by Rebecca Margiotta | Mar 30, 2020 | Uncategorized
I hope this note finds you and your loved ones healthy and well.
I want to share a short video I made about how to ask for something in a way that makes it much more likely that you’ll get what you want. How you ask can make a huge difference on whether or not you will get it, so please don’t make the big mistakes that we see all. the. time.
We’re delighted that some of you have taken us up on our offer to be a pro bono sounding board or thought partner. Our offer still stands. Just email info@billionsinstitute.com and we’ll make that happen.
And just so you know you’re not alone, we’ve identified a couple of concerns that seem to be widely shared by non-profit and social change leaders:
- How can I cope with this much uncertainty?
- How can I balance family and work now that we’re all on top of one another at home?
- How can my organization align itself to be most relevant now and going forward?
We will be writing and zooming about these questions – and others – in the days and weeks ahead.
We’re asking ourselves the very same questions.
Here’s my hunch: cultivating our ability to get fully present with ourselves and others through this period of heightened uncertainty and loss is a good start. That’s something we can definitely help you do.
Please drop me a note and let me know if you’ve make a request using the formula in the video and if you do, how it went. ** fingers crossed ** And let us know what’s keeping you up at night as a social change leader. We’ll all get through this together.
With tremendous love and affection,
Becky
COVID-19 Solutions from Solutions Journalism
People are helping each other fight coronavirus, one Google spreadsheet at a time.
Sigal Samuel, Vox. United States
Healthy citizens desperate to find a way to help those at risk of developing severe coronavirus symptoms are creating spreadsheets detailing what services they can offer to their neighbors, whether it’s grocery shopping or check-in calls. The mutual aid model is complementing the ongoing work of established nonprofits.
https://solu.news/08un
In The Age of Coronavirus, Libraries Are Getting Books Into People’s Hands — Without Touching
Elizabeth Pandolfi, Next City. United States
As public libraries in the United States are forced to close their doors in response to the coronavirus outbreak, librarians are trying new methods of (safely) getting books in the hands of community members. From organizing curbside pickups to books-by-mail services, librarians are adjusting and improvising.
https://solu.news/udvi
How to Save Elections From a Pandemic
Eric Cortellessa, Washington Monthly. Salt Lake City, Utah, United States
The coronavirus pandemic swept the nation at a time when many would be going to polling stations to cast their votes in primary elections, but vote-at-home practices are providing a solution for this civic inconvenience. Oregon, Washington, Colorado, and now Utah have all implemented statewide all-mail election campaigns that not only improve voter turnout, but also cost less to taxpayers than only relying on in-person polling booths.
https://solu.news/hz3n
These stories were selected from the Solutions Story Tracker®, a database of over 8,000 solutions stories from over 1,000 newsrooms around the world. Interested in receiving a weekly round-up of COVID-19 solutions stories that you can easily cut and paste into your newsletter? Click here to sign up.
Unleashing Social Change Podcast Season 2 is Out!
- Christine Margiotta, my wife and Executive Director of Social Venture Partners Los Angeles, on shifting their model from charity to justice.
- Dimitry Anselme with Facing History and Ourselves about teaching history as a way of bolstering our fragile democracy.
- Jason Marsh with the Greater Good Science Center on spreading research-based practices that advance happiness and well-being.
- Kate Hilton with the Institute for Health Care Improvement on getting out of your own way as a leader.
- Helen Smith, Forensic Psychiatrist with the National Health Service about taking the fear out of the system to unleash massive creativity.
- Gerry Balcazar and Hugo Ramirez from Vision y Compromiso on building movements of love and support around children
- Sasha Rabkin from Equal Opportunity Schools on bringing equity to AP/IB classes.
- Jake Maguire from Community Solutions on what happened after the 100k Homes Campaign ended. If you stick around til the very end you will get to hear him tell me a hilarious story that cracks me up to this day.
- Chris Chatmon from Kingmakers of Oakland on transforming schools to work for black and brown boys.
- Bruce Nilles from the Rocky Mountain Institute on climate change as an equity issue and why your natural gas appliances are no good.
- Peter O’Driscoll from the Equitable Food Initiative about how they’ve worked with the entire food production cycle to get healthy produce and fair wages for everyone.
- Arfon Williams, a General Practitioner in Rural Wales about how he responded to the crisis of being the only doctor around for hundreds of miles.
- Parvathi Santhoosh-Kumar, Vice-President of Equitable Results at StriveTogether, about how they’re working with dozens of communities to go from proof points to systems transformation on behalf of children everywhere.
