May 6, 2024 • 55 mins
Embark on a revealing exploration with industry finance expert Susan Den, unravelling the intricate dance of finance, HR, and strategy in the nonprofit realm. Susan's prestigious transition from the thrill of amusement parks to the nuanced world of arts and music organizations has endowed her with a keen perspective on using accounting as a vibrant storytelling medium. Our conversation dives into how this narrative power shapes the future, positioning finance and HR not just as support functions but as pivotal architects in the edifice of organizational strategy.
The journey continues with a heartfelt look at Treehouse's transformative work with foster youth and how their financial strategies have masterfully balanced expansion with innovation. We also navigate the post-pandemic fundraising landscape, now a terrain of shifting donor preferences and engagement tactics. This new world challenges us to redefine community support, highlighting the crucial role of intimate, donor-centered events in sustaining nonprofit vitality.
Concluding our session, we traverse the realms of transparency, trust, and mentorship, pillars of a robust financial framework. The exchange of financial insights across all organizational levels emerges as a catalyst for empowered decision-making and problem-solving. Through anecdotes from the festival industry's unpredictability, we underscore the trust and quick-thinking demanded in high-stakes environments, and celebrate mentorship's lasting legacy in sculpting finance professionals ready to tackle the sector's complexities. Join us for this thought-provoking voyage that not only demystifies the fiscal narrative but also celebrates the human connections that underpin the very essence of nonprofit success.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Susan (00:00):
Hi, this is Susan Den and you are listening to One Hour
to Doors.
Jon (00:10):
This is One Hour to Doors, a podcast about the business and
soul of the festivals andevents industry.
I am your host, Jon Stone.
Every episode of One Hour toDoors explores the people,
issues, insights and trendsimpacting the enterprise of
bringing people and communitiestogether in common cause.
We are recording today at theTotem Star Studios at historic
(00:33):
King Street Station in Seattle.
Our guest today is Susan Den.
Susan is an expert in nonprofitfinance, accounting and human
resources.
Her work tends to transform theorganizations she serves,
repositioning accounting and HRdepartments from the often
mundane perception ofadministrative necessity to an
(00:54):
essential partner in all aspectsof an organization's work.
Susan and I have workedtogether on a multitude of
endeavors and in my consultingpractice, she is my first call
whenever I encounter a need forexpertise in her field.
Welcome to the show, Susan!
Susan (01:11):
Hi Jon, thanks for having me.
Jon (01:13):
So I have to start off.
You volunteered a lot of timewith the Totem Star organization
a number of years ago, reallycontributing to setting us on a
path to what is now thisbeautiful new studio at King
Street Station.
This is your first time here.
What do you think?
Susan (01:31):
It is as amazing as I imagined and it is a reflection
of all of the heart that hasgone into arriving at this space
and it leaves so much roomstill for what's to come next.
So I'm tearing up a little bit.
I'm very, very happy to be here.
Jon (01:51):
It's a pretty cool space.
Wait till you get to see itactivated.
When did you get into financeand accounting in the first
place?
Susan (02:01):
Oh, that goes back to high school Just opportunities,
in particular business classesback in the day that lent to
internship style jobs and thenit started to evolve into a
(02:22):
greater understanding that thisis the story behind every
business, regardless of itsbusiness model.
I want to say it all camefairly easy for me, but I'm
always happy to say that thislength of time I learn something
new every day.
So it's a fascinating littlegame and story all the time, in
(02:44):
every environment and everyopportunity.
Jon (02:46):
Yeah, so you and I met.
The context was we were lookingfor a new CFO and we did a
national search and we found you.
You were hiding out in Texas atthe time and you were doing
finance for a chain of waterparks, right, and I remember in
(03:08):
the interview process at first Ithought, well, what does water
parks have to do with majormusic festivals that we were
doing at the time?
And I quickly found out thatthey're actually more alike than
not.
All the essential elements arethere you have staff, you have
security, you have ATMs, youhave admission systems, you'd
have marketing sponsorship.
(03:29):
Really, the only difference iswater parks, especially down
south, tend to operate in thewater year round, or mostly year
round, whereas all of our stuffup here in the Pacific
Northwest is very seasonal.
But it was a beautiful fitright off the top.
I mean, the learning curve wasnext to nothing for you, as I
(03:49):
recall.
Susan (03:50):
I never would have imagined.
You know, I recall my originalapplication was for a different
position because I thought I wasgoing to take a break, not work
quite so much, and then theperson at the time who was in
charge of the search called meand said you don't want that, we
want you to look at this.
Otherwise, probably would nothave made the connection that
(04:11):
that particular role would be sowell suited for the experience
that I had had.
But you're right, therelationships, when you think
about entertainment of any sort,people are seeking something
out and their method of gettingthere, the method of creating a
ticket situation, access to it,the marketing behind it, the
limitations to it, the risks,the human element is essentially
(04:35):
the same.
Jon (04:36):
If you've told me before I forgot what other position were
you applying for.
It was an accounts payable job.
Oh geez.
Susan (04:42):
Well, you know I really did accounts payable job.
Oh geez.
Well you know I really did.
I had, you know, for many yearsexisted in that space of doing
a lot and had very youngchildren at the time and thought
maybe I would just take alittle break, go back to school,
learn some.
You know cheese making.
I don't know what I was thinking, but even recently I've been
asked if I were going to make achange ever from one company or
(05:04):
organization to the next, whatwould be the draw?
And I always come back to myexperience in arts and music,
because accounting is laundrythat every company has a need to
keep moving through.
But the challenges ofsupporting people in their work
to create art and createexperiences for people is just
(05:27):
something unlike any other andthat's the draw.
That's the real thing.
As much as I love supportingall the human services
organizations that I work for aswell and my heart is very much
there, there's that.
What have we not thought of?
That's going to happen.
What are you know?
What are we going to encountertoday?
That's a new challenge andeverybody gets excited about or
(05:48):
everybody is freaking out aboutor having a challenge around it,
kind of.
I've only experienced it inarts and music.
Jon (05:57):
You just called accounting laundry, and there's certainly a
laundry element to it.
But you've taught me and somany others that it can be so
much more if you let it be.
It can be an essential part ofplanning and ideating, visioning
.
Susan (06:13):
That certainly.
I don't even think of so muchas the accounting.
If your accounting iswell-established and the people
that are tasked with keeping upwith it and making sure that all
the wheels are turning, that'sone component of it.
But then the real work is theanalysis of that information,
the breadth of exploration aboutwhat's behind those numbers.
(06:36):
It's really criticallyimportant to have the right
people moving the informationthrough the system in one way or
another, but it's just asimportant that each person
understands what it is, what istheir piece of it, what is their
part of it, what's behind it.
I'm not a fan of telling peoplejust fill in this blank and fill
in that blank.
You know, I want people toreally ask questions and
(06:57):
understand, to see the wholepicture, because that's when you
can start to plan and projectand caution people that you're
advising and learn the history.
I can look, you know I've doneit everywhere I've gone, you
know, with longstandingorganizations, go back to the
origins and you learn, you seethe story, you see the evolution
of how they got to where theyare today and then you can also
(07:21):
envision where they're going andhopefully support giving a
little bit of a crystal ball.
You know, look, this thingisn't addressed or isn't deeply
understood, it could start toturn things in the wrong
direction.
Or if this thing were nurturedor examined or given a little
bit more attention, that couldactually be an incredible
(07:41):
positive direction or growthopportunity that could actually
be an incredible positivedirection or growth opportunity.
Jon (07:51):
You, in my experience you're equally adept on the
accounting and finance side asyou are on the HR side.
Is that something that'stypical, or are you kind of a
fluke that way, the fact thatyou kind of bring both aspects
to the table?
Susan (08:01):
I think in small organizations it's not entirely
uncommon, because people thinkof finance and you know, if you
think of HR just from theperspective of the benefits and
wages provided to the peoplethat work with you, then at
minimum you sort of default to afinance person managing all of
that, because you have anassumption that it's going to be
(08:22):
accurate, that it's going to be, you know, keeping tax laws and
benefits, renewal expenses sortof in check.
But I've never approached itfrom that point of view.
You know it sounds trite oroverused, but I genuinely do
maintain people first.
You know you cannot besuccessful if your people are
(08:42):
not well supported, well caredfor, given the tools that they
need to do their job.
And so that's where the humanresources, the true human part
of that, comes in for me.
And some of that evolved fromthat finance and accounting
point of view, because a lot offolks in maybe earlier in their
careers might have a little bitof fear around the finance and
(09:05):
accounting responsibilities thatthey have.
And so I kind of chain the twotogether and then, when you're
working with people to help themunderstand their
responsibilities and what theircontribution is to the financial
health of the organization, youlearn more about them.
You know they begin to trustyou and lean on you for some of
(09:27):
those more traditional HR needs.
So it's kind of a mix, I guess.
So I wouldn't say that no, I'mcompletely an outlier.
I think it's probably common tocombine the two roles or to
have one individual or maybe ateam of a couple of folks in a
small organization doing both.
But I feel like I took it veryseriously in the space of I'm
(09:47):
not just here to make sure thateveryone gets paid and that the
taxes are filed that there'smore to it than that.
So I don't know that that partis that unusual.
I feel like I was given a giftof being able to exist in
environments that allowed me todo that.
Jon (10:03):
So talk a little bit about the organization that you're
currently working with.
Susan (10:08):
I am currently the Senior Director of Finance for
Treehouse, which is a wonderfulnonprofit in Seattle, now
statewide Washington, statewideproviding service to youth in
foster care.
There are a number of fantasticorganizations in our state and
across the country that provideservice to youth in care.
There are a number of fantasticorganizations in our state and
across the country that provideservice to youth in care.
Treehouse's specific focus andits origins were around
(10:32):
providing, as all nonprofitshave, you know, some original
origin and maybe communitypeople just seeing a need.
So it was a wonderful group ofpeople who started ensuring that
there was a gift made availableto every youth in foster care
during every holiday season, andfrom there it developed to
providing other necessities,clothing and general goods, and
(10:57):
then increased to providing theopportunity to pay for things
that the youth would otherwisenot have available to them.
I mean literally right up topaying for their football the
youth would otherwise not haveavailable to them.
I mean literally right up topaying for their football camp
or their senior photos.
You know things of that naturethat we take for granted often
that aren't available.
And then in the last 10 or soyears Treehouse has really
(11:19):
created some incredible programsto support the youth in a
program that is GraduationSuccess, which starts from a
middle school age and sees themall the way through high school
to ensure their graduation.
The percentage of graduates hasincreased dramatically in that
period of time Advocacy, work toensure that the required
(11:40):
services in each school districtare made available to those
youth, and then subsequentpost-high school support to help
them as they come out of thesystem, help navigate what
resources are available to them.
It's grown exponentially andthen in the last couple of years
has moved to provide servicestatewide for the youth.
(12:01):
So I'm incredibly proud ofbeing a part of that team and
the work that they do.
