The Urgency Marathon

When the challenge doesn't have a finish line, leaders have to strike a balance of meeting the urgency and staying steady.

Nancie McDonnell Dougherty sits down with Abby Fenton, Chief Advancement Officer at Capital Area Food Bank (CAFB), to discuss what it really takes to lead in the face of challenges that keep unfolding. 

Abby shares how CAFB is focused on digitnity, choice and long-term solutions while also responding to rising food insecurity across the DMV. Listen to hear how CAFB is meeting rising demand, how leaders can stay disciplined when urgency is unrelenting and what it takes to prevent burnout while continuing to look around corners.

Learn more about Capital Area Food Bank's mission and work at ⁠capitalareafoodbank.org⁠.

Curious how mission, strategy and proof align inside your organization? At Noetic Consultants, we help leaders connect culture to credibility and brand to business impact. Learn more at ⁠noeticconsultants.com⁠.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It's a marathon, not a sprint, but we are going to have to be dealing with this for a really long time.

SPEAKER_01 0:11

This is the Metamorphosis Moment, a podcast from Noeda Consultants. We are researchers, strategists, trainers, and coaches, obsessed with how change actually sticks. On our show, we have candid discussions with leaders who are embracing change, and we work to uncover what they're doing to help others achieve similar success. Just like with our clients, we bring our noetic secret sauce to each conversation. We dig into the messy middle, finding human behavior and leadership factors that are making a difference, and sharing practical guidance that you can use in the moments that matter most. I'm your host, Nancy McDonald Doherty. Let's fly. Some challenges do not come with a finish line. In the greater Washington, DC area, food insecurity is not a shrinking challenge. It's growing. And for those leading hunger relief work, the answer is not a short sprint of emergency support. It's a long-haul effort that requires leadership discipline, planning, and stamina. Today I'm sitting down with Abby Fenton, a leader who is truly in the work. As Chief Advancement Officer at Capital Area Food Bank, also known as CAFBE, Abby leads the relationships, resources, and community engagement that powers CAFB's Hunger Relief Support Network. Mission and Impact have been a through line in her career. But before CAFB, Abby helped build brands and community initiatives at Whitman Walker Health and at the DC Chamber of Commerce. In this episode, we discuss what it takes to lead through sustained pressure, scenario planning, donor confidence, team stamina, dignity in service, and leadership discipline. So let's get started with our episode, The Urgency Marathon. Abby, welcome. I am so excited to have you here to sit down and talk about the work that you're leading at Capital Area Food Bank, which I noticed fondly referred to as CAF B by those who are in the know. Thank you so much for coming.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

Thank you for having me. I love, always love our conversations, but happy to do it in a podcast form.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

I know. Oftentimes we're doing it over like a lovely dinner, but this time it's in the morning. I don't have a glass of wine in front of me at this time, but we'll make the most. We'll make two. Yeah. Abby is working in the food insecurity space. And what a space this is at this point in time. The realities of hunger right now are very, very large. We have in the DC area, what we locally refer to as the DMV, really amplified food insecurity, you know, with things like government shutdown and job losses, rising housing costs, you know, I could go on and on. So I want to start there. We're having this moment, but it's not even really a moment. It's like an elongated moment. What do you think this really requires from leaders in the community, you know, leaders of organizations?

SPEAKER_00 3:11

Such a good question. And I think the first and foremost is I always say to my team, this is a marathon, not a sprint. And this is something that I think the DMV, as you said, has been experiencing for a long time. If we looked at Capillary Food Bank and what they were distributing pre-pandemic, pre-COVID, it was 35 million meals. The height of COVID, it was 76 million meals. The hope was after the pandemic, things would settle in, people would get back on their feet, the levels of food insecurity would go back down to that pre-pandemic level. And what we're seeing is that's not the case. So originally when we projected for this fiscal year, we started at CAFB saying we were going to distribute 50 million meals, which is clearly more than 35. We are going to hit over 65 million meals by the end of this year. And so it's just this concerted effort. I think you're right to say the DMV really had some impactful moments from the reductions in force, the government shutdown. Those things have really impacted. In particular, when you think about like living wage has not changed, cost of living has not changed. I think what we're bracing for is next year, year after year after, we continue to see even continued and increasing levels of food insecurity. So our projections for next year are starting at 70 million meals. Well, even higher. It's a marathon, not a sprint. We are going to have to be dealing with this for a really long time. So calm, cool, collected. There's a sense of urgency. But urgency is not panic, urgency is planning.