- Tema Okun, Duke University, Facing into your own Racism with Courage and Love.
by Rebecca Margiotta | Mar 18, 2020 | Uncategorized
We are making ourselves available to help pro bono as sounding boards or thought partners to organizations that are trying to figure out how to scale essential services or address the challenges of virtual collaboration in view of the constraints presented by the Coronavirus.
This includes both co-founders of the Billions Institute, Becky Margiotta & Joe McCannon, as well as some graduates of our fellowship program who have specific areas of expertise in health care, human services, philanthropy, education and virtual collaboration among others.
All of our events at the Billions Institute are on hold for the next few months, so you will not be imposing if you give us a ring. Please email info@billionsinstitute.com if you want to take us up on this offer.
Meanwhile, please be safe and stay home if at all possible and be good to yourselves. As my friend Nicole Hockley reminded me this weekend: “Distance is needed but connection is needed even more.” The main reason I created the Billions Institute is so that nobody leading social change has to do so alone. If there is anything we can do to support you in navigating this global crisis, please do not hesitate to reach out.
Most warmly,
Becky & Selena
p.s. close your eyes and imagine what penguins would look like going down the stairs. It’s even better than that…click here to see for yourself.
Unleashing Social Change Podcast Season 2 is Out!
- Christine Margiotta, my wife and Executive Director of Social Venture Partners Los Angeles, on shifting their model from charity to justice.
- Dimitry Anselme with Facing History and Ourselves about teaching history as a way of bolstering our fragile democracy.
- Jason Marsh with the Greater Good Science Center on spreading research-based practices that advance happiness and well-being.
- Kate Hilton with the Institute for Health Care Improvement on getting out of your own way as a leader.
- Helen Smith, Forensic Psychiatrist with the National Health Service about taking the fear out of the system to unleash massive creativity.
- Gerry Balcazar and Hugo Ramirez from Vision y Compromiso on building movements of love and support around children
- Sasha Rabkin from Equal Opportunity Schools on bringing equity to AP/IB classes.
- Jake Maguire from Community Solutions on what happened after the 100k Homes Campaign ended. If you stick around til the very end you will get to hear him tell me a hilarious story that cracks me up to this day.
- Chris Chatmon from Kingmakers of Oakland on transforming schools to work for black and brown boys.
- Bruce Nilles from the Rocky Mountain Institute on climate change as an equity issue and why your natural gas appliances are no good.
- Peter O’Driscoll from the Equitable Food Initiative about how they’ve worked with the entire food production cycle to get healthy produce and fair wages for everyone.
- Arfon Williams, a General Practitioner in Rural Wales about how he responded to the crisis of being the only doctor around for hundreds of miles.
- Parvathi Santhoosh-Kumar, Vice-President of Equitable Results at StriveTogether, about how they’re working with dozens of communities to go from proof points to systems transformation on behalf of children everywhere.
- Tema Okun, Duke University, Facing into your own Racism with Courage and Love.
by Rebecca Margiotta | Jan 24, 2020 | Uncategorized
Ok so I’m 50 years old and true confession time: I love TikTok. That’s right. I love it.
15 second bursts of creativity from regular old folks all over the world. What’s not to love?
If I wanted to connect TikTok to some concept related to large-scale change I totally could. Virality. The science of memetics. The importance of people being able to make things their own. But you know what? It’s a gorgeous afternoon here in sunny Southern California, so I’m just wanted to invite us to be ticktok friends.
Have a great weekend and you’re welcome!
Love,
Becky
Unleashing Social Change Podcast Season 2 is Out!
Each week we will release a new episode but four interviews with amazing change leaders are already up on itunes or wherever you get your podcasts. Check these out:
- Jake Maguire from Community Solutions on what happened after the 100k Homes Campaign ended. If you stick around til the very end you will get to hear him tell me a hilarious story that cracks me up to this day.
- Chris Chatmon from Kingmakers of Oakland on transforming schools to work for black and brown boys.
- Bruce Nilles from the Rocky Mountain Institute on climate change as an equity issue and why your natural gas appliances are no good.
- Peter O’Driscoll from the Equitable Food Initiative about how they’ve worked with the entire food production cycle to get healthy produce and fair wages for everyone.
- Arfon Williams, a General Practitioner in Rural Wales about how he responded to the crisis of being the only doctor around for hundreds of miles.
- Parvathi Santhoosh-Kumar, Vice-President of Equitable Results at StriveTogether, about how they’re working with dozens of communities to go from proof points to systems transformation on behalf of children everywhere.
