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The mission of Prevent Blindness Texas is to prevent blindness and preserve sight. We are leaders and change agents in the eye health space here to empower you!
Hey, it's your eye health experts, Prevent Blindness Texas, and welcome to Eyespiring, a conversation about all things vision and life.
Heather Patrick:Hi, morning. Welcome to Eyespiring. I'm your podcast host, Heather Patrick, the CEO of Prevent Blindness Texas. Most of you probably know by now, but in case you're new and first time listening, we are a social impact or public health agency really focused on connecting people to information, resources, and vision care across the state of Texas. So I am, and I know I say this for every podcast, but this morning's guest is someone who's been a part of my life for a long time and I will say probably one of the most influential people that shaped my career.
Heather Patrick:I am really excited to really share Liz with the world in case they don't know her, but her wisdom and her perspective are just incredible. So I'm really excited to have this conversation. So Liz Thompson, I first met Liz when I worked for Susan G. Komen. And Liz has a really interesting background, publishing and then into the nonprofit healthcare space and spent a large part of her career there, but incredibly influential in the cancer space for a long time.
Heather Patrick:And so I just am excited to pick her brain. So Liz, I'm going to turn it over to you, give everybody a little bit of your background, and then we'll dive in.
Liz Thompson:I like to characterize the career that I've had in two separate segments that are separate but related. So in the first part of my life, I was in health and medical publishing. And I learned from the best doctors, only in our country, but around the world, who were teaching other physicians, nurses, anybody in the healthcare space. And I learned how to develop one business plans because publishing, while we like to think that it's purely educational, is a business model and you have goals and EBITDA to make, but it's also a way of storytelling. So I learned early on from those really phenomenal teachers who were teaching hard, difficult subjects, sometimes to people for whom English was not their first language.
Liz Thompson:The importance of storytelling to listen and learn and take that forward. So that those were early seeds. And then when I switched over to my nonprofit career after a wonderful run-in medical publishing, I learned some of those things were still the same. It's been an incredible career. I've gotten to work with almost all of the living presidents.
Liz Thompson:I've worked with women who are at the vanguard of legacy setting in the cancer space, in innovation and impact. And then what I really think is incredible privilege is I've had the incredible privilege to work with people like you, Heather, as you've grown and developed your career and saw that those early signs of leadership, interest, drive, and then have really seen it flourish and grow sometimes together, sometimes separately. And I get to applaud it from the sidelines. And I'll come back to that in a few minutes. But it's, I always say that the life that I've had has been filled with incredible blessings.
Liz Thompson:Some of it serendipity, but most of it is hard work, dedication, and a lot of stuff that isn't covered in this beautiful framework of a podcast.
Heather Patrick:The one thing I will say always is for me when I think about people who really just define leadership for me, You are kind of that standard. And I really think back to my time when I started, when I transitioned from local affiliate to the national team, That would have never happened without you. And that was a major turning point in my career. But you just really have this way of seeing people and seeing their pathway. And I just, you just have this remarkable sense of investing in people, really truly investing in people.
Heather Patrick:So let's talk about that a little bit.
Liz Thompson:Yeah. After I'm to interrupt you and go back to that, because I think it's really important to set the stage maybe for people who are listening.
Liz Thompson:And since you sort of brought that up, the identification of talent and building teams, we first met everyone when Heather was serving at one of our largest business units at Susan G. Komen for the Cure. She wasn't the CEO, but she was a member of the senior leadership team. At headquarters, we were really struggling to help develop systems and process.
Liz Thompson:So 122 business units could function better. As typical, when you're at a headquarters, you have, you're looking over the fence into the yard and you have very specific ideas of how you think change could come about.
Liz Thompson:As members of my senior team were wandering in and out of my office, and at that point I was not yet the president, I was the chief mission officer. I kept hearing a wide variety of philosophies. And the question I kept saying is, what do the affiliates want? What do they think they can do? And on what timeline?
Liz Thompson:And what programs, software, technology exist to help us do that. Who should we be talking to? And the very first thing that became common was there's a firebrand in Houston and we really need to have a conversation with her. And so right away, I was like, Oh, I love a firebrand. That's awesome.
Liz Thompson:Because this is a project that's gonna mean that we're gonna have to mix things up. It's gonna be somebody who is high relationship oriented, but also has the affinity for technology, data analysis, and then can wrap that all back into a change process. And that ladies and gentlemen, is not something that you find in young leaders or old leaders or any leaders at any time. Those are often qualities that you would have to pick three or four people, a whole consulting team to put together in order to get that. After my first fifteen minutes with Heather, I said, Wow, this is the person.
