Stop & Talk

Crystal Page 0:11
We're back at Stop and Talk.

Grant Oliphant 0:12
This is always the highlight of my week. So, thank you for doing this. I'm so..

Crystal Page 0:18
I just love being here with you, and I'm excited to know who did we stop and talk with today.

Grant Oliphant 0:23
Okay, today we with one of our colleagues, Dr. Novien Yarber, who heads learning and evaluation at the foundation, also works very closely in an integrated way with the program team, and we had kind of an inside baseball conversation about the recent CEP survey of how grantees perceive the foundation.

Crystal Page 0:45
Yeah, and as you hear in the conversation, Dr. Novi is lovingly called Dr. Novi, but I would like to claim him as well, because he is an honorary part of the comms team.

Grant Oliphant 0:54
He seems to be an honorary part of everybody's team, yes, which is, which is terrific, and I, you know, I think he, it was his, and your suggestion that we do this as part of our commitment to transparency about learning, since we took the time to survey our grantees about how they're perceiving our relationship with them, we want to feedback some insights that came from that survey, and this is one of the ways we're doing that.

Crystal Page 1:23
Yeah, so let's take a look at it, and I'll see you on the other side.

Grant Oliphant 1:26
All right, okay.

Grant Oliphant 1:30
Dr. Novien Yarber, thank you for joining me.

Novien Yarber 1:33
Thanks for the invite.

Grant Oliphant 1:35
Yeah, it is a pleasure, or Novi, as you're known around our halls, and we're going to talk today about the grantee perception report that Prebys recently did with the Center for Effective Philanthropy. Why don't you start us off by saying a few words about what CEP is and what the grantee perception report is supposed to tell us.

Novien Yarber 2:02
Yeah, absolutely. So, CEP, standing for Center for Effective Philanthropy, is a national or international nonprofit with a mission to support effective philanthropy as a means to create social change and in our nation and in our world, and so CEP utilizes data. They are researchers by trade, a lot of them, and and they utilize data as a resource to inform practice, different topic practice, and informing donors on how to, how to engage. And so one of their offerings to foundations is, is the perception report, and it's an, it's an offering in a way that provides a mirror to foundations around, like, how their grantee partners are perceiving their work and their impact. And so we have partnered with CEP in our, what we're in our sixth year of being, we partner with CEP on this report. This will be our second time, and so we first did our first report in 2022 was a different foundation then

Grant Oliphant 3:05
very different foundation.

Novien Yarber 3:06
And then we conducted a survey in 2025 right?

Grant Oliphant 3:10
Yeah, really helpful. And I, you know, I think what I want to say and acknowledge, Novi, is that, you know, when we undertook this survey, it was with the understanding that it, of course, would have value for us, but if- we believe that if you're going to ask grantees to take the time to evaluate us, that we should share back to them absolutely what we learned and what we heard, and this is part of our commitment to doing that. I also have to say about you, and one of the things that I really appreciate about you is you're very unusual for an evaluation and learning officer. Hopefully, well, it's, I mean, obviously you have the expertise and the skills and all the knowledge, but that is a field that is so often kind of lacking in warmth and authenticity and connection, and you manage to combine the rigor and the discipline with the authenticity and connection and are a voice for the people that you're surveying and talking to all the time inside our walls, so I just want to say I appreciate that, recognize that, so when you sit with the, we, we commissioned this survey, and we heard from hundreds, I assume, of our, of our grantees, when you sit with the overall tone of the report, both the affirmations and the invitations for growth, what feels most resonant to you about Prebys, and how we're currently perceived in the community,

Novien Yarber 4:52
that is quite a question. So

Grant Oliphant 4:55
they get worse

Novien Yarber 4:56
progressively. So the number of respondents we had was 169

Novien Yarber 5:03
around 169 out of our roughly I would say like 400 active grants, right, right, and so the way that we, the scope of which CEP kind of took was like within the past one to two years, what are some active grantees that are most present to like how you are and engage with community now, and so out of that, we invited 200 around 200 220 active grantees to engage in the, in the survey, and so about 70% obviously responded, and out of that, we, you know, I think it, I think it's something that I aspire to have, and I try to approach this stuff with the objective lens, which in research is no such thing as objectivity, to be honest, but I think I really wanted to, because that consortium of grantees also represents the time of which I've been at this foundation, so I've been able to see the internal piece of what they see externally, so I was really hoping that there was some alignment there, and so I think, generally speaking, there was a lot of affirmation around Prebys as, as a behemoth of, of, of a leader, community leader in San Diego, within, with the ability to be bold in grant making, and San Diego has not yet seen philanthropy in this regard before, and I know you know that, but it's, it's, it's, it was affirming to hear that from community members to say that yes, your impact on San Diego has been grand and something to admire, and

