive roles.
Speaker 4:All right, louisa, let's bring it back to you. So we talked a bit about your students, and we also know from our report that both hard skills and human-centric skills are highly important. So we're kind of bringing it back to the things that are familiar, the familiarity that our employees may have. How do you ensure that your students or the nonprofit leaders that you teach are able to successfully navigate new technology, and how do you think nonprofits can adapt this approach when developing their own teams?
Speaker 2:Really good question. Sorry, I forgot that I have a microphone. So, yeah, I think it's really important that we remember to combine both the hard and soft skills when we're thinking about team effectiveness. One of the areas that I focus on with our nonprofit leaders is helping develop a shared language around workplace behaviors so that we can help teams adapt to different situations and call on the strengths of different team members when they're needed. And so this means clarity around basic things like communicating, which we covered before, and giving and receiving feedback, which is really important, because not every team member is going to be ready to make decisions or pivot at the same speed, and so having open communication. And also, especially around AI, being able to say, look, I'm not ready for that next step, or I don't feel prepared, or I know the team wants to move this way, but these are concerns I still have, and making it clear that those are welcome comments as opposed to oh well, you're just against the process or our ability to adapt.
Speaker 2:And then I think it's also interesting, when we think about bringing in staff with strong AI backgrounds, how that might be intimidating for current staff, so how those folks are coming in with a different language and a different way of thinking and finding ways to empower existing staff. One by highlighting the skills they do have, so that it doesn't feel like, oh, ai is now more important than some of these community-based skills that you bring to the table, but also figuring out how to really bridge the gap between the language and knowledge differences of those folks. One thing I always remember is when we talk about tech teams and IT, there are always people who say, well, there's that person in the middle who's doing the translation, and just thinking through, who is that person? Or do we need a person like that, as we're bringing in really highly skilled AI professionals and mixing them into a different culture of potentially very community-based, very people-centric staff and organizations. So that's just something I've been thinking about.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think what you say there is so important, and I've been hearing that a lot about the intimidation factor, so I'm glad you were able to touch on that a little bit, luisa. So the beauty of leveraging these new technologies is that it allows us to spend more time on people-first approaches, so clearing the space for us to think about the ways that humans need to be doing their jobs in TA and saving on administrative tasks. This stat blew my mind as well from the report job openings on LinkedIn that did not require a degree increase by 14%, which signals that nonprofits are slowly but surely adopting a skills-based approach versus a degree-based approach to attracting new talent I love. So I'd like to pose this next question to you, betsy, as the shift towards skill-based hiring is becoming more prevalent in the nonprofit sector how has the Gates Foundation adapted its recruitment to focus on competencies over traditional education requirements and any outcomes you've observed from this shift?
Speaker 5:Yeah. So when it comes to skills-based hiring, a couple things I think about. One I think about with skills, it's really important to take a holistic approach. So it's not just what are the skills you're hiring for, but making sure as you identify those skills, those will grow with the employee. So you're bringing in skills at hiring, onboarding, performance, all those important moments through the employee life cycle. Now, with that it can become a rather daunting task because it becomes a much bigger program that you're trying to solve for.
Speaker 5:So what we're trying to do at the Gates Foundation is think about what are our short-term solutions that we can take advantage of, but then how will those stitch into a longer-term approach?
Speaker 5:And so one example at the foundation we have over 500 job profiles given the complexity of our roles, which is a lot. If you think about building skills for 500 profiles, that could take a good few years. So we actually found a way to click up. While we have over 500 profiles, we actually only have three different career tracks, so that's manager, professional and support, and so we've invested time in building skills and a hiring assessment for those skills based on those three tracks, acknowledging that 60 to 70 percent of those skills aligned to those tracks will also be relevant for the individual jobs, and it's made it a much more manageable approach. My hope is, as we do more around skill building, that we improve quality of hire because we're working around the packaging a candidate can bring, whether that's their pedigree, their background, and we're really truly assessing what are the skills that are required to be most impactful in the job.
Speaker 4:I love that.
Speaker 4:And I can't believe that we're almost at the end of our conversation, but we still have a lot of insights. I think we're going to get out of our speakers today and surprise we're going to be turning the mic over to our audience as well, to contribute to the conversation. So I want to start by asking this last question and again, we're going to pass the mic around. I want to hear from many of you in the audience today. We have a roaming mic, by the way, so I think someone will be running around with that. All right, betsy and Louisa question, we'll start with you. What are you most excited or hopeful about when it comes to the future of talent acquisition or development in the nonprofit sector?
Speaker 2:All right.