It points to what's reallyimportant and critical in our
region, in our state, in ourcountry, in our neighborhoods.
You know that we want toprovide opportunities for all
young people, much to comingback to the work that Totem Star
does, so that they have anunderstanding of what's
(12:23):
available to them, that they canfeel empowered, that they don't
go into adulthood in fear andthat in the end translates to
contributors to our communities.
That makes the world a betterplace for all of us.
Jon (12:38):
When was Treehouse founded?
I should know this off the topof my head.
Susan (12:42):
Well, we're celebrating our 35th year from its origins.
And how many FTE we'recurrently at about 220.
Jon (12:50):
Oh wow, that's a big organization and that was a huge
leap from about 2019 to now.
Is risk management run throughthe finance office or is it a
whole separate thing?
Susan (13:01):
It falls under a.
It's a collaborative department, if you will.
That is, we turn finance andrisk and we have a full-time
risk director, which was arecent add up to that point, and
in most of the roles that I'veheld, when you think of risk,
I've always been the point tofocus on areas of risk around.
You know the traditionalinsurance and personnel issues,
(13:24):
things of that nature.
Jon (13:25):
Yeah, I know you kept bringing that to my attention,
like on a regular basis when wewere working together, whether I
wanted to hear it or not.
Susan (13:32):
One of my favorite stories and that too, I'll
always tell people that I'm, byprofession and somewhat by
nature, risk averse, and then Iwill talk you out of something
and then I'll end theconversation with now how do we
make this happen?
So one of my favorite storieswas working with one of your
other podcast guests, chrisWeber, on a Bumbershoot
(13:54):
programming, ask.
And that was the year of allthe Elvises.
You'll recall that year.
And Chris came to me and saidthis is fantastic, I've found a
giant blow up Elvis head andwe're going to put it on top of
Fisher Pavilion.
And I said no, you're not.
And he said what?
What are you talking about?
I was like I am certain there'san exclusion in our insurance
(14:15):
policy around that oh, aroundinflatables, absolutely yes.
And he was just deflated youknow bad pun.
And then I sat on it for alittle bit and I came back
around and I said let's figureout how to make that happen,
because risk is obviouslysomething that everyone should
pay close attention to, but youknow you have to if you work
hard to mitigate that risk andyou understand what it is, and
(14:38):
I'm not a fan of making rashdecisions that ultimately could
cause harm to others.
But where there's a will,there's a way.
Jon (14:46):
Yeah, I mean, that's what I've learned over the years.
The first step is justunderstanding what the risk is,
which is easier said than done alot of the time, like really
holistically understanding thefull extent of your exposure.
But if you can get to thatpoint, to that level of
understanding, then it justbecomes a puzzle to solve.
Susan (15:07):
Right, right, and you know.
Coming back to the people, youknow there are a lot of people
in the arts that are incrediblycreative and they can picture it
, they can see it, they can mapit out and every once in a while
they have to be told we just,you know, we can't do that.
(15:29):
That's just not something thatwe can either bear the cost of
or the risk of, and berespectful and mindful, because
they are going to bedisappointed, they are going to
be told no, and you want tomanage it in a way that doesn't
feel like you're just beingpunitive or choosing to tell
them no when other people aretold yes.
Jon (15:43):
I mean we're going through that right here at Totemstar
Studios in a micro way, but it'sa new space, different types of
risk, working with youth.
You know it takes time andattention, devoted attention, to
fully understand the extent ofyour risk profile.
Understand the extent of yourrisk profile.
(16:07):
We were talking recently andyou mentioned that you were
doing a lot of work and puttingin a lot of thought to deficit
budgeting lately.
Say more about that.
Susan (16:13):
Well, the boring speak.
Part of it is in nonprofitaccounting guidance.
Until I guess we're probablyabout five or six years ago, the
guidance changed.
Most people will recall therewas a time when you could do
your annual fundraiser in Juneand ask your contributors to
note that their gift wasunrestricted, wasn't necessarily
(16:36):
for a specific program, ormaybe identify a program to the
next year.
And then you could allow boarddiscretion to say, okay, we're
going to restrict, we're goingto temporarily restrict the use
of those funds for next year.
We're literally fundraising fornext year activities.
And then the IRS gap guidancechanged so that we can no longer
do that.
(16:56):
You're required to recognizethat revenue in the year that
you've earned it.
Jon (17:01):
Right.
Susan (17:02):
So there's become this cadence of one year, as a you
know, having a fantastic excessand then the next year having a
deficit.
But we're still trapped in thatplace of we can't bring a
deficit budget forward to ourboard.
They're not going to approve adeficit budget.
So we need to start looking atthe little bit of our history.
(17:23):
You know what really occurred,not necessarily trick ourselves
into thinking that that's goingto be the cadence when you're up
, when you're down.
So go back in the history, lookand see what was really
occurring.
Were you consistentlypresenting a balanced budget,
yet your true outcome was adeficit?
That also is, you know,something to sit down and
understand and talk to yourboard about.
(17:43):
Some organizations have maybereceived a fantastic endowment
and cash contributions early intheir structure so they can
weather a deficit every year.
Then you need to know what doesthat look like?
At what point, you know, willthis run out?
It may never run out, dependingon the endowment and the
earnings that support that.
But we tend to like focus onthe upcoming year and how we're
(18:06):
going to manage it, how we'regoing to fundraise to support it
, what other lines of revenue wehave, what new initiatives we
want to put into it.
What are the expenses aroundthat going to be?
And then we come right back tothat habit of like and we need
to present a balanced budget.
So working with your financecommittee in particular to help
(18:26):
present that to the board in away that makes sense, because
you're in it for the long run.
You've been in it for the longrun if you've been doing it for
a long time, so understand thehistory, make that visible, help
your staff that are part ofbuilding that budget Understand
that this year we're operatinglean so that we can be prepared
in the next year to grow.
(18:46):
And just be mindful consistentlythat your net asset balance is
really what you're concernedabout, because you're borrowing
against it one year maybe whenyou have a deficit and then
you're replenishing it the nextyear when you suddenly have that
additional revenue for thatyear.
In real life it's rolling.
Do you have income coveringyour expenses or you're also
(19:08):
contributing to you know, maybebeing able to create some
reserves.
Are you borrowing against thosereserves in one year, knowing
that there'll be replenished thenext year?
And I've seen just so muchagain, especially in small
organizations where they're sohyper-focused on just that
upcoming year's balanced budget,that they're not actually
getting their finance committeeon board, aligned with them, and
(19:31):
what's the growth going to looklike.
This is a short-term situation.
Here's how we're going toovercome it and when.
And that takes a lot.
It takes a lot of work to getthere and you have to get it to
a place where you're actuallyspeaking from a place of
knowledge and trust that thosenumbers make sense.
You know you're not doing it tomanipulate the view and sort of
get the outcome that you want.
But moving away from thatconversation of we can't have a
(19:56):
deficit budget, I think is whatall nonprofits in particular
need to start considering andlearning about themselves what
all nonprofits in particularneed to start considering and
learning about themselves.
I imagine most of Treehouse'srevenue is contributed yes, it's
a 60-40 contributed and publicstate contract.
Supporting youth and fostercare in particular is, and
should be, a state supported,using our tax dollars to create
(20:22):
that level of support.
But of course, those dollarsare heavily vied, for it's more
than just caring for the youthin care, it's also systems
change is critical to reducingthat number and having a depth
of understanding of what'scausing it.
I mean, we all understand manystories behind it, but getting
(20:43):
to root causes and doingexcessive systems change is
where a lot of that statefunding should go as well.
Jon (20:49):
What kind of trends are you seeing recently in contributed
revenue in general?
Susan (20:54):
So the interesting thing, you know, as I was speaking
about deficit budgets inparticular, I think there's a
little bit of a we're all givingourselves a little bit of a
storytelling that when thepandemic hit, that everyone was
doing pretty good up to thatpoint, and then you know we were
very grateful for the PPP loansto help everyone survive.
(21:14):
And then, if we'd allunderstood at the time how long
it was going to go on, we couldhave done the one thing that
it's a very rare opportunity todo, which is put everything on
stop so that you can review andrevise and replan and
re-strategize.
But you know it just, it didn'treally work that way.
Hindsight would be, we wouldhave that.
Jon (21:35):
How are you going to strategize for something that
you literally can't even see orcomprehend or measure?
Susan (21:40):
It's only going to be two weeks, it's only going to be
six weeks and you know, thenwe're years down.
So as we all sort of came backout and back into programs and
delivering on our missions,there were some defaults, back
to the same habits that we had.
You know, this is how youfundraise, this is what people
care about, this is how peoplewant to be engaged with, because
(22:04):
we just needed to get it done.
So I am seeing more and moreexamples of how the story isn't
exactly true, that you know lotsof organizations were
struggling and they werebeginning to see trends change
in fundraising even before thepandemic.
But you know there's also somuch turnover post-pandemic so
(22:25):
the stories change and are maybea little bit lost.
And then the new folks comingin of course have to be super
focused on hit the ground andkeep going forward.
So once in-person opportunitiesrepresented themselves, there
was a flurry of incrediblesuccess in community fundraising
.
People had a moment torecognize what they missed and
(22:46):
what they wanted to support, andmaybe they had just changes in
deciding how they wanted to livetheir lives.
I'm going to give more, do less, whatever those things were.
So there was a year or two ofsome really wonderful giving.
The in-person events were verywell attended maybe record
(23:06):
numbers of attendees and then ofthe few folks that I know that
are working in organizations.
It's kind of fundraising season, you know, between now and May
or June, and attendance is low.
The outreach is requiring justa different level of
communication.
I won't say that people aren'tgiving as generously, but
(23:27):
they're certainly focusing onthings that might be different
than what they were focusing onpre-pandemic.
So it's becoming more of achallenge.
I imagine what we'll see nextis how people are solving those
new trends how people aresolving those new trends.
Jon (23:44):
I will get some of those links to some of those articles
from you and put those in theepisode description for people
to find.
Yeah, totem Star we haven't hadour annual fundraising gala
since 2019.
And then we didn't do it in2020, obviously, covid and then
we became singularly obsessedwith our first capital campaign
(24:04):
to build this new facility.
In October October 10th It'llbe our first annual gala since
COVID.
We have high hopes for that,but also we're not making any
assumptions about how that'sgoing to go.
Susan (24:19):
I think the traditional model is one have the right
people in the room.
You know the people who canshow up and write a big check,
raise their paddle.
That's the long time model.
But we've all experiencedfundraisers where there are a
lot of people in the room whoare there because they were an
invited guest of you knowsomeone, but they're not
(24:39):
necessarily prepared tocontribute in the same way.
I know all professionalfundraisers know that that's not
the indicator of success,because just having those people
experience the program, tounderstand what it is you're
raising funds for, is awonderful opportunity to start,
(25:00):
even a young person, in thinkingabout philanthropy and being a
community supporter of differentorganizations.
