Storytelling & mission metrics: Turning data into impact for nonprofits

Introduction: Storytelling and metrics for mission impact

Jill Holtz: Welcome to the Leading with Purpose podcast, where we share practical advice to help mission-driven organizations strengthen governance and lead with confidence. I'm your host, Jill Holtz from Diligent, and as it's National Nonprofit Day this month, I'm bringing you a topic that's really relevant for nonprofits, all about storytelling and metrics for mission impact. Because when organizations can connect the data behind their work with the human stories behind their mission, they create a much clearer picture of impact for the board, donors, funders, and the communities they serve.

In this conversation, we explore why stories are such a powerful tool for non-profit boards, for board members, how organizations can identify the right mission metrics, how leadership teams can use data more strategically, not just collect it.

We also talk about the role that storytelling and measurement plays in building trust, strengthening fundraising, and keeping boards connected to Mission Impact throughout the year. And do listen to the end to find out Dottie and Jennifer's top tips for using storytelling to advance the mission.

Meet the guests

Jill Holtz: Today I'm joined by two fantastic guests. First of all, I'm delighted to welcome Jennifer McKenzie, who is founder and principal consultant at Organised Synergy. Jennifer helps nonprofits measure, communicate, and amplify their impact through strategic planning, evaluation, and mission-focused storytelling. So welcome, Jennifer.

Jennifer McKenzie: Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me. You're very welcome.

Jill Holtz: I'm also thrilled to have a past guest rejoin the podcast. Welcome Dottie Schindlinger, Executive Director of the Diligent Institute and a founding member of Board Effect. Dottie is also the chair of the governance committee on the board of the Foundation for Delaware County, a community foundation in suburban Philadelphia. And she's a recognized thought leader in nonprofit governance, board effectiveness, and the role technology plays in helping organizations achieve their mission. So you're really welcome to, Dottie.

Dottie Schindlinger: Thanks so much, Jill. It's good to be with both of you.

Why storytelling matters for nonprofit boards

Jill Holtz: I'd like to start with why storytelling matters for nonprofits. So if I could start with you, Jennifer, can I ask you why stories are such a powerful tool for board members? What do stories communicate that numbers alone can't?

Jennifer McKenzie: That's such a good question. and the thing that comes to mind for me is because board members are not part of the organization on a day-to-day, stories are a great vehicle for allowing the mission, the measurements, the meaning, the why. and the impact to be able to travel. You know, I think about oral history for so long, that's the way that we communicated. That's how we were able to share insights from person to person that allowed us to be able to just transform just as communities and, you know, just really as a society. And I think it's the same thing for nonprofit organizations. I think for nonprofit boards, it's a way to be connected to the mission and to remember the things that's meaningful. For me, I think a lot of times board members feel underequipped to be able to really kind of go out and be the champion for the organization because they're concerned with remembering really detail-y things that maybe the leadership team typically speaks about or the program team typically speaks about.

And I think that board members shouldn't feel pressured to communicate about the organization in the same way that someone that's inside of the organization living it every day. But when you have really good pointing to it stories to tell. I think that's the way that board members can remember what's meaningful so that they can share that information and be the champions and the ambassadors for the work.

Jill Holtz: Dottie, from a board and governance perspective, why should directors care about organizational storytelling?

Dottie Schindlinger: Well, Jennifer's absolutely right. I mean, first of all, storytelling is so essential to who we are as humans, right? This is how we learn. When we're little kids, we learn through stories. When we are, you know, talking to each other, the thing we remember most are the compelling stories that we tell and that we hear. And so as a board member, I think what's so important is being able to tell that story in a way that is compelling both to the board member and to the people that they're representing the organization to. I mean, it's really part and parcel of being a good board member, as Jennifer put it, to be a good ambassador and to share information about the organization broadly. And if you can tell about the organization in a compelling, memorable story.

It's going to stick with the person you're speaking to, whether that's a policymaker, whether that's a prospective donor or partner, whether that's, you know, a member or constituent of the organization, being able to represent why you're on the board, why you're passionate about the mission in a memorable story is the most compelling approach.

Choosing mission metrics that move the needle

Jill Holtz: Love that. I'd really like to pick your brains next about mission metrics and measurements. So Dottie, from the board's perspective, what are the most important questions directors should ask about mission performance and outcomes?