Grant Oliphant 6:34
all right, just to put a finer point on that, so on the affirmation side, affirmation around, I loved your word behemoth, because it carries two kinds of connotations, some positive, some negative, but so affirmation around leadership and impact, and so what's on the other side of the of the equation,

Novien Yarber 6:57
and is, you know, as a new foundation, and as a large, relatively large foundation for San Diego, as well, is that we move - we're moving at a very fast pace. I think this is in part your design is known as, as your team member, as you, as you, as you have assembled your team to operate and not navel gaze, we operate in a way that's like, how, how can we be as informed as we need to be to make sufficient enough, you know, assumptions about something to move on it, be curious about it, and make the make the decision to move. When we do that, what is experienced externally is different. What we experience is.. oh man, we made the decision. We're moving on this. We're catalyzing, we're supporting, we're building. What is experienced externally is that we don't know where this foundation is going next. We don't know if we align. We don't know what is of importance, because you all are everywhere. We don't know what is a priority, and with that, I mean, so this is both like a light and a shadow, and this is of being so expansive in your reach in San Diego. To you know, you're you're doing all the things, you're in every conversation, you're facilitating these different collaborations and groups, it is perceived as, as not having clarity, I would say, for lack of better terms, and I know internally that you know this is very much a strategy, and at this point of our, of our development, we're, we're contending with both the pressures of the man, Conrad Prebys, of what we inherited from from him and his philanthropy, and being bold and having, you know, such such a statement in his philanthropy, and also what we've kind of done in the past six years, we've done a lot of work, and a lot of responsive grant making, which has been responding to the moment, but it hasn't been as externally seen as something that is strategic in a way that's like you can see, you can, you can expect what to see from Prebys next. Yeah, yeah, and that's been that's been

Grant Oliphant 9:21
predictable,

Novien Yarber 9:21
predictable is the word,

Grant Oliphant 9:23
and I think that's fair criticism, by the way, you know what I, but what I hear you saying is being agile and adaptive and responding to circumstances and acknowledging as we have that we're learning and adapting as we go, because we feel we have to, may be laudable in some respects, but it can be perceived by people on the ground who are working with us as grantee partners as just not being a predictable partner, right, right, and what they're. Sure, so we're going to explore a little bit more about about that I hope. Those are grand themes, affirmation around leadership and impact, some some constructive feedback around being a reliable and predictable partner. Was there anything else in the that really leapt out at you at a high level about, you know, either confirming or advising, yeah, in terms of the findings,

Novien Yarber 10:28
yeah, there's a few things I think, because we are a place-based funder, relationships, and I say in any regard, this is, this should be important for philanthropy, but I think, particularly for us, the way in which we're positioned, being place-based, we're very close to community, and so relationships are integral to how and what we do, and though you know we feel like we are out and about and connecting, community says we can do more, you know, and so we're, you know, contending with, okay, you know, there's always going to be a trade off for, for that type of work. When you think about the scope of where we've been thus far, we had over 300 grantees last year, and it's like, you know, how can how can we deploy the human resource that we have to be out in community to connect with people, and not just in the I want to show up to an event and be a representative for Prebys, but no, we mean by relationship means being in it with me, being in the work with me, we're checking in, we're doing the thing, so if you think about the level of engagement that relationships require, it's kind of hard to conceptualize what that would look like for such a small team here that we have currently. So that's something that I'm, I'm sitting with, is, is yes, affirming that, you know, we have been bestowed, been bestowed a leadership role in San Diego, yet we still need to learn more, and people are yearning for our, our relationship, and even more, I guess, in a more profound way, and so, yeah, just sitting with that is, How do we do that?

Grant Oliphant 12:14
I think this was a very important finding, and it's a hard one, because I think I think it's a perennial problem for foundations that there, there is a there's always more desire on the if you have a good team for them to be spending time in the community than they probably have the capacity to do, and yet that's important feedback for us, and I, you know, I, I've been, I've been at this work long enough to know that the answer isn't necessarily more people, and we can't invent more time, so we have to figure out other ways of doing that, but I think the feedback is important, and I like your phrase, and you used it when you and I first talked about this study, which is sitting with it. Sometimes you know it's just important to hear the feedback, and then think about it, and let the answers become apparent over time.

