Empowering Nonprofits with Technology: Lessons from charity: water

Access the Just Be Cause Nonprofit Toolbox here 🧰!

--

Hey, lovely listeners!

Get ready to be inspired by a dynamic discussion with Krista Stelzmuller on this episode of the Just Be Cause Podcast. We dive deep into the intersection of technology and nonprofit work, exploring how innovative tools can revolutionize the sector. Learn how charity: water is leveraging cutting-edge tech to provide clean drinking water to developing countries and the role that a strong tech strategy plays in amplifying donor engagement and impact.

Throughout the episode, we tackle the tough questions:
 

• How can nonprofits shift from viewing technology as a cost center to seeing it as a revenue driver? 
• What are the keys to measuring return on investment in such mission-driven organizations? 

From the importance of a great product manager to the role of personalized donor experiences, our guests share actionable insights that could transform how your nonprofit operates.

Join us as we uncover the exciting possibilities for nonprofits willing to embrace technology, break free from the scarcity mindset, and elevate their effectiveness and storytelling. It's a fun, enlightening, and professionally inspiring episode you won't want to miss!

Get ready for a tech-savvy and thought-provoking episode!

Meet your fundraising expert

Thanks for listening to Just Be Cause Podcast! I'm Katherine Lacefield the founder and head consultant of Just Be Cause Consulting.

My goal is to partner with YOU nonprofits and philanthropic organizations to help you make a positive impact in your community.

With over 20 years of experience in the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors, I help organizations optimize their operations with key knowledge in various domains, such as fundraising strategy, grantmaking research, communications, and development.

Sign up to my newsletter, The Nonprofit Nuggets for FREE fundraising advice, tools and guidance!

Sign me up!

