Chris Nanni

Chris 

My philosophy is push the line, but if we get too far out in front of the line, then we become irrelevant, or, you know, we won't be effective. And sometimes that line is not very clear, and sometimes we as a foundation, go too far beyond that line, and we have to retreat. But I think if we're constantly pushing and pushing our community forward, we'll bring the community along. From The Giving Practice at Philanthropy Northwest, this is "Can we talk about...?" a project to normalize the messiness of leading for racial equity in philanthropy and reflect on what it takes to create lasting transformation. In season two, our hosts explore what it looks like for philanthropy to advance racial equity on the ground where the work can look quite different depending on the context, whether it's place issue, area or community served, and in a world where our contexts are constantly shifting, we're asking guests to practice vulnerability, explore sticky topics and look for learning, and what we ask of you is to do the same.

 

Robin (Host) 

Hello everyone, and welcome to "Can we talk about...?" I am Dr. Robin Martin, Senior Advisor with The Giving Practice at Philanthropy Northwest. And your host for this episode. For today's episode, I am so excited to be joined by Chris Nanni a president and CEO of the Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham. Chris has led the foundation since 2014 before I introduce Chris, let me tell you a little bit more about the foundation. The Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham serves a diverse region spanning five counties, three rural, one suburban and one urban. The foundation has been committed to inclusive practices and to their strategy since 2018 and they are continuing to engage their communities in this work today, their vision states: A just, prosperous and unified region where every person is empowered to reach their full potential. What a great vision. Now, without further ado, I am thrilled to welcome Chris to the show. Chris, thank you so much for joining us today.

 

Chris 

Yeah great to be here.

 

Robin (Host) 

Please take a few minutes to tell our listeners a little bit more about yourself, your role and the unique environment you're working in.

 

Chris 

Sure. Name is Chris Nanni, President of the Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham, and I've been here for a little over 10 years, and my whole life has been in the nonprofit sector. So I started out really on the service side. I worked in the field of addictions. Then I worked with homeless, and actually went overseas and lived for three years in the Dominican Republic near the Haitian border. And that's really where I learned a lot about seeing mission done well and mission done poorly. And it's really sort of affected my view of how philanthropy is done. When I returned back to the States, I worked at an inner city school, dual language school in Chicago, and worked with sex offenders, and then transitioned into the foundation field in 2004 and then came to Birmingham in 2014 so a lot of experiences I've run two nonprofits. And so the approach that I really brought to the community foundation was more about being proactive and taking on underlying issues in our community, as opposed to just being a grantmaker, and so that was really a transition for the foundation and and it's really kind of kind of included the equity and inclusion work that we're doing.

 

Robin (Host) 

Yeah you know, community foundations are so important to the community. In one of our calls, as we planned for this episode, you talked a little bit more about fragmented communities, how communities are being more fragmented now more than ever. So talk a little bit more about coming to the Birmingham area and some of the work you've done.

 

Chris 

Sure, so you know, I'm originally I grew up in Buffalo, New York, and so I am not a Southerner, and Birmingham is located in the deep south. So I have, actually, I have a master's degree in cross cultural theology, and I never thought I would use that degree. And I feel like I use that degree on a daily basis here. You know, outsiders coming into the Birmingham area, it's, it can be a challenge, and I've seen a lot of people come in with the approach of sort of having the answers, and they don't last here long at all. And people who are able to come in and kind of view themselves as a guest and really sort of learning the culture, because it's a very unique culture. Here, it's much more. I've lived in all different parts of the US, but never in the Deep South. This is very sociocentric. It's very relation based, I would say it's similar in a lot of ways, to where I lived in Latin America. So highly relational. The other thing is, we are the most fragmented community in the southeast, so just in Jefferson County our one county, there are 35 different municipalities. And so it's it our fragmentation is probably our biggest underlying issue holding us back economically. We did a groundbreaking research on how we got to be in this situation and what we need to do to move forward, and the two reasons we're one of the only industrial cities in the southeast, and people don't know, but we were actually created after the Civil War, and so we're sort of a newer city in that sense. But our reason for fragmentation is being an industrial city and sort of communities growing up around where the the resources were, but then also race on top of that. So those are two of the issues, and so it's a huge challenge to coalesce around issues in in our region.

 

Robin (Host) 

So yeah, thank you, Chris for sharing that rich context. So talk a little bit more about how do you advance equity in these fragmented communities?

