144 – Bringing a Collectivist Spirit to Nonpartisan Volunteer Work with Britt Hogue

January 9, 2025

Episode #144: Bringing a Collectivist Spirit to Nonpartisan Volunteer Work with Britt Hogue 

 

In this episode of the Volunteer Nation podcast, Tobi is joined by the Founder of the Collective Good, Britt Hogue. The pair discuss the importance of bringing a collectivist spirit to nonpartisan volunteer work, especially in divisive politics. 

Britt shares her experience in organizing intergenerational conversations, and provides practical strategies for managing volunteer conflict, encouraging proactive community building, and integrating collective approaches into volunteer engagement. The discussion emphasizes the value of creating meaningful connections among volunteers and investing in relationship-building to enhance organizational resilience and impact. 

Collectivist – Episode Highlights

• [01:54] – Introducing Britt Hogue: Expert in Facilitating Across Divides 
• [03:26] – Britt’s Journey to The Collective Good 
• [05:40] – The Importance of Purpose in Volunteerism 
• [07:02] – Challenges in Collaborative Work 
• [10:06 ] – Finding Common Ground in Divisive Times 
• [16:30] – Building Community and Resilience 
• [23:22] – Embracing a Collectivist Spirit in Nonprofits 
• [30:46] – Shifting to a Collectivist Mindset 
• [31:22] – The Importance of Creating Space for Connection 
• [33:00] – A Collectivist Approach in Action 
• [34:17] – Building Relationships Across Communities 
• [37:30] – The Power of Host Committees 
• [40:50] – Engaging Students in Leadership Development 
• [46:39] – Creating Safe Spaces for Open Conversations 
• [51:12] – Future of Volunteer Work: A Collectivist Vision 
• [56:46] – Exciting Trends in Collective Giving 

Helpful Links

• VolunteerPro Membership Community  
• Volunteer Management Progress Report  
• Volunteer Nation Podcast Episode #127: Volunteer Centric, Community Centric, Organization Centric: What’s the Difference?  
• Volunteer Nation Podcast Episode #122: Rethinking Community Involvement with Ruth Leonard 
• Volunteer Nation Episode 136 – Getting Back to Neighboring with Breauna Dorelus 
• Find Britt on LinkedIn 
• The Collective Good, LLC  

Contact Us

Have questions or suggestions for the show? Email us at wecare@volpro.net.

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Episode #144 Transcript: Bringing a Collectivist Spirit to Nonpartisan Volunteer Work with Britt Hogue 

Tobi: Welcome everybody to another episode of the volunteer nation podcast. I’m your host, Tobi Johnson, and today I really want to talk about something that’s so timely. Given where we’re at in the world, given that we have divisive politics, and I wouldn’t just say in the U.S., I would say there’s other places in the world this is happening as well for our global listeners that I want to talk today, and I brought a guest on who is an expert in really facilitating across the divide. For the most part, I think in our organizations, we have volunteers that are so committed to the mission that they can overlook and decide to work together in spite of differences they may have in other parts of their lives. 

But I also think as policies change, as funding changes, as the world gets heated up, it’s possible that you may be managing conflict. And you may want to start to think now about how you might start to facilitate a better and healthier environment if conflict were to erupt. Now we can also do a lot of proactive things around conflict. 

I want to talk about this and give you some real tips and real strategies, because if you’re like me, you’re a little bit worried, and we certainly want our volunteers to feel healthy, supported, and safe within our organizations. So, I brought Britt Hogue with me today to talk about bringing a collectivist spirit to non-profit work, partisan volunteer work. So yes, some of you may work in politics or campaigns with volunteers. We’re really talking about volunteers who may vote differently, but that’s not the core of their volunteer work. Britt is here to share her best tips and advice. She is the principal of the collective good. She has over 20 years of experience working across social, public, and private sectors as a leader, advisor, and facilitator. 

After executing organizational transformations as a manager of global teams at Thompson Riders, a big data and analytics firm, she started The Collective Good. Now she leverages her corporate strategy and change management skills for societal good. Britt approaches her work with a motto of a quote unquote humanized strategy and that resonates with our audience Britt for real. 

A trusted partner to leaders and teams, she equips mission driven programs and business models. that sustain and scale impact. And I’ll put a link to her organization, the collective good, as well as a link to find Britt on LinkedIn. But Britt, welcome to the pod. Thanks, Tobi. It’s great to be here. So, let’s get started. And I like to ask our guests to tell us a little bit about the work you do and how you got into working in ways that support charities and causes.  

Britt: So, I’m a career strategist is probably the best way to sum it all up. In the private sector and now in the social sector, really working with leaders and teams to work better. So, that’s internally, how do we work more effectively as teams, as an organization. So, we’re looking at culture, we’re looking at DEI, we’re looking at systems and processes. And then also in their programs, how do we run more effective programs where we can have a greater impact, where we can scale the things that are working well. 

And I really found myself in this world because of volunteering. So, as a manager at Thomson Reuters, I was, I loved the work. I love people. It was challenging work. I was traveling around the world, and it was fantastic, but I found myself really yearning for more purpose in my work. So, I started volunteering. 

I joined the board of two organizations. I was doing some pro bono work with a couple of nonprofits, and I really felt like these are my people. This is work that I want to do. I can, I’m using the same skills, but I’m using it to help support organizations that are solving problems. Problems that are that are affecting real people. 

The markets sometimes feel a little out of reach. And so, working in a space of the financial markets, I often felt like I don’t really know who I’m working for here. And in this case, it was affordable housing. I can see it. I can feel it. I can feel like I’m having an impact. So that really sparked a big career shift. And so, I left that space, and I started the collective good and I haven’t looked back.  

