Episode 10 Transcript: Innovation and Technology are Revolutionizing Philanthropy and Our Ability to Have an Impact – Learn How
There’s a Lesson in Here Somewhere Podcast
Episode 10 Transcript
Guest: Brandolon Barnett, Head of Innovation & Philanthropy at Giving Compass and Founder and CEO of the Regular App
There’s a Lesson in Here Somewhere is a podcast hosted by Jamie Serino that features exceptional people that have compelling stories to tell. Whether it’s a unique perspective, an act of kindness, an inspirational achievement, a hardship overcome, or bearing witness to a captivating event, these are stories that must be heard, and from which we can draw important lessons.
Innovation and Technology are Revolutionizing Philanthropy and Our Ability to Have an Impact – Learn How
How can innovation and technology make philanthropy more impactful? Join us as we chat with Brandolon Barnett, a dynamic leader who is reshaping how we think about philanthropy and impact. From his beginnings as a tech-enthusiast child to becoming the Head of Innovation & Philanthropy at Giving Compass (https://givingcompass.org/) and the Founder and CEO of the Regular App (https://theregularapp.com/), Brandolon’s story is one of passion and innovation. Learn about groundbreaking tools like generative AI that are making philanthropy more effective and accessible, and discover the AI philanthropic advisor from Giving Compass that can transform how you engage with charitable causes.
We also explore the essence of being deliberate about philanthropy and long-term thinking in shaping a better world. Brandolon provides practical advice on participating in giving circles and highlights the significance of consistency in community events for fostering lasting relationships. Reflecting on his own journey, Brandolon emphasizes the importance of meaningful work and fair wages in the nonprofit sector, envisioning a future where social impact is seamlessly integrated into our daily lives. This episode is packed with valuable lessons and inspiring stories that will leave you motivated to make a difference.
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Intro: 0:06
You're listening to. There's a Lesson in here, Somewhere, a podcast featuring compelling conversations with exceptional people. Whether it's an inspirational achievement, a hardship overcome or simply a unique perspective, these are stories we can all learn from. Here are your hosts, Jamie Serino and Carlos Arcila.
Jamie Serino: 0:30
Hello and welcome to. There's a Lesson in here Somewhere. I'm Jamie Serino and I'm here today with Brandolon Barnett, author, head of innovation and philanthropy with Giving Compass and the founder and CEO of the Regular App. Today we're going to talk about innovation in the social impact space and it'll be a pretty broad conversation that I'm really looking forward to.
Jamie Serino: 0:54
I've known Brandolon for years and we've gone to the same conferences and we've interacted at the different companies that we've been at and I've always had an appreciation for his entrepreneurship and his way of thinking and his dedication to philanthropy, and I always share this story. It's kind of funny. So we were at one conference talking about how amazing another conference was. And you go to these conferences and you do get moved, you know, and you're like, oh, I'm going to do better, I'm going to do better, I'm going to do things. And you know, for me maybe it means, okay, you know, I'll rinse the yogurt cup and I'll recycle it, you know.
Jamie Serino: 1:32
And for Brandolon it's like, well, I'm going to launch a company, you know. So he thinks at a large scale, he does, he puts words to action and I've always appreciated that. So, Brandolon, welcome and thank you for joining us.
Brandolon Barnett: 1:49
Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.
Jamie Serino: 1:51
So, Brandolon, could you give us just a more complete introduction? There's so much about what you've done and what you're doing that I think we could all benefit from a more complete introduction.
Brandolon Barnett: 2:02
Yeah, more complete introduction. Yeah, I do a lot and that is because, you know, from a very young age I was a huge nerd. That's kind of where I always start my story. I loved watching Star Trek, Jean-Luc Picard and Babylon 5, and thinking about future worlds.
Brandolon Barnett: 2:22
But at the same time, I grew up with a single mother in Dallas, Texas, and we struggled a lot and I would at a very early age, just find myself a little bit confused as to how we all kind of looked up to and admired these future worlds. But I'd see my mother crying, you know, because she couldn't make the rent.
Brandolon Barnett: 2:42
Or I'd see people struggling just to get an education, just to get an opportunity to learn, and that juxtaposition is something that just really stood out to me and I wanted to do work that helped us move towards those kinds of worlds that I love, and it led me on a little bit of a strange path, where I've worked in the technology space as well as the philanthropy space. I was a research manager at the Council on Foundations.
Brandolon Barnett: 3:13
I ran a donor advised fund platform that was funded by the Gates Foundation, where we were one of the first to bring the cost of a donor advised fund down from hundreds or thousands of dollars to just a dollar, which later the customers of that ended up being a lot of giving circles, and that rolled over into the grapevine platform that's been built, and I was at Salesforce.org for quite a while as director of product and product strategy for Salesforce Philanthropy Cloud, chief product officer for a couple of different startups, series A companies, and all of it, though, for me, is really just about finding innovative ways to move resources to people who move them, who need them.
