Transcript
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You're listening to the Nonprofit Power Podcast.
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In today's episode, we share how to capture your most valuable lessons from 2024.
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So stay tuned.
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If you want to have real and powerful influence over the money and policy decisions that impact your organization and the people you serve, then you're in the right place.
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I'm Kath Patrick and I've helped dozens of progressive nonprofit leaders take their organizations to new and higher levels of impact and success by building powerful influence with the decision makers that matter.
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It is possible to get a critical mass of the money and policy decision makers in your world to be as invested in your success as you are.
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To have them seeking you out as an equal partner.
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And to have them Bringing opportunities and resources to you.
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This podcast will help you do just that.
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Welcome to the Nonprofit Power Podcast.
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Hey there folks.
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Welcome to the Nonprofit Power podcast.
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I'm your host, Kath Patrick.
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I'm so glad you're here for today's episode, as we're rolling into the holiday season.
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Between the waning light and the kind of tucking in that happens around the solstice.
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And the anticipation of closing one year and opening a new one.
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It's the perfect time to do some reflection on how the year has gone for us.
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And what it's meant for us.
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And to think about ways that we can carry our most valuable lessons into the new year.
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This year, maybe more than most, there's a lot to reflect on.
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No matter what kind of a year you've had.
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And for most of us in the progressive world, it's been a pretty mixed bag.
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You know, we had this election and that was not a good thing.
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Fortunately a lot of good things happened at the state and local level.
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There were certainly a lot of bright spots there.
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But at the national level it was a tough election.
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We did not get the outcomes we wanted.
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And that obviously has massive implications for us going into the new year.
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Whatever happened in your local and state elections that has implications, too.
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So we know all that.
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And this always feels a little bit like, and aside from that Mrs.
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Lincoln, how was the play?
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But even when really dramatic events like that happen on the plus side or on the minus side.
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When really big stuff happens, it tends to kind of pull all of our attention and pull all the oxygen out of our world.
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And that would be a shame.
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Because while that was monumental and has a lot of implications.
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So are all the things that you did during the year.
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Some of the things that you worked on were probably huge successes.
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Some of them, maybe they were more of a lesson than a success.
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Some of them may have you saying, oh my goodness, I'll never do that again.
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Even that is valuable.
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So I'd like to invite you to join me in a practice that I do at the end of each year.
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I'd like to share with you how I'm recapitulating the year and what I'm taking from it and deciding what I want to pull forward with me into the next year's work.
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I have a set of questions that I ask myself, that I'd like you to consider asking yourself.
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You could totally do these as a team exercise, and you may want to do that.
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But please think about that as an addition to, and not instead of, doing this for yourself.
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The primary value in these questions is to ask them of yourself.
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I'm really speaking to you as a nonprofit leader, as an advocate.
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And asking you to consider these questions in that context.
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You can do a recap for yourself on a very personal level using basically the same questions.
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But for purposes of this conversation, I'm really talking about you in your role as a leader and as an advocate, and as a progressive person trying to make a big impact in the world.
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So I hope you'll take them with that frame of mind, and consider them that way.
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We are not in a training here This is a podcast, so I'm not going to pause while you consider these questions.
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I trust that you will, when you have a moment, hit the pause button and truly take time to actually reflect on your whole year and reflect on each of these questions.
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And write this down for yourself.
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Whether you want to do that on a piece of paper or in a journal or in a notes app.
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Wherever you like to keep track of your self-reflection, this is where that goes.
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But do take the time.
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What I hope you won't do with this episode, is to go, yep, Those are good questions.
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Those are good to remember.
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Absolutely.
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Got it.
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It's important to reflect on our year.
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Yep.
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And celebrate the wins.
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Yep.
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Yep.
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Yep.
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Got it.
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Great.
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Wonderful.
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I've gGot it.
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And then you don't do it.
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There's no value in just going, yeah, yeah, I got it.
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The value is in the reflection.
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In actually taking some quiet moments here and there.
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Yeah, and I know you are crazy busy.
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But here and there.
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And honestly, I do a lot of this reflection when I'm driving from place to place.
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When we're doing something that is relatively automatic, whether we're in the shower, or we're driving, or we're taking a walk.
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We're doing something where we don't have to concentrate very hard on what we're doing.
