in the spring of 2000 my son was born it
was negative ten degrees and three days
later it snowed six feet when you live
in a climate like that you cannot wait
to get outside and so at the first sight
of warmth I grabbed my baby bjorn
backpack front pack thing and i grabbed
my son and i stuffed him in his little
legs dangling his head right here and we
headed to the park on this particular
day it wasn’t very crowded and as I
walked we kind of made our way to the
towards a parking lot in the lot is this
long brown sedan and on the passenger
side there was a little girl and she was
running around the front so she was
about this tall and at the time I didn’t
know what for looked like but I think
she was about four and she came running
around the front of the car and as she
passed the driver’s side a woman got out
of the car and she hit that little girl
so hard across the face that it knocked
moments like that change her life they
create these passion points inside of
you and for just a second I almost
forgot about this sweet child dangling
from the front of me as I ran to stop
that second swing I’m guessing that each
of you has a passion point something
that’s happened in your life that has
inspired action or for you to start
volunteering or maybe charitable giving
or even like me started a career in
non-profit no matter how you get there
or what role you take when you arrive it
is very likely that when you get there
you’ll find an unsatisfying system that
is not very impactful on a very large
scale in 2017 giving us a tells us that
Americans donated three hundred and
ninety billion dollars to charity in
fact we’ve been giving more and more
almost every year since 1970s
72% of all of those gifts come from you
and me individuals not big business so
where is it all going exactly well 35
percent of it is going to religious
causes they get the biggest piece of the
pie
year after year another sector that gets
a lot is the human services sector so in
2017 it received 15% which roughly
equals about forty six point eight
billion dollars just in 2017 and these
go to nonprofits that are serving areas
like poverty or homelessness or hunger
so what did we get exactly for our in
our forty six point eight billion
dollars
well the UC Center for poverty research
tells us that the poverty rate in 2017
was kind of fluctuating between 11 and
13 percent exactly what it’s been doing
since the mid 60s the USDA says 12% of
us were hungry the exact same percentage
that were hungry in 1995 so how is it
that we’re donating hundreds of billions
of dollars and we’re not feeling an
impact lots of people will blame the
nonprofit’s high overhead expenses
exorbitant CEO salaries are preventing
the dollars that we donate from ever
getting to the programs that solve the
problems that are so important to us
Charity Navigator is a non profit
watchdog group and their most recent CEO
salary survey tells us that the median
CEO salary for somebody who does
something like save-the-whales or stop
child abuse is a hundred and twenty
three thousand dollars and change
hardly extravagant when you compare that
to what the Economic Policy Institute
tells us during that same period of time
for-profit CEOs were making
these are the people who are selling us
widgets and telling us where to put all
of our money at sixteen point five
million dollars how is this happening
what is the problem I think that there’s
one group that’s responsible that we’ve
never really looked at before and I
think it’s the donor yeah the donor you
and me we are so caught up in our egos
and our a D D and our fear of saying no
that we are stopping these do-gooders
from making the incredible impacts they
really can the distribution of our
donations is everywhere it’s sprinkled
and so it makes effectively no impact at
all don’t worry I think I have an answer
it’s something that I like to call the
star phishing principle so you may have
heard this parable of old man on the
beach and if you have that’s too bad
because I’m gonna tell it to you again
so there’s an old man and he’s on a
beach and he sees this young boy and the
young boy around his feet are scattered
thousands and thousands of starfish and
he’s picking them up one at a time and
tossing them gently back into the ocean
and the old man says son what are you
doing and the boys picks up another one
and says and tosses it back into the
ocean the old man says you can’t
possibly be making a difference the
young boy does it again and he says it
made a difference to this one the
problem is we’re all standing on the
beach
moving from starfish to starfish trying
to figure out how best to toss it back
into the ocean what if that boy went out
and he found everybody that was as
passionate about Star fishing as he is
and he asked them to dedicate all of
their volunteer hours just to that and
all of their discretionary income that
they’ve devoted to charity giving just
to that then he could hire the best and
the brightest they could clear the beach
and maybe figure out why they got there
in the first place and fixed the problem
so it never happened again but instead
we go from starfish to starfish and say
yes to everyone I’m asking you to say no
what is that passion point that you have
only give to that we need to start
investing and stop donating so the next
time the football player knocks on the
door sorry coach or the the child
selling cookies asks you to donate think
am i sprinkling my donations am i making
an impact just say no okay Suzanne but
how do I know where to say no to
everybody’s asking I believe that all of
us can be categorized into three buckets
you’re either a people you’re a plant or
you’re an animal I know hold on so I’m
gonna give you a virtual dollar and I
want you to think about this for a
moment what is your passion point you
can only put this dollar in one of those
buckets don’t feel bad about not putting
