How Leaders Think with Kenny Lange

Alexander Fruth [00:00:00]:
When you give to the food bank, you partner with us and we do the work together. We can't do the work without people to donate with us. And what we do in that partnership might look a little different, but it is. You are doing the work of the food bank with us.

Kenny Lange [00:00:18]:
Welcome to the how leaders think podcast, the show that transforms you by renewing your mind and giving you new ways to think. I am your host, Kenny Lang, and with me today is the Alex, the truth fruit. I had to go there. I had to do it. It's going to stick with me, so I may just let it slip the rest of the time. He is the director of development for the East Texas Food bank. He is also the chapter president for East Texas association of Fundraising Professionals. AFP is just so much easier and more fun to say.

Alexander Fruth [00:00:50]:
It really is.

Kenny Lange [00:00:51]:
I know all these associations. I was like, I think your Alphabet soup is easier than the full name. But he is a nonprofit professional focused on building genuine relationships, and I can attest to that. And connecting community partners and passion and interests of the community to its needs, which is desperately needed all over the place, if you think about it. He's been serving as the AFP East Texas chapter president. And we recently just went over to our neighbors in Longview and had a lot of fun. So it's no longer just AFP Tyler. Right.

Kenny Lange [00:01:24]:
He's also on the board of South Tyler Rotary and first tee of greater Tyler. So he's hanging out with my friend Logan over there. He is a proud husband and father. Welcome to the show, Alex.

Alexander Fruth [00:01:37]:
Thank you, Kenny. Thank you for having me on today. I am excited.

Kenny Lange [00:01:40]:
It's gonna be. It's gonna be a fun one. I have a good feeling about this. Tell me, Alex, what is on your mind?

Alexander Fruth [00:01:45]:
Based on my bio, you can imagine there's quite a few things racing around in there. Wear a lot of hats, and very involved in the organization. And I think at the food bank, we're just entering a new fiscal year. So with all the new things that come with a fiscal year, we're getting the budgets rolled out, getting the new kind of development plan for the year, getting things set up and going. So doing a lot of strategizing with our fundraising team and getting our target set for this year. We just hired a new person on my team in the Longview area. So we're working on onboarding her, doing lots of things at the, lots of things at the food bank. We got some volunteer projects, got two things of mine intersecting this weekend.

Alexander Fruth [00:02:27]:
I have the South Tyler Rotary Club, volunteering at the East Texas Food bank at our, one of our resource centers, the resource center here in Tyler. So we have that coming up on Saturday. So doing a lot of things with that as well, man.

Kenny Lange [00:02:39]:
And you have a four month old, right? Four, five years old.

Alexander Fruth [00:02:43]:
She is six and a half months.

Kenny Lange [00:02:44]:
Oh, wow. Okay. So time just flies between having an infant and all those responsibilities. Tell me, when do you sleep, sir?

Alexander Fruth [00:02:52]:
I sleep very well between the hours of nine and about 06:00. We've been waking up about six every morning, but sometimes we wake up in it once or twice in the middle of the night, but usually pretty good at going. That's one of the things I've really been focusing on is one when I get done with work at 430, I'm not checking my email. It is family time. I'm spending time with my wife and daughter, and then at 839 o'clock, I'm getting in bed, I'm ready to go. And with everything else that I do need time to sleep, I do need time to do that, but that's been a priority, particularly now with Eleanor here and my wife and I both working full time, making sure that when I'm at work, I'm giving everything to my work, and then when I'm at home, I'm giving everything to home, too. So really just focusing on that balance of that work life balance. And if it's an emergency at 07:00 or priority at 07:00 I got an email.

Alexander Fruth [00:03:46]:
It's still going to be there in the morning when I get there. Unless the building is on fire, there's a massive emergency. It can wait till the next day, but it's that that's helpful for me, just to be able to have that time with my family and get to grow with them and just enjoy, have quality time with my wife and my daughter. It's really important for me to turn off the volunteer side, the work side, the fundraiser, the community service guy, and just be dad and husband for a little bit, too.

Kenny Lange [00:04:14]:
That sounds like you. You've done the hard work of setting healthy boundaries to just keep everything integrated, which I think personally leads to a more full and enriching life.

Alexander Fruth [00:04:26]:
Absolutely.