Brandolon Barnett: 3:54
Rather, so that we can create a better future. I just can't stop myself from thinking about a future that looks better than today. And what does that look like and how?
Brandolon Barnett: 4:10
do we get there in a way that takes into consideration all of the different, diverse voices that will live in that future. And so you know, my background really is all about trying to accomplish that core mission, and I've tried more over the years, especially over the past few years with the release of my book Dreams Deferred to tell that story particularly to different audiences like people of color, who don't know what philanthropy is, they don't know what social impact technologies are, they don't know what impact investing is and the fact that there are these amazing careers and opportunities to not only build a life for yourself but make an impact in the world. And so that's really what I'm all about yep, there's a lot there um.
Brandolon Barnett: 4:48
Time management is a problem for me, but um, so maybe we could start with that.
Jamie Serino: 4:56
You know what you called like a dichotomy and, um, you know, we have like futuristic societies, right, but we have our present society. And you know when you talk about, you know the United States and really around the world. But you know, if a country like the United States is so wealthy, then why are there so many people struggling? And you know, I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about that and about how, what you see there and how you feel like we can change that.
Brandolon Barnett: 5:23
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I actually feel a lot of hope in sort of the aggregate is what I say.
Brandolon Barnett: 5:30
I feel macro hope and a lot of micro sadness sometimes about the state of the world at a sort of macro level, we've got these really incredible technologies like generative AI that actually can, I think, simplify workflows, make it easier to find information that can help you engage with the world or understand it better. For example, at Giving Compass, we're using generative AI, as well as a lot of traditional data and data sets on small nonprofits, to build an AI philanthropic advisor where, if you go to givingcompassorg today, you can search for charities, for articles about causes, for funds, all in one place, just by saying I want to support organizations you know looking after women and girls, stem education in a specific city, without having to know the EIN or the name of the charity. And so, at a macro level, I feel a lot of hope about what we can achieve. But at a micro level, it is very clear, with the level of sort of fragmentation, that a lot of people are feeling left behind, and I think that's one of the key issues that we have to address and you know I can only speak to the realms in which I've tried to address that which have there been three, you know.
Brandolon Barnett: 6:52
One is I was an elected official here in DC for a number of years what's called an advisory neighborhood commissioner, if DC were a state which it should be shout out for DC statehood, then it would be something like the house of representatives representing about 2200 of my neighbors in the columbia heights neighborhood and it's amazing to think about. You know, I've been at places like salesforce we. We have millions of users and customers right and we're able to dynamically gather their feedback and understand them and connect with them every single day. But when I took my elected role, there was no email list of people to reach out to.
Brandolon Barnett: 7:30
There was no one from the city actually gave me an orientation hey, this is welcome to city government, this is your role. And so, on the macro level, I was able to stand up some tools to gather neighbor feedback in some new and innovative ways, but at the micro level, there was no system or infrastructure set up to actually help people connect. And so the same if you look at being a small business. So I own a startup here in DC. We operate in five cities Now. We do karaoke nights and trivia nights and we try to infuse social impact and giving back into those experiences. Working with you know at this point, almost 50 venues, bars, restaurants all over the country.
Brandolon Barnett: 8:12
And while the technology is great and the corporate responsibility movement has been this transformative movement right, we're still having to, at a micro level, go to a bar owner and say you can do more than donating a portion of proceeds once every six months. And if you think about philanthropy at the macro level, there's all of this wealth and money and all of this individual giving that people are capable of. But at a micro level people are feeling. If you look at USA Today and other studies, they are feeling less trust in institutions of all kinds, including nonprofits, including philanthropy. You look at the picture of who's making decisions in philanthropy and where the money goes. It's not a very inclusive picture. That's why you've had movements like collaborative grant making or participatory grant making, and so at the micro level, where you know innovation connects to people, I think that's where I'm seeing a disconnect, where there's all these amazing technologies and tools that give me a lot of hope for what we can build.
Brandolon Barnett: 9:12
I mean, there are things that we're in watching a character like Geordi or Data on Star Trek, the Next Generation. There are things that they're doing talking to their computer or interacting or gathering data that we can do today talking to their computer or interacting or gathering data that we can do today but at a personal level we have not decided, I guess, to build a society with empathy, to sort of prioritize that, and we have not had leadership that set out a sort of collective vision for the future that we can all connect with as human beings. And I think you know that's a huge challenge that I see just sort of in thinking about how we make a better world.