Transcript

0:00

I support bringing clean water to those communities who need it just because water changes everything. Welcome to the Just Because podcast. In a space in which the scarcity mindset has been normal for far too long, discover how we're helping nonprofits finally take back their power, find their true purpose, and even use mindfulness to manifest their dream solutions into reality. I'm your host, Katharine Lasefield, a lifetime non profit professional. Together, we'll master the tools needed to overcome limitations, rise in times of adversity, and understand the interconnectedness of all causes towards a more conscious philanthropy. Just because it's the right thing to do. After spending my entire life optimizing nonprofits, I've explored countless of the most powerful tools and apps available so that you can stop wasting your time on mundane tasks and start having an extraordinary impact on the communities that need you. Follow the link in the show notes to access our full list of non profit tools and apps for free. We've also included some discount codes in there to make it even more worth your while. Hello, everyone. And welcome back to another episode of the Just Because podcast. Today, I'm very excited to welcome Christa Stalsmuller to the show. Building off of last week's conversation around technology for nonprofits with Alexander Lapa, I'm very excited to continue the tech conversation with Christa today, but from a slightly different angle. Christa is the chief technology officer of Charity Water, a nonprofit organization infamous for offering clean drinking water to individuals in developing countries. Since 2006, Charity Water has relentlessly pursued its goals of ending the global water crisis and is fueled by optimism, collaborative efforts with local partners, and the generosity of supporters, aiming to ensure universal access to clean water within our lifetime. This is an amazing mission that I am so proud of all of the amazing work we've been able to do. And Christa here on the show will share countless examples of how technology should be seen as an investment for a nonprofit, not as a cost. And this is not just because you'll save time or money with tech, but also that you can directly increase your positive impact in the world. So huge fan of Charity Water here. I am very happy to share Trista's insights with you, so enjoy the show. Hello. Hello, Krista. Thank you so much for joining me on the Just Because podcast. As we've already just introduced you, you're from Charity Water, what I consider one of the biggest charities out there right now that is definitely making waves, pun intended. So I'd love to just get started straight into it of how did you get to being the CTO of Charity Water, shifting away from the corporate world into nonprofits? Like, we've had this conversation, and I really think it's a very important one. So how about we start right there and just let's get to know you a bit. So how did you get to to being where you are today? Sounds great. Well, first, let me thank you for having me today, so I appreciate that. I will, jump right into it. So I my road to CTO was actually, or road it to CTO at charity water. Actually, it was actually kind of a long road. Right out of college, I had started at a nonprofit in Washington, DC, and I had ideas in my life of how I wanted to be able to dedicate my time and how I was going to work. And the things I learned early on right out of college, I was actually working for free. And it was an interesting lesson to me in just how much sacrifice one has to make, especially right out of college when you're trying to pay your bills and you're paying down debt and things of this nature, how the nonprofit world is just a very different world than the for profit world in terms of our ability to be able to support ourselves. I realized very early on that I wasn't going to be able to support myself in this context. And so I sadly had to make the choice to actually switch out of the nonprofit sector and move into the for profit sector, and I did that for a very long time. And so I became I started doing software engineering. And in the for profit sector, I also had the opportunity at that time to be trained. This is another opportunity that comes in the for profit world as there's a lot of emphasis on building up new skills for folks early on and taking that leap into technology and really sort of developing my skills there is what allowed me to then do what I eventually did for many years, which was work in the startup space. And in the startup space, I learned so many different lessons, not just about technology, but also about how business worked, how to grow in an environment from being a very small organization to trying to be a very large organization, and everything that happens in that context about how we about how to actually grow. And it's interesting because all of those lessons really led me back to The nonprofit space. In my life, like, led me back to the nonprofit space, which was kind of amazing. And so I eventually became was able to come full circle around this and say, I have learned all of these great lessons, and so many of these lessons are transferable into the nonprofit space. And now I'm actually in a feel very privileged to be in a position in my life where I can dedicate my time to working in a nonprofit sector. And that's how I ended up at Charity Water, was making that intentional choice to move back into it again. That is amazing, and it's beautiful to see the mindset shift of, like, the understanding that, you wanted to work in that field even, you know, straight out of college. And and this brings up a very important point, I think, to the nonprofit sector of people have a hard time starting working in the sector and living a what we would consider a good life. And it's interesting because I had a a different experience since I've always worked in the nonprofit sector, but I actually lived out exactly what you're saying of I had a hard time. I was living paycheck to paycheck. I was never able to invest in professional development. I was never able to, you know, travel or, you know, invest in myself because I was just constantly in this scarcity mindset of, like, no. I have to I have to save because the the nonprofit can't pay me more because they have no funds. And so there's definitely a lot of of that mindset I feel that is is very negative and