Fast Break: Investing in Impact – How Businesses Can Support Nonprofits

Matt Cranney

Welcome to Fast Break. Today, we’re diving into the heart of our community, the nonprofit sector. Did you know that 1.5 million nonprofits are registered in the US, contributing an estimated $1.1 trillion to the economy. These organizations are the backbone of our society, tackling critical issues, supporting those in need and enriching our lives.

I’m excited on today’s episode to welcome Jeff Burkhart, a seasoned nonprofit leader with a passion for community impact. Jeff has a wealth of experience having served as the executive director of the Literacy Network and founding Mission Forward in 2022. Mission Forward is a nonprofit consultancy that helps organizations develop and implement strategic plans, build capacity, and strengthen their impact. Jeff, welcome to Fast Break.

00:51 Jeff Burkhart

 Thanks so much for having me, Matt.

00:54 Matt Cranney

Jeff, this is a conversation that I think is going to be incredibly interesting to our audience and something that in today’s climate I think is really needed. And so, before we kind of dive in, I’m hoping you can tell us about your journey in the nonprofit world and maybe what inspired you to dedicate your career to this sector.

01:12 Jeff Burkhart

Yeah, I started as a volunteer in this world. I was a college student at Indiana University when I found an adult literacy program and I started volunteering there. Became a tutor, really loved the work, and wanted to do more of it. And so I found some different opportunities along the way. I volunteered for a little bit of time in Toledo, Ohio. And then was an AmeriCorps member in Durham, North Carolina for a year and then stayed on for another year after that, teaching GED classes and coordinating technology programs.

And when I moved up here to Madison in 2000, took a job at another nonprofit that was Forward Service Corporation doing adult basic education. Met some folks at Literacy Network while I was there. Many years later, fast forward, I was encouraged to apply at Literacy Network, and that was in 2008. And there was the executive director there for a little bit more than 14 years. And just had a great experience and learned a ton of stuff about how nonprofits operate.

02:17 Matt Cranney

That’s awesome. And what I love about your story, Jeff, is it’s a phrase that I use a lot which is, your proximity determines your perspective, oftentimes. And your story illustrates sort of starting as close to some of those challenges that you cared about and has kind of continued on through your career journey is remaining close to the issues that affect our community. So, I really love that.

Let’s dive in. So, the genesis of our conversation here is we have the privilege to partner with you on putting together a nonprofit symposium here with Mission Forward and M3, and we’re really excited about that. We’re really excited to share that news with our audience.

We’re hopeful that a lot of people who are listening from the nonprofit world will be able to join us on June 18th when we have that symposium. We want to bring together leaders of those organizations to connect, learn and be inspired. Jeff, why do you think events like this are so important for the nonprofit community?

03:18 Jeff Burkhart

This particular event comes at an interesting time for nonprofits, of course, and I want to just say, first off, big thanks to Mike Victorson for inviting me to do this. And Mike has always been a great advocate for nonprofit leaders and the organizations themselves. So, it’s a great honor to be able to work with you all on this.

We know that our nonprofits are really under attack in a lot of ways, and you know, in particular funding, of course. But also, just sort of the rhetoric that we are hearing now from the federal government. So, I think we’re at a really pivotal moment for our nonprofits in, in Madison and Nationwide.

The goal of this meeting on June 18th is to bring folks together to talk about these threats and we know that these are, you know, while there’s rhetoric, there’s a lot of funding that’s being, that’s on the table for organizations and there a lot of local organizations have lost significant amounts of money.

And I’ve just been hearing more and more about this and the best way for us to address that is to come together, creating some strategies around we’re going to do. Collaborating with one another, and I really feel like, you know, one of the one of the goals that we’re seeing from the federal government is to kind of pick off different organizations. We’re seeing that happen, you know, and with law firms and universities, media outlets, that’s how they would succeed in in helping to you know, eliminate the impact of those organizations.

But what we see is a nonprofit community, if we can really break that down and build one another up and identify the collective action that we can take as a community and we can start to have some impact within the state, I think that we can join with other organizations around the country to challenge some of these funding cuts that are very indiscriminate and are broad based and are really impacting people in a in a in a very dramatic way.

So, you know when we first talked about this concept, we weren’t thinking, you know, nonprofits are going to have to come together for their own survival. But that’s kind of where we’re where we’re headed, I think. To make the case that nonprofits are essential in our community, that we’re going to find ways to advocate for ourselves and to go to the general community and say this is what’s happening with our funding it. And it’s not any fault of ours.

