The Future of Work with Russ Finkelstein

This episode is sponsored by my wonderful friends at Qgiv! I'll be holding a free webinar with them on July 21 - to go https://www.bit.ly/qgivandjulia and register for free! See you there!

"Your career has real value and potential, even if you didn’t start out with a fixed idea of what you wanted to end up doing, then pursue it in a series of obvious, tried and tested steps." 

For the past twenty years, Russ Finkelstein has worked to change how individuals view their current and future work and how institutions support their staff, members, fellows and alums in developing their leadership and making decisions. 

As a founding team member at organizations like Idealist.org, ClearlyNext, Fund the People, and Title8, Russ has helped visionary leaders realize sustainable programs, have greater impact and live better lives outside of work. 

Russ was chosen by LinkedIn as one of 6 LGBTQ+ creators feature during Pride Month.

Here are some of the topics we discussed:

• His stated purpose in helping outliers find their way in work in life;
• How he envisions the future of work;
• The so-called "great resignation"
• Imposter syndrome and how to be vulnerable and show up in an authentic way personally and professionally 

Connect with Russ:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/russfinkelstein/
https://russfinkelstein.com/
Washington Post Column
LinkedIn: Support LGBTQ+ Professionals Beyond June

About Julia Campbell, the host of the Nonprofit Nation podcast:

Named as a top thought leader by Forbes and BizTech Magazine, Julia Campbell (she/hers) is an author, coach, and speaker on a mission to make the digital world a better place.

She wrote her book, Storytelling in the Digital Age: A Guide for Nonprofits, as a roadmap for social change agents who want to build movements using engaging digital storytelling techniques. Her second book, How to Build and Mobilize a Social Media Community for Your Nonprofit, was published in 2020 as a call-to-arms for mission-driven organizations to use the power of social media to build movements. Julia’s online courses, webinars, and talks have helped hundreds of nonprofits make the shift to digital thinking and raise more money online.

Connect with Julia on other platforms:
Instagram: www.instagram.com/juliacampbell77
Twitter: www.twitter.com/juliacsocial
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/juliacampbell
Blog: www.jcsocialmarketing.com/blog

Take Julia’s free nonprofit masterclass, ​3 Must-Have Elements of Social Media Content that Converts

Take my free masterclass: 3 Must-Have Elements of Social Media Content that Converts

Transcript

Julia Campbell: 0:00

Hi there, I want to invite you to a super special free live training that I am giving with my friends at Q give on Thursday, July 21. All about creating a future proof nonprofit social media strategy. You can register right now for free at www dot bit bi T dot L y forward slash que give and Giulia once again www.bit.li. Forward slash que give Qg I V. And Julia, you don't want to miss this free webinar. You can also go to the show notes of this episode and click the link to register, you're going to learn all about how to navigate upcoming digital changes, the four pillars of social media management, actionable ways to engage your community, and more. See you on July 21. Hello, and welcome to nonprofit Nation. I'm your host, Julia Campbell. And I'm going to sit down with nonprofit industry experts, fundraisers, marketers, and everyone in between to get real and discuss what it takes to build that movement that you've been dreaming of. I created the nonprofit nation podcast to share practical wisdom and strategies to help you confidently Find Your Voice. Definitively grow your audience and effectively build your movement. If you're a nonprofit newbie, or an experienced professional, who's looking to get more visibility, reach more people and create even more impact, then you're in the right place. Let's get started. Hi, everyone, welcome back to nonprofit nation, incredibly excited to be in your earbuds to have you listen to me today, my conversation with Ross Finkelstein, or Finkelstein are still trying to figure it out. And he'll tell you that whole story how his parents let him choose the pronunciation, which I think is actually really interesting. And I do want to hear that story. So for the past 20 years, Russ has worked to change how individuals view their current and future work, and how institutions support their staff, members, fellows and alums, in developing their leadership and making decisions as a founding team member at organizations like idealist.org. Clearly next fund the people and title eight, Ross has helped visionary leaders realize sustainable programs have greater impact and live better lives outside of work. And he recently shared with me that he was chosen by LinkedIn as one of the six creators that they are going to feature during pride month. So I'm really excited for us to have you here today. We found each other on LinkedIn or rather, I might have found you and stalked you a little bit. So thanks for being on the podcast.

