Outreach: Failure and Persistence OR "OMG, What If No One Shows Up?"

It’s time to tell a story about failure. And persistence. Before one talks genuinely about persistence, one has to talk about failure. Because stories about how people persist in their constant and inevitable success are boring and –  in my experience – often fiction. This blog entry isn’t about the silver bullet of how to gather people to your movement. (If you have a blog like that, please send it to me. I’d like to read it.) It’s about how to keep going and why you should keep going when it looks like things are not going well at all.

October 17, 2009 was a dark day for me. It was a day the Millennium Campaign invited anti-poverty groups worldwide to join them in a day called: “Stand Up, Take Action, End Poverty Now.” At RESULTS, we dedicated one of our monthly conference calls to the event for a nationwide outreach push. I was excited. Certainly, there was a RESULTS group in Oak Park, but I lived an hour away near Evanston and I felt I really needed some local partners to help me. I’d been an activist for two years and this was my big chance to invite my friends to join in the advocacy I found to be so thrilling and fulfilling!

The famous Dr. Paul Farmer, author of Mountains Beyond Mountains and founder of Partners in Health, was the speaker on this conference call and it was our first live webcast. RESULTS had done everything it could for us…scheduled a great speaker on a international day of action, designed invitation flyers, given us outlines for a great outreach meeting, and given us an easy action to take. I secured a comfortable office space in the heart of downtown Evanston close to public transportation and ample parking. I made fresh guacamole and brownies. I invited everyone I knew and sent out reminder emails. I was ready to grow my group and launch a new bunch of activists into the work I was so passionate about.

At the appointed hour, I set out the snacks. I opened a soda. I opened the door…and no one walked through it.

Damn.

A half hour ticked by while I waited for the call. Maybe they were going to walk in at the last minute?

Nope.

The webcast started. Door stayed open. Chairs stayed empty.

A half an hour later, I closed the door, lay back on the office couch, and closed my eyes. I felt like the biggest dope. If I couldn’t grow my group with all that support from the Washington D.C. office, there was no hope for me. Forty-three cities held “Stand Up” events and I was certain that I was the 43^rd, sitting alone. The part of the call came when all the groups were supposed to “Stand Up” against poverty. I couldn’t even bear it. I threw my arm over my face and defiantly continued to “Lay Down” in harmony with my own miserable nature while listening to groups on the open phone line cheering wildly. Later, I would find out that an estimated 173 million people stood up against poverty that day. I wasn’t one of them.

What did I do? What didn’t I do? Was it my abrasive personality? Should I just give up on this whole thing?

What would you do?

That was five years ago. I’ve come a long way as an activist since then. I can now gather people for a fundraiser and raise thousands of dollars. I can now look my senator in the eye and ask for billions for global health programs. Yet, honestly, outreach is still a challenge for me. Getting people to come over in person and take an action is still a tough nut for me to crack. I have great and supportive advocacy coaches. They picked me up, put me back together, gave suggestions about how to improve my inviting (invite people in person, not only over email…recruit a few others as an inviting team…have it at a fun venue…etc) But what I really needed was a shift in perspective to inspire me to try again at all. 

As usual, Captain Jack Sparrow had some guidance to offer…

 “The problem is not the problem. The problem is your attitude about the problem.”
- Captain Jack Sparrow, Pirates of the Caribbean

Yes. Some pirate thinking is what we all need now and then. There had to be a shift in attitude for me to understand that not everyone is going to be instantly successful in getting people to flock to meetings about poverty right off the bat. At some point, I had to realize that poverty work doesn’t sound as fun as a day at the Magic Kingdom to most folks. Getting people to attend action meetings is a skill just like many other skills to be practiced and learned.

Being a mom, the best coaching I have for myself when no one else is around is to think:

“What would you say to your child?”

If your child has difficulty making friends at playdates, would you tell your kid she should just give up on trying to make a friend? That she is better off going through life alone? Of course not. You might try different situations to make the experience more comfortable or try tactics to set her up for success. It might take a very long time. Maybe even years. But you wouldn’t just say, “Nah, bag it. You don’t need ‘em. You probably won’t need a job where you get along with co-workers either.” I bet you would help her see that in life you need to keep at it until you find a way it works for you, even if it’s not the way that usually works for other people.

And what would I tell my child if she came home telling me that she didn’t have a $500 robot she’d like to use for a science fair? That we can’t afford it and she should quit? Or, would I help her understand that sometimes you gotta work with what you have to get the job done a different way? If I don’t have 100 or even 20 activists…so what? I need to ask myself, “What can I do with 2 or 3 activists?” Quite a lot, actually. (and with a lot less coordination, it turns out!)