Tobi: That’s amazing. What a leap of faith to really say and to follow your calling. You know, I’ve worked in nonprofits my whole career and never could leave. I, you know, I certainly could have made more money elsewhere, but I was, I couldn’t, I, from graduate school onward, it was like, nope, I’m going to work in the nonprofit space because it is a fantastic space full of people who really are working for the greater good. When you think about volunteerism in today’s world. Why do you think it’s important?  

Britt: I start with that purpose piece. I think purpose is important to so many of us. Certainly the, these younger generations, millennials, Gen Xers are called the purpose generations. It just drives so much of their decision making and their careers and in their personal lives. 

For all of us, humans are social creatures. And we want to be a part of something bigger than us. We want to join with people who believe some of the same things that we believe in, we want to do things that are fulfilling. for us. And I really do believe that people want to be part of something and volunteering allows you to do that. 

Tobi: It’s true. And I think we have a social DNA and during the pandemic, it was rough for people because they couldn’t be social, but people were still volunteering online, still finding ways to support one another. So, it was an amazing time and still is right. We’re seeing a rebound. Recent data from the Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics have noted that we’re seeing a rebound since the pandemic and volunteering rates. 

And we’re not back to what we were quite before the pandemic, but the data is lagging from last year. So, who knows? I think we’re on the, on the rise. So, we’ll see. Let’s talk about working collaboratively. Let’s kick it off with that and kind of ground ourselves. What do you think are some of the biggest challenges that arise when we’re working collaboratively? Certainly, volunteers in non-profit organizations are collaborators just in our DNA. But what are people you’re seeing across the board, what are people struggling with when it comes to collaboration?  

Britt: The biggest thing that I’m seeing is, is staying the course. Yes. Because it means working across priorities, right We’re often if you see organizations that are collaborating, they have their own missions, they have their own funders, they have their own commitments, they have their own teams, their own budgets, and they’re trying to partner because they see an opportunity to do more together. Uh, but those conflicting, sometimes, you know, Conflicting competing priorities can sometimes draw those organizations apart, and it’s hard to kind of stay the course when you have things that are kind of pulling you apart. 

And I think the same goes for us on an individual level. And you mentioned before, the politics of today can be really challenging because a big Part of what’s happening in politics is that we are moving farther and farther apart. We’re being drawn farther and farther apart in terms of our ideas and ideals. 

How do we stay together or how do we get back together? Once we’ve, something has happened, right? Something in the news or something has happened to me personally or between two people, we’ve had some sort of disagreement and we’re starting to drift apart. How can we reconnect and stay, get back connected to the, the vision? And to our shared values and really stay in it together. So, I think that’s, that’s probably the biggest thing that I’m seeing is, is that staying the course and connecting once something has happened that has, has created a bit of a rift.  

Tobi: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I know back in the day, one of my first jobs in nonprofits was doing outreach to different organizations and creating connections between the community and the organization I was working at. 

And the real people. thing that made or broke a relationship was consistency. I had to keep showing up, right? And throughout my career, and I, when we’re training people inside our volunteer pro community on partnership development, for example, I talk about really investing time, but then like allocating time every month to go back and maintain that relationship because it’s not one and done, especially when there’s rifts. It seems like we used to agree on the problems that the world was facing. For example, tax rates, what’s a proper tax rate, who should be taxed more, who should be taxed less, that kind of thing. But we would disagree on the solution or what’s going to make the economy better. 

But now it seems like we don’t even agree on the problems. Like our tax isn’t even a problem. Um, so. What do we do in that situation where we’re not even agreeing on the problems? And I wonder how that might start to spill over into our missions as nonprofits when our missions are focused on problem solving. But what if the community doesn’t even agree on the problem? So, tell me a little bit about that.  

Britt: Yeah. And to your point, this is going to impact missions of organizations. If someone says, is there even an education problem? Like, maybe the system isn’t even broken. There’s nothing to fix here. Or reproductive rights. 

Like, there’s not, there’s not a problem to solve there. So, we can’t even get to the solutions because we’re, we’re stopping right at the very beginning. I think the key, and it’s tricky, it really is, this is probably the hardest space, but I think the key is to get back to the basics, right, is to shrink the conversation. 

And that’s where relationships are important because we can say, okay, maybe we don’t agree in the big that the education system is broken. That’s a big statement. Is it, there’s so many smaller parts of the education system. We could talk about the role of parents and the relationship between parents and schools. 

You can talk, is, are we talking about K 12 or higher ed, or are we talking about early childhood? Okay. development. There’s so many smaller slices that we could talk about. So I think if we can zoom in on smaller conversations, so shrink the conversation from a big talking point, that again, this is for politics, you know, we have politicians who kind of are making these sweeping statements sometimes that really get us You know, that’s yeah, that’s part of the point is to kind of get us tangled up in these big sweeping statements. 

And then we, we stopped kind of focusing on what are we actually talking about here. So I think our role in this space as leaders in the nonprofit space is to help people dissect Transcription by CastingWords the conversation, break it up into more manageable, smaller conversations where you can say, let’s talk about early childhood education and let’s just put the system stuff to the side for a second. 

Let’s talk about kids and young kids and what do young kids need to be prepared to learn? in a healthy way? Are we talking about nutrition? Well, I think most people would agree that we want our kids to be healthy and to have nutritious diets. And we might disagree on how involved schools should get in free lunch. 

I think we can all talk about, you know, do we want kids to have that nutrition as part of their early, early investment? And we know that there’s research that shows that there’s a connection there to learning. I think the key is to kind of complicate the conversation in some ways by getting more micro in our discussions. 