Russ Filkenstein: 3:14

It's my pleasure. I'm happy to be useful whenever possible.

Julia Campbell: 3:18

Yes. So let's start off with the story of how your parents allowed you to choose your pronunciation and your teacher was annoyed. I like that story.

Russ Filkenstein: 3:26

Oh, well, I was mostly I was I was at a public school in New Jersey. And the teacher had a very specific question, because she was stumbling around my last name. And I shared with her that my parents told me I could go in either direction. And she just got very frustrated by that she in fact, she I think she sent me to the principal had failed to give her a good answer my parents, I would say that they're they're not like massively liberal or progressive and sort of traditional parenting. But that seemed to be one of those things. They're just like, yeah, go either way with that one.

Julia Campbell: 4:02

Oh, my gosh, that's awesome. So that actually probably set the stage for you as a little bit of a disrupter. So tell me about how you got into your work with nonprofits. And, you know, some of the work that you're doing now,

Russ Filkenstein: 4:16

it's funny that I don't know, at that point, that I would think about myself as the disrupter. I think I would say that my head tends to go to the logical in my head is this weird thing. It's a combination of super empathetic and hyper logical. And though that's a weird combination. I think for me, it was really more about, you know, there are things that are important than that are logically important that are things that aren't. So how I got into this work. I was destined to be a lawyer from a relatively early age, given the my tendency to speak a lot, which we'll all be hearing much more of over the course of this podcast. My parents were just said Well, he's gonna she's gonna be a lawyer in the future. And that was the plan. And then when I was in college, my junior year, I had a conversation my family were in the process of losing the house I grew up in, was being taken basically by the bank. And we just had a situation where it looked like I was gonna have to drop out of school. And I didn't quite know what to do. So there was a program through my college, which helped me find out about a program called the Higher Achievement Program, which still exists in Washington, DC, and there's actually some some national chapters across the country now. It was a program that ensured that you stayed in school that you would come back to college, so it looked like I have taped my leave in my junior year hopefully come back in my senior year, they weren't sure what financials workout, they didn't think they had money to help scholarships for me to remain. So I found out about this program, I completely tanked. My junior year my GPA was miserable. I actually still took the LSAT just because I always loved standardized test logic loved

Julia Campbell: 6:09

standardized tests, okay, I love

Russ Filkenstein: 6:11

I like I love the logic portion of like, an essay, to me is amazing. It's super pleasing to be to do those those sorts of things. But my GPA, you know, kind of some below the 2.0 range. So law school was was likely not going to happen, I decided to continue on, I was ultimately able to go back to college and graduate with my with the class that I had been a part of, and I ended up just doing this thing called the Higher Achievement Program, running a literally running a learning center, and then become the Associate Director for a bunch of learning centers that existed during the school year. And then a summer school program for fifth through eighth graders in Washington, DC. And I loved it. Like I realized that was the first taste I had of how much I enjoyed potential, like how much I love the possibility of people to figure out what was out there in the world. So like working with young people, like I did all of these programs from starting up, you know, different relationships with offer companies or with public speaking opportunities, or with improv comedy, doing a first private school fair, for all the students who work with like, I just for me, there's nothing more delightful than showing people all the things that they might be or do. And so I just fell in love with that, in many regards that work. So I did that for three years, went to grad school. And while I was in grad school, I was asked to read this lengthy document that AMI AMI Dar, who's still the founder and CEO of idealist.org, which went by a different name back then I read this document and I had lots of feedback. I always, whenever I'm asked to do a task, I take it far too seriously. I read everything and write comments on everything I'm ever asked to read. And yeah, I read this thing. And the part of me that had run an after school program was always frustrated by the fact that someone's educational experience was often depend upon whether they had a good guidance counselor. So access to information, access to possibility, and how we created mechanisms for people to better find out and make choices. So if you want to find a Summer Arts program, where the instruction was in Spanish, how would you know about that? So that for me was the beginning point was that.