Novien Yarber 13:16
Yeah, I have been curious about something, because this is not your first rodeo, and you've engaged with, you have a history with CEP and the perception survey, and I'm curious, from a leadership lens, why is perception important? Like, what's the significance of perception

Grant Oliphant 13:32
you know, this would be an interesting conversation, especially for you as a, as an expert in research and evaluation and learning, and but there is a, there is a lot of research about the correlation between how foundations grantees perceive them and how effective that foundation really is. One very simple way of understanding this from my perspective is, in in this work, it is so easy to begin smoking your own dope, where you, where you start just believing, "Oh, we're doing great work because everybody says we're doing great work, or because, yeah, and, and let's face it, a lot of the work feels really great, and it should be great work, but what is hard is to get critical feedback, and so the idea with the grantee perception report was to create a mechanism for honest but productive feedback to come back to the foundation, and the reason that this number of the number of times that CEP has done the survey is important is generic, generic rankings about how you're doing tend to be positive, and I appreciate that. I mean, unless you're really horrible, you know, people should have have nice things to say. Okay, but the passion of those relative to the passion of others in other communities is how you know, is this good or is this not good, right? So the fact that they have a comparison set helps us see, oh, is this good or is this maybe not as good as we would like to believe it is. That's, I think that's, yeah, why, yeah, you know, I'm curious. Did you want to follow up on that, or did you..

Novien Yarber 15:25
I've always got questions.

Grant Oliphant 15:28
Yeah, I wanted to push you on the next one, which is.. and then maybe you can.. we can continue on that, but as I looked at the report in the areas of impact and identity, the grantees consistently described Prebys as having quote strong and meaningful impact in the region. I'm very proud of that, and I, that's something we've set out to do. What do you think we're doing particularly well that allows the community to experience us that way, so that we can do more of it.

Novien Yarber 16:03
Yeah, I think the first thing that comes to mind, because very resonant for me, we were in a conversation with a, with a, with a partner, prospective partner, and they made somewhat of an assumption of how we operate in grant making, and saying that, you know, foundations, you know, you, you have a problem that you want to solve, and then you, you create an application for people to respond to, and they solve the problem for you, and I, and I, and I paused them, and I was like, that's not how, that's not how we operate in our grant making. Our philosophy here is not to, to find the issue in our story, you know, it's we find the issue, and where are we in that story, and like, where are we as an actor in that, and I say we, you know, we start by doing research, right? You, we always start before an initiative begins, or you, we even conceptualize an initiative. Our POs are very skilled at being in community and understanding what the issues are as they relate to our impact areas, right? And I think that goes a long, that goes a long way. And one community knows when you're out trying to learn, they can see you trying to see you showing up, they see you taking information back, they see you applying, you know what you learned, and there's, you know, we're trying to work on, like, closing the feedback loop right now, but I think that is, that goes a long way to see that, oh, you're actually listening, you know, I mentioned that this was an issue, and now I see it as a formalized initiative where it spans not only my sector but other sectors, right, like or organization. So I think that is something that is a strength of ours, because our program appeals program officers, for those who are listening, the program officers are very deliberate around how initiatives are one understood, issues are understood, and then how we go about approaching them. We're becoming more and more sophisticated around that, which means we're in ongoing conversations with the community, and so therefore, if it's relevant to the community, they're going to say that we're having an impact. If we're missing the mark, they will let us, they will let us raise it.

Grant Oliphant 18:18
Right. Yeah, I love that. I love, I love how you answered that question too, and placing us not at the center of the story, but as an actor in the story, player in the story, lot to unpack there, but you know, if you think about how we we're so young, you know, you mentioned our sixth year, which we've really got five years behind us, and we've been learning on the go about what works and what doesn't in this community as we continue to mature as a place-based foundation. How do you see our identity evolving? Do you think based on what you're seeing,

Novien Yarber 19:03
based on what I'm seeing, yeah, I think we're going to be even like more deeply in integrated in community. I think it won't be a surprise if you see a prebys staff person, like at a, at a community event, like it's not just a luxury, like it's almost expected. I think that's what I could see us doing, because one community is asking for it, and because we are moving into a relational, more relational, deeper relational, multi year kind of approach to our grant making, where we're going to be able to do that more and show up more and not be spread so thin across hundreds of grantee partners that are doing amazing work, not to, you know, minimize that, and of a team of 22 and. And and six, or you know, are charged with, with, with being out deliberately in community to do the things, yeah, yeah,

Grant Oliphant 20:09
you're, you're by definition stretched, then yeah, and by the way, you're, you wear kind of two hats in that you're because of the way that you have designed our learning role. You're part of the program team. You're not a consultant. You're not sitting in a sort of off on the side somewhere, judging everybody, but that gives you a special, I think, insight into what it's like to try to be in relationship from the standpoint of a small group of people with a large, a much larger group of people, who, by the way, I think are right to expect a certain level of access, exposure, you know, we had a couple of things come up in that, in the report, where we heard from grantees who hadn't had any kind of follow up, and that wasn't the rule, it was by far the exception, but it, you know, you don't want to hear those stories, and you know, more broadly, just a thirst for more face time, more opportunity to give and take, as you've talked to colleagues at other foundations, is that a common refrain? And how do you hear them wrestling with it?