Liz Thompson:I love the description of Firebrand, but she's so much more than that. She has all of these key pieces. And what she doesn't have yet, because that was many years ago, I have every confidence she has the curiosity and the drive to ask the questions and figure out how to put it together. I also wanna tell another part of this leadership story because it's very important. As women, one of the things that we constantly strive for is balance.
Liz Thompson:We constantly say, I want more balance, I need balance. There is no such thing. And when I looked at this young leader, who again, lived in Houston and our headquarters were in Dallas, and well, that's just a short hip hop flight South on Southwest from one city to another. It's leagues different in terms of culture. And more important, this young leader was a young wife.
Liz Thompson:She was a young mother with two children under five at the time. And one thing that I learned, so I have always been a working mother, is not to make choices for women when they come forward and accept a leadership challenge, accept something. I expect that in the background, they're able to work with their spouse and their support community to accept challenges. And in this case, it meant travel away from those two little ones with a spouse that also traveled. But it wasn't my job to fix that for Heather, it was my job to make it easy if her kids got sick or they had duo things to change meeting dates.
Liz Thompson:But it wasn't my job to decide for her. Could she take this? Could she accept this responsibility with those challenges? She knew herself, she knew what she could and couldn't accept. And I think, obviously my background as a single working mom influences me when I look at women, the things that they're willing to step up and take.
Liz Thompson:But the other thing that I constantly say is we don't have balance. And one of the things that I saw in Heather that I've always admired and I admire today is that she knows the value of a good three day weekend or good four day weekend to zip down to the coast and get her toes in the sand and get some sunshine and refuel, and then come back on Sunday night, prepare, go for the gusto on Monday morning.
Liz Thompson:And those qualities, so that was our first time working together, but that high emotional intelligence coupled with the ability to do systems and process, that circle is why I've tapped Heather to join me two other times in change, high change environments to create change. That's not just change, but change that would create true innovation and impact. And it's been a privilege to see her grow through each one of those.
Liz Thompson:And now of course, in this role, which is just an amazing match for her vision, for her abilities. And I can't wait to see what's next for you, Heather.
Heather Patrick:Thank you, Liz. Thank you. It was and I agree with you. I think this idea of balance, it's trade offs and it's also what I've shared with my children. Are trade offs I think when you understand that there are trade offs, then you learn how to evaluate differently.
Heather Patrick:For me, to work at really a global organization, at that time, I was in my early 30s, to have that kind of experience, that kind of exposure was just invaluable. I mean, it just really set the course for the rest of my career. But again, you did something revolutionary because we could work remote and that wasn't an option until you came into leadership.
Heather Patrick:That really, And interestingly enough, years later, because I had had that experience and knew how to build teams remotely, knew what it took to manage teams remotely. When COVID happened, my team was already in a place where it didn't stop us because that leadership, that experience, those skills were already at play in my current organization.
Heather Patrick:And so there are just so many things that go back to you, but really it's your philosophy of giving that flexibility, understanding that recruiting the best talent no matter where they are, I think just really demonstrated for me. Because at the time it was a risk from a leadership perspective, but one that you were willing to make. And again, going back to investing in leadership and growth and women. That forever changed my career and my life really. Thank you.
Heather Patrick:Thank you. So I guess part of that is then, what do you wish you would have known earlier in your leadership career that you look back and you think, would have, it would have really, I knew then what I know now. What is that for you?
Liz Thompson:That's such an interesting question, because in the background, the things that shape our leadership trajectory are world events, cultural events. I've only ever worked at a national and global stage. I've never worked in community. So my life, the organizations I've worked at, the organizations I've led, have always been influenced by national and global politics in some way, shape or form.
Liz Thompson:And the leadership answers are not easy when you're in that kind of situation. I think the real hard thing to learn as a leader when you're working, especially a young female leader, when you're working at a national and global level, is you want a perfect answer. And there is no such thing. There are good answers. And you have to get comfortable with good.
Liz Thompson:And you have, I've always been comfortable with risk. That, and part of that is because I always felt like if I took risk on a person and they weren't right, I probably could pick up the job myself in addition to the other things, I have high capacity. But the risk of that enters with global markets, global politics, relative to healthcare on the ground, all of those things you can't control.