 

Chris 

It's a huge challenge. So our work really began in 2018 we did our first ever community based needs assessment, and it took pretty much an entire year we met, we've got rural areas, inner city areas, and we had a third party help us. And that actually was advantageous, because there were five priorities that came out of this, and it were not priorities that I chose, but that truly came from the community. And that's why looking back having a third party do this was was really helpful, but the five priorities were overcoming persistent poverty, building thriving communities that people want to live in, economic opportunity for all those that, particularly that are outside the workforce, regional cooperation, which is something we've been a champion of and I was surprised that was identified, and that has to do with our fragmentation and the fifth one was equity and inclusion. And I was actually we were pretty surprised about that, because the person doing our third party person doing this, said that 10 years ago, it would not have been identified, identified as an issue. But there is really an interest in hunger to address some of these underlying racial issues, and that's why it became in 2018 one of our five priorities. And so in 2019 we and each of those five areas, we began what we call the woven together series where we brought outside experts in each one of these five areas to come speak to our community, and we brought in 2019, for equity and inclusion. Dr Tricia Rose from Brown University, and she did a segment on she spoke about really structural racism. And we had, it was a week night, and we had over 300 people come out to hear about this. And it she did a really it was a really powerful presentation that you gave to the community.

 

Robin (Host) 

So what were the biggest takeaways from the woven together conversation?

 

Chris 

You know, the one that struck me the most is she said, Let's take an issue, an issue like education that we're all facing. People want to attack education. Let's fix education. And she put this image of interlocking gears, and she said, the the challenge is, if you're taking on education, education is really dependent on how you fund it. It's it's dependent on home prices and the taxation, on that which is involved in banking, which is involved in and so there's all these under underlying issues that affect just education. So you can't just address one of these complex issues alone. You have to address the other issues that affect that. And so that's what makes this work so complicated, it's not just let's educate these kids, and in a generation, we'll solve our problem. You have to also address all of these underlying issues, which, again, that's why these problems are so persistent, because they're so difficult to affect.

 

Robin (Host) 

So thank you, Chris for sharing, because it highlights the need for a multitude of different strategies at the table. What do you think the participants took away from that experience? What were some of their aha moments?

 

Chris 

I think for some of them, so a lot of times, I think the issue when we're bringing the community together is of the challenge that we've had is preaching to the choir. So we've really, we've really, really put a lot of effort into bringing people that that normally wouldn't come to the these events, because if you're just preaching to the choir, then you're not really affecting change in perspectives. But I'll tell you, that has been a really difficult thing. Even though we've put a lot of effort into doing that, we still struggle with getting diverse perspectives in the room. So I think where people left I think people got a sense what's very prominent here in the deep south is the issue of personal responsibility, and I think the flip side of that is people don't see systems. Systems are difficult to see. They're invisible, but they're very powerful. But here, as opposed to other parts of the country I've lived in, this issue of personal responsibility, responsibility is plays a critical role. So I think people left there seeing that it's a little bit more than personal responsibility, that there are systems and complex systems at play that act as barriers. I think systems benefit some at the expense of others, and so I think just having a little bit better understanding of that is what you know, people walked away with.

 

Robin (Host) 

Yeah, I love that. It's interesting, because I do think that community foundations are similar to educational communities, right? Like they should see themselves as such, they have the power and influence to bridge a very diverse community. One example you shared earlier was the woven together series as a prime example of bridging, if you will, another group that we often talk to community foundation leaders about in equity work, or boards. How have you thought about bringing the board along on your journey?

 

 

Yeah, so again, our work began in 2018 before, you know, really kind of in 2020 with the George Floyd, Floyd murder, there were a lot of people. Then started to address issues of equity. After that, our work really began in 2018. 2019 we dove deeper into it, and then the beginning of 2020, before covid, we entered into a cohort called passing gear philanthropy, and it was run by MDC and David Dodson. And it was really four foundations, two community foundations, two private foundations. It came together for a year to work deeply on these issues of equity and inclusion as a grantmaker. And so in that cohort, we had board members and staff that attended, and we had four sessions and homework and all of that. And it really kind of had us as a board look at this issue of equity and inclusion, and as a grantmaker, you know how that plays out? And we spent a year in 2020 defining what equity and inclusion is, because there were people in our community that were pushing us on this. Well, what do you mean by it? What's your definition And interestingly, we have five priorities, and this is the one that attracted the most attention. So we spent a year working on what we mean about equity and inclusion, and that really sort of brought our board together. And I will tell you that not all board members were totally on board with this and and I think that's pretty typical, but I I think that exercise and the pressure from the community really helped us kind of define what we mean as an institution is of equity and inclusion.