- Tema Okun, Duke University, Facing into your own Racism with Courage and Love.
by Rebecca Margiotta | Jan 16, 2020 | Uncategorized
On R-Day, my first day as a “new cadet” at West Point, back in the summer of 1987, I was taught my four responses. These four responses were to be the only acceptable answers to questions upperclass cadets might ask me for my entire plebe year. I remember somebody much bigger than me in a very stern voice showing me my four responses and giving me the opportunity to recite them from memory until I got it right.
And I still remember them 32+ years later:
Yes, sir/ma’am.
No, sir/ma’am.
Sir/ma’am, I do not understand.
No excuse, sir!
Perhaps not surprisingly, for something so seemingly simple, under the duress of R-Day it took me a couple tries to get it right! Since I wasn’t taking selfies on R-day back in 1987, I’ve included a stock photo below that pretty much captures the gist of my first year of college.
Thus began my plebe year – an extraordinary context based on the premise that you can’t be a leader until you’re a good follower first. And one in which just about every aspect of your behavior and character receive copious amounts of feedback, to put it in the most positive terms.
Physical hazing wasn’t allowed but verbal hazing was the norm, and the smallest mistake or poor decision was noticed by somebody. This gave me lots of opportunities to unlearn the habit of making excuses. Here’s what it would look like:
Upperclass Cadet: ”Cadet Kanis, your shoes look like a dog literally took a shit on them. Did you shine them with a Hershey Bar? I guess you’re just too good to shine your shoes anymore, huh? You’re better than the rest of us now, right?” (yelling at me, and inch away from my face, with bad breath, too).
Me: **has a reasonable explanation and attempts to offer it **
Upperclass Cadet: “NO EXCUSE, SIR, right Kanis? NO EXCUSE, SIR” ** continues hazing me but now it’s no longer about my failure to shine my shoes but about my attempt to make an excuse.
Here’s the thing that’s totally bananas – you’d think I’d figure it out pretty quickly, right? ** JUST SAY NO EXCUSE, Sir!!! ** but I couldn’t make myself do it!! Becuase I had an excuse. It took me a solid 6 to 8 months of my plebe year and plenty of unnecessary suffering to get out of the habit of offering excuses.
For the record I also had a really difficult time “removing that smirk from my face.” Military bearing took a tremendous amount of effort for me and even now I have nothing resembling a poker face! If I think something is funny, I am gonna laugh! But that’s a story for another day.
What would your life be like if you spent zero energy justifying your own behavior or trying to explain to someone how they misunderstood you? I’m not saying don’t apologize and commit to doing better going forward, especially if you’ve caused harm. But I am saying it might be more efficient if nothing else for you to dispense with the habit of making excuses once and for all.
Next time you find yourself wanting to defend your behavior, try “no excuse” on for size and see what happens. You just might free yourself up from a whole lot of wasted energy so you can get on with the important work of making the world a better place.
Love,
Becky
by Rebecca Margiotta | Jan 6, 2020 | Uncategorized
| I hope you had a restful holiday and that your 2020 is off to a great start.
Two of the things I am most excited about in the year ahead is I will be publishing my first book (!!) by the summer and we’ll be rolling out a brand new, shorter, less expensive workshop in the fall. I’ve gotten crystal clear that I want to support people who are working to make the world a better place in being happy, loving their work, and doing the most good possible. The new book and workshop were designed with exactly that in mind. More on both soon!
Speaking of being happy and loving your work, I wanted to share a tool that I developed many years ago to help me reckon with how I was choosing to spend my time as the Director of the 100,000 Homes Campaign for Community Solutions, the “Genius Tracker.”
Once again, I was at a workshop led by Katie Hendricks when she asked us this question: “What percent of your time are you willing to commit to spending in your genius?” By genius she meant things where I lose track of time, I’m really really good at it, so good, in fact, that it doesn’t even feel like “work.” For a much deeper dive into this concept, I recommend her husband, Gay Hendricks’ books, The Big Leap and the Joy of Genius.
When Katie asked me that question, I realized I had no idea what my baseline genius was. So being well-versed in continuous quality improvement, I decided to go about getting that baseline data. I created the genius tracker as a spreadsheet and kept it as an open tab on my laptop for four weeks. I recorded every single thing I did, how long it took, and whether or not I experienced myself in my zone of genius, excellence (which is you’re good at it, but it still feels like “work”), my competence, or my incompetence.
After a month of tracking, I realized that I was spending about 43% of my time in my genius. I used what I had learned to proactively change some agreements with my colleagues that resulted in me – and several others, too – being able to contribute from a much greater percentage of our genius.
I thought it might be a nice gift to share the Genius Tracker with you so you can get some baseline data for yourself and start your new year off right. Please let me know if you use it and what percentage you discover. In the coming weeks I plan to answer your questions about how you can spend more time in your genius so please circle back!
Love,
Becky |
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