But the costs to do afundraiser of a certain level,
you know, in 200 people, 300people, 1200 people begins to
shrink your net.
(25:20):
I think that the trends we'llsee will be smaller gatherings,
genuinely asking people how theywant to be contacted.
We have amazing donors and allthey want is a phone call once a
year to ask you a couple ofquestions about how things are
going, and then they're happy tocontribute and they just are
not interested in that big show,so to speak, to contribute and
(25:43):
they just are not interested inthat big show, so to speak.
It doesn't mean that weshouldn't be having some type of
joyful community access on anannual basis or semi-annual
basis to open the new minds andgain opportunities to show and
showcase what the work is.
We can certainly work to drivepeople to our websites, I mean,
but all of us are bombardedevery day with an email that
(26:03):
says look at me, you know, readabout my program.
So I think that we're going tosee a shift in that as well,
that it's no longer going to bea you know, an expensive
fundraiser.
It can be.
Totemstar is a good example.
It doesn't need to cost a lotof money to invite people in to
enjoy the conversation about theprograms, and I think that
that's a trend that we're goingto see.
Jon (26:23):
Well, with Totem Star, the annual fundraiser has never been
a critical source of revenuefor us.
Really, the main purpose for usone is to give our youth
artists performance opportunityin front of a real audience.
Performance opportunity infront of a real audience.
(26:47):
Secondly, it's really it's justa chance to connect with the
actual community.
To us, getting some new peopleon board with the Totem Star
mission.
That's just as important, ifnot more important, than them,
you know, writing a check for ahundred bucks or something like
that.
Most of our revenue comesthrough grants and because we're
cognizant of the fact thatthere's not a lot of other orgs
(27:10):
out there doing exactly whatTotemstar does.
So for the people for whom ourmission resonates, it's not a
hard sell, right?
We don't have a competitivestance most of the time in our
fundraising.
So the gala yeah, we sure wouldlike to generate as much money
as we can with it, but reallyit's more just about.
(27:32):
It's almost like an annualreport to the community.
I love that.
That's the vibe that we want toachieve with it.
Susan (27:39):
And I think, acknowledging that as we sit
inside our organizations, thatmaybe we fall into a place of
thinking that we know who thatcommunity is.
It's a little daunting to justhave an open door activity, but
that's where we're going to seetrue change and partnership
opportunities and new peoplebeing curious.
Jon (28:00):
You talk about trends coming out of COVID.
I can't remember if I'vementioned this to you before,
but my mindset is that COVIDreset everything and we won't be
able to truly understand whatthe new normal is until three
years after COVID ended.
For your organization and so,like when the official end of
(28:24):
COVID, it's different fordifferent industries, even here
at Totemstar, for example.
Covid is no longer impactingour programs, but it still
resonates.
There's still little echoes ofit that keep popping up in
oddball places.
But for us, I would think 2024really, I think, will be our
(28:46):
first year of normalcy again,and so my mindset is that we're
not going to be able to say withany real objectivity what the
new normal is until after 2026.
We'll have three years ofoperating under the new normal
conditions.
Now we've got some actualstatistics and anecdotes to look
(29:08):
at.
It's like when we start a newevent, you launch a new event,
you can't really judge it untilyou've run it for three times.
Susan (29:18):
I think it has also created the challenging of the
norm, challenging of, but thisis the way we've always done it.
You know that some folksactually, after maybe years of
routine, kind of felt a sparkwhen they had to become very
creative, and maybe there wereplenty of folks who fought
(29:41):
against it and said no, no, no,no, we can't.
You know, we can't go outsidethe box.
This is what we've always doneand this is why we've done it
and have maybe either had to beheld accountable for that
resistance or moved on orbegrudgingly started to change
their frame of mind around that.
But I hope, my hope is thatthat curiosity lingers and that
(30:05):
it's okay to have conversationsaround.
I hear you, I hear that this isyour view of what is going to be
successful.
But let's talk about it alittle bit longer.
We've got a little more time toreally make sure that what
we're committing to has beenbeen fully vetted.
And in the midst of that, whatdid we all learn?
(30:25):
You can shift very, veryquickly and so, like a hard
commitment of this is what we'regoing to do, this, how we're
going to behave, this is what'sgoing to make it successful.
I think there's just a lot moreappetite for course correcting
habits have been formed that are, we can react a lot quicker.
We don't let things just sortof go down that track for an
(30:48):
extended period of time and thenfind out that it wasn't working
.
So I think that there were someunintentional lessons learned
that maybe we aren't evencognizant of, that we wouldn't
even name unless we sit down totalk about it, true?
Jon (31:03):
Let's talk for a minute about something that I know
you're big on, but that'stransparency and finance.
Susan (31:10):
I think that you know, a person's title doesn't
necessarily turn them into anexpert on every subject.
We all are only as good as thepeople that support us.
We can be better by supportingthem as well, and one of the
ways to support them is to giveas much as is reasonable in
(31:31):
context and view to ourfinancial situations, to our
risk situations, to ourchallenges.
I mean, how glorious is it tosit in a room full of young
people, as we've experienced andtalk about you know, we're just
having lunch and then achallenge comes up and, in their
brilliant way of just askingquestions, problem solving
(31:53):
occurs.
Starting people early in theircareers understanding financial
implications.
It doesn't mean they have to,you know, run the spreadsheets
and get deep into the weeds, buthaving a clear view of how
things work provides theopportunity for them to help
contribute to problem solving.
It gives them an understandingthat just because we have the
(32:15):
money doesn't mean we shouldspend the money, and they can
own the decision making behindsome of those things.
The level of satisfaction thatwe will have for those people in
their roles will increase,because no one likes to feel as
if they're being left out ofsomething or if they're or that
they're being viewed as notbeing able to understand some,
(32:39):
some levels of finance, and andthen you'll you'll just find a
shift, I think, in theconversations.
You don't want to go into aconversation or a meeting with a
group of people who have to getbrought up to speed on things,
or maybe just overwhelmed by theinformation.
If you brought them along withyou the entire time, then you're
all kind of in the same placewhen you have to sit down and
(33:00):
have difficult or joyfulconversations about how
financial things are working out.
Joyful conversations about howfinancial things are working out
.
Jon (33:07):
You remind me of when you and I were working with the big
EDM concert promoter and when wecame in there to help solve
some issues.
They were having the financesand the budgets behind every
event and there were a lot ofevents.
All those numbers were heldpretty closely by just a couple
of people at the top, and thatwas one thing I saw you change
(33:29):
right away is that you made sureall of that information
trickled down to everybody andthe results were really profound
.
Just like you were saying, it'slike give a little insight into
the how and the why and thewhat, and people will tend to
make use of that information.
Susan (33:56):
I mean, you think about how.
That's a great example, becausethere were often so many
critical decision-making.
You know you've got four hoursto decide if this thing is going
to work or if we're going topay for that, or someone made a
commitment and that commitmentthen pushes something else aside
and then you have to, of course, advise people that, by the way
, this thing you were countingon has been yanked out from
under you.
Having the bigger context ofthat then keeps them from, of
(34:17):
course, blowing up.
And then now you're dealingwith a completely different set
of problems and a drama thatdidn't need to happen if they'd
had a greater understanding andthe other brilliance behind all
of the people that we workedwith.
There is their problem solvingon the fly abilities were
remarkable and you know, therewere times anywhere where maybe
(34:39):
a supplier or a vendor you knowwas given expectations on
payment date and payment timeand such, and many times when
someone would, you know I'dliterally walk on scene and
they'd fly in front of me sayingI need a check now.
Because I worked one-on-one withthem so much to understand,
(34:59):
they were empowered to say tothat vendor you're going to get
it as soon as you know, she cansit down and get organized here,
instead of creating a situationin which now you have a vendor
or supplier who is feeling as ifsomething's not right, because
it wasn't a question ofsomething's not right, it was
just a question of volume andactivity and timing and
communication, and they wereable to contribute to those
(35:23):
successes as well.
Those successes as well.
Something that I found wasalways successful was coaching
people at all levels tounderstand the general cost of
things.
There's a lot of work that hasto go into finding the right
thing, and everything doesn'thave to be the, you know, the
golden paperclip.
You can do somethingsatisfactorily with the plain
(35:45):
old paperclip.
But we saw a lot of success infolks understanding how they
could solicit in-kindcontributions of goods or
services and what wasappropriate for that and how to
have those conversations and howto, you know, know that at what
point they could make anintroduction to the people who
could do that negotiation andthey were so contributory there.
And you know, having onein-kind intern who was meant to
(36:07):
make all those connections andcalls was not nearly as
successful as everyonecontributing to that and
thinking those things through.
Jon (36:14):
You know you're hitting on something that I was just
talking about.
Earlier today I was recording apodcast with Jane Zaletsky, my
old boss from OneReal, fromOneReal, and we were reminiscing
about the environment that waswithin the four walls of the
OneReal offices in the 90s andthroughout the entire time I was
(36:35):
there.
One of the key words he said itwas this environment of
extraordinary trust For an artsorganization.
We were very large yet everybodytrusted everybody to an
extraordinary extent, and I'dnever thought about it that way.
But as soon as she said that, Iknew exactly what she meant and
(36:55):
so I asked her why do you thinkthat was Like?
What caused that?
That doesn't just happen byhappenstance.
There had to be something thatbrought that environment about.
We struggled with trying tothink about that for a couple of
minutes, didn't really land onany one answer for sure.
(37:16):
But listening to you now, we didpractice extraordinary
transparency in finance andeverything else and everything
else.
And even if you were, such asmyself in those days, the junior
coordinator person, at leastonce a week we were sitting in
an all-staff meeting 20, 30, 40people and everybody would go
(37:39):
around the table and speak veryopenly about every single
challenge they were encountering, including matters of finance,
and I learned a lot from that.
It gave me an unusually clearunderstanding of what everybody
else was going through and thekind of problems they were
grappling with.
And while we didn't always comeup with solutions right then
(38:01):
and there at the table, it justgave me this sense that, man,
there were some really sharppeople here and we have problems
.
Somehow I just knew thattogether we were going to figure
this out, and we did regularly,time and time again, and that I
(38:23):
think might be a key changethat OneReal experienced.
Susan (38:27):
That really did was a thread that continued, because I
still hold that as an example.
There were times when thingswere stressful and difficult and
especially you know, day of, ofcourse, an event, of course an
event, and people were living ina high stress situation for
(38:49):
days or weeks prior days of andjust you know, kind of losing
our cool occasionally with eachother and having a little knock
down, drag out here and there.
But the outcome was alwayscoming back together from a
place of respect, true apology,giving each other grace, you
know, saying I hear you, Iapologize as well.
(39:10):
We were in the heat of a momentand that's not a, you know, a
thing that is commonlyexperienced.
You know, we tend to maybefollow, especially in the
Northwest, into a more passive,aggressive approach of you know
just tiptoeing around each otherafter something like that.
But we did the work to comeback to it and name it and own
it, and that doesn't just happenby accident.