Liz Thompson:So you have to go into an opportunity with a degree of faith that people are gonna meet you where you are, and that everyone is joining this for the best outcome possible. But those lessons about perfection, especially as an oldest daughter in a large family, those are hard, those are things that are hardwired into you at a very early age.
Liz Thompson:So get comfortable with good, because you can get to great from good, but it requires a good team around you. It requires great systems, but don't get mired in good.
Heather Patrick:Yeah. Yeah.
Liz Thompson:And don't feel like you have to do it yourself because there are always people who want to help and want to support you almost any hour of the day.
Heather Patrick:So you've been doing this a long time and you've been at a high level of leadership for a long time, there are days when it takes its toll. I've been in executive leadership for almost twenty years and some days are harder than others. What keeps you motivated? What keeps you going? What fuels your fire?
Liz Thompson:A couple things. One, by nature, I'm a problem solver. I love complicated problems with lots of different pieces to them. And I love to put the pieces to get back together again in a new way. So I kind of think of it almost like a Van Gogh painting.
Liz Thompson:This is an impressionist painting with everything perfect and little things. Well, that's not how the real world is. The ear might be up here in the real world because we need to hear with our heads and our hearts. So maybe it's repositioning things in ways that traditionally we wouldn't have been taught or inclined to think about them. So that's one thing.
Liz Thompson:And there continue to be big, big, big, big problems that need to be solved. That continues to motivate me. The second thing that continues to motivate me at this point in my life is connecting with leaders where they are at different stages of their lives, especially women. And so as we look at the challenges that leaders have, whether they're looking to do combination work and merger work in their organizations, leading in community, again, that's where the hard messy work gets done. Whether that's at a local level, a state level, or even a national organization that's working at the local level.
Liz Thompson:You get your healthcare, they always say, all politics are local. Well, all healthcare is local. We may make federal policy, but how that gets delivered is in local community. And so that motivates me. How are we translating information so our healthcare teams have the best information?
Liz Thompson:So they have great technology. So they have data systems to track that person through a lifetime. How are we doing that? How are we innovating? And how are we bringing people together to build up organizations in the best way possible?
Liz Thompson:So those things continue to motivate me, continue to wake me up just like today at 02:00 in the morning to write in my black book of ideas. And, you know, connect this person, think about that. But yeah, and I hope I'm back at our ranch in South Dakota this week and I'm with my mom who's 86. I hope I'm still problem solving at 86 like Yeah. She
Heather Patrick:Oh, I have no doubt you will be. So you've had some really unique experiences. You've worked for a president or two. Is that like? Because obviously most people aren't in that space or role, but what has that been like for you?
Heather Patrick:And what has it meant to you?
Liz Thompson:Yeah. Well, it's incredibly humbling for your phone to ring and to have somebody say, Standby, the president will be with you soon. That's incredibly humbling. Again, for folks who don't know me, I grew up in rural South Dakota, 40 miles from the nearest town of any size. Went to a two room country school first through eighth grade.
Liz Thompson:My life has had very humble beginnings. And so to get a call like that is pretty incredible. And then to have that person say, we've been following your career. We've appreciated your leadership. And we'd like you to lead our organization during a time of change.
Liz Thompson:Wow, pretty humbling and incredible. But I think part of the other part of your question is what did I learn from them? Or what did I, what things did I see in them? And when presidents choose nonprofits or found nonprofits, that's obviously part of their legacy. And so they're thinking it's usually personal.
Liz Thompson:So President Bush and Barbara founded C Change because they realized there were huge disconnects between pharmaceutical companies, government advocacy organizations, all and then foundations, all the pieces were in pillars instead of working together. And so their goal really was to think about a way that would maximize the energy of leadership and hence see change. But they also realized maybe the work that they had done with the organization over a number of years had been achieved. And so part of defining the legacy is really knowing, have you achieved the goals that you set out to do? And I think one of the things that's so unique when you work with presidents, their terms are four years or eight years, and that's it.
Liz Thompson:And then they exit stage left or right, whichever way they decide to go. And that's really interesting. So I also want to tell a follow on story, because it shows true what I think of as true leadership. So when I was at Coleman, we stood up a program called Pink Ribbon, Red Ribbon, understanding that in Africa, women were surviving AIDS, but they were dying cancer that could have a really, cervical cancer that had a really simple, cost effective diagnosis and treatment, and could be delivered basically in a modified quantitant. Barack Obama was the president at that time.
