How can we reimagine nonprofits and philanthropy?

Farra Trompeter: Welcome to the Smart Communications Podcast. This is Farra Trompeter, co-director and worker-owner at Big Duck. I’m very excited because today is not only our 200th episode, but I’m getting the chance to interview someone I have long admired. I think maybe even going back 10 years, or almost 10 years, and that is Vu Le. We are going to get into a conversation where we ask the question: How can we reimagine nonprofits and philanthropy? And if that phrasing sounds a bit familiar, it may be because you’re familiar with Vu’s new book, which carries a variation of that title. Specifically, it’s Reimagining Nonprofits and Philanthropy: Unlocking the Full Potential of a Vital and Complex Sector.

Farra Trompeter: If you’re not familiar with Vu, which I’m guessing most of you are, I’m going to tell you a little bit about him. Vu, who uses he/him pronouns, writes the blog, NonprofitAF.com. That’s F as in Farra. Just kidding, I believe it stands for something else. He is the former executive director of RVC nonprofit in Seattle that promotes social justice by supporting leaders of color strengthening organizations led by communities of color and fostering collaboration among diverse communities. Vu is a founding board member of Community-Centric Fundraising, which we have been delighted to have lots of folks from the CCF world on this podcast before. And Vu has degrees in psychology and social work, which I was personally excited to learn about because I also have a Bachelor of Arts in psychology. So many things in common: psychology majors, love of unicorns, and more. And finally, Vu has two kids and watches way too much television when he’s not causing trouble. Vu, welcome to the show.

Vu Le: Thank you so much, Farra, for having me.

Farra Trompeter: Well, so Vu, you are a prolific and very entertaining writer who’s not afraid to stir things up. Your weekly blog posts via NonprofitAF promise and deliver on “Making Tuesdays suck less”. So, making the leap from being a blogger and conference speaker to author makes sense. In fact, I know this is not your first book. In 2018, you co-authored Unicorns Unite: How nonprofits and foundations can build EPIC Partnerships. But let’s go back to the book. What led you to go from, you know, blogging and speaking back to a longer form publication and write Reimagining Nonprofits and Philanthropy?

Vu Le: Yeah, I have written probably over 600 blog posts or so, and that’s just a lot of different ideas, and I just wanted to consolidate them into a more cohesive book so that if people are looking for certain topics, they can just flip through to the right chapters and find it easily. The other reason is also because, honestly, the way that things go here in, in this sort of culture, you kind of need a book to be taken seriously. And we can talk about that. But you know, like, as soon as I announced this very boring title, people are like, “Oh, he’s serious.” Like, so, I mean, sometimes you’ve just got to play the game. I kind of want this book in you know, in university courses. Kind of help, maybe spread some of the lessons that I wish I had learned before when I was starting out on my nonprofit career.

Farra Trompeter: Well, I’m curious, was there some other names of the book that were in your imagination before you went for this straightforward, boring approach? Did you have some fun names on the draft list?

Vu Le: There were things like, Let’s burn this shit down. Something like that. But yeah, but the publishers were like, “Yeah, no Vu. We need, we need you to be a little bit more respectable.”

Farra Trompeter: Yeah. Well, you know, I think folks will get into and understand your humor and your insights as they start reading the book. So, in the blurb of your book, I really love this line, “With everything being so urgent and dire. It’s time we let go of a lot of philosophies and practices we’ve taken as sacred.” And I just want to start there. Can you share one or two of those “sacred ideas” you think it’s time for us to bid farewell to?