Dottie Schindlinger: As board members, we're always really wanting to make sure that the organization is continuing to head in the direction of its mission. And in order to be able to do that, we need to know what to measure. You know, what are what should we be looking at? And so, board members, it's helpful to have conversations around what are the numbers that really move the mission forward and then to keep an eye on those dials, really come up with some type of a dashboard view or, you know, a scorecard view that just helps us understand are we still going in the right direction? And sometimes I think the things that get put onto those kinds of dashboards and scorecards aren't necessarily the right metrics, right? They might be metrics that are easy to measure, but they don't necessarily correlate to whether or not the mission is being met, right? So for example, let's say that our organization runs an event. Does the number of people that show up at the event actually equal success? Or, you know, is that just one output of the event? So do we really want to try to find other metrics that tell the story better? And that can be some hard work, but it doesn't have to be expensive work. It just has to be something that you're thoughtful about and that you spend some time really talking about what are the things we need to keep an eye on to ensure that we're still heading in the right direction.

Jill Holtz: So, Jennifer, from your experience, when you talk about measuring impact, that's a term that people use all the time. How do organizations go about identifying those right mission metrics that Dottie said? And it's not necessarily the number of people that came to the event, but how do how do you go about finding those to measure ultimately how you're moving the needle towards your goal that you're trying to achieve?

Jennifer McKenzie: The three things that come up for me is how do we mine that information? I think a lot of times organizations feel kind of put on spot. They're trying to look at maybe what their collaborators, you know, really competitors, but like what are other organizations measuring? Because we are competing for dollars, right? And so we want to be able to tell a story and to be able to say, hey, we're on par with some of these other types of organizations. And they may not necessarily be measuring something that is meaningful for their organization. Sometimes they might look at best practices. And so maybe there's, you know, some research and maybe they read something, was like, we're also interested in that, but it may not necessarily speak to how do we move the needle to measure that organization's advancement towards their mission.

So I like to look at three things. Typically, it's going to be stakeholder interviews, it's going to be a board retreat, and then yes, some market research. I say stakeholder interviews because it's a good way of having a 360 review of the organization, right? So you want to see the organization from the point of view of the funder, of the board, of program staff, of leadership, and then whoever other valuable stakeholders are, because there are ways in which you are seen.

I like to use like a Jihari windows perspective, which is you have blind spots and hidden spots. And so when you do a stakeholder interview process, it allows you to be able to see things that maybe you're blind to as an organization. And so it's a fresh thing to say, well, what's meaningful to staff? What do they need to be able to do their work, to be able to advance it? You know.

What do funders actually care about? Maybe they don't care about the number of people that serve. Maybe they care about is this a sustainable or scalable project? And are you pulling the data that supports that? So I think stakeholder interviews are really, really good at being able to identify the different points of use and what data is important to them to be able to tell a compelling story. I think board retreats are a great resource for boards to be able to get together to look at the organization and to consider what are the things that are of interest to us, what are things that are exciting to us? And how are we co-seeing this organization? because what might be important for four board members might not be important for another five.

So getting on the same page to look at the organization and to understand, you know, how are we going to be able to make decisions from a governance perspective and what numbers are important and what information do we need in order for us to make those types of decisions? And I think that's moving a different type of needle. I think sometimes we're looking about moving the needle as it relates to the mission, but then you also have to think about the business of the nonprofit. And so what numbers matter there? That's going to be something that's totally different.

And then the last thing is the market research piece. I think market research is very critical because it allows you to see what's out there, you know, what new reports may have come out. maybe you're using outdated language, maybe using outdated data points, right? And so I think that market research is important just to make sure that your metrics are still relevant to the community at large.

Aligning strategic goals, programmes and impact measurement

Jill Holtz: That's excellent advice. I mean, you've both really talked there about as well the challenge of you collect data, but is it the right meaningful data? It is it are we using that data strategically? Jennifer, what are some practical ways that leadership teams can look to align, you know, the strategic goals, the programs and that impact measurement?

Jennifer McKenzie: That's so hard to say, honestly, as I'm sitting here thinking about it. What are some practical ways? And I and I think I struggle with that question sometimes because what's practical to one organization may not necessarily feel practical to another. So I'll give an example. My fallback answer is typically do a strategic plan, right? Like I think that's the thing that's going to help you to be able to see the entire organization, what are our goals and what are our metrics? We're all familiar with what a strategic plan is. But as I think about more early stage nonprofit organizations, and this isn't based off of number of years they've been in an organization or a number of years they've been in existence. This is based off of their level of development. And I think the answer changes. So I remember working with some earlier early stage nonprofits, and strategic planning was they didn't have enough knowledge, enough experience in the nonprofit space to be able to put together a compelling strategic plan.

And so one of the things that one of the clients, as we were doing some discovery, we came up with the concept of strategic exploration, right? and this is this the process that you take again of going out and really learning what's important and understanding what's happening in the field. And so I think practically that means having conversations. I think being part of coalitions is a great opportunity to understand what strategies have been tried, what strategies are working, what strategies may not work, what strategies may or may not be relevant, and what strategies are fundable. I think having strategic conversations are important. I think as we think about practical ways for leadership teams to align that work, I hate to sound like a broken record, but it's all about relationships. It's all about how do we get everyone in the room so that we can co-see the work.

