Growing with Rickesh Lakhani of Radiance Advisory
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Rickesh Lakhani believes that we are all responsible for each other’s success, and that social impact organizations will do their best work when they are nurturing from within and grounded in truth and trust.
He has over 15 years of experience in the social impact sector, including serving as the Executive Director at Future Possibilities for Kids, a community-based organization serving children, and as the Director, Campaign at United Way York Region, leading an $8M annual fundraising campaign. Rickesh is a Certified Fundraising Executive (CFRE), sits on the Global Council for the Community-Centric Fundraising movement, and has volunteered with numerous causes and boards.
He enjoys spending time with his family including his 3 children, camping, bike riding, cooking, and playing drums.
Episode Transcript
Daniel
So welcome to Growth for Good, Rickesh. Thanks so much for being on the show. I've been wanting to get you on for a while, you were one of the first people I reached out to. So thanks for being here.
Rickesh
Oh, that's a that's very kind of I've always admired you and your work and the way you approach things, and your creativity. So I was really excited to have a chance to be on here and have a have a chat with with a friend.
Daniel
Awesome. And it was great that we actually ran into each other at the AFP networking event, it's so good to see the nonprofit sector kind of coming together in person, which is nice. Today, we're going to start off by telling a little bit of your story and where you're at, because I know you kind of have had an amazing career in the nonprofit space and, I'd love for you to explain where you started in the nonprofit sector, and where you're at right now.
Rickesh
Yeah, 100%, the stories are always important to see where you came from, where you are, and where you're going. So I started like a lot of folks did, kind of fell into it. I went to school for business, and I was realizing this is probably not going to be fulfilling, and rewarding for me, personally. And so then I discovered this whole other space where you can work every day trying to support and change some of these really big issues in a coordinated way. And this, that's where I sort of really decided that's where I want it. This is where I want to be after working in it for a while. And so I started out in fundraising at United Way. And then I was there for a few years and leading a large fundraising campaign. And then an organization I volunteer with and love called Future Possibilities for Kids. They were looking for a new leader. And so I was able to fortunate to be chosen to be in that role and sort of do now via a community-based org, as ED of a community-based organization serving children. And then in January of this year, I actually gave my notice and said, “Hey, like I'm going to be heading out I had a few months”, I gave a long notice, which is what I always wanted to do. I did something a little unusual, I didn't exactly have a next step planned. I just knew after the last couple of years, if we're being fully transparent here, I was just new, and it was gonna be a little bit of time to heal and recover and figure things out and reset. So where you're catching me now is I've recently launched Radiance Advisory. What I want to do is work with social impact organizations to really align their declared values, what they say they're doing publicly and what they stand for, with how they operate internally, based on truth and trust. How do you treat people? How do you operate in a way that's ethical, equitable, and it's often we know what we need to do, but we have trouble getting there. And so that's what I want to want to be doing for for the next chapter.
Daniel
Amazing, I love that. And you definitely bring a wealth of knowledge being on the inside of these organizations. So definitely excited to see kind of some of the projects you've worked on with that. Now, being in the space requires you to be passionate about what you do, whether that's a cause or an organization or community specifically. So I'd love to know, what are some of those causes or initiatives that you're personally passionate about?
Rickesh
That's a great question. I mean, we do need to really find fulfillment and reward in our work and connect to what it is that we're doing. So for me, definitely one of those is community building. So it's a little bit more abstract, but it's how do we bring multiple folks together and come up with solutions together, I think that's something that I'm always passionate about, which was a fit in sort of my first role, and then also supporting, working with children, because of course, they are the future. And you know, we always want the next generation to be in a better space than the previous one. And so when we ensure that every child has an opportunity to, to really understand themselves and see the role they play in the world, and build that confidence, that's something that I'm also very, very passionate about, especially having now three children of my own, I really see that that's something I'm passionate about. Now my next chapter is more about being passionate about reducing hypocrisy in the social impact space. Aligning behaviors have been valued as like I see that that often hinders us doing our doing the good work, we don't invest properly in ourselves and our infrastructure and people and, and do things in a way that's going to really help us achieve those missions. And so that's sort of the new thing that I'm excited and passionate about.
