We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits

625. Hold Fast: 8 Takeaways on Finding Resilience + Clarity - Jon McCoy and Becky Endicott

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What does it look like to hold fast and move forward—at the same time?

In this heart-filled wrap-up of our ImpactUp series, Jon + Becky reflect on eight powerful lessons that emerged from this season’s conversations around resilience, clarity, and building momentum in times of uncertainty.

From grounding ourselves in community to embracing the unknown, you’ll walk away with practical takeaways and a renewed sense of purpose. We talk about the power of story, the strength in showing up authentically, and how we can all anchor ourselves in values—especially when the world feels wobbly.

This one’s a love letter to nonprofit leaders, social impact folks, and anyone navigating change with heart. 💛

✨ You’ll learn:

  • Why uncertainty isn’t something to fear—but something to move with
  • How to build resilience personally + organizationally
  • Why trust, community, and connection are the real growth strategies
  • The kind of storytelling that fuels generosity and movement

Come get inspired—and reminded you’re not alone. Let’s keep moving forward, together.✨ 

Episode Highlights

  • Embracing Resilience and Grounding (03:03)
  • Personal Reflections and Insights (06:09)
  • Key Takeaways from the Series (09:04)
  • Building Trust and Community (12:12)
  • The Power of Storytelling (14:52)
  • Activating Generosity and Belonging (17:48)
  • Looking Ahead: Movement and Activation (24:00)

Join us July 10 for ImpactUp: Movement! https://www.weareforgood.com/impactup-register

Episode Shownotes: www.weareforgood.com/episode/625

Join us at ImpactUp: Movement on July 10th!

It’s a free, one-day virtual event for changemakers who are ready to move their mission forward. You’ll walk away with real, practical tools—like how to use your data to spark action, how to craft a clear and compelling elevator pitch, and how to create messaging that actually moves people.

Grab your free spot at weareforgood.com/impactup 🥳


Thank you to our partners 🩵

Big gratitude to Givebutter, RKD Group, DonorDock, Feathr, Whiteboard and Sowen for their partnership in growing the Impact Uprising. If you’re searching for a new CRM, tech tool, brand partner, direct mail partner, or impact strategist— we’d love for you to start with our trusted recs. We’ve vetted them so you don’t have to. Head to weareforgood.com/recs to learn more.

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Speaker 1:

Hey, I'm John.

Speaker 2:

And I'm Becky.

Speaker 1:

And this is the we Are For Good podcast.

Speaker 2:

Nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions and the growing pressure to do more, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world.

Speaker 1:

We're here to learn with you from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories, all to create an impact uprising.

Speaker 2:

So welcome to the good community. We're nonprofit professionals, philanthropists, world changers and rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.

Speaker 1:

So let's get started. Hey there, Becky, what's up Hi?

Speaker 2:

John, it's the end of a season, and what a season was this little limited series that we just did on Hold Fast, wowza.

Speaker 1:

Seriously, we knew we were going to hold fast and impact up, but we didn't know we'd be holding fast for like 10 weeks, right, and it's such like 2025, you know, I think came at us a little bit like a freight train. If you're in the social impact sector, there's just news that has impacted the way that we do our work, the way that we get our funding, and it's not lost on me that obviously we're. We keep our ears to the ground. We're in community, we talk about what's happening, but we don't always know what's right ahead of us. And I think this this year started off content wise with bringing Abby Falick into the podcast who we love so much.

Speaker 1:

She's the founder of the flight school is her latest venture, but she came in with this quote that was kind of appropriate tone setting to a degree we didn't even understand at the moment, but what really played true? And she said our lives are in constant flux. We never know what's going to happen from one moment to the next, but we're scrambling for solid ground that does not exist.

Speaker 2:

Wow Facts. Totally feeling every bit of that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So it's like, what do we do with that? That there's not solid ground. And I think there's some peace in realizing that we're all kind of in that space together and we're all navigating and figuring it out together. But for us as a community it meant to really coming together around a theme of like holding fast, you know, and I think that really set in groundwork for creating the series and creating impact up around that topic.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and, and I want to be clear that hold fast was not about sitting in the paralysis of not feeling where you can move. It was about asking a bigger question, which is like how can we get our house in order, so to speak, in times of change, and how do we build personal and organizational resilience when things feel so untethered and chaotic? And so today we're really going to give you the TLDR, like of. I don't say Cliff Notes anymore, I just say the TLDR because I want to be relevant.

Speaker 1:

But we're wrapping Semicolon right, I know right.

Speaker 2:

Semicolon, totally, but we really want to hit this at a high level because, friends, we don't say this too often, but this content is hell of fire right now. I cannot overemphasize how strong these last 10 episodes were. It was not by our own making. It was the asking of a bigger question sitting in this moment right now. So we want to talk about how do you embrace the white space, which is really what Holding Fast was about. It wasn't about controlling all the things.

Speaker 2:

When you're feeling absolutely out of control, sometimes it literally looks like slowing down. Do you remember that, as just this through line, john, that every single guest, when we were having each expert on each of these 10 episodes, they all were saying we need to slow down, we need to ground into what's matter, and so we build up these theme and content because of all that was happening in the world. But yet we come to learn that change is always going to be constant. These episodes are going to serve as such guideposts for you in future seasons of change and uncertainty or what must feel like a storm. So I really want to encourage each of you to go back, find these episodes when you have some time, when you're gardening, when you're grocery shopping, when you're driving, whatever and really pull them back into your spirit, because I think you will find that holding fast and grounding yourself is an incredible form of moving forward and action. Grounding can move you forward.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I mean so good be. And I think personally we were close. We know we've been navigating a lot each other personally, in our own families, over the last few months, alongside talking about this constant thread of like how do we hold fast when it feels like everything is turned upside down? So I'm curious, like, what's lifting for you personally? And I love that we didn't share this in advance, so I have no idea where you're going to go with this.

Speaker 2:

You have no idea what I'm going to say.

Speaker 1:

I'll share mine and then.

Speaker 2:

I'd love to hear what you're thinking.

Speaker 1:

But you know, becky and I got to be together at Impact Up in Washington DC, which was really kind of special. We have not gotten to be in the same time. We were preparing to speak at an event that was kind of unrelated but also related at the same time, and as we were preparing that talk, we're navigating all the change and we're reflecting on what's happened in this movement. We're reflecting on what's happened in our careers over the years and our families and what bubbled up.

Speaker 1:

I feel like it was something your daughter, sophia, said to you, which was look up. And it became this through line of how do we stop looking down at everything that's wrong or all the problems or all the details and actually look up to recognize that we're not alone? We do have resources, we do have abundance, there are places that we can find opportunity, and that's been a very constant that keeps coming back to me because physically, when you keep looking down like you kind of lose sight of that, but in community you lose the fact that, oh my gosh, you realize you're surrounded by people that believe in you or your mission, or opportunities that maybe you have forgotten about, and so that posture has stayed very present for me. So thank you for sharing that and thank you for letting me build that slide that lives on in my heart of look up.

Speaker 2:

Gosh. John, you quoted Sophie.

Speaker 1:

Thank you.

Speaker 2:

My Sophie is here on the podcast and I just think that there is something really special in that notion of just. We can get so mired in the noise of this moment and the messages that are coming across the media, the demand, the fact that this donor didn't come in, that this grant is no longer there to give us a safety net, but it's like we are still have the ability to not just put our head down and keep grinding into it or feeling that fear. So I think you're going to appreciate my one word that really bubbled up for me and I had to say that I feel like it's a little dramatic, but it really is how it made me feel, but liberated.

Speaker 2:

I felt liberated after I listened and experienced these 10 episodes with our guest because and I want to know if anybody else has felt like this I have felt like one of those people that is just white knuckling the mast while the storm rages.

Speaker 2:

Personally, professionally, I think we all feel that in some sense in our lives and in our work.

Speaker 2:

But to have someone and when I say someone, 10 someones look us in the eye and say slow down, take care of yourself, understand what your unique advantage is and double down into that that was very powerful to me. And the arc that you're talking about, which I think is so good, about lifting up and looking forward and not casting down is really powerful. And it brings me back to this quote from Jeff Shuck, when he was talking in episode 603 about we need your light, which is one of our trends for this year. He says we have to hold on when things feel like they're in flux at all the time and we're constantly surrounded by change and we're exposed to it and we don't have a choice to Abby's point whether to absorb it or avoid it. But worrying and whining has this low social utility, so we need to do it to vent, but we need to move on because activation is the change and I'm teasing that I'm putting a pin in that for what we're about to talk about at the end of this conversation.

Speaker 2:

But we also need people who are getting back into the field. We need people who understand their unique value. You don't have to play every part. All of those unanswered emails, all of those questions that are looming in your organization. You don't have to answer all of them. You just have to play your part. So I just think that is a big unlock for this series. That's what lifted for me. So I'm jazzed and we got to round up these incredible 10 conversations at a higher level.

Speaker 1:

So you know we have this saying that what starts here ripples and if you look back to it impact up. Hold fast the ripple of those conversations functionally have been on this podcast now for 10 weeks and we're going to talk about resilience and clarity and trust and rootedness that was threaded through all those conversations. So part of this episode today is like if you've missed some of those, like go back, like this bank story bank is here for you to lean on. But secondly, I've got a lift that Lindsay from gather at the well, lindsay Fuller's human centered leadership and human centered policy series has also been dropping. So there is so much scaffolding, friends of like how do you actually do the thing? We were moving past just the talking. This is a moment that there's a playbook in front of us and it is the opposite of sitting. Still it's actually leaning in with so much intention. So we're going to do a little bit of TLDR. Of the eight core takeaways from the series and I'm curious what's the first one that sticks out for you, becky?

Speaker 2:

Well, I got to go to Brooke Ritchie Babbage, who was our keynote at Hold Fast and arguably in my mind, I think, one of the most brilliant and forward thinking leaders in the impact sector right now.

Speaker 2:

And she was talking about how resilience requires a blueprint in some way, which I had never thought about, because resiliency isn't reactive, it's designed and it's habit, it's practice, and so strong, value-aligned systems can create these spaces to adapt and to thrive in, even in crisis. And I just thought Brooke nailed that so well. She had such great frameworks, and so what I took away from that is friends, if you are looking around saying I don't know where to take my first step, I will tell you start here. Start with your values. Who are you? What do you believe? What is your unique change? How do you show up in the world that is different and unique from everyone around you? Start there, yeah.

Speaker 1:

So dang good and I'm lifting. The second one that really stands out to me was from Scott Curran. So he's with Beyond Advisors. You know he's like a phone, a friend on all things like operational strength and like understanding how to show up as a solid organization, resilient organization. His, you know, through line was operational strength equals mission strength and if we think about that it comes down to like we can only be as strong as our operational core. And talking to a couple of storytellers and marketers, we see this as a problem in our life. Like the operations are so key and we need to be partners in that and to find ways to be able to deliver on that. But that's for all of us. For organizations that are going to stand, strategy without solid scaffolding is always going to lead to burnout and to fragility, which is the opposite of what we need in this moment. So powerful episode and one of our favorite humans.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. The third was from an episode we did with Yada and it's trust is the new currency of philanthropy, and I want you guys to just think right now about who do you trust right now? Because I look at my feed, I look at my media and I don't know that I trust anybody on that feed other than people that I know, people whose hearts I know and that is what I think Yada pulled to the forefront is that trust is eroding in so many different ways in our lives and in our day to day. However, when funders and organizations co-create from a shared place of mutual trust, deeper impact is the output of that. That is what gets unlocked and what is possible.

Speaker 2:

And Yada is with JustFund, and if you don't know about JustFund, please put in to your Safari or your Chrome platform right now JustFundus common grant application platform that's connecting funders to organizations and they're advancing social and racial justice through this. And Yada is a very famous quote that we have used many times on this podcast, which is money moves at the speed of trust, and so relationships, not just reports, are going to drive your momentum. Get back into really valuing not just the dollar but the trust that you are building with your audience.

Speaker 1:

Aren't we glad that it's not the reports driving the momentum.

Speaker 2:

I'm so much gladder, so much happier. That is my life. Let's be honest.

Speaker 1:

Okay. The fourth takeaway that really stands out to me is that clarity creates motion. This comes from Ori Carmel, who has come into our world and given us a lot of clarity at we Are For Good. He has been so kind and measured to walk through a journey with us to understand who we are. Where are our strengths? Where are we not adding value which is a really fun conversation to have where are we lit up?

Speaker 1:

Because, from this process whether you have someone walking you through it or following up with the questions that Ori leads us to in that conversation on the podcast once you really clearly dial in what matters most and how to measure it which is really key then you can move with direction and know that you're not just doing stuff. Because how do we not get to the end of the year or the end of a decade or the end of our life and just feel like man, we just showed up to do a lot of stuff? How do we actually move the needle toward what really matters, our North Star, the thing that we're uniquely gifted to do and bring and to show up in this world? And that's what it's about, so that clarity allows us to move really confidently. And so I'm going to hold fast to that in my heart over here B.

Speaker 2:

I love Ori Carmel so much. I could do an entire podcast on what he has helped us unlock for.

Speaker 1:

We Are For Good. We need to do that. Let's be clear yeah, we'll manifest that one, okay.

Speaker 2:

So number five is that generosity begins with belonging. You are here, I hope, in the we Are For Good space, because not only did you want to learn, but I hope you feel safe and welcome here. That is the absolute impetus for what we think is going to have to ground the impact uprising, not just our shared values, but the fact that we want everyone to feel like they matter here. And Holly Lee came on the podcast and she is just such a force for good in the community-driven fundraising movement. She's got this great book out. She came into Impact Up, just had such a great cool community moment and she says community and trust are the soil where generosity grows and trust are the soil where generosity grows.

Speaker 2:

And she talks about how resilient fundraising is human-centered. It's rooted in relationship and reciprocity. I want you to sit with that and think about when are times you have felt seen, whether that was digitally, whether that was in person, whether it's through a piece of mail. How are we showing up in that way for the people in our community who surround us, not just the biggest donors? Yes, I'm sure you're loving on them really, really well, but what about the people who had been with us for a really long time, the people whose influence, whose belief, whose dollars, whose stories, whose insert, whatever they're bringing to the table. That is what's driving us, and so get back to the heart of belonging, and I really think you're going to be able to unlock so much in a time that is chaotic as well.

Speaker 1:

Holy heck, this is going to stack so well because I wanted to talk about number six, which is stories are anchors, and we had a really deep convo with Obi Obekwe, one of our favorite humans and storytellers and creatives based in DC, but he talked about that. In uncertain times, stories become our stabilizers. They carry the values, they restore trust, they connect us through shared meaning and I got to tell you, ai freaks me out a lot. I don't know if you're the same.

Speaker 2:

Do you all have these moments when you're like is this real?

Speaker 1:

life, yes, but it's helping me so much right now I'm like I think I'm just like yeah, I think I'm blocking it.

Speaker 1:

So but I keep coming back to this because, as someone who considers himself a storyteller at least on my journey to be a storyteller that it's still the human connection that we don't want to get replaced. How can we draw out the personal lived experiences? And that's disruptive, it's not going to come out of your chat, gpt, or it's going to be a horrible imposter. Maybe they can help you clean up the grammar, but the story of that believer that's part of your movement, that person that was part of your collective giving movement that Holly was talking about, those are the things that are evergreen and they do connect us to our values and connect us to each other. So stories are the anchors in this crazy time that we're walking through right now.

Speaker 2:

I'm here for stories every single time. Number seven is a belief that lifted through Mike Dirksen and if you're not following Mike Dirksen over at Build Good, he's got a podcast, he's got such a great community. We think he is so brilliant and he talked about that. Trust is earned through both action and presence. And so think about this, through both action and presence. And so think about this, donor, trust grows when we show up with transparency, with consistency and with care, especially when things are uncertain. And Mike knows this.

Speaker 2:

I feel like he is the king of annual giving, of understanding how to empower the base and always make them feel very seen. But I just think that he really talks in a different way about why today's growth is going to come from today's donors and why that retention piece is absolutely essential to how we're going to keep connecting people back to the mission, back to the need, back to your point, john, the story. And so we have to have that presence to show up, see them. But we also have to drive that action that we want them to take part in. And I think please get back into that episode. He left us with so many great action items blocking your time. He even broke down how to get into your CRM and see who are the people that need to be cold right now, and he also has a great challenge in there. Do you remember this? The nine word email challenge was so good.

Speaker 1:

That's a good challenge for us. We're both very wordy.

Speaker 2:

Oh my gosh, I'm so verbose, but ringless voicemails was in there. So many great tactics. So please go check that out and understand that we can't just show up and sit with someone. We got to tell them what to do.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so good. I mean, it's all about the activation, and that leads us to number eight, which is collective momentum starts locally, and we see this. The seeds of movement are always planted in community, and I think we can talk a lot about strategies, but at the core of this, you can see the through lines that we're seeing in a time when it feels like everything's changing. Relationships, people, human to human interaction in community is the way and it's the disruptive, but it's also the age old way that that just works. And so, as we're thinking about this, we're really excited to think about what's the transition between hold fast and what's next, and it's pretty exciting to see it unpacked. Do you want to kind of tease it enough?

Speaker 2:

You talked about stacking and I always think of those like the visual of the Russian nested dolls that just keep stacking on top of each other. And it's like we talked about how to multiply, how to create really great movements in January, in April we had hold fast and we're building that complete reflex of tenacity and resiliency. But now we're moving into July and here's your reveal. If I can get some drum roll here.

Speaker 1:

How do I do?

Speaker 2:

that Our next theme is going to be movement. Hold fast was really about rooting down, but now we're ready to move forward with clarity, community and courage, and we felt like these conversations weren't just about weathering the storms. They were about building the foundations for meaningful, directed motion. You can take movement into an interpretation of activation. We want you to go, we want you to do and we want you to be that change, that person that is stepping out onto the field and getting ready to play.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I mean, this is so good. The missions that we are part of are not meant to be static. They're meant to move, and we see them moving through people and through communities, by taking action together, not just statically through those people, but the collective action, collective power of each of us coming together. So in this next season, we are unlocking that motion. We are asking a bigger question, like what happens when belief gets unstuck, or when clarity gains traction, or when community becomes the carrier, not just the recipient. These are big, heady things, but they're also moving us toward activation and we just believe in this power of it's, about motion with meaning, because building movements that move the world forward toward more good need all of us and need all of us actively participating, and so that's what we're going to talk about, like how do we actually do the thing?

Speaker 2:

And you're going to do it together. We're all going to take that first step together and, john, I just I feel so deeply in my bones that we are standing in an inflection point for philanthropy, for community, for nonprofit, for missions, and the next step that we take are very important ones and I hope we choose to step forward toward that movement, toward that action together, because this is what we intend for Impact Up Movement, to unpack and unlock for you. We want to unlock motion and get unstuck within your mission. We want to help you to think and act like a movement builder. We want to help you clearly communicate your mission and what you're building, succinctly and co-built with community, and we want to create messaging that moves people. We want people to see themselves in that message and feel inspired to act, and we want to help you ground yourself in purpose, literally, and in rest and in belief.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I mean we got a lot of objectives, but they're all grounded in this idea of movement. So I hope you will save the date with us. That is July 10th. It's coming to you virtually to start the day with clear keynotes and activation and workshops and people sharing their stories, and then we are gathering in cities literally around the globe. Our hosts are busy preparing places for you to connect in local community or maybe you're hearing this and you're being like I want to be part of this host. It's really a small obligation of just finding a place to gather people that's free, that's accessible for people to get together in local community. We've talked about the power of this, so head over to weareforgoodcom. Slash impact up. You can register for the virtual, you can sign up and tell us hey, I want to host over here.

Speaker 2:

Yes, there's just so many ways to plug in and I'm going to tease. I'm going to tease John's news news without, like giving any consent at all, but John's going to be in New York City. So if you are going to be around the New York City area on July 10th, like come over to Impact Up New York and come see John You're always welcome to come see me at my last Impact Up in Oklahoma City before I head out to Colorado. But there are so many ways for you to take that first step into the field. Like you have held fast, you have worked on multiplying. We need you in this community, in this moment in time, in this movement, to bring your unique gifts and offerings. Show up in some way. Take a first step. We want to see you there.

Speaker 1:

So glad that you've been here with us. I hope that this series is helping you hold fast and unlock whatever's next for you. We're grateful to be in community with you, friends.

Speaker 2:

Always rooting for you.