Tobi: It almost seems like you could go to a touchstone, like you said, of can we agree that kids need good nutrition to learn, right? You can find a spot of commonality where most parents would agree with that, at least like that group of constituents or stakeholders. So, it almost seems like you have to seek, and I’ve had conversations, I have family members who don’t vote like me or haven’t in the past, and Interestingly enough, this last go round, we’ve had some pretty open conversations and we find middle ground in surprising places that we never really find the middle ground. 

The only reason we’re able to find the middle ground is because we keep and maintain the conversation. When I’m having the conversation, I’m always asking questions versus telling. Do you think this or what do you think about this? And it opens up conversation. There’s still a few times where it’s like, all right, we’re going to agree to disagree on this one But there’s sort of a norm that it’s okay to do that but also The way I approach the conversation is is is questions versus telling and it seems to me I mean i’ve just been doing this recently in the last year or two and it seems to dissipate the tension And the defensiveness, it becomes a two way conversation, right? 

Britt: And because what you’re doing is you’re relating to the human on the other side, right? You’re just having a conversation with someone. And and I think that sometimes coming into the conversation acknowledging we may disagree. This may be a disagree. We may not land this conversation in full agreement, and that’s okay. 

What we’re trying to do, and this is this, I can’t take credit for this, it’s such a great phrase, um, is we just want to disagree better. Yeah. We just disagree better, and relationships are a big part of that. You mentioned consistency earlier. I think if you keep coming back to the table and show people who you are, show people that you’re, you’re not coming in with an offensive or defensive, looking to have a, have a disagreement, but that you’re looking to have a conversation and that you’re not trying to sell them on something negative. 

You’re not trying to force them to your side. You’re, you’re just actually trying to learn about their perspective and hear where they’re coming from and hope that they’ll hear where you’re coming from and then kind of see where you land at the end of it.  

Tobi: Yeah, absolutely. As our constituencies and the world seems to move further and further apart, you know, I’m wondering if nonprofits, they’re either galvanizing people or They’re turning people off. It seems like there’s no middle ground. How can organizations maintain their broad base of support and realign them around a shared vision and mission? Because we talk a lot when I’m doing training around volunteer recruitment, that’s mission first. Start with the mission. Make sure you’re explaining it on, in regular people terms, not wonky terms. 

in ways that people can relate to. But how do we start to bring people back to the table? Of course, we’re going to have our galvanized people who are like in it to win it till the end. But you may have people who are starting to float away or starting to question whether this is the right organization for me to support. We may see volunteers’ kind of ghosting us. What are ways to bring people back?  

Britt: I think it is talking about the mission and vision and having the proactive conversations with volunteers. Sometimes I think we interact with volunteers in a transactional way. Yeah. We want you to out for this event or come, you know, make some phone calls for us. 

And as you said, there are some volunteers for whom that’s fine. They’ve been working with the organization for a long time and. But I think there, if there are folks that we’re noticing are not showing up as much or we’re just seeing a general trend of less turnout, fewer people showing up to the webinar, then how do we really lean in and focus on the relationship side of it. So, it’s really encouraging folks that this is the place for you to talk more about the mission, talking about values, getting them engaged in the conversation. So less of a one-way presentation here, our mission and our vision and our values, but really finding ways to facilitate conversations with them so that they’re sort of co creating with you. 

They’re a part of the conversation and they’re saying it in their own words so that they’re really building a stronger connection to the organization, I think will be key. And then I think the other, when folks are, do kind of maybe walk away and you’re looking for ways to bring them back to the table is helping them see that there are opportunities for them to get involved in maybe, uh, new ways. 

And so how can you sort of re make a re commitment to to the organization in ways that maybe we haven’t tried before? So we work with organizations that are in the democracy space. It’s a very politicized space. Because if you’re starting to get into agendas, policy agendas, we’re talking about things that we might not all agree on. 

And speaking of that first point I made, we’ve been talking a lot about how you talk about the things that we know we agree on. So, we’re all here because we agree on a fair system. We all want a fair and free democracy. We all believe in voting rights. There, there are a handful of things that we’re all here around. 

So having conversations around that really engaging folks in the conversation and then to the second point of new ways that folks can lean in and be a part of the organization and maybe volunteer in new ways is we’ve been organizing a series of intergenerational conversations. How do we allow folks who are on the older spectrum, age wise, of, of volunteers with folks who are on the younger end of the spectrum of age to have conversations together? 

Not around the topics necessarily, but just having conversations, story sharing. Between these two groups, which may not feel like it’s a volunteer effort necessarily, but it is because we’re bringing more young people into the organization where we engaging folks around the topics that matter to us, but we’re doing it in new and different ways. 

Tobi: Interesting, so you’re giving people the opportunity, really, to discover Common Ground. And Common Ground doesn’t get discovered when we’re head down doing the tasks that we are volunteering to do, unless we’re having casual conversation with folks, or the task involves sharing of ourselves. So, are you bringing people, are these considered team building events, or what, how are you branding these for volunteers? 

Britt: It is. It’s team building. It’s really, we’re, we’re all part of this organization. And it’s happening inside of organizations and on the staff side, as well as on the volunteer side and it’s, it’s community building. We’re taking some of this from restorative practices. So, anyone who’s familiar with like school systems, they use these restorative practices a lot when something there’s been an issue in the school and rather than going to the traditional disciplinary tactics, you might use a restorative practice to sit down. 