I think leaders need to empower their teams to identify what the problems are within the organization or opportunities and really supporting the staff that are what we like to say boots on the ground, supporting them in being able to help come up with strategies. I think we've all been part of organizations where the strategies come from the top. And I just don't think that typically works because it creates a lot of resistance.

And we're trying to figure out like why strategies aren't working. And it's not that the strategies are ineffective. I think the way that we come up with the strategies might be ineffective. And so I think for leadership teams, how do we get our program staff in the room and empower them to come up with the strategies? And then we document them, of course, we fund them. we approve them, we might refine them. But I think leadership teams all by themselves really aren't equipped because we have blind spots.

At least that's how I think about it. I don't know, Dottie, what are your thoughts?

Dottie Schindlinger: So, Jennifer, I think, you know, from a from a board, first of all, agree with everything that you said, right? It really depends on your stage of development. It just it depends on what you're trying to accomplish. I think from a board perspective, you know, we're trying to figure out how to align what are the strategic objectives with the numbers and the metrics and what to measure. When I think about it from a board perspective, we just want to make sure that whatever numbers we are looking at actually tell the story of whether or not we're meeting the goals. It's very simple to say that out loud. It can be very hard to put into practice, but I'll give an example, concrete example, right? So one of the things that the board does at every meeting is look at the financials. And as a board member, I'm always looking at that financial report kind of against what we say our strategy is, or kind of against what we say our mission is or our core values are, to see if the financials tell that same story. And it is sometimes quite surprising when it doesn't. So maybe we say, you know, the most important thing for us is to invest in this program. And then you look at the financials, and the cost centers have nothing to do with that program. Right. So, you know, we're not staffing up there. We're not providing enough operating support to that program. Instead, all the cost centers are elsewhere. And so that would be a really useful thing to know as a board member to start a conversation. I mean, Jennifer's totally right. All of this is about having good conversations. And at the end of the day, sort of the point of having these metrics is to start a conversation. So you can ask questions and really sort of try to understand why are we making the choices we're making? Are we making the right choices? Do we need to make other choices? That's really what it's about. So if you can kind of look at that alignment from what we say we want to do and have we in fact proven that that is what we are doing. That's really what you're trying to do with metrics and with alignment.

Using storytelling and measurement to strengthen fundraising

Jill Holtz: I love that. And I really love the expression used a few minutes ago, Jennifer, for talking about strategic exploration. And to some extent, that's what you've just described, Dottie. You're exploring, do the numbers match you know, what we're telling ourselves as well. So I think that's really impactful. Let's talk next about fundraising because that's often where both storytelling and measurement can really come together. So, Dottie, if I could start with you, how can boards help ensure the organization is communicating its impact effectively to donors, prospective funders, stakeholders.

Dottie Schindlinger: Well, for many, many nonprofit organizations that say the vast majority of nonprofit organizations, the board plays a pretty critical role in fundraising. And that can take a lot of different forms, right? I know a lot of my board peers get really nervous when we start talking about board members doing fundraising because they think, my gosh, you're going to make me ask all my friends for money and I don't want to do that. but there's so much more to it than that. That I mean, maybe that's one thing that you might do if you're so inclined. But the more important role that you play is in helping to tell a compelling story that really inspires donors to want to join your team. So you really need to understand kind of what is driving you, board member, to be a board member of this organization. Why are you passionate about this? What is it about this mission that speaks to you? And then be able to articulate that in a way that is genuine and authentic and ties to the mission of the organization.

You can open doors, you can help make connections to donors and to money, you can show up at meetings. You know, at the end of the day, usually the ask is handled by typically a staff member if you have a paid staff. But you know, you can do everything but that. And then you can also be an incredible ambassador in thanking donors, right? This is something that I find we don't ask board members to do often enough. Just a thank you. It could be a handwritten note, it could be walking up to someone at an event, shaking their hand and saying, thank you so much for your support, it's critical for us. That really matters. And that is a role that I think every board member can and should play in helping to make sure that the organization has the resources it needs to carry out its business. At the end of the day, that's part of our fiduciary obligation. We have to make sure the organization has the resources it needs to carry out its business. And we need to make sure that that's happening. You know, if we're not doing it ourselves, we have to make sure that it is happening. So I think being able to tell a compelling story and just understanding your role in that process is incredibly important.

Jill Holtz: I love that. And I love the fact that it's a scale from giving yourself, getting your friends and network to give, helping turn up, you know, thanking a simple thank you and how effective that can be. I love that. Jennifer, in your experience, what makes that your story? How do you get that fundraising ready? How do you combine the emotional resonance with the credible evidence as well?