SPEAKER_01 4:46

And I want to talk a little bit about what one needs to do when it's a marathon, not a sprint, because the way one needs to conduct oneself is different when you're going all out for a very short period of time. But before we delve on that, I want to make sure our listeners really understand the scope of what CAFB does. I know you've said to me in the past, think of Capital Area Food Bank as like the Costco of food. So talk a little bit about what that means. Because I'm not sure that everybody really totally knows. And there's really great sense of the brand, if you will, and goodwill in the market, but I don't know that people really know the extent.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

I could probably talk a whole podcast about CAFB and what we do. So I'll try to keep this to reader's digest version of the story. So CAFB, our footprint where we provide services, is Maryland, Montgomery County, and Prince George's County, all of the District of Columbia, and then Northern Virginia, including Prince William County. We work with a network of other food banks to provide services to the entire nation through Feeding America. And we have about 400 partners that we work with. So if you think of us like a Costco, we distribute food to many different players in the market, some of whom prepare that food, some of whom distribute groceries, some of whom are tiny food pantries at churches, some are the major organizations you know as key players in town: Martha's Table, Miriam's Kitchen, DC Central Kitchen, Mana. So we work big and small. I think one of the things that really shocked me when I first got over here was, as I call it, the strategy behind the operational piece of the puzzle, right? We have tractor trailer trucks. We pull every day orders for all of these different organizations and help deliver those orders.

SPEAKER_01 6:27

Yeah, I mean the logistics are tremendous.

SPEAKER_00 6:29

Logistics are in are insane and really interesting, and I really can learn out about all the different things we do. What we also do is we provide assistance for food insecurity in the pockets where our partners aren't. We actually have a hunger heat map on our website that sort of tracks where we see food insecurity in the DMV. And then we look to where our partners not and where can Capillary Food Bank also show up and make a difference where where there might be a pocket of food insecurity where there's no one doing anything. So some of that is things like markets that sort of look like farmers markets, both for the community, but also we do a lot of work with schools. So we will show up and do like a farmer's market for the parents.

SPEAKER_01 7:13

Yeah. That broader footprint, like when you say we work big and small, local, but then that extended reach. And I also had the notion you try to identify those areas that are just not getting served, which I think is amazing.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

The other thing I would say as well is we're really focused on not only food for today. I mean, that's all the work we do to distribute food to the 1.5 million people in the DMV who are experiencing some level of food insecurity, but we also look at how we can help solve the problem long term. We have several programs we call our Food for Brighter Futures work. And those programs are really set up to help provide opportunity for upward mobility. People don't want to be food insecure. They want to be able to feed their families and to be in living wage jobs. So we have two programs in particular, one that's around food and education. Again, we're very data-driven. So we looked at sort of what are the opportunities for people to get to a living wage job, most of them with a certificate or two-year degree or maybe a four-year degree. And how can we support folks going through those certificates to get to the living wage jobs that are around the DMV that they can slide into pretty easily? And so we've worked with all the universities, lots of universities, and they all, but most of the universities around the region, they identify cohorts of students. They may be parents, they may be first generational, they may be military. And we help support those cohorts by giving them what we call food scholarships. So an opportunity for us to take care of their grocery bills while they're in those programs, so they'll stay in the programs. We also have a whole focus medicine program where we work with area clinics and hospitals to identify cohorts of patients who might not have to be on medication if they had the nutritious food they needed. So, like for instance, lupus, diabetes, heart issues, right? So, how do we help provide food prescriptions for those patients so that they can get back on their feet?

SPEAKER_01 9:08

I love that. It's not just like, let's deal with it today, because if we're just not that that's not a tremendous job in and of itself, but if the only work is dealing with it today, it really doesn't help people be able to move out of, you know, that is the hope to move out of the insecurity. And the point you're making around colleges and universities and schools, it's so important because we've done a lot of work in education. And students don't stay. Like they might, you know, they might get recruited and and they have fantastic skills, but they don't stay typically for those basic needs not being properly met. You know, they they don't have the ability to feed themselves at the proper level and or to buy supplies that they need to take the classes. So they start with hope and optimism, but not enough of an infrastructure. So that's tremendous. And I do want to hone in around like we have had this past year so many different changes with federal workers and contractors. And I'm wondering what particularly have you seen and learned in like this last year where there has been this notable change. I would say, like, local to my community in Bethesda, people have signs in their yard supporting federal workers. I work from home and I'll see people out in the middle of the day that I wouldn't normally have seen. And I'm like, okay, I know that they were a federal worker. It's really profound. So I'm just curious what you feel like you've learned and what CAF B has been dealing with beyond, I know, as you stated, just the sheer volume.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Right. First of all, I think there's a myth that food insecurity only happens for people who don't have jobs, right? And I think before we even got to the reductions in force and the government shutdown, the sort of myth that there aren't people out there that are working full-time and experiencing food insecurity, right? It's a bell curve. It's not like you're always in this space. But we see people who are making six-figure salaries, but they have two children at home. And because of the the way the DMV is structured and life and expenses, maybe just one thing that gets them to need a food pantry or some support, right? It may be a car breaking down. It may be a parent that needs more support, health issue. There's a lot of people living right on that edge of food insecurity. And there are a lot of people who work full-time, maybe both people in the household work full-time, but they may be making a $70,000 and a $60,000 salary doesn't make complete ends meet. So they may be coming to a food pantry once every four weeks, once every seven weeks. So we were already dealing with that level of food insecurity where where folks with full-time jobs were still needing the support of the food bank or one of our partners. I think what we're learning is how many of our community members are were really living on that edge. Yeah. So then you sort of have so many did lose jobs. Right. And then also the trickle down. One of the things that CAFB is really good at is pivoting and getting emergency support into community. So when we started seeing the reductions in force originally in the spring, we sprung into action. We looked at sort of where food insecurity was the highest, and we set up some pop-up food distributions. When we first got out there, we were like, we're gonna just do government contractors and federal employees who were let go. And then we realized there was so many people who were impacted from that trickle down of those folks losing their jobs, the dog walkers, the house cleaners, the people who were losing their clients and losing their income because other people were pulling back services. I was just with a colleague yesterday and she was remembering a story from that time where there was a government employee who needed food that was let go. And she went and put the groceries in this person's car and there was a stroller in the backseat. And how impactful that was, right? I mean, there's a it's I think the other thing about this, not that it wasn't human before, but how the DMV has been impacted just makes this issue so much more about your neighbor.