also detrimental to the nonprofit sector. The one thing I would find that's interesting is from a professional development development point of view is that although they don't invest in, like, training opportunities for their staff, I have found that for someone that at the time when I started, I was 23. From the get go working in nonprofits, I was given responsibilities and tasks that I never would have been able to do in the for profit sector. So I feel like there is that caveat of building up experience even if you're gonna be paid, let's be honest, generally much lower. The experience that I think the nonprofit sector can offer to people is great. Now the problem is, will students, especially in the states with the price of school and the debt that you take when you're leaving, can you afford to make that leap? And so this is where I find your story very interesting of you tried, you realize that this is not gonna be possible, and I think that many people make that same conclusion and then end up coming back years later when you've gained the probably, a lot more skills that you can very easily apply. For sure. I mean, I think there's so many I think today, we all are searching for a little bit more meaning and where we spend so many hours in the day. Right? 100%. I've I know I followed my own progression of first personal development through building up my my what we would call our hard skills. Right? And even some of our soft skills at work. But then really starting to translate that into being selective about where I worked. Right? Like, working at for profit organizations where your values may have been aligned with or mission based in the world of startups. They're mission based startups and b corps and opportunities today to be able to work in that space while still feeling like you're making a positive difference. A 100%. I thought about you know, when I was making that progression, but, like, the like, to actually come into the nonprofit space, there is a real material difference between actually working in a mission based for profit company and working in a nonprofit organization. And so going all in, so to speak, on these on that commitment requires you to learn how to operate in a slightly different context than I think many of us are used to operating every single day. And so it's yeah. It's it's just how people development is approached. Like, I think you're absolutely right. You get to wear a lot of hats. Right? In a smaller organization, especially by definition, you have to wear a lot of hats. But there is that investment in people that does can look different. Even though you want it to look exactly the same, it can look a little bit different. And there's also just the very strong reality that nonprofits are governed by a different set of rules than for profit are. And so it makes working in 1, present unique challenges. And that's exactly what I'd like to to ask you about around the differences between working in the for profit and nonprofit mindsets, but specifically around tech. So being the chief technology officer, of course, everyone's gonna ask you about, what about the tech? So Right. I feel like there's this big movement, and I would say in the last year, around AI, technology, digital infrastructure. And having done both worlds of the for profit and nonprofit, what do you see as the main differences in the mindset around tech between for profit and nonprofit space? The main thing that I when I was making this transition and starting to talk to different nonprofits, I think the thing that really surprised me, when I started talking to folks was the prevalence of seeing technology as a cost center versus a revenue driver. This really stood out for me, and it was reminiscent to me of, like, much larger, older companies where technology isn't necessarily or wasn't the basis of how they were originally, started to begin with. And overall, when you see technology as a cost center, it's generally always seen through the lens of, like, how do we minimize our investment in this. Right? And when you see technology as something where you need to minimize your investment in it instead of seeing it as part of a revenue equation where it's an actual driver of your revenue, you'll invest in it very differently if you are thinking about using technology. Either your programmatic efforts go further than they might otherwise, or whether you're thinking about fundraising and all the ways that you can apply technology to do fundraising very effectively, it you have to see it through a different lens than just what are these team members or what are these tools going to cost me overall. You you generally if you look at it through that other lens, you'll find yourself investing more deeply in it. And let's say, it should have if you're doing it well, it should pay off in the end. Right? Like, there should be a real return on that investment over time that you can measure, and that's tangible. Can I ask, do you have any particular examples of, let's say, the mindset of seeing it as a cost versus a revenue equation for, let's say, at Charity Water, that was different than you've seen in maybe other nonprofits, and that's what, maybe attracted you more to working with them? Like, do you have a concrete example of how, like, PEC was specifically used and seen as part of generating revenue for the organization? Sure. A few years ago, this was before I actually joined Charity Water, but this was, like, a really great example of how technology was very different at Charity Water, and that was when we were talking about the donation experience and the donation flow. Many years ago, I think a lot of teams were like, they they might use just something out of the box, right, that everybody else is using. Standing it up with the CMS and just using something that comes standard. And then you're really reliant on other groups to help produce the thing that you might need. And a really concrete example was when Apple Pay came on the scene, and Charity Water wanted to be able to take Apple Pay donations, but there wasn't anything out of the box that you could buy from a software perspective that would have enabled that. Now there are today. Today, there are certainly solutions that cover that. But in the beginning, there were not solutions that covered that. And though having your own engineering team that was really focused on that donation flow and really