Jennifer McKenzie: Yeah, no, that's good. And I'll kind of piggyback on some of the two earlier things that I mentioned, right? Which the stakeholder interviews are really important. So hopefully you've had you've had a conversation about your organization. Typically using a third party makes funders more comfortable with sharing maybe things they may not necessarily be comfortable sharing with you directly. And then having the board retreat as an opportunity for you to really kind of understand what information and insight do board members need to be able to tell that story. And then all of that is mined and used to what I like to refer to as the case for support. I think most organizations should have a case for support that speaks broadly about the organization, the why the organization exists, what problem does it exist to solve, how does it go about solving that particular challenge. And then I think having impact ready statements that speak to different types of funders, right? So most of the time we might be thinking about corporate foundations, community foundations, government grant makers, right? Even maybe even faith-based, you know, foundations. And the way that you tell the story, the things that the funder cares about is going to be different. The organization doesn't change and the work doesn't change, but how we communicate it to a community foundation who is normally focused on the geography, right?

So here in Ohio, we have, you know, the Cincinnati Foundation, the Clemens Foundation, right? So they're concerned with their particular city and the surrounding counties. And so you really want to be able to speak to why is this work important to that specific community? Right. And yes, they might have some issue areas. Government grant makers, they care about something different altogether. So I think having a way to communicate, here is how we communicate our mission to those different points of view is going to be a game changer. And what I found in my experience is that it gives board members confidence to speak to the types of foundations and funders that they care most about. Maybe your organization can also fundraise from business owners, right? And so I think that particular case for support and being able to have impact statements for each of the different types of funders. I think it arms your board members with the type of insights and the type of impact statements that are relevant that they feel comfortable with. So now they can say, I feel comfortable really, you know, I do a lot of advocacy, I'm in the government space, you know, I'm willing to share our story and I have a couple of sound bites that I think are going to be relevant for them. Same thing for a community foundation. I think that's amazing.

Building trust with authentic stories and credible proof points

Jill Holtz: I think that's excellent advice having that ready to hand kind of snippets to lift and use and to build that trust with the stakeholders. So obviously beyond fundraising, storytelling and your metrics that you talk about play a major role in trust. And without trust, you know, nonprofits in trouble. So Dottie, talk to me about how using storytelling combined with metrics in a way that isn't too data heavy can help make information feel authentic and accessible.

Dottie Schindlinger: Well, again, I mean, it goes back to something that Jennifer said right at the beginning of our conversation about, you know, storytelling being so essential to kind of who we are as people, right? And it's so essential to how humans learned language and learned conversation. You know, if you can tell a really compelling story, it might be the one and only thing that someone remembers. You know, even in today's conversation, we're talking about a lot of different things. And I guarantee what people will most remember are the stories that Jennifer and I are telling. So telling a compelling story often is the only thing that matters.

But then if you can add to it a couple of proof points to say this isn't just a good story, it's a true story. That then gives it additional credibility and additional weight that someone can take and maybe repeat. You know, you never know what someone is going to latch on to, right? I'm a data nerd. So if someone tells me a really good stat, I'm gonna remember that, right? But others might remember a really powerful emotion that they felt when you told a story, or they might remember something specific about the individuals involved. So it's good to be able to tell a short story that's memorable.

That has a few of these key elements that that is memorable for the listener, regardless of sort of what's the thing that's going to drive them. So you want to try to you try to come up with those stories that are compelling. I think as well, numbers are great if you're talking about what you want to achieve, the vision stuff. So we would like to serve, you know, 80% of families who have this issue, whatever it is. A number is a really good thing for someone to latch on to as well, is that emotional story.

Jill Holtz: Jennifer, do you have anything else to add to that?

Jennifer McKenzie: The only thing that came up for me as you were speaking, Dottie, was that how storytelling can generate curiosity. Because, like you, I'm I definitely am a data nerd. And if you say something that's really interesting, you know, a word that I've never heard of before, interesting stat, I'm gonna go right to the computer. I'm gonna do some more research, right? Which then that curiosity kind of helps me to continue to be engaged, to kind of pulls me in further into the mission if I'm now doing additional, you know, research on something that you said. And so I just wonder how storytelling and curiosity go together. And should we be thinking about curios curiosity as the forefront of the emotion that we're trying to generate to keep people engaged in the story?

Dottie Schindlinger: I love that so much, Jennifer, because you know, you're so right on that, you know, at the end of the day, what you really want is for people to hear a story and then do something with it. Not just hear a story and it resonated with them and great, but to really do something. And so to your point, if we can build curiosity, that's a great outcome. Because you're right. They're going to stay engaged because they are curious, because it fields something in them. And then they want to take action on it. I think that's a really good idea.