SPEAKER_01 13:06

And immediate, right? It's it's very approximate. Yes. And this may be a tough thing to answer. Like if there were one lever that you could really, really press on over the next year that you think would make the biggest difference and it may be even something you don't have complete control over.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

I have so many thoughts on that one. That's a really hard question to answer. One thing is I wish that we weren't going through cuts to snap and Medicaid. Yeah. The fact that we're going to 70 million meals, but then we also have like 50,000 folks who are impacted in our region around snap cuts, and they're probably going to lose average $187 of their snap benefits, which when you think about your grocery bill, when you're just going to the grocery store and how food has gotten so much more expensive. There's already a lot of people out there, we like to say, that are only able to shop in the middle of the grocery store. When you think about the way a grocery store is set up, the dairy, the meat, the fresh vegetables are around. And so there's a lot of people already only getting to the canned goods and whatnot. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:09

Because that's the cheaper fare, right? Everything that is, I mean, frankly, like better for you, healthier, fresh, is in the outskirts and is more expensive.

SPEAKER_00 14:18

Which is the other thing I'm really proud of. 40% of what we distribute on an annual basis is fresh produce.

SPEAKER_01 14:24

Another thing I don't think people realize. I think people think about a food bank and I think they think canned goods.

SPEAKER_00 14:29

And of course we do that. But one of the things we are really trying to make sure is that the folks that we serve are getting that same nutritious, healthy plate of food that anyone deserves to have. And we do it with a lot of choice. So when you come to one of our community markets or you come to one of our partners, the goal is that you get to choose, even in our food pharmacy, you get to choose what you want to take home with you, what you're comfortable cooking with. We also have recipes and a lot of support around that nutritional component. Here's how you can take collard greens and cook them more healthy for your diet. Maybe you've never seen a Brussels sprout. We had a gentleman at our food pharmacy that had never seen a spaghetti squash, but we gave him a recipe and he was super excited to go home and try to just cook the spaghetti squash. And I think that's also part of it. It's the let's not assume that everybody doesn't want to eat these things.

SPEAKER_01 15:19

Maybe they haven't had an opportunity to just because somebody is food insecure doesn't mean that they don't have aspirations to eat the things that they want to eat. Yeah. Healthy choices are not something that are just reserved for certain people. Yeah. I do want to talk a bit about your leadership. I'll just give you a heads up. I'll embarrass you here. I just see you as such a thoughtful leader. And we've talked about your leadership over time and how you regard your team and how you think about things. You're doing such important work and in such difficult realities. So I'm curious, like, even amongst your own team, how do you talk honestly about the scale of the need without creating overwhelm or like demotivating people because it feels so big.

SPEAKER_00 16:08

Well, thank you, first of all. I feel so blessed because I feel like my team is just A, excited sort of for the challenge, but B motivated by seeing the need. So I don't really feel like I have to push on them. I think the one thing I always want them to know is that they have to take a break. Yeah. Back to that sort of urgency does not mean panic. I want them to feel like they can still leave the office at a reasonable hour. I remember during the shutdown and also the reduction in force when the food bank sort of sprung into action around these pop-up food distributions, and my team was signing up left and right. And I was like, I'm so glad you're doing that. But your other colleagues need to do it too, which they were, but I'm mindful of how much time you're spending here. You also need to take that vacation. Log off at three o'clock if you're exhausted after a week of just churning and burning. I think those things are really important, especially right now, because this is not going away. Marathon, not sprint. You're gonna show up tomorrow and it's still gonna be here and it might get even more impactful. So that's a big thing for me.