Julia Campbell: 8:57

So with idealist.org? How did that come about? And I also want to say thank you, because I have found many and internship, and actually many job on idealist. And I'm sure many of my listeners have used it and Ben on it. So tell me about what was the impetus for that, because I know that you currently you say you want to help people make a fulfilling life for themselves. And I know that idealist is a huge part of that.

Russ Filkenstein: 9:30

Yeah, so it was interesting at the time, we had this concept and it was under the name of something called Contact Center Network. And there was there is a group called contact centers. And so there was initially some early stage tension and it was about creating physical spaces for people in their communities to connect with one another. And you know, this was at the time of the internet was sort of bubbling up. And when we just started working together those early days around, like, how do you create an initial before there was there was ease of search engines or search on websites, I would just basically go looking on the web to find every nonprofit website I could find. And the initial version of idealists was a directory that was looked at that divided up into a taxonomy of geographic locations, and areas of interest before you can even search. So we had to create that architecture initially. And our goal was just to serve as a conduit, you know, we weren't able to get a lot of funding initially. So in many respects, that job posting piece of which we're best known now, was the result of the fact that funders when we initially went, and we're just like, hey, we're trying to do this thing, using the Internet there. And basically, their response was like, well, we don't know how big this internet thing is going to be. It doesn't really make sense to us that you would do something that was across geography or issue area, like I remember, at the time, there have been a massive donation that was given just to youth serving organizations in Georgia to develop a website just for that. And so we were just at this sort of cutting edge of that it took a long time for other folks to catch up. And for me, I just loved, I just kept running ahead and with the stuff associated with careers, whether it was nonprofit career fairs, guide books, graduate school fairs, it was just, that was a space, the idea of trying to be a conduit between people who are seeking opportunities and organizations that would be better off if they had access to those people. And just kept thinking about how we could do more and better of that that was sensitive to the needs and challenges that people faced.

Julia Campbell: 11:55

I really love that. Well, thank you. Thank you for that. Also, I know that when I contacted you to be on the podcast, I had said we would talk about the great resignation. And I've been reading a lot of your articles, you have a fantastic publication on LinkedIn. And I also love your title, helping outliers find their way in work in life, but you call yourself a word nerd. And I think I want to read you something you said about the great resignation, and then talk about it because I do believe the nonprofit sector is experiencing this both of these things as well. So you said when you saw the recent headline, this was in 2021, about the great resignation, I asked myself, has a massive group of people decided they must resign from their job immediately, or has a massive group of people resigned themselves to settling for a life where work is unfulfilling. So tell me more about that. You know,

Russ Filkenstein: 12:57

it's great when you I forget some of the stuff that I read was like that was actually fairly well written.

Julia Campbell: 13:01

It was great. And you also have a Thelma and Louise reference in this article that I appreciate.