How board technology keeps mission impact visible

Jill Holtz: So let's talk next about technology. Obviously at Diligent we sell BoardEffect. We're passionate about how our software helps nonprofit and volunteer boards be better at governance, remission, impact. Dottie, many nonprofit boards use technology like BoardEffect to support their governance. How does that help the board stay connected to those, you know, mission metrics, organizational outcomes, the story that we're telling?

Dottie Schindlinger: Well, at the risk of dating myself, I've been in this world of board governance technology now for over 20 years. So I will tell you, I do yes, most organizations these days have some system that they use to communicate around board meetings and get board materials out to their members and so on. But I will tell you that in my humble opinion, a lot of organizations barely scratch the surface of what that technology could do for them. And I'll give a couple of examples, right? I've just taken on the chair role here at the Foundation for Delaware County of the Governance Committee. And, you know, we had a space in our board effect platform for the governance committee's work. And when I go in and look at it, it's really just, you know, a collection of minutes and a collection of meeting materials. It does not, however, lend itself to a true board recruitment effort or create an onboarding experience for new directors where they can do some self-study. You know, you can create sort of a workroom just for new directors where they can go in and poke around and learn about the history of the organization at their own pace, right? Look at past minutes, look at the the bylaws, look at some of the policies, maybe see some of the big things that have moved the organization over time. Right. I'm I really want to plan to use our board effect platform differently for the governance committee. So I'm outing myself to my committee members who I'm going to be meeting with on July 30th. I just took over the chair roll. Right. I just took over the chair role on July 1st. So get ready, folks. you know, what we're going to be doing is really using it as a staging area to organize all of our efforts. We have we have two big things we have to do in the next, sorry, three big things we have to do in the next year. One is we have a big recruitment effort because we've had a big rotation of people that were retiring off the board. So we have to bring in new members. So we need to organize that process. We also have a couple of new members that we need to onboard. So we need to create a whole onboarding experience, not just a two-hour orientation meeting. But let's face it, onboarding really takes a year to 18 months. So it's not, it's not a sprint, it's a marathon. So we need to kind of create a very reasonable bite-sized at a time process that they can go through. And I want to use BoardEffect to help with that. And then the third thing is ongoing board development because we have some areas of education and engagement that we really need to focus some time on. And BoardEffect can be a huge, huge helper in this. It can be huge tool for this. So I really want to rethink this platform from being a place to store stuff to being an active, engaged ecosystem where we're really doing work together. That's that I'm going to be trying to make that happen. So wish me luck all. I'll let you know how it goes.

Jill Holtz: We'll have to come back and talk to you about that. I think that's exciting. And it's about about thinking that you've invested in this platform. How can we really use it to help with that impact and to achieve the goals.

Dottie Schindlinger: Exactly. I mean, I just I just feel like, you know, it's so underutilized and there's so much more that you can do. And why wouldn't you? You have this tool at your disposal. Why why not just use it? So we're gonna we're gonna see how it goes.

Jill Holtz: Jennifer, do you have anything to add to the whole technology supporting discussion?

Jennifer McKenzie: Yeah. I'm over here like super excited. And I don't know if it's because I've had too much matcha or what, but what you're saying resonates so much, Dottie. Like I think just your leadership style, I can just tell that it really is transformational. You know, I don't think that there's a lot of people that think about that work in that way. and so just thank you for your excitement and your foresight and your forethought, all the things and even you're not on my committee, Jennifer. They might not like it. They may not like it to start. But they will love the results, right? Like it's the joy, you know, it's the ju right. It's the joy that happens after the fact, right? but the thing that comes to mind for me that I think what you're saying that makes it so brilliant, is something that comes up for me when I think about board members and we're usually thinking about board recruitment, board development. We almost never talk about board cultivation. And I think what you're talking about, this tool allows for board cultivation. A lot of times we have board members that are sitting in seats, and the expectation is that they're bringing money to the table, right? And so they're also, by definition, funders and donors, but we don't treat them like they're funders and donors in that same way. And so what you're saying just resonates so much that this tool can be used for and should be used for board cultivation. And I think that that literally transforms the organization. How can we expect people to sit in a particular seat to do a particular type of job, but we're not really giving them the resources to do that? And trying to communicate that just in meetings or a designated, you know, orientation is just not going to get you there. Yep. Thank you. I hope I hope they agree. Okay. Fingers crossed.

Jill Holtz: And you mentioned, you know, not just thinking of as storing the minutes, but you know, your reports are there, your market research that you talked about, Jennifer, putting that in one place, your dashboards, your strategic plan, tracking, obviously board materials, but the survey tools and using them strategically to sort of sense check how things are going with the board and the impact so that that mission performance remains visible throughout the year, not just kind of once in a while or board members that they really feel connected in between the board meetings as well.