Liz Thompson:We went to him, we pitched the idea, and he was the son of Africa. He could have said, I wanna put my face on this initiative. He didn't. He said, I need to get my secretary of state involved, Hillary Clinton, and I'm gonna call George Bush, 43, because he saved the Continent Of Africa by standing up USAID. And I'm gonna put, I think he should be the face of this.
Liz Thompson:And at the time I was just shocked. Obviously, I didn't know how people felt about President Bush, 43 relative to USAID, but I was kind of surprised that a sitting president wouldn't wanna get those accolades and wouldn't wanna get all that lift from this initiative. We raised $85,000,000 in less than six months to stand up that initiative. And one, I think the most memorable day of my entire career, and I still get kind of jumped up just thinking about it, was the day that we opened Pink Ribbon, Red Ribbon in Africa with President Bush. He and my son, who had just graduated from high school, painted three Quonset huts in their blue jeans and their boots and their t shirts because it was blazing hot Africa in the summertime.
Liz Thompson:And women walked as far as 20 miles to have to meet him. They held their babies up for him to not just to hold, but to bless. And they would say, I have a child because you delivered AIDS vaccines to my village, and now I can be tested for cervical cancer, and I hope I can live to see this child grow up. So that was leadership, a leadership legacy. That was a leadership positioning.
Liz Thompson:Hillary Clinton was amazing. She unleashed, she said, I believe in the vision of this. This is radical way to change the way healthcare is delivered. You're talking about something that's so simple, so cost effective. Why weren't we always doing this?
Liz Thompson:And she very quietly, but strongly made a really good investment in that program. And then because the Clintons and the Bushes were really good friends, she also, you know, really uplifted that. But because of the strength of all of those people that were involved, we were able to get that money on the ground so fast.
Liz Thompson:I mean, I've raised almost $2,000,000,000 in my career. I've never raised $85,000,000 in six months for a brand new initiative just like that. So I'll stop talking. But that it's really been a privilege and you can see by the emotional response I had. It'll never leave me.
Heather Patrick:Yeah, yeah. So after all of that, after that kind of experience, who still inspires you?
Liz Thompson:You do. You absolutely do. What inspires me are the people who every single day get up, they're excited, they sit in the chair, they move around the room, they move around the community, they make the work happen. They look at the challenges of the missions that they accept. And that's really how I think of it when you're sitting in that seat.
Liz Thompson:Accept, it's like a scepter, you accept the mission that's in front of you. And you get up every day, easy, hard, fun, change, challenge, and go forward. That's incredibly inspiring to see people accept that, accept that challenge. And most of the time people don't, know, and I would say, well, you know, we just talked about the fact that I've had the privilege of working with some US presidents. Most of my days are not spent talking to presidents.
Liz Thompson:They're spent talking to people who are under insured or not insured, who need health care, who have real needs, real challenges. And today, more of my work is in a consulting fashion. So I'm working with people who are on the front lines of that and trying to figure out how do we do the best with what feels like a diminishing supply. And that's incredibly inspiring.
Liz Thompson:It's tiring, it's challenging, but people get up every day looking for new solutions and new ideas. Leveraging technology is one part of that.
Heather Patrick:Yeah. Throughout your career, you really have taken on kind of the biggest turnarounds, changes, and it goes back to what you said earlier. You are a master at kind of pulling the pieces apart, reconfiguring and building them back. But over the years, what stands out to you? So it's a two part question.
Heather Patrick:What has been one of the biggest challenges you have found when you do that work? And how do you approach it differently now than you did in the beginning?
Liz Thompson:The hardest part is that there are real people involved. And they have different perspectives, and they have ego because this is passion work, right? This isn't like a widget. And there, if you do it, or don't do it well, it has a real impact on the people that for whom you serve. And so that's always the biggest challenge.
Liz Thompson:And asking people to step back, Maybe they did have an incredible gift to offer the organization, but maybe part of what they're offering is part of the problem. And then in order to heal in order to go forward, they need to define their legacy and, and find a new way. And again, that work of working with presidents and understanding the chap, the book is over after four years or eight years. And I have to find a new if I still want to work in this area, I have to find a new way to do that. Well, we don't always do that in the nonprofit world, we founders stay on well beyond their experience.
Liz Thompson:It's sometimes messes in our governance, it often messes in our governance. It means sometimes that we're limited by their vision, because often there's a huge high ego involved. So those things remain challenges. They were there when I founded Transcend for Good in 2013, and they're still there. How would I approach it differently?