Kenny Lange [00:04:27]:
Being fully present to wherever it is that you're at and with whoever you happen to be with. And I know that there's probably some grammar specialists out there who's going to tell me it was whomever or something.

Alexander Fruth [00:04:39]:
It's not going to be me.

Kenny Lange [00:04:40]:
Yeah, you can send those emails to a free truth at East Texas food. I'm just kidding, Alex. You brought up several things, so I think we could go in a lot of different directions, and I believe that they'll all converge at some point at the nexus of the universe. But you mentioned you just started a new fiscal year with the food bank setting targets. Can you talk a little bit about what you've seen in the nonprofit space in terms of how organizations, whether they have a full time director of development like yourself, or it's still the primarily the CEO executive director serving that capacity. What's the prevailing wisdom around setting fundraising or development goals, and how are you going about setting those goals?

Alexander Fruth [00:05:28]:
So they're actually, Kenny Sigler and his team actually just did a survey of East Texas nonprofits earlier this year. And one of the things that he found in that survey was that nonprofits in the area who met their goals for the year had a development plan. And I think it was a majority of the ones who had it, who had met their goal had that plan at the beginning. In fundraising, the development plan is one of those things where it's like, we have to have one, so let's do it. And I've been involved in some organizations where it's just really an exercise to have one and complete it and get the board to approve it. So it's in the minutes, but it doesn't necessarily kind of inform where you're going or become the roadmap. And then I've been a part of other organizations as well, where it's, you have the whole team coming together. It's a collaboration.

Alexander Fruth [00:06:14]:
You're really deciding, hey, here's where we want to go. How do we need, what do we need to do to get there? Here's our destination and building it out. But I think the, it's one of those, that it works. If you have a plan, if you have those goals and you know where you're needing to go, you. I'm one, I kind of subscribe to the ideology that you, if you don't know where you're going and you, like, you don't have metrics in place, you can't measure. Did you do what you were said? You said you're going to be. So I think having those goals and having those targets and then knowing what you need to do, you need to be able to measure whether or not it was successful or not. So having all of those things in place, I think the food bank has done a really good job over the last few years.

Alexander Fruth [00:06:54]:
The food bank has a strategic plan which actually is aligned with the strategic plan. Of feeding America, our parent organization, and feeding Texas as well. We're all under the same umbrella trying to do the same thing. And it looks a little bit different here in east Texas than it does in some of the other areas. So it's tailored to us, but under that umbrella. And so then each team at the food bank has goals that roll up into that overall organizational strategic plan. We actually just had a leadership meeting yesterday at the food bank where we had all of the different leaders, managers and directors in the senior leadership team in a room going over. Here's what our goals are for in each department for the year, and here's how it all aligns to where we're going or as an organization.

Alexander Fruth [00:07:37]:
So I think it's really helpful. Just as a, particularly in fundraising, you have to know what is the target? How much money does the organization need? And I think sometimes there's the thought in nonprofit organizations, regardless of the size, is here's the gap, here's how much we're going to spend on programs. So development, go figure it out. We just need you to bring the money in. And so I've been part of those organizations where it's, hey, we need to raise an extra $500,000 this year. And it's like, I don't know where that's going to come from. It's kind of a balance because you have to, what you raised last year is a pretty good indicator of what you can raise this year. And if you've seen growth in the last couple of years, I've been parts of coming up with a plan and a budget for an organization and was like, literally, I have no idea how we're going to raise this extra $500,000 and then being part of other organizations, we're like, yeah, I think we've been working, we've been building towards this with a few people.

Alexander Fruth [00:08:31]:
I think we have some good partners that we can talk to this year. I think we can achieve that goal. And there's other times where it's like we're going to have to pull a rabbit out of a hat because this is not looking great here. But I think at the food bank, we just do a really good job of we know where as an organization where we want to go. We know as a team, what do we need to do to get the organization there. And then each individual goals are wrapped up into that whole organizational goal. That's been a fun just as a, as a manager and as a team member, just to kind of see how every, everybody's role fits together to hit that team goal, and then that team goal fits that overall bias, the overall organizational goal is. I don't know if I actually answered your question, but I went down a few.

Kenny Lange [00:09:15]:
I think you did. There's a lot to unpack there. I heard you describe. Well, there's sort of a plan that sits above that in the strategic plan, and one, it blesses my heart to hear that someone's actually paying attention and utilizing their strategic plan, and that it's not a 73 page binder just sitting on the shelf collecting dust, which is parts of.