Russ Filkenstein: 13:05

I dork out over word for double word meanings far too much. There's a whole piece about like queer and queer. There's, like multiple meanings of words like the light V. In this case, the truth is, I think a lot of people are deeply unhappy with their work situations. And so I think that's been the case for a long time. But it was almost as if there was collective permission of just like, you know, what, work is awful. And we're now we're all going to go and step away, or many of us are gonna go and step away. I think for a while, there has been a sense that folks can maybe cobble together a bunch of side hustles, there's never been a better time for people to start off their own thing. And I think it's just it's one of those things where I think more people are just like, I'd rather figure it out, then go through the grind. I think the notion of of a grind, and how one is grinded down over time, or ground down over time, is, is problematic. And people don't know what they have left. And I think very often, you know, to think of the nonprofit sector and so this so, so fascinating to me about how so nonprofit and progressive don't necessarily mean the same thing. But let's for the sake of this off, and let's just just let me play around for a moment with that, that very often you have organizations that espouse a progressive worldview, but don't actually espouse policies that are reflective for their people of that progressive worldview. And so there's this weird thing I find around. So I go back and forth best whether in fact, it's hazing. But I think there's a notion that I paid my dues in the following way and it sucked. And so I expect other people it's a little bit like how people some people get annoyed with the notion of like loan fraud eveness for college or grad school, I've paid back a ton of money. And, you know, I probably would have been happier if I had that back. But it doesn't mean that I want other people to suffer through that, you know, in the same way that you know, I recall, you know, meeting gay people when I was in my 20s. And there was just Oh, things are so much better for you. It's so great. And I don't go and say like, oh, well, now, you know, things are, things are better still, depending upon where you are for other game, depending on where you are. Exactly, exactly. So. But it's not that I wish the folks who have it better still, at this point that they're jumping off, had it worse. It's an interesting part of the sort of human condition. And maybe it's just the way in which we excused or allow ourselves to get away with behavior that we know isn't amazing.

Julia Campbell: 15:53

It's really like seeing kids today, which actually, I do say it pretty frequently. I'm not a boomer. But that's very interesting how you made that correlation with the nonprofit sector. Because I see that all the time. You know, well, now fundraising, you have Facebook, and you have email, and you have zoom, and you have all of these technologies that we don't have, and I had to drive five hours to meet a donor, or I couldn't get my message across as quickly. I couldn't look for board members as efficiently or, you know, as simply and easily as I can now maybe. So it really is a mindset shift around, what are the opportunities that are being offered, and how can we leverage them. But I think that segues into a question that I want to ask, especially around impostor syndrome. I think that younger people, I've been seeing this, especially with younger, the younger generation, experiencing this impostor syndrome, and I'm not sure if it's, it's being kind of imposed on them by by the older generation, or if it's self imposed. But you and I talked about this a little bit before we we hit record, can you talk about how you deal with impostor syndrome, especially in your professional life, and some tips that you can give to other people dealing with it?

