Navigating the Maize
A weekly, 15-minute podcast on nonprofits and AI — real workflows, no hype, hosted by a 30-year nonprofit development veteran.
Navigating the Maize
Latest Episodes
What AI Can’t Replace: Why Personal Stories Still Win
A LinkedIn post about Sean's daughter's solo trip through Europe reached over 4,000 people and pulled in nearly 5,700 impressions, almost 80% from outside his existing network. Meanwhile, carefully crafted professional content, including posts ...
The Algorithm Is Reading Your Pitch Deck: AI and the New Corporate Giving Gatekeepers
Somewhere right now, a corporate giving team is deciding whether your organization is even worth a meeting, and increasingly, an AI tool is making that first cut before a human ever reads your name. This episode digs into how corporate social r...
The Candidate Who Wasn’t There: AI, Fake Qualifications, and the New Hiring Crisis
A nonprofit hired a grant writer who aced the interview, and couldn’t do the job. This episode digs into a hiring crisis moving faster than most nonprofit leaders realize: candidates using AI to fabricate qualifications, feed live answers durin...
Untitled EpisodeThe Pitch Is Always Exciting: A Framework for Evaluating a New AI Tool
If you're a development director or ED, you've had this meeting: a consultant or vendor pitches an AI tool that "changed everything" for an organization just like yours. This episode gives you the actual framework Sean uses — sitting on both si...
“Your Gala and Golf Tournament Isn’t the Problem: What Happens After the Last Guest Leaves”
Sean breaks down what actually happens in a room full of 150 donors, prospects, and corporate partners — and where AI can help make sure it doesn’t evaporate the Monday after: capturing what actually happened (not just who attended),...