Vu Le: Yeah, I mean, there’s plenty. The entire book is about all these ideas that we need to get rid of or, you know, reconsider. So, an example would be like this constant hero worshiping around donors, right? Which is something we talk a lot about in the Community-Centric Fundraising movement. For such a long time, it’s like a sacred cow, you know, like you’ve got to treat donors like heroes, make sure that they’re in the center of everything, their feelings and all this stuff. And I’m like, I really think we need to care less about donors’ feelings and what they want. Like, why? Why? Just because you have a bunch of money, somehow you get to determine how nonprofits do their work. In any other profession, that’s called corruption, right? You get a bunch of money, you don’t know anything about stuff, but you get to determine… that’s corruption. Here, it’s best practice. That’s a ridiculous sacred cow that I think we need to let go of. I mean, donors are wonderful people. I don’t go to my dentist and be like, “Oh, because I’m paying for this root canal. Like, why don’t you use the number seven drill on the root canal?”

Farra Trompeter: Yeah “I think you should actually do tooth number three, not number 21. Let’s switch it up.”

Vu Le: Exactly. So that’s one of the sacred cows. There’s some other ones, such as boards, for example. Like the boards need to be the boss of the ED. And, and I’m like, “Why is that?” The board is one of the least informed groups of people, you know, in the sector. Like they––I mean they’re nice people again––but how do we have a system where people who see 1% of the work and oftentimes do not have any experience with the lived issues we’re trying to address, or even with the nonprofit sector itself, get to have vast power?

Farra Trompeter: I was going to say, I’ve been on and presented to boards where I’ve been the only person who has ever actually worked for a nonprofit. I’m like, this is not good.

Vu Le: Yeah. So let’s just have a bunch of people here who are very nice and just give them a ton of power over nonprofits. Yeah, it makes no sense. So those are two.

Farra Trompeter: Two of many. People can delight themselves learning more as they get into the book. Well, things are quite dire these days. We’re recording this conversation in late September 2025. There are growing attacks on free speech. Nonprofits are removing staff listings from their website to protect their staff from personal attacks. Others are agonizing over their overall tax status and the funding being taken away if they utter the letters DEI, and other work they’re doing. What do you think the role of the nonprofit sector is in this moment? Which I’ve heard you describe as “a fight for our humanity”.

Vu Le: Yeah, I mean, our sector has always been involved in some of the most important fights, right? For civil rights, for all of these different things throughout history. And I think that’s one of the reasons why I really wanted to write this book, which is like, we don’t have time to waste with a lot of the shenanigans and the bullshit we’ve been dealing with, right? We have a very important role to play in really like stopping this rapid rise of fascism, and that means philanthropy and nonprofits have to start thinking about, like, “What are some of these things we just don’t have time for anymore? We need to start focusing.”

Vu Le: You know, I talk about like with foundations and with nonprofits, like “We have to work together to build institutions to protect our civic rights, and we need to start electing people who represent our communities. We need to protect voting rights. We need to, you know, change the tax codes so that rich people are not…” Like right now, everything is controlled by a bunch of billionaires who are like rich white dudes, right? Privileged white dudes with money. They get to control everything. It makes zero sense. So we need to start changing our tax codes and other things.”

Farra Trompeter: Yeah, and like you said, these have been problems that have been around for a long time. They are just certainly the match has been lit underneath them in the dumpster fire that is this world we’re living in.

Farra Trompeter: Hi, I just want to pause this conversation to stop and take another moment to celebrate our very special 200th episode of the Smart Communications Podcast. We are so excited that we hit this milestone, and I just want to thank everyone who helped us get here. First, all of you who listen and give us feedback and are the ones we do this for. Of course, I want to thank everyone who’s been a guest on the show and shared your insights with our community. Our producers, our current producer, Bek Johnson, our initial producer, Marcus DePaula. Our in-house team, who make sure we get these episodes out and ready to you and transcribe the content, Jennifer Petersen and Nickie Rudolf. Of course, everyone at Big Duck, who I think at one point or another has been either a host or a guest on the show. And our original duck, Sarah Durham, who was the initial host and person who conceived of the Smart Communications Podcast. So gotta give Sarah a shout out. And just again, thank you all. We always hope you find these conversations valuable. And if you ever have a topic that you’d like us to cover or a guest you’d like us to interview, please send an email to [email protected]. Alright, let’s get back to the conversation.