Daniel
That's great. It's definitely a transformation but those passions that you have kind of can carry through no matter what role you're in, right? Whether you're volunteering, whether it's a job, or whether it's your own business as you're launching as well. We'll switch gears and talk a little bit about the world of online marketing and social media. You're very active on social, which is great, I always love to see that, you're definitely a great example for leaders in the sector to kind of put themselves out there. What are some things that either leaders or organizations can do to kind of stand out in a really crowded online world?
Rickesh
That's a really good question. I know that you've always been someone who's an advocate for digital, and this is before people are like, “Oh, wow, we're already too late”. So a lot of folks have been screaming off the rooftops for a while that like, embrace digital, and often we do find that there is a bit of a lag and folks embracing this stuff. So, you know, I was fortunate that we actually got a grant to work with Claire, who was a great person, and many, many years ago, she told me: there are two elements, there's the organizational reputation and online presence, and then there's the individual person. And she told me something like, “you’re, you're one of the main faces of the organization”. And so from your personal space, you need to be out there talking about this stuff. So the organization of course, should, that's pretty clear. But that's something that's important for you to do. So figure out what it is you need to do put your humility aside. And we're not talking about going out there bragging, and being arrogant necessarily, we're talking about advocating for the issues that impact the organization you're working within. And so that happens, perhaps in more public spaces, like social media, but it also happens behind the scenes, when you're reaching out to government officials. And you're pushing in through multiple channels to push for broader change. To me every social impact organization should be spending 10 to 20% of their time and resources on something larger than what's happening within their own walls. And part of that is how the leaders of the organization show up publicly to advocate for something — FoodShare Toronto is a great example of that, they very much stand out, because even recently, they were publicly vocal about supporting QP workers during the Labor Action, because this is about paying people equitably and it's about workers’ rights. And so they took a stand on something that isn't directly related, you know, clearly necessarily to what they're doing. But you know, Paul Taylor has himself and the organization, they were able to stand out in that way. And, they're not doing it for show they mean it, but it does attract attention. So when you're talking about a crowded space, so many organizations are silent, when it comes to things that are related to these, these public things that are happening, they just kind of keep saying the same message about their own work, which is also necessary, but I think you have to break out of your own walls.
Daniel
There i definitely a bit of repetition that's required, of course, and as you know on social, not everyone sees every piece of content that goes out there. But at the same time, it's important. You mentioned Paul Taylor, as an example. This leads to my next question, he's someone who maintains his own personal brand, and what he does, in addition to the organization that he represents, as a leader, so I would love to know Rickesh, personally, what role you think your personal brand, or your network at least, has played in the success as a leader in an organization?
Rickesh
That's a really insightful question. Because I think, for me, I was always like, “I'm just gonna kind of do this quietly, and just sort of, not make a big stink about my particular role in it”. And I think a lot of folks will need to sort of wrestle with that. And it's like, I don't want to be out there saying, it's all me because 100%, it was a team, always the team gets full credit for anything great that happened. And so I think it's important to acknowledge that in this. And so once I started to recognize that this is actually going to help achieve our organizational goals. And I think you have to be mindful of does your personal brand overtakes your organization's brand? Are you using your organizational brand, as a platform to elevate yourself beyond that brand? And I think that's where I start to kind of worry. But I think if you can do it in parallel and say, the more I expand my personal reputation out there, and bring other people into the fold to trust me, I can I then take that spill off, sort of leverage that in a way to sort of bring trust to the organization. And I would say that future possibilities for kids when I first started, I said, you know, I'm, I don't I was new to being an ad and I said, I don't know exactly all about the programmatic side yet. I'm going to learn, but what I can do is how do we get people hyped up and excited about the work of the organization and want to be involved, whether that's volunteering, donating, you know, providing, you know, guidance, whatever that happens to be So to me, I saw that parallel happen that the more I was out there, it doing it in a way that was comfortable for me it spilled off and get a lot for FPFK’s brand as well. So the two kind of went hand in hand. And I will say there was a really interesting question someone asked me recently, though, that's very relevant to this. And they said, What happens when you leave the organization you've built up, you know, you've got if people associate you with the brand, and then you leave, you know, can the new leader take that over? Or is there some of that still there. And, and I thought I had to think about that. And I said, I wouldn't have done my job, if FTK is brand didn't, you know, grow significantly in the process. And I would say that we did build something that was sustaining and lasting and will last way beyond me, because I just wanted to fade off into the sunset, it's not about me anymore, right. And so I think that was something I did notice that, you know, our presence, our reputation will, will be a lasting, lasting impact.