I think the community needs to know what the impact of that is so that they can kind be in line with us as nonprofit leaders to really address these issues and for philanthropy ,to really consider how they can help to step in, hopefully for a temporary period of time, to support the good work that’s happening.

06:07 Matt Cranney

You know, there’s so many headlines. So, so much news. And perhaps for the average person in our community, it can be difficult to, you know, find a signal within all of the noise and be able to very practically understand what that means for insert the name of your community. And so being able to, you know, translate that into very real perspective for our community to understand in light of these things, here is what you will see in the community. And here is how that will show up. So that people can, to your point, make decisions about what their next step is. Is that something that you would agree with?

06:44 Jeff Burkhart

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think there, you know, the nonprofit sector is already linked in so many ways. You know, just and the fact that I’m having this conversation with you is really clear evidence of that. And we know that that our community is pretty strong. I mean, I think there there’s always, you know, improvements to be made. But I see that there’s already deep connections that our nonprofit sector in the Madison area has to the broader community in terms of the business community, also the educational institutions.

And these are the folks that we really need to be collaborating with because we’re all kind of in this together. We’re seeing it’s not just nonprofits that are being affected, of course. Nonprofits are, you know, have a unique perspective on the impact that it’s going to have because a lot of organizations are serving individuals who are most vulnerable to these cuts.

You know, it’s really important that that we come together, we figure out the best strategies, or at least a strategy. Maybe it’s not the best strategy, but having you know, collective voice around what’s happening right now I think is really important.

07:55 Matt Cranney

Obviously, we’ve opened our conversation talking about potentially the biggest challenge right now to the nonprofit community, but I’m curious with this next question to maybe take away some of the recency piece, and sort of maybe take a step back and think about longer term challenges and opportunities that you know are present for the nonprofit community. What would you share with our audience of some of the biggest challenges over the last few years and maybe into the next few years that you think nonprofits experience?

08:25 Jeff Burkhart

All nonprofits, well, I’d say most nonprofits are really facing, you know, funding issues and so that’s certainly the biggest challenge that if you, you know, could generalize for all nonprofits. You would say, yeah, funding is probably the biggest issue.

But on top of that, I think engagement with the community at large is a challenge, and so that comes in the form of recruiting board members who joined the organization and understand the importance of their impact and what their role is.

I think it comes in the form of recruiting volunteers as well to non-board positions. And making sure that those volunteers are as engaged and retained for their skills. And also just, you know, getting the, the marketing and outreach that it takes to run an organization that serves the public. Because there are so many nonprofits in our place that has been a challenge for a lot of the organizations that I’ve been working with.

And so that’s one of the things that I try and help with is, to provide some strategies for good outreach on all of those different levels, better board engagement and making sure that that your organization is recognized for its good work so that you can address those funding challenges and you can address the shortages that you might have for volunteers.

09:54 Matt Cranney

Jeff, obviously, we’ve got an audience today of small business owners and others. If you could speak directly to what businesses can do to help and support nonprofits through those challenges, what would you say?

10:09 Jeff Burkhart

That’s a great question, Matt, and it’s one that I thought a lot about. The first thing that I would say to leaders of businesses regarding their involvement with nonprofits is to invest.  And invest, not just in, in in the finances of the organization. But invest your leadership, and your skills and be curious about ways that you could get involved.

And if you have a cause that you really care deeply about, maintain that investment. Because the most disruptive thing that happens to nonprofits, and I have personal experience with this is for an organization to come to you and say, hey, we’d like to partner with you on X. And they start, the partnership starts and then it disappears. And there’s a lot of back-end work that has to happen for the nonprofit to really kind of set up that opportunity for success. And so, when that is pulled out, you kind of have to start over. It really does take a lot of time to kind of adjust to those changing situations.

I know that there’s a lot of very valuable causes in our community, but I would challenge the status quo in this area and encourage more businesses to invest deeper with nonprofits, rather than trying to spread it out because your impact is going to be so much better. You’re going to get to know the organization better. You’re going to be a great advocate for them. You’re going to bring other people to that organization because you have demonstrated that you care so much about what they do.

11:53 Matt Cranney

So that big call to action is the difference between investing versus just giving. And when you think about the depth of the word to invest, I love it because it doesn’t just specifically talk about money, although that’s obviously, you know, a huge part of it, but also your time.

I think one of the things that we see at M3, you know, how do we continue to encourage our new employees, and our younger employees newer to the workforce, that being an active participant in your community is an essential part of being a professional in whatever role you have.