Liz Thompson:I think I've always been an emotionally intelligent leader and that has never changed. So I always lead with listening. One of the things that I learned early on is it's not the things that people tell you when you go into these situations, it's how things feel. And then you have to piece the parts together. And often the people who have the most interesting perspective are not the people on the board or the C suite.
Liz Thompson:They're the people for whom the mission was developed, or they're the people in community or your receptionist or your phone bank people or your providers. They're seeing the breakdown of the organization this way. And how systems and process or leadership unraveled so that when it got to them, the organization wasn't impactful. And when you're in the C suite and up in this golden thing, you can keep the PowerPoints going, you can keep the Queen waving, and it all seems wonderful until it's not. And so, when I go in, you know, most of my thing, I spend a lot of hours listening and feeling what is the feeling that I'm getting from people.
Liz Thompson:Because, know, when you come in to do these turnarounds, it's not like people are just waiting for you to arrive and they're gonna vomit all the bad things to you the first day. You have to earn trust, and then you have to act responsibly. The last thing I think in terms of that piece, whether it's a turnaround or in a regular organization, and let's face it, there's not no such thing as a regular organization.
Heather Patrick:Yeah.
Liz Thompson:Is the understanding of higher, slow, fire, fast. There's nothing like
Heather Patrick:such great advice
Liz Thompson:a bad employee to undo the rest of the team. And you can accept that they have awesome qualifications, that they have an amazing background. But if they don't fit your culture, they don't fit your organization, it doesn't matter. And there's, you're not doing your team a service. You're not even doing that person a service by You'll helping find another person to do the work.
Liz Thompson:There are always people who want to join us in this mission and passion work. And they'll probably find another role that's better for them. So I think that combination are things that I've learned.
Heather Patrick:Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yes. So one of the things that I have always admired and that I really think I learned from working with you is you have the unique ability to take the program component and the development component and marry them to tell a strong story.
Heather Patrick:You also are one of the only high level leaders that I have worked with that you knew everything that was going on up here but you still had a really strong grasp of all the different things going on down here too. You are right. Very few people can operate in that way on a regular basis. Have always loved that about you because I just think it is so remarkable to be able to do that.
Heather Patrick:But talk a little bit about how important understanding both sides of the house are in telling that story because I think that's one of the reasons when you look at the money you've been able to raise, I mean, you're fantastic at being able to take the data, the science, the impact, and really tell that story.
Heather Patrick:Where do you think you learned that from?
Liz Thompson:Weekly reader.
Heather Patrick:Really?
Liz Thompson:One of the things that I learned early in my life, we would get weekly reader in the summertime once a week, and I would walk the half mile down our driveway to get mail on Tuesday or Wednesday. I'd walk if it didn't come Tuesday, I'd walk Wednesday too. And then I would lay down in the grass in the ditch with my little blanket, so I wouldn't get bugs on me.
Liz Thompson:And I would read it cover to cover. And I would read the stories of the kids and the people in all over the country, because it was a national publication, who were learning about science projects, who were learning about this, who were learning about that. And they were from inner cities. And, you know, again, I was in this very rural environment. I had spent time in an urban environment in Minneapolis St.
Liz Thompson:Paul, but most of my life at that point had been in this very rural environment. And I realized very quickly, I got excited because of the stories of the other kids and the teachers. And I wanted to be a storyteller. I wanted to be a person like that. And I wanted to always have people like that around me.
Liz Thompson:So, you know, that was second grade.
Heather Patrick:I didn't see again, I've known you this long, and I didn't know that. But I can totally see you with your blanket and your your magazine sitting down and reading cover to cover as a kid.
Liz Thompson:The tall grass around me, and then sometimes, so my dad was a farmer obviously, and he would ride his motorcycle down the half mile. And he would always look to see if I was still lying down in my blanket, because I would lie down, I would just get so interested. He would make sure, as he's rounding the corner, was I still reading and did I need a ride home on the back of the motorcycle? But I think it's that passion for your mission. You can't get people excited about what you do if you're not excited about yourself.
Liz Thompson:So I've only ever picked causes and missions that I was personally interested in. And then I felt I would want to put all the time and energy that I devote into work into that. But it's deeper than that. If our former colleague Molly were here, you know, she would chime in and say things like, I cut programs. They make hard decisions about things that aren't working.
Liz Thompson:And they may be blocked, they may be things that were part of a legacy, but they're no longer serving our constituency in the way in which they need them to. And sometimes it means that you keep the core of what it was supposed to do, but you add technology to it. You add new operators to it, you change it. And then that becomes part of your story too. Why did you have to make that change?