Speaker 2:So I think this is something that isn't necessarily changing, but it is something that we see that, as the country goes through different times of uncertainty, we often get an influx of folks into the nonprofit sector.
Speaker 2:Get an influx of folks into the nonprofit sector we saw it with the economic decline in 2008, where all of a sudden, we had folks with a very different background than you would normally see a nonprofit seeking out nonprofit work and I think the positive of that is that we're bringing in we will have this opportunity to bring in new folks who have new ideas, who can help with some of the creativity and innovation which is going to be necessary for our organizations to weather this storm and come out stronger than they were before.
Speaker 2:So a lot of it is just around this diversity of perspective, experience, skill set, and I think it's going to help us address some of these community challenges that continue to persist, and one of the things we talk about more and more within our trainings is the importance of working across sector. So if we can be bringing in people who have been in other sectors, who can help us understand how best to have those cross-sector partnerships and who to approach and what are potentially good partners for our work. That's going to help us have a better chance at addressing some of these really big systemic problems that we face around poverty and education and housing, for example. So I'm optimistic, despite the fact that this is obviously a challenging time, but I think again, it gives us new opportunities to rethink who we are and what we do and how we best show up for our communities.
Speaker 4:That optimism is so important. I want to hear from you too, Betsy.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I'll build off, louisa, what you said. I think for me, it's innovation. I really do believe that while change can be hard, it is an opportunity, that while change can be hard, it is an opportunity. And as I look at the Gates Foundation, I talk to peers and colleagues. I think we're in this unique moment where we're moving from very structured and traditional organizations into a much more fluid environment, and so, with that, I think about what am I doing myself as a leader to prepare? How am I getting the information to think about where my team needs to move to? And then what am I doing to support my team? Make sure they have the right skills, make sure they're understanding where we're going, allow them to also help build with me. And so, between myself, trying to paint that future, bring my team along. I'm really excited, acknowledging that there are bumps and challenges along the way, but I'm excited for those problems. I think they're really interesting and exciting to solve for.
Speaker 4:This is great. I think it's really important for us to send off all of you to the rest of the day with some of that optimism and hope for what's to come in the sector, because we're sure there's going to continue to be a lot of change. I'd love to hear from you. Did we pass the mic around? Anyone want to jump in? What are you excited or hopeful about?
Speaker 7:Yes, so I just wanted to share that.
Speaker 7:You know we are a team around 250 people right now and we were just developed the strategy plan for the next 10 years and we were all together to discuss about.
Speaker 7:From you can say executive level to everyone.
Speaker 7:You know all the board members and everyone was there to design the how strategy for the next 10 years should look like.
Speaker 7:So I just want to want to know from you you know, uh, when we design the strategy for the non-profit who work with the youth and also with the women, so you know, as you see, there is a culture, background and the difference in the languages, so we have to make sure how the ai need to be used for us and what are the limitation we should keep on it like, if you have see, everyone is providing you ai tools, but there is a fear in the staff also what we should use or what we should not use, because might be because of the training, as you said, there is need of training to the staff also what we should use or what we should not use, because might be because of the training, as you said, there's need of training to the staff also.
Speaker 7:But somewhere it also found that if we give a training to, they will, you know, just be depend on the, you know on the charge gpt and just writing the report on that way. So I just want to know what you think, what kind of strategy we should have with the staff.
Speaker 2:I mean, I'm happy to start. So one of the things I was also thinking about and this came up in our workshop last week with our AI toolkit for nonprofits somebody said, well, not only do we need to be worrying about training the staff, but we have to worry about training the people that we're serving. And one of the things we saw when technology and the internet came out. Originally, it led to a huge economic gap, so the people who had access did better and you saw the people who didn't have access, the gap in income grew between them, right, and we don't want that to happen with AI. So I think we need to be thinking about not only how are we training our staff, but how are we making sure that the youth that we are working with understand AI and understand a number of different things right, Like how to assess information that they're finding online and decide whether this is valid or not? How do they and we are doing this in our coursework at Georgetown how do we let them use AI tools so they can learn what they can do for them and what they can't do for them, and have that actual conversation so that they're learning about the tools in real time.
Speaker 2:The tools are going to continue to exist, and so I think avoiding them doesn't really serve anyone's purpose. But being really thoughtful about how are we helping people analyze the tools, not just use them, but understand what is the tool saying it's doing and what is it actually doing? So we do that a lot, especially in our research work, to say, okay, what is the difference between asking a question that you kind of have a sense of what the response should be and then being able to assess the response, versus asking a question about information you know nothing about and then relying on AI to have told you the right thing? Right? These are very different scenarios and I think that that's what we need to help our staff, but also the people we're serving, be able to have that kind of critical analysis.
