Authentic Storytelling in International Development with Vila-Sheree Watson

Hello, my friends. I'm running a brand new special live training called How to Stand Out on Social Media in 2023. What you will learn, the three most critical changes to the social media landscape in the past year, the pros and cons of meta verified for Facebook and Instagram, the best features of each platform to help you stand out on social media, the power of LinkedIn for nonprofits and how calls for data privacy have affected social media advertising and reach and what we can do. If you're interested, sign up. It will be given live on April 24th. Go to non profit social media trends.com and register today. Hello and welcome to nonprofit nation. I'm your host Julia Campbell and I'm going to sit down with nonprofit industry experts, fundraisers, marketers and everyone in between to get real and discuss what it takes to build that movement that you've been dreaming of. I created the nonprofit nation podcast to share practical wisdom and strategies to help you confidently find your voice, definitively grow your audience and effectively build your movement. If you're a nonprofit newbie or an experienced professional who's looking to get more visibility, reach more people and create even more impact than you're in the right place. Let's get started. Hi everyone. Welcome back to nonprofit nation. I'm your host Julia Campbell and today we're doing something a little different. I have a podcast listener and new friend on the podcast today and we're going to talk about some issues that were raised in previous podcast episodes. So my new friend, my guest is Viola Sherry Watson and Viola Sherry is a multifaceted leader, fundraiser and content creator known for her dynamic and soulful approach to creativity and social justice. Born in the south and raised in Oakland, California, Watson's upbringing was deeply influenced by the vibrant arts and culture scene that surrounded her and from a young age, she was drawn to the power of words and storytelling and found solace and inspiration and poetry, art and music, but it wasn't until she discovered, I and Gio's like international non-government organizations. She truly found her passion and what would become her life's work and Viola Sherry has had every job from graphic designer, writer, content, gather event planner and now fundraiser. And I know that resonates with a lot of my listeners. Her current employment is with chorus international, a Baltimore based I and Gio where she focuses on direct response for the Lutheran World Relief brand. A few other little tidbits for the last 25 years, she's led a national sorority for Christian women that encompasses women ages of 18 to 80. And when she's not writing or performing or fundraising, Watson can often be found exploring the world and traveling with her husband Paul. She's been to over 60 countries. So welcome to the podcast Viola Sherry. Thank you so much for being here. Oh my goodness Julia, I love your podcast. Thank you so much for inviting me. I have been looking forward to the stay of recording with you. Yes, I'm so thrilled. So tell us how you got started in nonprofit work and about some of the things you do at chorus international. Absolutely. I would say for the first 15 years of my career, I worked in the marketing space in the for profit world from a variety of places to publicly traded companies all the way. To advertising agencies and the recession happened and the company that I was at folded and I said, well, I can go back to my roots of graphic design and ended up being placed at an I and G. And from there, my world completely shifted and my passions grew for this topic area and I have had the pleasure of working in I and G. O's for the last 16 years. So tell us about chorus international. Oh my goodness, chorus international is an I and G. O. That is somewhat newly formed. If you're looking at the family of course organizations, the actual organizations Lutheran World Relief, I am a world health farmers market coffee and others are longstanding organizations. In fact, Lutheran World Relief has been around for 75 years, but in 2019, these organizations decided to come together and form chorus international and all of these entities work under this family of organizations and it's a wonderful thing because we're able to draw on the resources of each other as well as support each other in this great global work. Fantastic. And you work in direct response fundraising. That's right. Okay, fantastic. I think a lot of my audience works in that kind of fundraising or at least has direct responses part of their job. So the purpose of this episode is something, you know, a little bit different for my listeners, but I still think it's incredibly valuable because you originally wrote me a very nice email after listening to the conversation that I had with Vic Hancock fell about her experience as a white woman in international development. And I was sharing my experiences as well, having served in the Peace Corps and having worked abroad for several years. So for the listeners, the title of the episode is shifting the power to the people you exist for. I'll put it in the show notes and it definitely struck a chord with many listeners. And just I want to read a piece of the email that you wrote to me. You wrote it is so interesting to me that white and geo fundraisers are centered in this conversation. As a black fundraiser and content gatherer for more than 16 years, I believe our viewpoint is not often a part of the conversation and I know that some of us have different perspectives. So for me, you know, I really appreciated that response because the episode was to