Alexander Fruth [00:09:38]:
I've definitely been parts of teams where that's the case, too. We have this strategic plan, and as you spend all this money, you get a consultant to come in and do it, and then it's like, okay, well, that was a good activity. Let's go back to doing our job now.

Kenny Lange [00:09:50]:
But I can imagine that that happens even when you draw up a development plan. Right. Not the best plan that wins. It's the one you use. Right. That usually helps move the organization forward. Yeah.

Alexander Fruth [00:10:04]:
And I think, too, it's something that if you create a plan and you use it as a roadmap to get to those individual goals, and it can be a really powerful tool, but it's also, sometimes it can be a. We need to have one. So let's just go ahead and draft one in a word document really quick and send it over to the board, and then we don't look at it until we have to update it the next year, and then we'll just do the same thing over again.

Kenny Lange [00:10:27]:
But there's several things about that make me sad. One of which was, you did it in a word document, but I have.

Alexander Fruth [00:10:34]:
Done it in a word document. I didn't say that it is done in a word document currently, but so.

Kenny Lange [00:10:40]:
Often, especially with nonprofits, because we operate now on the board. I joined one earlier this year with Hope Haven of East Texas, and I getting acclimated to a lot of the governance and the different things that are required. And I've learned a bit about the board and our bylaws and things at my church is those bylaws can stipulate things that you have to have in order to be in compliance, either just with the wishes of the organization, or there may be federal or state requirements or even we could pull this back around. Of funding is you're filling out grant applications, there are certain requirements or things that you would need to submit. I know a lot of, or I've heard of a lot of grants requiring parts of maybe a strategic plan. They want to know that you're going somewhere, that you're not just requiring a blank or asking for a blank check, but checking a box doesn't really move the organization forward. It may be activity, but it's not progress. Do you see, especially with you're on several boards and now getting to be around so many different organizations through the association of fundraising Professionals, that there are a lot of people who are, maybe they're checking boxes or they have plans.

Kenny Lange [00:11:56]:
Aside from just not using it, what leads to development plans failing not working? If having one was a key indicator of hitting goals, but there were some people who had some and didn't hit those goals, why is that happening?

Alexander Fruth [00:12:12]:
Yeah, that's, that's a good question. I think there's a number of different factors. I, the unfortunate part in, particularly if we're talking about fundraising goals and meeting that fundraising plan, that I haven't seen if it's updated with this last survey that went out, but I know historically, the last five or six years, the average development director's tenure is like 18 months. And so a lot of organizations, they, you get a plan, you hire somebody, you're starting to build those relationships, and then they're moving on to another organization and you're having to hire somebody again. So I think that can lead to it. A lot of just, you get into a position, you have a plan and your staff changes, you do that. Or I think the, you never know when a pandemic is going to come and it could bless your organization or it could really hinder your organization. I know there's a lot of speculation about fundraising in the fall with the election coming up.

Alexander Fruth [00:13:03]:
So there's a lot of external challenges and changes that are happening all the time, that the stock market goes up or stock market goes down, people are going to donate. People aren't going to donate. One thing I love about East Texas, it's such a generous area. Like everyone in East Texas is like, they have what they're passionate about, what they care about. They're so generous, they donate their time. They don't have their money. But for being a relatively small area, there are so many nonprofits and they're all important. They all do.

Alexander Fruth [00:13:30]:
And have a wonderful mission in the, if we didn't have that mission, our area wouldn't be what it is. I know not everybody loves the food bank mission. Like they, they might be passionate about any number of things within the communities. One thing that the food bank has focused on, I know it's been a focus of AFP programming over the last year or so is really just relationship based fundraising. That seems to be a pretty, pretty standard switch within fundraising in general. Just a lot of organizations are starting to see how impactful and how important, getting to know the people that you don't that donate to you and connecting them to the mission, getting them to come in and see the people you're feeding or the animals that you're helping, or the young people that are learning life skills through golf, or the people who are getting into foster care when they need assistance. So I think just connecting people to the mission, in a way, is something that is changing in the last year, and I think they're in the last several years. But I know starting out in fundraising, it's, oh, we have this dollar amount, we got to get it.