Jon (39:32):
That's a carryover from before my time with OneReal.
That was the environment Iwalked into in 94 or 95 or
whenever it was.
Yeah, I wish I could go back ina time machine and try to
figure out what exactly thegenesis of that office
environment was, Bottle it andsell it.
Yeah, One of my favoriteattributes about working with
(39:55):
you you always ask outstandingquestions, even when you don't
need to.
I wish that I was able to askthe quality of the questions
that you do.
Is that a learned skill thatyou have or do you have no idea
what I'm talking about?
Susan (40:09):
I always picture myself speaking more than asking.
You know, speaking more thanlistening.
I hope that as time has gone onI've become a better listener.
But I have also learned that,particularly in finance, you
have said to me many times thatall finance people are alike.
When you take on a new role,you say what was that idiot
(40:32):
before me doing?
You know, I don't know ifthat's exclusive to our line of
work, but I want to know what isbehind the decision.
We can't be successful.
I certainly don't want torecommend a change to something
if I don't understand itsorigins and I want to be
respectful of the people whowere part of the decision to do
(40:52):
something in a particular wayand ask questions Whereas you
know accounting rules arechanged.
We can no longer do it that way.
Or let me add an additionalcomponent in there so you have a
better understanding of why I'masking a question.
I found that people just bydefault you know whatever
(41:16):
environment they've been in.
I don't want anyone to feelattacked.
You know if a recommended changeis made, you know I'm not
holding someone responsible forsomething they didn't know.
You know I'm not holdingsomeone responsible for
(41:37):
something they didn't know.
So I find that asking questionsis the path to educating myself
on a subject and ofteneducating the individual that
I'm asking the question of,because it causes them to pause
and, not supported, to say, whenasked I don't know the answer
to that question.
Let's find out together and Ithink I've just taken joy in
(41:58):
those conversations and beingable to do that.
You know how dull would it beto assume I know all the answers
.
Jon (42:06):
That's such a beautiful statement right there and
unfortunately I think a wholelot of people don't necessarily
care to know all the answers,but it makes me think about how
fortunate I've been over thepath of my career to be, for the
most part, surrounded by peoplethat are extraordinarily
curious and investigative,people that are extraordinarily
(42:28):
curious and investigative.
Susan (42:33):
I mean I will say that someone like you I appreciate as
well, because there's also theability, because in a group of
curious people we can reallyspend a whole lot of time, you
know, getting off topic and godown some paths that are
fascinating and great to explore, but you know you have the
ability to bring people back tothe.
You know the purpose and thenyou know we'll parking lot those
(42:56):
things and come back to themlater.
I do tend to be a little bitmore distracted by fascinating
conversation and want tocontinue to pursue just sort of
how, whatever those questionslead us to.
Jon (43:10):
Reflecting on your work for the past say 20, 25 years and
all the different organizationsyou've been with, how do you
measure the impact of your work?
Susan (43:21):
Measure is difficult.
I think that the outcomes that Iwould like to see is the
measure of confidence from allparties, you know, confidence in
the team that I'm supporting,confidence in the people in
other.
You know components of theorganization that I've
(43:42):
contributed to, their increasedunderstanding of areas of their
role and how that contributes tothe success of the organization
, particularly in nonprofit.
We also have our incrediblysupportive board members,
finance committee members, whoare dependent upon us to provide
(44:03):
them with the picture.
You know they're not sitting inour seats shadowing us doing
our jobs and seeing every lineitem so successfully conveying
the depth of understanding ofwhat's happening to a committee
who maybe only meets four timesa year, so that they can take
(44:25):
their commitment seriously andknow that they're not at risk of
being blindsided by informationthat wasn't shared with them.
So I think the confidence thatcomes away in conversation with
people, even if they were toleave an organization to say you
know that organization mighthave been struggling, that
organization might have beenflourishing, but what I do know
(44:48):
is that they were in good hands.
Jon (44:51):
I think you're brushing up against mentorship as well.
I know that's something thathas been very important to you
over the years is helping thenext generation come up, come
along.
Susan (45:03):
You know finance and accounting some folks might
think is terribly boring.
You know it doesn't need to beboring.
Working in an organizationdoesn't need to be boring.
I mean, I've had opportunitiesfor people to say you know, the
other finance folks you knowjust stayed behind closed doors.
So anyone that I mentor orreports to me or I'm supporting
(45:26):
in some way, I want to push themout there, you know.
Push them outside their comfortzone.
And we're not just all about thenumbers.
You need to understand thedepth and the breadth of the
business and in the world thatwe're working in.
In the end I don't want to workforever.
You know I'm a Girl Scout, momand leader and the way of leave
(45:47):
something better than you foundit, one of the ways to do that
is to hand it off, you know, tothe next stewards of that work,
so purposefully.
In the end no one's going toremember you know what balance
sheet I presented, but I hopethat they'll see the legacy of
any number of people that areworking in professional capacity
(46:09):
, that that I coached andencouraged to not just be a
typical accounting and financeperson.
Who's who's just looking atnumbers on paper, because it's
never just numbers on paper.
There's so much more than that.
Jon (46:23):
Exactly, exactly, in the wild and wacky world of
festivals that you've traveledwith me.
What are two or three of yourproudest accomplishments, or
maybe even just your favoritememories?
I know there's a lot of groundto cover there.
Yeah, yeah, do your best.
Susan (46:41):
That goes back to the accounting, is the laundry.
There were so many challenges.
You know there was a year thatthe accounting system went down.
You know, two days before thefestival.
Generations that are heavilydependent upon technology, that
you know.
Sometimes you just have tofigure it out.
So those are, those are proudmoments of setting the example,
(47:21):
of the flight, not just.
You know stomping around andsaying, well, this is a problem
that can't be solved.
You know bringing everybodyalong.
We have to laugh when thosethings occur.
There was a year out at theGorge, you'll recall, a festival
when it was record heat and wehad to solve for getting ice.
(47:42):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that wastough, right.
Yeah, it's not just go to yourlocal 7-Eleven.
There was no ice to be had inthe region.
We literally had to.
I think we hijacked a deliverytruck driver and said, well,
will cash work, can you go?
Literally drove back to Seattleto get pallets of ice for us.
(48:02):
But again, I mean, there wasthat mix.
Of this is critical.
People could actually, you know, be put at medical risk by not
having water and ice, and it was.
Jon (48:12):
There were people dropping like flies Right.
It was scary.
I remember that we had to.
We got so hot one day we had tosuspend work.
It was just.
It was past the point of commonsense.
And then we had to switch toworking at night instead to stay
on schedule, which was acompletely separate set of
(48:33):
problems.
If I recall, we got luckybecause it was a full moon or
near full moon, so we could seewhat we were doing.
Susan (48:42):
But yeah, yeah, it would have taken us days to set up, to
have the lighting, and wedidn't have days.
Jon (48:47):
That's a great example, because some festivals of that
size, that's year-round planning, so a whole year's worth of
planning goes up in smoke justbecause of the temperature.
Susan (48:58):
What are you going to do To be able to say, when
someone's concerned, are wegoing to be able to make this
happen?
To, just in the moment, say yes, just do this, literally yes,
take cash, hand it to thisperson, unknown person, and make
them run for us and and justtrust that you know we were all
doing everything that we couldfor the right reasons, and that
(49:20):
you know we were.
We're not going to be fired thenext day for for making a
decision like that.
So it's a it's a it's not foreveryone, that level of stress
you know in the moment andproblem solving, and then you
know crashing hard the next day.
Jon (49:37):
But there's that word trust again.
Now I'm getting kind of lockedin on that.
I had mentioned recently thatone of the aspects about event
work, especially concert work orone-off, single-day work, is
that by default we have to havean ability to judge a person
(49:59):
we've never met really quickly,like within minutes, like you
got the first five or 10 minutesof the morning when the touring
production crew steps off thebus or whatever it is.
But we have to make a judgmentabout this person and how we're
going to work together, andalong with that comes a degree
of trust.
(50:20):
We're rolling into a new venueand here's the house riggers.
Here's one of these jobs where,if they don't do their job
right, people can die, manypeople can die all at once.
And so again, do I trust thisperson?
And how do you go about that?
I don't know.
It's a skill, it's a sense thatI think we just develop over
(50:42):
time in the industry.
It's important.
So when you're talking about,all of a sudden, even in a major
festival, in a remote location,and things start going sideways
and so we just have to startpunting, punt left, punt right,
tossing money around, butthere's this through it all.
There's this thread of inherenttrust that everybody's doing.
(51:04):
Hopefully they're making theright decision, but even if
they're not, they're doing thebest that they can and knowing
that we'll come out the otherend, you know, okay, I think in
those environments there areprobably other industries that
are similar.
Susan (51:18):
Those are the you'll say.
These people are our people.
You know, they're one of us,they get it.
They get it.
And there are people who mightwork in the environment who
recognize that it isn't the kindof extreme situation that they
(51:39):
want to put themselves in overand over again.
I mean here we are talkingabout it as if it's, you know,
right in insanely difficult orstressful, and there are moments
of it, but there's also momentsof great joy and very relaxed
successes as well.
But I think it's a personalitytype to be there every once in a
while.
The other thing I'm thinking ofis sometimes you will bring
someone in on that moment oftrust because your time is so
(52:01):
short and midstream or midday oractivity, you recognize that
you didn't make the bestdecision and you have to make an
immediate decision to dismissthem from that role or the
activity.
And that is another piece of itis even with that, yes, it puts
additional burden on eitheryourself or other folks, but
(52:24):
there's also that trust that,for being short of that set of
hands, everything will stillwork out, everyone will still be
able to to work together tosolve things.
So I think it's a, it's a bitof a learned experience, because
look at the people who maybecame into the environment for
the first time.
I, you know, use interns as anexample and you know they, they
know what they know, or theyhave an idea about its glamour,
(52:54):
an idea about its glamour, andthey very quickly, very quickly,
catch up to.
Oh, this is different than whatI thought, but I can do this
because that's the examples thatare being set around them.
I think, when specificallyfocusing on festivals, arts,
music, one thing that we'vetalked about is, I think you
would agree that we don't wantto be the keepers of the mold.
It's not for us to say what'scoming next or how things should
(53:15):
be managed next.
I remember the fascination ofthe wristbands.
You know let's move away fromcash and let's move to other
things.
And then you know people.
You know that's not going towork.
That's, you know, terrifyinglet's.
You know, trust the nextiteration of incredible minds
and creative people and muchmore brilliant than I could ever
(53:36):
be accountants and financialanalysts.
To, to, to do what they'regoing to do.
Let them, let them go their way.
I, you know, if we're luckyenough to have them come to us
and ask us for advice or inputor or anecdotes to share.
We want to do that, but I don'tthink that we want to ever try
to squash their brilliance,their ability or their need to
(53:59):
make mistakes and figure outthings that we could never
possibly have imagined.
Jon (54:03):
Absolutely.