SPEAKER_01 17:16

Sounds like encouraging them to take a break and also encouraging them to understand that, you know, you don't, you don't kind of get done with the to-do list. We're not gonna get to done. And so do a good day's work, but then also know it's still gonna be there. Right. And we can't exhaust ourselves trying to get to done in the marathon space. How do you help them differentiate? I see oftentimes when things are intense, many people, I'm definitely one, tend to overfunction. And part of overfunctioning, it's helpful till it's not, is making things urgent when they may not be urgent. And I often say to my team, let's not create false urgency. How do you think about the difference between urgency that can help and urgency that can even harm? Because it's either burning people out or it may not be well thought through. Is that something you find yourself balancing?

SPEAKER_00 18:08

Yes, and no. I think one of the things I love about the food bank, and one of the things that was an early indication this was gonna be a great fit for me, was my first day on the job was actually the day after the day after the election.

SPEAKER_01 18:21

Yeah, I remember that. We're gonna jump into the deep end.

SPEAKER_00 18:25

Yeah, and our Arrata, our CEO, said, You're not gonna have a typical orientation this week. I need you to be in this meeting with leadership where we're gonna start planning. And that was what, November 6th? And we started that day discussing all of the scenarios that may play themselves out under a new administration. Positive, negative, all of it. Sort of here's what, knowing what we know now, we might want to plan for. And that's how Rhada leads. She's thinking through a few steps ahead, maybe a few years ahead. So I inherited a team that thinks that way and three wonderful direct reports who think that way and lead their teams that way. And I have developed even stronger skills in that sort of scenario planning. And so I think that is really important in these times of urgency. Good leadership like that also allows for people to want to invest in you because they see that you're not just thinking for today, you're thinking about sort of end result. So again, why the Food for Brighter Futures work is so important too.

SPEAKER_01 19:26

And you don't put people through unnecessary wear and tear that happens in the more reactionary space. At Noetic, our head of client services is a former army officer. And she was in charge of travel logistics for a period of time. And I mentioned that to say she's so good at the proactivity around scenario planning. So it's like scenario planning for well, if this happens or this happens or this happens, but also in what I just called the look around the corner. And she's made me better at it in the look around the corner. And I just find that the more proactive you get, the less reactive you have to be. Right. Because you already thought of it.

unknown 20:05

Right.

SPEAKER_00 20:06

And also the data piece of it that I think is so part of the DNA of the food bank, the why, sort of like we should do this. Okay, we maybe we should do that, but why should we do it? That sort of just second to pause and refocus or reframe the idea or the urgent action into a let's just take two seconds to think about why we should do it. I think is really helpful in these moments because you're giving your team some breathing space. Also, you're giving them an opportunity to say, all right, since this is my priority today, what is not my priority? You know, you can't do everything at once. If you have to give it, something may have to fall.

SPEAKER_01 20:42

There's only 24 hours in a day. Like I've tried to get more, but I haven't figured that out. So, so really being selective about what are those things that you're gonna move now and why. Why are those the right things? And before we leave the idea of, you know, the marathon and I'm gonna say enormity of the issue and and the growing issue, how do you maintain donor confidence? So donors are a critically important part of the work that you do when the truth is that the problem is growing, not shrinking.

SPEAKER_00 21:14

I think it's that scenario planning and I think it's transparency. You know, here's where we were before COVID, here's where we were after COVID, here's where we are now because of these different pieces impacting the DMV in particular. Everyone in the country is experiencing food insecurity right now, but I think the DMV, given sort of what we've been handed, there's such a heightened level. I think it's, you know, sharing what our plans are, sharing with them why we think these things are important right now, how many people we will be providing meals for, and also doing it in a really fiscally responsible way, right? Sharing with them what this means, how we'll do the work. I think we're constantly trying to innovate to make sure we're we're using resources appropriately and we're being the Most efficient we can. Like, how are we delivering the food? How are we getting the donations? One of the great programs we have here is Partner Direct, where if a grocery store in the region calls and says, we have an extra pallet of pineapples, we don't bring them back to the food bank and then distribute them. We find a partner that's close by to that particular grocery store who can take them and use them. And I think the other thing about this work, we've been thinking a lot about this. We know there's a big problem. We know we need to get more food out to community, but we also have to be able to be supportive of the partners that are helping us get that food out. We have to balance how far or how fast CAF B can go with how far and fast our partners can go.

SPEAKER_01 22:41

Sometimes they don't actually have to take care of the people that are taking care of the people.

