The Just Be Cause Podcast

The Power of Partnerships in Global Development with Gretchen Villegas

• Katherine Lacefield and Gretchen Villegas • Season 1 • Episode 19

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Hey friends!

Prepare to be inspired by our captivating conversation with Gretchen Villegas in this episode of the Just Be Cause Podcast. Dive into the dynamic world of global development and discover how Gretchen's journey from the Peace Corps to founding Nexus Strategy and Growth Partners is reshaping the nonprofit sector.

We'll explore transformative partnerships that break away from traditional models and work towards sustainable social impact. 

  • How can creativity in collaboration unlock unprecedented potential? 
  • What role do corporations play beyond just financial sponsorship? 

Discover concrete examples of innovative projects, like tackling biosecurity challenges for farmers across different continents, and learn how nonprofits can leverage partnerships for greater fundraising success.

Join us as we unravel the intricacies of interconnectedness, challenge conventional thinking, and uncover strategies for maximizing positive change in communities worldwide.

Get ready for a thought-provoking and uplifting episode!

Connect with Gretchen:

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Nexus Strategy and Growth Partners

Resources mentioned in the show:


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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.

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I support social impact just because I believe everyone deserves the best life possible. 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, Catherine Lacefield, a lifetime nonprofit 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 nonprofit tools and apps for free. We've also included some discount codes in there to make it even more worth your while. Hi, everyone, and welcome to yet another episode of the Just Because podcast. I am very excited to have Gretchen on the call today because the last time we had our talk when we were exploring the podcast content, we really dived into some deep issues that I feel are not as often covered in the nonprofit space, and I am very glad to be able to bring this conversation to you so you can benefit from her many, many years of experience working in the nonprofit sector with many different kinds of partners. So, Gretchen, welcome to the show. Thank you. So first of all, there's a lot to unpack in your bio. You have a very hefty background. So let's maybe start by diving into how you got to found Nexis Strategy and Growth Partners and what brought you to the global development space in general. So you can start with whichever one you feel more comfortable with. Right. Thank you. Well, I started out right after my bachelor's degree, in the Peace Corps. So I decided to take my kind of application period, to to spend two years in a remote village in South America. And the amazing part about that was that I learned what global development was all about. It was about not having all the answers. It was about listening and understanding what the community was struggling with and how I could be a bridge for that community. And that piece, I took with me all the way through my career and all the way through Nexus. So after the Peace Corps, I was able to spend almost sixteen years working in Latin America and East And Southern Africa, managing projects, for contractors of US government aid funding. Mhmm. We're talking about agriculture value chain cooperatives, all with vulnerable communities. If they needed health care, if they needed different skills or training, That was what I we would work on through these projects. And then at the end of about sixteen years, I came back to The US and worked at the executive level of some larger nonprofits around a hundred and 20, hundred and $50,000,000. And what was amazing was that I took what I had learned from the field, and I could really use it to understand how to put together programming and how to seek out partners that, otherwise, headquarters staff really didn't understand because they hadn't been most of them hadn't been to the field. Mhmm. So how I got to Nexus was I took that p score, the fifteen years abroad, the ten years in The US working with as executive teams, and brought it all together to create NexSys strategy and growth partners. So it really is a consolidation of all the different areas that I've worked in, which includes program design and program management, partnership development and fundraising, as well as, you know, operational systems, intercultural management, and just learning how to be a leader in global development, which means you don't come in with all this all the answers right away. And I think that that is something that I love hearing as opposed to a lot of the rhetoric where we hear about global aid and global development where it's very much like a top down, where a lot of the projects are kind of directed to certain countries, or at least this was like the traditional approach or like the older approach to international development. And I've seen that in the on the ground or where a project will come in and they'll supposedly come fit a local need or what the Western world often thinks is a local need and that is not necessarily the case, not necessarily ingrained in the community or supported by the community. Do you I'd love to hear of, if you can maybe give us a concrete example or a case study of one of the projects you've supported just so that people can get a better understanding of, like, what would that look like in real life? Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And you're and you're right. I mean, I think there is the traditional, you know, top down approach, which, you know, is is still being used today. But, unfortunately, you know, it's just not bringing forward the right sustainable results. Right? In global development, we're supposed to be able to remove ourselves. Yes. And that social impact is to stay there and, be be sustainable, for those who who, you know, benefited from the investment, of the aid funds. And so I think that's being looked at very critically right now. So I I really like how you brought that up. A %. And just just before we move on to the example, because I wanna bring this up for especially all the funders out there, I feel like the philanthropic model has been replicating that a lot in the sense that that we don't invest in operations, we don't invest in admin, we don't invest in actually building up the teams, be it even within the same country. If a funder is just saying you can only fund programs, but we're not actually building up the sustainability of your organization, then they will create that dependency of those organizations on the funder. And then as soon as the funder changes priorities or has a new program that they're funding, that organization can no longer continue. So the connection I see with global development is kind of the same thing, where Mhmm. If the funder is not building strong partnerships with the community, so make sure that the community can then take the project and run with it on their own, then what's the point? So anyways, I just wanted to bring that up because I think, yes, it is very common, I think, and there's a lot of pushback, I think, on the global level. But we can even look internally to the philanthropic sector as a whole and see, well, a lot of these models of power dynamics are still being replicated even on the local level. Yeah. That's a great parallel. That's a great parallel in terms of of understanding, yeah, that it we haven't broke that systemic issue completely yet. However, you did ask about a case study. I do. I think there there are some really great examples Mhmm. That, you know, we could start learning from and, especially sharing more widely. And it it really comes into play when you're when you're bringing together more of that for profit and nonprofit sector. At least that's been my example my my experience and the examples I've worked in. So right before COVID, farmers in India and the rest of Asia, Farmers in Kenya, the rest of Kenya, were really struggling with safety and biosecurity measures. Okay? And with COVID, of course, it came to a head. I mean, the whole world was talking about it. Because if you don't have safety on farms, you know, in in countries, where you are raising animals, the local communities eating those animals. Right? And then there's the health safety. So all of those questions were coming to a head. A large multibillion dollar corporation started hearing back from their field distributors, from India, from Kenya, from from these places where they would be, you know, buying in feed products and and other supplements that are then sent around the world. And this was a real issue that was that was coming forward to this corporation. At the time, I was working in a nonprofit, about a hundred and 20, hundred and $50,000,000 nonprofit at the time. And we were, as a nonprofit, looking to get into US government funding. Mhmm. Had not had any US government funding. And if you know about US government funding, there are major compliance standards, and you must have a track record of being able to implement that type of funding because it is so much more rigorous than your unrestricted funding. And so there were a lot of reach outs. So I reached out to, a corporation, and this corporation said, you know what? We do have an issue. Through our distributors, we've actually figured out there is a biosecurity issue. And the first thing we said was, well, if you're open to partnering with our NGO, we can help each other. You have a track record of multibillion dollars and you have information from the field that something is not working, right, within actually the value chain, which could have a huge effect on the world in terms of animals and people and their health. And there has just been a solicitation that came out from the US government that was looking for a corporate partner to take the lead and use the internal expertise because the government knew they didn't have enough internal expertise. They need a for profit partner that had the PhDs and the people who knew, you know, how to look at the research and the data. And we said, if you're willing if you're willing, we'll move forward. We'll write this proposal for you. We'll we'll put everything together. We'll negotiate it, and we'll make this happen. And the great part about it was that the corporate did utilize its expertise and knowledge and distributors on the ground. The nonprofit also had people on the ground who were from the villages and from the areas in which the distributors from this corporation were actually clients. And so the great part of this was we brought together the boots on the ground nonprofit work, brought together the corporate supply chain where all the gaps were in distribution and safety issues, able to bring in almost$35,000,000 plus that which the corporation put on the table. So that as a corporate, as a nonprofit, and bringing in various local nonprofits, so Africa, Asia nonprofits, who even knew the context even better, that is what, number one, allowed the procurement to go through and the win to go through. But number two, the impact was immense in a time where we shut our country down. Right? So many countries shut down. Yeah. And we were able to continue working on during this time, we were working on basically what I think is is a root cause, right? It