Jamie Serino: 9:50
Yeah, well, you touched upon a few things there, and one thing that I think about a lot is the. You know, the fragmentation of, you know, like the media landscape, let's say, and so you know it's sounding like it just becomes more difficult to sort of reach people in a way. In some ways it's easier because everyone can be a publisher, right, yeah, but in some ways it's, you know, everyone can be their own sort of media channel, but in some ways it's more difficult because you know there's not this sort of like bullhorn effect anymore, right, and so how do you connect with the individuals and and? And there's not this sort of mass communication or like you were saying, you know you got hired for the or you, you, you, you were elected to this role and it was no sort of blueprint for it, um, and no way to reach people. That was an immediate need that you saw, um, so what if you could talk a little bit about that?
Jamie Serino: 10:44
And you know you mentioned giving compass is maybe a way where people can sort of self-direct or, you know, help themselves to that, and how would they know about that? And I'm asking, like so many questions in one question, like wrapping everything up and you had said something you know about people of color, like not realizing about philanthropy and even just that they can be involved with it. You know so much there, so I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about that.
Brandolon Barnett: 11:10
Yeah, it's not just people of color, it's people in rural communities not understanding a lot of these social impact systems that are now pretty integral to how our society functions. I mean, when we think about the billions of dollars that move to charity integral to how our society functions I mean when we think about the billions of dollars that move to charity, there are whole institutions, systems of companies and technology platforms that actually move that money and get it from you as a donor to that charity, and so there's a whole set of institutions and a whole ecosystem that I think we need to do a better job as a whole in the social impact space of helping people to understand, which is why moments like this, opportunities like this, I value. But I think you know, just sort of taking a step back, where I would say the opportunity lies for a lot of this work is really in democratization. It's in making people aware, but also involving them in the process. And it's sort of a meta point, right, and I'm not a political scientist, right, but it almost strikes me as, with all the new technologies and inputs we have, there is a need for us to democratize who inputs on building those tools, what they look like make sure that people are educated and understand how they're built, how they work, the biases that are inherent in them.
Brandolon Barnett: 12:38
So, for example, one of the things you mentioned, Giving Compass. So, Giving Compass, we've built this AI-assisted search that also uses a lot of traditional search. So imagine an AI that you ask the question I'm interested in supporting a specific cause, or I want to find articles on X, y, z topics in philanthropy. That AI is then calling a traditional search. It's determining, sort of what you're asking, what you're talking about, and then it's calling and interacting with traditional search. So when we think about a tool like that, that's really valuable because we have a curated data set of nonprofits, organizations that we've vetted, information, articles that we've curated and that can be trusted. But if you just ask a chat GPT, which we actually did this experiment if you ask a general AI system, kind of where should I give? It's going to say Doctors Without Borders, save the Children, because those are the organizations that have the most data represented, right?
Brandolon Barnett: 13:31
Yeah, even though they do good work, the system itself isn't democratized. A lot of the smaller nonprofit organizations or causes are not rising to the fore when people search, and so that's one of the core problems that we're trying to solve with our donor education tools, but I think it is a microcosm of the sort of larger need that we have in society to really think about democratizing innovation, bringing in a variety of voices as we build tools and products and as we deploy them, making sure that the data sets that we're using, that the information we're offering, is accurate. Until we do that, we're going to sort of be caught in a situation where there will, I think, be declining trust. And that gets me to another point of this. When I think of innovation, I think it's kind of unfortunate that the term innovation has kind of been hijacked by Silicon Valley, because yes innovation is tender and it's swiping right.
Brandolon Barnett: 14:28
Right. It's dating apps, it's all sorts of applications, but it's also just new ways of thinking of solving problems.
Brandolon Barnett: 14:36
but how to solve problems in our society of the challenges we face, that's going to involve some technology, but it's not dependent on that is around third spaces and community and how we connect with each other and the world around us, and so I think there and that's one of the things that we do with the regular we're trying to really innovate in how people find and engage not just with events but community, and I think that there's a lot of space in our society for us to think about social innovation as seriously as we think about sort of technology innovation to drive, you know, SAS revenue or whatever sort of vertical you might be thinking of.
Jamie Serino: 15:16
Yeah.
Brandolon Barnett: 15:18
So I'm not sure if I really like that. I think about the broad.
Jamie Serino: 15:21
Yeah, yeah, it's, yeah, it's, it's all good. Um, I really like that and that. That is true. Like everyone thinks innovation and a lot of people's minds go to technology, but there's innovation and process or just in the ways that we do things, like everything you're talking about, and a person in you know, let's say, the impact space or the social impact space, can feel like they're being innovative just by trying new things. And they should feel like they should try new things.