SPEAKER_00 22:45

Right. So that's another way we slow down a little bit. And to donors, you know, it's not just us, it is the whole infrastructure of how this community is dealing with food insecurity. So the donors, we can say, if you invest in us, we can also invest in our partners in these ways, which I think is uh is a point that's very helpful in terms of making the case for support, but also for them understanding we want to get to the other side of this problem and we know we can't do it alone. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:13

Lastly, on the enormity and the the marathon, not the sprint. How does Abby keep Abby in a good headspace? And I know every day is different and I know that it's never perfect, but I'm sure that there are listeners out there thinking, like, wow, like thought my job was hard and it is, but like this is a really hard job you're doing.

SPEAKER_00 23:33

How do you keep yourself steady? I try to give myself a lot of grace these days. For instance, last weekend I was exhausted after a really crazy week, in particular around just like some things that, you know, in these jobs, the further you get up, the more you're dealing with HR and staffing and big picture strategy and what's what's the hole that isn't being filled, all of those things. And it was just a really draining week. And I knew I had a lot to do, but I purposely said, you're not working this weekend. The laptop is staying closed because you need a break. If you don't give yourself that break, you are not going to be able to think strategically or quickly or efficiently next week because you're tired. And I think that's a big thing for me right now is when do I need those moments of rest?

SPEAKER_01 24:18

Yeah. And it can be really, really hard because it doesn't mean that there aren't a million things that you feel like you need to do. I have a colleague, I consider this to be a person who's super productive, high energy, focused. And she said, I've noticed lately that I'm working too many hours and I'm watching my productivity plummet. And it really had an impact on me because I pride myself on focus and productivity and all those things. And then when you start to notice that, you really, really notice. What you can also notice, because I had a similar situation to you, that I had a super heavy week last week, and I made the decision, it's hard for me to not open the laptop this weekend. Monday morning, early Monday morning, I was so productive. Yes. So that rest I think makes a difference.

SPEAKER_00 25:05

I would say that I have my biggest best ideas when I'm on vacation because I actually am not distracted by the small things and by the people coming into the office or the fire. And your brain can be expansive. And you get to be sort of in that space. And I try to model that for the team, especially because I think women in particular have been told or have been programmed to feel like working.

SPEAKER_01 25:27

Yeah, there's actually a book called Women Who Do Too Much. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

Which is most all of us. I would like to model for you that when I go on vacation, I check my email once a day. I would like to model for you that you going away is actually beneficial to me because you will last longer in this job if you feel like you have balance. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 25:48

Beneficial to everyone, really. But you know, it's it can be an inconvenient truth for a lot of leaders. We coach a lot of senior leaders and we talk to them about people will do what you do, not what you say. And so if you say, I want you to be balanced in your life, but if you as a leader are working 24-7 and sending emails at one o'clock in the morning, four o'clock in the morning, on a Saturday, whatever it is, then people see that as the currency and they will do the same.

SPEAKER_00 26:19

100%.

SPEAKER_01 26:20

So I do want to um talk a little bit about life before CAFB. You and I met back in the day when you were at Whitman Walker Health, and Noetic had the honor of doing some patient research and some brand work and some naming work right around the time of the new building, which was super, super exciting. And that's where you and I was. The first of three new buildings. The first of three new buildings, I should specify. Yes, the 1525 building. And you did so much great work at Whitman Walker, but I particularly want to pause on the gala. Um, this just sticks out so much in my memory of you just really standing that up at a whole new level. I know you didn't do it by yourself, but I would love for you to talk about like how that came together and please tell everyone about you and Tim Gunn.

SPEAKER_00 27:11

Oh, my friend Tim Gunn. Yes. One of the best things that came out of that gala is a friendship with Tim. He's just an amazing guy. You know, it's funny, galas or events have followed my career from the beginning. I started at Center Stage in Baltimore back in the day and then was recruited to come to Wooly Mammoth Theater Company. And when I started at Wooly, the special event they were doing, their revenue was like $7,500 when it was so fun because it was a theater, so there was a lot of creativity. Wooly is such a dynamic, edgy place that we could do a lot of fun things with an event. Wooly was so edgy that we had a lot of, we couldn't get corporate sponsors. You know, I always joke that there were always sort of naked people or swear words on stage that made the make the corporate sponsors feel.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

Then make the corporate little nervous.

SPEAKER_00 28:00

But at an event, we could get those corporate sponsors to take an interest in Wooly because we were throwing this really fun, engaging way that they could bring clients and support. So that was the start of it, this kernel of understanding. Different audiences may do different things with you. And sure, many of those corporate folks then came to shows at Wooly, but I would say many of them didn't. And that was the thing they knew and engaged with at Wooly. And then I went on to the DC Chamber of Commerce and did the biggest event I've ever thrown, which was 1200 people. There's Chamber's Choice Awards. And I had the uh the great fortune to work with Kathy Hollinger and Paul Cohn, and they wanted to do something exciting and creative, and they knew that I had come from this background, and so we did a 1920s theme, and it was just super fun. So events have always been something I've never shied away from, which is funny because I think so many people are like, oh, there's so much work and they're this and they're that. They are.

