Liz Hixson: The Lowest Cost Way to Save A Life
Summary:
In this episode, we speak to Liz Hixson. Liz is a Senior Communications and Development Associate at New Incentives, a GiveWell top-rated charity. New Incentives provides small cash incentives (usually just a few dollars) to caregivers in order to increase childhood vaccination rates. And it works, in Nothern Nigeria, New Incentives has saved thousands of lives from preventable diseases like whooping cough, measles, and pneumonia. Researchers estimate that New Incentive’s program saves one life for every $5,000 in donations.
Some things we touch on in this episode:
What it’s like being an Eastern Orthodox Christian working in a secular public health charity.
The significance of addressing easily preventable diseases.
The kinds of soft skills needed to excel in communications and fundraising work.
Liz’s career advice for university-aged Christians who want to have an impact.
Articles, organizations, and other media discussed in this episode
New Incentives provides small cash incentives to caregivers in order to increase childhood vaccination rates in northern Nigeria.
GiveWell is an independent non-profit focused on helping people do as much good as possible with their donations by evaluating the most effective charities.
World Changers is an organization that empowers orphans and families to crush poverty, embrace Christ, and share their transformation with others.
80,000 Hours is a London-based nonprofit organization that conducts research on which careers have the largest positive social impact and provides career advice based on that research.
Giving What We Can is an effective altruism-associated organization whose members pledge to give at least 10% of their income to effective charities.
EA Global Conference is a series of philanthropy conferences that focuses on the effective altruism movement.
Business Made Simple is a book that covers the basics of professional excellence: personal productivity, communication, how to unite a team around a mission, messaging, and marketing.
Blue Like Jazz is a personal reflection of Donald Miller on Non-Religious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality.
Episode Highlights:
Infant mortality is a massive, solvable problem
“Every 97 seconds, a child in Nigeria under the age of five dies from measles, meningitis, lower respiratory infection, whooping cough, tuberculosis, or diarrheal diseases. And in 2019, this equated to 37% of under-five deaths. And vaccines can prevent most of these.”
On the intrinsic value of humans as beings made in the Imago Deo
“We're all made in the image of God, right? And so whether that's here or across, across the Atlantic, they're still made in the image of God. And Christians were called to care for the downtrodden, human beings have inherent value no matter what they might produce and give and benefit society.”
The scale and effectiveness of vaccine cash incentives
“Our current estimation is that there are 14 states in Nigeria that are cost-effective to work in. And we estimate that we could be reaching — in those 14 states — that we could be reaching up to 2.1 million infants per year in Nigeria alone. And so, assuming a cost per infant of $20, which is what we're currently budgeting for, that annual budget would be approximately 42.5 million to sustain operations at that scale. And as we expand... we are committed to GiveWell’s bar, to be 10 times more effective than GiveDirectly unconditional cash programs.”
College majors for effective nonprofit careers
I think there are lots of different paths to that. So I majored in communications, and then I have a master's in nonprofit administration. So if I had to go back and do it again, I would probably… I think communications was helpful. I wish that I had maybe a minor in business. I'd get some of that accounting, some of that business side of things, which nonprofits are businesses, and so those skills are helpful.
Fundraising in Christian vs. secular settings
“[When] raising funds for a Christian organization… there is that inherent trust that makes all the sense in the world… because it's not just about data, right? Because if you're raising for a Christian organization, there are other things that you both — it's kind of assumed — that you all find that valuable, whatever that that program is or whatever you're doing is… So I can imagine it would definitely be easy to connect with donors because you do have that automatic connection when you share the same faith.”
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D (00:02.798)
Great. Liz, thanks so much for coming on.
Liz (00:05.286)
Yeah, thanks so much for the invite. I'm happy to be here.
JD (00:08.682)
Yeah, so glad you're here. For those who don't know you, could you please search a little bit about your background? You know, what it is you studied and how did you stay busy and work to improve the world?
Liz (00:19.513)
Yeah, yeah. So a little bit about me. So I was raised in a Christian home, grew up, and attended a Southern Baptist Church until I went to college. I went to a small Christian liberal arts school and I majored in communications. And then during the summers, I actually interned or worked with World Changers, which is, it was like a branch of the North American Mission Board, right? And you know, Southern Baptists do missions, a lot of missions. And so I worked for them during the summers.
at World Changers where we put together week-long mission trips for youth to come in and work on substandard housing. So replacing roofs, those sorts of things, handicap ramps. And really it was during this internship that I think it really set me on the trajectory to work in the nonprofit world. I loved getting paid to do something that benefited other people and wasn't just about a paycheck. And so...
Anyway, I graduated two weeks later, got married, and took the first job I could find, because of the stage of life that we were in, right? It was at a dentist's office, nothing that I enjoyed. But anyway, during that year after we got married, my husband and I actually thought about going on the mission field. After like the fourth time, we were told, no, you need to be married for a certain number of years. First, we thought, oh, okay, there must be some wisdom to that.