happened at the the root of a supply chain. Yeah. And we needed to to stop it. So that's that's that's probably the best example I have of, you know, where you take real life corporate supply chain and you take nonprofits together and, that impact is just multiplied exponentially. And and the government the government wanted private sector to take a lead because private sector had the internal expertise the the US government couldn't afford. And this is where I think we often in the well, I say we, but the nonprofit sector in general, when we think about corporate philanthropy, we kind of see them as, well, they'll they have the money. They can sponsor. They can give us money. They can give us this. Right. This goes beyond that. And that's sort of something that I really like hearing about is that every partner and every player can play a role, and it's sometimes not the role that you would think. Whereas this in this example, we see that the fact that they had the industry and they they had people on the ground was also helpful. It's not just their money. It's also their expertise. It's also the the infrastructure that they have that allows them to distribute. Let's give a quick example in the sense of Mhmm. I'm working with a client that does, food insecurity. So she works with farmers Uh-huh. And she takes all their their waste the food that is still good but that they can't sell anymore, and she distributes it immediately to families in need in her area. And when I was thinking about, like, yes, we can ask for grants and for for money from spons from from companies, but I just launched as an idea. I'm not saying it would work, but Mhmm. What if, let's say, Uber or Mhmm. Foodora or one of the other DoorDash style food delivery services. Imagine if instead of sponsoring with money, they just sponsored by allowing some of their workers and their drivers to deliver the food that day. It would save the comp the organization funds and give direct visibility to the company, and it's already using their infrastructure to facilitate the process. So once again, I love this example you gave because it's it's putting everyone's expertise together to have the most impact, and we often don't think about that. I think that's really great and I think that that's from what I understand your role is putting those together more and so. Right. It's making those connections, correct? Yep. What role does everybody play? And, you know, you pointed out in your example that, logistics. I mean, logistics are one of the most costly parts of any delivery of a product or a social impact. Right? It's logistics. Yeah. And, you know, that's a great example. I and it just takes some creative thinking and and mapping out who's in the ecosystem. So where where is the root of the problem and who who is in that ecosystem? Is it for profit, nonprofit? Is it global? Is it local? What are the community sentiments about that? And then where are the pockets of funding, right, or revenue that have the same objectives that we do in terms of solving a problem Mhmm. And bringing them together. A %. Like, I think more people need to hear this of we need to see what's already out there. And Right. One of the things that whenever I get messages sometimes of like, I wanna start a nonprofit. I'm like, don't. I'm like, let's or at least wait. Right. Have you done a landscape analysis to see who else is offering at least a similar? Like, I I very rarely doubt or highly doubt that you're offering something so unique that no one is has has even touching on it. So before trying to go out on your own and being the snowflake that is offering something so unique that no one else is doing it, Why don't you see if there's people that are already working on it, and maybe you can add on a program to their existing infrastructure? Because as you say, logistics, admin, all this stuff is extremely expensive. If we can collaborate and share that weight of admin, of logistics with the organizations that that might be their strong suit, we're also reducing the fundraising burden to cover those costs. Because Excellent. Let's be honest. It's not sexy to try to fund, oh, we need a a vehicle or we need to pay the gas for mileage. Like, it's just it's not. Like, we have to be honest about what kind of stories we're telling and what is easy to share of. Yeah. We need a new CRM or to manage or we need a new project management system. Like, a plan. No. So this kind of leads perfectly into the next question I want to ask you around. What mindset must nonprofits have when approaching different kinds of partnerships? How what what kind of mindset shifts do you think they need to have to be able to make it a success? Times have changed. Mhmm. It's not about go at it alone at all. In fact, you have a much, much higher possibility of winning a restricted award or even bringing in your unrestricted funding if you can think about who is it within the ecosystem that we were just talking about that can play different roles. So it's like it's like putting a puzzle together. Right? So you have a certain project. You know your goal you need to meet in a certain amount of time. You know more or less how much money you have available to you, but yet there's still a gap. There's always a gap. Right? And so if you look across the realm, you're able to figure out what role a for profit, a nonprofit, the government, especially around enabling environment of legislation and whatnot. Sometimes there's even funding available there, and the community themselves. Don't forget about the community and the contributions that the community brings along. It's it's a puzzle. You you put together your team. It's like it's like when you are you are the the CEO or you're the the lead of a department. Right? You're the