it in the other two because there are
lots of people that are going to put the
their dollars in the other buckets allow
yourself to give to the thing that
you’re most passionate about so which
bucket are you let’s say you’re the
plant bucket the environment that’s your
thing that’s the thing that makes your
blood boil the thing that makes you cry
it’s the environment great drill down
what specifically is it it’s the ocean
awesome what about the ocean coral reefs
let’s save them say yes to everybody who
asks you to invest in fixing that
problem and say no to absolutely
everybody else say yes
to those people who are trying to fix
the problem you are most passionate
about and allow yourself to say no to
one of the things that we hear over and
over and I’ve certainly heard it many
times when people experience that
passion point something happens
something changes them and they say I
have to fix this I have to do something
so that that plant that animal that
person never has to suffer experience
feel that again and so every year
thousands and thousands of nonprofits
are started in fact today we have 1.5
million of them just in the United
States and yet instead of looking for
somebody who has the same passion point
as we do we insist on creating our own
organization our own nonprofit that
needs resources and fuel to run because
I know how to fix this
nobody knows what I know nobody’s felt
what I felt we need to check our egos at
the door and stop worrying about whose
name is on it and instead stop creating
and start collaborating there are people
out there who can who are making a
difference just like you let’s say
animal welfare is your thing guidestar
tells us that right now today as we are
sitting in this room there are 23,000
animal welfare nonprofits in the United
States you don’t need to create another
one because if you do we will now have
twenty three thousand and one CEOs staff
office space technology support
marketing all of those things that have
to be funded before a single sense gets
to go towards the problem that you are
so passionate
about we need to stop donating start
investing stop collaborating stop no
stop creating and start collaborating
when you make the choice to support a
non-profit you’re investing your time
your money all of the knowledge you have
everything you bring to the table focus
on one thing that one passion point that
one problem and be proud shout it from
the rooftops
this is the thing this is how I’m going
to change the world as a non-profit we
need to bless and release you and
instead spend our limited resources
finding people who carry the torch for
our cause
you as an investor don’t just consider
your money consider the knowledge and
the time and the energy you can spend on
changing the world this year I believe
if we apply that star fishing principle
we have over 390 billion
chances to get it right 390 billion chances to clear the beach thank you
was negative ten degrees and three days
later it snowed six feet when you live
in a climate like that you cannot wait
to get outside and so at the first sight
of warmth I grabbed my baby bjorn
backpack front pack thing and i grabbed
my son and i stuffed him in his little
legs dangling his head right here and we
headed to the park on this particular
day it wasn’t very crowded and as I
walked we kind of made our way to the
towards a parking lot in the lot is this
long brown sedan and on the passenger
side there was a little girl and she was
running around the front so she was
about this tall and at the time I didn’t
know what for looked like but I think
she was about four and she came running
around the front of the car and as she
passed the driver’s side a woman got out
of the car and she hit that little girl
so hard across the face that it knocked
moments like that change her life they
create these passion points inside of
you and for just a second I almost
forgot about this sweet child dangling
from the front of me as I ran to stop
that second swing I’m guessing that each
of you has a passion point something
that’s happened in your life that has
inspired action or for you to start
volunteering or maybe charitable giving
or even like me started a career in
non-profit no matter how you get there
or what role you take when you arrive it
is very likely that when you get there
you’ll find an unsatisfying system that
is not very impactful on a very large
scale in 2017 giving us a tells us that
Americans donated three hundred and
ninety billion dollars to charity in
fact we’ve been giving more and more
almost every year since 1970s
72% of all of those gifts come from you
and me individuals not big business so
where is it all going exactly well 35
percent of it is going to religious
causes they get the biggest piece of the
pie
year after year another sector that gets
a lot is the human services sector so in
2017 it received 15% which roughly
equals about forty six point eight
billion dollars just in 2017 and these
go to nonprofits that are serving areas
like poverty or homelessness or hunger
so what did we get exactly for our in
our forty six point eight billion
dollars
well the UC Center for poverty research
tells us that the poverty rate in 2017
was kind of fluctuating between 11 and
13 percent exactly what it’s been doing
since the mid 60s the USDA says 12% of
us were hungry the exact same percentage
that were hungry in 1995 so how is it
that we’re donating hundreds of billions
of dollars and we’re not feeling an
impact lots of people will blame the
nonprofit’s high overhead expenses
exorbitant CEO salaries are preventing
the dollars that we donate from ever
getting to the programs that solve the
problems that are so important to us
Charity Navigator is a non profit
watchdog group and their most recent CEO
salary survey tells us that the median
CEO salary for somebody who does