 

Robin (Host) 

Yeah, thank you, Chris, you talked a lot about doing a community wide survey, and the importance of bringing the community along, and the value of that, even before the George Floyd episode, which says to me that you all have been doing this work for a very long time and listening to community voice. So after hearing a desire for more intentionality around equity from the community, you talked about spending an entire year discussing equity and what it means to the foundation, what other steps did you take internally to be able to do the work externally?

 

Chris 

You know, we got some pressure internally because we were doing all of this work externally, and people saying, you know, we're good at talking about it and and funding it, but are we really doing this work internally? So we actually hired a consultant to work on because to be honest, you know, we we were out of the office for two years. When covid hit, we did not come in the office. And so when we came back, we had a pretty diverse staff. We're a staff of 16, and we're we were pretty diverse at the time. And when we came back after two years, you know, it was difficult for everybody. And. But it was really prominent that work needed to be done on organizational culture. So we we hired a consultant to work with us for a year, and she interviewed people individually, and we looked at onboarding. To be honest, the issue was not sort of racial issues, it was sort of the younger generation wanting to grow in their jobs and positions and have their voices heard. And so that was really a lot of the work that we did, and we continue to do. We've institutionalized it because, to be honest, we're pretty flat organizations, community foundations are are pretty flat. We're small. You bring people in, you have maybe your leadership team, and that leadership team doesn't turn oververy often. So then what do you do with sort of that next layer? You're trying to give them more responsibilities, and I think that's sort of an inherent challenge with community foundations. So so yeah, we spent an entire year just looking at our policies, how we onboard people, opportunities, and it's really made me a lot more sensitive to letting people's voices be heard, and not in a superficial way, but a way that really can help change the culture of the organization. So we're actually at a much better place today than we were just a couple years ago, but it takes effort and intentionality to do that.

 

Robin (Host) 

Yeah, so share one story that you're most proud of around building staff capacity and internal culture?

 

Chris 

You know, one of the interesting things that you know we we've worked together for years, but we didn't really know each other's personal stories. And so one of the things the consultant did was, had us, each person, come up in whatever artistic format that we want to do, to present about themselves and their history. And that actually was really powerful. So it took, you know, we've got 16 staff, and people did PowerPoints, people did poems, people did different things, but it was a really powerful experience, because it was the first time that we really understood where people came from, where they grew up, what were their challenges, what was their family like, and it built a connection. We also use a tool called the Enneagram. Some people may be familiar with it, but we have everybody assessed once they they start working here with the Enneagram, and then we use that as a way of bridging different styles in a way that's that's positive and productive. And so I think those two things are, are things that have really helped us organizationally,kind of come together and work more cohesively.

 

Robin (Host) 

Wow. Now, thank you for sharing that. You know, a lot of foundations are starting to do their internal work. So could you give me one example where doing the internal work actually transform the external impact of the work?

 

Chris 

You know, what comes to mind is, it's something that it was positive and also had sort of a negative effect. So, you know, coming out of covid, we really focused a lot on smaller organizations, organizations run by people of color, and we dedicated dollars, you know, was we were we transformed when covid hit? You know, we had two grant cycles a year, which, like a lot of community foundations do, well, that just wasn't realistic when covid hit, and we, we ended up doing weekly grantmaking, and that actually came internally from our program staff, and we were not set up to do that,because our board needs to approve these grants. So we we had to change our bylaws or our policies and procedures. And so we were, we were reviewing grants on a weekly basis. And so then in 2021 we were still affected by covid, but we went to our traditional grantmaking. We wanted to keep that focus on underserved, minority run organizations. So in our equity and inclusion priority, out of our five priorities, we decided, let's do what was pretty common at that time, do a Black Equity Fund, which is which is really focusing on minority. The other four priorities were focusing on poverty and job creation and all that. Well, we got massive pushback from came from the board and community members by calling it a Black Equity Fund. Now there were a lot of I know New Orleans and people all over the country were creating these Black Equity Funds, and it was a little controversial here, and so I remember talking to one of our board members, who's actually African American, and she just told me, you know, she said, I understand where you're coming from. You're not from here. I grew up here. Language is very sensitive here. It's really about getting the work done. So she was like, don't call it a Black Equity Fund. And so that that really kind of hit home for me. And so I think where we'vepivoted is doing the work is more important than sort of bringing attention to it. So we changed the name to advancing equity. It didn't really change the focus, but what I've learned, and I think in my growth pattern here at the foundation, is language is powerful, and we really and then sometimes it's important to make a stand and use the language, but a lot of times here it's, let's just do the work and get the work done. And if we have to change a name or talk about it differently, we do that. And so our messaging can be different depending on the populations that we're working with.