SPEAKER_01 28:56

They are as I'm sure people hear, you bring this creativity to it, and I think you also don't get restricted in your mind by like, well, where has it been? You more think about, well, what are we trying to achieve and how might we attract people to make it even bigger and more impactful, which brings us to Tim Gunn. I'm gonna take us back to Tim Gunn because I'm a little bit obsessed with him. I know a lot of people are. You made it work with Tim.

SPEAKER_00 29:21

Yes. And I was very lucky we had a strong, strong committee of volunteers that helped with the gala. We called them our engagement committee. And there was a gentleman on that committee, Jason Maida, who was the connection to Tim. He knew Tim and he asked him to participate. So I want to give props where props are due. We're so lucky because Tim grew up in DC. Not maybe not everybody knows that, but he grew up in Cleveland Park. And so he was willing to come down.

SPEAKER_01 29:44

And I think of our own people.

SPEAKER_00 29:46

He's one of our own. And the impetus to do a gala at Whitman Walker was really around engaging a different audience of support and making sure that people understood what a critical role Whitman Walker was playing in the overall health of the DMV, not just the LGBTQ community. Now, granted, legacy and they are the best in the business in Washington, D.C. for LGBTQ care and HIV care. Hands down. No question. The idea of the branding that we were doing with the WeCU campaign and everything was about we want everyone who needs care like that to have dignified, respectful care at a place that will give it to you. And so I think that was one of the impetuses of the gale of how do we get more people to understand that's the role that Whitman Walker ideally wants to play in community, especially I mentioned we opened three buildings. The third building was the Max Robinson Center on the campus of St. Elizabeth's in Southeast, which is an area that needs a lot of support, in particular on those rudimentary things like food insecurity and healthcare. And Whitman Walker was providing and filling a void. And we just needed to get that message out there. What better way than to have an event that was fun and inspiring and brought a little glam? And and was definitely the glam, right? And just so willing. I know.

SPEAKER_01 31:02

I feel like Tim and you were the glam because you have some fantastic outfits as well. So don't give it all to Tim, but for sure, he does bring a certain glam factor. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:12

Just being able to tell the stories of the patients that are part of the Whitman Walker family. I mean, like we are doing at the food bank, making it human and understanding how critical those things are to people, in particular if they're administered with dignity and respect. And that was what was so fun about it. And we raised a lot of money and a lot of awareness. And that's always the thing for me. Yes, we raised a lot of money, but how many people posted on their LinkedIn, on their Facebook, on their Instagram, their picture with Tim, their I was here to support? Like that to me.

SPEAKER_01 31:45

That's that's where the really massive, you know, promotion can take place, right? It's like, you know, from the event and then and then beyond the event. I'm sure you've deeply thought about the very special mission of Whitman Walker and the very special mission of CAF B. Can you talk a bit about that decision? So many people who listen are in a role or seeking a role, or maybe in a role and quietly seeking another role. And I just know you to be such a thoughtful leader. And I was kind of along the path with you. And I think people would really benefit from that thought process.

SPEAKER_00 32:20

It was not an easy decision. I had a fabulous, fabulous team at Whippin' Locker, and I got to do great work, including things like host Aguela and co-host with Tim Gunn. And I think the mission is so important to me and the patients that I got to meet along the way, some of whom I'm still in contact with, so important. And it's just to know that the place I was working for was helping so many. But personally, and if I looked at my whole career path, this is true. I love to build things. I love to take things and get them uh to their next level. Get Whitman Walker, I had such a great opportunity to do that in meaningful ways. And we opened the Liz building, we opened the Max Robinson building, we did a gala, we built a brand. I'm so proud of the We See U brand, and I'm so proud that it's it's not only a brand, but it's literally part of the DNA of the employees that work there. We see you means something to the clients and patients.

SPEAKER_01 33:15

Which is what all brands should seek. Right. Right. That people truly embody, but it's a rarity for it to exist at that level. But that is the level of authenticity that all brands should seek. And when a brand does achieve that via the people really embodying, there's no mistaking it. Like it's just palpable.

SPEAKER_00 33:34

I'm so proud of so very many projects that I got to do at Bitman Walker. But then I hit a place where I sort of realized I don't know if there's much more I can build here, which is a hard thing to think about because you're comfortable, you've got, you know, you've got a good work-life balance, you've got a great team, you've spent all this time build building the thing. But I just know in my heart of hearts, that's sort of part of my the way I'm built.

SPEAKER_01 33:59

Yeah, what drives your energy and your passion.

SPEAKER_00 34:01

And actually, in full disclosure, while I was at Whitman Walker, I had at one time looked at a role at Capital Area Food Bank. Yeah, tell me that we interviewed and got to meet Rhada, and it didn't work out that time. But Rada and I stayed close, and I remember just being so impressed by her. So I had already started to pick my head up to think about resume, to think what's next for me. Like I'm happy. I I also think it's always good when you're still happy at an organization to start this journey versus when you're not.