white women talking about racism and racial equality and how to shift the power back to the people that we work for. So I really appreciated your reaching out and I wanted to give you a chance to share this different perspective. One that's not focused on white guilt and, you know, white saviorism. So can you share your thoughts with us and we'll get right into it. And I have a lot of thoughts on this topic. So I'm going to try to not make it too disjointed. But let me start here with this particular topic area and that is the area of the speed at which people are so quick to call out white saviorism without really taking the critical time to see if a story is really authentic and true. What I mean is, you know, a lot of times, I shouldn't say a lot of times, sometimes on our social media platforms for my organization, we will get someone that calls us out on white saviorism or something like that. And it's usually a white person and they don't even understand that the person that has selected every image and selected all of the stories is black. And so what that says to me, I find that offensive, frankly, because it's assumed that a white person is leading in this storytelling and the sharing of this story and they don't understand the painstaking measures that I take to ensure that people that look like me are portrayed in a certain way. So I think we're getting into even a bigger issue and you had said this to me in your email where I don't know if it's donors, I mean, it's probably donor staff people. It's like you said, there's this assumption that organizations are white led and, you know, the majority of them are, but not all of them are obviously and the assumption that the content creator and the fundraiser is white. Has that been your experience? That's right. Yes, so that was really what you were talking about was just the quick draw to call out white saviorism when it could be an organization that is actually being led by people of color. That's right. Where not only are the people who are the storytellers, story, gatherers and content creators could be people of color, but also the donors could be. And so you're also assuming that the people that are giving the money are all white and that is a scary and bad assumption. So, you know, you did say in our correspondence, you know, that you believe that there is a shift in power taking place and that you believe the people that should be setting the new rules and principles should be the people in those low income countries. So when you talk about that, and is that something that happens in your work as a content gatherer for chorus international? Well, currently I don't work in the capacity of content gatherer. I have done that for another I N G O right now. My role really is what's under my purview is ensuring that all of our direct response fundraising is well done and goes out to our donors and that we're communicating with our donors stories of actual people. We actually called our donors and the people that we serve neighbors. That's one of the terms that we use so that the people don't seem so far away. It's important that these neighbors are connected in a pure and authentic way. And I do that through mailings, through email, through texting, and that's the program that I'm responsible for right now. I am not the actual person that gathers those stories. I can talk about how story gathering happens in our organization. So we never collect is a bad word because we're not just taking pictures of people randomly. We're not just writing stories randomly. We're speaking with people. We're asking them what story would they like to tell? And I think that that is the important part about the shift in power. Yes, a shift in power needs to take place. A shift in language needs to take place. Who is setting those rules is the key. Okay, so at this organization, how do you do that? Do you do it as a team? So, yeah, we do have individuals that are on our team and also contractors that we use that go out and collect stories, but we have certain rules around how we gather these stories, how we engage with people and how we talk to people. Yes, because I know in one of the email correspondence that we had, you wrote, you know, the future of I and Joes is in trouble if we move away from authentic storytelling because of our own guilt and inability to share difficult things. And that really struck me because I teach storytelling all the time. And the question that I get usually from white people, I mean, just being honest, many fundraisers I speak to, they're so afraid of being exploitative and unethical in the stories that they tell and that they gather. And they're often really hesitant to either use them for fundraising or they find that program officers people in the field doing the work are a little bit reticent to share these stories because as one client put it, I don't want to just trot out our clients to raise some dollars. And I said, Oh my gosh, so how do you get around this like mindset shift and and how do you tackle it in your work. That is so good. There are a few things that that you really can do. One of the thing is when you're telling someone story or sharing the story that they would like to share, you're speaking to them as a person and as an individual. You're letting them know, you know, if we are to use your story, it can be on the internet. It can be meld out to, you know, thousands of people. Would you still like to tell your story? What would you like to share with people? I think that that is very important in the gathering process. I will also say in the gathering process, it is important. I think we need to move into this type of thought process where local