Persistence and creative thinking are a couple of the best qualities I could hope to model for my children. They are key components of success in lobbying, sports, academics, and just about every aspect of life. I model persistence for them when I keep working on my outreach. Plus, I enjoy successes from time to time that show me that it’s worthwhile.

These are the things I tell myself even today. From that kind of shift in attitude, came the idea of having meetings at my house with other moms and a babysitter in the basement to play with our small kids. Turns out, having someone else watch your kids for an hour IS BETTER than a day in the Magic Kingdom when your kids are 1 and 3 years old! That’s not the national RESULTS model, but it worked for me and my little group of moms got a lot of great work done together.

Anyway, this part of my advocacy is still a work in progress. I’m still trying and this time I have an inviting team and a decade of lessons learned. I’ll be starting a new RESULTS group in St Louis on March 30 to work on global poverty issues. Come join us if you are in the area!

I will also say this: My earlier struggles make me a much better coach. I have the empathy and the street cred now, so that people believe me when I can say “Keep going. Try different things. It gets better.” A colleague and I presented an “Advocacy 101” session on a college campus in Chicago. When we got to the part about the importance of outreach, a young man in the front row raised his hand suddenly and we called on him. Turns out he didn’t have a question, but sadly confessed, “One time I held a meeting and I was the only one who came.”

Me, too, buddy. Me, too. Keep going.

Coalition Work: Playing Nicely in the Sandbox

I’ve been thinking about coalition work in advocacy a lot lately…the art of bringing separate organizations together to work on a common goal and with a positive and constructive attitude. Metaphorically speaking, coordinating volunteers in one organization can be an exercise in herding cats. Why would you add more kitties? How do we keep the sandbox from becoming a litter box?

I love coalition work for many reasons. Building allies is important to making local connections and is often mutually advantageous to everyone. Every organization has a special culture and area of specialization, which can be a great advantage when the diversities compliment one another. With a spirit of cooperation and collaboration, you can see the miracle of 1+1 adding up to much more than 2 when you see the impact that you can make together in your community. I’m reminded of an African proverb:

“If you want to go fast, go alone. 

If you want to go far, go together.”

From the viewpoint of an organizational leader, I tend to seek out allies in other organizations in these three situations (although there are many other reasons, too):

• I’m new in town and want to know what other people are already doing about my issue
• I want the volunteers I lead to learn or experience something my current organization doesn’t provide
• A project – like, getting the attention of a certain member of Congress or putting on an event – requires strength in numbers 

From a personal view, I feel I don’t have to limit myself to working with just one organization or one set of people. Because I know people receive messages in different ways depending on the messenger, I like being able to move between groups. That way, I can represent different messengers. I always have the same mission of advocating against poverty, but have a drawer full of t-shirts from various organizations, so I can pick and choose the one that best suits the specific message of the day.

Let’s take a look at four groups I work with in the anti-poverty world as an example of how similar organizations can have different vibes. Every one of these is a reputable advocacy organization that encourages similar kinds of actions. I know stellar expert advocates from each one, yet I value the unique culture and the mode of operations for each one.

ONE activists party downtown for World AIDS
Day. One free Belevedere (RED) vodka drink for
every letter we wrote to Congress. I wrote three!

1. RESULTS lets me do a deep dive into advocacy for key, interrelated issues. There’s no better organization for teaching about best practices of how build meaningful, personal relationships with members of Congress. If you want to get a message delivered face-to-face to a decision maker, these are the people you want in the room.
2. Shot@Life has a laser-focus on global vaccines as a tool for child survival as well as giving me great infographics and social media training. I get to fully indulge my “mommy” side and involve my kids as the culture is extremely welcoming to kids and parents.
3. ONE Campaign volunteers are the cool kids on the block. ONE makes activism a sexy, mainstream thing to do and does a great job of using social media and texting tools for easy advocacy actions. If you want thousands of people to take a urgent, quick action or to pack a downtown Chicago bar full of hip young activists for a World AIDS day party, they are the masters.
4. Bread for the World is a Christian organization with a deep focus on hunger. It is the very best entryway to talk to church congregations. Bread’s annual Offering of Letters is the gold standard of how to organize letter-writing events and they are extremely good at making the moral case to end poverty. They know how to get thousands of handwritten letters from churches or a powerful lobby meeting with clergy (and every member of Congress knows each pastor has a flock of hundreds). 

So, if I’m speaking to a Jewish congregation, I know it will make people feel more comfortable for me to use secular materials from RESULTS instead of Bread hand-outs with quotes from the New Testament all over them. You can also see how they can compliment each other very well. ONE campaign volunteer coordinators often do a stellar job at outreach and can lean on local RESULTS partners to provide lobby training if they don’t have nearby ONE staff to provide it.