Jennifer McKenzie: Wait, can I say one more thing? Yeah, I'm sorry, I want to say one more thing. And I don't know, this might get cut out, I'm not sure. But what it reminds me of, there's a there's a book by Daniel Priestley by the name of Oversubscribed. And he talks about some research that Google did that says that you know, organizations that are trying to sell, they should have seven hours of bingeable content. And that is what allows for people to feel like they know, like, and trust that particular business. I think it's the same thing for a nonprofit, right? Nonprofits are, you know, tax exempt businesses. And what you're talking about, Jill and Dottie and being able to have a reservoir of information that board members can essentially binge on about the organization that you're asking them to step into a leadership role on like what does that mean to help them to feel fully like indoctrinated into the work and prepare to be an ambassador. So that's it.

Using AI responsibly for storytelling and impact analysis

Jill Holtz: Excellent. Yeah. I love that. So I did just want to ask you about something that is just literally on everyone's mind, and that's AI, artificial intelligence. Jennifer, what opportunities do you see for AI to help nonprofits with the kind of storytelling and measurement of impact?

Jill Holtz: I'm gonna just really take this time to maybe talk about a project that I've been working on. But before I do that, let me share what I think is a misconception about AI. I think we tend to think that AI is going to make our our jobs faster, like the work that we're doing, we'll be able to save a lot of time. Personally, for someone that uses AI for a lot of different things, that has not been my experience, right? It if you are really a true AI user, you are finding that it actually takes a lot more time. I think the thing that AI does allow for us to do, we're allowed, we are able to do things that we would not have been able to do but for AI. And it does take more time because we're doing new things, we're leveraging new skills, we don't really know the right questions to ask, right? And so we're building as we're going.

And so as we think about opportunities for AI to help nonprofits with storytelling and metrics, we just finished up a project where we had over 1200 surveys that we needed to parse the data. And my bright idea was: hey, we're gonna use AI to do this, right? And in my mind, it was a simple thing. We're gonna scan all the documents, we're gonna put them into the system. AI is gonna be able to parse the data.

And while yes, that is the case, we ran into a lot of different issues that were very technical, like the resolution of the actual scan, how that impacts the ability for AI to actually read the information, the le the actual technology behind being able to read scan documents. I don't know if you guys had to take assessments in school and we had to do those scantrons. And so I understand scantrons more than I probably should because there's a specific way in which they need you to, you know, fill in the information so that the technology can read it. I think for nonprofit organizations that particularly are working with youth organizations, youth serving organizations, where they don't have a lot of devices, so they can't actually use digital tools to be able to collect surveys, they still are required to use paper surveys. I think AI is a really, really good tool for that. What I would share though with nonprofits is start early. Like as soon as you start getting in, you know, the handwritten surveys, start scanning them now because you're going to run into challenges that you do not anticipate. But it will save you a lot of time on the back end with being able to parse the data. And that's the information that you need. Once you go through that challenge, you can then still use AI to analyze the data. As the human in the loop, you still have to synthesize like, why is this information valuable and meaningful? So it's never going to be fully, you know, tech technology. there is a partnership between AI and the human. But I think if you are using large data sets, AI is a really good resource. I would say you have to know the difference between using a large language model like a Claude or Chat GPT that's really, really good with creating copy, which is not the technology that you need for parsing data. clawed co-work is a really good resource for that. and clawed code is a really good resource for that. And so I think nonprofits that are looking at AI, really I think having someone who can tell you the possibilities, right? What can Claude AI do? What can Claude, you know, co-work do? What can Claude the large language model do? And then building basic your data architecture around that. and I would also say be open to like what the data might tell you. I think sometimes we go into these data projects and our first thought is, we already know in our mind what we want the story to be. But I think being flexible enough to be able to leverage the data to be able to review the results and say, what is the new story that we're learning that maybe we didn't have the capacity to learn because we didn't have the computing ability. So I would say if we're gonna use AI, don't use it in the same way you would use a human to just be able to take the data and tell the same story that we've always told. I think how do we look at the same data?

And are there new stories that we might be able to tell that we weren't able to tell before?

Jill Holtz: I love that. And in fact, you could ask AI to do that very easily, couldn't you? Take this data that we've compiled and find new ways. Dottie, we talk a lot, I think at Diligent about responsibility with AI and ethics. how should boards think about the responsible use of AI when it's used for stories, for evaluation, for communicating that impact?

Dottie Schindlinger: Well, a couple of things. First of all, really passionate about this issue of using AI in the boardroom. And I'll share some use cases for how directors are actually using AI today that I think really nonprofit organizations probably aren't leveraging and should be because it's not expensive. It's absolutely available. but I'll just talk a little bit about the responsibility. You know, the truth is AI is everywhere. Whether or not your organization has invested in licensed tools or not, I guarantee you people at your organization are using AI today to help them with their work.