What's your favorite soundWater?
Susan (54:08):
in its many forms.
Water running in the tap, waterlapping, you know, gently on a
beach rain.
Jon (54:20):
You're getting an ice cream cone with two scoops.
What are the flavors?
Susan (54:25):
You know it's pistachio and coconut.
They're brilliant together andneither one of them are
something that I'm going tocreate day-to-day access to on
my own.
You know you're in an ice creamshop and if somebody's going to
do it right, I'm going to letthe experts do it.
Which?
Jon (54:46):
flavor goes on top Coconut Excellent, Susan.
Thanks for making the timetoday.
Susan (54:53):
Thank you, john.
It's always a pleasure.
All call.
One hour, two doors.
Hi, this is Susan Den and you are listening to One Hour
to Doors.
Jon (00:10):
This is One Hour to Doors, a podcast about the business and
soul of the festivals andevents industry.
I am your host, Jon Stone.
Every episode of One Hour toDoors explores the people,
issues, insights and trendsimpacting the enterprise of
bringing people and communitiestogether in common cause.
We are recording today at theTotem Star Studios at historic
(00:33):
King Street Station in Seattle.
Our guest today is Susan Den.
Susan is an expert in nonprofitfinance, accounting and human
resources.
Her work tends to transform theorganizations she serves,
repositioning accounting and HRdepartments from the often
mundane perception ofadministrative necessity to an
(00:54):
essential partner in all aspectsof an organization's work.
Susan and I have workedtogether on a multitude of
endeavors and in my consultingpractice, she is my first call
whenever I encounter a need forexpertise in her field.
Welcome to the show, Susan!
Susan (01:11):
Hi Jon, thanks for having me.
Jon (01:13):
So I have to start off.
You volunteered a lot of timewith the Totem Star organization
a number of years ago, reallycontributing to setting us on a
path to what is now thisbeautiful new studio at King
Street Station.
This is your first time here.
What do you think?
Susan (01:31):
It is as amazing as I imagined and it is a reflection
of all of the heart that hasgone into arriving at this space
and it leaves so much roomstill for what's to come next.
So I'm tearing up a little bit.
I'm very, very happy to be here.
Jon (01:51):
It's a pretty cool space.
Wait till you get to see itactivated.
When did you get into financeand accounting in the first
place?
Susan (02:01):
Oh, that goes back to high school Just opportunities,
in particular business classesback in the day that lent to
internship style jobs and thenit started to evolve into a
(02:22):
greater understanding that thisis the story behind every
business, regardless of itsbusiness model.
I want to say it all camefairly easy for me, but I'm
always happy to say that thislength of time I learn something
new every day.
So it's a fascinating littlegame and story all the time, in
(02:44):
every environment and everyopportunity.
Jon (02:46):
Yeah, so you and I met.
The context was we were lookingfor a new CFO and we did a
national search and we found you.
You were hiding out in Texas atthe time and you were doing
finance for a chain of waterparks, right, and I remember in
(03:08):
the interview process at first Ithought, well, what does water
parks have to do with majormusic festivals that we were
doing at the time?
And I quickly found out thatthey're actually more alike than
not.
All the essential elements arethere you have staff, you have
security, you have ATMs, youhave admission systems, you'd
have marketing sponsorship.
(03:29):
Really, the only difference iswater parks, especially down
south, tend to operate in thewater year round, or mostly year
round, whereas all of our stuffup here in the Pacific
Northwest is very seasonal.
But it was a beautiful fitright off the top.
I mean, the learning curve wasnext to nothing for you, as I
(03:49):
recall.
Susan (03:50):
I never would have imagined.
You know, I recall my originalapplication was for a different
position because I thought I wasgoing to take a break, not work
quite so much, and then theperson at the time who was in
charge of the search called meand said you don't want that, we
want you to look at this.
Otherwise, probably would nothave made the connection that
(04:11):
that particular role would be sowell suited for the experience
that I had had.
But you're right, therelationships, when you think
about entertainment of any sort,people are seeking something
out and their method of gettingthere, the method of creating a
ticket situation, access to it,the marketing behind it, the
limitations to it, the risks,the human element is essentially
(04:35):
the same.
Jon (04:36):
If you've told me before I forgot what other position were
you applying for.
It was an accounts payable job.
Oh geez.
Susan (04:42):
Well, you know I really did accounts payable job.
Oh geez.
Well you know I really did.
I had, you know, for many yearsexisted in that space of doing
a lot and had very youngchildren at the time and thought
maybe I would just take alittle break, go back to school,
learn some.
You know cheese making.
I don't know what I was thinking, but even recently I've been
asked if I were going to make achange ever from one company or
(05:04):
organization to the next, whatwould be the draw?
And I always come back to myexperience in arts and music,
because accounting is laundrythat every company has a need to
keep moving through.
But the challenges ofsupporting people in their work
to create art and createexperiences for people is just
(05:27):
something unlike any other andthat's the draw.
That's the real thing.
As much as I love supportingall the human services
organizations that I work for aswell and my heart is very much
there, there's that.
What have we not thought of?
That's going to happen.
What are you know?
What are we going to encountertoday?
That's a new challenge andeverybody gets excited about or
(05:48):
everybody is freaking out aboutor having a challenge around it,
kind of.
I've only experienced it inarts and music.
Jon (05:57):
You just called accounting laundry, and there's certainly a
laundry element to it.
But you've taught me and somany others that it can be so
much more if you let it be.
It can be an essential part ofplanning and ideating, visioning
.
Susan (06:13):
That certainly.
I don't even think of so muchas the accounting.
If your accounting iswell-established and the people
that are tasked with keeping upwith it and making sure that all
the wheels are turning, that'sone component of it.
But then the real work is theanalysis of that information,
the breadth of exploration aboutwhat's behind those numbers.
(06:36):
It's really criticallyimportant to have the right
people moving the informationthrough the system in one way or
another, but it's just asimportant that each person
understands what it is, what istheir piece of it, what is their
part of it, what's behind it.
I'm not a fan of telling peoplejust fill in this blank and fill
in that blank.
You know, I want people toreally ask questions and
(06:57):
understand, to see the wholepicture, because that's when you
can start to plan and projectand caution people that you're
advising and learn the history.
I can look, you know I've doneit everywhere I've gone, you
know, with longstandingorganizations, go back to the
origins and you learn, you seethe story, you see the evolution
of how they got to where theyare today and then you can also
(07:21):
envision where they're going andhopefully support giving a
little bit of a crystal ball.
You know, look, this thingisn't addressed or isn't deeply
understood, it could start toturn things in the wrong
direction.
Or if this thing were nurturedor examined or given a little
bit more attention, that couldactually be an incredible
(07:41):
positive direction or growthopportunity that could actually
be an incredible positivedirection or growth opportunity.
Jon (07:51):
You, in my experience you're equally adept on the
accounting and finance side asyou are on the HR side.
Is that something that'stypical, or are you kind of a
fluke that way, the fact thatyou kind of bring both aspects
to the table?
Susan (08:01):
I think in small organizations it's not entirely
uncommon, because people thinkof finance and you know, if you
think of HR just from theperspective of the benefits and
wages provided to the peoplethat work with you, then at
minimum you sort of default to afinance person managing all of
that, because you have anassumption that it's going to be
(08:22):
accurate, that it's going to be, you know, keeping tax laws and
benefits, renewal expenses sortof in check.
But I've never approached itfrom that point of view.
You know it sounds trite oroverused, but I genuinely do
maintain people first.
You know you cannot besuccessful if your people are
(08:42):
not well supported, well caredfor, given the tools that they
need to do their job.
And so that's where the humanresources, the true human part
of that, comes in for me.
And some of that evolved fromthat finance and accounting
point of view, because a lot offolks in maybe earlier in their
careers might have a little bitof fear around the finance and
(09:05):
accounting responsibilities thatthey have.
And so I kind of chain the twotogether and then, when you're
working with people to help themunderstand their
responsibilities and what theircontribution is to the financial
health of the organization, youlearn more about them.
You know they begin to trustyou and lean on you for some of
(09:27):
those more traditional HR needs.
So it's kind of a mix, I guess.
So I wouldn't say that no, I'mcompletely an outlier.
I think it's probably common tocombine the two roles or to
have one individual or maybe ateam of a couple of folks in a
small organization doing both.
But I feel like I took it veryseriously in the space of I'm
(09:47):
not just here to make sure thateveryone gets paid and that the
taxes are filed that there'smore to it than that.
So I don't know that that partis that unusual.
I feel like I was given a giftof being able to exist in
environments that allowed me todo that.
Jon (10:03):
So talk a little bit about the organization that you're
currently working with.
Susan (10:08):
I am currently the Senior Director of Finance for
Treehouse, which is a wonderfulnonprofit in Seattle, now
statewide Washington, statewideproviding service to youth in
foster care.
There are a number of fantasticorganizations in our state and
across the country that provideservice to youth in care.
There are a number of fantasticorganizations in our state and
across the country that provideservice to youth in care.
Treehouse's specific focus andits origins were around
(10:32):
providing, as all nonprofitshave, you know, some original
origin and maybe communitypeople just seeing a need.
So it was a wonderful group ofpeople who started ensuring that
there was a gift made availableto every youth in foster care
during every holiday season, andfrom there it developed to
providing other necessities,clothing and general goods, and
(10:57):
then increased to providing theopportunity to pay for things
that the youth would otherwisenot have available to them.
I mean literally right up topaying for their football the
youth would otherwise not haveavailable to them.
I mean literally right up topaying for their football camp
or their senior photos.
You know things of that naturethat we take for granted often
that aren't available.
And then in the last 10 or soyears Treehouse has really
(11:19):
created some incredible programsto support the youth in a
program that is GraduationSuccess, which starts from a
middle school age and sees themall the way through high school
to ensure their graduation.
The percentage of graduates hasincreased dramatically in that
period of time Advocacy, work toensure that the required
(11:40):
services in each school districtare made available to those
youth, and then subsequentpost-high school support to help
them as they come out of thesystem, help navigate what
resources are available to them.
It's grown exponentially andthen in the last couple of years
has moved to provide servicestatewide for the youth.
(12:01):
So I'm incredibly proud ofbeing a part of that team and
the work that they do.
It points to what's reallyimportant and critical in our
region, in our state, in ourcountry, in our neighborhoods.
You know that we want toprovide opportunities for all
young people, much to comingback to the work that Totem Star
does, so that they have anunderstanding of what's
(12:23):
available to them, that they canfeel empowered, that they don't
go into adulthood in fear andthat in the end translates to
contributors to our communities.
That makes the world a betterplace for all of us.
Jon (12:38):
When was Treehouse founded?
I should know this off the topof my head.
Susan (12:42):
Well, we're celebrating our 35th year from its origins.
And how many FTE we'recurrently at about 220.
Jon (12:50):
Oh wow, that's a big organization and that was a huge
leap from about 2019 to now.