 

Robin (Host) 

Yeah, thank you for sharing that, Chris. You know, you know language does matter. It does matter, and a lot of CEOs are struggling. You know, not only just CEOs, for foundations are struggling around the idea of language versus impact and growth. So what one piece of advice would you give CEOs and foundation leaders about how to use language and grow impact?

 

Chris 

Yeah, so a couple things. You know, when I started here in 2014 there was a group that came to us to open a field of interest fund. So for maybe people listening who aren't familiar with the field of interest fund, it's, it's where someone comes to us to utilize our mechanism, but their field of interest, you know, could be pets and animals. It could be whatever. We're the platform. They're raising the money. We're not promoting it. We're not raising the money. And it's they themselves are doing it. So we had a group, an LGBTQ group, come to us and say, we want to open a fund. And I was like, you know, I was new, not from here? I was like, Sure. And so we created that fund in 2014 and as a result of that, I lost a couple donors. Donor Advised Funds. And I remember thinking, oh my gosh, you know, I'm new here. I'm not from here. Am I going to ruin the foundation. And I remember at the time, one of our development people, our head of development, came to me and said, you know, this is controversial, this we could be losing donors. And I remember saying to her, Do you think we're doing the right thing? And she said, yes, no, I'm not questioning that. And my response was, Well, if we're doing the right thing, we need to do the right thing, and if we lose donors as a result of that, you know, maybe they were not a fit for us at the foundation. So I think being motivated to do the right thing is is, I think, what should drive us, but we do have to be sensitive to the culture and the climate, and my philosophy is push the line. But if we get too far out in front of the line, then we become irrelevant, or, you know, we won't be effective. And sometimes that line is not very clear, and sometimes we, as a foundation, go too far beyond that line and we have to retreat. But I think if we're constantly pushing and pushing our community forward, we'll bring the community along and so that that is in our experience, kind of what what we're dealing with on a daily basis.

 

Robin (Host) 

Chris, there's so much impact in that statement that you just made. And I think a lot of CEOs and other leaders are grappling with, where is the line, right? And so where do you find personal support, and where do you find that line? Where you find support in finding that line?

 

Chris 

So I have sort of that kitchen cabinet, you know, a couple people that that that are in the field, that actually some are here locally, but there are some that are outside this area, and I just, I just call and talk to them. I've had a couple board members who grew up here and understand the situation, and I seek guidance from them. But you know, the interesting model, the community foundation model, is kind of interesting, I think, because you have, in our case, 80% of our resources comes from two zip codes, and the money is going all over to people in need. And so what we learned by a survey is that those five priorities that the community came up with don't necessarily match where that 80% of those resources are coming from. And so that, I think, is that's just built into the model, and it's more a reflection, I think, of our economic system. So. So, you know, half of our assets are donor advised funds, so we don't really control those and so it's sort of a balancing act. We have to cater to the donors. That's, that's, that's critical, and that's important, but that that part is really about helping them with their own personal philanthropy. You know, the other half is what we control as the foundation, which is our five priorities, and the mistake that, and I don't know if it was a mistake, but probably would have done this differently. Back in 2019 we did our needs assessment. In 2018 we identified five priorities. 2019 we spent the entire year to let the community know about these five priorities and bringing national speakers in 2021, 2022 we do a survey with the donors. And the response was, Well, where are the donors in all of this? You know, are you forcing us to fund in these five priorities? And the piece that we missed was we focused on just half of what we do, and we sort of we didn't give enough attention to the donor piece. And so what we do now in our when we do our annual report and our presentation, is we really distinguish between the half of our resources, which are Donor Advised, and highlighting the work of the donors and what they're funding and the importance of that, and then the other half is focusing on the five priorities and where the community foundation is focusing its unrestricted dollars. And so, you know, I think sometimes we can get lost in the work and not give as much attention to the donors, which is really the lifeblood of a community foundation?