And so one of the most important things that boards can do is ask questions about how are we using AI today? And have that conversation as a no-shame, no blame conversation, and have the directors also share how they are using AI. Because sometimes what you find is they're using AI in ways that are not great. they're putting very sensitive information into the free versions of Chat GPT or Claude. And that's a that's a real no-no, because of course you know, ChatGPT and Claude, if you're using the free version, anything you type in is becoming part of the model. It's training the model. And so you're literally losing any privacy of that information by sharing it with a public model. And now it's available for the rest of the world to have too. So you might as well just put it on a billboard on the highway. and I don't think you would feel that way about your sensitive information. So you have to first of all just have a conversation around what are we doing today, have it as a no shame, no blame conversation, get it all out on the table. And then as a group, have a conversation about what tools should we be using. Now, to be perfectly candid with you, diligent board effect, we are not unbiased about this because we have tools that are AI developed, native AI, that we have built specifically for use in the boardroom. So they are protected and ring fenced and secured just the same way that any other board tool we've ever built has been constructed. So we take security and privacy incredibly seriously. These tools are no exception to that rule. So figure out what tools you're going to use, read the licensing agreements. Make sure you have, in fact, read the licensing agreement, even if it's very long. Maybe get AI to help you read the licensing agreement, but understand what the gotchas are. Figure out what settings you need to turn on to keep everything secure. And then the third part is write a policy. Write a policy about appropriate usage of AI in the boardroom. What we have been finding as we've been doing our research at the Diligent Institute is that 82% of directors are using AI. Only 30% of companies have a policy around the use of AI in the boardroom. And that's a huge governance gap. So fill that gap. It's an easy thing to fill. We've provided a sample policy document that you can, you can have, you can make it your own. We recommend that you do. But the idea is don't just don't just assume that your standard AI usage agree usage policy for the whole company or whole organization fits the use in the boardroom because it often does not.

And the policy often needs to be much more specific to what kinds of data directors are dealing with and what kinds of things directors are doing. So make sure that you've just thought that through. And then once you write the policy, train everyone on what's in there and why. Why is this what we decided the policy needs to say? Why is this important to uphold? And make sure they understand how to uphold it. Because I can tell you some real horror stories of things that were done very innocently and well-meaning that had terrible, terrible consequences. I mean, one example actually is we did a program earlier this year. This was with corporate boards, but it's still applicable. And there was a board member who shared a story that their board was at a retreat and they were gonna go through a scenario exercise. And the scenario was you know, a hostile takeover attempt. It could be anything, right? So they went through the scenario, but they used I think it was Claude to help them with this scenario. So they were typing into Claude and it was all fake. The whole thing was fake. But because they weren't using a ring fence secured system, what they were typing in ended up leaking. And then there started to be a rumor that the organization really was the victim of a hostile takeover attempt. And it impacted their share price like badly. It created reputation damage. Now, if you put that in the nonprofit context, what if you're doing a scenario exercise around you've lost all your government funding? You're doing that with the free version of ChatGPT, and now that becomes a rumor.

Because it's in there and someone does a prompt and finds it and thinks, well, there must be some credible, credible information behind this. And they start a rumor. I mean, it's really worth it to make sure you understand how what you're using AI to do, what the consequences of that could be, and make sure you're using the right tools and you're using them in the right ways. That said, there are so many incredible use cases for AI in the boardroom. And I'll just give you two.

One is really helping board members get different perspectives. So I agree with Jennifer. I don't think of AI as an efficiency tool. I think of it much more as an effectiveness tool. She's totally right. If you really are using it the way that you can use it, it might take more time, not less, but it makes you more powerful. It makes you much gives you broader reach, gives you the ability to do things you could never do before. So let's say, for example, you know, on our board, we don't have a cybersecurity expert, but we're getting ready to launch a new program. And I'd like, as a board member, to understand.

What risks would a cybersecurity expert flag? Well, I could train an AI agent to be a cybersecurity expert board member and feed it our information and say, what do you see? What are you seeing? If you look at this through the lens of being a cybersecurity expert, what do you see? And it will tell me. And whether or not it's 100% accurate is really not even that significant. It's giving me a different perspective. Now I can act on that. So now I can come armed into the boardroom with new information, new perspectives, and I can ask different questions than would ever have occurred to me.