Daniel
That's incredible that you brought up that comment, because I was actually going to mention that — a lot of times I do workshops on personal branding, or I speak with leaders of organizations, and that is often one of the things I mentioned is that your personal brand follows you no matter which organization you're part of, and the values that you've kind of kept and put out into the world, those do translate across. So it actually makes it easier, it's a stepping stone for the next organization you go to — but to your point, it can also help leave that impact that positive legacy on the organization that you served as well. So that's amazing that you share that, Rickesh it sounds like you made a great impact on Future Possibilities for Kids. So that being said, every organization has its challenges, and there's a lot of tough things that that we face as leaders in the sector. What are one or two challenges that you've had to deal with in your role? You could choose from any period of time. I'd love to know about a challenge.
Rickesh
There are probably two that really come to mind. One is, what is the cost of putting ourselves in the center of the work? And when I say in the center, I don't mean that we're centering ourselves, but diving in so deeply. And does that come at a cost if you don't have those personal boundaries of that balance? So I think there's one challenge on a personal level is, I think that I had a tendency to kind of probably give more of myself than I probably should have to maintain my own well being to be honest, especially the last couple of years were particularly tough. So I think it's a thing for leaders to really think about, or anyone in organizations that we don't need to destroy ourselves in the process. And I'm not saying I did that exactly. But it's a challenge to say, I really care about this. And I want to see this go further. I want to push for this, because I care about it. And how do you say that, but the best way that I could do that is for me to also be in this for the long haul in the long game, and be whole and be replenished, and be rested, and be balanced? So that's the personal side.
For organizational side, there are just so many, I call myself lovingly critical of the social impact nonprofit, charity sector (whatever you want to call it). I’m lovingly critical because I want to see it succeed, I believe it serves an important purpose. And there are a lot of challenges. So, how do you navigate things where these are, a lot of the stuff is values-based. So when things go against your values, and I'm impatient like that, like I want to get this stuff done right away. And then you get into the realities of what it's like to manage and lead an organization with an amazing team and a huge community supporting obviously, but there are things you just want to do right now. And just for many reasons are not possible to do right away. So that impatience, but I think that that fire, that urgency that impatience needs to be in you because it motivates you. But I do think that sometimes things just don't happen as fast as I want. I want to see funders coming around and funding organizations properly for the things that we actually need, I want to see leaders and boards, you know, getting out of the way of the wonderful people that work there, I want to see more consultation with communities that were being impacted and having them represented in decisions. These are all the kinds of things that I'm like, we can keep doing better at those. So it's, it's that's another piece of that, that impatience is sort of a personal and organizational challenge. I hope that answers your question.
Daniel
Definitely. I actually see that in the entrepreneurship world as well, where we want to solve problems, right? There are people that are driven for a solution and clearly, they see a better way of doing things. So it's hard to balance that I think one of the ways to approach that is having small wins along the way right where you can kind of feel like you're making a making dents and then still aiming for those big picture goals of transforming the sector transforming how people work, which I love, and I love to recatch that you kind of are always an advocate for those bigger picture issues as well and kind of keeping bringing those to the forefront because it's very easy to get caught up in in the day to day grind of what we do. That being said, it is super important to celebrate our successes and showcase the impact. So I'd love to know, you know, what are a couple of wins from your career so far, that you'd love to be able to share?