Alexander Fruth [00:14:30]:
So it's, oh, to get it, I have to ask for it. So I have to send people a bunch of stuff. And then I. It was one of the first people I've ever tried to fundraise with is I started one of my fundraising jobs in November at an organization, and they were like, hey, this person has given us $10,000 December for the last 15 years. We'd go ask them for the gift, and I went, met with them, and I asked them for the gift, and they're like, no, we have no idea who you are. We love your organization, but we don't know you. Like, we need to know you and what you're about. And it was one of those.

Alexander Fruth [00:14:59]:
Oh, okay, yeah, that makes sense. So they care about the organization, and they ended up giving the gift eventually, but it was one of those for me. I learned very early on in my career, okay, they can be very passionate about the organization, but as a fundraiser, you have to take the time to get to know them, to get to know what they're interested in. The money will come in, but it's the, you have to have that established relationship and rapport with people because they're, hey, we love the organization, but we've never met you before. We have no idea who you are.

Kenny Lange [00:15:30]:
Yeah, that's really intriguing that would happen, because you think they're tied to the mission, to the organization, and so you may discount the influence of individuals and that process. And just think, I'm representing that. So I'm under this banner and this flag, so automatically, like, I get whatever goodwill that this organization has generated, but it sounds like you got to generate a bit of your own goodwill, and that can really nudge things forward or or backwards? Hopefully not backwards. One thing that I'm glad you brought up, the relational approach and how that's changing in the for profit world. There, there is a greater degree of push on. How are you building relationships? How are you connecting with other people who serve that same community to build further relationships? One of the things, though, that I have noticed is a lot of times you have, whoever the executive director or the CEO of a nonprofit is, tends to be sort of the community face of the organization. How do you advise those executive directors, CEO's and their development directors, how do they balance that out? Because, like, in your situation, the CEO could have gone and asked for it. And they know that person.

Kenny Lange [00:16:44]:
They're on all the prep materials. They hear them speak at keynotes and things like that. You're the development director guy. Maybe not at that moment. How do you balance the personalities between those two?

Alexander Fruth [00:16:57]:
That's a really good question and something that we've wrestled with at the food bank over the last couple of years. And it's a process that we continue to evolve. And I think a lot of times it's a relationship by relationship instance. And so there's some people that we meet and we're getting to know them and they're like, they might be at a high level at a company or pretty big community member. And I was like, oh, not that they don't care about talking to me, but it's, we want to talk to David. We want to, we want to hear from him. We want to hear his vision. And so it's one of the things for me, it's prior prioritizing his time in so that I don't want to bring him into every single donor meeting that I have.

Alexander Fruth [00:17:36]:
But I think what is going to be the most impactful for him, for the donor. And so the, it's in the changes with, with each person, but we've, David has a few people that he, with the help of our team, like, we kind of do a lot of the legwork in the, in the grunt work, but he's the one that's sending them emails or getting to know them and stuff, but we're tracking in at our CRM and doing all the important, but not as the boring things that have to get done. But so I think we do some of that stuff so we can take things off of his plate that he doesn't necessarily need to do. And so we can do that so he can spend time going to lunch. We can set those meetings up for him, do those types of things, or as we're building relationships with folks, just using our professional judgment of, okay, I don't think they're talking about giving a relatively small gift. I don't think we need to go. And I don't think we're at the point where they're ready for lunch with the CEO type of thing and really trying to figure it out. But we had some people when they were working on setting up a meeting, they're very adamant, hey, I want to meet with David.

Alexander Fruth [00:18:35]:
And so in those instances, we pull them in, and those have led to some really great conversations, some really great partnerships. But I think it's such a challenge. When I came to the food bank, we have people all the time who want to come in and do, like, check presentations. And it might be like a connect group at a church that did a donation drive and they're dropping off a couple hundred dollars or something like that. And then it's, we're having high level executives at the food bank step out of meetings and go take a picture. And it's like, for $250, like, it's a great gift and it's important, but we can have other people take those pictures. And so it's something that shifts all the time. And other organizations, like, they really want to be a part of those things.