The folks who had, there was an incident involved involving a handful of students, you sit down and talk through it. There’s a proactive element to restorative practices also, which is that you build the community first so that when something happens, We have those relationships and it’s easier for us to sit down and talk about it and mend Because we liked each other to begin with we knew each other. 

We had a relationship. There was a foundation there So that’s part of what this is. It’s really community building and doing that in a way so that people feel that sense of connection to the organization and will show up and volunteer, but also so that they know the person even independent of our relationship to the organization that we’re volunteering. 

I just like the people these days. So I want to come out again on Saturday because I got to know Anne and Jeff and I really liked something and we had something in common. And so it starts to become something for them just as much as it is something for the organization.  

Tobi: Yeah, I think that social aspect is hard. People are hard pressed to find that because we’re so much behind our screens. And so, when our organizations can, can provide a place for people to be social, to make social connections, to make friends in a place that’s safe, intellectually stimulating and has meaning and resonance. And, as you said, you’re building community to create a kind of resilience that is not brittle. 

Like the world feels brittle right now. It feels like things can, you know, when people get cancel culture, that’s like as brittle as it gets, like it’s a yes or no, there’s no gray area in between. You know, when you’re building community, you’re building more flexibility amongst people. So I love that idea of really investing ahead of time to create that resilience. 

Britt: Yeah. I mean, it means a little more work for, for those of us who are managing volunteers and have a lot of other things on our plates, but it’s the point you made earlier about consistency and showing up. Part of what you’re doing and showing up again and again and allocating that time to show up for these communities is you’re building trust and Folks want to to feel that they want to feel a connection They want to know that you’re that you care about them and that this is important to you And it should be important to them also and so I think that we’ve got to find We have to carve out that time because it is going to help us in the long run. 

Tobi: I think you can integrate it into volunteer orientation as an icebreaker, for example, or at the end of shifts doing a team self-reflection. There’s a lot of ways to do stand-up team building as well that I think can help people reflect on what does community means to us. How are we going to be part of? 

When you think of the collectivist spirit, what do you think it means in the context of non profit work, and especially non partisan non profit work? You know, when we think of collectivist, we kind of, folks are like, what is that? That sounds kind of strange, you know? What, maybe define it first and then talk about how we might promote it. Why is it good for, for non-profits and how can we support it? Foster it.  

Britt: It’s bringing people back to the power of we, the concept of we and togetherness. Maybe the best way to define it is to say what it’s not, which is it’s the opposite of individualism. And so when we think of individualist, it’s everyone for themselves. 

It’s competition. It’s a zero sum game. I’m on an island. And the truth is we’re not on an island. Yeah, everything is a system. Our bodies, our systems, our communities, our systems, our workplaces, cities, industries, the housing sector is a, is a system. And so we’re always, we’re interconnected. We just, we just are. 

And so I think it’s leaning into that concept of if, if we can embrace a collective, yeah. Spirit and really lean into the fact that we can do more together than we will do apart. It helps us when we’re trying to really organize volunteers. We need you and we need, and we need all of you because we’re, we can do more with you. 

We can do more together. We will go farther. We can have a greater impact. And then also at the organizational level, we can do more when, when organizations are working together. And I think that plays through sometimes to volunteers as well when they see groups of organizations in a coalition partnering with each other, they can see, okay, this, these organizations are really committed to this cause. And they’re working really hard to, to make a difference here. And so I want to be a part of that.  

Tobi: Yeah. I mean, I almost think, I do think actually, now that you’re, when you’re talking about a collectivist spirit, sometimes I think nonprofit staff work in an individualist way. individualistic way. I’m thinking about even volunteer managers or staff supervisors who are supervising volunteers. 

They’re really hesitating to, to delegate and, and share space and share power with volunteers. And when that happens, that sort of counter to the collectivist spirit, like the ability to delegate and share, tasks and give people space. I do a lot of advocacy for team based volunteering, because it’s much more flexible in individual volunteer roles. 

If you can have a team take on something, people can come and go and share and decide together how the work’s going to get done. But there is still a resistance within the sector. And a lot of leaders of volunteers will tell me there’s people in my organization who just refuse to have volunteers working in their department. 

And that seems counter to me to a, that’s an individualistic, like, I, I know better. I’m going to be able to do this. It’s sort of a little bit of savior syndrome as well. Like, Hey, I know the answers. I’m going to be the savior. And I also think it starts with volunteer managers, engaging volunteers in their own work and their own in volunteer services, like helping with training, welcoming new volunteers, working on volunteer communications, et cetera. 

But But also at the top at executive leadership, when executive leadership is willing to work collectively, not just with the board of directors, which they’re required to do, but with other volunteers. I feel like we’ve got to walk the talk before we ask volunteers to act collectively. 

Britt: Yeah. I think there’s two aspects to what you’re touching on. One is the incentives need to shift. So when people’s performance reviews are. all around what you’ve done as an individual, right? All of your objectives, you can get high marks if you just do all of this in a little bubble on your own, then there’s no incentive to collaborate and work with other people. 

So maybe change the, the objectives, change, change what you’re asking people to do and say, I, we know that we can solve problems better. And that we can get more done when you and your role are collaborating with your teammates with your peers, maybe another programs we want there to be cross pollination across this organization. 

And so it’s, it’s required even that you, that you look for ways to collaborate. So I think there’s one part of shifting the incentive structure to reflect what, what we, how we want Folks to show up and think about their work and helping them supporting them and doing that. And then to your second point of the modeling piece. 

If we’re saying I want you to think about ways to use volunteers in this work, but then you never see me collaborating. I’m never delegating. I’m never asking people what they think. I’m not facilitating conversations where we’re problem solving together. as a leadership team or as a whole staff, folks are going to say, okay, she’s not really serious about this. 

