Episode 7: Stewarding Emotions

Appreciate your time and interest this week on “Around with Randall” and today, I want to spend, particularly with the holidays, some time talking about time, so to speak.

In the holiday season, at least in the consulting world, there may be a moment or two extra of free time. And whenever possible, I try to spend those moments with my kids. And this week, having a little more than normal openings on my calendar, I took a morning and told my beautiful wife that I'll take the two kids, seven and four - Jay and Margie respectively, and bring them to the office.

We'll get some breakfast. We'll come up and just have daddy, child/children time with no real set agenda or schedule. We did some fun things, like get out my Christmas tree , which sits on a table. We drew pictures, we played go fish. We colored.

And they walked away after a few hours, smiles and giggles when their mother showed up to pick them up. Why do I tell you this story? And eventually, how is this going to relate to philanthropy? Well, first I think we need to spend a second reminding ourselves that the word philanthropy doesn't mean money.

It means love of mankind, and in that original Greek or Latin derivation fellows and anthropos. Okay. We should remember that what we do is really about loving each other and why people give is because they want to make the world a better place. They want to help others.

The second part of this is about remembering time.

What psychology tells us is that memories are heightened by emotion. They're more vivid when we tie the emotional inside feelings to the memory of what happened, and that then elevates them in our brains and our ability to recall them, either both in the short and in the long term. 

I remember when our son was in the hospital as a very, very young child…days that were not great for his mother and I. I had a friend, a mentor, who just showed up and sent a message up via text to my phone. And said I'm in the hospital lobby. I know you're going through a lot. I'm going to sit here for an hour. There's no need for you to come down. You want to get out of the room or just take a break. I'm going to sit here. And all I want to do is give you a hug and tell you that I love you. And that I'm praying. 

In all of the emotional moments during our son’s trials and tribulations early on in his life, that moment sticks out because there was emotion with it. It was such a fervent emotional connection with the need I had just to know that somebody out there was with us. 

I have other emotions like that with my parents and my sisters and with my in-laws, and certainly very vivid ones with my wife. But it's those moments and that emotion that are tied to that in some ways why as children, even though I am now 50, I can remember certain moments in my upbringing that my parents can’t, even though they were active participants at that time, because it was more emotional for me.

There were moments around key lessons in life, and I have built who I am on them. And yet when I mentioned them to my parents and I've seen my sisters do the same, my parents don't have the same memory if at all, because it was just maybe not as pertinent to their moment to their growth, because they were adults and I was a child or an adolescent trying to figure out what life was all about.

How does this tie with how I started off this podcast with, with my children in that Monday morning and dad time at the office? They were so excited to do this at 6:25 or 6:30 am. My wife and I could hear our four-year-old daughter singing “Frozen" and “Frozen Two” songs in bed because she's not allowed to get up until the clock becomes green, which isn't till 7:30, and is just singing and happy. And at 7:15, our seven-year-old son comes paddling in saying, “Is it time to go?” And when they left, I heard later on in the afternoon, they just couldn't stop talking about all the things we did while I cherished that time. My guess is they'll remember pieces of that more strongly than I will, because there was such emotion tied to it. It's also a good reminder of a simple fact that we probably should do more. I should do more things like that. So that as active as I am with my children, I'm even more engaged in their daily life. 

So what does this all have to do with philanthropy? Well, this gets us to the tactical and it's really a reminder of the season. When we talk about stewarding donors, what we really should be aiming at is that emotion. How do we help them connect their gift to their emotions of wanting to make a difference? It doesn't have to be big. It doesn't have to be expensive. It doesn't have to be putting their name on the side of a building. It may be as simple as connecting the value of that gift and what it did for someone else. 

Storytelling. It's more than just creating a scholarship report or an endowment report. It's telling them the difference that money made and the emotion that came from it. Maybe it's tying that gift to the original reason that they made the gift. Is it a room for remembrance or memory of someone? Is it because of a certain event in healthcare that medical need and the clinicians that provided the support and the direction during a hospital hospitals?

I sometimes realize that we get as fundraisers too close to the 500 or 50 foot altitude and not to go up to 50,000 feet, but to go to a thousand and realize people give because they emotionally feel connected to you and the organization and the desire to help whatever that mission is. And yet I think a lot of the time we get into the tactics of what do they get the thank you letter to where do they fall on the stewardship chart? You know, or do we get the letter out? What is it that we can do today that connects to them emotionally? 

How about the simplicity of an iPhone or Google phone video that's not overly produced? Just send them a video via text, either from you or from a doctor or the patient or someone who was affected by their generosity that says, “Thank you. You made a difference. And, let me tell you how.”

Complexity is not necessary for great stewardship. Tying someone emotionally to the reason they gave and the reason they engaged is a prerequisite and required. So, the tactic is how do you do simple stewardship to make someone feel that emotion of why they gave.

Let me remind you the website. HallettPhilanthropy.com. That's two L's two T's Hallett, philanthropy.com. And that's where you'll find the opportunity to send an email. If you have a disagreement with something I've said in the podcast to reeks R E E K s@hallettphilanthropy.com, or if you want to suggest a subject for one of the podcasts. That's podcast@healthphilanthropy.com and under blogs, I'm putting up two or three a week - 90 second reads about things going on in the industry. What we see in this holiday season, let me say and pass along my gratitude to you for listening for reading, but more importantly for what you're doing for your non-profit in your community to make it a better place to make a difference.

To tie that emotion that you need to express in doing something to help others, to people who emotionally want to do something to help those that you're trying to represent. This is a vocational call. This is something that we come to because we seek out the ability to help others. And it goes along with my favorite saying that I try to conclude with every week.

Some people make things happen. Some people watch things happen. Then there are those who wondered what happened. We are people who make things happen for people in all areas of the world who are wondering what happened. And I can't think of a better holiday gift than helping someone through the art, the science and the emotion of philanthropy.

We'll look forward to seeing you next week and don't forget, make it a great day.