Alexander Fruth [00:19:16]:
And so I think it depends on who your team is, who's in your organization, who the leaders are. But it's one of those, like, for us, what we're looking at is, like, how do we maximize his David's time and get him to what's going to be most impactful for him? And him having to walk ten minutes to the back of the warehouse for a check presentation for $200 probably isn't the most effective use of his time. And so really prioritizing those things and within that process, what we get to showcase as we're having more of the people who are in our program teams, hey, they're coming to a distribution and they're bringing a check. Can you take a picture with them and send it to us? And so we're getting to involve a lot of people in the organization. And I think that the relationship side, it's important to decide who needs to be with the CEO, who needs to be with the development director, the major gift officer, those types of things. But then another thing that we've done, similar to what I just mentioned with having them take pictures and things, but we have donors who, the high level donors that they volunteer every single week, every single Thursday. So I think one of the things that at the food bank over the last couple of years, we've really tried to instill is just everybody at the organization. We have quarterly all teams meetings and we'll talk once or twice a year, just like how important everybody's job is at the food bank and connecting that to the donor who's coming in and volunteering.

Alexander Fruth [00:20:35]:
And not necessarily that you have to treat someone differently because they donate a lot of money to the feud bank, but just essentially having the culture where like everybody who's in the warehouse, everybody who's volunteering is that million dollar donor, and treating everybody with that way and just having everybody at the organization understand, like, how important it is to build that relationship because you really never know who's going to come through that door, who's going to come and volunteer. And so there's kind of those multi layers to it as well. So you, and we have, we have people in our organization who are on our program team or in our warehouse pulling orders that I easily think could do my job. They are so great with our volunteers and our donors, and so it makes my job easy. In those instances, I'm not necessarily worried about how they're going to talk to somebody. We have the best receptionist in the world. Like, she treats, she is so nice and like, she answers the phone or she like, greets people at the door. She's incredible.

Alexander Fruth [00:21:32]:
And so I think we've just built that culture and we've hired people that can do that and just, they understand the importance of their job and also the importance of fundraising and having that whole culture. I think that's been another shift I've seen. It's a buzzword in philanthropy is you have to have that culture of philanthropy. Like every organization, they're looking for someone who can come and build a culture of philanthropy. But I think that I've been in a few different organizations, and some organizations are like, they aspire to do it and other organizations do it and start to build it. And that's one of the things that the food bank has done. We continue to work on it. We're a growing team, and we have to continue to instill that as we're growing in size.

Alexander Fruth [00:22:13]:
But we have people spread all across our area, and we don't necessarily have to worry about how they're going to treat volunteers coming in or donors. But yeah, to your point, it's a struggle. It's how do you prioritize time? How do you have the most impact? And for one of those things we're looking for is I'm busy, David's busy. Tim, our chief development officer, is like, everybody has things that they need to do and just like trying to, we have a strategy that we set at the beginning of looking at, if they meet these kind of metrics, they go to this portfolio. If they met this extra level of metrics, they're going into that portfolio. So really having that process set and it's every time you're not having to go sit and should they go here? Should they go there? But I think the, one of the things that the major gift officer team and like myself, we can do a lot of things on the legwork of like setting up a lunch and like, all David has to worry about is coming to the lunch and we can let them know who's coming a little bit hungry. Yeah, exactly. And so just he gets to show up and eat and talk about his passion for the organization and get to know them as well so that he doesn't necessarily have to sit and spend a couple of hours trying to schedule all of these things.

Alexander Fruth [00:23:21]:
It's also, it's very important for donors and for partners to know who's at the head of the organization to get to know the leader, get to see their vision, get to see where they're going. Fundraising is, it's a, I don't know if it's 50 50, 60 40, or what the split is, but it's a, you have to have the science aspect of it, but you also have the art of it as well. And so that you can have these formulas, but you also have to be flexible enough to know when to change things or when to do that.

Kenny Lange [00:23:47]:
But yeah, there's a couple things came to mind. One, I think people are now just going to call the food bank just to hear how friendly your receptionist is.

Alexander Fruth [00:23:57]:
Miss Brenda's great.

Kenny Lange [00:23:59]:
Maybe we'll say, everybody wish Miss Brenda well. She's going to be like, trending on social media later.

Alexander Fruth [00:24:06]:
She will. But she'll probably note without them having to say it, that I was the one that sent them to call her.

Kenny Lange [00:24:13]:
Yeah. So you'll get an email later on. Hey, I appreciate all these friendly phone calls, but can you cut it out? But one of the things that came to mind when you were talking about how you're empowering everyone in and say, the warehouse to be a part of the philanthropic culture or the giving and treating the donors, it makes me think of, I don't know who said it, but the, everybody equally represents the organization. So when, say, we want to return something or we have a problem. We need to talk to customer service. Like, in that moment, that person represents the company as much as the CEO does.