Liz Thompson:And will you come with me on this journey of change? Right? And that's, I think the other part of it is I have never believed that this was my singular journey. This is our journey. When I'm working, I'm every morning before I swing my legs over the side of the bed, I'm imagining three, five, seven people that I met in the prior week that I'm serving, that I'm delivering care for, delivering the mission.
Liz Thompson:And when I'm telling this story to donors, most of them have been touched in a similar different way, and they have different resources and capacity. And I'm talking to them about joining me, joining the organization in investing in something that, you know, could be life changing. Everyone might not have the resources that they do. And I feel a great privilege to be sitting at that table speaking on behalf of those people who can't, aren't there.
Heather Patrick:No, no. So one of the other things that I think throughout my career, but certainly working and learning from you too, is this idea around data. Having really strong data systems to collect the data. How do we use the data to make informed decisions? Do you think I know we talk about it a lot in the nonprofit space.
Heather Patrick:Do you really think that has become the fabric of this space or do you think we still struggle to really understand and utilize data as effectively as we could?
Liz Thompson:I think that's a two part answer. So I'll go back to Francis Collins work with the genome. Millions of pieces of data. And now you could go to your local medical center and have a genome sequence if you wanted to, and you could get the results back in just a couple of days. And that would tell you your hereditary risk for things that would kind of highlight if you have an environmental risk, if the environment is changing things and the environment is working with that hereditary risk, and what does that look like for your profile?
Liz Thompson:It can tell you if you're starting to develop a disease or starting to have gene changes. Wow. But, you know, in the early days of that, it was $100,000 And we were like, how is this going to translate to everyday people? How are we going to take this data to make medicines diagnostics first, and then medicines that will make a difference? In the cancer community, because we've had a tremendous investment by the National Cancer Institute, We have leapfrogged ahead with that data.
Liz Thompson:I will say though, and this has been a passion of mine for my entire career, and I know your organization is tied to Doctor. Amelie Ramirez. Yes, we don't have enough people of color participating in these studies to add to the data. No, know there are differences. We know that economics play a part in overall health.
Liz Thompson:And so without that full picture, and I think the study All of Me that was led by the National Institute of Health was a step forward in that. But until we really require pharmaceutical studies to redesign their studies and include that, we're not gonna get there. So that's one part of the answer. In some ways, it's incredible, the data that we have. AI testing now for breast cancer.
Liz Thompson:AI can find something that's so infinitesimal, it would be seven years before we would see it on any kind of other technology today. It's not readily available. All women can't have that. But with the way that AI is moving, I think that'll go relatively quickly into the market. But we still don't use data to set standards like we should.
Liz Thompson:And I think of the team at Duke, and if any of you have ever seen it, that's one of the great healthcare data analytics centers country. And one of the PhDs there put together the spreadsheet that if you printed it out, it would be hundreds of pages long. And it's the sequence of how decisions are made using data to to actually create change in healthcare systems for people. And that can be every time we change and we decide that we're gonna use robotics, every time we change and we're gonna change a formulary every time. Data tells us we're not making efficient decision making, but we continually go back to that.
Liz Thompson:So in that way, we're not harnessing technology and AI, we're not harnessing the tools that we have. We're not adopting them at the right places in the system to make it more efficient and effective, which of course would drive costs down and which of course would deliver answers to people more quickly. So, still live in a yin yang. Some of that of course influenced by policy and some is influenced by reimbursement. What do you think about that question, Heather?
Heather Patrick:I think part of it, at least from the nonprofit space, is resource constraint that you'd like to invest in more technology or your staff learning technology in a deeper way, applying technology, having the systems, but usually that takes investment. And so it's kind of this catch 22 of, you want these organizations to become more efficient, have larger impact, become more sustainable, all the things that funders talk about. But you also have to spend money to do that. And I think there still is not a strong enough pathway to help small to midsize. I think nonprofit leadership really on developing technology strategies, truly looking at their business and understanding it from a business perspective.
Heather Patrick:How do I take these tools? Where do I implement them to have the largest impact? How do I help my staff acclimate to them, leverage them? Not to replace staff, but to really give them the capacity to do the work that I think they really signed up to do that they love to do. And you get mirrored down in all the crap.
Heather Patrick:But I think that is for me the struggle. And so I've seen, I mean, I've had the benefit of being at a $400,000,000 organization, a $50,000,000 organization and a $2,000,000 organization. And some things are throughout, right? But I will say at the smaller side of it, I think that is you are constantly looking at how do I keep up, how do I hire the best staff and work off a $2,000,000 budget to serve an entire state like Texas. And it is.