chief of a department, and you need to put your team together. Right, you don't hire yourself over and over again. You bring in all those different actors that have different skill sets and have access to different networks and different resources that can all come to the table and play different roles. So that's the consortium type view of of moving forward, and that's that's what we're in. It's not about one organization seeking out funding or one organization implementing a project anymore. It's about leveraging and catalyzing the partnerships that you said so well are already there. Right? And once you've done that and there's still too many gaps in there, then a donor is going to hand you money to make sure you fill that gap. But if you can't show, right, that you've actually done the work to know that you've got the right the right puzzle pieces, the right people at the table, the donor is going to look past you because there's not enough funding out there anymore. And I love the puzzle example because I can just imagine when all the puzzle pieces are just in a big mess in the box, you it's very hard to see where every piece fits. But if you start establishing those partnerships and you start filling out your puzzle, that at the end, those little gaps that are missing, you know exactly where to put them. So it makes it very easy for other donors or for other programs to be like, okay, that's true. We just mapped it out and that's what's missing. Well, we actually have this. Let's just plug it in right there. And it makes it just so much easier when people are working together towards a common goal. Not only are we sharing resources and reducing costs, but we're also just having more people feed into the idea brain Right. To actually move things forward. And this is where I feel oftentimes there's a lot of ego involved in, well, my organization needs to get visible. We need to be recognized as number one. And of course, visibility recognition plays a role. But I strongly believe, like you say, times have changed, partnerships and collaboration are the way to go. And I kind of wanted to touch on that point around the benefits of partnerships from a fundraising perspective because I really love the way you said for government funding in The US, you need a proven track record. But if you don't if you haven't already applied, how are you supposed to build up that track record? And this is kind of like the chicken or the egg problem of when you have no work experience, but you need work experience to get a job. Well, where do you start? And so partnering, such as internships in the the job perspective, is how you can move forward. It's also for and I've talked about this in another episode where let's say if you're an organization for I don't know. I'll choose a dog example. Let's say you're protecting dogs, but you have a partner that is looking for some form of activity to help engage the elderly in a long term care home. Well, maybe finding funding for the dogs has been challenging, but by partnering with a long term care home, perhaps you can also find funding from someone who helps the elderly. So I kind of went from your perspective. How vital or important has partnerships and other types of these connections with other organizations helped from a fundraising perspective, be it grants or other? I don't believe I personally would have been successful at all in my career because I was since the time that I was contracted, you know, by US government contractors to implement projects, I was never given enough money to finish a project. Never. Because once you get once you get involved and you get your feet on the ground, there's lots of things that haven't been thought of. Right? And there's just so many more needs. And so there was always looking for partnerships to fundraise. And it's not always money coming into your books, which is exactly what you've been talking about. It's about leveraging systems, spaces, right, venues, anything that would cost us money, like thought leadership, right, bringing in an expert in different things. You know, if you can bring them in as a volunteer from some of the corporations or whatnot, you can fill that gap. Mhmm. So I don't believe I would have been successful had I not, you know, had some mentors really early on that said, you don't just sit there and say you have a gap. You go figure out how to fill your gap. Uh-huh. And the other is that in this point in time, philanthropy has changed in the sense of wanting to see the true impact. Mhmm. And I'm not just talking about the restricted dollars of writing, you know, projects and and millions. I'm talking also about people giving 50, a hundred dollars a month to certain organizations. They want to see the impact. You have to have the data and the analytics in order to prove that you are actually making that impact. And when you do that, the donors will give you more funding. They will. Because that differentiates you from the nonprofit that's just handing out money and hoping that there is true sustainable impact at the end of the day, it it gives some sense of some sense of urgency to those who are implementing with the funds to say, if this impact isn't happening, guess what? That organization's gonna pivot. Mhmm. That nonprofit is gonna make a change. And they're gonna make a change because they care about the outcome. And that nonprofit, which you might say, oh, they were unsuccessful. They couldn't do what they said they do in the proposal. That nonprofit that actually steps back, reflects, and pivots, they're the ones that are gonna get more funding. That's what the change has been. It's strategic. It's thinking long term and also learning from mistakes and actually analyzing the long term impact and the real impact that