Novien Yarber 21:30
I think it is common, and you know that let's demystify that closer relationship does not imply more funding, right? And so I think,

Grant Oliphant 21:40
and that may be an assumption that is often made

Novien Yarber 21:43
I think it is often made, which is fair. Like, this is this is part of the partnership. They don't want, you know, just be partners with us, because we're great people. Yeah, sure, but like this, we all play a role in this work, and so part of our role is to resource, you know, the work, and so in, in deeper connections, you know what I hear is that everybody wants more face time. For us, I think it's a little bit more nuanced because we are place-based and because we are large. There are often times where you know our colleagues are national foundations and their grantees are across the nation, so it's not almost.. it's not expected that you know we have a program officer show up at our events, you know, where in this case they're like, I know where your office is, I know your office is, and I saw you driving today, no just kidding, but like that's real, so I see.. yeah, I see you at this event, where you know I saw that you had posted this thing. I'm curious about this. Let's follow up about this, and so, yeah, I mean, I think it is.. it is a.. it's a desire. I, you know, I would want that too, as a partnership. When I think about partnership, that's what I would.. I would expect as well. And, you know, yeah, just. just thinking about, like, to not romanticize partnership in a way that's like we're accessible, like your own staff, right? You know, like your internal staff, like I think that that that's where kind of gets conflated a little bit.

Grant Oliphant 23:15
Yeah, I mean, that's actually something I wanted to drill down on even a little more. I mean, there is this invitation coming out of the data in the CEP report, for you know, it expresses a desire for deeper engagement. I love what you said, that maybe in part that comes from an expectation that deeper engagement leads to more funding, but it's also very real and human for people who are working together as partners, and I think you said this to want to be in deeper relationship and feel like, but how else do you interpret what you're hearing around that?

Novien Yarber 23:55
Yeah, I would say, and maybe this is a bias opinion, maybe it's about learning, like if we're in closer relationship, we can, we can learn together, you know, and not kind of default to like a funder grantee relationship, where I just need to report the good things to you, or I can't tell you about my, my losses, or my lessons, you know what I mean, but if we're in a relationship, I can tell you that I had a misstep, and you not take it out on me, right? You know, or you not, you not retract funding, or I'm not considered for the next round of funding. So, I, in my, in my bias opinion, because learning is my, is my lane, is I think that it's also about how can, how can we build a relationship where we can exchange the wins and the losses and the advancements, and then the setbacks, and you know, in pursuit of this shared goal. Yeah,

Grant Oliphant 24:48
I don't think that's a biased answer at all. I actually think that's a profoundly meaningful answer, because it is the type of relationship we profess to want with the organizations that we fund, and I believe that it is inevitable that organizations we fund that will periodically will periodically fail, yeah, yeah, in things that they undertake if they're doing good, meaningful, interesting work, if you're being bold, right, yeah, and if, if they're not in a space of feeling comfortable about talking about that, because they never see us, then that's a problem. Well, I'm glad you're taking that on from a learning perspective, but I, you know, I think what I think, I think what we have to acknowledge is that this is a real dynamic, and we have to, we have to continue to pay attention to it, I mean, it does raise the issue of how we, I think, I also saw in the data, correct me if I'm wrong about this, but the, that there was a, you know, there's a broader thirst for us to be more broadly engaged, and it's not just they, they all want everybody wants the time of our six program related folks, but they also want, you know, us to be more broadly present across all manner of activities and organizations in the community, and there is kind of a role that you know, if you're everywhere, you're nowhere. How should we sit with that sort of feedback?

Novien Yarber 26:27
Yeah, yeah, and you're referring to the data point that that kind of spoke to, yes, the foundation has immense impact on San Diego in our region, however, it does not understand my own challenges, that kind of related, yeah. Okay, so yeah, that one's that one's hard because I think that we can, to your point, do a better job of of sitting with the challenges of our partners, and maybe eliciting, soliciting, you know, what are you challenged with? I don't know if we enter conversations like that, you know. I think our approach to it, and philanthropy does it often, it's like, what are you learning, right? And if you are reflect a reflective organization, you can talk about some of that, you know, through like reporting and such, but then it becomes a little bit more like linear and rigid and all the things when it goes through, you know, all the chat GPT, but yeah, I think I think we can do a better job of actually asking one ourselves, are we ready to receive the challenges that are the real challenges of our nonprofits, and the realities for me, and maybe this is a projection, is that if and when we ask, are we ready to respond, because to just solicit and say what are your challenges, but we're not ready to respond with a let me assist or let me support, that is a recipe for

Grant Oliphant 28:01
frustration, right? Frustration, maybe disaster. Yeah, yeah, certainly. Actually, that was an interesting data point, and you called it out really well, better than my question did. But you know that data point about the, about, so you're the foundation is perceived as understanding the region's issues, as providing leadership on the region's issues, impact on fields that individual organizations are working in, high value there, but to your point, not understanding my organization, and so your point would be we need to get better at maybe asking about those, those challenges, but that requires us to be prepared to do something about, yeah, and