Farra Trompeter: Well, Vu, there’s so much I appreciate about you. One of those is that you come to this work having worked within several nonprofits, including those you’ve served as an executive director. I know that many of our listeners out there are nonprofit staff who are leading organizations or maybe even just leading a communications department or a fundraising team. And I know you mentioned this earlier, and you mentioned this in the blurb about why you wrote this book, which is, “I wish I would’ve gotten some of this advice earlier in my career.” So I’m just curious if there’s one or two things that stand out to you as some of that advice you wish you would have received, or you would like to share with our listeners.

Vu Le: Yeah, some of the advice I would say, (1) is that this is all just made up. Like everything we’re dealing with that we’ve been taught as best practice, it’s made up. And what that means is that we don’t really have to follow it. We can start thinking differently about things. For example, I mean, we talk about the board. Like I talk about Robert’s Rules as a simple example. Robert, like, who is Robert? Why are we still using his rules? Well, Robert was Henry Martin Roberts who was like this military dude who in like 1878 or something, you know, like 150 years ago, he took the, the parliamentary procedures from the US Congress and distilled it into this book and now we’re still using it a 150 years later we’re still using these rules that were designed for like Congress of like several hundred people and we’re using this, you know, on a team of like eight people or whatever. And why, and we think, “Oh, we gotta do that. That’s best practice.” No, it’s just all made up. There’s no law that says you have to use Robert’s.

Farra Trompeter: Just say you want to talk about something, and can everyone approve it? Why do we have to get a second into this and a that?

Vu Le: Yeah, exactly. So it’s all made up, and I think when I was starting out in my career, I thought these things were sacred. These are things that much smarter people have created and have tested through time. And no, the reality is that a lot of these things are not only ineffective, but they’re actively harmful to a lot of marginalized communities. Robert’s Rules, I mean, even if you’re fluent in English, it’s still very confusing. But if you’re not, or if you’re from a different culture, then oftentimes, you’re lost. And I’ve attended meetings where, like we’re talking about, I don’t know, education for immigrant kids or something, you know, and I might be one of the only immigrants in the room who’ve had experience working in education or whatever. But I’m left out of the conversation because I don’t know what the motions are at the tables and who’s seconding what and what I’m supposed to say or not say or what’s allowed and stuff, right? So things are completely made up. It’s time to reimagine that.

Vu Le: And then really, like we need to reimagine, like that’s another thing I would say is like we have become so incremental in our approach. Like, I mentioned Hildy Gottlieb from Creating the Future, and something she said about, like, we need to start really thinking about the future we want and how do work backwards on how to get there, versus what we’re doing right now? We just take a crappy situation and try to make it 10% less crappy every year, which is kind of what we do, right? And it’s so ingrained in us, we don’t think about it that way. But if you think about it, it’s like, “Oh, what’s our budget this year? It’s a million. Oh, let’s next year, let’s make it $1.1 million. Yeah, let’s make it 10% more.” “How many people do we serve? A thousand? Let’s make it 1,100 people next year.” No. We need to start thinking about “How do we solve these issues? And close up, and I don’t know, become wedding singers or whatever. Open a stand at the farmer’s market.”

Farra Trompeter: Maybe karaoke. I’m not sure I can go for a full wedding.

Vu Le: Something like that. I don’t know. I think I might be very happy just doing photo booths at weddings.

Farra Trompeter: That’s true. I could see you rocking a rainbow boa, perhaps.

Vu Le: I’d just be managing the the photo booth.

Farra Trompeter:. Okay. Alright. Alright. You don’t have to be in it, you just, you know, let people know where the props are.

Vu Le: Right. And since it’s a wedding, you can charge like five times more. Because of capitalism.