Alexander Fruth [00:24:51]:
Sure.

Kenny Lange [00:24:52]:
Because that's who I called the company. This is the human that answered. You are now personifying the organization.

Alexander Fruth [00:24:59]:
Yes.

Kenny Lange [00:24:59]:
And it sounds like you've really tried to communicate that to everyone so that you may not have whatever the top title could potentially be. But that isn't a measure of importance. That's just, hey, that's. This person makes these kind of decisions. You make these kind of decisions. But we all have this great impact, especially with the type of work that y'all do, where you have volunteers come into the facility and get to actively participate in the good work that you're doing, which not every nonprofit is set up and structured to do that. Right. Some may require very specific training and qualifications and stuff in order to work with the people group.

Kenny Lange [00:25:38]:
So I really do love that. I think that there's a note there for a lot of people is, what's your version of that? If you're listening and you're in leadership of a nonprofit, how can you bring more people into connecting with the donor base? Because ultimately, what I hear you saying is, get the donors closer to the work, and the people closer to the donors is the more you do that I would imagine you would see. And you mentioned you have a CRM, which if. If you're not using one, please, dear God, you're helpful. You use one. CRMs are not just for high growth nonprofits that are churning out thousand deals a month or something like that. But I imagine when you start taking that approach, you would see an increase in frequency and size of gift, because the more connected they are, the more likely they are to express that. And some of it may be through actual monetary gifts, but some of it may actually be through a donation of time.

Kenny Lange [00:26:42]:
Right? Like we talk about time, talent, and treasure. You could give. Any of those three are good. And obviously, I know with most of the time we're talking about money, when we talk about fundraising and gifts and giving and donations to an organization. But those others can be immensely helpful and powerful, too, because I used to teach people, when you're doing, when you're serving in any sort of customer service or representing your organization, you're never talking to just that person. You're talking to every person that person knows because they're going to go back and they're going to talk about you. And there's a statistic, maybe it's changed since I last looked at it, but people are three times more likely to express a negative opinion than a positive one.

Alexander Fruth [00:27:24]:
Sure.

Kenny Lange [00:27:25]:
And if they feel like you're just sort of like, hey, they got my money and now I'm dead to them, or whatever it is, your reputation is going to take a hit, which ultimately could impact your fundraising in ways you couldn't possibly imagine. Right?

Alexander Fruth [00:27:37]:
Sure. And I think, too, something that, at least for me, that has shifted when I think of fundraising over the last couple of years. But I think I often, when I tell people that I'm a fundraiser, oh, I could never ask somebody for money. I don't know how you do that. But I think what fundraising? Yes, the end goal is to raise money and to bring money into an organization. But the heart is really 95% of what I do, and what we do as fundraisers is how do you connect to the person in their heart and get to finding out what they're interested in, what they're passionate about, and then connecting that, and when you find that, the money will come down at the end of the road. And so I think the, and I think that is one thing that, particularly that instance that I mentioned earlier where I went and asked them for a gift and I didn't know them, I think that what I learned through that is not necessarily that they didn't know me or didn't care about me, but they could tell that I cared about their money at that instance, and I didn't care about what they were interested in or what they were passionate about. And so I think when, as a fundraiser, if your intention is to get the money, it becomes clear to the donor.

Alexander Fruth [00:28:42]:
But if you're genuine and you want to know them and you want to bring them alongside of your work and just connect them to the organization. One of the things that we do at the food bank is it's really a partnership. It's not necessarily a donation, but when you give to the food bank, you partner with us and we do the work together. We can't do the work without people to donate with us. And what we do in that partnership might look a little different, but it is, you are doing the work of the food bank with us. And so I think the, that's been a pretty big shift. And I think, which is why the relationship based fundraising is starting to take off, is because people are starting to realize that it's, hey, if we spend time within this relationship and getting to know people, it's going to have a greater impact. You might not see that.

Alexander Fruth [00:29:25]:
See those larger gifts come in tomorrow or next year or five years from now. But if that's a. It's a proven model and method, that if you spend time in those relationships and you connect them to your mission, whatever it is, you can do that. I know at a. At a previous organization, we were envious of the zoo in town because there's, oh, they can bring people to see the new sea lion exhibit, or they're renovating. It was like, man, I'm not a zoo. I can't. I can't take people to see the, you know, all of this stuff and, like, take them behind the scenes.