SPEAKER_01 34:31

I tell that people all the time. Not that you're looking to jump, but don't ever neglect your network.

SPEAKER_00 34:37

Right.

SPEAKER_01 34:38

And don't ever neglect your resume because it's just really good hygiene. And it's not about jumping quickly or anything like that. But sometimes things change and sometimes you change them, and sometimes they change and you didn't want them to.

SPEAKER_00 34:52

Well, and also just the idea of being in a place where you're not running from something, but you're walking towards something else. I think it's really important. And so that's where I was at Women Walker. I certainly wasn't running away from something. It's just the recruiter called and they told me what this job was. And I was like, wow, it's all the things I've gotten to do at Women Walker and have built. And it sounds like they need a someone potentially like me that's more externally focused, that might be able to bring some creativity to the mix. So I remember I said the recruiter. Well, Rada knows who I am. So please call and and let her know that I'm interested because she'll know if I'm someone she would like to. Yeah, because she already knew you. And turns out she was excited and I was excited. I I trust my gut a lot. I think that's the other thing in this process. I've certainly been up for jobs, have even gone all the way through the process and have then thought something's not right in my gut. And as hard as it is to say to this person who I feel like I've led on that this isn't the right role for me, I've had to say this isn't the right role for me because that was the best thing for myself. And so for advice, it's like trust your gut to know. And it's probably okay, even if you're at the last stage, to say actually no, because they may be upset with you in the short term or it may be awkward, but it's better. Right, but you're eclipsing a far worse situation.

SPEAKER_01 36:11

Yeah, you know, being in touch with like a lot of recruiters who talk about the best practices at all. If you're prior to a fully written offer, it's really okay to withdraw one's candidacy. If you can do it prior to the written offer, that's kind of best. But the point that you're making around at the end of the day, you really got to look at the pros and cons, look at the leadership that you would be stepping into. You got to look really hard at are you running away from something because you're unhappy. And therefore, are you really assessing like that's not gonna happen sometimes that you're running away, but are you running to as much as you want to get away from it?

SPEAKER_00 36:46

When you're unhappy, you can convince yourself a new opportunity is the right opportunity for you. So it's like, well, anything would be better than this. And I've convinced myself, oh, I could do that, I could do that. Even if it's, I don't know, for me, it has to really in my bones feel like A, I can make impact, like there's something special I could offer this organization, and B, it feels right. It feels like the right stuff.

SPEAKER_01 37:09

So making impact, permission to brag here, which I know doesn't come naturally to you. So you've been there like a year and a half.

SPEAKER_00 37:17

About a year and a half, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:18

So is there a specific piece of positive impact that again, I know it's you and your team, but that you feel particularly proud of in the in the tenure you've had so far?

SPEAKER_00 37:29

There's a few things. When I came here, I felt like the three teams that I oversee, which are philanthropy, communications and marketing, and community engagement, felt very siloed. They didn't have a big connection to one another, oftentimes working sort of on similar projects that, you know, could be combined, at least from a communications marketing perspective. I think just in terms of not knowing each other, not knowing what what each other is working on, but sitting sort of next to each other in an office space, right? And I feel like I'm really proud, especially with the help of my three wonderful direct reports, we've really managed to turn that around. We've had some really successful meetings. We've done a disc assessment with the group so they could understand each other better and how to communicate with each other. So there's been some nice internal work. And then I tend to collect people. I love relationships, deep relationships with people. And what I'm really most proud of is being able to bring some of those relationships to Capital Area Food Bank and thinking through how we build even deeper relationships for Capital Area Food Bank. So one of the things we're really working towards on the philanthropy side is deep donor engagement. Like beyond coming over for a volunteer shift, how else can we touch our donor base? How else can we sort of have impact with them, talk with them, update them beyond email, beyond email and phone calls? What is it? And so we've elected to do these wonderful sort of parties where donors that we know have agreed to host folks in their home. And it's a it's a wonderful mix of people who are already part of the food bank world and people who aren't. The host invites folks, we invite people, and it's a wonderful opportunity to get to know people in an intimate way. And it's also been fairly inexpensive for the food bank, but we've been raising wonderful amounts of money through this process. And so it hits everything I love. You know, engaging with people in a meaningful way, making sure our goals are met, and also being efficient in the process, right?

SPEAKER_02 39:24

So the cost is little.

SPEAKER_00 39:26

So that's been really wonderful. And we're also working on some updates to the brand. We have a really, really strong brand. It won't change, but we want to sort of retune it a bit. And so we're doing some research and really being thoughtful about how we might want to show up in our next iteration of website and design work. And that's that's been super fun to work on too.