 

Robin (Host) 

Yeah I love how you're thinking about balancing and bridging community partners and donors. Can you share a little bit more about this?

 

Chris 

You know, it's, it's a challenging thing, I think, in in our community, because we're so fragmented again, those 35 cities just in one county, is, is we really don't come together in meaningful ways. So we have our little, you know, area where we live, and it's sort of a bubble, and we don't, we don't interact with others. And I think the result of that is, if you live in a very safe area and you hear about crime, you know, in the downtown or on our west side, or whatever, you have no connection to it. And so it's easy to other people to say that, hey, you know, they're just they don't care. Or the inner city school system poor results. It's very easy to say, Oh, well, the teachers don't care, the parents don't care. And so part of it. And I think the biggest challenge is you can present people with data and you can that's not going to change people, that can inform people, but it's not changing people the only way. And this is just my experience, especially in the Dominican Republic, where I learned this is people are changed by being in relationship. And so how do how do we do that in a meaningful way? And so one of the ways that we've done it is we have a field of interest fund called the Unity fund, and its purpose is to help unify our region. And one of the things that we did is we were piloting, this year, what's called the healing circle, where we're bringing together people from incredibly diverse backgrounds. There's 22 of us, and my wife and I are participating in it, incredibly diverse in a number of different rates, just not racially, socioeconomically, ideologically, age wise. And we come together once a month for two and a half hours. And it's a very, very particular, prescribed way of doing this, and it's based on Dr. Gail Christopher's work and and so for an example, we start with with sharing stories with each other. We're not talking about race or anything. But really we pair off, and there are into dyads, and we're talking about particular things. And one of them could, you could start off easily with what's, what's one of the things that has brought joy into your life, and then you start moving to and I remember one of them recently. We're about midway through this year, this cohort, but one of them was describe an experience where you felt othered. And it was interesting, because there was a white male and a white female who asked, I don't know what you mean. What does that mean? And so we kind of explained and explored what other meant. And so we went into our dyads and we talked, and then we came back into the larger group, and I remember asking one of the participants afterwards, you know, how was that for you? One of the people that asked, you know, what does it mean to be othered? And, you know, she responded, she said, you know, she said, I realized that there was a reason why I didn't know what that meant, because I've kind of grown up in, in my kind of safety zone, my my my bubble, and I haven't really interacted. And I said, Well, what was, what was that like coming to that realization? And she said, you know, it, it was great, because I came up with that myself. She said, I didn't have someone pointing a finger at me and telling me that I was privileged, that I came to that conclusion myself. So it was really powerful, and it was done in a very, very loving way. And so to me, the power of this healing circle is that it's about self growth and realization, and that wouldn't happen without that relationship. And we're really seeing each other as human beings and the commonality that we have. And so I think the more that we can, we can bring people together in a way that are forming relationships in a non threatening way. At least for us, where we are in our context is critical. So we're looking to really grow this healing circle model and to bring as many people into the fold as possible.

 

Robin (Host) 

I love that model, and you're right about it's all about relationships. Can you share a little bit about what you've learned on how to really hold this rich diversity of community across racial lines and social economic class? What are some of the challenges around bridging some of those gaps, and what are some lessons that you can share with our listeners?

 

Chris 

Yeah it's also a great question and a great challenge. So I, you know, it was interesting. When I first came here in 2014 I presented, we were working on reducing homicides in Birmingham. And I talked to a prominent African American woman who worked at a for profit organization, but had a lot of power and responsibility here. So I was presenting to her, and she just said to me, I can't believe what I'm hearing. And I said, Oh, this is a this is a research based model. And she's like, No, no, I'm not talking about the model, she said. And she said, it very, very matter of factly, she said, I can't believe that the community foundation's interested in my people, African American community. And I was kind of taken aback. And I said, Well, what like, What do you mean by that? And she said, you know, well, she said, when I think of the community foundation, I think if you're doing sort of like cute, nice things around the edge. And she named a couple examples. She said, but anything that has to do with my community, the community foundation has not been at the table. And I just said, you know, I mean, I can't speak. I'm new. And I said, but we should be at the table. And so though we have grown in in, I think, relevance to the African American community by a lot of things that we've done, as well as communities like the LGBTQ community that that never saw this as a place for them, and where I think we've made great strides, strides as being the community foundation where people can see themselves as a part of it, and so that, I think, is really where we've been effective. Now. We're a pride. We're primarily a would be considered a predominantly white institution, historically. And so I think that there's a role to play. I think we can speak to the white community in ways that say African American leaders cannot. And so I've actually had African American leaders come to me and say, you need to speak to the white CEOs, because they will not listen to me. And so I think that that's a very privileged role to be in. I like to see us as an insider outsider, so that we can play that role of connecting different communities in a way, of bringing them to the table in a way that's not that's not threatening. You know, one of the things that I've learned about Birmingham, in this region is we, we suffer. And people will tell you this from a poor self esteem, from what's happened the in the civil rights era. And so there's, there's a sort of poor self esteem. And when you try to address issues, people feel like you're, you're trying to blame them, or so there's a real sensitivity around that, and I think we're poised as an institution to do it in a way, as sort of a bridge builder, and so that's what we're trying to lean into that role more.