She’s saying it, but she doesn’t really believe it because I never see her doing it. So I’ll go back to my, my other way, which is usually we say like, you know, I could probably do this faster if I just did it myself. Yes. And then I’m going to have to explain it to them. And then I may have to check their work the first couple of times. 

So I’ll just do it myself. And I that as a leader, we have to say, I want you to spend a little more time. I know that it will take a little longer the first few times, but let’s talk about the long game here and the fact that over time. Now you have this whole team of people who will be able to reach more folks. 

They’ll be able to amplify our message much more than you as one person will ever be able to do and so make the investment. And so again, as a leader, I also must do that so that I’m making those investments. And then I’m showing up that way.  

Tobi: Absolutely. I mean, I think if you do the math, it is if you invest the time to get people supported and trained up, and you make that delegation in an effective way, okay. In the long run, you save tons of time. Plus, if you’re also adding that community building element that you’re talking about earlier, you’re creating resilience, you’re creating longer volunteers are staying longer, they’re willing to be to pitch in more, you know, when people are feeling good. And I feel like working collectively can be, there are a lot of like hormones going on. 

Dopamine, all the feel good hormones. When you’re really collaborating and you have synergy with a group of people, it feels good. I mean, I think it’s in our DNA. I mean, human beings, in order to survive, our species had to collaborate well from the beginning. If we didn’t, if we were all running around in the savannah by ourselves, we would have been eaten by lions like immediately. 

But when you’re all around the campfire and you’re sharing food, you’re sharing like protection of the clan, all that, you’re going to, you’re obviously going to do better. And so we’ve been, we’ve been taught, our, our species has learned. And that’s why we’re still here is not because we’re individualistic, but because we’re collectivists. 

Britt: Yeah, it is. It’s, it is in our nature to, to, to work that way. And I, that’s why I say, but sometimes, we are conditioned to kind of think about, okay, well, I must do this myself. I can go faster myself. I can, and so I think we must sort of shift the conditions so that folks can, can do what’s natural to us. 

So, you know, we’ve all been in that great meeting where everyone’s kind of bop, bop, bop, bop. And we had, we come out and we feel really great about it. And I would imagine most of us want to spend our days. having conversations like that with volunteers, with our teammates. So we just have to create it. We have to, it does require a little bit of investment. 

You need to get to know people and make the space and the time for it. But I think it really does. It speaks to our natural instinct of, like I said earlier, humans are social creatures and it’s how we want to work. And so how do we just do more of it?  

Tobi: Yeah. Yeah. Let’s take a quick break. And when we come back, we’ll talk more about bringing a collectivist spirit into volunteering and maybe get into a little bit more specifics, maybe describe some, something, an organization that’s doing this well, or just what it looks like. Stick with us, everybody. We’ll be right back with Britt Hogue talking about bringing a collectivist spirit into volunteering. We’ll be right back. 

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Tobi: Okay. We’re back with our conversation with Brit Hogue about bringing a collectivist spirit into volunteerism. 

This has been an absolutely fantastic conversation. I really think people, I’m hoping that our listeners are really taking a moment to think about their personal identity when they’re at work, and whether or not it’s an individualistic identity or a collectivist identity. And some of us are rugged individualists. 

I’m one of those people who’s highly self sufficient, but our self sufficiency can actually really Some ways turn people off because number one, we’re not being vulnerable. We’re not sharing the human side of ourselves. Number two, we’re not empowering others. And so we’re not creating community when we’re working in our silos and head down at our desks. 

I think you’re right. What we were talking about before the break of investing the time. That it will pay, this investment will pay off later, not only in having more pairs of hands to do tasks for us and being able to delegate, but I think also building that resilience. So we’re not having, we’re more inoculated against like rifts. 

in differences of opinion. Talk to us about what does it look like if this were happening? Do you have an example of an organization or can you describe when a collectivist spirit is working really well even if people aren’t voting the same way or agree on all of the, all of the things?  

Britt: We’re working with an organization now. This has been a client of ours for a couple of years and we’ve worked on organizational strategy, we’ve worked on culture stuff, and now we’re working on a program that they’re launching, a national program, but it’s place based. So, it’s happening in different cities across the country. 

And I’ll just explain the program for, for a second, and then really get to your question about how they’re doing it in a collectivist way. So, it’s a program that has a collectivist mission to it, which is bringing together college students. of different identities. And so, we’re specifically talking about black students and Jewish students. 

And so these two communities, because they have a rich history, and because we know there’s been a lot of tension, there, there is a war going on that is, has been affecting the Jewish community here in the United States in significant ways, and specifically on college campuses. We saw a lot of incidents and tensions last school year. 

And so this is a way to really build allyship. And, again, with, with the Black and Jewish communities specifically, we’re talking about how do we confront and combat anti Semitism and also confront and combat racism. There are these two communities that we, that we think if we can build stronger relationships, we’re creating spaces where these students can feel safe, can come in, meet people who maybe they’ve never met before. 

These are specifically African American students that are at historically Black colleges. Thank you So they’re kind of in a bubble and, and so how do we get these students to kind of communicate and, and get to know each other, build relationships across campuses and across identities, these different identity groups? 

Because the fact of the matter is, yes, they’re different in some ways, but they have a lot of, they’re all 20 year olds, they’re all, they’re on the same social media and they’re tick tocking and whatever. So we really want to just kind of, you know, create space where they can build that relationship. And so the first engagement is over dinners. 

that are happening in their cities. So we started in Atlanta and it happened in D. C., New Orleans. We’re going to seven more cities in the spring. And these dinners are really opportunities for them to sit down and just get to know each other. But over time, what we’re hoping is that the students remain engaged and we can start to get to harder topics. 