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It allows our brain to untether a little bit and go into the creative corners and think real thoughts.
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Instead of just being focused on the to-do list and the next 10 things you got to take care of and all of that.
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So wherever and however you usually free up more creative thought for yourself.
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That would be the practice you would want to use for these questions.
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This is totally a choose your own adventure for how you do this.
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What I ask is that you do it.
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And that you really give yourself the gift of the time and the genuine exploration and discovery and thought.
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That will take you into a space of reflection that you wouldn't go normally.
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I certainly have found a lot of value in doing that, and I suspect you will too.
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So I hope you'll do that.
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I always like to start with the best of the best.
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You know, I preach all the time, how important it is to celebrate the wins.
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And I really mean it.
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It's one thing to say that.
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It's another to actually do it.
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I know that no matter what kind of a year you had, there were some wins.
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And again, when we've had a lot of dramatic upheaval and things that didn't go the way we wanted.
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It's very easy to ignore the wins and kind of just push them away, and say, well, yeah, whatever, but this other really bad thing happened.
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Or, this other problem is still here.
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That is human nature.
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It's the nature of the human brain.
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Because it's primary function is to keep us safe, it's always looking for the bad stuff.
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It's always looking for the stuff that is going to hurt us or put us in a bad place.
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So you can thank your brain for that, for that tendency to go to the negative.
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And to kind of shove the positive off to the side and not pay attention to it.
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But luckily there's more than one part of our brain.
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And the conscious thinking part of our brain gets to be in charge now.
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And you can say to the very helpful subconscious, who just trying to keep you safe.
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It's doing its job.
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We're glad about that.
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We want it to do that.
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But in this case, it needs to chill out for a bit.
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Go take a coffee break.
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Go somewhere else.
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And let your conscious brain focus on this first question.
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Which is what were your biggest wins this year in 2024?
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And that could be your biggest advocacy wins.
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Or something else in the context of your leadership or the work that you do.
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But this is you personally.
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This is not the, Woohoo, this is what the organization did.
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It's what did you do?
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What were your wins?
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Obviously some of those will overlap heavily.
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If your organization achieved a huge advocacy victory, and you were the chief architect of that, then that's a win for both you and the organization.
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But you see where I'm going.
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I want you to focus on you for this conversation.
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Really take the opportunity to reflect on your own year.
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So, what were your big wins for this year?
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What do you want to celebrate?
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And it doesn't have to be massive and monumental, could be little.
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But it's significant to you in some way.
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So the wins first.
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And then kind of on the heels of that is to think about, what did you do in this year, particularly in an advocacy and leadership context, but there could be others as well, that really worked.
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For example, think back to the moments where you were engaging a decision maker and they really leaned in.
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They were super engaged.
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They were just totally in it with you.
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Well, first of all, recall that that happened.
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And make a note about what that was, what was going on.
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But then a layer deeper is what were you doing that caused that?
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How were you showing up?
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What kind of ways were you engaging with them?
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What were you doing that resulted in that engagement from them?
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Because I promise you, they didn't just automatically engage with you.
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They did so in reaction to something you were doing, probably several somethings that you were doing.
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When that happens, particularly if it's not the norm for you.
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Now, if everywhere you go, you engage everyone beautifully, then you probably have this down and maybe that's not a great example.
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But you get the point that if it's something that you would regard as a win, that it was a standout thing that really worked.
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First take note of that and then really look at, so what was I doing when that happened?
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What did I do that caused that?
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How was I being that caused that?
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It's not all about the doing.
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A lot of this is about the being.
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What identity were you working from?
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And I don't mean your title.
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What were you saying?
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How were you saying it?
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And what emotions were you bringing to the conversation?
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Explore that.
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And if there were several of those events where you were like, oh, boy that really worked.
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That was a red letter day.
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That was when everything worked exactly the way I wanted it to.
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Whatever the context, whether it was a conversation with a decision maker or something else.
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Maybe it was a negotiation.
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Maybe you were negotiating a contract and you got everything you wanted in the negotiation.
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In which case, wow.
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Congratulations.
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It could be anything.
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It could be that you had an awesome moment where you got your team really engaged.
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Anything at all where it was about you, and it really worked.
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We want to take note of that because we want to know how to be able to do it some more.