 

Robin (Host) 

Yeah when we're talking about bridging difference in the wider community, it makes me think about again, about your vision statement, which says: A just, prosperous and unified region where every person is empowered to reach their full potential, that in itself, takes an entire community in order to fulfill that vision. So what you described is, how do we all do it? How does everyone in the community leverage their responsibility, their power and privilege to speak to the needs of the full community so that they can, so that everyone can reach their full potential. Oh, man, I love that.

 

Chris 

You know, can I just say one thing about that vision statement? So we came up with that. We came up with a vision statement in 2018 when we were doing our strategic plan. And I will tell you it's a just prosperous and unified region where every person is empowered to reach their full potential. I had more conversations around the word just in starting off that vision statement, where people wanted us to take that out, because they feel like the word justice here in our context, is a politically loaded word, and it was interesting because it went to our board, and we had a long discussion about it, and what I found was it wasn't a racial it didn't fall on racial lines. It was more people who did not grow up here, but were living here and have lived here for many years, wanted us to include the word just there was more sensitivity around it from those who were born and grew up here, and that was a really interesting lesson to me. So we ended up, we had a lot of discussion around just the word, just in that statement. And so we ended up voting, ultimately, to keep it in. But it goes back to language. Language is important depending on the regions that we live in. Like when I hear what some of the community foundations are doing say in San Francisco and other places, I'm like, there's no way we could do that here. So we hired a group in 2019 called frameworks out of DC, which is a group of social scientists, and what they use, they use data, and they use surveys, and they have about how you're doing your communication. So they came in and looked at all of our communications and gave us feedback on how we could better frame some of the issues that we're talking about. And so that was that was really helpful for us.

 

Robin (Host) 

You know what? Chris, I love this multiple this multi prone approach. You know you've leveraged having deep conversations with your leadership and your board. You talked a lot about having deep conversations with community members, even when it was hard, and then you use external experts to come in to both affirm and challenge your own thinking. Using these different approaches to make sure that you're moving in the right direction is just a powerful testament to your leadership. So thank you for sharing that, Chris. You know, I'm from Tennessee, what they would also call the Deep South. And like you, I have lived in a variety of different places. I've lived in Houston, California, Seattle, and you are correct. I've seen in one region where things like racial equity is taboo, and other places not so much. Can you share what you've learned about the different ways that race shows up across geographies, and more importantly, how has that impacted the way you've led the foundation's racial equity work.

 