Alexander Fruth [00:29:53]:
But I. Then what that got me thinking, though, is like, what is our sea lion exhibit? What is our. How? We don't have to be the zoo, but what is. What can we have a mission? And some people really enjoy it. What is it about our mission, and what can we bring people to and connect them to that is our equivalent to that behind the scenes tour of the new exhibit. And so I think you have to think a little bit out of the box in some instances. And that's one thing that, as I've done presentations and met with people, is like, how do you infuse your mission into multiple parts of the organization? So as you have an event, how can you make your mission really a big part of that event? The food bank. We did a signature event for the first time, and in a very long time, if not our history, last February.

Alexander Fruth [00:30:40]:
And when we were planning for the event, did we want to host it at an event space, or did we want to host it at the food bank? The committee was like, we have to do it here. We have to bring people to the food bank. And I understand not everybody has the facility or the space to do that, but I think that was something that we're lucky to have part of our warehouse where we can bring 300 people in to do that. But I think the. You can still bring elements of your mission if you have to host at one of the event spaces in town. Like, you can have people come and share their mission, or you can bring books. You can really just build the mission into the event. Just so the community members, the partners, they see all of it and they experience it.

Alexander Fruth [00:31:21]:
Thinking about, from a census perspective, just having it be.

Kenny Lange [00:31:24]:
Yeah, if you're missing.

Alexander Fruth [00:31:25]:
Smell like it's a. Oh, that, that candle. I know that candle is, you know.

Kenny Lange [00:31:29]:
What that was a special edition candle.

Alexander Fruth [00:31:33]:
Or, you know, whatever it is, but just kind of the. As many different ways, because some like that people like to touch things, they like to see things. They like, to experience them. So connecting them in different ways. A lot of that, to me, goes around Simon Sinek's like, start with why is the people don't care what you do. They care about why you do it. And I just, like, your mission is your why. If you can bring the mission and your why into everything that you do, it really just helps, helps things happen and really just make those connections.

Kenny Lange [00:32:01]:
Yeah, I love that. Making it real. Like, how can you demonstrate it?

Alexander Fruth [00:32:05]:
Or.

Kenny Lange [00:32:05]:
Early on, I think my first real job was at Radio Shack, and the manager and assistant manager always tell me is, take the thing off the shelf, put it in their hands. Right? Put the product in there. Even if it's wrapped in that plastic that for some reason, even a blowtorch can't open. I don't know why people felt the need to secure some of these items. They were only, like, $30. Probably took $3 to make. Yeah, but put it in their hands. And with some of the work that nonprofits do, that can be very difficult to really, like, put the.

Kenny Lange [00:32:40]:
Put the outcome, put the mission in their hands. I do have an idea for you with the food bag. I think a food sending candle, like a Thanksgiving candle or something. I think those could be really fun. Like, if you. If you're at this tier, like, you don't get to meet David, but you do get a candidate candle of your choosing, maybe. You know what? Hit me up with that butternut squash right now.

Alexander Fruth [00:33:04]:
That's a really good idea. We'll see if we can make that happen.

Kenny Lange [00:33:08]:
Yeah. And if you could just, like, in small, like, four point font, just put, like, idea by Kenny Lang. But I gotta give credit is due. Well, that's my contribution. That's my donation to the. To the cause.

Alexander Fruth [00:33:23]:
I like it. I appreciate it. And I think the. In some instances, as well, with the type of nonprofit you are, it's not actually safe to bring people to the mission. And so I think you. You also have to take a lens of looking at the people you serve. Like, is it okay for them to have other people around them? Some. One of my organizations I fundraised for was a mental health organization.

Alexander Fruth [00:33:48]:
And, you know, the people are in counseling sessions, and they're like, medication treatments and all of these different things. And it's like, you can talk about the mission, and you can. And in some instances, you have to take the mission to the donor and not necessarily take the donor to the mission. So you have to get creative with things. But in some instances, like, you don't want to have a ton of people coming to your facility or being around. Like, if you serve vulnerable populations or really, like, different situations where people. You don't want to have a ton of people around or what's going to impact their treatment or their. The services that they're being provided, you have to look out for the people that you're serving first.