Jamie Serino: 15:46
And I like what you were talking about there with the Giving Compass and just in general, because when you mention, like these bigger nonprofits which are wonderful Doctors Without Borders and Red Cross and everything, they're doing wonderful things but they, in a way, they've sort of been vetted by someone else, right, and like not by, let's say, not by me, not by you, right, and so then there comes the trust. And then if those nonprofits stumble and everyone's allowed to make mistakes or whatever, but all of a sudden if there's a loss of trust there, then I might stop giving to them or I might question, like why would I just give to them? Like what are my other options? And that's what I really like, what you're talking about there, and which one would I believe in and which one do I want to support? And you can actually maybe feel like you're being even more meaningful by helping to prop up a smaller organization with your donation or with your time. So I really like that and I can appreciate that.
Jamie Serino: 16:55
Now you know, as you mentioned, sort of getting people together in third spaces and stuff. Then, of course, my mind goes to now we're post COVID, but you know everyone's at home on their phones and no one you know. You hear I want to interact, but you hear about people not wanting to interact, and so how do you get people up off the couch and how do you get them into you know, these, I guess, third spaces that you're talking about?
Brandolon Barnett: 17:25
Yeah, I think the one of the keys we've discovered in the regular is consistency. So knowing that something is there, even if you don't go to the trivia night, if you consistently pass the bar and they've got the sign up every Tuesday for trivia, it's going to dramatically increase the odds that you're going to try it one day, right.
Brandolon Barnett: 17:44
And if you know it's going to be there next week and you have a good experience. You've not only now gone to an event. In a sense, you've joined a community. You're going to be seeing some of the same people week in and week out, and it's really funny because that's how we all made friends and built relationships, right. Going to school every day at the same time. You go to college, you go to classes, you see the same people Used to be. You go to work no-transcript about artificial general intelligence, right which could significantly transform every aspect of human society. That involves any digital technology, right.
Brandolon Barnett: 18:46
So we can't have difficult conversations because we're so stuck on in this model where we are really disconnected from each other, and so consistency is key in terms of what we've found and then being willing to try new things. So, with the regular, we have, for example, a competitive karaoke community. It's like 6,000 people all over the country. They come out once a week. They wear costumes. There's choreography, they compete in karaoke. We've had people getting married, having children. There's one older woman she's probably in her 60s. Her daughter graduated college. She and she's on a team and they're competing with each other, and so we're trying to also get creative about the sorts of experiences that bring people out.
Brandolon Barnett: 19:35
And that can mean involving impact and community as well, because one of the things that you know is another pillar of for me and thinking about how we bridge these gaps and how we build community is social impact. And you know we were talking about this before the call started and I've mentioned the phrase a few times. But you know social impact I define very broadly. We can get into it, but it does include things like small nonprofits or small organizations in your community that can help you feel connected.
Brandolon Barnett: 20:06
So you're at that trivia night, can you also learn about a cause that is in your neighborhood, in your community, where your help even if it's $20, could be invaluable to a really small organization? And bringing that organization into that karaoke night and having them talk about their work, bring some of the people who are participating from it, or rather who are benefiting from it, who beneficiaries, and so then we have a situation where all of that community is consistently sort of jam-packed into one one space, and I think that's where all of the all of the crazy things I do sort of fit together right, because you've got donor education, which is a huge, huge important thing for me because I spent so much of my life and my career trying to build a home in the space of social impact and philanthropy, and so there were a lot of things that I had to learn along the way, that I had to learn the hard way. I had no one to ask like what is a donor advised fund? I didn't know that until I was almost 30 years old right, and it's now. The largest charities in the world are donor advised funds, right, but a lot of people don't even know what they are. So there's that aspect of it for my work. But then there's bringing people together consistently into these spaces, bringing that donor education into that space, that opportunity to give and connect to community. That's where all of it kind of comes together for me, which is what makes my life not entirely unmanageable, seeing those connections.
Jamie Serino: 21:36
Yeah, if you can have some overlap, that would help. So I did want to circle back to the donor advised fund. I wonder, for our viewers and listeners that don't know what that is, if you could talk a little bit about that.
Brandolon Barnett: 21:49
Yeah, donor, advised funds are a vehicle for giving where you can think of them almost like a philanthropic or nonprofit social impact savings account where you can put money in.
Brandolon Barnett: 22:01
There's often a minimum, although there was a time, you know, when I first started a platform called Grow Fund, which I think that's when we, when we first met I was with an organization called Global Impact we started a startup to democratize DAFs and at the time minimums to open a DAF were $5,000, $10,000.