Chris 

I've lived a lot of my life in marginalized populations, mostly though with the Latino community, I would say that I knew a lot about race before I came to Birmingham, I would say that I have just learned a ton more since being here. One of the most powerful things that I learned about race early on was when I lived in the Dominican Republic. You know, I think there are a lot of things people who don't, I think understand the power of poverty and race, will just say, hey, just get a good education. You can have the same opportunity. I think people in my position, we tend to confuse merit with privilege. We tend to say, hey, you know, I'm a hard worker and I'm smart, and if you're a hard worker and smart, and you live in poverty, you can have what I have, and they don't understand sort of the barrier. So in my position, it could be that, you know, I got this opportunity, this internship, because my dad knew the CEO of this company. But I don't see that, that advantage. I just see that, well, I got that position, and I'm working hard where someone else doesn't have that advantage. But one story that really sticks with me is when I was in the Dominican Republic. When I first got there, I was with my host dad, and I didn't know Spanish at the time very well. I was learning and I was playing two young farm hands. And so Dominicans, if you know the Dominican Republic, we were near the Haitian border. And as you get closer to the Haitian border, Dominicans are darker in skin tone. So it was with two young farmhands. And I'm looking at them. We're playing dominoes. And my father, my host father, was playing against these two farmhands. I'm looking at them as the experts. Well, you guys are the great players. And so my host dad and I won the game. And I was like, so excited. And I said to the two fire farm hands, we beat you guys. Like, I'm excited. And the one farm hand again, just matter of factly said, Well, that makes sense. And I was like, What do you mean that makes sense? I just, I'm just learning the game. And he just said, very matter of factly. He said, well, white people are smarter than black people. And I just looked at him, and I was stunned. I was taken aback. And it was really in reflecting on that moment that I realized that in his experience, every white person that came down there was a missionary, was wealthy, had power, and so that sort of psychological effect of poverty. I've heard people, African Americans in in this country call it sort of an echo chamber of injustice, like you question things you know in your your head, and that it presents these barriers that can be very difficult to break through. And so, you know, part of our role is sort of understanding these dynamics and looking at the data. So we're like, one of the pieces of data is that our county is our region is like, 23% say African American, but we have only 3% of small business or businesses owned by African Americans, and that gap, 3% to like 27% is the largest gap in the country. And so looking at that, we have to say, well, something's going on, and we need to better understand what are those barriers that are preventing that, and if we can understand those barriers and work towards alleviating that, it's sort of like I've heard someone else say, it's this latent potential that people have, that if you can discover and remove those barriers, people will flourish. And that's part of what we're we're trying to do here at the foundation.

 

Robin (Host) 

Thanks Chris for sharing your experiences. You know, I've thought about this deeply white supremacy, and whiteness is both a biological and a psychological untruth, and it plays itself and has impact on all of us in very different and hurtful ways. Right? And so what has been your experience and lessons learned from working with the Birmingham community to help folks understand the harmful impact of the system of white supremacy and of itself?

 

Chris 

Sure a couple things, the understanding of especially here in Birmingham, you have the past, you have the present, and you have the future. And we've done some surveying, and what we find is everybody's in agreement that we want a better future for everybody. I would say, there are some that would say, and I think this falls this in our informal research falls sort of along racial lines. Is, and I don't mean to generalize, but in our experience, more myself, people in the white community would say, hey, let's just forget about the past. The past happened. What's done was done. Let's just focus on the future. We're getting hung up on the past. I think what the minorities are trying to say is that we're not saying dwell on the past, but we need to understand how the past has influenced our current structures, because we can't change these current structures to move to a better future unless we understand that. And so that's been a real lesson learned is that we need to understand how the path has influenced our current structures, so that we can, we can deal with we can't just say we're just going to move ahead, because if we just move ahead, the structures aren't going to change. In the situation's not going to change. You know, I hear a lot of people say, you know, in one generation, well everybody will be fine. Well, I think what we're finding is that we we need to change current structures, that the current structures were set up to benefit some at the expense of others. They're difficult to see. And so it's that's been a hugely kind of, I think, challenging thing that that we've been trying, trying to work on and bring people along. I would also say that, you know, another thing that I've learned is, I remember, in the early 2000 the Minneapolis Community Foundation did a white paper on the cost of sticking your neck out, and it was basically saying they took some really, really progressive stances on issues, and they lost a lot of donors, but then what they did is they people who saw them as standing for something, they gained a new generation of donors. I have found that that, and you hear people say that all the time, I don't think that's necessarily the case here in the Deep South, that you know the donor basis is a pretty kind of limited segment of the population, and if you lose then there isn't, say, another set of donors that are going to necessarily step in. So it's a balancing act. Is, how do you bring the whole community along in a again, in a way that's not going to turn them off, but allow them to grow. And again, I think the only way through that is building relationships.

 

Robin (Host) 

That's right, that's right. So how do you build relationships? You know? How do you build better, stronger relationships, and this growing political hotbed, if you will. So how do you do that?