focused on driving seamless donation experience, especially for the mass donor, which is where Charity Water has spent so much time as in cultivating a very large community of donors. You had to be able to develop that. Right? This is something that you needed to be and then introducing that type of flow, which reduced friction for so many donors who are moving to mobile and wanting to use, tools like Apple Pay in order to be able to make those donations as quickly and easily as possible, that impacts already your revenue and your bottom line on a day to day basis. Right? And so that was an early example of how Charity Water was using technology. On the programmatic side, technology, I'll talk about a more recent example like today. We want to be able to reach more people through driving experiences that build empathy, and we cannot take every donor out there to the countries that we work in to show them the direct impact of the donations that they're making. We would love to be able to do that, to bring everyone there. When that it would be so much fun to be able to actually bring everybody there. And so our role with technology, and this is not something that you can just do with standard solutions. You have to think about how to build this, is how do you actually build mechanisms so that people can both see as transparently as possible what their donations are doing. So all the mechanics of the donation and how it gets connected with the impact that you're trying to have. And then so there's that aspect of it, which you have to build out with technology, which then improves retention over time. And retention clearly drives revenue. And then the other way is to actually build empathy through the use of technology. And so we're building out an experience lab right now where we're using technology to actually build bring real stories from the communities where we're providing clean water so that you can hear directly from the people impacted. And how how would how does that work? So we have some holographic technology in place where you can really, yes, where you can really see and experience. We also have some immersive experiences that where where the walk for water, so you can actually feel what it's like to walk. Like VR experiences? Yeah. They are VR, but also immersive in the sense that you'll be on a treadmill and you'll feel the heat of what it feels like to be able to do that. And so there are we can use technology to try to bridge the gap between That's crazy. What your experiences every single day and what someone halfway across the world's experiences every single day. And so these are all ways where we can try to extend either our impact through education or impact through fundraising. Using tech. I love these examples, Krista, because I kind of feel like it shows you the it shows the how broad technology can be implemented and why you need someone like you to to talk about all of the different aspects, because tech is such a huge spectrum of opportunities. So, like, originally, I would have thought of, like, yeah, your CRM, your email management system, your donations. But this just brings it to the next level of using it for storytelling, but also actually bridging that connection between donors and your supporters and your actual program. So this is just I think if if there's one thing that so far in what we've talked about, like, I feel this is such an important message that nonprofits can take is that they should really widen their vision of what not what technology can do for their organization and seeing it as an investment in that sense of not just to, like, speed up their processes, but even then, that's great. But also how they can use it and mobilize it for greater good and greater experiences, which I feel is something that is maybe more lacking in some nonprofits where they're so focused on their donations or their fundraising and their programs that they forget to have that interconnection. And it's funny that in your situation, technology is allowing for those connections, whereas I feel like now people are like, oh, no. Technology is, like, creating separation. But in your case, these stories you're sharing, it's it's actually the opposite. We're trying to. Exactly. We're trying to. And that it's really important for us to be able to build these moments of relatability between communities that can feel so different from one another. So yeah. I agree with you though. Martech, we should all focus on Martech. Right? Like, at the very least, if you're starting with anything, your marketing technologies have to be a place where you should be investing. But, yes, you're completely right. Don't stop there. We have to think about technology as part of, like, the broader solution overall. Yes. And I have so many examples of, some of my clients that when I talk about, like, I'm not my role is not usually to advise on necessarily technology of which platforms to use, but I of course tell them which processes can be more made more efficient with technology. And so I'm always having these conversations to be able to, to give, the best and more actual advice to my clients. But sometimes it's basic things like a social media manager that, that will save them hours and hours of work of just being able to manage all of their social platforms and what. And it's like, there's some that I'm like, yeah. It there's there's some that will fit your suit your needs for, like, 10 or $12 a month. And they're like, I don't know budget. And it's just that that's that mindset of the investment of like, yes, but how much will you be saving or how much will you be able to generate in fundraising? It's like this, this lack of belief and that scarcity mindset, and this is this goes beyond technology. So I find it really interesting that there are some nonprofits out there that are taking advantage of it. And I I see we see the the success of charity water. So I'm curious as to what did what what attracted you most to starting to work for Charity Water given that we know of all of these issues that are often, very common in nonprofits? What kind of sparked your interest of, like, you know what? Like, they would be a good fit for me, and I feel like they have the right thing going. Yeah. I think it was really I mean, at its most basic core, the mission is clearly a mission that I was aligned with from a values perspective. But setting that aside, it's also it's it