Rickesh
Yeah, Daniel, and I look, I mean, I know you, by the way, the challenges piece, I know, you get it as someone who's founded an organization and dealt with a lot of this stuff, and is very involved in many ways and supporting this work. So you know, I know you get it. And I appreciate that piece about celebrating success. If we're not looking, we're not looking back and celebrating, if we're not excited about the future and have hope, it's going to be very difficult to do some of this work. As always, it's can be pretty heavy, even with some heavy thing. So we do need to take some time. And you know, we're not I'm not very good at it necessarily. And I think a lot of us might not be so I'm going to stretch myself a little bit and, and declare proudly, a couple of successes. I mean, one of them is that, in Future Possibilities for Kids like over a course it took a few years, I would say what we really were good at was what I call responsible growth. I mean, there was there were times when we're like pushing like, Okay, this is we're pushing quite hard. But we're like, we're not going to make these decisions, if it's going to put us all out, we're not going to make make, we're not going to do this growth on the backs of the employees of the organization. So I was very proud of that. But over time, we were able to double more than double our programming reach. And so that was really wonderful that it was done in a way that was sustainable. And over time, and you know, everyone was on board with it. And we all we put into our strategic directions that the staff wellbeing is actually an indicator and measure of success. So that was something I'm proud of. And then on that same note, I was just really happy to see that even during a global pandemic, to be honest, the team members that future possibilities for kids, because for me, it's all about the team members and community members. You know, there, our employee engagement scores went up during that time, because we really focused on is what can we do to support everyone in this time, and whether that's looking at, you know, paid time off and compensation and just flexibility and all those different pieces. And so in our last survey, everyone rated the organization 5/5 is recommending as a great place to work. And we had 0% turnover in almost two years, I was actually the first person to leave the organization. So I mean, again, it's not to say it in in an arrogant way, it's more to say, when the team is focused on this, when you focus on people focus on your values, you can actually see those things play out whenever everyone's working together and, and aligned on those pieces. And you make those intentional changes, perhaps small wins over time, that lead to, you know, a better organization and people really being happy to be there.
Daniel
That's amazing. It is great. It's definitely a testament to your leadership. And I think it's a great example for the sector too, is that you want your employees, you want your team, your volunteers, you want them to be ultimately your greatest ambassadors. And that's when we talk about communicating our impact and that growth, it really starts from the actual internal team, you don't want your marketing and communications messaging to actually, you know, contradict what it's like on the inside. So I love that you shared, those examples, and congrats on the success that you've had there for sure. When it comes to the online world, Rickesh, you're quite active on different social media platforms, I've seen you experiment with TikTok, and I've seen you do a lot of great written posts on LinkedIn. So I'd love to know, what platforms are most important to you, and most effective for you? What have you seen seen work for your organization as well?
Rickesh
That's a good question around the platforms because I think a lot of folks think you need to be everywhere. And I got some great advice before that. If you're not reaching your audience, it's not it's helping you achieve your mission, like why are you on this platform? I know there's we've come to a place where you sort of need to be on certain platforms for credibility at this point. So maybe some you can avoid, but you still have to be posting regular and meaningful, you know, interesting things. So I think they all serve a different purpose. I mean, Twitter, obviously is going through some changes, but I found Twitter to be good for sort of the, you know, sound bites and amplification. I found Twitter to be more personal kind of useful than necessarily organizationally. I think you have to put a lot of effort into it and like really be engaging folks and like tagging, you know, let's say, you know, political leaders or other organizations and retweet, like, you have to do a lot of work. It's not just putting stuff out there. You really have to just like all, all of it, it's kind of be collaborative. But so that's So Twitter is good for more kind of bite-sized advocacy, I would say if people aren't usually looking for it for kind of what's going on with your organization necessarily. Then I found LinkedIn, from a personal standpoint is great for sort of finding other folks who are doing Cool things, getting things out there from like, like, let's say volunteer recruitment. You know, LinkedIn was is amazing for that when our organization posted or I posted about that because people are kind of there for maybe for that purpose. It was also good for amplifying other messages. But I think it's the frame of mind people are in it's like, this is a professional networking space. And for me, you don't really separate personal and professional that much. And then yeah, tick tock, I mean, I'm still figuring it all out. I'm, I don't know what I'm doing on there. Personally, I'm just trying to make people laugh and make fun of my embarrass myself a little bit if it helps make other people laugh and, you know, have a little bit of validation about what they feel about working in this space, the good, bad and the ugly. But I think there is opportunities for organizations to sort of use that video is obviously really, really important. So I'm still trying to see if organizations you know, are using that. And not just I've seen organizations on Tik Tok, for example, posting stuff that just feels very stuffy. It's like very, very text-heavy, it's using buzzwords. And I'm like, I think people are going to tick tock because they want to just get something quick 30-second entertainment or message or