Is risk management run throughthe finance office or is it a
whole separate thing?
Susan (13:01):
It falls under a.
It's a collaborative department, if you will.
That is, we turn finance andrisk and we have a full-time
risk director, which was arecent add up to that point, and
in most of the roles that I'veheld, when you think of risk,
I've always been the point tofocus on areas of risk around.
You know the traditionalinsurance and personnel issues,
(13:24):
things of that nature.
Jon (13:25):
Yeah, I know you kept bringing that to my attention,
like on a regular basis when wewere working together, whether I
wanted to hear it or not.
Susan (13:32):
One of my favorite stories and that too, I'll
always tell people that I'm, byprofession and somewhat by
nature, risk averse, and then Iwill talk you out of something
and then I'll end theconversation with now how do we
make this happen?
So one of my favorite storieswas working with one of your
other podcast guests, chrisWeber, on a Bumbershoot
(13:54):
programming, ask.
And that was the year of allthe Elvises.
You'll recall that year.
And Chris came to me and saidthis is fantastic, I've found a
giant blow up Elvis head andwe're going to put it on top of
Fisher Pavilion.
And I said no, you're not.
And he said what?
What are you talking about?
I was like I am certain there'san exclusion in our insurance
(14:15):
policy around that oh, aroundinflatables, absolutely yes.
And he was just deflated youknow bad pun.
And then I sat on it for alittle bit and I came back
around and I said let's figureout how to make that happen,
because risk is obviouslysomething that everyone should
pay close attention to, but youknow you have to if you work
hard to mitigate that risk andyou understand what it is, and
(14:38):
I'm not a fan of making rashdecisions that ultimately could
cause harm to others.
But where there's a will,there's a way.
Jon (14:46):
Yeah, I mean, that's what I've learned over the years.
The first step is justunderstanding what the risk is,
which is easier said than done alot of the time, like really
holistically understanding thefull extent of your exposure.
But if you can get to thatpoint, to that level of
understanding, then it justbecomes a puzzle to solve.
Susan (15:07):
Right, right, and you know.
Coming back to the people, youknow there are a lot of people
in the arts that are incrediblycreative and they can picture it
, they can see it, they can mapit out and every once in a while
they have to be told we just,you know, we can't do that.
(15:29):
That's just not something thatwe can either bear the cost of
or the risk of, and berespectful and mindful, because
they are going to bedisappointed, they are going to
be told no, and you want tomanage it in a way that doesn't
feel like you're just beingpunitive or choosing to tell
them no when other people aretold yes.
Jon (15:43):
I mean we're going through that right here at Totemstar
Studios in a micro way, but it'sa new space, different types of
risk, working with youth.
You know it takes time andattention, devoted attention, to
fully understand the extent ofyour risk profile.
Understand the extent of yourrisk profile.
(16:07):
We were talking recently andyou mentioned that you were
doing a lot of work and puttingin a lot of thought to deficit
budgeting lately.
Say more about that.
Susan (16:13):
Well, the boring speak.
Part of it is in nonprofitaccounting guidance.
Until I guess we're probablyabout five or six years ago, the
guidance changed.
Most people will recall therewas a time when you could do
your annual fundraiser in Juneand ask your contributors to
note that their gift wasunrestricted, wasn't necessarily
(16:36):
for a specific program, ormaybe identify a program to the
next year.
And then you could allow boarddiscretion to say, okay, we're
going to restrict, we're goingto temporarily restrict the use
of those funds for next year.
We're literally fundraising fornext year activities.
And then the IRS gap guidancechanged so that we can no longer
do that.
(16:56):
You're required to recognizethat revenue in the year that
you've earned it.
Jon (17:01):
Right.
Susan (17:02):
So there's become this cadence of one year, as a you
know, having a fantastic excessand then the next year having a
deficit.
But we're still trapped in thatplace of we can't bring a
deficit budget forward to ourboard.
They're not going to approve adeficit budget.
So we need to start looking atthe little bit of our history.
(17:23):
You know what really occurred,not necessarily trick ourselves
into thinking that that's goingto be the cadence when you're up
, when you're down.
So go back in the history, lookand see what was really
occurring.
Were you consistentlypresenting a balanced budget,
yet your true outcome was adeficit?
That also is, you know,something to sit down and
understand and talk to yourboard about.
(17:43):
Some organizations have maybereceived a fantastic endowment
and cash contributions early intheir structure so they can
weather a deficit every year.
Then you need to know what doesthat look like?
At what point, you know, willthis run out?
It may never run out, dependingon the endowment and the
earnings that support that.
But we tend to like focus onthe upcoming year and how we're
(18:06):
going to manage it, how we'regoing to fundraise to support it
, what other lines of revenue wehave, what new initiatives we
want to put into it.
What are the expenses aroundthat going to be?
And then we come right back tothat habit of like and we need
to present a balanced budget.
So working with your financecommittee in particular to help
(18:26):
present that to the board in away that makes sense, because
you're in it for the long run.
You've been in it for the longrun if you've been doing it for
a long time, so understand thehistory, make that visible, help
your staff that are part ofbuilding that budget Understand
that this year we're operatinglean so that we can be prepared
in the next year to grow.
(18:46):
And just be mindful consistentlythat your net asset balance is
really what you're concernedabout, because you're borrowing
against it one year maybe whenyou have a deficit and then
you're replenishing it the nextyear when you suddenly have that
additional revenue for thatyear.
In real life it's rolling.
Do you have income coveringyour expenses or you're also
(19:08):
contributing to you know, maybebeing able to create some
reserves.
Are you borrowing against thosereserves in one year, knowing
that there'll be replenished thenext year?
And I've seen just so muchagain, especially in small
organizations where they're sohyper-focused on just that
upcoming year's balanced budget,that they're not actually
getting their finance committeeon board, aligned with them, and
(19:31):
what's the growth going to looklike.
This is a short-term situation.
Here's how we're going toovercome it and when.
And that takes a lot.
It takes a lot of work to getthere and you have to get it to
a place where you're actuallyspeaking from a place of
knowledge and trust that thosenumbers make sense.
You know you're not doing it tomanipulate the view and sort of
get the outcome that you want.
But moving away from thatconversation of we can't have a
(19:56):
deficit budget, I think is whatall nonprofits in particular
need to start considering andlearning about themselves what
all nonprofits in particularneed to start considering and
learning about themselves.
I imagine most of Treehouse'srevenue is contributed yes, it's
a 60-40 contributed and publicstate contract.
Supporting youth and fostercare in particular is, and
should be, a state supported,using our tax dollars to create
(20:22):
that level of support.
But of course, those dollarsare heavily vied, for it's more
than just caring for the youthin care, it's also systems
change is critical to reducingthat number and having a depth
of understanding of what'scausing it.
I mean, we all understand manystories behind it, but getting
(20:43):
to root causes and doingexcessive systems change is
where a lot of that statefunding should go as well.
Jon (20:49):
What kind of trends are you seeing recently in contributed
revenue in general?
Susan (20:54):
So the interesting thing, you know, as I was speaking
about deficit budgets inparticular, I think there's a
little bit of a we're all givingourselves a little bit of a
storytelling that when thepandemic hit, that everyone was
doing pretty good up to thatpoint, and then you know we were
very grateful for the PPP loansto help everyone survive.
(21:14):
And then, if we'd allunderstood at the time how long
it was going to go on, we couldhave done the one thing that
it's a very rare opportunity todo, which is put everything on
stop so that you can review andrevise and replan and
re-strategize.
But you know it just, it didn'treally work that way.
Hindsight would be, we wouldhave that.
Jon (21:35):
How are you going to strategize for something that
you literally can't even see orcomprehend or measure?
Susan (21:40):
It's only going to be two weeks, it's only going to be
six weeks and you know, thenwe're years down.
So as we all sort of came backout and back into programs and
delivering on our missions,there were some defaults, back
to the same habits that we had.
You know, this is how youfundraise, this is what people
care about, this is how peoplewant to be engaged with, because
(22:04):
we just needed to get it done.
So I am seeing more and moreexamples of how the story isn't
exactly true, that you know lotsof organizations were
struggling and they werebeginning to see trends change
in fundraising even before thepandemic.
But you know there's also somuch turnover post-pandemic so
(22:25):
the stories change and are maybea little bit lost.
And then the new folks comingin of course have to be super
focused on hit the ground andkeep going forward.
So once in-person opportunitiesrepresented themselves, there
was a flurry of incrediblesuccess in community fundraising
.
People had a moment torecognize what they missed and
(22:46):
what they wanted to support, andmaybe they had just changes in
deciding how they wanted to livetheir lives.
I'm going to give more, do less, whatever those things were.
So there was a year or two ofsome really wonderful giving.
The in-person events were verywell attended maybe record
(23:06):
numbers of attendees and then ofthe few folks that I know that
are working in organizations.
It's kind of fundraising season, you know, between now and May
or June, and attendance is low.
The outreach is requiring justa different level of
communication.
I won't say that people aren'tgiving as generously, but
(23:27):
they're certainly focusing onthings that might be different
than what they were focusing onpre-pandemic.
So it's becoming more of achallenge.
I imagine what we'll see nextis how people are solving those
new trends how people aresolving those new trends.
Jon (23:44):
I will get some of those links to some of those articles
from you and put those in theepisode description for people
to find.
Yeah, totem Star we haven't hadour annual fundraising gala
since 2019.
And then we didn't do it in2020, obviously, covid and then
we became singularly obsessedwith our first capital campaign
(24:04):
to build this new facility.
In October October 10th It'llbe our first annual gala since
COVID.
We have high hopes for that,but also we're not making any
assumptions about how that'sgoing to go.
Susan (24:19):
I think the traditional model is one have the right
people in the room.
You know the people who canshow up and write a big check,
raise their paddle.
That's the long time model.
But we've all experiencedfundraisers where there are a
lot of people in the room whoare there because they were an
invited guest of you knowsomeone, but they're not
(24:39):
necessarily prepared tocontribute in the same way.
I know all professionalfundraisers know that that's not
the indicator of success,because just having those people
experience the program, tounderstand what it is you're
raising funds for, is awonderful opportunity to start,
(25:00):
even a young person, in thinkingabout philanthropy and being a
community supporter of differentorganizations.
But the costs to do afundraiser of a certain level,
you know, in 200 people, 300people, 1200 people begins to
shrink your net.
(25:20):
I think that the trends we'llsee will be smaller gatherings,
genuinely asking people how theywant to be contacted.
We have amazing donors and allthey want is a phone call once a
year to ask you a couple ofquestions about how things are
going, and then they're happy tocontribute and they just are
not interested in that big show,so to speak, to contribute and
(25:43):
they just are not interested inthat big show, so to speak.
It doesn't mean that weshouldn't be having some type of
joyful community access on anannual basis or semi-annual
basis to open the new minds andgain opportunities to show and
showcase what the work is.
We can certainly work to drivepeople to our websites, I mean,
but all of us are bombardedevery day with an email that
(26:03):
says look at me, you know, readabout my program.