Now we can talk about the war in Gaza, a really hard topic. conversation to have. We’re not going to have it the first dinner, but after a couple of opportunities to get to know each other, now we can talk about things like that. And, and the reason we want to do this with college students is because we’re, we’re leaders need those skills. 

So investing, this is ultimately also a leadership development program where we’re, we’re equipping young people to be able to do these hard things at a young age so that they can take that into their career and lives. So that’s the program. Now, the way that the organization is doing it is from the beginning, realizing that this is not something that one organization can do on its own. 

We, and we need to think about what, what is going to allow us to deliver this program in the most effective way that is going to be really special. To the students, they don’t feel like this is a DC based organization that’s swooping down into Atlanta and is going to rally everyone to come to some place that we, we don’t know the community that well. 

And what we’ve done is we’ve, we’re, we’re working through host committees. It’s a group of volunteers in each city that we’re saying, we are looking to you to really bring this to life in your city. You know the city, you pick the location that’s going to be accessible to everyone. That’s going to be a space that everyone feels comfortable in. 

In some cases it’s the campus, in some cases it’s maybe a civil rights museum. And some places, some cases it’s been a house of worship. But so bringing folks to a central place, recruiting the students. We want folks who know these students to be the ones to, to invite them to participate. So it’s faculty, in some cases the provosts at the schools, in some cases it’s community based organizations that have done other programs to, to support these students in different ways. 

But what it’s required is to really think about these host committees as as an extension of the organization. And they are meeting each other for the first time as well. So they’re not a ready group of people who we can say, okay, the Atlanta team is going to take this and do it. It’s creating a brand new team of folks. 

And so we have invested in the relationship. Amongst these host committee members, we’ve helped them get to know each other. We’ve really talked a lot about what is this program trying to accomplish? And we’ve, we’ve really encouraged them to think about the kind of the collectivist angle to it, which is we need you to work together on this. 

No one school is going to be able to do it. on your own, you need each other. And so we’ve, it’s kind of embedded in the design of it, that it has to be a group effort. So we’re going to give you the tools, we’re going to make sure that you are structured in a way that you can work effectively together and have all the supports you need. 

And we’ve done this in every, For the organization, it’s been key because they can’t be in 10 different cities building this from the ground up. So there’s, there’s a scale factor to this and a sustainability factor to this for the organization that we want these host committees to really own this. And not just think of it as I’m, I’m planning a dinner, but I’m, this is something that I am a part of and I’m cultivating something that is one event that will lead to multiple other opportunities to engage these students in meaningful ways. 

And so it’s worked incredibly well. We’ve had a couple of, we’ve of course had some learnings from the first year we did it that we’re incorporating into the second year. But I think they’re all around. How do we really strengthen and build strong host committees that have everything they need to be able to, to do what we’re asking them to do? 

Tobi: When you’re pitching these, this program to students, is it branded as a, or offered as a leadership development program or is it, how is it conceptualized to students in terms of why they might want to participate? 

Britt: It’s a little bit of both. It’s, we’re, we’re talking about the first invitation is to the dinner. And so just, it’s a, it’s a light ask. It’s an easy ask of just asking you to come out to one night. And here’s what the experience will be. There isn’t a paper required at the end of the dinner. You get a free dinner and you’ll get to meet some people and it’ll be a, it’ll be a great conversation. But then when they get there, we, we say, okay, here’s, here’s the longer arc of this and additional ways that you can continue. 

You could just come to the dinner and that could be it. And that’s fine. What we’re hoping though, is that you’ll meet people. We actually encourage them to exchange phone numbers at the end. And they do. They often already have started, you know, bumping their phones against each other and all that stuff. 

Like they’re already, they, they’ve met someone and they want to stay connected. And it’s an hour and a half and from this didn’t know each other at all to the end of a dinner, their friends, at least the start of a friendship there. And so that’s really what we’re trying to do. And then we say there’s, there’s opportunities for you to be more engaged. 

What we’re trying to build is a national network, a national society of leaders who are thinking about allyship, who are thinking about anti hate, who are social justice leaders of the future. And if you want to be a part of that, we invite you to join us. Stay connected and come to the next event and tell friends about it. 

Tobi: It’s very grassroots to grass tops in a lot of ways, a lot of affinity with community organizing. I’ve done a fair amount of community organizing in my day as well, versus just traditional volunteer engagement or program direction. And it, it, it’s interesting to think from that perspective, I could see this model being used for volunteer recruitment in general. 

You know, I mean, I often recommend people do info sessions before you actually make an ask. A lot of organizations, you go to their website, the first thing is like, sign up, create an account, and fill out an application. And it’s just like, it’s like, It feels way too fast. It feels like you’re asking for a prenup before we’ve even gone on our first date. 

You know, it just feels like too much too soon. And there’s no trust there that you don’t know the organization. But I love this idea of integrating, not only like slowing the process down a little bit and giving people a minute to understand what the goals are, And to see if they align with them, but also integrating community building into the first steps and seeing if people make connections because people show up for their friends. 

That’s why I’m on a volunteer team. And that’s why we show up and we don’t agree. We don’t vote, vote on the same things. We don’t agree on certain issues and pretty hot topics that we don’t agree on sometimes. And we’ve had very calm conversations and we. tend to stick together. And we’ve been on the same team for years now and because we’re friends and we feel connected to one another and we care about one another. 