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And the more we explore how we made that thing happen, it stands to reason doesn't it, that the better the chances we'll be able to do it again.
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The next one we'll take a look at is what didn't work.
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Now again, because the human brain works the way it does, these will be much easier to identify.
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Most people can recall what didn't work much more easily, much more quickly than what did work.
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That's that reticular activating system, looking for the threats, looking for the bad stuff.
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So, okay.
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Now it's back from its coffee break.
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You can let it talk to you a little bit about what didn't work.
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And again, jot a few notes about what it was that didn't work.
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What happened?
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And how could you change that outcome?
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Implicit in that is that there probably were things that you were either doing, and or not doing, that caused the outcome that happened.
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Because again we're talking about what of the things that you did, didn't work.
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Please don't take on responsibility for external events that you had no control over.
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That is not the point of this.
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But it's stuff that you did.
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You tried a new thing.
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You tried a new approach.
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You experimented with something new, whatever it is.
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And either all or part of it didn't work.
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And you probably debriefed it at the time, but it's worth taking another look from a strictly personal standpoint.
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And say, what did I do or not do that resulted in that outcome?
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And what could I do differently next time that would change that outcome?
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The purpose of this is a hundred percent not to get involved in self-recrimination, in judgment.
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It's to get curious.
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Say, huh.
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Well, I sure thought that was going to work and then it didn't.
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Huh.
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Wonder what happened?
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Sometimes in the moment we don't even have time to do that self-reflection.
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We go, oh crap, that didn't work.
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Bummer.
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And then two seconds later, there's another brush fire we got to go deal with.
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And maybe we mean to go back and analyze that, but we maybe don't get to it.
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So the end of the year is a great time to just survey the year and say, ah, all right, of those things that didn't work out the way I wanted to that were mine.
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What was going on there?
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And how could I maybe go after that differently?
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Now the next piece is, for each of the things that worked and for each of the things that didn't.
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Go back and ask yourself.
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What were the lessons for me in this?
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And if nothing's coming to you, that's okay.
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Try asking it another way.
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It's actually often harder to find the lessons in things that did work, but I will give you an example.
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Let's go back to the example I used earlier where you were engaging a decision maker and they were totally leaning in and they were in it with you and it was awesome.
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So much progress happened in that meeting, and it was great.
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So that's on your win list.
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And you have your list of what it was you were doing and how you were showing up and how you were being.
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Well, if nothing else, there's a lesson there of, it might be beneficial for me to do more of that.
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Maybe I could try showing up that way, being that way, doing those things with other kinds of decision-makers.
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Maybe you were being more relaxed and more your true self and showing a greater range of emotion with that particular decision maker, and it was totally working.
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But maybe the reason you did that with them was that you felt really comfortable with them.
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You felt like there wasn't a lot of risk in showing up in that way.
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One of the lessons in that might be, it might be worth an experiment to find out if showing up that way with some decision-makers who I don't feel as comfortable with.
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What if I showed up more like that with them?
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Because the lesson may just be that that's what works for me, that's effective.
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So let me see where else I can take that.
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That could be the lesson.
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Now with things that didn't go the way you wanted, and you've identified what you could have done differently.
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Or that you think might've made a difference if you'd done them differently.
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To go one layer deeper on that, you could ask yourself what information or knowledge or principles or discovery came out of that experience.
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The one that didn't work.
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That if I had known that beforehand, I could have prevented that outcome.
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Or I would have known to do that thing differently.
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That's another way to look for the lessons.
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Say oh, yeah, that went really sideways.
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And now that I think about it, the reason it did was I made this assumption, or I was missing a key piece of knowledge that I didn't know I was missing.
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But I found it out real quick when this thing went sideways.
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Okay, well, now you know that thing, now you have that perspective, that piece of information, whatever.
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That is a lesson.
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That is something you have gained from that.
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So write down the lessons that you can think of that have come from both your wins and your wish that hadn't happened that way's.
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And what you may be realizing is that once you've got those four things that I just walked through.
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Especially the last ones of, what are my lessons?
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And what worked and what didn't, and what do I want to do differently?
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You've got the beginnings of a roadmap for 2025.
00:17:50.839 --> 00:17:51.470
Wouldn't you say?
00:17:52.267 --> 00:17:53.767
It's a darn good place to start.