Alexander Fruth [00:34:24]:
But then, as I mentioned, that's an instance where, how do you take your mission? You can't. You can't bring people to your mission, but you can take your mission to the people. And so just trying to figure that out as well.

Kenny Lange [00:34:35]:
That's really good. Again, there's no one right way. But I think that the essence of it is, like, what's your version of that? As we're sort of wrapping up and thinking about, hey, there's a lot of meat on the bone here in this conversation. I think I could probably spin it off into, like, a six part mini series. Maybe Netflix would pick us up. They might, but they just might. That they're watching. Believe me, they're watching.

Kenny Lange [00:35:00]:
But I. I'm thinking about the. Maybe that CEO or executive director who's been still in that development seat, or maybe a development director who is getting going right. And they were where you were when you had to ask for that ten grand. If somebody wanted to start down that path of relational fundraising, relationship based fundraising, which, to your point, isn't an overnight thing, but the long term success and benefits far outweigh the sort of short term cash grab. But if somebody wanted to take some steps in the next 24 hours, spending little to no money to implement that sort of approach, what would you recommend for them?

Alexander Fruth [00:35:43]:
Yeah, there's a number of different things. I think that there's podcasts that are available that you can listen to. I know, for instance, the Veritas group has a ton of. They do a podcast a couple times a week where they talk about relationship based fundraising or major gifts global. There's a lot of resources on their website, but then at our local chapter, we have meetings once a month, and so we get 20 to 30 fundraisers in a room every month. So just talking with people and learning from them, hey, what worked for you at your organization? Hey, this is a challenge that I'm working through. How can I do it on a practical sense? You don't necessarily have to jump if you're an executive director and you're doing everything, like, you don't necessarily have to go and have a portfolio of 150 people, because that's what consultants recommend that you need to have, maybe there's five people at your organization that they're the top donors. You start with them and you start to build those relationships and go from there.

Alexander Fruth [00:36:37]:
And I think you can bring your board into it. You can bring volunteers into it in a number of ways. So I think you might be doing it all on your own, but really delegating some of those things out. And I think that you mentioned it earlier, you're not just talking to that person, you're talking to that person's network as well. So then I think you can, as you build those relationships with a few people, you're asking those few people, who else do you know that care about the same things that you care about? Who can we talk about? And then you're getting them involved in a little bit higher of a level to you where they're going and having those conversations.

Kenny Lange [00:37:06]:
That's really good because people tend to hang out with others that have the same passions and cares and ideas, especially in this realm. I think that would be work even better than when that's recommended in the for profit world. So excellent tips, excellent ideas. We got several things that we'll be linking up in the show notes. But Alex, if people wanted to know more about you and your work, whether with the food bank first t AFP, I feel like I was about to say KFC, FBI at and Taideh, but pretty much. Pretty much. But if they wanted to connect with you or maybe ask some follow up questions or anything else, where would you send them?

Alexander Fruth [00:37:44]:
Yeah, absolutely. The easiest way probably would be to email me. You already shouted it out for the grammar wizards to do it, but afruthestexasfoodbank.org is a pretty easy way to get ahold of me and have a LinkedIn profile. I think that to learn more about the mission of the food bank, look@easttexasfoodbank.org dot and then.org probably would be the best place to look at where we're working on getting our local website put up. You can email me@afruthastexafoodbank.org. if you're interested in getting in on the AFP, we have newsletters that we send out. I can get you on the list, but reaching out to me directly would be the most efficient way to do that for now.

Kenny Lange [00:38:22]:
Excellent. Alex, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us. I'm sure it won't be the last time. We'll find some new and exciting topics.

Alexander Fruth [00:38:30]:
We're going to see each other again because we're going to be on that Netflix miniseries.

Kenny Lange [00:38:33]:
Exactly. That's coming to us television near you.

Alexander Fruth [00:38:37]:
It is.

Kenny Lange [00:38:37]:
But if you are listening at this point, I imagine you were, you know, you tuned in. This was helpful. And the easy way for you to help others come across this kind of content and maybe unlock something for them and their leadership journey is just a like, rate review, subscribe, put it in their pathway, get it found by more people. Because you never know what could be the key to unlocking somebody's leadership journey. But until next time, change the way you think you change the way you leave. We'll see you.