Novien Yarber 28:53
maybe it is not our responsibility to be, and I don't want it to sound like a savior complex, right, like to do

Grant Oliphant 28:58
that, yeah, because the foundation can't do everything for everybody

Novien Yarber 29:01
exactly right, but I think it's like in partnership. How would you respond if someone says I'm, I'm challenged with this? Like, can we direct other resources? It doesn't have to be grant dollars, but you know that's the, that's the, I think the capital and the influence of foundations. It's not just financial capital, but it's also social capital. It's, you know, you can connect resources, and so, yeah, I just think it's we just have to work on that skill of how do we, how do we operate in partnership in that way. Great.

Grant Oliphant 29:32
Before I, I move on. You said you had lots of questions.

Novien Yarber 29:37
I always have questions. Yeah,

Grant Oliphant 29:38
Do you want to throw one on the table now? Yeah, and then we'll move on to more of the findings. I think the big one that's coming up is around that predictability question and

Novien Yarber 29:50
adaptability, like I know that that is your, and I think maybe this assumption or projection, but I think that the way in which the foundation operates is a reflection of, of you, right? you're an adaptive leader, like you shift and move and do other things, so I'm curious, like, how do you, how are you mitigating some of the, I won't say transparency, but the predictability of your leadership as a reflect reflection of of Prebys, or you know, does this land for you to say, like, okay, you know, people see that we're adapting and responding, but that's what that's that's what that's what we're intended to do, that's what we're designed to do, it's an intention, so how do we mitigate?

Grant Oliphant 30:39
Yeah, I actually, I really appreciate and love the way that you're expressing what we do, and I, I do think it is a reflection of, for better or worse, of me as a leader, but you know, it is, I think what I would say is on the, on the one, on one level, I want to acknowledge the point, and, and say we, we came in, and actually it was a design strategy early on that we didn't know all the answers. The worst thing I felt I could have done was come in and articulate a permanent strategy that would guide us for the next 10 years. I did not feel that I knew enough about San Diego, or that San Diego knew enough about the model of what large philanthropy from large regional philanthropy can do, or that we had the relationships in place to begin to do that. So I wanted that to be a dynamic and fluid learning process for a period of years, and so it was kind of very intentional. And I wanted to provide guide posts by through values, as opposed to, so you know, purpose, opportunity, and belonging, and I think we have been 100% true to that, that we would very much evidence a willingness to listen and engage with community, and I think we've been true to that, but we would continue to adapt as we learned, and and I'm, I'm kind of glad we did. But I am also, I want to acknowledge that that is frustrating for grantees who want to understand what is my door in, and how do I know if I've got one next year and not just this year, because that's really, I mean, if we're honest, this would, what people want to know is, are we a predictable funding partner? Are we a predictable partner on their issues? And I think many, many organizations through that time have found us to be that, but they have felt it's been in kind of different ways every year, because we have, we have shifted for sure, and you know, if you think about just this last year as an example, we had to do it again because suddenly our entire world changed when the new administration came in and started undoing a lot of the things that we. so that's in our defense, but I hear about the impact, and I do think we are now, especially having gotten this feedback at a point where we have to say to ourselves as a team, this is, we do not want our grantee partners to feel like we're an unreliable partner that they can't figure out, so we're going to have to have to lock in on some more reliable ways of engaging with us and articulating ongoing through lines around strategy. Absolutely, one thing I would say about that is that tends to feel very good for some organizations, and less good for other organizations, because you, you know, one way of developing more predictable relationships over time is you hone in on on fewer and fewer partners, and I think that's the other piece that we've been wrestling with, is we don't want to do that prematurely, right? I'm not sure that we want to do that at all. Yeah, so that's again, you know, not to duck the, the, the question around the answer, I just don't know the answer.

Novien Yarber 34:36
Yeah, that's fair.

Novien Yarber 34:37
Yeah, and it's a tension, I think it's a very real tension that we don't often share, I think, for for foundations and or leadership within foundations that care, like, like our leadership does, and so I think, I mean, I think it's a great practice, because I think this is what community is looking for, this is what our grantees are looking for, for, for that type of transparency, if you would. It's like, share where you're at, and what, what is informing the strategy, and how you all are showing up, because I don't know if we've done, you know, we do, you know, our events, and, and kind of share out, and you know, convene different groups of people, but I think, in regards to, you know, the inner workings of the foundation, granted, we are a private foundation, so