was really important for me to work with an organization that really had a vision for technology in this way. And Charity Water, it came across in every way that they talked about technology. Right? Whether it was the job descriptions that were being posted or whether it was, the type of problems that they spoke about in various conferences. I mean, I've seen talks where Charity Water was talking about experimentation. Right? And Mhmm. Really talking about how to optimize experiences through experimentation and things of this nature. And then finally, knowing that data was such a central part of what Charity Water was focused on continuing to improve over time is, like, the data and the enrichment of that information, but not just to have more, but to really drive high quality donor experience. At its heart, Charity Water is about delivering on experiences and positive experiences. Whether it's positive experiences for those communities who now have clean water or whether it's a positive experience for our donors. And in order to really deliver a great donor experience, you need to have the right systems and information in place to help people be able to do that at scale. If you are interested in growing your nonprofit, you will need to be able to do this at scale at some point. And technology is what you were talking about a moment ago. It's like missing those opportunities of, oh, it's 10 to $12 a month. Well, is that relative to the cost of the experience you'll be able to deliver to your donors? And if you really care about keeping your donors connected with the impact that they're having every single day, you will be focused on exactly those types of choices. Because you'll see them not through the lens of this cost 10 to $12 a month, but through the lens of how much better will my donor's experience be if I have this in place. Not just how much more efficient am I personally, but as a result of that efficiency, what positive benefit can I drive for the donor as a result of now having this efficiency in place? And if we're, like, really focused on delivering high quality experiences, we'll make these investments in ways that we won't if we're just thinking about ourselves. Right? It's easy to trade off our own time. It is. We will all do it every single day. We'll say, oh, no. I can make it work. I can make it work. Like, we'll say that all the time. But you're not just asking yourself to make it work. You're making the trade off in terms of experience for your donors as well, and that's where you should be making the trade off. Mhmm. No. For sure. I think that there's limits to that. Like, as much as we want to believe that we can do it all, there are human limits. And as I've talked about in previous episodes, nonprofit burnout is a thing, and we tend to expect and ask a lot of ourselves and our team, and it's not necessarily what's best for the organization or your mission. So you you talked a lot about this return on investment and the the need for data. When I was working at, we did a lot of, research into technology. One of the biggest gaps that we found in information was case studies of how to actually, calculate the or measure the return on investment of technology. And so I'd love to hear if someone wants to be able to prove this, because a lot of nonprofits, when they're looking to invest in technology, they do need to find either a funder or a grant making organization that will fund this investment. Because, yes, it it can cost quite a lot. Just the implementation of a new CRM can sometimes cost 15, 20 k plus, depending on the size. So a lot of times, it's about finding how to measure the potential, the return on investment so that they can say, well, if you allow us to do this and invest in our technology, then we'll be able to have this impact down the line. So I'd love if you can have any recommendations about so how can nonprofits go about measuring their own either existing return on investment of the in the tech that they've done or even prospective returns that they can see from technology that they're hoping to invest in? Yeah. So I think there's no one size fits all answer here. This is one of those situations where what you're talking about doing to actually measure your return on investment means you have to think about how you're structuring the problem upfront. Right? And so I'll take a couple different examples. When we work on sensor development, we're not looking for a positive revenue outcome on that right now because that's in an r and d component for us. Right? And so it's research and development. And when we think about it, in that case, we're looking at developing that technology for a longer term outcome, which will be enabling at scale the ability to understand water points that are still in use versus water points that have fallen into disrepair. Right? And so that is measuring and looking at that. We wouldn't look at that through the lens of, like, how much revenue is it driving right now or anything along those lines. We're gonna look at it in terms of how quickly and how far are we pushing the technology to get us to a place where we can assess our programmatic efforts at scale across all of these things. And then it becomes measured in the context of first the research and development and how quickly we're making progress there. And then later on, it'll be through how successful the rollout is and how wide the uptake is of those particular sensors, and so that's how we'll measure that. Other systems we may look at in a completely different way. Your CRM, for instance, you're gonna wanna look at that through the lens of one usability. Right? And how effectively are your fundraisers actually using the CRM at its base? No CRM is effective if it's not used by your fundraisers every single day for in all the ways that you have imagined it being used. And then the second piece is setting out specific functionality inside of that. Let's say, how your fundraisers maybe move 1 donor from one segment into another segment, and you wanna be able to measure exactly how that process works. And so it's not, I think, a one size fits all. Our email systems, we would measure in a completely different way. Right? We would literally measure those based on how much revenue they drive relative to how much they cost. Right? And so every single one of these systems, you have to be careful in terms of deciding how you're going to