Farra Trompeter: Right. Well, back to your book, and as we’re talking about your book, the last chapter focuses on identifying the barriers to change and working to overcome them. So, as you were just saying, as we try to reimagine, part of reimagining means also things we’re letting go of or things we’re acknowledging we need to fight against and move beyond. And in that chapter, you talk about the elements of the Wheel of Change from Robert Gass, who, side note: I had the pleasure of taking a leadership training from him at the Rockwood Foundation, I don’t know, a million years ago, maybe in 2001. So I was excited to see his name. He’s a great, great nonprofit leader, but you encourage folks to explore what might be driving these challenges. And I’m wondering if you can explain the framework, I believe it incorporates hearts and minds, behaviors, structures, but if you could talk about what is the Wheel of Change and how do these elements affect one another?

Vu Le: Yeah, I’m paraphrasing Robert Gass’s work here. I did attend a one-week course called The Art of Transformational Consulting, which was very helpful. And that’s where we learned about this Wheel of Change. So with the Wheel of Change, there’s basically three like circles, right? There’s the hearts and minds, then there’s the behaviors, and then there’s the systems. And we tend to really focus on the behaviors and the systems without really addressing the hearts and minds. And that includes thinking about, like, what motivates people? Or even like what sort of background did they grow up in, right? So we zoom straight into like changing people’s behavior and not take time to consider, like, why are they so resistant? We, we’ve got to start having more of a framework around that, you know? So it’s a lot of resistance to change is because, you know, people may have certain unconscious things that have been affecting their hearts and minds. And so, really kind of understanding it will lead to much more effective changes in behavior and systems.

Farra Trompeter: Yeah. That aligns with a lot of work we do in communications where we always want to make everything we do centered on the audience and really understanding, what’s their mindset? What’s their motivations? What are their beliefs? How do we understand that? And then think about the messaging, the messenger, the communications channels, but not just do what we’ve always been doing because we’ve been doing it. So I really appreciate that framework.

Vu Le: Yeah. But I mean, within reason, of course, right? I mean, going back to what we said about the Community-Centric Fundraising movement…

Farra Trompeter: You can’t make it all about them.

Vu Le: It can’t be all about donors, and also we need to actually do it more meaningfully. Like, we think that we’re addressing the hearts and minds of donors, but are we really? Or are we just, like, infantilizing them and thinking that this is what their hearts and minds is, right? Versus, like, actually communicating with them and figuring out what is meaningful. And sometimes the most meaningful things are painful. Like, ask people to examine where their wealth comes from, and it could be from slavery and stolen indigenous land and whatever, you know. And that is in some ways more meaningful, but possibly more uncomfortable.

Farra Trompeter: Yeah. And I think as you understand these things that lead you to question even your own activities and behaviors, which I think is important too. Well, I can’t let you go with a little time for some rants and raves. We’ve had some ranting, but I want to just open that up. What are some things that are pissing you off these days in the nonprofit sector that we haven’t talked about yet?

Vu Le: There’s quite a lot. I think right now I’m getting very tired of this sort of white moderation, which I mentioned in chapter two of the book as one of the nine horsemen of our sectors, like being ineffective. And white moderation is what Dr. King mentioned is probably the biggest threat to justice. It’s not the people who are like burning crosses and wearing hoods. It’s the people on the side saying, “You know, like, can you just be a little bit nicer? Like, can we just be more civil to one another?” I had someone angry at me because I was on a webinar just last week, and I was, I don’t know, I was talking about fascism, and you know, how we need to fight it. And I think at some point I got really heated and I used the f-word, I was cursing, and this person on the feedback phone was like, “Oh, it’d be so much better if you didn’t, like, curse’. Like, really?

Farra Trompeter: Sometimes the situation demands a, you know, a fuck and a shit and whatever else you’ve got to say.

Vu Le: Yeah, exactly. I’m like, this is what you’re worried about? That’s the F-word that you’re worried about, not fascism?

Farra Trompeter: Exactly. The wrong F-word they’re concerned with.