story gathering is always going to be the best. That would be the perfect thing. After that, number two would be having the story. Gathers match the heritage of those people that are being shown in that story. That way you can get a more authentic story. I'll tell you why. The third best thing will be someone of another race, a white person, let's say, that is gathering the story. That should be option three. I want to talk a little bit about that option two. For example, I'm a black American. Raised in a middle-class home, never had a hungry day. But I'm a better option than a white story gatherer. I'm especially a better option than a white male story gatherer. Why? Because when you're out in country collecting those stories, a white male story gatherer is going to stand far off from the person that they're talking to just as a sign of respect. Whereas I am going to sit down on the ground with that person. Hold their baby. Sit hip to hip with another woman and we're going to have a conversation. What's going to happen is even though I'm an American and this person is from some other country because our skin color is the same, they're going to tell me a lot more than they're going to tell you. I'm going to get a more authentic true story. That's just being honest in what it is. People may not like to hear that, but that is the truth. I've been told many times when I'm in country. Oh my goodness. I didn't know you were coming. I know exactly what that means. And one person said, I expected a white man in a suit. And it was like almost a sigh of relief. Like I can talk to you. So that does make a difference when people have been so exploited and so mistreated and so abused in so many ways. So I think that that is important. Another thing that I wanted to talk about, Julia, is why it's important to not tell only stories of hope and self-actualization and tell stories of real need, stories of survival, which is the place where people are. It's important because when we swing the pendulum too far, we end up in the same situation that we found ourselves in in America in 2020, where, you know, when George Floyd, when that story erupted in America, and I know I'm painting with broad brushes here, but black Americans were grieved. We were angry, but we weren't surprised. White Americans surprised. And why was that? Because for the last in our recent history, when we elected a black president and, you know, we had the Cosby show on TV, we painted this picture that things had changed that we were in this post racial society when black Americans knew that that wasn't true. And so by painting this picture of hope and this good-natured new way of living, you crippled society in a sense to a point that when something this drastic happened, people were shocked and surprised. When black people all along had continued to experience racism, we continued to experience something like microaggressions in the workplace, or something as extreme as what happened in the case of George Floyd, we continued to experience traffic stops and people following you around the store, and even simple things like people thinking you weren't as good as or as capable as or being underemployed. You know, the list goes on and on. We had continued and still are continuing to experience those things, but everyone was so shocked and surprised. And we had, you know, this collective eye roll like, no, yeah, this is what's going on. So I do think that that applies here. If we swing the pendulum too far in the type of photos that we gather, the type of stories that we tell, in 20 years, we're going to be very surprised because we haven't been honest and truthful and authentic. That's such an important point about storytelling and also about white people being surprised, and also a lot of people that I knew, white people being incredibly uncomfortable, talking about it or addressing it, because it was calling out, obviously, you know, their own unconscious bias and potentially their own racism, you know, inherent racism. So I try to do my best work, and people know in the podcast, like, sometimes I put my foot in my mouth and I don't always say things perfectly, but I try to be an ally. That's really all I can do in this work. So I wonder how can white women or white men or people that are like, cisgender, how can people be allies, but not be performative. And I also want to recognize that I know it's not your responsibility to tell me how to do it, and I know that I need to do the work, and I am doing the work, but I would just love your personal thoughts on that. Thank you for saying it that way, because I want people to also understand that these are my personal thoughts, and not the thoughts of every black fundraiser, and not the thoughts of every black person. And I do think that allyship is important. I do think that allyship is essential. I'm so glad you're doing that work in so many other people. You know, so many friends of mine and so many other people are doing that work. I had friends come to me and say, I really didn't know. And it was a great way to open up some of those very personal and intimate conversations. So while allyship is important, I think it's an opportunity for white people in particular to reflect, to make change, to take action. But I think it's a slippery slope, because if white people start leading the charge on that and calling out racism, when I think that it's my role to call out racism, when white people start setting the rules of how things should be now, then we recreate that power dynamic that we're all fighting against. And so it's like a neo-colonialism. When white people say, oh, we all need to change, and we realize we need to change, that part