00:17:54.710 --> 00:18:00.000
When we make our plans for the new year and our, quarterly, monthly, weekly.
00:18:00.029 --> 00:18:01.049
However you do your planning.
00:18:01.722 --> 00:18:06.819
It tends to be a lot about to do lists and what we got to get done.
00:18:07.380 --> 00:18:08.730
And that's certainly important.
00:18:08.730 --> 00:18:10.792
That's how we keep the organization running.
00:18:10.792 --> 00:18:13.656
It's how we keep on top of the stuff we're responsible for.
00:18:13.656 --> 00:18:14.797
That's totally appropriate.
00:18:15.646 --> 00:18:25.636
But consider that if we only focus on that, and we don't bring forward our lessons and our awareness of what really worked and what didn't.
00:18:26.416 --> 00:18:33.519
That if we don't bring that with us consciously, intentionally, into our new year with all our new to-do lists.
00:18:34.817 --> 00:18:38.747
What are the chances that we'll repeat the mistakes from the last year?
00:18:39.497 --> 00:18:48.299
And that we'll maybe fail to fully capitalize on the actions and the lessons that caused the home run to happen.
00:18:49.589 --> 00:18:51.839
There's potentially a lot of value there.
00:18:52.470 --> 00:18:58.067
Depends a lot on how much actual thought and energy you put into working through these questions.
00:18:58.517 --> 00:19:07.727
If you just kind of, jot a few notes and don't put much of yourself into it, then, you know, you'll get a comparable amount of benefit out of it on the other end.
00:19:08.237 --> 00:19:11.007
But if you've taken the time, and I hope, you do.
00:19:11.480 --> 00:19:14.900
To really reflect and really say, what can I take from this?
00:19:15.487 --> 00:19:17.807
This was a wild ride, this 2024.
00:19:17.826 --> 00:19:20.196
There were a lot of experiences in it.
00:19:20.886 --> 00:19:22.146
What can I take with me?
00:19:22.386 --> 00:19:24.007
And what would I like to leave behind?
00:19:25.196 --> 00:19:26.906
And that takes me to the last question.
00:19:27.386 --> 00:19:29.960
Which might just be the most important one.
00:19:30.539 --> 00:19:34.383
Which is to ask yourself, where was my greatest growth?
00:19:35.150 --> 00:19:37.130
And that could be in terms of skills.
00:19:37.970 --> 00:19:40.369
It could be your personal evolution.
00:19:41.012 --> 00:19:42.663
Any way you want to think about this.
00:19:43.547 --> 00:19:44.596
There aren't rules.
00:19:45.606 --> 00:19:46.717
One thing's for certain.
00:19:47.376 --> 00:19:51.349
You are not the same person you were at the start of 2024.
00:19:52.259 --> 00:19:57.227
Because you've had all those experiences that happened in 2024.
00:19:57.676 --> 00:19:58.846
Some of which were awesome.
00:19:58.846 --> 00:20:00.436
Some of which were really tough.
00:20:01.037 --> 00:20:02.866
Some of which barely registered.
00:20:03.817 --> 00:20:05.707
Those experiences shaped you.
00:20:06.426 --> 00:20:07.926
They gave you lessons.
00:20:08.436 --> 00:20:11.946
Whether you chose to notice them or extract them or not.
00:20:12.700 --> 00:20:20.390
You have been informed and shaped by the experiences of the last year and you've come out the other end of it a different person.
00:20:21.170 --> 00:20:23.029
Not radically different, probably.
00:20:23.606 --> 00:20:25.017
Maybe, but unlikely.
00:20:25.467 --> 00:20:28.076
More typically the differences are going to be subtle.
00:20:28.846 --> 00:20:29.596
But you grew.
00:20:30.356 --> 00:20:34.492
So it's worth checking in and saying, so where did I grow?
00:20:34.492 --> 00:20:35.242
How did I grow?
00:20:36.126 --> 00:20:39.517
If you're asking yourself that and you're going, um, I don't get this question.
00:20:39.517 --> 00:20:40.086
I got nothing.
00:20:40.797 --> 00:20:43.936
Here's some more ways to ask yourself about this.
00:20:44.757 --> 00:20:49.886
What are some of the ways you've grown into a more complete version of yourself?