Grant Oliphant 35:24
we have, we have made a commitment around transparency and talking about these things. And thank you for embodying that, by the way, so well. You know, we don't interpret the word private to mean we don't talk about these things. It's an organizational structure, it's not a, but I, you know, I think that this is, you know, what, what, what did come out in the survey was this sense of moving goal posts. I'm looking at the language that, you know, that as our strategies evolve, the goal posts get moved, and I think that feels bad. So we want to, you know, we want to figure that out within the context of everything we just discussed, but I loved your words too about tensions, because that is the challenge, in a, you know, it's one way of looking at this work for us is a region is not a closed system, but it kind of looks like one, right? So there's a discrete number of organizations that work within that system. There are a lot of them, you know, way more than our six person program team can possibly engage with in the meaningful way that we would like to have, so you know, obviously we don't have their 13,000 plus organizations in San Diego, we funded, I think you said 300 last year, so obviously we're not doing all of them, but it's a, it's a lot of, so there's a tension between wanting to be in relationship and what you can actually meaningfully do with the team and discipline you have in place. There's a tension between wanting to be fast and agile and on top, you know, and not. I've seen so many foundations get hidebound by this sense of their strategy and their process, and, and you know, 20 years on, they're still, still in that, yeah, still in that, the whole community's moved on, and you know, the world has changed,

Novien Yarber 37:38
but, and that's not what San Diego, I don't think San Diego wants that.

Grant Oliphant 37:41
I don't think San Diego, but there's a tension between that and being all over the, you know, feeling like you're scattered and all over the place. So, I think we have to really wrestle with that issue around predictability.

Novien Yarber 37:54
I appreciate that.

Grant Oliphant 37:54
Yeah, so what is, since we, you just raised this, we just talked a little bit about transparency. I can talk about this too, but from your perspective, what does transparency look like?

Novien Yarber 38:08
Who I would use it synonymously with accountability, especially in social change work, because our systems. I think I think I know to be very insular sometimes, especially when you're working in on the helms and the intersections of power and money and social change, like, like the system is constructed in a way for people not to know what you're doing, you're operating in a vacuum, and to actually disrupt, disrupt that system and actually make the change that we're intended, we're set out to do. We've got to like challenge the very system at which we are in and we operate in, and how we do it, and so I think when you think back to early iterations of philanthropy, and like the charity work, right, it's about keeping the money within a insular community, like it's like I'm giving money to a church, my church, right, giving money to my alma mater, to my alma mater, exactly, so it's keeping it within a system, and you know, in this era that we're in, which I so appreciate that I'm entering philanthropy at this point, like, is that there we can actually talk about it, and we can unearth some of that, and so when I think about accountability in today's time, especially for the work that we do, it is about how can we break the mold and the norm of keeping things insular into, into the chest, it's about it's about sharing the process, about sharing a little bit more about how we're operating, and how the system is moving, and some people are more or less comfortable with that, I get it, like it's, but that's. What social change is, it takes, it takes time, it's uncomfortable to sit in, but that's, I think, that's the work that we signed up for.

Grant Oliphant 40:08
Yeah, I would agree with that, and I, I do think it has been an important shift. It is hard if you don't have people inside and a board that are comfortable with that, absolutely, because sometimes it means we have to admit we're not perfect, and we're not doing things the way that we would have wanted

Novien Yarber 40:36
notice the nervous laugh, right, but no, it's real, I think it's so real, and I think it's something that we implicitly, we might unconsciously take on, too, especially in philanthropy, is that it seems to be buttoned up, seems to be doing the right thing all the time, the ones who know the holders of knowledge and access, and all the things, and it's like it's a system, man. It's like it's a system full of human beings, the same as the ones who are, you know, I wouldn't say the same, but you know, human beings that are doing the work on the, you know, grassroots work. It's like same human beings just now in a system that just operates differently. And so, yeah, I think that we have to consciously kind of disrupt some of that for ourselves, yeah. And who, what that looks like, and to your point, you know, having a board, having leadership, having organizational culture that that creates conditions for that is really important. I think it's, and then as it goes for us, I think that that's where we're as a team that we can kind of engage in this a little bit more, and I think that will make us more effective partners.

Grant Oliphant 41:45
Do you find, in talking about this with your colleagues, they're receptive?

Novien Yarber 41:49
Oh, absolutely. Yeah, yeah,

Grant Oliphant 41:52
I have found that. I have found that. So, one of the.. let's go back to the study. One of the data points that emerges is, and it's consistent with this issue of being predictable, and so they've rightly observed you all have had a lot of initiatives, and it's true. We threw a lot of stuff at the wall in our early years to try and start getting some efforts in place, figuring out who is good at doing what, and you know where the, where the potential really lay. Also, major learnings, you know, I think about what. So, one of my favorite ones to talk about is we funded a lot in the area of youth mental health, initially mostly focused on putting clinicians in front of kids, and all of that was good. We quickly realized we didn't have enough money to, nor were there enough clinicians to meet the demand, even remotely, and that led us to the healing through arts and nature work, because one thing we could do was take advantage of San Diego's amazing arts and culture and natural resources, and all the research that exists around how that helps mental health, and start making that more available for the community, and young people in particular. We only learned that by doing it, doing it, yeah, and it's not like you come into something like this with a perfect game plan, but I think what the community is asking in the data is, okay, you tried a bunch of things and that led you maybe to do some other things, yeah, but then how do you deepen that work