you're having. Like, okay. We distributed a thousand meals. That's a very static data point. But if we can explain that we have maybe given out 500 this year because of our program that actually made it so that less people need meals. Exactly. And so it's changing from a very numerical value of how many dogs have been saved or how many meals have been given or how many conversations we've sparked between elderly and youth, whatever it may be, into but how is this how are you helping the system change the envelope of the problem itself? And I think that that systems change perspective is definitely more complicated. It's not the the original charitable vision. We have evolved past that, and that is what people expect. Yeah. I I agree completely. And it it's not just a numbers game anymore. It's really, that one step further towards impact. So, you know, we've been able to give out, 505 meals because, like you said, we didn't have to give the thousand out. But but why? What happened? Income levels went up because we did x, y, and z. At the meals, we gave them training about bookkeeping. At the meals, we brought in a network of people who could help them seek jobs. You know, it's like all of these all of these additional things Mhmm. Your puzzle. Right? Those different roles that you bring in that you forget or you not that you forget, but that you didn't know you needed to include in the beginning. When you bring that in, then your true impact is gonna come. That's what donors are seeking right now and not only donors, impact investors. Mhmm. So even if, you know, even if you're a business, a social enterprise, you know, you're a lot of nonprofits now are going a social enterprise route, Right? Because they wanna have some kind of income to make sure that they can sustain themselves. There is a lot of impact investment money out there right now for those social enterprises doing really good work because what the investor is seeing is business principles being applied, and they can see data, and they can see results on spreadsheets, whether it's the financials or the actual impact. And I would say, in all honesty, that impact investment space is going to definitely continue growing, and they love to combine it with grant funds. So the grant funds go where you're very vulnerable. Right? That there's just no there could be no investment from a community because they're just so vulnerable. And then you have, say, the private sector working in that area, but the private sector is socially oriented. Well, if you give an impact investment to a local company that's socially oriented, you've got grant funding for the real vulnerable, they are linked in terms of their value chain, then you know you've got a system, right, that's working. And you can break the vulnerable out of the vicious cycle that's not working and create a new reality basically for the ecosystem where the vulnerable is inside the system instead of left outside the system. So, I mean Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. And yes. So much things that came up from what you just said. First of all, for anyone interested in, like, social enterprise and the alternative ways of funding, we just did an episode, at the end of the year in 2024 by Stephanie Jacobs from the Scale Collaborative where she really dives in with nonprofits on what are the other options for fundraising, and it's not from the traditional stuff. It's, like, maybe even buying a company that is well established, that works. Let's say a coffee shop that has established, but the owner doesn't have anyone to take it over. Why not invest in that and have recurring income, and then you have a new corporate partner that can also work on different forms of funding? So, first of all, that Absolutely. And, you know, you know, a lot of people just don't know that you can do that. They think a nonprofit can't own a for profit. Well, that's not true and that's really not the new reality. Exactly. For all the things you just explained. It's just we're in a different space. I think that, like, there's so many nonprofits also quote, unquote competing, which I don't think we should be competing anymore. I think we should just be collaborating more and making more partnerships so that our ecosystem becomes more connected, and that's what will make all those connections. I see it as, like, a net, and the stronger more connections there are, the less things will pass through the polls because there's just there's more things being caught. Before we move on to my one of my last questions, I also wanted to bring up a point that you mentioned earlier around contributions from the community. Because I feel, when I have conversations with clients, their donors, their community, they see them as almost like a one way or there's two options. Either they're gonna be the ones benefiting from their services or they're gonna be the ones donating to the services. And we're recording this really two days after Giving Tuesday. So Giving Tuesday, everyone's asking for donations, donations, donations. Right. And I remember reading this great email by someone that, unfortunately, I will not be able to remember. I'll just try to remember in the show notes. And he was saying how, why don't we flip it to also other ways of giving? And they can be giving their advice. They can be giving their stories of on the ground of impact. They can be sharing advice. And like you said before, instead of hiring a professional consultant, like Mhmm. Have you at least even just gone and asked the community to maybe participate in, a sharing session where you can get to learn from their mouths directly what is needed? Or maybe they know, well, historically, we have done this and it's worked. We just haven't had the capital to invest in doing