measure. It's whether you're getting the right return on investment. Let's say you're invested in a digital asset management system. You wanna make sure that your measures of success are all of my assets there, and can all of the people in the organization access them in the way that they need them to? And then how much time is it saving them? And then you can measure the ROI through that mechanism. So no one size fits all, but the key underlying theme is you must decide upfront what success means in terms of the data around the system that you're putting in place. What I'm hearing from this is, number 1, investing in the measurement and tracking of the data of, like and but figuring out first what do we what are we measuring? What are we tracking? What is the objective of this technology investment? Is it to save time? Is it, like, in the the water collection data? Is it to be able to respond quicker and have more data on which points need to be reactivated or not? So is it more of, like, a program? So figuring out the the measurement stuff and then the the thinking about how. So I really like that about thinking about how are you gonna actually be, measuring all of these things. Like, what are the actual data points, and how are we gonna be collecting that information, as well as the modeling aspect of what are you gonna be looking for from a from a model. What is it gonna be telling you? So I really like that, that aspect of it's not just a question about the dollars saved. It could be the time. It could be the efficiency and it could be just saving more lives. You know, that could be the measurement. It could be directly the impact on the communities themselves that is your return. And I believe that for fundraising, that's the numbers that people are gonna get more excited about anyway. You know? For sure. I feel a lot of times with as fundraisers, we get very stuck on, like, oh my god. We're able to raise $20,000 more a year. Like, fundraisers aren't like, people donating are not gonna get excited about that as much as, like, well, we're gonna be able to do what with that $20,000 or how many more? So I think that translating the data points or numbers into stories or into impact is very important, especially when looking for funding, which which kinda brings me to the point of Charity Water, obviously, has a a specific funding model that I think is very beneficial to it in the sense of its base cost and administrative is covered by key a circle of funders that allow them to have that kind of stability. And and, unfortunately, for a lot of nonprofits, that hasn't been the case. And one of the issues that I found across the board is that there's very little funders that get excited about funding that investment in technology. That's so true. I I'd love to hear kind of your your thoughts on that of how you feel funders can step up and better support nonprofits because we see the success that it has with organizations like Charity Water. So I don't know if you have any thoughts on on what funders can do for that. Yeah. Well, I mean, I think one of the things that works overall for Charity Water is we are focused on innovation. Right? And I do think innovation is an exciting story for a lot of people to want to be a part of funders in general. If you can share your story in terms of how that particular innovation is going to help make a specific kind of programmatic impact, I think that's always the thread that's missing. And sometimes it's as simple as, like, telling sharing with people, like, a dollar invested here turns into x dollars of impact over here. You we do need to keep it very, very simple. We can't get so complicated as to say, okay, it's gonna save these people this much time, which will translate into them being, you know, like, we have to try to make it as simple, make this connective tissue as simple as we possibly can. And so tying the investment back and being able to say, we believe your $1 of investment here will translate into x dollars of impact over here. But to say it is one thing, to prove it is something else. And that's the thing that technology can be very helpful with, is actually building that line that shows how that dollar eventually translated into x dollars of impact. Because, like I said, we can say that all day long, but we also have to demonstrate it. And that's something Charity Water takes super seriously, is being able to demonstrate what your impact is Regardless of the type of impact, if you're choosing to be an investor in our operations or if you're choosing to be a water investor, it's important for us to be able to demonstrate how your dollars were used and how they were turned into programmatic impact. A 100%. And I I love that you're saying that, and I find it beautiful that there are those 2 types of donors, and that both are absolutely necessary. And the operations one actually are necessary to get more of the water donors. And I feel like that is something that is very missing. And after working in in philanthropy grant making research for 7 years, it is something that I feel foundations really need to step up in understanding that they have the flexibility and they have the understanding to invest in those less, what I would like to call, the less sexy parts of of of running a nonprofit. Like, yes, we still need Internet, and we still need computers, and we still need technology. And I find honestly, the technology is super fun in my opinion, but it's not necessarily the same as, like, the the stories of impact directly in the field. So I think those 2 work really well together, and we see through this conversation of how technology investing in that that space can have huge impacts on programs. So it's not just about being having a sexier CRM to manage their donor database. So to to wrap it up, I'd love to hear if you had one tip to give to nonprofits out there about technology Yeah. That you wish more nonprofits knew, what would it be? So I think the thing that I would say is never underestimate the power of a great product manager. If you are actually in interested in building a high quality technology team that can go beyond the traditional provision of tools and support and security into the world of providing systems and systems that help us make a stronger impact and be better fundraisers, etcetera. You must invest not just in your engineers, but also in a great product manager because it is too much