something. And so I think organizations are one, that's one mistake I think people make is posting the same thing everywhere. And just assuming it's going to work. And no, in fact, what's going to happen is the algorithm is going to be is going to push you out if you keep posting stuff that nobody's looking at. So post very meaningfully, and really take the time to learn if you don't have the resources, then be better not to even beyond that, I would say that a have a poor presence. So that's what's happening with Tik Tok, I'm not sure where I stand on Facebook, and Instagram and they're always again, kind of changing, I think Facebook's kind of really not, it's kind of on its way down in some ways. And very, for organizational purposes. I think Instagram probably has more of an opportunity to sort of share, especially again, the visual and the video side of things, it just brings, I feel some of the work and some of the people, it brings that to life and in a different way. So I'm still trying to figure out what each one is for. But I know where I spend most of my time is probably Twitter and LinkedIn. And then if I have a few moments and an interesting idea, I throw a TikTok and every once in a while.
Daniel
Love that. It is great that you've obviously you know, over the years, you've experimented with different platforms yourself. And, you know, it's important for someone as a leader, you know, not just your, your social media coordinator to be the one that's aware, right, but to have, you know, leaders in the space, whether they're executive directors or board members, actually, you know, being active on these platforms and kind of seeing what it has to offer, because you may actually find that, you know, you have a great reception from partners, sponsors, volunteers for recruitment, as you just mentioned on those platforms. So kudos to you for kind of always experimenting, overall this time. I'd love to know, whether from your own experience, you know, what are some of the best practices and principles that you've adopted? I don't know if you've done any kind of formal training when it comes to marketing, communications, and social. But you've had a lot of experience. So what are some of the things that you would like to share with nonprofits, charities, and leaders when it comes to marketing?
Rickesh
I will say that I know social media is not the only element of marketing, there are so many other pieces. It's not just advertising and, and then that, but I think everything that I've done, I did it because I wanted to learn it better. I didn't expect to stay on there. I'm like, if we're going to ask organizations to use Twitter or LinkedIn, I really want to understand what it is and how it works. And then I just every, that's what's happening with every single platform, I learned it for organizational purposes, so I can understand it myself, even if someone else was doing the work. And then I ended up staying on because I was having a good time and seeing the value of it for me personally. And honestly just “school of hard knocks” just like go in, try and experiment mess up, make mistakes, you know, learn how these proprietary algorithms work and see what kind of, you know, I don't think the goal should be to get likes, you don't I mean, or get followers, they talk about that. I mean, the people that are engaging with your honest, authentic self and your messages, I think that's who you want to be engaging with you, even if it's not big numbers. And I think there are ways to take what you do and position it in a way that does take advantage of; what is going to get more amplified without selling your soul. I don't think I've seen folks do that, or whether it's organizations or people and they just post stuff, but the explicit it feels like the explicit goal of getting likes. And I think that's, that's a problematic approach because then you're maybe not being coming from your true place. I think that's a best practice, but I don't have any formal training, even Facebook advertising. When I first started, it became like, we need to really figure out how we can use this, especially for volunteer recruitment. So I learned Facebook advertising from scratch, and it was like, Whoa, what a world right? But once you learn and you get it, I think that is an important piece because a lot of times, organizational leaders and board don't understand the technology, but they're still trying to make decisions about it, or they're writing it off and saying it isn't important, I think it has to be an organizational pillar has to be a strategy, it has to have its own investment. And sometimes for that to happen, you have to be kind of playing in there at this is that you're a social media coordinator. So many people, Daniel, in my career have told me just get a young gun just get like a, like a young person to come in and just like, fire off this stuff and go viral. And I'm like, You clearly don't know what what social media is. Because that's not how it works. It's engagement. So you want multiple people. So how can you for example, if you have board members, have them put on their LinkedIn profile, that they're a board member with you and then announce it to everybody, raise passive awareness about your organization that doesn't feel like you're flaunting, right? You're just, hey, I'm gonna, and it's not you as org saying, and it's a board member who's proud to say, here's something that I'm doing, you know, get your volunteers to do that, get donors to do that. This, this, having other people amplify the message, I think is key, because a lot of times the posts that actually come from the organization, are not even what's getting the traction, right? It's other people sharing, that's what social media is all about. So be generous with what with sharing with others, amplifying other people's things, don't just, it's not email, it's not email marketing, you're not just sending stuff out. And I think what's important is to find other organizations doing great work, amplify what they're doing. Don't be selfish, if you're all here for the same goal, the same cause, then share their work, even if it means that a funder or donor may give to them instead of you. That's okay. Right? It's it's not competition, we're supposed to work together. So to me, that's, again, the best practice that I think a lot of folks miss is how do you amplify other people and not just be saying, we're great, because over time, that's just going to wear fit.