this on a larger scale. And so I just wanted to bring that up of remembering that your community, both the beneficiaries as well as the surrounding community that is maybe funding, can also bring other pieces of that puzzle to the table that you might have not thought about before. Absolutely. And it all has significant value. Nothing is less valuable. No. It because it takes a% to get it done. You never say I'm gonna go at this 75%. Right? But it you know, and we call it in kind. So at least a lot of donors call it just in kind. Sure. And you're you're giving it in kind, but it has a monetary value. Yep. And, many nonprofits today and the ones that I coach as well and advise, you can use the in kind that's been given to you as a nonprofit and what the community has given as a way to also leverage cash resources to fill where you can't find the in kind. Right? Mhmm. That expertise or, the transport or whatnot. So it's it all goes back to fill your puzzle with the right pieces and then be very creative in how you're thinking, and don't be shortsighted. As you said really well, be thinking about that real%, that long term impact. Yes. And and I just wanted to share maybe one more example of how sometimes it can be very surprising. So I had this conversation with Community Vet Outreach, and they have chapters all across Canada. And they're sharing an example of how what they do is they offer veterinary services to especially the unhoused, and they actually partnered with other social service nonprofits that realize that people, the unhoused peoples, are much more likely to show up to have their dog looked at than themselves. So Yeah. The fact of having this nonprofit that takes care of the animals come in, and they actually would pay them as a donation of, like, please come to our events, because that would attract the people that they also wanted to serve. And it was mutually beneficial. The nonprofit for animals got some donations, got to do their mission, and the other organizations got, like, free marketing, if I could say, or some form of attraction that actually also allowed them to do their connections. And how did they find this out? By listening to the community and by looking at the data. Even if it, like, well, of course they're gonna come if they need employment services. No, it's not that obvious. So partnering with other organizations that have complementary services and seeing how you can work together is just a smart way of better understanding the people you're trying to serve and actually find a long term solution for them. Right. And it's it's so much more of a holistic approach because a person or a community is not a is not about one lack of something. Right? It's, it's about, like, the whole the whole person approach. And I I love that example because I think it really exemplifies that there's various factors happening in in people's lives, and we can we can make inroads together way more than we do as separate entities. Mhmm. And Yeah. Just another plug for this amazing book we were talking about in kind donations. Well, I'm reading this book called HumanKind and it's a % rec like, recommend. I'll also put that in the show notes. And the whole story is around the reason why humans have taken over the world, if we can say that, is not necessarily because we have bigger brainpower, like, whereas, yes, we do. They actually compared with our ancestors and the way that it was explained was our ancestors, the Neanderthals, actually had bigger brains, but they didn't have the capacity to collaborate and to work in teams. So even if one person became a genius, that that genius stayed within him because he wasn't spread. Our potential and power as humans is actually that we're really good at teaching others. And so we can expand that impact and that knowledge very quickly, which is what allowed us to to grow and to benefit. So once again, the power of collaboration, of sharing knowledge, and exchanging is what actually made us become the successful species we are. So if there's anything that we can take from this conversation, it's collaboration, partnerships. If you're not doing it, start doing it right now. And but let's Literally. Let's say we don't know how to start, Gretchen. We're we're a nonprofit, we've we have our list of donors, we have but we haven't explored partnerships. What advice would you give to any of these nonprofits that are looking to develop more partnerships either with corporations or with government? Like, where can they start? -Well, look in your own backyard, honestly. So if you're in a city or if you're in more of a rural area, look in your whole state. But start mapping out where are the for profits, nonprofits, government programs, community led programs that are really aligned in some way to your social impact that you wanna accomplish. And remember, you have to think creatively. Right? So like many of the examples, that that Catherine and I were sharing today, you have to think about it's not just, okay, that one degree, like, the the one thing. You know, I wanna work with homeless shelters. But what are all of the other holistic things that need to happen in order for someone not to need a homeless shelter? And then once you have that, you really start conversations. And the conversation is, hey. This is what I do. What do you do? What are you interested in doing? Do you see any synergy or alignment with us? And I think that is where you start the conversation. And sometimes you'll find an opportunity right away to to combine resources and make a difference. And other times, it'll take you four or five years. But because you made that effort to have that conversation, that big event is gonna happen or that big project or program or the funding that they wanna give out, maybe