Speaker 5:That judgment is so important. The only thing I'll add there is we've had to get much more intentional about a technology inventory, so looking at what are all the tools we're using and then being much more agile with the review of that. So, instead of looking at a tool over a two or three year period even from a contracting perspective, really getting more into every six months, let's check in what are the tools we're using. Are they still serving what we need them to? How have those tools themselves evolved? Because so many of our partners LinkedIn is a great example they're providing new features that we need to stay up to date with, and so looking at in a much more agile schedule, checking in what are we using. Is it serving what we need to? Using our network to understand what others are using, what new tools are coming out, and then being in a more fluid environment of okay, we're going to roll off this tool because it no longer serves our need and we're actually going to pilot this new tool and see how it goes.
Speaker 4:Great ad-libbing, ladies. That was not in the scripts. I love it. Do we have time for one more? Okay, any other brave souls in the audience? Thank you for that.
Speaker 6:Thank you very much. My name is Greg Hutchins. I'm the head of talent acquisition for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. I have a question related to AI, particularly around ethical usage of AI, as we still try to drive innovation in our work, knowing that AI can be used in a variety of different ways. What processes, guidelines one of you mentioned guardrails what are you putting in place to make sure that there is still a focus on true innovation and not relying on solely the output from an AI algorithm?
Speaker 5:Yeah, I'm happy to start.
Speaker 5:So, as I said, I think what's been important for us at the Gates Foundation is having both the principles of here's what we're aspirationally working towards with this technology, as well as the guardrails, and those guardrails are really in close partnership with our legal team on these are the do's and don'ts and where not to use it.
Speaker 5:And then we are really trying to engage almost a growth mindset, I would say, with our teams of these past 12 months we've talked about this is a time of experimentation. So, take the principles, take the guardrails and then test and try but bring those learnings back. And that's where I think what has been so critical is those regular check-ins to come together as a team and say, hey, what are you trying? And hey, did anyone hear about this or see this new feature? And it's in those moments to some of the kind of ethical or more ambiguous situations that we don't yet have answers for, that's where we're able to better identify as a team. Hey, these are the good moments, keep going, we're gonna build off of those. And hey, love that you tried this. But we actually, because of these reasons, want to move more towards this direction.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think that there are a couple of things I would also share is that one of the things that, when we were considering the AI toolkit, was that most AI approaches focus on a human-in-the-loop approach, which says humans need to be checking in in the places that we think AI might have these biases or might have some issues. Focus on a human in the loop approach, which says humans need to be checking in in the places that we think AI might have these biases or might have some issues, so making sure that they are in the loop. What we decided, though, was that, because of our mission-driven organizations, we think humans have to be at the top of the loop, right? Humans need to be making decisions at every stage of how AI is being used, not just checking in to make sure it was doing what we thought it was going to do. And then there are just certain types of AI that you want to be really careful around. One is chatbots. They can be very helpful, but, at the same time, a lot of our organizations and the people we serve kind of believe that they're going to be interacting with a human being, and, especially when they're vulnerable populations, we want to be really careful about when it's human interaction and when it might not be.
Speaker 2:The other thing I heard was just be transparent as much as you can, and so just tell people this is how we're using it, this is when we're using it, this is what we're using, and that way, at least people are aware and then if there are concerns, they can tell you.
Speaker 2:As opposed to it being used without that kind of transparency, then it's really hard to get feedback from folks to know how they feel about the use of AI, and I think we also just need to get people used to the fact that AI is going to be used in certain situations.
Speaker 2:But what we found with the toolkit was that there's some organizations, because of the type of work that they do, that they really don't see their organization moving beyond using AI just for efficiency purposes, and that's fine, especially as we're continuing to learn about AI and some of the potential biases and concerns, and especially those who are trying to push towards an area of using it for decision-making, really taking the time not just to understand AI and the kinds of prompts you're using and how those could lead to biases, but also how your data could just be.
Speaker 2:The kind of data you're inputting can lead to biases. So I had heard an example where an organization said oh, we're hiring and let's just put all of the resumes of our current staff into AI and say pick someone who would fit well in this organization. Well, it turned out this organization was working in an area where there weren't that many women who were part of the staff, so the AI tool just did not put forward any female resumes because they said well, you didn't want women, you don't have women on your staff, you have very few, and so it's just understanding that what you're asking and how it's processing that ask, and so those are just some examples of things to keep in mind.
Speaker 4:I'm sure the audience loves those real life examples. This is great and just a quick observation, I can see both of the initial points you brought up about advice you give on navigating change be like a through line through how you'd guide your teams through AI. So really nice work.
Speaker 8: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 changemakers 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.