is good. But when you say now, let's let us change the rules, now we've taken it a step too far. Right. And I want to go back to what you were talking about in terms of being a story-gatherer, and who the person is is so critical. And I just want to share a story of when I was a development director. I'm from Boston. I moved to Virginia, worked in Hampton, Virginia, Newport News, Virginia at a domestic violence shelter and prevention program. And I was the only white employee, my executive director, everyone that worked there was a person of color. And I really understood that I was not the person that should be getting the stories, or going to the support group and listening in and trying to figure it all out. So I really want fundraisers to know that you might have the best intentions, but building those bridges and learning and just being willing to listen and being willing to put your ego aside a little bit, and know that you know, sure, you might have all of these brilliant ideas, but you need to build up that trust first, and you need to talk to the people on the ground because it wasn't even necessarily a race issue. It was like an issue of I was from the Northeast and between the Northeast and the South. Things are a lot different. So I think that what I learned in that position was I couldn't just say, I need some stories for the newsletter. I need some stories for social media, because the program officers, they built this trust for years and were incredibly protective as they should be about their clients. And I really needed to spend some time, you know, working, working with them and in conversation with them about why, like you said, authentic storytelling is important, but we're going to do it in a non exploitative way. And I think that when you're telling someone's true story, that that or sharing their true story is a better way to say it, because we should be authentically sharing what they have told us. When you're sharing someone's authentic story, and you have also given them the choice of whether or not that will be shared and how it will be shared, then we're doing the right thing. But when we have put upon them our own biases and our own guilt about the situation of, oh, they don't want their story told, they would never want that picture shown. They would never, you know, want to say that they're hungry or that they're living in poverty. That's our own bias that's coming into that. And you have not asked them or given them a choice in that. I'm just shaking my head, people can't see it. I'm like nodding my head, not shaking my head, nodding my head. What you just said is so important, and I want to pull out a blog post I've read recently by the Better Fundraising Company. And they wrote, you know, language matters. And they talked about a client that they worked with, who is very uncomfortable saying hungry. They wanted to say food insecure. And the way that Better Fundraising Company, that Steven Screens Company, it was such a great blog post. I'll link to it in the show notes. They understood why saying hungry could make people uncomfortable and could seem exploitative. But the point being was that these people were hungry and that word raises twice as much money. So you really, I love this conversation because I feel like there's two sides of this coin. People that are overly afraid of offending people and then people that are willing to share the hard stories and kind of get flack for it. And the way that I always see it is you want to be authentic, but you don't want a sugarcoat. Like you said, if you send out an email that says, everything's great, everything's fine, we're doing great work. Oh, there's no problem here. Not only is that not going to raise money, that's not the reality. So just even going beyond the fundraising point, it's not reality. And I have always seen our job as exposing the really hard truths. And we know that the COVID has proved and way before COVID, the safety net has a million holes in it. It's our job. I've always seen it as nonprofits job to be educating people on the need and that this problem is real. So how can we get over this? How can we really step into our truth and say, this is the problem and do it in a way authentically? Yeah, and change cannot happen until we see, hear and read hard things. It never happens in history. It doesn't ever happen until we see the hard thing. And that's when we take these huge shifts. And so if our job is whatever our organization has said is mission is solving, if we don't authentically tell that, we're not doing our jobs very well at all. And how we do that, we have to keep having this conversation. We have to also look at our hiring practices, stateside, you know, and in Canada and in any other high income country that has these types of organizations. We need to look at our hiring practices and make sure that we are hiring people that are from those countries, have heritage from those countries, and or also inclusive of the people of color that are in our own country. I think that that is important. That's how we will get the truth out there. That's how we will solve some, many of these complex problems that these countries are experiencing. That's how we will help people. Involving constituents, involving clients. I'm trying to think of a better word. You say neighbors. Yes, we say neighbors, we say program participants, you know, people that are participating in our programs. That's the language we like to use most often. So what is sort of your top piece of advice that you would give to a fundraiser listening to this that is getting inspired that wants to kind of change the culture around storytelling or at their organization? Where