it's five years out, but they remember you and they call you and say, hey. We wanna do this. Our shareholders or our board of directors thinks this is important. Why don't we do it? So it's it's, it it it has to be part of a nonprofit's everyday work. And for anyone who is a nonprofit leader that is not on LinkedIn, you are missing if I cannot I LinkedIn for me has been because we're talking about that first degree, second degree of connections. Right? So let's say if we're looking for a particular skill set. I was just doing a prospect search for a client today where we were trying to see who do we know at this big corporation. And so I literally went on to the corporation's page, went into the people, looked for the ones that were in Canada, and put in corporate social responsibility in the search tab. Then I found a list. I saw that there was one woman who had I had 20 plus connections in common with. And so that allows me to be like, okay, well, that's where I'm gonna start, with people that I already have connections with. And then every time we make one connection, we are now opened up to their network, and then that's how things just expand. So Yep. Pushing off on your point of looking in your own backyard, check with your board members, check with your biggest volunteers, your biggest donors. Hey, we're currently looking for partners in this sector. Do you know anyone? Just ask them. And then ask for warm introductions because as we know, if you have someone doing the introduction to you, you're much more likely to confirm that meeting than if it's just a random cold call. Even if it's just someone you connected with on LinkedIn, I have friend friends LinkedIn friends that I have Mhmm. Yet to meet in person that I feel very connected to and that we know what each other are doing, and I've gotten people refer me clients, refer opportunities. The same can happen if you're in that mindset as a nonprofit. So I think that is a great advice of looking in your own backyard. I also think that looking at your people that are working in a similar field and look at their annual report. Who are they working with? It's not about poaching. I don't wanna I'm not saying we're poaching, but just understanding and seeing how someone else is working and making similar connections of, like, oh, I have I have a lawyer's office. I know a lawyer or I know an accountant. It that's how it starts. So sometimes just Right. Looking at what is there and then that's gonna expand on its own. Right. And then and initially, it's a reach out. You know? It's a let's get to know each other. Eventually, it will be a pitch. Mhmm. But you never pitch No. The first time. And and I've seen so many nonprofits say, oh, it's a waste of time, like, if I don't have a pitch ready. That's not how that's not how these relationships work either. So, it's definitely worth ensuring that you have staff time focused on being able to do this because it also it's, it is it's, it's not something you just stick in here now and then. Like, your CEO is gonna do it whenever they can. No. Schedule it. Those right. Those nonprofits that are being successful, they're actually creating paid time for people to focus on partnership. Yeah. I had to put it in my calendar. Like, I had my LinkedIn hour in my calendar Yeah. On Fridays where that would be my time where I would seek out potential collaborators or partners, send connection requests, send messages. Maybe I would only send five in a week, but at least I will still be building, and I have noticed a huge difference since. But like anything, if it's not in someone's calendar, if it's not being recognized as an important task, it's just gonna get pushed to the wayside, and it's not gonna happen. Agreed. Well, miss expert in partnerships. I know that there's a lot of people I know a lot of people working in the global development space and a lot of people that have issues with developing those types of partnerships. So if people are interested in learning more about what you do, about how you do it, and how to work with you, I'd love for you to share what is the best way for people to reach out to you. So my company is called Nexus Strategy and Growth Partners. And so it's www.nexusstrategypartners.com. So you can find me there. You can also find Gretchen Villegas on LinkedIn, and book an appointment there. But I'm more than happy, to talk through any ideas that you have and and, be able to support you in in any way that I can. My goal really is to take that twenty five years of lessons learned, failures, successes, and translate that into helping create many organizations reach an optimum social impact. If I can do that, I'll be very, very happy with in my next twenty years. I totally get it, and that's exactly what I've been trying to do as a consultant of just sharing the knowledge because that is how we can actually grow as a sector, and that is what I think is more important. So, Gretchen, this was I feel like we could continue talking about partnerships forever, but, of course, we do eventually have to stop. This was an amazing conversation. There's so many lessons learned. I've taken so many notes, and I hope that you have as well, everyone listening. All of the links, everything that meant that Gretchen mentioned, I will be putting this in the show notes, so don't hesitate. Don't worry if you are driving. You can just take the links. You don't have to stop right now, and you'll be able to follow-up with her. Gretchen, thank you so much. This was so eye opening, and I really hope that everyone that was listening was able to listen to take a lot from it as much as I did. Well, thank you for having me. My pleasure. 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. 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