Russ Filkenstein: 17:20

Sure. So it's when were you you raised the LinkedIn playing as you I was sharing and sharing before I started recording, that this unusual thing happened. So when I share it with some friends, they're just like, Oh, my God, that's so amazing. I'm just like, well, you know, it could be really good. But here's a bunch of other things that worried me a little bit. And in truth, you know, one of the things that I'm that I'm working on actually are one of the things I've been catch, I write down ideas for things that I'm going to write about. And so one of the things that I've been thinking about is the question, Why me both as sort of this, you know, the sad like, why the why has this bad thing happened to me? And also, why me why haven't been selected for this honor, because my initial response was like, Well, why? Like, why am I the person to represent this thing for a bunch of reasons? And I think, on some level, you know, I think impostor syndrome is not simply an issue. For folks who are younger, I think, almost everybody has it. And I think that the people who don't are typically like sociopaths, so it's one of those things where like, I think it is so pervasive, I think the challenge is, how much you let it limit what's possible. So I remember, years ago, I did this tour of philanthropy in the state of California. So I just met with program officers in San Diego, LA and San Francisco over over the course of 10 days. And I spoke with one program officer, who had a PhD and spoke eight languages. And they were just like, I don't know why I'm in this role, or had this title. I don't feel like I'm necessarily accomplished enough. I was like, if you're feeling that, like, I feel really bad for the rest of us. I think it is just, maybe it's the part that keeps us human. Right, the fact that we have experienced that self doubt, the fact that we're aware of that I just, I just really do think it's just an issue of, okay, I hear you, I see you. And now what am I going to do? And so, you know, when folks approached me, it shows up in a variety of ways, right for different people. So sometimes, it's a question of people just not knowing what they're good at what other people perceive them as being good at. And so a lot of the time, it's just your ability to, to shift out of that mode. I remember, there's a weird anecdote. I remember when I was actually on that particular tour that I was just mentioning, I was meeting with like 10 to 12 different, largely program officers a day to talk about, talk with them about their careers and their goals and such. And on the sixth day of meetings, the first conversation I had, it was in the third city, I had a really bad conversation. It was a coaching session. And every time I attempted to kind of reframe, or ask a question, I just kept hearing, I've done that already. I've done that, right. I just felt like, we're not hearing one another. And at the end of that session, I called up a good friend, colleague of mine, cuz I started to per separate a bit, I started thinking, Oh, my God, what if today, the rest of the day is going to be like, this is going to be all bad sessions. And I was like, what, what if the next couple of days were spiraling? Oh, yeah, totally. And then I was like, and what if it's like one of those things like, you know, a professional athlete, where they were good at something, then suddenly, it's gone. So I called up this friend of mine. And I was just like, you know, I'm having this experience right now. And he said, Sir, talk it through for a minute. And they're like, how many this conversations have you had? And I was like, Well, I've probably had over the course of this particular piece of work about 200 conversations. And there were like, This is the first bad one you've had as like, yeah, there's like, well, it's about time. And that has always stayed with me, I think sometimes we hyper focus on something. And so knowing what we do well, owning what we do well, and also finding ways that when our mind is kind of cycling through that, having people that we trust that have standing in our lives that we can go out to in those moments. So one, when that spiral happens, who are the people I can go to that I trust to give me like the straight advice. That's one thing that I do that I think helps. I've done things before where I've reached out to people and have others that have had others do this, where I reach out to folks and ask them, like, reach out to 10 or 12 people and say, Hey, what do I do? Well, like, what do you think, because people remember about me. And so there's a doc, I keep on my laptop, that's just like, if I'm having a day, I might go and look at that, Doc, that's just a reminder from, you know, people that I trust and who are direct and honest and have no problem as well being critical. So that's the thing that I do. I've also become really good at having developing mental like visual things in my head. So that helped break up things like whether it's imposter syndrome that's happening, or other behaviors that are difficult. So, for example, I tend to be a perfect information person, I tend to want to gather all the information to synthesize and make a decision that will de risk the decision. And of course, perfect information is impossible. And so I've developed this visual thing that I go to, that's a shortcut for like, Oh, you're doing that thing where you're where you're going on too long trying to make a decision. And so the visual thing is actually from my days in Washington, DC, and it's watching a group of girls play or do double dutch. Are you familiar with double dutch jump rope? Yeah. So you've got both the ropes going, you've got the Turner's on both sides, you've got the person who's going to jump in. And I always think of a particular girl whose head is bobbing, which is going to jump, she's going to jump, she's going to jump. And the Turner's getting annoyed at how long she's taken to jump. And so like that, for me is like the thing, right, you're waiting for the perfect elevation of the rope on the top, and down at the bottom, that gives you the spirit and so that for me is has become a thing, a visual thing that pops off my head when I'm like, I'm moving in that direction. So those are some things that that are helpful for me, you know, some of it relate to impostor syndrome, but just overall to the behaviors that we know are part of who we are. And that can limit our ability to go out there. And I think a lot of it is just having people you trust, being aware of what the areas are, that are your tricky areas that you may just need to be aware of and try to figure out your way to lessen their impact in your life.

Julia Campbell: 24:29

And the coaching that you do. Do you help people create a balance between authenticity and professionalism? Because I know when we were talking before and you said you got my podcast prep document and it says I just want this to be a conversation like we're having coffee, and you said I live my life that way and I said I live my life that way. That's how I live my life. But a lot of people a lot of my listeners are very hesitant to either be vulnerable or or show up in an authentic way? Because they're worried it's not professional. Do you have advice on that?