So I think that we're going tosee a shift in that as well,
that it's no longer going to bea you know, an expensive
fundraiser.
It can be.
Totemstar is a good example.
It doesn't need to cost a lotof money to invite people in to
enjoy the conversation about theprograms, and I think that
that's a trend that we're goingto see.
Jon (26:23):
Well, with Totem Star, the annual fundraiser has never been
a critical source of revenuefor us.
Really, the main purpose for usone is to give our youth
artists performance opportunityin front of a real audience.
Performance opportunity infront of a real audience.
(26:47):
Secondly, it's really it's justa chance to connect with the
actual community.
To us, getting some new peopleon board with the Totem Star
mission.
That's just as important, ifnot more important, than them,
you know, writing a check for ahundred bucks or something like
that.
Most of our revenue comesthrough grants and because we're
cognizant of the fact thatthere's not a lot of other orgs
(27:10):
out there doing exactly whatTotemstar does.
So for the people for whom ourmission resonates, it's not a
hard sell, right?
We don't have a competitivestance most of the time in our
fundraising.
So the gala yeah, we sure wouldlike to generate as much money
as we can with it, but reallyit's more just about.
(27:32):
It's almost like an annualreport to the community.
I love that.
That's the vibe that we want toachieve with it.
Susan (27:39):
And I think, acknowledging that as we sit
inside our organizations, thatmaybe we fall into a place of
thinking that we know who thatcommunity is.
It's a little daunting to justhave an open door activity, but
that's where we're going to seetrue change and partnership
opportunities and new peoplebeing curious.
Jon (28:00):
You talk about trends coming out of COVID.
I can't remember if I'vementioned this to you before,
but my mindset is that COVIDreset everything and we won't be
able to truly understand whatthe new normal is until three
years after COVID ended.
For your organization and so,like when the official end of
(28:24):
COVID, it's different fordifferent industries, even here
at Totemstar, for example.
Covid is no longer impactingour programs, but it still
resonates.
There's still little echoes ofit that keep popping up in
oddball places.
But for us, I would think 2024really, I think, will be our
(28:46):
first year of normalcy again,and so my mindset is that we're
not going to be able to say withany real objectivity what the
new normal is until after 2026.
We'll have three years ofoperating under the new normal
conditions.
Now we've got some actualstatistics and anecdotes to look
(29:08):
at.
It's like when we start a newevent, you launch a new event,
you can't really judge it untilyou've run it for three times.
Susan (29:18):
I think it has also created the challenging of the
norm, challenging of, but thisis the way we've always done it.
You know that some folksactually, after maybe years of
routine, kind of felt a sparkwhen they had to become very
creative, and maybe there wereplenty of folks who fought
(29:41):
against it and said no, no, no,no, we can't.
You know, we can't go outsidethe box.
This is what we've always doneand this is why we've done it
and have maybe either had to beheld accountable for that
resistance or moved on orbegrudgingly started to change
their frame of mind around that.
But I hope, my hope is thatthat curiosity lingers and that
(30:05):
it's okay to have conversationsaround.
I hear you, I hear that this isyour view of what is going to be
successful.
But let's talk about it alittle bit longer.
We've got a little more time toreally make sure that what
we're committing to has beenbeen fully vetted.
And in the midst of that, whatdid we all learn?
(30:25):
You can shift very, veryquickly and so, like a hard
commitment of this is what we'regoing to do, this, how we're
going to behave, this is what'sgoing to make it successful.
I think there's just a lot moreappetite for course correcting
habits have been formed that are, we can react a lot quicker.
We don't let things just sortof go down that track for an
(30:48):
extended period of time and thenfind out that it wasn't working
.
So I think that there were someunintentional lessons learned
that maybe we aren't evencognizant of, that we wouldn't
even name unless we sit down totalk about it, true?
Jon (31:03):
Let's talk for a minute about something that I know
you're big on, but that'stransparency and finance.
Susan (31:10):
I think that you know, a person's title doesn't
necessarily turn them into anexpert on every subject.
We all are only as good as thepeople that support us.
We can be better by supportingthem as well, and one of the
ways to support them is to giveas much as is reasonable in
(31:31):
context and view to ourfinancial situations, to our
risk situations, to ourchallenges.
I mean, how glorious is it tosit in a room full of young
people, as we've experienced andtalk about you know, we're just
having lunch and then achallenge comes up and, in their
brilliant way of just askingquestions, problem solving
(31:53):
occurs.
Starting people early in theircareers understanding financial
implications.
It doesn't mean they have to,you know, run the spreadsheets
and get deep into the weeds, buthaving a clear view of how
things work provides theopportunity for them to help
contribute to problem solving.
It gives them an understandingthat just because we have the
(32:15):
money doesn't mean we shouldspend the money, and they can
own the decision making behindsome of those things.
The level of satisfaction thatwe will have for those people in
their roles will increase,because no one likes to feel as
if they're being left out ofsomething or if they're or that
they're being viewed as notbeing able to understand some,
(32:39):
some levels of finance, and andthen you'll you'll just find a
shift, I think, in theconversations.
You don't want to go into aconversation or a meeting with a
group of people who have to getbrought up to speed on things,
or maybe just overwhelmed by theinformation.
If you brought them along withyou the entire time, then you're
all kind of in the same placewhen you have to sit down and
(33:00):
have difficult or joyfulconversations about how
financial things are working out.
Joyful conversations about howfinancial things are working out
.
Jon (33:07):
You remind me of when you and I were working with the big
EDM concert promoter and when wecame in there to help solve
some issues.
They were having the financesand the budgets behind every
event and there were a lot ofevents.
All those numbers were heldpretty closely by just a couple
of people at the top, and thatwas one thing I saw you change
(33:29):
right away is that you made sureall of that information
trickled down to everybody andthe results were really profound
.
Just like you were saying, it'slike give a little insight into
the how and the why and thewhat, and people will tend to
make use of that information.
Susan (33:56):
I mean, you think about how.
That's a great example, becausethere were often so many
critical decision-making.
You know you've got four hoursto decide if this thing is going
to work or if we're going topay for that, or someone made a
commitment and that commitmentthen pushes something else aside
and then you have to, of course, advise people that, by the way
, this thing you were countingon has been yanked out from
under you.
Having the bigger context ofthat then keeps them from, of
(34:17):
course, blowing up.
And then now you're dealingwith a completely different set
of problems and a drama thatdidn't need to happen if they'd
had a greater understanding andthe other brilliance behind all
of the people that we workedwith.
There is their problem solvingon the fly abilities were
remarkable and you know, therewere times anywhere where maybe
(34:39):
a supplier or a vendor you knowwas given expectations on
payment date and payment timeand such, and many times when
someone would, you know I'dliterally walk on scene and
they'd fly in front of me sayingI need a check now.
Because I worked one-on-one withthem so much to understand,
(34:59):
they were empowered to say tothat vendor you're going to get
it as soon as you know, she cansit down and get organized here,
instead of creating a situationin which now you have a vendor
or supplier who is feeling as ifsomething's not right, because
it wasn't a question ofsomething's not right, it was
just a question of volume andactivity and timing and
communication, and they wereable to contribute to those
(35:23):
successes as well.
Those successes as well.
Something that I found wasalways successful was coaching
people at all levels tounderstand the general cost of
things.
There's a lot of work that hasto go into finding the right
thing, and everything doesn'thave to be the, you know, the
golden paperclip.
You can do somethingsatisfactorily with the plain
(35:45):
old paperclip.
But we saw a lot of success infolks understanding how they
could solicit in-kindcontributions of goods or
services and what wasappropriate for that and how to
have those conversations and howto, you know, know that at what
point they could make anintroduction to the people who
could do that negotiation andthey were so contributory there.
And you know, having onein-kind intern who was meant to
(36:07):
make all those connections andcalls was not nearly as
successful as everyonecontributing to that and
thinking those things through.
Jon (36:14):
You know you're hitting on something that I was just
talking about.
Earlier today I was recording apodcast with Jane Zaletsky, my
old boss from OneReal, fromOneReal, and we were reminiscing
about the environment that waswithin the four walls of the
OneReal offices in the 90s andthroughout the entire time I was
(36:35):
there.
One of the key words he said itwas this environment of
extraordinary trust For an artsorganization.
We were very large yet everybodytrusted everybody to an
extraordinary extent, and I'dnever thought about it that way.
But as soon as she said that, Iknew exactly what she meant and
(36:55):
so I asked her why do you thinkthat was Like?
What caused that?
That doesn't just happen byhappenstance.
There had to be something thatbrought that environment about.
We struggled with trying tothink about that for a couple of
minutes, didn't really land onany one answer for sure.
(37:16):
But listening to you now, we didpractice extraordinary
transparency in finance andeverything else and everything
else.
And even if you were, such asmyself in those days, the junior
coordinator person, at leastonce a week we were sitting in
an all-staff meeting 20, 30, 40people and everybody would go
(37:39):
around the table and speak veryopenly about every single
challenge they were encountering, including matters of finance,
and I learned a lot from that.
It gave me an unusually clearunderstanding of what everybody
else was going through and thekind of problems they were
grappling with.
And while we didn't always comeup with solutions right then
(38:01):
and there at the table, it justgave me this sense that, man,
there were some really sharppeople here and we have problems
.
Somehow I just knew thattogether we were going to figure
this out, and we did regularly,time and time again, and that I
(38:23):
think might be a key changethat OneReal experienced.
Susan (38:27):
That really did was a thread that continued, because I
still hold that as an example.
There were times when thingswere stressful and difficult and
especially you know, day of, ofcourse, an event, of course an
event, and people were living ina high stress situation for
(38:49):
days or weeks prior days of andjust you know, kind of losing
our cool occasionally with eachother and having a little knock
down, drag out here and there.
But the outcome was alwayscoming back together from a
place of respect, true apology,giving each other grace, you
know, saying I hear you, Iapologize as well.
(39:10):
We were in the heat of a momentand that's not a, you know, a
thing that is commonlyexperienced.
You know, we tend to maybefollow, especially in the
Northwest, into a more passive,aggressive approach of you know
just tiptoeing around each otherafter something like that.
But we did the work to comeback to it and name it and own
it, and that doesn't just happenby accident.
Jon (39:32):
That's a carryover from before my time with OneReal.
That was the environment Iwalked into in 94 or 95 or
whenever it was.
Yeah, I wish I could go back ina time machine and try to
figure out what exactly thegenesis of that office
environment was, Bottle it andsell it.
Yeah, One of my favoriteattributes about working with
(39:55):
you you always ask outstandingquestions, even when you don't
need to.
I wish that I was able to askthe quality of the questions
that you do.
Is that a learned skill thatyou have or do you have no idea
what I'm talking about?
Susan (40:09):
I always picture myself speaking more than asking.
You know, speaking more thanlistening.
I hope that as time has gone onI've become a better listener.