should they start? Oh, that is a great question. I wouldn't say that I'm the expert on where they should start. I think this is a conversation that is burgeoning, that is new, and maybe I need to think about ways to keep this conversation going and really provide some tools for people that could help us come together. Right now, if someone is inspired, we can share in the show notes my email address, right? I have no problem with people reaching out to me directly and emailing me to talk about this, to talk about it more. And maybe together we can come up with some ideas on where people can start, what people can do. Because I haven't quite heard this perspective before, but I think it's an important one. It's definitely important. And what do you see as the future of fundraising? Like where is fundraising going post pandemic? Obviously, we are still experiencing COVID, but allegedly the pandemic's over. I don't know. I'm not. I'm not a doctor. Okay. I'm not a, you know, communicable disease specialist, but where do you see where do you see the future of like international NGOs fundraising? What are the trends that you're seeing in terms of fundraising communications? Well, I will say I am seeing the trends of, you know, people really standing boldly and creating this time of the shift in power. I really want for it to be authentic and not performative. I really want for the right people to be at the table as these decisions are being made. And that means program participants. That means country directors. That means local people. I am very pleased with Oxfam's language guide. You know, that was recently published and that they are standing firm in how we use language. And I appreciate that throughout that guy, they said the people that we are referring to are the authority, you know, on how and what is said. And because who sets the rules is what matters. Any advice for a fundraiser that wants to start having these conversations with maybe an executive director or a board that's a little more hesitant. Right. I think that they can share with them some of these materials that are circulating. Oh, I forget the author's name, but I saw another article on LinkedIn, actually one that Vic shared with me. And I can find the link and you can maybe add that one as well. And this was an author who I can't remember the details around the author. But again, talking about this shift in power, it's something that people are talking about. We need to find more ways to come together to continue to talk about this. I wish I had more tools and resources. Oh, no, this is fantastic. And if you think of them, email them to me, I'll put them in the show notes. And I know he put you in the spot a little bit, but Oxfam's language guide, that's a fantastic resource. And I think we can all learn because they are standing firm on what they believe. But I love that statement. The people that you serve should be in the authority. I think that's really the takeaway. This has been absolutely fantastic. Do you have any parting thoughts? And then also, where can people find you? Where can they learn more about you? That's awesome. So my parting thoughts really are just this. Who sets the rules and principles matters? Yes, we need a shift in power. Yes, we need a shift in language. Yes, things need to change. But who is setting those rules is the key. And where people can find me, you can email me at v as in Victor Watson at chorisinternational.org and that's C-O-R-U-S international.org. And you can also find me on LinkedIn. Vailashari Watson. There is no other Vailashari Watson. Nice. And that's V-I-L-A-S-H-E-E-E. Last name is Watson. One last question. Where are you and Paul going next? Where are we going next? We need to think about that because we are celebrating our 22nd anniversary this year. Congratulations. So we need to think about where we would like to go. I know the pandemic spoils our 20th anniversary plans. But it's well my 15th anniversary plans too. See? Yeah, my 15th anniversary year in 2020. So where haven't you been though? You got to figure out somewhere you haven't been. A lot of places I've been on my own because I've been working. But there are places that I definitely would love for him to see that I know he would be very interested in. And he's an amateur photographer. His dad was a professional photographer. So he's very good. And so I know that we would love getting pictures and just enjoying the culture and food especially. Amazing. Well, we will follow your exploits. You and Paul need an Instagram, like a travel Instagram so that we can all follow. Thank you so much, Vailashree for accepting my invitation for being so open and honest and transparent with your comments and your feedback. I really appreciate it. This was absolutely wonderful. So I just want to say thank you so much and can't wait to see what you do next. Oh, thank you, Julia. It was an honor to be invited. I'm an avid listener. I really am. And so it's an honor to be a part of this. Thank you for having me. Well, hey there. I wanted to say thank you for tuning into my show and for listening all the way to the end. If you really enjoyed today's conversation, make sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast app and you'll get new episodes downloaded as soon as they come out. I would love if you left me a rating or a review because this tells other people that my podcast is worth listening to. And then me and my guests can reach even more earbuds and create even more impact. So that's pretty much it. I'll be back soon with a brand new episode. But until then, you can find me on Instagram at Julia Campbell 7.7. Keep changing the world, you non-profit unicorn. ♪♪ ♪♪