And so that’s what keeps us coming back. And so I think when you can have both the connection to the cause and the connection to one another, that’s a powerful duo for increased volunteer involvement, engagement, retention, etc. And so I think if people would slow down a little bit. and just take a little bit of time to help, help volunteers make connections with one another. 

Britt: I think it may have really great results for organizations. And to put yourself into their shoes, you’re describing why you continue to show up for this organization because of the feeling you get. And I think we probably all had volunteer experiences where we show up and no one talks to us with some instructions to go over in that corner and fill that box and you do it alone for an hour and then you leave. 

And you’re kind of like, I’m not sure I’m going to do this again. I love the cause. I’m happy that I was able to be helpful, but it didn’t feel great. And I think really thinking, thinking of it as a community, your volunteers are a community. And what, what do communities need? They, they are connected to the cause, but you want them to have an experience when they’re. 

When they are showing up for you, that they’re going to want to keep having that experience. So yeah, someone talked to them for a little while. They made a friend, they were able to have a conversation, just a casual conversation about something. And I think the other side of that is to make sure that it’s safe. 

So, if you are in an environment where we know we’re going to have folks who have different beliefs or different or vote differently, then how can we put some, whether we call it housekeeping or just some best practices or community agreements in place to say, we’re not going to talk about politics here. 

This is a morning where. We’re really thinking about, you know, we’re at a food bank and we’re thinking about the communities who need these resources. And we encourage you to have conversations with each other and make friends. And, but let’s, let’s try to keep the politics out of this morning. It’s just a space where we can, where we can do something other than debate the issues. 

We can get back to that tomorrow. I think just being able to, to give folks some, some reassurance that, you know, This is a space where they can, they can come in and make friends and have a good time and where it’s not going to be a difficult conversation necessarily today, you know, on the first day.  

Tobi: So when, when you frame these dinners, invited folks to these dinners, did you have facilitated conversations and did you set up sort of norms or set the stage for how we’re going to treat one another? 

How did you create that safe space? That’s a group of complete strangers from the beginning. And I don’t think everybody, I think, especially coming out of the pandemic, we’re not all absolutely embracing. I mean, so there’s social anxiety, frankly. So how did you kind of overcome those there’s barriers and set a stage where people could have an open conversation, they could feel safe. 

And people may have experienced micro or macro aggression that made them feel a little bit tentative about coming? And then did you facilitate conversation through questions? How does the structure work? 

Britt: So, the opening of, of the dinner, we, we do, we name it. We say, look, there’s, there’s an elephant in the room. And that is that there are difficult things happening around the world that impact all our community. I think we’re all concerned about what’s happening in Gaza and in other parts of the world and here. And so, we name it, but we say, and, but we’re not going to talk about that today, right? 

This is a space where we can just come together. We’re building community. We want to get to know each other. That’s really the focus is who is the person across the table. We’re not going to talk about a big picture. political debate tonight. And so we, we do sort of to say that right at the outset, then we, we, we’d actually share the history between these communities, the civil rights, the fact that many HBCUs were founded with the help of Jewish philanthropists. 

And so you start to see some of these kind of like aha’s of, oh, wow, yeah, there’s, there’s some interesting history here that we share. And so we’re kind of just grounding people in commonality and in togetherness. We’re kind of anchoring in that as opposed to all the things that we might be bringing in to this conversation that will maybe put a barrier up between me and the person across the table. 

So we’re, we’re really trying to kind of facilitate that. And then, and then we, we do have discussion cards that are on the table that really guide the conversation where folks can say, let me, I want to talk about a time when I felt like the other, and pretty much everyone around the table has an experience where they felt like that. 

And then everyone can say, Oh, wow, I, I wouldn’t have expected you to have, I have a very similar story of having had that same experience or I’m sorry that you had that experience. And right there, folks are, are building empathy for each other and they’re sharing stories and they’re opening up a part of themselves to, to people they don’t even know. But that’s how we build relationships and friendships.  

Tobi: Do you synthesize at the end and have folks discuss sort of what their aha moments were?  

Britt: With the larger group, we do. We invite, you know, the students are at tables and there, there are always some adults in the room, and we put them at a table. So, you’re going to have the conversation too, because we need adults to have these conversations as well. And so we invite each table for someone to stand up if they’d like, and just share a little bit. We could either be something that you talked about at your table that really resonated with you, or it could just be your own reflection on this experience. 

And, and actually most. People who stand up share a personal takeaway and say like, wow, I really, I learned something about another community that I just didn’t know before, or the person across the table and I have changed my understanding of what I learned about them tonight. 

Tobi: Really great model. I think there’s structure, but not too much structure. There’s enough to keep people feeling safe, but also enough for people to take some risks. Yep. And there’s a little bit of tension there. And I think that’s good. People can feel like they’ve evolved during that dinner, which is a really powerful feeling for human beings. 

We, that’s a key driver of satisfaction in our lives is to have meaning and to move forward, but for every human being, we want to make progress in our lives. And so to have people leave an event and feel like they made some progress in their lives, had a new distinction or a new realization is a pretty powerful thing, I think. 

Yeah. So thinking to the future of volunteer work, What roles do you see a collectivist approach playing in shaping that future as we think of nonprofits moving into the years ahead, given the trajectory of the way we’re seeing things in the world? How? What’s your vision for what could be the best of what is in terms of collectivist work? And how could that work shape the future? Not only of nonprofit work, but of the missions that we’re trying to impact, right? 

Britt: I think it is. Really focusing on that grassroots. element is to go smaller. Let me go back to my point at the very beginning of when, when we’re confronted with a really hard challenge where it doesn’t seem like anyone’s on the same page about anything and nonprofits are doing complex work, the problems that we’re tackling are really hard problems. 