Some of the language we use around hearing you mentioned, our CEO Mike Vickerson, earlier that, you know Vic has installed here is as a business we get to take so many deposits from our community. We draw our employees, we have clients. What deposits are we making in return, and to your point, how do you do those consistently over a long period of time?

I’m curious maybe too, Jeff, before we move on to opportunities and I promise audience, we’re going to go to some of the opportunities that that our nonprofit community has as well. But what would you say to organizations that maybe have a lot of newer professionals or newer to the workforce, in terms of how to present this sort of engagement in the importance of it and being invested in their communities because I think that that mindset is kind of evolving amongst that generation.

13:11 Jeff Burkhart

As business leaders, I guess what I would recommend is give people time to do this and have an active program of employee engagement. That’s where you see the most results. The businesses that we have worked with at Literacy Network most frequently who are successful. It literacy, it doesn’t happen in a day, and so having a day long volunteer opportunity doesn’t really make sense for our type of organization. I still speak of Literacy Network as an “our” sort of thing, so pardon me for doing that, but I still feel very invested in the work. And I think there’s a lot of organizations that are like that.

But if you if businesses were to give their employees a few days in a year where you know they could go and volunteer in the community that might encourage them to be mentors, to be tutors, to invest long term with their time into relationships that really help us build a better community rather than just doing a day off volunteer opportunity. Which is valuable, you know? So, I don’t want to discount that. But I think for a broader array of nonprofits the more you know, periodic and consistent volunteer opportunity could be the better.

You know, also to think about the leadership opportunities within organizations. You know there’s a ton of need for board members at these organizations and leadership from among the business community. And so I would encourage businesses to see what they can do to invest in board training or support for board training within organizations because that really is important to the health and sustainability of the nonprofit sector.

15:09 Matt Cranney

Jeff, this sort of idea of, you know, allowing employees more consistent time, I think also has the benefit of allowing that employee to see the return on their investment, right? We’ve talked a lot about investment.

And so, as their connection to those causes grows, their ability to continue to show up and go, oh my gosh. I’m changing as a person because I’m here like it’s doing things in me and also I’m able to see the impact that, you know my time makes.

I’m curious if we’ve talked a lot about the challenges, what do you see right now for nonprofits as opportunities as they look to thrive in this sort of, you know, new and ever evolving and changing world?

15:48 Jeff Burkhart

Well, I mean I talked about the crisis, the beginning of this segment, but I also think there’s there are opportunities even within the crisis that we’re looking at right now and that is the funding that we’re getting from the federal government and that comes to Madison, the threats of that, should shine a bright light on the things that are really important to our community.

You know, there’s a lot of philanthropy around the country that sits on the sidelines sometimes and so I think it’s an opportunity for us to appeal to the foundations and the individual donors to come out and support the things that are that are necessary.

And so for us, it’s telling the nonprofit sector, it’s telling the story of what we do and why it’s so important and what is the issue that we’re addressing and to be really, really dig in deep on storytelling in in a lot of different formats and ways that that we can connect with people in our community.

16:55 Matt Cranney

We often talk here at M3 about making sure we always stay focused on the question, who would miss us if we didn’t exist. And when I think about our not-for-profit community to build an awful lot of people that would miss a lot of these organizations, if they didn’t exist.

Your call to telling the stories of the people that were serving the lives that are being changed is a is a huge opportunity. Do you see for nonprofits the, you know, technology and innovation in 2025 in terms of where we’re at as an opportunity to enhance their act in reach with people.

17:31 Jeff Burkhart

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think technology is a major part of our lives and it continues to increase year after year. But I think that the common wisdom that we’ve had that we’ve been operating with over the last 10 years regarding social media, it’s time to rethink where, where that energy is spent. Not to say that social media is irrelevant. But the personal connection is way, way more important.

So the technology that I would lean in on is e-mail, it’s and I really do think that you know people are checking their e-mail more than they’re checking their social media. I know it’s true for me it’s true, for most people I know. And I think people feel a little bit burned by social media, there’s a lot of burnout. The algorithms are not working to our advantage as nonprofit organizations.

It’s time for us to go to a more direct approach to using technology and really honing your message. It’s essential components and being able to tell that story, with images, with short blurbs, with video.

We have to do all the things, of course, we have to use all our channels, but I would lean in more on e-mail and lean on direct connection to people and try and leverage those messages to get publicity from the mass media as much as you can. Working with TV and radio and print. So how do you leverage the technology to actually have real in-person conversations with people because that’s where we want to be.