SPEAKER_01 39:46

Yeah, it is remarkable that amidst what you're dealing with, all the external forces that were far more amplified than you knew they were going to be when you took the job. The three things that you mentioned around really dialing in with research and brand fine-tuning, strengthening the team and going deeper with donors are, you know, big important strategic initiatives that take their own time too, and are perhaps never going to be on the urgent has to happen today list. But I think part of being that thoughtful leader is you have your think big and the and the do now, and you know, and really finding the balance between all that of that and then knowing, as you said, when to take a rest. I just so appreciate your perspective, and I'm sure many will. To wrap us up, because the time flew by, we love to end with a metamorphosis moment question around a limiting belief that you may have had at some point in your life that that you no longer do, that you shed, if you will, and how you think it's made you stronger, what you learned.

SPEAKER_00 40:49

You even prepped me for this question, and I have so many different thoughts.

SPEAKER_01 40:52

Yeah, because there's never just one, of course.

SPEAKER_00 40:55

I think the biggest one for me right now that I'll share is I'm at a certain time in my life. I'm 50 years old, I'll be 51 in a few weeks. As someone who has had a really great career and sort of these mega moments, right? Like opening buildings, capital campaigns, producing a film. There's lots of things that I could point to that are really big moments and hugely successful in their own ways. I think what I'm really learning, it's a shed that those are the only important moments. I think for me, the smaller, quieter moments have become all the more important. So, like having a conversation with an employee that really seems to matter to them or to make sure I'm listening to them, or sending off something and getting a really wonderful response from a volunteer or donor or what have you. I'm learning to really appreciate those moments on a day-to-day basis that help. I want to say ammunition, but that's really not the right word. Like that they build on each other that keep me motivated, right?

SPEAKER_01 42:00

It's a big impact, right? But on a small scale. You know, oftentimes people talk about the inch deep, mile wide versus the mile deep, inch wide. And so I think you're talking about that deep impact, not at scale and the importance of that.

SPEAKER_00 42:14

And it doesn't supplant, you know, the it's also being able to recognize in myself my own growth. For instance, I pick a word every year. I don't do New Year's resolutions, but I pick a word. And I remember a few years ago, my word was own. And it wasn't about owning things, although I did buy a car and a house that year, which is weird that it was that year, but it was about owning my own responsibilities better, being upfront when I was making a mistake and saying, you know what, you're right, I was wrong. Owning space, like as women, we're told to be sort of small, like owning the space that I was in. So it had a lot of different connotations. But just a few months ago, I had a conversation with one of my direct reports where she basically sent me an email and was like, that didn't feel good. Like something I had done didn't feel good. And I responded and I said, You're right, and I'm sorry, and I shouldn't have done that. And her response to me was, it felt so good to have you just do that. And in my head, I was like, because I've taught myself how to own that, right? It's like those small wins, those, my gosh, I am actually making progress and I'm being thoughtful about how I'm showing up. So this year the word is nourish. And I think it's funny that I'm, yeah, and I'm at popular food bank and my word is a food word, but it is about having grace and letting myself take time.

SPEAKER_01 43:32

Is there a specific because I do a word too a year? Is there a specific way you pick it? Do you feel like it picks you? How do you find it?

SPEAKER_00 43:40

I think over time it started to pick me. Around October, it starts to percolate. It's weird. I don't even think about it anymore. And this last my 50th year, I picked radiate because I thought radiate was such a fun word for someone who is turning 50. And nourish was all about keeping the lessons I learned and keeping radiation. On the front burner and going deeper.

SPEAKER_01 44:02

Love it. So inspiring. I love our conversations, even when we're not eating yummy food and having a glass of wine water. I just think that you do such a beautiful job of helping people understand the enormity of what's going on with food insecurity doesn't mean that one should throw up one's hands and say, oh, but what could be done? You really have such a practical and yet inspirational way of looking at the work you do. And I so appreciate you being a leader that is so mission driven and also cares for all of those strategic initiatives. It's not mission and run myself into the ground, right? It's mission balanced with I need a great team, we need to have great partners, we need to be doing meaningful work, I need to own my stuff, they need to own their stuff. So just thank you for being you and for all you're doing and for taking the time to speak with us today.

SPEAKER_00 44:55

Well, thank you, Nancy. You ask amazing questions. It's always clear to me why you make such a good coach. So thank you. It was really lovely to spend some time with you. Next time, why though?

SPEAKER_01 45:05

Next time why?

SPEAKER_00 45:07

Next time why.

SPEAKER_01 45:08

Thanks for listening to the Metamorphosis Moment, a podcast from Noetic Consultants. If this episode made you think about what's next for your team or about a challenge you're currently facing, we'd love to hear from you. We often help leaders think through complex issues to realize the change they seek. Until next time, trust the transformation and make it stick.