Brandolon Barnett: 22:21
Now they've come down to a dollar, $10, $100. And so you start the account and then, once you've started it, you're actually able to make a charitable contribution into your donor advised fund and get a charitable tax deduction if you want to itemize and claim that deduction. But you don't have to give to a specific charity at that point. You can then choose, almost like you have your. So you have your philanthropic savings account and then it almost acts like your own personal foundation where, at whatever point as that money builds up, you can then make a grant out to a nonprofit organization and that donor advised fund provider of which there are many can send that those funds out to that charity. And there are now so many donor advised fund opportunities. If you have a community foundation in your community, most likely they are offering donor advised funds as an option for you to engage with causes and they have lists of charities.
Brandolon Barnett: 23:14
We work with several community foundations, like Giving, compass, to help them educate those donors. So you might be seeing some of our technologies and innovations there. But also there's now the largest charity in the world is Fidelity Charitable overtook United Way several years ago and they distribute billions and billions and billions of dollars every year and have billions of dollars saved. And donor advised funds have been a little bit controversial. There's been this idea that because you don't have to make that distribution to a charity and you don't have the same rules as a private foundation, so private foundations have to distribute 5% of their total assets each year at a minimum. There's no such payout rule for donor advised funds.
Brandolon Barnett: 23:54
But a lot of new research is coming out is actually showing that, which is something I suspected for many years. This is an opportunity for a lot of social impact organizations and nonprofits because that money is captive. Those people who have invested in that donor advised fund can only send that money to a nonprofit. What's becoming clear is that as organizations become more sophisticated about recognizing those donors, speaking to them, understanding them, that there's a huge opportunity for donor advised funds to transform how funding gets to people, but there are a lot of questions that we need to ask and there's some controversy around it, but it really goes back to what I said earlier around this larger social impact space. I think one of the main things I try to help people come away with whenever I have an opportunity to be heard is just understanding that there are so many ways to give back. Mm, hmm.
Brandolon Barnett: 24:45
When I was younger I thought, OK, I can give to a charity or I can work for charity, I can maybe work for the government and that's pretty much it Right. And then later I learned that maybe I could join a foundation. There are now so many ways to get back. There is impact investing. If you think about your 401k, there are options where you can actually choose 401k. There are options where you can actually choose.
Brandolon Barnett: 25:26
You go into the settings and talk to your broker to invest in sustainable companies or companies that are not hurting the world at a minimum, and you can do that according to your own worldview and your own thoughts. That's the democratization, right. You are bringing your an opportunity to sit around with their family and say, hey, everyone in the family we've put in this collective amount. Where do we want to make that distribution? Where do we want to give? Where people come together as groups with strangers or others in their communities or friends and family, and they often use a donor advised fund or a similar vehicle, and they put pool money together and once a year they find an organization to grant it out to. And it's also creating a new third space, right. So there's those opportunities.
Brandolon Barnett: 26:04
There's opportunities to work and build new technologies. That I've been a part of that. There are many jobs, whether you're an engineer or you're in marketing, where you can help organizations to get their message out into the world or to get in front of donors and to raise more resources for their mission, and all of these things are really powerful and, I think, something that everyone needs to keep in mind. There are so many ways to give back. There are not just a few. I didn't even touch on volunteering and skilled volunteering, joining a board. I think that's one of the main messages for me, and donor advised funds are definitely a big and growing sort of piece to that puzzle of how you can choose to give back of how you can choose to give back.
Jamie Serino: 26:48
Yeah, and I think, you know, with all of that out there which is amazing, you know, like I was saying earlier, there's, you know, there's a little bit of a fragmentation there and it may seem complex, but really it's just choice and I think it comes down to a person actually being able to be deliberate about what they want to contribute to in society, like I want to contribute to environmental causes, about what they want to contribute to in society, like I want to contribute to environmental causes or I want to contribute to disease causes and things like that. And I think that that's, you know, amazing. It is democratization and the donor advised fund. So you're saying you know you learned about it. I learned about it, I don't know, maybe nine years ago, so, and at that time there were those minimums that you were talking about. So when you talk about those minimums, when you talk about the captive money maybe that's people with millions of dollars in there, but I'm assuming that you put the money in the DAF, you don't get the IRS deduction until you donate it, right?
Brandolon Barnett: 27:52
No, that's the innovation for a DAF. You get the deduction. You get your tax receipt, if you will, that you have made a charitable deduction when you put that money into the DAF.
Jamie Serino: 28:05
That's where the controversy is, then.
Brandolon Barnett: 28:07
That's where the controversy is.
Jamie Serino: 28:08
Yeah, that's where the controversy is then.
Jamie Serino: 28:09
So where the yeah, so that's when they yeah, that's where the controversy is then yeah, so, um, yeah, I guess if people want to be like that, they can sort of find that loophole.