19:12 Matt Cranney

The number of newsletters that I follow, I have a 100% open rate, you know, because I’ve chosen to say, hey, these are, you know, important to me. And so, when it comes through, it’s still a personalized and when you think of it from not-for-profit perspective, you are controlling directly your access versus entrusting that to third party to be able to say like am I seeing that? Am I not seeing it?

 So Jeff is our is maybe my last question. If we have people today that are listening that are considering a career in the non-for-profit sector, what advice would you give to somebody who’s thinking about making that choice?

19:45 Jeff Burkhart

I think the most important thing to consider is this where I want to be, like what is my passion?  What am I driven by and how can I leverage my skills to make a difference in a positive way for whatever the cause is.

So really be clear on what your why is. So why do I want to go in this direction? And then I would say the most, the second most important thing is to connect with people who are doing those things, connect directly with people as much as you can. The more you can do that if you’re entering into this field, the better you will be and you also get an opportunity to learn a lot about what other people are doing.

20:29 Matt Cranney

Sure, Jeff. If you’re able to talk to nonprofit leaders exactly who are in in it every day, just like you are. What would be the headline message that you would want to share with them?

20:42 Jeff Burkhart

Right now, it’s, have faith that your mission will continue, and we have to be nimble. We just we absolutely I mean, I know this is a, it’s a broken record I think for a lot of us because we’ve had to be nimble for a long time through COVID and through, you know, lots of other challenges that that organizations have faced. But we have to diversify our funding sources, we have to connect and create partnerships with other nonprofits and with the business community.

21:15 Matt Cranney

Jeff, I want to move now into kind of the next segment of our conversation and that is our fastest break set of questions. And so that’s where I will ask you a series of rapid-fire questions and just looking for a quick off the top response from you is that OK?

Your favorite book that you’ve read in the last 12 months.

21:36 Jeff Burkhart

I would say that it’s The Coaching Habit by Michael Bungay, Stanier, and it’s it really gave me a great way of thinking about how to coach and support leaders.

21:48 Matt Cranney

Complete the sentence for you Leadership is.

21:51 Jeff Burkhart

Passion.

21:53 Matt Cranney

Oh I love that. The most impactful coaching advice you’ve ever received.

21:56 Jeff Burkhart

I received coaching advice that said I don’t believe what I’ve heard about your generation. I believe you can do it and that that changed the trajectory of my life.

22:05 Matt Cranney

I love it. Your favorite podcast that you would recommend to our audience?

22:10 Jeff Burkhart

I love “Hidden Brain”. It’s a great podcast if you haven’t checked it out. Ezra Klein show. But the fun one is 1 by Willie. OK, so check 11 by Willie.

22:22 Matt Cranney

Your can’t live without it app on your phone.

22:25 Jeff Burkhart

The maps.

22:26 Matt Cranney

Yes, yes, Jeff, I this is now becoming like every time we ask this question, I always think somebody’s going to say something completely random. And this new up and coming niche app and everybody says either maps or e-mail or the music.

OK, last thing you did that truly scared you.

22:41 Jeff Burkhart

Started a business. I was really scared to do it, but it worked out.

22:45 Matt Cranney

I love it. If you had to give a Ted talk today, what would be its title?

22:50 Jeff Burkhart

Telling your story, I think it’s in a very, very important thing that we need to all do, and no matter nonprofit or business.

22:57 Matt Cranney

I love it, Jeff. This has been an incredible conversation, but before we close, if we have people in our audience who’ve listened today and would love to connect with you, can you share with our audience where they can find out more about you and the best way to get connected with you.

23:11 Jeff Burkhart

Yeah. So, my business is called Mission Forward, and my website is missionfwd.org.

23:20 Matt Cranney

If we have a segment of our audience today who has heard about the nonprofit symposium we’re planning for June 18, and they are interested to get the details. What are the places and spaces that they can be watching to get more information as we get closer to that event?

23:33 Jeff Burkhart

So on my website you can sign up for the newsletter. That’s one way that I will definitely be sharing information about this. And I think the M3 website will also be sharing that as well, right?

23:45 Matt Cranney

Yeah, I was going to add to if you’re not connected to M3 on LinkedIn or our newsletter, all the details be coming out as we get closer and closer to the 18^th.

Jeff, thank you so much for joining us today for sharing your insights into the nonprofit world. We’re really excited about the upcoming symposium and our partnership with you and the opportunity to support nonprofit leaders it together in our community. So thank you so much.

24:10 Jeff Burkhart

Thank you, Matt.

This has been Fast Break brought to you by M3 Elevate. I’m Matt Cranney, thank you for joining me. Do you want more tips to grow protect your business? Subscribe now and catch all of our episodes and we’ll see you next time.