It’s fun to have more people playing in your sandbox…especially when everyone is playing nicely. Here’s my handy-dandy list of “Do’s and Don’ts” for coalition work. The key to getting along is mostly common sense, but these tips are things I've had gently to remind myself – or others – about every time I start over with a new group. When it comes to collaboration and personal relationships, every one of us is a work in progress!

• Do be make sure you have a mutual understanding of your common ground, so your work can stay focused and clear.
• Do be clear with others about what makes your organization special and what you bring to the table that is beneficial to the partnership.
• Do give as much as you take. Be generous with your time and others will be more willing to lend a hand for you.
• Do build a reputation for being professional and easy to work with. 
• Do be dependable and follow through with what you agree to do.
• Do listen. Listening is so important.
• Don’t overwhelm yourself trying to be all things to all organizations.
• Don’t poach members. Actively recruiting and trying to get people to switch to your group is not cool.
• Do respect the culture and strategies of the other groups. Just because they use different methods doesn’t mean they are wrong. In fact, it probably makes the coalition stronger as a whole!

To start off a conversation, let me ask you…what organizations do you find compatible in your work? How have you seen groups have success in working together? Or, if you don’t have stories like that yet…which organizations’ tshirts are in your drawer?

Stuff Your Own Stocking: Advice for Parents & Organizers

a.k.a. "Take Care of Yourself"

a.k.a. "Put Your Own Oxygen Mask On First"

There is something wrong with me. Not terribly wrong, but I can tell by the twitch in my right eye. And the ache where my neck meets my left shoulder. And the way emotional commercials about children in need feel like a punch in the gut. I know my temporary disorder is nothing more than stress from the end of a long year of poverty fighting and the emotional holidays getting to me a bit. So, I'm writing this blog as a reminder to myself - and other parents with a selfless streak - that it's okay...no, it's important...to take care of yourself. Even if it means stuffing your own Christmas stocking.

If you read no further, this is the takeaway: Resting, refueling, and treating yourself shouldn't be a luxury...it's necessary to avoid burnout as a parent and a social justice advocate. Here are a few story metaphors from my own life to illustrate my point.

The Empty Stocking
A few years back, I awoke on Christmas morning to an empty stocking. It wasn't because I was bad that year. It's just that as I skillfully played "Santa" and took over the role of reigning Christmas matriarch for my family, everyone else assumed that somebody would take care of getting me a little something. I came to the startling realization that if I did not stuff my own stocking, I very well might end up with a flat, disappointing sock hanging from a nail.

There's a metaphor here, I think, about moms (and dads) taking care of themselves. As a skillful leader of a family or volunteer group who often just quietly and routinely "takes care of things" for others...if you don't let others know what you want or make a little "you-time" to get it for yourself, you shouldn't blame others for assuming you've taken care of everything when you always seem to every other time. I moped for a few minutes over my flat stocking, but in the end, I just laughed in recognizing what happened and made a note that I had my own permission to put a little something in my own stocking every year afterward. After all, I'll be sure to love whatever I put in there, right? (This year, it's a small box with six of my favorite truffles from Kakao Chocolates in St Louis...not even my husband nor sister could pick all six correctly) Side note: It wasn't like I didn't get a present at all! It's just that silly detail of the sneaky, overnight filling of stockings. 

The Oxygen Mask
Have you ever flown on an airplane with children? When you do, you get your very own, personal safety spiel: "Always secure your own oxygen mask first before assisting your child." They say that because the parental instinct is always to take care of the children first. Yet if you are unconscious, you can't get their mask on and you both perish. Eek! Applying this concept to everyday life for caretakers and organizers, if you don't take care of yourself, you're not going to be able to take care of anybody. You won't be a good parent, advocate, employee, spouse, etc. When I put myself dead last, I get snappish with my kids and the volunteers I organize. From a mommy perspective, doing a few things I want to do will make me a more compassionate and generous role model for my kids. From an advocacy perspective, if I slow down and spend good quality time with myself and family now at the end of the year, I will come back to my advocacy in January with a renewed sense of purpose and the ability to save more lives than if I just played the martyr all the way through the holidays.

I'm not saying that putting yourself first is always the way to go. Selfishness is not attractive nor a good example for your children. But neither is martyrdom. There is a lot of wiggle room between putting yourself first and putting yourself at the bottom of your priorities. What I am saying is: put yourself somewhere on the list!

So, what will you stuff your own metaphorical stocking with? A nap? A break from social media? A nice long run? A pedicure? Hey, I'm not judging. I'm indulging.