Heather Patrick:We do it and we do it well, but that is the constant. Think that is really hard because I want to invest in AI. I know it can help us drive our impact. We've invested in data and data collection, but again, that takes resources. And so I think that is the constant grind.
Heather Patrick:We want to, the expectation is there, but it is hard in terms of finding and getting the resources to do that.
Liz Thompson:Because nobody wants to invest in operations. Only want to invest in mission.
Heather Patrick:I get that. I I don't agree with it, but I understand it because it takes people to do the job. It takes technology to do the job. You've got to have the infrastructure in place. I think for a long time, the industry took almost pride in doing so much for so little.
Heather Patrick:I think we're beginning to understand where we sell ourselves short on the true impact we could have Because the reality is I just had this conversation today. I'm here to make money. I just wanna invest the money differently. I want to be as impactful as I can be across the state serving people, and it does take money to make that happen. I just want to invest it in the people and communities to close those gaps.
Heather Patrick:But I think that it's just the industry needs to shift, I think, its perspective on what defines it as successful. And then I also think funders need to come more to the table to invest in infrastructure and operations to make that happen.
Liz Thompson:And donors and individual Absolutely.
Heather Patrick:Although I think most of the time, I think your individual donors are, and maybe it's because we get more time with them and can share the story and connect the dots more effectively sometimes. They usually, I think, are sometimes quicker to invest in things like that, especially if you find one that has that background or understands it.
Heather Patrick:But yeah, it is for me that I think if we can crack that, especially if we're just speaking for my organization, if we can make that flip, I just, there's just so much potential out there for change and impact. So I want to ask you, when you, and I know you work with a lot of women and that is a part of what really drives you, What do you share with women leaders that are coming up in their career? What advice would you give them?
Heather Patrick:One or two pieces as someone I'm twenty plus years in of working with you and having the benefit of your advice and guidance. But some young woman who's in her 30s thinking about, can I really do this? What would you say to her?
Liz Thompson:Take appropriate risk. Know yourself. If you're tapped, if you're asked, I'll go back to young Heather Patrick. If you're tapped and asked to take an assignment, think it through. What made that successful is that you knew you had, you knew what you had, you knew what you didn't have.
Heather Patrick:Yeah.
Liz Thompson:And you were willing to have a risk, you were willing to trust that the things that you didn't have, there would be a team or I would find the support for you to fill in those gaps somehow. And when you're taking that risk, it's super important that you do it with someone you can trust because you have to have vulnerability.
Liz Thompson:And behind the scenes of the Liz and Heather show at that time, I don't think people would have had any idea how many hours we spent in my office or at the In our jeans or our sweatpants, really talking about nitty gritty stuff that would make or break it. So, don't be, someone comes to you and says, will you accept this kind of messy challenge that has some risk to it, don't be afraid to say yes.
Liz Thompson:And don't be afraid to say yes, but.
Heather Patrick:Yeah.
Liz Thompson:Here are things that I need in order to be successful. Whether that's accommodation for childcare, whether that's different kinds systems and technology, whether it's, I can do that. I know we need to do that in order to accomplish this in our business, but then I can't do this anymore. And for you, that meant stepping away from your role in the affiliate.
Heather Patrick:Yeah.
Liz Thompson:And so, you know, as women, one of the things that I really counsel young women, especially is we are trained and ingrained to and not or, or but. And so it's okay to say, I can do this, but I can't do this and this. And men do that all the time. So that's one lesson. The other thing that I talk about all the time is being seen in leadership circles.
Liz Thompson:And so in college, I had a triple major. I was a communication psychology and sociology graduate.
Heather Patrick:Of course you were. One was not enough.
Liz Thompson:I was just so curious about people and all of those things kind of brought. Yeah, absolutely. So one of the things that I learned in interpersonal communication is that a male leader, you know, could make a comment about a change process or a need for something. And then other men around the table would not necessarily add anything, or like a new perspective or cite a study or talk about problems in implementation, they would just say, Joe, that's a great idea, blah, blah, blah. As you were saying, Henry, I can really see that in the Southwest Region.
Liz Thompson:But they made it a point when they were at the table to have their voice recognized, their presence noted. Whether or not their contribution was strong could be debated, but they were noted. As women, we are not hardwired for that. In the business setting, we're hardwired to get our work done, eight hours, we're putting in double time because then we go home and we have another job to do. So we rarely make comments that we don't think are necessary or important.