00:20:50.603 --> 00:20:58.700
Think about what are the ways that you grew into a more powerfully effective advocate, a more effective leader.
00:20:59.093 --> 00:21:00.502
A more connected human.
00:21:01.472 --> 00:21:07.343
Ways in which you allowed yourself to connect more fully with other humans, specifically in a work context.
00:21:08.047 --> 00:21:14.373
Because that is as we know, an absolute key to developing influential relationships with decision makers.
00:21:15.066 --> 00:21:15.905
Think about that.
00:21:16.598 --> 00:21:28.905
Maybe one of your wins was you gave a talk on a really big stage, and that was something you hadn't done before, and it was totally terrifying and you did it, and you did great.
00:21:29.536 --> 00:21:37.163
And you've recapped for yourself what it was that you did, how you made that happen, how you made that be such a big success.
00:21:38.016 --> 00:21:41.945
What does that say about how much you grew and in what ways you grew..
00:21:42.855 --> 00:21:47.256
When you went into that, you were not confident at being on a big stage.
00:21:47.976 --> 00:21:54.769
And then you had this huge success, and now you're probably at a minimum, more comfortable on a bigger stage.
00:21:55.519 --> 00:22:00.169
Maybe you even discovered that that was pretty awesome, and you'd like more of that.
00:22:00.925 --> 00:22:02.833
That's a huge bit of growth.
00:22:03.823 --> 00:22:08.932
So that's just an example to toss out, to help get your brain unlocked.
00:22:09.699 --> 00:22:11.618
I promise it's not a trick question.
00:22:12.608 --> 00:22:16.752
It might be one that you will want to come back to periodically.
00:22:17.318 --> 00:22:21.858
Especially if, when I first asked it, you kind of froze and said, I don't know.
00:22:21.979 --> 00:22:22.969
I don't think I grew.
00:22:23.669 --> 00:22:24.148
You did.
00:22:24.929 --> 00:22:25.828
You absolutely did.
00:22:26.368 --> 00:22:28.439
Unless you were in hibernation the whole year, you grew.
00:22:29.173 --> 00:22:30.476
It's just not yet clear.
00:22:31.202 --> 00:22:39.576
But if you've taken the time to really explore the first four questions, it will be much easier to answer this last one of where and how did I grow?
00:22:40.476 --> 00:22:46.145
That personal growth I think is always just the most important thing to celebrate.
00:22:46.145 --> 00:22:49.695
To take note of and to congratulate yourself on.
00:22:49.695 --> 00:22:52.036
Because personal growth is not easy.
00:22:52.695 --> 00:22:53.596
It's hard.
00:22:53.836 --> 00:22:55.909
It's often uncomfortable.
00:22:56.749 --> 00:22:59.472
But when we grow, great things happen.
00:23:00.528 --> 00:23:03.766
So while you're running around doing all the holiday things.
00:23:04.365 --> 00:23:07.705
And doing, I hope at least some of the things that make you happy.
00:23:07.705 --> 00:23:14.425
Whether that's big wonderful parties or whether that's curled up with a cup of cocoa by the fire.
00:23:15.115 --> 00:23:17.556
Or zipping down a ski slope.
00:23:18.145 --> 00:23:21.942
Whatever you're doing for your holiday celebrations.
00:23:22.632 --> 00:23:27.152
I hope that you will take the time to give yourself this gift.
00:23:27.882 --> 00:23:41.346
The gift of the time and the care and the love to reflect on that year and find those important things for yourself that matter to you and that represent your growth.
00:23:42.082 --> 00:23:46.229
That will give you a more complete sense of what this year brought for you.
00:23:47.135 --> 00:23:49.625
What you gained, what you'd like to leave behind.
00:23:50.435 --> 00:23:56.362
And how you want to carry the lessons and the things that worked into the new year.
00:23:56.692 --> 00:24:03.506
So that you can grow even more and become an even more bad-ass powerful advocate and leader.
00:24:03.976 --> 00:24:05.596
Which is one of the things I want for you.
00:24:06.479 --> 00:24:07.618
Have a wonderful holiday.
00:24:07.979 --> 00:24:08.848
Thanks for listening.
00:24:09.328 --> 00:24:12.695
And I'll see you in the next episode, which will be in the new year.