Russ Filkenstein: 25:06

Well, I think, you know, many of us have the need to code switch, right have the need to show up in a variety of ways. So it's hard like I've constructed a life, where I will say that my 100% Authenticity thing is in part based on I some respects, I feel like I don't have the mammalian ability to adapt to situations that it's pretty much 100% of the all the time, which is good. And it's also bad, right? It's good in the sense that you know, that there are people that you have an ability to make very real connections with people, you don't have to put on an act, per se. And some people will find that incredibly refreshing that they know that you're dependable. And there are others who will not like that, who will find that impossible, who will find that like no, this is my expectation around professionalism. And it's actually it's funny, one of the pieces that I've been working on, for this pride piece has to do with professionalism. And I've just been thinking about that there's a distinction between personal preference, and professionalism. And very often the person who's who's dictated you the terms of professionalism is really dictating the terms of their personal preference. And so I think that's the messy piece, right? That's what they think that's their thing. And so in your choices, always, so given the constraints of that, is this, are there better environments for me? Right? Are there better places? Or are there other venues where like I can, I recognize the limitations of this. And I could put up with this, because this thing that I'm doing is useful to get me to this next place that I want in life. So my partner is, is a muralist. And so he has work, art will always be the thing that she loves, that he's most passionate about, and any other work that he does, that can help pay the bills, by and large, will be okay. And the goal is for not to do too much harm. Hopefully, there's something useful and pleasurable from it. But the role it plays is different. And so some of it just depends on being really clear about what your goals are from work. And so I'm you know, I'm also like nerdy on like, ranked, and weighted decisions around the people being super clear about their criteria. And what's most important, and so you could say, the most important thing for me is a place where I could be authentic and authentic means the following things. And that could be your most important thing. And there may be other criteria that goes along. It just It depends on what the Venn diagram intersections, you know, I've gotten like hyper nerdy, but for me, it really is about the like Venn diagram intersection of things that matter most to you. And what that what's possible is result of that.

Julia Campbell: 28:17

I read a lot of business books, and productivity books and books about entrepreneurship. And the book I'm reading right now, I'm almost done with it. And it's been my absolute favorite book is called free time. And it's by a woman named Jenny Blake, and she has a podcast as well. But it's about defining your business in terms of what you want to get out of it. And for her, it's free time. I've never read a business book that wasn't like hustle, hustle, hustle, make as much money as you can. Here's a funnel, here's this, hire a team make a million dollars. And those never really resonated with me because I thought, Well, okay, but I kind of just want to have a lot of free time and make enough money to take vacations. Like I don't want to work 90 hour weeks.

Russ Filkenstein: 29:05

I think that so yeah, I've always the experience that I've had with my partner has been a big eye opener for me, because of the way work plays into my life, like work is a primary passion of mine. But in my relation with him, I've become someone who actually really dislikes this notion of like, do the work you love. It's like, well, you could do that. But you have a lot of choices you can make. And so what I think is like if your goal and there are people I talked to who are just like, Listen, my goal is to maximize the amount of money I'm making, for the minimum number of hours that give me access to my hobbies or my family or whatever. And that's okay, like I think my thing is, it's less about a judgement of what work should be and more about ensuring that people are doing the things that are aligned with what their goals are. And you just have to Have you thoughtful and articulate what those goals are so you can work towards them

Julia Campbell: 30:05

is that the kind of coaching that you do with the Roddenberry fellowship, and you say you connect people to coaches.