Liz Thompson:And this kind of high five communication that men do on the golf course, on the basketball court, everywhere they exist, we are not trained to do that. We're kind of trained to look at the issue, make a comment when it's needed or noted, and then move on. And part of that is developing our professional persona because we don't wanna seem gratuitous, we don't wanna seem simple. But what I really work with women on is let's look at the agenda. Okay, where are three times during that four hour, six hour period that you're going to make a contribution that is meaningful?
Liz Thompson:It can be with controversy, but are you ready to follow through with facts and information that point to your highlighting the controversy. If you're in support of it, what data are you bringing to show how that's going to change the people that you lead, whether that's a team, or in your case, if you're at headquarters and they're making a decision, the entire state of Texas and the vision program.
Liz Thompson:What is the data that supports that? And really what we know is if you can do that in a four or six hour meeting, three pieces, three contributions that are meaningful, and they don't have to be long, by the way, they should be a paragraph, two to three sentences, but it doesn't have to be a soliloquy. People will very quickly realize this is a person who came to the table prepared.
Liz Thompson:She came with the right kind of information. And remember, leaders are always getting the readout of the meeting afterwards. And now with AI, everything is recorded and it bold stuff for me. So, I'm seeing, oh, we want to launch the program. And Heather's highlighting for me why that's a controversy or what the challenges would be for implementation in Texas.
Liz Thompson:And she listed three concrete things we need to do to solve that to make it right for Texas. If that's what's true in Texas, what about Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, California, Arizona. About because some of those leaders weren't at the table. Do we need to have a different kind of callback? So, I guess in closing, the other thing I would I always encourage young women leaders to do is to poll your colleagues.
Liz Thompson:Maybe you're at the table and none of your colleagues are, or you're one of three people who get tapped to attend a meeting. And if you're an affiliate structure, maybe eight, ten, 100 other people aren't there. Poll your colleagues. What do they need leadership to know? What do they need to know differently?
Liz Thompson:If you're on a national stage and you're giving a talk, use your LinkedIn portfolio to say, I've been asked to speak to blah, blah, blah. Here's a question, please respond. And then when you're speaking, you can say on my LinkedIn profile, I posted this 89% of people said the number one challenge they have. Again, we just talked about this a minute ago. Use data.
Liz Thompson:That gives you credibility and strength. Don't be afraid to take a risk, lean into it, but also recharge. It's okay to say, I need a three day weekend. It's okay to say, I need help. It's okay to say, I'm struggling.
Heather Patrick:Yeah. Yep. I would say, I love the part about we are we lean to and instead of but or no. And I really I love that. And I think that is one of the things I have learned throughout my years.
Heather Patrick:And when I was at the award ceremony last summer for most admired CEO, we had to give this, we had to give what our spirit animal was and that advice we'd give our younger selves. And I really believe this. We are not trained to negotiate. So kind of back to and, but not the but, or the and or, or no, I need this instead. I wish I would have learned that earlier in my career because I think that learning how to negotiate across all spaces is just critical, I think.
Heather Patrick:And so that would be my piece of advice. I will go to a quick story and I will tell you, I don't know if you remember this or not. This was a defining moment for me too. At Coleman, most of my colleagues in particular, when I was on the community health side, had masters or some had doctorates. And I was one of the only ones that did not.
Heather Patrick:And we were at probably one of the leadership conferences, and a comment had been made alluding to that I didn't have that. And you pulled me aside afterwards and said to me, It doesn't matter. Your leadership far outweighs that. And I will never forget that because that really, again, finding ways to just build that confidence in leaders and upcoming leaders. I think that is part of our responsibility when in leadership too.
Heather Patrick:But that really meant a lot to me because I so valued you and your leadership and that just stayed with me, that kind of confidence that you had. So I think anyone who works with you is very lucky to have your leadership and learn from you. And you just have had amazing experiences and such an incredible perspective. So thank you, Liz, for sharing your time this morning and your wisdom and your stories because I think so many people can learn from you. So thank you very much.
Heather Patrick:All right, so we're going to close out like we always do. There's always opportunities to get involved with Prevent Fundless Texas. We're always looking for volunteers, our board, we have event committees, be a donor, so come along on our journey to change people's lives in the state of Texas and to help them get the care they need. So, and we always end with the question of, tell us what your vision is. We'd love to hear it.
Heather Patrick:Thank you again, Liz.
Liz Thompson:You're welcome.