Jamie Serino: 28:15
But you know, for people that want to use it for what its purpose is, and you think about a person maybe who is gonna like, who is not a millionaire, who wants to put, you know, a few hundred or a few thousand in there, you can be like your own foundation, like you said, and be deliberate about where to give that money and not not feel as stressed about it and not just be reactive either Like oh, I got this email or I got this thing in the mail, and those are fine too, reacting to those you know out, you know outreach, um, methods and stuff. But uh, it's just really nice that a person can just sort of be deliberate and say here's the money I'm setting aside and here is I'm going to put it there, and then I'm going to distribute it as I want to and as I feel like I need to. And then now you talked about giving circles, which I'm not as familiar with. So this is, this is where. So can you tell me how people would come together for a giving circle?
Brandolon Barnett: 29:12
Yeah, so there's a few ways, um. First, there are a variety of different platforms and solutions. If you search, you know, giving circle platform online, you'll find several of them. Um, but you can do it with friends and family. That's very common um, where you just say, hey, we're going to start a giving circle, maybe it's the immediate family grandparents, aunts and uncles and then maybe during the holidays or Thanksgiving, around Giving Tuesday, everyone has a vote.
Brandolon Barnett: 29:40
There's some charities that you're all selecting from and then you can make distributions from that giving circle fund, which often is a donor advised fund these days, to those charities. So that's one way, friends and family. Another is that there are some very well-known and large and popular giving circles that have created some pretty awesome communities. There's one here in DC that I was a member of called Black Benefactors. If you just search giving circles, there are thousands of them now all across the country, of people who are strangers, who just met through a platform or through a meetup or networking experience and said you know what, I want to join, and then they're putting in $100, $200, $300 a year.
Brandolon Barnett: 30:23
And all of that adds up to a substantial amount. I mean there are small charities with $500,000 budget where you have 100 people giving $300. That is a lot. That's a substantial portion of their budget. That could be all of their marketing spend for two quarters right. So there's that option of just sort of finding some of those larger established giving circles. And then there are some innovative things, like what we're trying at the Regular, where if you join a adult social league like we do a bocce league, for example, called DC Bocce you pay a membership, you participate and compete in that adult social league for two months, and what we're doing is actually innovating by making part of your payment for that experience go into a giving circle and then you have the right to vote and be a part of that community and we're building experiences and meetups around it, and that's what I call that social innovation, right?
Brandolon Barnett: 31:18
So there's a few ways to do that, but I think the kind of I really want to go back to that point you made about being deliberate and that's really at the core of a lot of what we do at Giving Compass, where we've really said Giving Compass was founded by Jeff and Tricia Rakes and early Microsoft employees who went on their own philanthropic journey, started the Rakes Foundation, which is based in Seattle, and then Jeff Rakes was actually invited to be the first CEO of the Gates Foundation and so they went on this philanthropic journey where they learned to be more deliberate about how they give, and Giving Compass built up technology and articles and content around supporting people on that journey.
Brandolon Barnett: 31:59
So now we get 100,000 site visits a month, we have 40,000 plus content, and we work to get that content and that educational material in front of partners like Schwab Charitable, fidelity Charitable, which I mentioned the largest charity in the world and it really is all about being deliberate. And so what we've built is a tool where, yes, you can go and search for a nonprofit. You can also, though, search for an article about the cause that that nonprofit is working on. You can also ask questions like the questions we're discussing now, like what is a giving circle, what is a donor class, how does it work, and see sourced answers, and I think that's a really crucial point. No matter what decision you're making, this better world that I want to create, it does require us all to more deliberately think about the shape of the future right.
Brandolon Barnett: 32:51
I think that we've reached a point and I'm going to sort of pontificate a little bit, I guess, but I think we've reached a point as a species, just sort of at the highest level, where we have tremendous capabilities we can go to other planets.
Brandolon Barnett: 33:03
We could destroy life on this planet if we chose to right. So with that power comes the opportunity as well to think more long-term. How do we want the future to look? And social impact and philanthropy that's really what's at the core of that movement. It's about deliberately thinking about the shape of the future, what we want it to look like, and that requires educating ourselves and learning and being open-minded and exploring new topics and trying new things. And so that point that you made about being deliberate I just really wanted to hone in on that because I think that's a really, really important point for all of this Just being deliberate about how we interact with community, how we interact with each other, how we support causes and organizations in our community and making decisions that we feel, after being deliberate, after doing our research, after learning as much as we can, after checking our sources in an era where we need to check sources, what's the future that we want to look?
Brandolon Barnett: 34:05
Then we democratize everyone participating in that process beyond just voting right, where it's a sort of daily thing, and I'm definitely rambling at this point, but I think that's a really, really powerful point about being deliberate.