Daniel
100% I love that, Rickesh you've given a lot of great, you know, practical tips in there, but also driving home that message, that's core to building an online community, which is, you can't have an email newsletter with no subscribers, you can't have a social media presence with no one following your page. So it really is about that community and about that interaction. And you also use the term amplifying amplification a lot. And that's, you know, that's part of this podcast growth, for growth for good. It's literally about amplifying impact, right for Nonprofits and Charities and social purpose organizations. So I think you've definitely kind of summed that up really well. That being said, I'd love to know how you've seen some of these marketing, and communications tactics change. Over the course of the pandemic, you joined your organization as EDI, you know, while before the pandemic. So, that being said, have you seen kind of a shift? Or did you witness that shift.
Rickesh
I think so I think that the pandemic, in many ways really just pushed us to look at things that we hadn't before, like, how are we working within organizations? Because everyone needs to be in the office all the time? Do we need to have everyone working? Nine to five? Do we need to have all these things in place, I think the same thing was true for digital presence. And so organizations I've seen that really embraced it and resource for that and said, Wow, we're going to be doing a lot of stuff, you know, probably online for the next while, but let's not just do it for the time being, because I have seen a lot of folks kind of snapping back, no, take that. And that can be that's where things are going there's always a place for in-person and other streams 100% and build something that's going to continue to last in that in that space. So what I've seen is kind of three schools, I guess one is people who just said forget this, I'm not I'm still embracing digital. Two were the ones that embraced it, and probably even saw results, and then kind of abandoned it. And then the third is like the group that's like, we know, this is how things are, there's going to be things coming up all the time. But this is something we have to invest in. And now is the time because we are motivated to do so because we need these channels in place. But also because there are more resources, and funding knowledge being shared. And that's so that it's an opportune time to say, Let's build this up for the future. So I think that's kind of what I've seen those three kinds of streams, as far as you know, the content or the platforms, I don't know if I've maybe absorbed any trends there. But I just haven't seen some distinct approaches. As far as like, who's doing what, and I was talking with someone the other day, the orgs that really embraced digital fundraising, virtual things, which is, from an accessibility standpoint, and reach standpoint can really do well, if they're done well. Because nothing, nothing worse than a bad virtual experience. I gotta say, it's not for everybody. But when you have a bad one, it's really bad. Like, if you're in person or fluids bad, it's something like, are you still some people, they're like, you know, it's okay. It's an alright time. But yeah, I think I think that folks that did it well have seen, it's paid dividends for sure.
Daniel
Love that. And, you know, we're all learning from that and the best practices have continued to evolve. Right. And, you know, there are some people that we know, in our sector that have chosen to actually keep doing things online that show shifted from in person, because certain parts of that actually worked out better and they're more efficient. And maybe there's a better ROI on that. Right? So I think out of it, there's been a little bit of innovation, a few things changing when it comes to some of their main programming and main fundraising efforts.