We’ve been around for ever and are going to require a lot of undoing and restructuring to and policy changes to be able to get to a better place. And I think it’s really is shrinking the way that we’re approaching these things. And it’s almost like you slow down to go fast. I think small to do bigger things. 

Because it is in these smaller groupings where you build friendships and where you can really do the, when we say collectivist, it sounds like, Oh, talk to everyone, you know, go out and meeting a hundred people, but that’s not really how you create a collective feeling or how you, how you create connection. 

Connection happens on a much smaller scale. So I think we’ve got to slow down. I think we’ve got to think smaller, engage with people. More one on one, more small groups, more on a human level so that we can do more together. And there are ways to connect people to each other. The part that we were saying about, it’s one thing to be connected to the organization, but it’s another to create these really powerful peer networks, volunteers that are connected to each other and are really communities that can kind of grow into these bigger movements. 

But you’re doing it, step by step, right? One relationship at a time. So I think that’s really, that’s where the power of this is, is that if we can go smaller, we can ultimately do a lot bigger.  

Tobi: Yeah. Yeah. Brit, this has been really a fascinating conversation, and I hope that for our listeners, you’ve learned a lot. 

It’s giving them some ideas about how to bring the collectivist approach versus an individualistic approach, bring that to the fore, really focus on community building. I think we’ve leaned into sort of a human resources model of volunteerism in recent years. And we’ve almost, the pendulum has swung too far where we’re so about compliance. 

We’re so about policies and procedures. In fact, I’m training a workshop today on policies and procedures and standard operating procedures. It’s not that those things don’t need to be in place. In fact, to pull off an event like this, you have a work plan, you have a specific procedural way you’re going to go through it. 

That’s behind the scenes, though. That’s at the, that’s sort of the infrastructure. But the infrastructure should only be there to serve the people, to facilitate the connections. The infrastructure isn’t the infrastructure for its sake, its own sake. It’s there to make sure the connections happen, right? 

Like a volunteer handbook doesn’t make connections with people. A volunteer agreement, your volunteer, even your volunteer training slides, unless you’re having a specific purposeful part of your training where people are getting to know one another. are reflecting on the mission and its, its relationship to their lives. 

It’s not doing that for you. The piece of paper or the document or the SOP isn’t doing it for you. It’s the, it’s just keeping you organized, right? And it’s communicating. I mean, I think some of our, volunteer documents and the way we communicate with volunteers can be more collectivist, can be more pro social. 

I think the the field as a whole has made the mistake of thinking that that it’s in and of itself the the thing, and it’s not. And so this has been a great reminder. Lately, there’s a real, like, movement, and the pendulum’s starting to swing, and people are saying, like, where’s the human side? How can we bring back the human side? 

It’s not that you’re just winging it. You’ve described a process oriented way of approaching, helping, or people make connections so that they can support a cause or a movement, that there is a process there. There’s a process, there’s a  

Britt: lot of structure. There’s a lot of. intentionality around it. So yeah, we’re not winging it and saying, Oh, just everyone be friends and you show up and everyone just kind of goes off and does whatever they want to do. 

It actually it’s In some ways, like it’s, I’m trying not to say more work, but different work, the way you’re thinking about structuring these engagements and the way you’re thinking about your volunteers is, I, the experience that I want them to have so that they will keep coming back for more of that experience. 

So what is it I’m trying to create for them so that they can show up  

Tobi: for us? Absolutely. Absolutely. I could not have said it better. Britt, this has been fantastic. Thanks for joining me. I want to ask you just two more questions. One is, what are you most excited about in the year ahead? I’m surprised, excited about more collectivist  

Britt: things, specifically around collective giving. 

Like giving circles. Just an extension of all the things we’ve been talking about, but going a step further into how can people combine their resources. in ways to do big things and even small groups being able to get together and have a big impact from giving. So really, again, just thinking about the power of, if you’re a gift officer and your job is to try to cultivate as many donors as you can, not having to do it on a, you know, each person, can you, can you look to one donor to be a leader and them to cultivate? 

their friends and their community who give to the organization in a big way.  

Tobi: Yeah. I love that. I love that. It’s, uh, it’s like a merging of volunteerism and development, fun development. It’s a merging of both the best of both worlds, right?  

Britt: Both worlds. And that’s what we as organizations that are always trying to do. 

more with less or as much as possible with sometimes limited resources. We’ve got to think of ways, innovate around these models. And so I think just bringing the same mindset, how do we, how do we get our volunteers to be leaders and help us do more? We have to think about donors the same way.  

Tobi: Absolutely. So Britt, how can people learn more about you, your work, get in touch with you if they’re interested in learning more? And I will put links in the show notes, of course.  

Britt: Yeah, I think those links are great. We have a lot of great information on the website about. The different projects that we’ve been engaged in and some great case studies, client success stories on there. 

And I’m on LinkedIn is, is the mains where I’m most active is on LinkedIn. So I invite folks to reach out to me there and would love to have conversations with folks if they would like to hear more about how we’re trying to really build more collectivist mindsets and movements.  

Tobi: Britt, thank you so much for joining me today. 

Britt: Absolutely. 

Tobi: This has been a really great conversation and a reminder and really giving people some practical ideas for how to continue to build community within their volunteer core, but also even out in the community in general. Thanks for joining us and have a happy holiday or happy holidays and gang, if you like this episode. 

I hope you’ll share it with a friend. And of course, rate and review. We love those five star reviews if you give them to us and join us next week. Same time, same place on the Volunteer Nation. Bye everybody.