Jamie Serino: 34:22
Yeah, well, I appreciate that you honed in on that, and then you raised it up a level, thinking about society. And then I think, if we take that point about being deliberate at that societal level, we're past the point of not being deliberate about solving problems. And I think there are people in our organizations that have been out there and have been hard at work at, you know, deliberately working to solve problems. So to pull everyone else along with them is, you know, I think it's a difficult exercise, and so I think, the more that people can feel like I'm in control of this and I believe in something and I'm going to go support it as opposed to being haphazard about it or, oh, tax season's coming up, I better donate my money. It's like it needs to be, and I think, you know, with younger people, it is a regular part of their lives and they believe in things and not say the older people don't, but I think it's becoming more of a core part of a person's life. So then to your point.
Jamie Serino: 35:35
The democratization, then, is important, because I don't want to just say, all right, it's going to be my elected official that then has to go to Congress to fight for something for me, I want to actually just go and put my money somewhere, I want to go donate my time, I want to go actually contribute to this movement.
Jamie Serino: 35:46
That's happening and so it's all great. And so I see where your optimism is coming from, because I think a lot of people may not realize that there's this undercurrent happening where all of these things can take place. They are, and there can be a groundswell around the process of it, it and the participation, and then the problems will get solved. And so, just going back to your point about, in the micro, there's, you know, some things to be upset about, but in the macro, I'm feeling your optimism because I see all these things happening now. Um, and it's, it's, it's, it's, it's encouraging and and it also, again, it's empowering and it's just, you've always been about democratization and I, you know, I've always liked that. So tell me a little bit more about your book.
Brandolon Barnett: 36:36
Yeah. So my book is called Dreams, deferred Recession Struggle and the Quest for a Better World and it's just, it's about my experience trying to graduating from college during the great recession, you know, having all of this hope, not being able to find work, um, but really wanting to work in non-profits and philanthropy. And then, when I did get a job, it was often, you know, minimum wage, not being able to support my family. My mother passed away when I, you know, really, really was powerless to save her. I went to grad school, living on the you know tales about living on the street in San Francisco while working at internship with a social impact organization there and just that journey and what I learned along the way and some of the hopelessness that I felt along the way.
Brandolon Barnett: 37:28
I talk very frankly in the book about a moment where I was very intent on ending my life because I couldn't find a job, I had no hope, I felt like I had no prospects and I felt like, at the same time, I was not willing to compromise and do work that did not make the world a better place, and so it was this really labyrinthine journey of trying to figure out, like, how can I do the sort of work that nonprofits do, that impact organizations do, but also make enough money to take care of myself, to buy a home, to have support my family and to just not feel I grew up very poor, so to not feel that constant scarcity, which is really something that I think becomes physically painful, you know, after a while.
Brandolon Barnett: 38:15
it hurts your heart and your mind and it interferes with your ability to even to be deliberate and to be strategic. And so I really just recount that journey and talk about what I went through and my goal in writing it. I really had two goals. The first goal was I wanted anyone out there who had a similar mindset to me or who was struggling especially you know I wrote a lot of it during the height of COVID, when a lot of people were losing their jobs and feeling hopeless, and I wanted them to see a journey that maybe would resonate with them and allow them to say that hey, there's a light at the end of this tunnel, maybe.
Brandolon Barnett: 38:55
I've applied to 400 jobs, but I only need to be worried about the one that I forget all the others. It just takes one right and to help them to see that there's hope. The other reason I wrote it was I wanted to start a conversation in the space of social impact and philanthropy, much like this conversation we're having here today, where I just ask the question why is it so hard for people to understand this space, for people to see how they can get involved, for people to start careers in it, for people to start careers and get paid enough to live in a world where these organizations saying they're making the world a better place? You have to be willing, as a grant maker, to give organizations the money to pay their staff so that they can have a living wage, so they can create families, so that they can do better work. And so I wanted to start and be a part of that conversation in the space of philanthropy and social impact.
Brandolon Barnett: 39:43
But it actually is the first of a few books that I'm working on. I'm actually working on sort of a trilogy. That book was about my journey to get involved and find space for myself within the space of social impact and philanthropy and to define it, to understand things like corporate responsibility and impact, investing and ESG and all of these different movements that you can sort of choose to interface with or understand as much as you like. But my second book that I'm working on is actually going to be highlighting where I landed, which is in this space of innovation, and so I'm right now going around and talking with different nonprofits, different technology companies, about the ways that they're innovating for social impact and just to share their story and to share their innovation.
Brandolon Barnett: 40:26
And then the third book that I want to write is actually going to be called I'm tentatively calling it Impact Anywhere, and it actually relates to the point that you were making earlier around for younger generations, millennials and Gen Z in particular this sort of mindset becoming part of everyday life. I believe that you know I want to write a story. That's the end where we're really. I'm really asking the question what if we didn't need philanthropy? What if we didn't need social impact? No-transcript had some deliberate aspect to it that made the world better in ways that we as a society have sort of agreed on, and we already see some of that happening.