Vu Le: Right? So like, I’m very tired of this sort of civility. People are like, “Oh, like, why don’t we…” And then I’m also very annoyed at how people have been turning on one another instead of, like, focusing on who the real enemies are, right? You know, the people who are fascists, people who are suppressing free speech, like those who we need to be angry about, not the people who are actually trying, and maybe they don’t know everything, and maybe they made some mistakes or whatever. You know, like, I think that we really need to have like a conversation about like, can we just be a little bit nicer to one another instead of just like throwing like, you know, people into the trash when they made one mistake because they were not up to date on every single thing that’s going on, you know, every single terminology or whatever. So those are two things. And also like funders, like, what the fuck are you doing with all this money right now?

Farra Trompeter: Yeah.

Vu Le: You know, like you’re hoarding all this money when there’s not… you’re saving for a future that may not exist for anyone at this point. Like in a totalitarian state, all the money you’ve saved and hoarded up, it’s going to be meaningless. So what the fuck are you saving for?

Farra Trompeter: These are the raves I’m here for. And I want to just sort of nod to one of your last comments. In 2022, there was an article that I love that I know we passed around, and I think we’ve talked about on the podcast before, Maurice Mitchell’s Building Resilient Organizations, where he points out some of what you’re talking about, where we have started fighting within the progressive movement with each other and made it so that there’s no grace for learning, there’s no grace for saying the wrong thing, and that we have sort of gone too far in that. And this was, again, written in 2022. And if folks haven’t read it or haven’t read it in three years, we’ll link to that in the transcript at bigduck.com/insights. Well, I want to bring some unicorns, which I know we both love, and some rainbows back into this conversation. What are some things that are bringing you joy right now? Let’s have a little “up’ moment.

Vu Le: Well, let’s see. My kids are bringing me lots of joy. They’re very sassy right now. Also, my flowers, like I’ve been, I planted dahlias and they’ve just been growing, and then I planted tulips and in the spring they just pop up, and it’s just really nice. But also, I’m just, I find so much joy in all the folks in the sector who are continuing to fight, even if, you know, it’s hard and stuff. And I think we, we all need to take a break and so on, but they’re being very creative in how they build community and how they continue to resist. And it’s really inspiring and very moving.

Farra Trompeter: Well, you are as well. And if you’re out there, you’re not already subscribing to Vu’s posts at NonprofitAF.com, do it now. You’ll thank me later if you haven’t already. You can also follow Vu on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn, which again, we will link to at bigduck.com/insights. And of course, I do hope you check out his latest book and use it to stir up some needed conversations with your team, your board, your funders, your donors, and other folks in your community. Vu, before we sign off, is there anything else you’d like to share with our listeners?

Vu Le: I would probably just want to just end by letting people know, you know, I think it’s been really hard right now. And everyone is just struggling, not just professionally, but I think like existentially and personally, people are dealing with a lot. And I don’t recall a time when we’ve all been this collectively stressed. I know it’s happened throughout history, but you know, in recent times, in my lifetime, I don’t remember the sort of collective, constant, relentless stress. And I just want to let people know, you know, like, it seems really dire right now. But I think also some of the worst moments in history are often followed by some of the best moments. Some of the greatest progress have been made after some very challenging times. I think about the, like the civil rights, you know, movement came after a period of like Jim Crow and some horrific oppression and stuff. Not to say that it ends or anything, but like we make a lot of progress after some of these really, really awful times. So I want people to continue hanging on and to take breaks and take care of one another and to continue building community, because that’s how we’re going to make it through this. Not just surviving, but I think, I think a better world will come out of this.

Farra Trompeter: Well, I hope so, and I will hold on to that. And I want to thank everyone for listening today and to listening to all 200 of our podcasts. I know there might be some of you out there who have done that, and really do take some time today to find some joy to reimagine the world we’re living in and challenge the status quo. Thanks again for listening, and thanks, Vu, for being here.

Vu Le: Thank you. Farra.