Russ Filkenstein: 30:12

So with Roddenberry, it's with a lot of founders. So I have some matters, that program and there are a team of coaches that are that are part of that that are that specialize in a set of different areas. So the coaching I do with I do some one on one coaching with frog very fellows, and I helped him manage that the entire program. So there have been this is the fifth cohort of fellows that are all founders of social change organizations. And then I do work with some founders who are not part of Roddenberry who are working in a variety of areas, working with people is super personal for me. And so I have to basically love the person I'm working with. And so there's, there's several founders that I work with on a broad set of areas that I work with, to help scale the organization have better lives and balance and those kinds of things. So is a set of group of folks like that. And then as part of my little beard pro bono DME work, you know, I've worked in a couple of areas, I've gotten very involved in foster care, in particular, because I think that's one of the less less resourced areas. And, you know, I find like, again, you know, I'm a sucker for potential. So I work with some folks who work in that space. But I also every week, I chat with people who are seeking a coach who are in transition, and I'll have, you know, anywhere from one to three conversations with them over time, mostly to help them find a coach, if it makes sense, right? It may not, but many people, they need to have someone who serves an advisor. And the challenge is people don't put in the work to know what they want. Because I think different dealers, like they'll reach out to me because someone's like, oh, this rough guy is nice. And he's can be helpful. And it really helped me, I'm not the right person, for everybody, even for most people. And so, you know, I want to get into like, Okay, tell me a little bit more about sides of developing an intake to get a better sense of like, so what's the work experience that person needs to have? What's the lived experience? What's the communication style, the training, and so when you're, you know, it's easy for me to do that, because I'm not going to work with these people long term. And they can be really honest, and they can, and we can help to explore what's going to be a fit for them. So that's the thing that I do, because I've been in places in my life where I was last adopt certain what to do. And, you know, one of my goals is to try to show up as much as I can in the world, and be one of those people who's, you know, the helper, who can help us whatever standing I have to be useful to others. And sometimes, there's a moment in time when we're thinking about making a pivot. And it's, it's often a long time coming. And so when you do it's, it's an expenditure of energy, money and energy. And so like there's a stain, what are others, this analogy that I that I've always loved, which is essentially, people will say, when you ask them about the work that they do, the number one thing that they will say is I fell into X,

Julia Campbell: 33:24

yes. Especially in the nonprofit sector.

Russ Filkenstein: 33:27

Yeah, are they oftentimes are also like passionate about a thing for a reason.

Julia Campbell: 33:32

They were volunteer, and now they're the executive director somehow, right.

Russ Filkenstein: 33:35

And so I always think of that like falling into, for some reason that's always evocative to me of a river or a stream, and someone has fallen in, and it's rapidly moving along. And at some point, they take a look back, and they realize they're far away from where they started. And they don't know if they have the energy to get out. And even if they did, they have no idea what to do next. And so it feels like there's a bunch of choices here that feel hard. And so, in that moment, when people are just like, I'm ready to exert the energy, I'm ready to use the money. I want to make sure that they have the best chance of being successful. So my goal is to try to play this like small role of being a conduit to people being more successful.

Julia Campbell: 34:26

Wow, I love that analogy. I think that's going to resonate with a lot of the listeners certainly resonates with me. But I liked the river I'm in now, so I didn't always like it. But I liked the river. So where can people find out more about you and read about you? I know LinkedIn.

Russ Filkenstein: 34:46

Yeah, so there. I mean, they can look me up on LinkedIn. They're also you know, I write a weekly piece for The Washington Post on careers and leadership, whatever I write in the post as well, so you can sign up for that. A newsletter on the post. But also, always post, you know, the once a week thing in LinkedIn will also include whatever that week's Post article is.

Julia Campbell: 35:09

Yes, I'll include all of this in the show notes. And congratulations again on being featured for Pride Month. I think that's fantastic. Celebrate it, promote it, you deserve it. And I'm so happy to have you on the podcast.

Russ Filkenstein: 35:24

also glad to be here. And if I can be helpful or useful to you or your listeners always happy to say

Julia Campbell: 35:37

Well, hey there, I wanted to say thank you for tuning into my show, and for listening all the way to the end. If you really enjoyed today's conversation, make sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast app, and you'll get new episodes downloaded as soon as they come out. I would love if you left me a rating or review because this tells other people that my podcast is worth listening to. And then me and my guests can reach even more earbuds and create even more impact. So that's pretty much it. I'll be back soon with a brand new episode. But until then, you can find me on Instagram at Julia Campbell seven, seven. Keep changing the world your nonprofit unicorn