 

Chris 

So it's interesting. We were continuing our woven together series, and this year we had a conversation, civil conversation. We brought someone that from the American Enterprise Institute that worked in the issue was on poverty, how to overcome poverty. So he was someone that was in the Trump administration, and then we brought someone that was in the Obama administration, we just looked at issues of poverty. How do we and we had a great civil conversation, but very, two very, very different perspectives, and the goal in that was to get different people in the room that otherwise would not occupy those spaces. And it was really not about changing minds, but maybe altering perspectives to see the other perspective. And then actually tomorrow, we're bringing in Dr. Gail Christopher, who created the healing circle model, and we're, we're going to have about 200 people, and she's going to lead people through an exercise, and what the methodology is and and what the creation is of healing and bringing people together. So we're trying to do it, you know, in in different ways. The healing circle model is just, is just one of the examples. But I think in our conversations, a lot of what we do is listening is profound. Listening and not trying to tell people what they should think and believe, but it's really hearing. And I think if we're secure in what we know and what we believe, you're able to hear people who just have radically different ideas. And the more we can just listen and understand. We can be sort of that sounding board, but we can also kind of provide a different perspective and bring people together that way. It's a very challenging and difficult thing to do, but I think community foundations are poised to be able to do that if we take that challenge.

 

Robin (Host) 

That is that is such that's so rich. Chris, thank you, because I do believe that community foundations are poised to take on that bridging. So I'm going to change the subject a little bit earlier and kind of tap into some of your educational training you talked a little bit about earlier. You talked that you are trained in cross culture theology, so give me two skills that you have learned in your training, that you've been able to leverage in your own work.

 

Chris 

I'll give you one that has been the most profound, and it's probably it sounds off the wall and everything. But it was a course, a one on one course I did on witchcraft and sorcery, African witchcraft and sorcery. And it was with a gentleman who lived 15 years in a tribe in Africa. And so the thing with witchcraft and sorcery, which exists in sort of closed communities, that if you try to analyze it from the outside, it makes no sense at all. It's illogical. But if you approach it from living within that community, it is your worldview, it makes perfect sense. And what people normally do when colonizers come in or have come in and and they impose their religion or whatever, it entrenches that witchcraft and sorcery. It digs it and makes it more entrenched, and people will hide it, but they're not going to share it. The way to approach those communities is to provide alternatives that make more sense to them over time, but if you go in forcefully, it's going to entrench their beliefs. But there's give and take on both sides on that. So translate that to this culture. When I'm talking to someone who, to me, is illogical and makes no sense, and what I what I'm saying to myself, is whatever they're saying makes perfect sense to them. And if I can enter in and try to understand their worldview, it doesn't mean that I agree with it or accept it. And if I'm secure enough in my own beliefs, if I can try to get to their worldview, I can say, You know what? I understand why they think that way, but then I can offer a counter, you know, this is what I believe, and have a conversation. And that's a lot of what I find myself doing is I don't react, I don't tell them the person's wrong, but I've actually learned from people too, if I can understand where they're coming from, it's a give and take, but I think profound, listening in trying to understand normally, we say, oh, that person's crazy. I mean, how could they think that way? But they're not. There's, there's a worldview that they're operating out of. And I think if we did more of this, we can engage in dialog that that changes people's perspectives, but we've got to be willing to have our perspective changed also in the process.

 

Robin (Host) 

Thank you, Chris, you are so wise. I cannot thank you enough for joining me today. I have learned so much, and I am telling you from this days, from today's conversation, you have absolutely shifted my perspective on so many different things, the stories you've shared not only about supporting the work of philanthropy, but you've also provided invaluable insight for CEOs, community leaders, boards and dedicated staff working every single day to improve the lives of the people they serve. So thank you again for joining me today. I feel we are leaving this conversation more inspired to continue the work that we do so that everyone can live into their full potential. Thank you again.

 

Chris 

Well, I appreciate, appreciate the opportunity, and I want to just end by saying that I by no means have the answers. I mean, we're learning every day, and if we were to have this conversation 10 years from now, I'm sure it would be a completely different conversation. So I appreciate the opportunity to just share a little bit of the little insights that we've gained throughout the years.

 

Robin (Host) 

Now. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for your willingness to be both a part of the field building process, but also bringing your expertise and leadership to bear. We appreciate you.

 

Chris 

Thanks.

 

Nancy (Host) 

"Can we talk about...?" is a podcast by Philanthropy Northwest, written and produced by Aya Tsuruta and Emily Daman, with audio engineering support from Jesse McCune at Podfly and graphic design by Asha Hossain, we'll be releasing season two episodes throughout the fall, so make sure you're following us on your favorite podcasting platform to stay up to date. A huge thank you to Katie Hong, Robin Martin and Abby Sarmac for hosting this season, and to the Ford Foundation for making this project possible. I'm Nancy Sanabria, and we'll see you next time you.