Novien Yarber 43:44
for sure

Grant Oliphant 43:44
And what did you hear about that? And as you read the report,

Novien Yarber 43:49
yeah, similarly, I think it's yeah, a can can we land on a thing on a path to to this issue, right? Essentially, and I think, and I think we are, we're on that path, and again, this, this, the survey, and the data, and the data is just a snapshot of a moment in time, and I think that that's just where we are in the process, in our development as an organization, but what you just shared is such, it's such a great demonstration of of the progression that can happen when you allow yourself as a team and as an organization to learn based on what you do, like being in it, right? If you weren't sitting and exploring and experimenting with these different initiatives, we might not have arrived at healing through arts and nature, and we might not have gotten to know such incredible practitioners who are offering healing resources that go beyond clinical, you know, interventions, and if we were to take the CEP at that time during, during that initiative, they probably would have something else to say, but, like, look at what happens after that, right. And I think, so right now it's just a moment in time, I think we've got so much more to to learn, and my hope is that the community is is is with us along that journey, because I mean we can't learn without them

Grant Oliphant 45:16
it's gonna be rough, very lonely, yeah, without that,

Novien Yarber 45:20
yeah, so we're on that, we're on our way, run our way, as long as I think that the key point, integral point, is that the way in which we get to the thing is can change, but to the point of that, that quote that you said, the goal post, the goal post, or the vision of San Diego should not change, and that in the goal of an initiative, right? So, for with your example, attending to youth mental health and well-being has always been, you know, the priority. Has been a priority. We might have gone about it different ways, but it's always been the priority. And same with healing through arts nature, we might have expanded the aperture a little bit, but it's still a priority to say we want to attend to the mental health crisis that we have here in San Diego. It just looks different, just feels different. So that I think the community can be confident in.

Grant Oliphant 46:10
Okay, that's that's helpful. I mean, I do think this long-term question for us is, I am absolutely committed to keeping us an agile, adaptive foundation, because I think the worst thing that happens for philanthropy is that we become stuck, and that we, that we stop evolving in the way that the community needs us to, but if you look down the road at if we're doing that better in a way that is the community can receive it also as good partnership. What would that look like?

Novien Yarber 46:50
I would say there was even more. This is one indicator to me, is like there was even more activity, momentum, energy activation around the work that we're taking part in again, not our work, but the work that we're taking part in, meaning like there, there are more foundations coming online and joining the party, they're committing long term to San Diego. There are partnerships, not only between foundations and and CBOs or community-based organizations, but across the spectrum, across the sector, thinking for profit, thinking our B Corps, thinking government, like people are rallied around, like, let's, let's operate like a, like an ecosystem, we talk about it all the time, but like, let's, let's truly like operate as an ecosystem, and that's where I can see if we're doing our job right, we're going to have more people join the party.

Grant Oliphant 47:47
Great, yeah, like that. So, what else comes up for you that you, that you would like to ask me about?

Novien Yarber 47:55
Oh, stay tuned for part two. Wow, what else do I..

Grant Oliphant 48:01
we touched on the major themes I think that came out of the report, so I'm not putting you on the spot.

Novien Yarber 48:09
I think that's a good question, but I think I.. I.. how is it going for you this far? It's a lot. Yeah, right. Yeah, we've - the organization itself has done a lot, and, and you know, leadership is the lens of which I look at things. That's my background. So I'm thinking about it in terms of like you coming into this new space and context, and then leading this organization to do to this point and beyond. Like, how has it, how has it been, and you're navigating all the crises, yeah. As an org leader, I don't know people checking in.