of a gap to ask business teams to bridge over to what it means to run a great engineering team. And over and over again in my career when I've people have come to me and said, you know, I have some really great engineers on my team, but we just don't seem to produce a lot. What am I doing wrong? Almost every single time, it's a lack of product management in place. That is the missing piece to actually making something like that happen. So I would say that is my tip. If if you're going to invest in technology, do not forget to invest in product management as well because they are a critical aspect of a successful engineering team. Do you have an example of what that person's role would be, like, versus, the engineers? Like, what exactly is the missing piece? Like, what do they bring to the table? So what they bring to the table is the the ability to make trade offs in the right way. And so if we're talking about, let's just briefly discuss a stakeholder, we have a fundraiser, and the fundraiser knows conceptually what they want. But to simply hand that over to an engineer, there is nothing there that helps say, what is the most important part of what I am asking for? What sequence of events should I take to sort of build toward the outcome as opposed to thinking about it in a big bang approach, which so many if you've ever been on a 2 year implementation of a system Oh, god. That is that is the way where that's the what I like to call the big bang approach as opposed to the small incremental approach. And a product manager is that individual who's specifically tasked with being able to understand what is the most important, what will have what will drive the greatest amount of impact in the shortest amount of time, and how can we sequence our work from an engineering standpoint so that we can start delivering value early and often and build toward the grand vision that we have? That, yes, we'll still be 2 years from now, but we don't wanna wait 2 years to start seeing value from it. We wanna start seeing value from it as soon as we possibly can, and we can build that value over time. That is so I I just make a little for anyone listening, the way I see it is kind of when I talk about fundraising or a fundraising plan. Like, yes. Your your goal is to raise a $1,000,000. But right now, you're at either nothing or, let's say, a 100,000. You're 1 at 10 x your fundraising. You're not gonna do it tomorrow. But so let's take the little baby steps to start winning small battles, and that's where a plan and a development plan comes into play and where we're gonna see, okay, how are we gonna be building up towards that million? What are the all of the little steps? Because if not, it just becomes overwhelming. So it kind it's like kind of like a a project manager, but specifically for the development of a technology product. So that makes much more sense now that you break it down like that. So thank you so much for sharing, and I definitely agree. I think, someone that actually knows what they're talking about to bridge the gap between the dreamers and the engineers that don't speak the same language is probably very necessary. Well, this is what I there's a there's this famous quote from Henry Ford that says, if I'd asked my customers what they wanted, I would have given them a faster horse instead of a car. And product managers are there to sit in that capacity because I like a fundraiser as a stakeholder can tell you what they want, but they will be telling you in exactly what they in their current context and what they understand. And a product manager needs to be hearing through those requirements and translating them into the car instead of the faster horse. And that's another like, that's the bridge. That's a great example. Today. No. That's great. So, Krista, this was so interesting, and I feel like a lot of nonprofits out there need this mindset shift away from the scarcity mindset around technology and starting to understand of how by simply changing their perspectives on the role of technology, they can start going down the road towards building up their technology and building up their capacity. So how can people connect with you or find out more about the great work that you're doing at Charity Water? Because a lot of these ideas were really cool, and I feel like a lot of nonprofits should hear about them. So where do you recommend people checking them out? So well, for Charity Water in particular, you should go to www.cherrywater.org. And we have information, like, about our sensors on the website. Like, there's places and resources you can go. To connect with me in particular. Easiest to find me on LinkedIn or at krista.stelsmuller@charitywater.org. I am always happy to share insights and experiences and have a small community of folks around me who like to do the same thing. Amazing. So I'll definitely for anyone for all my listeners, all of these links will be available in the show notes below, so please feel free to find them. Krista, this has been amazing. Honestly, charity water is one of those charities that I feel a lot of other charities look up to. So it is amazing to be able to have you on the call. Thank you so much. And for everyone listening, go check it out and learn from the best so that your organization can reach those same heights. Thank you so much. Thank you. After spending my entire life optimizing nonprofits, I've explored countless of the most powerful tools and apps available so that you can stop wasting your time on mundane tasks, and start having an extraordinary impact on the communities that need you. Follow the link in the show notes to access our full list of nonprofit tools and apps for free. We've also included some discount codes in there to make it even more worth your while. Thanks for tuning in to the Just Because podcast. Are you enjoying the content we're creating? We'd love to hear your thoughts and feedback. Thanks for leaving us your wonderful review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and hitting that subscribe button to have access to new episodes as soon as they drop. All of our affiliate partners are hand selected to offer you only tried, tested, and true tools to give your organization the absolute best. Signing up to any of them using our code or link directly supports the podcast and is a great way to say thank you without any extra cost for you. Thanks for being part of the community.