Because I'm not a cybersecurity expert, right? So that's one way is to give you different perspectives. Another way that it can be used in the board is to do longitudinal analysis. So one of the things I think directors are always asking is: when was the last time we talked about this? And what did we do about it? And how did it go? Well, AI is great at helping you find those answers without, you know, making a staff person spend two weeks digging through old records to try to get you the answer. AI can do that in a snap, especially if you're using it securely and it's deployed on your systems, all ring fenced, all private. You can unleash it on all your old board information and ask questions like, when was the last time this came up in a board meeting? And what did we decide and how did it go? And it'll give you what it can find. And then from there you can ask more questions, but at least it helps you with that kind of longitudinal perspective, that overtime perspective that would really be kind of impractical for a human being to do.

Jill Holtz: I love that. That that whole perspective partner. That's what I'm gonna call AI now. So you've got the perspective of we don't have that expertise, but you can bring it in so that you can ask the right questions and then we can have that longitudinal sort of perspective to really remember. It's the institutional memory then that becomes important. And if you have that yeah.

Dottie Schindlinger: Yeah. I I really like to think of the way I say it is I like to think of AI as my thought partner, not my thought replacer, right? I don't want AI to do my thinking for me. I want AI to help me think differently. I want it to challenge me. And sometimes I will ask it, okay, your role is this. You are this kind of expert. Now look at this thing that I've given you and ask me questions one at a time to get more context. And then tell me what your perspective is on what I would send back to you. And we have a conversation back and forth. And all that is doing is giving me a different way of saying the same information that I wouldn't have had otherwise.

Because it's seeing the world differently for me. So I think that is what's really powerful about AI. Not, I mean, yes, it's a great drafting tool, it's a great, you know, writing tool, but it also hallucinates. And so you have to be really careful about what you get out of it versus if I'm just having a conversation with it, even if it is hallucinating, it's giving me a different perspective that I can then do something with. I can validate, I can go do some fact checking, I can go do some digging, but it just gives me a new way of seeing the same information.

Final advice for boards

Jill Holtz: I love that so much. Thank you, Dottie. So I'm really conscious of time. You're both really busy and you've spent lots of time chatting today. So I'd like to finish with one final question for both of you. So I'll start with you, Dottie. If a board listening today could change one thing about using mission metrics and storytelling to advance its mission, what would your advice be?

Dottie Schindlinger: I think the thing I would say is be curious and really try to figure out how you can use the data to tell the story about what the organization values. And then, you know, make the story personal, make the story authentic, and then use data just as one way to prove how the story is true, rather than just a laundry list of data. Like that doesn't really data is not a story, right? You need a story within which you sprinkle some very important pieces of data, but make the story authentic and make sure that you remain curious about what information is being presented to you and create a story that that promotes curiosity in other people.

Jill Holtz: Jennifer, if a board listening today could change one thing about using mission metrics and storytelling to advance its mission, what would your advice be?

Jennifer McKenzie: You know, I will go from the opposite end, which I feel like having a story all by itself and having metrics all by itself is not going to transform a board member to be able to be an ambassador of the organization. I think the thing that does that is their connection to the mission, which is typically going to be with the executive director. So my advice to a board member in terms of leveraging metrics and storytelling is to have a meeting, schedule a meeting within the next 30 days with the executive director to have a conversation around the metrics and around storytelling. And then I would also say schedule a coffee with one of your other board members, right? Someone that might be really vocal, someone that you probably don't know that well because I think there's beauty and value in having ashared board perspective and talk to them about the story and the metrics, right? And because I think that's the thing that's going to tie us and to connect us to the mission, to the story, into the metrics is the people.

Jill Holtz: Excellent advice, Jennifer. Thank you. So thank you again, both of you, Dottie, for joining me today.

And Jennifer, it's been such a pleasure to have you both on the podcast. I really appreciate you taking the time to talk to me today.

Dottie Schindlinger: Thanks so much for having me. Jennifer, it was great being with you.

Jill Holtz: Thank you for listening to this episode of Leading with Purpose. I hope today's conversation with Jennifer and Dottie gave you a clearer sense of how to use stories and metrics to communicate impact with more clarity, credibility, and confidence. One of the biggest takeaways for me was that storytelling and measurement are strongest when they work together.

Data helps boards understand progress, performance, and outcomes, but stories help bring that impact to life in a way that feels authentic, accessible, and meaningful for donors, funders, stakeholders, and the communities that nonprofits serve. And for boards, this is more about more than reporting. It's about staying connected to the mission, asking better questions, making more strategic decisions, and helping the organization build trust as it advances its goals.

If you'd like to dig further into this topic, we have a free guide available called How to Leverage Data for your Mission Driven Organization's Success, and I'll include the link in the show notes.

And if I could ask a special favor, if you enjoyed listening, please rate and review this podcast wherever you listen, as that helps others find it.

Thanks again for tuning in and I look forward to bringing you more practical advice for purpose-driven governance on the next episode of Leading with Purpose.