Grant Oliphant 48:45
I, well, you know, I well, first of all, thank you for asking me the question. And I, I love, I love San Diego, and I, I, you know, I love what this community has the potential to be, I get frustrated sometimes by how we get in our own way, and I look for ways for us to disrupt that on issues that I think are really important and core to us, but I love, I love the community and its capacity to be entrepreneurial and innovative, and to really have its own unique way of developing progress, you know. I had a funny moment when I first, when I first came to town, and I remember this vividly. I've never talked about this, but I, I had, I was having a conversation with a very wealthy donor in the community who's, you know, who's whose name was, you know, probably known like Conrad's name was known, and and he, you know, we, we were introduced to each other, and he said, "Oh, you're the new guy who's going to show us how it's done", and, and I, and I felt. Felt first of all, set up for failure, and I felt really bad because I, you know, what I, what I really realized, and I sat with that actually for a while, but I, what I, what I realized was, and I, it actually played out over the next year or two, I knew a lot about how regional foundations can exercise leadership and power in creative ways in partnership with the community to change community, but the way in which that happens is different for each foundation and for each community, and, and so it has been really humbling, actually, to come in with this expert expectation around expertise and have to acknowledge you don't know all the answers, and that, yeah, you have, you have this experience and this expertise, but San Diego is different, and people in San Diego are different, and you still need to know the community, because the same that community where you came from, and that's been good for me, you know. Yeah, I mean, it's again, you know, I love, I do love learning, and I don't always love feedback, none of us does, but I, I do love the getting to reinvent the model of philanthropy, and you know, I will tell you, I'm really proud of Prebys, and it's unlike, you know, I, this is not a clone of where I came from, you know, this is its own thing, and it's a San Diego thing, in addition to, you know, being a reflection of my leadership. Thank you very much. But it is a, you know, it's a San Diego thing too, and it's, and it's a reflection of this team that we've built. Anyway, so I'm, I'm, you know, it's been great, it's been humbling, it's been a. I just, you know, I'll conclude by saying this. I, I just wish that we were doing this work at a, in the midst of a different national conversation about culture and about people, and the, you know, the themes and values that we articulated at the front end. We're living through a period of stunning and immense cruelty and exclusion, and I hate that, you know, but I wouldn't rather be anywhere else.

Novien Yarber 52:37
Well, thanks for being here.

Grant Oliphant 52:38
No, thank you for being here. Thank you. you, and I, I do you know, maybe a great place to conclude for both of us would be if, if they were in the room, which they kind of are, through the miracle of our technology, is to say to everybody who participated in this study and who took the time to fill it out, thank you for doing it. You're helping us learn, you're helping us get better, and, and hopefully you'll see that reflected in how we not just talk about it, but how we engage over the next few years. Thank you.

Novien Yarber 53:14
Thank you.

Grant Oliphant 53:19
All right. Well, what did you think of that?

Crystal Page 53:22
I appreciated the reflection. You know, I've been here since the start of the strategic plan, but I'm also.. it makes me proud to work here because we're being super transparent, or we're trying to be super transparent about where we are, where we have opportunities to grow, and what's working so far. How do you feel about it?

Grant Oliphant 53:41
Well, first of all, I love talking to Novi about our work, and you know, he really does have this, this commitment to having us take away everything we can from what we ask people to share with us. So it was just great talking with him about that. I also feel, you know, I'm just aware that there are certain trade-offs that happen in this work where you can't be perfect, you know, if if you want to lead and have impact and you want to be adaptive and flexible, there will be ways in which some people can't find their niche in that, and, and so, how we manage that, because we do want to be a foundation that lives its values, is I think it's important for us to reflect on that. I'm grateful for the opportunity to do that. I'm just also aware of how complicated that is.

Crystal Page 54:45
Right off of that, how complicated it is, I appreciated that you talked about this is not a clone of what you did at Heinz, you know. It's very telling. I think we just all assume because. You were at a foundation that, that you've done this, and it's rinse and repeat, but it sounds like you've been very intentional, and you made sure the foundation has been super intentional with that as well.

Grant Oliphant 55:09
We've invented a very, I mean, some ways similar, maybe at a values level, and a notion of how to exercise influence through a regional philanthropy that absolutely, but we've invented our own thing here, and it's very much a bespoke San Diego model invented in concert with our board and our staff and our community of grantees.

Crystal Page 55:36
Yeah, I think that's super apropos, where we don't like to just copy other people, we have to do our own things.

Grant Oliphant 55:43
Well, I, yeah, thank you. I wish we had more time to talk about it, but I think this is this is an important conversation to understand the foundation and how we're evolving, and it's also terrific just to get to profile one of our colleagues and share his wisdom with our audience, so glad we did it.

Crystal Page 56:04
Yeah, I'm glad we did it too. And thanks everybody for listening and taking the time to stop and talk.

Grant Oliphant 56:09
Thank you.

Grant Oliphant 56:14
This is a production of the Prebys Foundation,

Crystal Page 56:19
hosted by Grant Oliphant,

Grant Oliphant 56:21
co-hosted by Crystal Page,

Crystal Page 56:24
produced by Adam Greenfield, Tess Karesky, Edgar Ontiveros Medina, and Crystal Page,

Grant Oliphant 56:31
engineered by Adam Greenfield.

Crystal Page 56:34
Production coordination by Tess Karesky.

Grant Oliphant 56:38
Video production by Edgar Ontiveros Medina.

Crystal Page 56:42
Special thanks to the Prebys Foundation team.

Grant Oliphant 56:44
The Stop and Talk theme song was created by San Diego's own Mr. Lyrical Groove

Crystal Page 56:50
Download episodes at your favorite podcatcher, or visit us at Prebysfdn.org