Brandolon Barnett: 41:07
Right, you go to the grocery store. Now you're checking out, you're seeing an opportunity to give. That's an everyday interaction, where you are being asked to make the world better just by buying your apples or your frozen pizza or whatever you're getting at the grocery store.
Brandolon Barnett: 41:22
And so I think the last piece that I want to write about is just that, so that stories or journeys like mine they're not necessary. I would hope that they're not necessary in 50 years or 100 years, because everyone's doing good all the time and everyone's thinking deliberately about how they're doing good and how the world around them is affected by their actions and how the world around them is changing or can change at all times. And I think that's, for me, is the sort of the ideal instate for all of the work that I do, even if I don't sort of get to see it, I don't really care.
Jamie Serino: 41:58
It's really just about taking one step at a time toward that future it's really just about you know taking one step at a time toward that future. Yep, that's great and I mean I appreciate that you shared. You know about your struggle and I think that could be helpful to a lot of people and now it's great to see that you are full of hope now and I think you spread hope as you talk to people, which is great. But you know you did mention some very real problems and I think it's good advice about trying to work in this industry and finding ways to help and contribute.
Jamie Serino: 42:32
But can it be at a good enough salary to be, able to live and pay your bills and stuff, and that might be something for the industry to have to figure out. And I remember eight, nine years ago around when we met, when there was a bit of a shift going from well, how much of this dollar that's being donated to you is being used for the program?
Jamie Serino: 42:56
A shift toward well are you taking care of overhead, because otherwise you're going to lose your staff, and are you going to grow and people? You know people are going to have loam around stuff and so hopefully that's sort of continuing so that organizations can build infrastructure there. And I think that that goes into what you're talking about there, um, and I think just in in general, you know, uh, there, I I love what you're saying there about. I'm taking it as the sort of built-in quality.
Jamie Serino: 43:28
I think that more and more products and services try to build things in like built-in innovation or built in this or that, and there needs to be like built-in philanthropy, like you're gonna buy and some companies do it you're gonna buy this product and it means that we're going to put this much money into the environment or we're going to make sure that our practices are sustainable. You're, you're, you're buying our product, you're investing in us, we're going to invest in the future, right, and that mentality, you know would would go a long way and it kind of that's a little bit of what you're talking about there. Um, about there Awesome. So I think people would be angry at me if I didn't ask about the guitars in the background.
Brandolon Barnett: 44:09
What do you like to play?
Brandolon Barnett: 44:10
My mother was an opera singer and so I grew up around music and it's super important to me. These days I'm more of a karaoke guy, but in the past I led a band. If you, if anyone wants to do a little sleuthing, there's an album you can find out on the internets. But I generally will play sort of singer, songwriter stuff, alternative stuff. I have done live shows where people come up to me and they say that was great, you should do some of your own originals and not so many Tracy Chapman songs and I'm like well, they're all my songs, but I appreciate that. So if you like Tracy Chapman, it's sort of in that vein.
Jamie Serino: 44:50
Great, yeah. So the Giving Compass, the Regular and the book Dreams Deferred. Encourage everyone to check those out. Brandon, do you have anything else that you want to add, Anything that you feel like we didn't quite cover?
Brandolon Barnett: 45:09
No, I've enjoyed the conversation. I think the only thing I'd say is all of these things I'm talking about, you can go and try for yourself. So, if you go to givingcompass.org, try searching for what is a giving circle, tell me about the overhead myth or what is a donor advice fund A lot of the questions we've discussed today and let us know what you think that tool is there for people to ask the sorts of questions that you're asking on this podcast and on this show, and the other thing is, you know, just as we think about technology, I think one of the main takeaways I want people to realize is just reinforcing what I said earlier that innovation isn't just the latest app.
Brandolon Barnett: 45:47
We can innovate in our communities just in how we new ways to gather together and connect with each other, and so I just encourage people to do that. Check out my book it's on Amazon and find me on LinkedIn. Otherwise, I'm so glad that you're engaging in this podcast and telling these stories, and it's been a pleasure.
Jamie Serino: 46:09
Yeah, pleasure was all mine, so I think you know. Last message there is, you know, for people that do want to get involved and want to help, they want to do something or start a career. It sounds like the Giving Compass could be a good place to start. Some people don't even know where to start. It seems like that's a great place to start and just search stuff and get some information. It's great. All right, Brandolon, thank you very, very much, and to our watchers and listeners, thank you for joining us and we will see you next time.
Brandolon Barnett: 46:39
Thank you Bye.