something like save-the-whales or stop
child abuse is a hundred and twenty
three thousand dollars and change
hardly extravagant when you compare that
to what the Economic Policy Institute
tells us during that same period of time
for-profit CEOs were making
these are the people who are selling us
widgets and telling us where to put all
of our money at sixteen point five
million dollars how is this happening
what is the problem I think that there’s
one group that’s responsible that we’ve
never really looked at before and I
think it’s the donor yeah the donor you
and me we are so caught up in our egos
and our a D D and our fear of saying no
that we are stopping these do-gooders
from making the incredible impacts they
really can the distribution of our
donations is everywhere it’s sprinkled
and so it makes effectively no impact at
all don’t worry I think I have an answer
it’s something that I like to call the
star phishing principle so you may have
heard this parable of old man on the
beach and if you have that’s too bad
because I’m gonna tell it to you again
so there’s an old man and he’s on a
beach and he sees this young boy and the
young boy around his feet are scattered
thousands and thousands of starfish and
he’s picking them up one at a time and
tossing them gently back into the ocean
and the old man says son what are you
doing and the boys picks up another one
and says and tosses it back into the
ocean the old man says you can’t
possibly be making a difference the
young boy does it again and he says it
made a difference to this one the
problem is we’re all standing on the
beach
moving from starfish to starfish trying
to figure out how best to toss it back
into the ocean what if that boy went out
and he found everybody that was as
passionate about Star fishing as he is
and he asked them to dedicate all of
their volunteer hours just to that and
all of their discretionary income that
they’ve devoted to charity giving just
to that then he could hire the best and
the brightest they could clear the beach
and maybe figure out why they got there
in the first place and fixed the problem
so it never happened again but instead
we go from starfish to starfish and say
yes to everyone I’m asking you to say no
what is that passion point that you have
only give to that we need to start
investing and stop donating so the next
time the football player knocks on the
door sorry coach or the the child
selling cookies asks you to donate think
am i sprinkling my donations am i making
an impact just say no okay Suzanne but
how do I know where to say no to
everybody’s asking I believe that all of
us can be categorized into three buckets
you’re either a people you’re a plant or
you’re an animal I know hold on so I’m
gonna give you a virtual dollar and I
want you to think about this for a
moment what is your passion point you
can only put this dollar in one of those
buckets don’t feel bad about not putting
it in the other two because there are
lots of people that are going to put the
their dollars in the other buckets allow
yourself to give to the thing that
you’re most passionate about so which
bucket are you let’s say you’re the
plant bucket the environment that’s your
thing that’s the thing that makes your
blood boil the thing that makes you cry
it’s the environment great drill down
what specifically is it it’s the ocean
awesome what about the ocean coral reefs
let’s save them say yes to everybody who
asks you to invest in fixing that
problem and say no to absolutely
everybody else say yes
to those people who are trying to fix
the problem you are most passionate
about and allow yourself to say no to
one of the things that we hear over and
over and I’ve certainly heard it many
times when people experience that
passion point something happens
something changes them and they say I
have to fix this I have to do something
so that that plant that animal that
person never has to suffer experience
feel that again and so every year
thousands and thousands of nonprofits
are started in fact today we have 1.5
million of them just in the United
States and yet instead of looking for
somebody who has the same passion point
as we do we insist on creating our own
organization our own nonprofit that
needs resources and fuel to run because
I know how to fix this
nobody knows what I know nobody’s felt
what I felt we need to check our egos at
the door and stop worrying about whose
name is on it and instead stop creating
and start collaborating there are people
out there who can who are making a
difference just like you let’s say
animal welfare is your thing guidestar
tells us that right now today as we are
sitting in this room there are 23,000
animal welfare nonprofits in the United
States you don’t need to create another
one because if you do we will now have
twenty three thousand and one CEOs staff
office space technology support
marketing all of those things that have
to be funded before a single sense gets
to go towards the problem that you are
so passionate
about we need to stop donating start
investing stop collaborating stop no
stop creating and start collaborating
when you make the choice to support a
non-profit you’re investing your time
your money all of the knowledge you have
everything you bring to the table focus
on one thing that one passion point that
one problem and be proud shout it from
the rooftops
this is the thing this is how I’m going
to change the world as a non-profit we
need to bless and release you and
instead spend our limited resources
finding people who carry the torch for
our cause
you as an investor don’t just consider
your money consider the knowledge and
the time and the energy you can spend on
changing the world this year I believe
if we apply that star fishing principle
we have over 390 billion
chances to get it right 390 billion chances to clear the beach thank you
Please follow and like us: