Building Ecosystems, Not Silos: Mike Moss on Smarter Nonprofit Strategy

[0:00]  So if I can optimize the effectiveness of my work, I have more time to pick up that phone and make that call, to make that connection. I have more time to just sit and reflect and think about doing things differently. I can bring curiosity in more. So using AI for effectiveness, which can bear efficiency, but really thinking through um help me ask better questions so I can go talk to a human with better questions, right? So using AI for learning how to ask a better question, being curious, but then don't let that work be your work. Now go go do the human work. So so yes, there are some positions and no doubt that will like any automation moments in our industrial history will be lost to the to the machines. But at the same time, I think a lot of the jobs, particularly those of us in the service sector, good luck taking the human centricity out of our

[0:46]  work. Help us ask better questions so we can make better decisions. So what we in our use policy it's like use it for effectiveness and efficiency but make decisions with humans. Welcome back to another episode of the hard and hustle. Today we got Mike. And Mike, before we get into the big ideas today, you know, just really having a conversation, like I always say, maybe at a coffee shop. I always think that's the best place to have a conversation or at a networking event.

[1:26]  But let's talk about it. AI nonprofit leadership. I got to ask, if you had to describe what you do at ESUP in a tweet length answer tweet that is just like one sentence, what would that say? We build inclusive communities of practice on your campus for planning and for student success. I love it, man. And how long have you been at the forefront of this organization? Uh I will be 11 this year.

[1:49]  So just a little bit over a decade at this point. 11 years. And you've led five or six different associations, uh which which is really a good track record of just straight leadership. What keeps you pulling back into the nonprofit world? Um as we talked about in one of our earlier calls, I did try and leave. It just didn't work right. I ended up having to to stick with what I know. So, I had the uh blessing of starting my career um not knowing what a nonprofit was, not knowing what an executive director would do. And I applied for a job literally out of the newspaper, out of the one ads, and found out that I was going to be the executive director of a grant-f funed 501c6. And I got to file paperwork with the IRS and off my journey went. And what's kept me involved is uh the opportunity for societal impact whether it's through a vertical association of a specific

[2:37]  discipline or like SCUP where we're connecting all kinds of disciplines for student success. So I think it's the service aspect that is going to keep me entrenched here till retirement. Man listen it looks like you belong there. Like that means you're doing a really good job. They didn't want to let you go. Uh and you come from a CEO background. You were already a seuite exec and then you go into the CEO. What was that biggest mindset shift that you had to actually make from going COO to a CEO? Now, that that's a great question because um to this minute, like literally right before you and I connected on the recording here, I was doing probably some operational work over here on on my other whiteboard because you're not going to let it go when you're a systems thinker and you came up through ops. It's where it's where your journey starts pretty much for me on the daily. But I think what I've learned the most about this

[3:24]  transition is um I wouldn't call it elevation because I think um for better or for worse I'm the same person I am now as I was when I was in ops but I've learned how to ask better questions and I've definitely learned how to apply systems thinking better through better questions. So uh in my ops roles again for better or for worse I was often in the solutions mode and the one offering solutions all the time. And now what I really enjoy about my role is I'm much more focused on inquiry and growth with a team with teammates who will make those things happen. I don't I don't have to be involved. I love it. And with your organization, is it just not about one mission? It's about impacting change beyond the immediate nonprofit space.

[4:03]  What's something that your organization does that most people really wouldn't expect from a nonprofit? So I think uh in listening to a lot of y'all's other recordings um you have a beautiful representation of of service focused um societal benefit type philanthropic type organizations which is amazing and where we sit in this this crossword space is that we are a professional association by incorporation meaning we represent planning and higher ed and anyone involved with that and so we are a professional association C3 but our impact aligns with a lot of the other folks you've talked to on your program around it's not just about having a plan developed and then good job. You didn't do anything when you wrote your plan.

[4:46]  The only thing you've done is decide that you're going to start to have impact. And so with that change and impact moment, what I really appreciate about what SCUP does, it does not really um align with a lot of vertical associations like you know the Metallica listeners of America, right? We we would have our own and we wouldn't listen to anything else, right? That's what we do.

[5:04]  But what we can do then is have impact through community and through kind of this ecosystem approach of everything we did at a campus strategically is also involving our local community, the local population, the employers and employees of the community just as much as our faculty, students and athletics. So having the opportunity to really have people bring in a holistic impact moment across their community is what I think SCUP does best and why it's going to be pretty hard to get me out of here. But at some point I will have to go. But it'll be pretty hard because I I've really found a place where I feel I can be my authentic self every day with a group of people who encourage me to do that and then we can have this broadstroke more community- based impact. I love it. And to be at that level and to still feel that man, I'm I'm loving what I'm doing that this

[5:51]  doesn't feel like work. I'm truly making a difference. What a sweet place to be in. And and you know, Mike, I talked to a lot of people that really transfer from that um corporate world, you know, into a nonprofit world and they all say how much they should have done this a lot earlier. Are you in agreeance? Oh, absolutely. Um if you sit next to me on the bus or the subway or the L train, you're going to hear why you should work for a nonprofit and it may not be a direct recruitment, but um everybody always wants to know as we do, we ask, "What do you do?" And I don't I get to not talk about my role or my title. I get to talk about our impact. And I think that's one of the things that I think just really brings us back into that service orientation for nonprofits is that it's impact. And you know, we can make a living doing this for sure, right? There's millions of us that do

[6:37]  this and we we're very passionate about it. Uh that that argument that I often get from some of my family members early in my career about but you could do this and you could have that and thinking about some of the benefits of corporate work. Agreed. it's just not where I'm going to be my best self and do my best work. So, I think having that balance of service and support, um, good luck getting us out of here once you get us in. Yeah. You know, one thing I really enjoy about just life in general and the and the line of work when it comes to um, what you're doing and other leaders in nonprofit space do is that we're here for a very limited time, right? And it's not about us. You know, when you become a parent, you realize it's definitely not about you. But then it's definitely not about us as you continue. Yeah.

[7:21]  Yeah. Exactly. But just to know, you know, that it's not about us and it's about what the legacy that we leave here, you know, and the the lives that we touch and you're put in a place where you really get to touch a lot of lives and really impact a lot of people. And it's that sweet space to be in. So, I definitely do challenge anybody that's not in the nonprofit leadership role, but they're watching this that you you go find something that you love. Find that thing that makes you happy. There's probably an organization that is around that, you know, from writing to people that want to read to, you know, there just uh sexual abuse, adoption, like there has to be something that just resonates with you that you would love to give back in that sense and you got to find that. So, um I do feel that nonprofits also tend to kind of operate with a little bit of scarcity mindset

[8:08]  just really stretching every dollar, every resources. Um, why do you think that's actually so ingrained in in leaders in the nonprofit space? From for speaking for myself, from my my 34 years of experience in this is that it's not hard to get to that point because you really are often dealing with with limited resources, whether it's financial, human, uh, support, whatever, whatever that is, there's going to be some pretty tough moments as you get your mission going, as you get success. Like higher ed right now is highly challenged by external factors.

[8:39]  And so, you know, there's moments of eb and flow. And so, it's pretty um I don't think anyone should feel bad operating in a mindset of scarcity because you are protecting the mission and its ability to serve and and that's great. But what I would offer is that when we switch that to that growth mindset and mindset of abundance and you really start thinking about your support networks, it's beyond the traditional setup of your business. Meaning, it's not just about your revenue, expenses, and and human capital. It's about your impact in the community. And when you have that impact in the community because you have that abundance mindset of opportunities are basically everywhere I look. I just get to choose which align with my mission then I think you find that the resources um you know knock on wood generally solve themselves. And that's in terms of both of the humans you get to work with and the money you need to

[9:25]  have humans be with you. I think it all kind of takes away a lot of the stress and gives you that more systems thinking like, you know, I just heard a song that that made me think about two more strategies in order to have student success at this type of campus. It just starts to like really just be this beautiful everything's got abundance to it and everything has opportunity to promote your mission. Just look for it.

[9:47]  Such a good speaker. Just listening to you. I'm just like, "Yeah, I'm in. I'm in, man. I'm listening to you." uh when you think about I think last time we spoke you you did talk about moving towards an ecosystem approach what does that really look like like in in practice can you share an ex real world example for those that may be listening yeah and let me start with as I do um I've referenced music a couple times it's it's part of what gets me uh through every day not just because of stress but because of motivation and so it's not uncommon in my basement and I will own this right now for all musicians as part of your community I can't play anything without massive of distortion because then it's all right.

[10:24]  Right? So somewhere in the basement is a big old pile of guitar strings, right? It's just a mess. But that is actually a beautiful representation of the ecosystem that our organizations work in is that somewhere in there is the right string for me to pull at the right moment for that right sound to do that right service. Right? So when you really think about uh this ecosystem mindset is that none of us truly operate independent or in silos or in verticals as as you know I think we all challenge ourselves to break out of silos but then our mission says I only do this but then there's an overlap over here of another organization that does kind of skirt what you do if not touch it a little bit so don't compete talk right and so when you're building your it's no different than building your own personal network like all of us have a personal and professional networks and sometimes there's a beautiful bleed between the

[11:11]  two. Your association works the same way. So our ecosystem is not just planning and higher ed. That's our mission. Our comm you know notice I at the beginning I said our community of practice for an inclusive program. Well that means that we got people who actually may not ever plan a minute in their life. Although everybody does.

[11:28]  That's a different thing. True. Yeah. But um but they got impact on whether or not your plan's going to be successful. So how do you get that inclusive table of conversations outside your discipline? because everything influences everything. And that goes back to your scarcity question. It's like, "Yeah, but I don't have resources for that." The resource we have that we've all been given is the ability just to talk. Just text, pick up the phone, send a letter, do an email, you know, all those things. Just connect. And I think most people in our service mindsets of nonprofits are happy to connect even if it's not 100% board approved, mission aligned. It actually probably is if you have the conversation long enough. So really just pick up the phone. I love it. And just because you said it, I wanted to show you my guitar.

[12:11]  Oh yeah, that's awesome. It look I I I don't even play guitar to be caught on honest. You talk about broken string. I got a broken string here. You know what I mean? That is absolutely perfect and amazing. And the color is typo negative for band I I grew up on. I mean that's just amazing. That's why I won't get rid of it. I had this one and I had a brown one and someone gifted me this one. And I actually tried to learn like years ago. The reason of guitar is I love the sound of a guitar. Piano and guitar has always been my thing. I just love the sound that they make. And ju just imagine how good I look if I'm playing guitar. I guess I'm not looking good though cuz I'm not playing guitar, you know. But uh you know I I love I love how you use your I'm always a sucker for when someone uses analogies that just make me smile. When you talk about

[12:57]  music, so many people can resonate with that. So when you talk about guitar strings and just pick one at the right time like I got it, you know, and I hope that some some of the people that are actually watching got it as well. And you talk about like that ecosystem. You talk about the network. Collaboration is sometimes just the buzz word. Yeah. But real collaboration is actually sometimes tougher than people believe. What's the hardest part about getting nonprofits to even work together across um different industries? Yeah, I that's a great question and I I I don't think it's from um any sort of protectionism or um obviously I got competitors. I have to make revenue. All those things are true and it's true for them too, right? So the basics of running the business are the same and I I respect that. I'm not coming to take your turf. I'm coming for us to build something together like

[13:44]  expansion, right? Again, abundance. So I think the toughest thing is often um just the constructs of associations can be restrictive by design. So, it's not just my mission, but I also have a governance structure. I have volunteers. I have a board of directors. And they obviously have a very strong voice, as they should, and where we're going. It's not always up to the executive director or CEO to determine direction or opportunity. We have to work what works best from the board's perspective. So, I think sometimes we just get a little stuck into the constructs of the governance and business and the mission.

[14:16]  And there's nothing wrong with that. I want to be careful. not criticizing anything because you also don't have time just to go go talk to everybody in your business complex. You don't have time for that. So I think that the the hard part is knowing where did you see some alignment of value or impact. So to that word where are your values aligned?

[14:33]  Don't worry about the rest of it. So if the values start to align, you're going to find collaboration opportunities. And the other thing you got to do is you just got to keep it simple. Um I you know I'm in higher ed. I'm prone to acronyms and buzzwords. not because I'm in higher ed but because I'm 34 years in the business and everything can be acronymed. You get in the habit and then you start picking up the language of those you serve. You start in my case I start sounding really academic and actually the best part of planning is this simplicity. And so we have a real strong goal here at SCUP which is clarity through brevity. That's the same approach for collaboration. If I just call up and go, "Hey man, y'all's value statements are right in our heart. Is there any way we can find 15 minutes for a cup of coffee?" That's different than calling up with a voice of collaboration and a bunch of strategy language.

[15:16]  That'll come. I think to your question, it's really about where do your values align because that's where service starts. It doesn't always start with your business plan. Hey, real quick. Have you enjoying the podcast? We first want to say thank you. And we also just want to give you a little insight of what we're up to at Francis. Some don't even realize that we're working with organizations to help them use AI to create that real human communication experiences where that's actually supporting your your families, those patients or the entire community. We're actually creating tech that connects.

[15:48]  Check it out. Francis.ai. I like that. I like that. I'm telling you, every time you're talking, I'm sitting here like, he should be a speaker. What? Are you not speaking on stages? This is so good. You're giving too much knowledge. That's very kind. Thank you. And I think how just relaxed it is like ego is just so natural like like you said at one point you said uh you were 34 years in the business. I was I thought you were going to say 34 years old. I was going to say yeah I knew we were the same age. Damn it. Oh no no I think I got a couple couple on you for sure. Yeah. All right.

[16:17]  Listen, if there was one mindset shift you wish every nonprofit leader could actually make overnight, what what would that actually be? I think the mindset shift is not just, you know, we've talked about abundance a lot and obviously um I have reminders on my whiteboard behind me about it's not like it's grant I've been doing it for a long time. I still have to remind myself. But I think the mindset shift is actually curiosity is that um when we have a definitive business plan with strategies, goals, they're all smart.

[16:44]  They're measur all the things that that's amazing. But why aren't you curious why you limited yourself to that? Aren't you curious about why you only wanted to go to X number of people served versus Y and so continue to really the mindset of curiosity which is basically and there's a lot of lot of articles out there on this great groups run this stuff but it's learning centric run a learning centric organization that mindset shift is not as simple as saying we're learning centric we do learning it's really I found it to be personally really hard because I have to every day I approach my work with I did it now I'm reflecting on it and I'm going to do it differently And bringing that curiosity and progress and abundance combined to think forward, I think is a mindset shift that starts with curiosity. So good. I want to kind of shift this a little bit. We talked

[17:31]  about mindset. We talked about the nonprofit. I want to talk about a little bit about AI just because I continue to speak to to leaders like yourself and it's like 50/50. You got people that are saying, "I love it." And you got other people saying, "Oh, no. It's going to replace human decision-m." But talk about it. What what do you think? Are are we replacing human decision- making with robots? Like what's the reality? I think some people are kind of scared, but is it something that you guys are implementing?

[17:58]  Something that you're thinking about? Yeah, absolutely. Um, and we actually have an encouraged use policy and it's in everybody's job description, including my own. All 18 job descriptions at SCUP have this written into it. And what we mean by an encourage use policy is that we you are expected to use AI tools within the confines of your role and within the guidelines of the organization's policy.

[18:20]  So uh early on in this journey two years ago when everything kind of took off, we were very careful about putting anything in any machine that gave attribution to anything, right? We weren't sure where all that was going. As we got into more subscription models and now that it's embedded in half of the software that we just had licenses for, we encourage people to use this to find effectiveness in this order. find effectiveness in your job which can bear efficiency but mostly leads to time recovery so that you can look at people and less at computers. So if I can optimize the effectiveness of my work I have more time to pick up that phone and make that call to make that connection. I have more time to just sit and reflect and think about doing things differently. I can bring curiosity in more. So using AI for effectiveness which can bear efficiency but really thinking through um help me ask better questions so I can

[19:09]  go talk to a human with better questions right so using AI for learning how to ask a better question being curious but then don't let that work be your work now go do the human work so so yes there are some positions and no doubt that will like any automation moments in our industrial history will be lost to the to the machines but at the same time I I think a lot of the jobs particularly those of us in the service sector good luck taking the human centricity out of our work help us ask better questions so we can make better decisions. So what we in our use policy it's like use it for effectiveness and efficiency but make decisions with humans.

[19:45]  Yeah. I believe I believe that it is a resource. It's a tool. Yeah. You know it's it that's really what it is. I think um so many people think it's going to take the driver's seat and um it's not. It's really going to buy us back time. One of the biggest things that we always say we don't have is time. I don't have time to work out. I don't have time to get on a call. I don't have time for this meeting. But you really do. You know, now you have something that allows you to buy back so much time, especially when it comes to like projects and things like that because let's be honest, some some projects if you did not do with AI today could take you months and now it's taking you minutes and maybe it could even take you days, but it really decreases a lot of the things that you're able to do. I mean, from grant writing, you know, I guess one of the big what is a big misconception that you think um nonprofit leaders have about AI right

[20:34]  now? It's a great question. It's also really hard. So, um because of the systems thinking that showed up in me when I arrived on Earth, um I form a lot of my own mastermind groups with people from other industries so that we can just have these conversations very similar to what you and I are doing, right? Have these conversations about why won't your staff use it? why won't you use it? And there's all kinds of answers, but a lot of it has to do, I think, with um it's scarcity and fear. And I don't disrespect that. I don't anybody who's chosen not to use it, I am not being disrespectful, but I would encourage you to to just keep informed because pretty soon it's, you know, and I did this with my son. Uh he's 23 and he's like, I'm not sure I'm going to use an AI. I'm like, you just ordered off of Amazon, you used AI, right? So, keep up with it.

[21:22]  you don't have to implement it, but don't pretend like it's going to go away. Um, we have to kind of embrace it. So, in that fear and scarcity mindset, I do think some of my colleagues who I've talked to, the reason they're not using it is they really truly at this point don't trust that it's not violating uh an ethics commitment they've made to their membership for privacy or other and I respect all of that and we're still very careful with any attribution of anything we put in there. You know, if the machines can figure out it's Mike Moss, well, then they're great. That's great machine. but we don't tell them it's Mike Moss. So, I think there's some of that. I think there's a a very strong reason for for protectionism of privacy and your members data and your members outputs and your member value because I do think that's the one I hear the most is if the machines get really good at this, the association will cease to exist. Same argument like you talked about with humans won't have these jobs.

[22:11]  I really because we're nonprofits, because we're serviceoriented, that human connection will never be lost. It will be only be enhanced if we learn to use the tools correctly. Whatever that means for you. I I uh I remember something and this may show a little bit of your age here, but remember when you told me that when you started your career before email was even a thing.

[22:34]  Now we're in a space we're talking about AI having AI assistance like how has truly the nonprofit leadership changed in just digital age for you? Yeah. Yeah. So yes, thank you for now confirming to everybody 60s. That's great. So those of us born in the 60s probably started our career um as I did. I mentioned that first job. I kind of fell into nonprofit work and I had a board of directors I reported to. So every Friday I keystroked out a report. I ran it over to the copier. I made enough copies to put into enough envelopes to mail to my bosses with a weekly update. Like here's what we did this week. They then received that on Wednesday. Well, I'm already halfway through whatever I think I'm supposed to be doing the next week without correction because they don't know what I'm doing yet. And then I'm writing another one two days later.

[23:18]  Right? So, we did these weekly updates and it literally was through snail mail and it worked out just fine. Right? We found our cadence. Then everything got busy, right? So, when we started using email and all the other things, uh there's a term you probably remember sneakeret where I would literally floppy run it over to you to give you data because the networks didn't exist in my first couple jobs. It was sneakeret. So, as we started to progress in all this, the speed of communication was awesome, but I don't think at first and for me, it did not affect the speed of decision-m because we still were waiting for those moments of meetings to have those discussions and then there was this gap and you mail out or email minutes and then you'd have a a conversation. And now where I think we progressed, which is so beautiful, is that we're mostly convening to confer and we're doing the work between meetings and we're able to collaborate constantly as required. Not, you know,

[24:06]  you don't have to overdo it, but like just things like Slack, right? While we've been talking, my Slack is lighting up because people got ideas, they got questions, they got thoughts, and they don't have to lose that to the mail and take four days to get it to me. And they also don't expect an immediate response because we set up those understandings.

[24:23]  So I think it's just that opportunity to globally and in that ecosystem to ideulate is what's been so awesome about going from mailing letters to my bosses to collaborating with them in real time and then coming to a meeting and having that human connection to make the decisions. Over time through all these journeys of just technology evolving for us was there ever a moment that you were just thinking no way this would actually work. Um, but you were proven wrong like technology-wise, whether it was email, whether it was the Google search. That's a great question. I don't think I ever wondered if it was going wrong, but I wondered if we were relying on it too much, which of course brings us back to the question you asked about AI, right?

[25:06]  Is I think some of the amount of time that myself and colleagues were spending on making sure this thing was exactly as it should be because it's going to be everything. Whether that was and like to your question, whether that was an email or some sort of really fancy pants PowerPoint, right? All that stuff. I think our reliance on that tech to drive decisions and curiosity was probably a little over overdone. And so taking that lesson into the AI, I think is why we have this encouraged use practice of as for your role, use it as appropriate, but for others, it may be extensive. But don't in all cases just don't I think the mistake I made with tech was thinking it was going to bring me that proverbial 20our work week and that that was never the case. It was generative.

[25:48]  Not at all. It was generative, right? You know, as I'm sitting here and thinking about technology and innovation, I just think floppy disc. Like we're just showing age today. I just want you to know that you are not alone. I remember before we had USB drives, we had floppy. I still have a floppy disc. I would love to know what the hell is on it. But I get got to find a computer that can take that, you know.

[26:17]  Um, think about mentoring a young nonprofit leader today, right? You talked about your time at some point has to come to an end. Um, if you had to mentor a young nonprofit leader today, what's that one thing you'd tell them about just navigating change? Because change is definitely going to happen. Um, read everything outside of your industry. Right? So, I'm I'm a certified association professional, so I obviously have training. I I keep myself up on trends and governance practices, all that. But the majority of my reading is spent learning about other industries, other leadership practices, other reasons why things have su succeeded and failed. So, I think the the ability what's been awesome about this tech, whether it's like we're doing with with pod and video and all the things that I can't explain on social media, but

[27:04]  what's great about it is the amount of information has never been more accessible. So, don't just limit yourself to the discipline you think you're going to be on. Take take a divergent path in your learning because that will give you the path for where you're going to take your leadership. That's so good. That's so good. I'm taking it all to I am that young uh nonprofit leader and I'm learning every single day. Um, it ain't easy. It's not easy. It's not easy. Um, last time we talked about you talked about being outdoors. You love outdoors. You love spending that time.

[27:37]  Do you think leaders need to spend more time outside like how does that actually keep you grounded? Oh, that's Yeah, absolutely. That um about 3 weeks from now, if we had been doing this recording at that time, I'd be on my patio, right? Because uh I do my best thinking when I'm in the the open air. And that came from my youth, right? I grew up on a bayou in Houston and I am the meme that represents Gen X is like see be see be be see be see be see a dinner mom and we disappeared to the bayou and we came back for dinner right so that outdoors was a very much a part of my upbringing and everything that it brought me in terms of of just basic joy right so one of the things that I need to do if I'm really getting down in it uh I'm stuck I'm struggling is hit the garden and when I hit the garden I don't stop thinking about work it's not that on and off but I think about it differently and so as I look at my um my my strawberry

[28:26]  patch that also has onions intertwined into it because they're good partners. Just take our board for that. It's awesome. How much grows? So when you do all that, it starts me thinking about systems again or it starts me thinking about collaboration like why are these two things working? Why is this weed showing up here but not all the things right? So it helps me I think grounds myself in the sense that it's not as complicated as I left work thinking it was. It's as simple as so when I can ground myself outside, even if I just go for a walk with my dog, sit on the patio, um you know, whatever, doesn't matter. Work out outside, whatever it is, um it grounds me back to it's just as simple as so get back to your work with that mindset. And then I usually at that point I can get back to a more productive self. Mike, this is going to be very random. It's like the guitar, but one moment.

[29:12]  I think I told you I was a plant last time we That's awesome, man. You're doing good, too. There's there's a where's there's a somewhere another one here. Anyway, somewhere else. I have so many in here. I have at home. I have 50. We just got into growing vegetables though, you know, cuz I realize I have a green thumb. And it's the funniest thing is people come to my house and and want to my wife that the plants look good. I get really upset like excuse me my wife will kill these plants like I did this you know and now I said you I gotta take a step further I got to get into actually doing my own vegetables so now I know who to call what was it strawberry and onions is that what you said strawberries and onions very much complent each other in our garden and then we also have tomatoes and zucchini and squash and

[30:00]  cucumbers and and and you have all that in your backyard I have so much space my like back there just looks almost like a little forest It's a lot of trees. I got I hate it cuz it's like you rake and you pick up leaves and it's back there again. But I hear you can compost these le like there's so many things that I'm learning about him, right? So, and then I'm seeing people with these nice gardenings in the back and they're growing everything. My my my kids eat vegetables. I'm not a vegetable eater, but my wife and kids do. That saved me money, you know? I like that. And what you just described was a leadership journey, right? So, as you think about how you put together the soils and you do the things and the leaves and the compost, that's all I'm doing here with my my amazing group of 17 people I work with is how do we combine them into teams and how do we bring out the cross functionality? It's the same thing. So, that's what I mean. When I'm out there

[30:47]  in the garden, I can get to the simplest and as simple as to come back and be a better person for them because I I feel refreshed. I feel grounded, but I also still thought about it, but I didn't think about it in a way that got me all, you know, twisted. I I love plants. I mean it comes definitely from my mom. I used to water plants when I was younger and and if I was to overwater those plants I would hear from my mom like she would let me know that they were over watered but and I didn't know I I look at it right is it helps with the mindset when you realize like I've had this plant I had one plant and I just remember it looking like it was dead you know but when I took it out of that pot and I put it in a new place new dirt new surrounding it's alive today you know and it grew and I'm like wow it's like life a lot of the times we want to know Why are we not growing? Why are we not, you know, producing? But are you in the

[31:35]  right environments? Um, so that's how like when I people like plants, I'm like, yeah, it's like life. You just don't get it. And I always have to get analogy. So I love how you also give the analogy of the gardening aspect and and it's really good for people to kind of see it that way, especially that gardening. No, that's if I had a plus 100 button on here, I'd figure it out.

[31:53]  But that was awesome because I think that that's why most of us do it, right? Getting a little dirt on your fingers for those of us who like that. It really is the best I can give myself in a day. Love it, man. We're going to start wrapping up here in a bit. Um, couple of questions before we get to that blind question. If someone wants to get involved with your organization or really learn more about this ecosystem approach, where should they start? Um, obviously we have a website, soc.org. Uh, would love anybody to come in there. I'm all over the place with connections, so you can hit me if you see something you like. you can hit me with see you see something that's confusing but just give it a give it a look and then see how that integrated planning approach could apply to your work because it is not designed only for higher ed that's our application of this approach this integrated approach really is about building community for service in whatever way that means to you so I

[32:40]  would love to see how people would take that information and then apply it to their missions and to their their impacts impact moments um and also if you want to get involved just ping me love it yeah I mean I was going to ask you what's one challenge you put out there for nonprofit leaders, but it seems like you just did it. So, we don't got to think about Listen, you're always ahead of the game. This is why I love this conversation. If there's one thing you hope people walk away remembering from this conversation, what would that what is it? Do reflect, do differently, make that part of your daily mantra.

[33:12]  I love it. All right, Mike, the final question, the fun time. Before we wrap it up, we always have that tradition on the show that the last guest left a blind question for you, not knowing that you were the blind, you know, that you were the person that was going to be interviewing. But the question is, if you can go back and do it all over again from the beginning, what would you do different in the nonprofit world?

[33:38]  That is an awesome question. I would So, I'm going back into the nonprofit. What would I do different? I would have been a faster learner about community ecosystems and connections that are outside of my teammates, outside of my boss, right? Okay. I think it took me a minute to get there because I was a good company person, right? I was doing what I was supposed to do and that was there's nothing wrong with that. But what I would do differently now is I would go back and really just from the jump start exploring those ecosystems of value alignment versus just working with those who are mission aligned. Yep. I agree. I love how you say, you know, I was that good employee, did everything right because, you know, we do. We go into the work field and we do everything right and I feel sometimes they just don't see our value. But taking things away from it is the biggest thing. So, I

[34:24]  love it. I love that. That was your answer. So, now I'll put you in the hot seat. So, for the next guest that we get on the uh whether it's me or Keenan, we always love that that question from leaders like yourself. So, what is your blind question to the next leader? 15 years after you retire, what is the societal impact that your organization has made? M you're getting deep here, Mike. Yeah, getting deep here. Bracketed qualifier for this would be not in terms of your personal legacy, but how are the people's lives different because of the work you started doing today? I love that question. I love that question. I'm hoping that I get to ask that question and not Kenan. Mike, it has been such a blast with you, man. I I knew since we got on that it was going to be a great conversation. I sorry for those that have come before you, but you really set the standard of what it looks like to be

[35:12]  on the Heart of Hustle podcast. Guys, if you're still watching, please make sure that you guys do share, subscribe, make sure you guys are checking out what Mike is doing, his mission, and if you want to be a part, he just mentioned just ping him. He's so available now that he's using AI that he has time. He bought time back.

[35:28]  Guys, this is Mike Moss. My name is E Frane, Heart and Hustle Podcast. We'll catch you guys in the next one. Lers. Peace.