But I have also learned that,particularly in finance, you
have said to me many times thatall finance people are alike.
When you take on a new role,you say what was that idiot
(40:32):
before me doing?
You know, I don't know ifthat's exclusive to our line of
work, but I want to know what isbehind the decision.
We can't be successful.
I certainly don't want torecommend a change to something
if I don't understand itsorigins and I want to be
respectful of the people whowere part of the decision to do
(40:52):
something in a particular wayand ask questions Whereas you
know accounting rules arechanged.
We can no longer do it that way.
Or let me add an additionalcomponent in there so you have a
better understanding of why I'masking a question.
I found that people just bydefault you know whatever
(41:16):
environment they've been in.
I don't want anyone to feelattacked.
You know if a recommended changeis made, you know I'm not
holding someone responsible forsomething they didn't know.
You know I'm not holdingsomeone responsible for
(41:37):
something they didn't know.
So I find that asking questionsis the path to educating myself
on a subject and ofteneducating the individual that
I'm asking the question of,because it causes them to pause
and, not supported, to say, whenasked I don't know the answer
to that question.
Let's find out together and Ithink I've just taken joy in
(41:58):
those conversations and beingable to do that.
You know how dull would it beto assume I know all the answers
.
Jon (42:06):
That's such a beautiful statement right there and
unfortunately I think a wholelot of people don't necessarily
care to know all the answers,but it makes me think about how
fortunate I've been over thepath of my career to be, for the
most part, surrounded by peoplethat are extraordinarily
curious and investigative,people that are extraordinarily
(42:28):
curious and investigative.
Susan (42:33):
I mean I will say that someone like you I appreciate as
well, because there's also theability, because in a group of
curious people we can reallyspend a whole lot of time, you
know, getting off topic and godown some paths that are
fascinating and great to explore, but you know you have the
ability to bring people back tothe.
You know the purpose and thenyou know we'll parking lot those
(42:56):
things and come back to themlater.
I do tend to be a little bitmore distracted by fascinating
conversation and want tocontinue to pursue just sort of
how, whatever those questionslead us to.
Jon (43:10):
Reflecting on your work for the past say 20, 25 years and
all the different organizationsyou've been with, how do you
measure the impact of your work?
Susan (43:21):
Measure is difficult.
I think that the outcomes that Iwould like to see is the
measure of confidence from allparties, you know, confidence in
the team that I'm supporting,confidence in the people in
other.
You know components of theorganization that I've
(43:42):
contributed to, their increasedunderstanding of areas of their
role and how that contributes tothe success of the organization
, particularly in nonprofit.
We also have our incrediblysupportive board members,
finance committee members, whoare dependent upon us to provide
(44:03):
them with the picture.
You know they're not sitting inour seats shadowing us doing
our jobs and seeing every lineitem so successfully conveying
the depth of understanding ofwhat's happening to a committee
who maybe only meets four timesa year, so that they can take
(44:25):
their commitment seriously andknow that they're not at risk of
being blindsided by informationthat wasn't shared with them.
So I think the confidence thatcomes away in conversation with
people, even if they were toleave an organization to say you
know that organization mighthave been struggling, that
organization might have beenflourishing, but what I do know
(44:48):
is that they were in good hands.
Jon (44:51):
I think you're brushing up against mentorship as well.
I know that's something thathas been very important to you
over the years is helping thenext generation come up, come
along.
Susan (45:03):
You know finance and accounting some folks might
think is terribly boring.
You know it doesn't need to beboring.
Working in an organizationdoesn't need to be boring.
I mean, I've had opportunitiesfor people to say you know, the
other finance folks you knowjust stayed behind closed doors.
So anyone that I mentor orreports to me or I'm supporting
(45:26):
in some way, I want to push themout there, you know.
Push them outside their comfortzone.
And we're not just all about thenumbers.
You need to understand thedepth and the breadth of the
business and in the world thatwe're working in.
In the end I don't want to workforever.
You know I'm a Girl Scout, momand leader and the way of leave
(45:47):
something better than you foundit, one of the ways to do that
is to hand it off, you know, tothe next stewards of that work,
so purposefully.
In the end no one's going toremember you know what balance
sheet I presented, but I hopethat they'll see the legacy of
any number of people that areworking in professional capacity
(46:09):
, that that I coached andencouraged to not just be a
typical accounting and financeperson.
Who's who's just looking atnumbers on paper, because it's
never just numbers on paper.
There's so much more than that.
Jon (46:23):
Exactly, exactly, in the wild and wacky world of
festivals that you've traveledwith me.
What are two or three of yourproudest accomplishments, or
maybe even just your favoritememories?
I know there's a lot of groundto cover there.
Yeah, yeah, do your best.
Susan (46:41):
That goes back to the accounting, is the laundry.
There were so many challenges.
You know there was a year thatthe accounting system went down.
You know, two days before thefestival.
Generations that are heavilydependent upon technology, that
you know.
Sometimes you just have tofigure it out.
So those are, those are proudmoments of setting the example,
(47:21):
of the flight, not just.
You know stomping around andsaying, well, this is a problem
that can't be solved.
You know bringing everybodyalong.
We have to laugh when thosethings occur.
There was a year out at theGorge, you'll recall, a festival
when it was record heat and wehad to solve for getting ice.
(47:42):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that wastough, right.
Yeah, it's not just go to yourlocal 7-Eleven.
There was no ice to be had inthe region.
We literally had to.
I think we hijacked a deliverytruck driver and said, well,
will cash work, can you go?
Literally drove back to Seattleto get pallets of ice for us.
(48:02):
But again, I mean, there wasthat mix.
Of this is critical.
People could actually, you know, be put at medical risk by not
having water and ice, and it was.
Jon (48:12):
There were people dropping like flies Right.
It was scary.
I remember that we had to.
We got so hot one day we had tosuspend work.
It was just.
It was past the point of commonsense.
And then we had to switch toworking at night instead to stay
on schedule, which was acompletely separate set of
(48:33):
problems.
If I recall, we got luckybecause it was a full moon or
near full moon, so we could seewhat we were doing.
Susan (48:42):
But yeah, yeah, it would have taken us days to set up, to
have the lighting, and wedidn't have days.
Jon (48:47):
That's a great example, because some festivals of that
size, that's year-round planning, so a whole year's worth of
planning goes up in smoke justbecause of the temperature.
Susan (48:58):
What are you going to do To be able to say, when
someone's concerned, are wegoing to be able to make this
happen?
To, just in the moment, say yes, just do this, literally yes,
take cash, hand it to thisperson, unknown person, and make
them run for us and and justtrust that you know we were all
doing everything that we couldfor the right reasons, and that
(49:20):
you know we were.
We're not going to be fired thenext day for for making a
decision like that.
So it's a it's a it's not foreveryone, that level of stress
you know in the moment andproblem solving, and then you
know crashing hard the next day.
Jon (49:37):
But there's that word trust again.
Now I'm getting kind of lockedin on that.
I had mentioned recently thatone of the aspects about event
work, especially concert work orone-off, single-day work, is
that by default we have to havean ability to judge a person
(49:59):
we've never met really quickly,like within minutes, like you
got the first five or 10 minutesof the morning when the touring
production crew steps off thebus or whatever it is.
But we have to make a judgmentabout this person and how we're
going to work together, andalong with that comes a degree
of trust.
(50:20):
We're rolling into a new venueand here's the house riggers.
Here's one of these jobs where,if they don't do their job
right, people can die, manypeople can die all at once.
And so again, do I trust thisperson?
And how do you go about that?
I don't know.
It's a skill, it's a sense thatI think we just develop over
(50:42):
time in the industry.
It's important.
So when you're talking about,all of a sudden, even in a major
festival, in a remote location,and things start going sideways
and so we just have to startpunting, punt left, punt right,
tossing money around, butthere's this through it all.
There's this thread of inherenttrust that everybody's doing.
(51:04):
Hopefully they're making theright decision, but even if
they're not, they're doing thebest that they can and knowing
that we'll come out the otherend, you know, okay, I think in
those environments there areprobably other industries that
are similar.
Susan (51:18):
Those are the you'll say.
These people are our people.
You know, they're one of us,they get it.
They get it.
And there are people who mightwork in the environment who
recognize that it isn't the kindof extreme situation that they
(51:39):
want to put themselves in overand over again.
I mean here we are talkingabout it as if it's, you know,
right in insanely difficult orstressful, and there are moments
of it, but there's also momentsof great joy and very relaxed
successes as well.
But I think it's a personalitytype to be there every once in a
while.
The other thing I'm thinking ofis sometimes you will bring
someone in on that moment oftrust because your time is so
(52:01):
short and midstream or midday oractivity, you recognize that
you didn't make the bestdecision and you have to make an
immediate decision to dismissthem from that role or the
activity.
And that is another piece of itis even with that, yes, it puts
additional burden on eitheryourself or other folks, but
(52:24):
there's also that trust that,for being short of that set of
hands, everything will stillwork out, everyone will still be
able to to work together tosolve things.
So I think it's a, it's a bitof a learned experience, because
look at the people who maybecame into the environment for
the first time.
I, you know, use interns as anexample and you know they, they
know what they know, or theyhave an idea about its glamour,
(52:54):
an idea about its glamour, andthey very quickly, very quickly,
catch up to.
Oh, this is different than whatI thought, but I can do this
because that's the examples thatare being set around them.
I think, when specificallyfocusing on festivals, arts,
music, one thing that we'vetalked about is, I think you
would agree that we don't wantto be the keepers of the mold.
It's not for us to say what'scoming next or how things should
(53:15):
be managed next.
I remember the fascination ofthe wristbands.
You know let's move away fromcash and let's move to other
things.
And then you know people.
You know that's not going towork.
That's, you know, terrifyinglet's.
You know, trust the nextiteration of incredible minds
and creative people and muchmore brilliant than I could ever
(53:36):
be accountants and financialanalysts.
To, to, to do what they'regoing to do.
Let them, let them go their way.
I, you know, if we're luckyenough to have them come to us
and ask us for advice or inputor or anecdotes to share.
We want to do that, but I don'tthink that we want to ever try
to squash their brilliance,their ability or their need to
(53:59):
make mistakes and figure outthings that we could never
possibly have imagined.
Jon (54:03):
Absolutely.
What's your favorite soundWater?
Susan (54:08):
in its many forms.
Water running in the tap, waterlapping, you know, gently on a
beach rain.
Jon (54:20):
You're getting an ice cream cone with two scoops.
What are the flavors?
Susan (54:25):
You know it's pistachio and coconut.
They're brilliant together andneither one of them are
something that I'm going tocreate day-to-day access to on
my own.
You know you're in an ice creamshop and if somebody's going to
do it right, I'm going to letthe experts do it.
Which?
Jon (54:46):
flavor goes on top Coconut Excellent, Susan.
Thanks for making the timetoday.
Susan (54:53):
Thank you, john.
It's always a pleasure.
All call.
One hour, two doors.
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