So we put that on hold. During that time, my husband and I started exploring Anglicanism. We were really drawn to the beauty of liturgy and the history of tradition and faith. It seemed more concrete in an ever-shifting society. So that's where I kind of made the shift in terms of religion for us and for Christianity. So then anyway, moved to Birmingham after I'd been out of college a year.
and that's where my husband went to Divinity School. And it was there that I got my first real job, a full-time job working in the nonprofit sector. It was at a women's and children's homeless shelter. It was not for me, but I learned a lot there. And I worked with volunteers and yeah, communications. Communications, yeah. And so anyway, I got that job and Volunteer Coordination Development Associate learned a lot there.
JD (02:22.41)
What was it that you studied?
Liz (02:36.733)
I then moved on to another job, locally in Birmingham, that was focused on early childhood literacy. And that was way more in my vein. I really enjoyed it. And I was able to, at a small nonprofit, wear lots of hats. And so I was able to work in a variety of roles there, from coordinating volunteers to development to chief operating officer, marketing, and everything in between during my seven years there.
And then this past summer, after 10 years of being in the Anglican Church, six years, my husband served as a priest. We actually decided to leave for a variety of reasons. I needed to look for a new job. And that's when I stumbled upon new incentives on a job board, like idealist.org. I think it was not 80,000 hours. It was nothing EA-related. I stumbled upon this job and until I was hired, I had never heard of effective altruism and I didn't know what gift well was.
And looking back, I don't know how that was possible being in the nonprofit sector for almost a decade. But because it was so locally focused and I was never working at larger organizations or in global development, I guess I just missed it and I actually just talked to somebody the other day who said the same thing and I thought that's crazy. So anyways, yeah.
JD (03:57.15)
And for those who aren't as familiar, how would you define effective altruism? What is it? And, and, and how did you, how did you get involved in that?
Liz (04:05.017)
Yeah, I mean, so I got involved in it because I got hired by new incentives, to be honest. Like it wasn't, I was interested in effective altruism and then found a job within that framework. But right, effective altruism is about cost-effective solutions and maximizing impact, right? So we're focused on data-driven and evidence-based results. And so that really resonated with me once I found it. And you know is I'm one enneagram and so I thought ah
JD (04:39.018)
especially Christian comments, by the way, only in a Christian podcast where someone just casually dropped their Enneagram. Yeah.
Liz (04:42.513)
Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah. So, um, so as an Enneagram one, I was like, oh, this is, this is, this is what I've been looking for. Um, anyways, I, well, I'll talk maybe more about it later, but in terms of, um, I wanted something, I think I'd always been searching for something that was more efficient, more effective. Like that's what I'm always looking for in every area of life. And so when I
Literally stumbled across this just looking for any job with new incentives. I thought where has this been this makes so much This makes so much sense So yeah
JD (05:16.558)
Amazing. And we care a bit about the global problem that you're tackling at New Incentive. And you can talk more about how New Incentive tackles that. Maybe with New Incentive, you're working in the realm of neglected comparable diseases, right? And vaccination writ large. But maybe you could share a bit about why that's a problem, why that attracted you, and maybe
Liz (05:40.876)
Yeah, so at New Incentives, we are focused first and foremost on cost-effectively saving lives. But guided by evidence, we provide cash incentives to increase childhood vaccination rates. So we're really focused on those routine childhood immunizations. Nigeria has some of the highest under-five mortality rates and the lowest vaccination rates in the world.
So every 97 seconds, a child in Nigeria under the age of five dies from measles, meningitis, lower respiratory infection, whooping cough, tuberculosis, or diarrheal diseases. And in 2019, this equated to 37% of under-five deaths. Now, some of those, the...
JD (06:25.07)
So in the time that we started this podcast, there were four deaths from one of these four diseases, as he mentioned.
Liz (06:30.769)
Right, right, from one of those diseases. And vaccines can prevent most of those, right? So there's of course some lower respiratory infections or diarrheal diseases that aren't prevented by vaccines, but there's a large portion that are prevented by certain vaccinations. So some of these diseases, right, you might've heard of them, but you probably, those who are listening probably haven't experienced them firsthand because if you're living in the US or if you're living in the UK, right,
you have greater access to vaccines, we have herd immunity, and we have a better health infrastructure, right? So measles, right? It's usually spread via direct contact. It's highly contagious. It's a viral respiratory disease, and particularly it affects children, right? And so fever, runny nose, cough, and of course, a rash that develops on the face and spreads throughout the body, right? But in 1963, when a vaccine came out, it dramatically reduced.
the annual mortality rate, which at that time was 2.6 million. Right. But still over 200,000 people die every year from measles. Right. We've also got tuberculosis, right. Highly contagious bacterial disease that spreads when you cough or when you talk or seeing sneeze. Um, symptoms are cough, chest pain, right. But in 2021, 1.6 million people died from tuberculosis. Um, so it might not be our reality, but it is someone's reality.
Diphtheria, actually interesting enough and sadly enough, has actually, there's been an outbreak of diphtheria actually in Nigeria, in one of the states where we've been working this summer. So it's known as the strangling angel of children. But that's again permanent. So symptoms include inflammation of the nose, throat, and windpipe, which restricts respiration.
And in June, there were almost 800 outbreaks in Nigeria and the vast majority of those were in one single state in Kano state where we work. Of those cases, 10% resulted in death and 72% of the confirmed cases were kids ages two to 14. So these diseases are, it's serious and even though it's not serious a reality in our stage of life
Liz (08:51.767)
where we live, it's very serious for those in low-income countries.
JD (08:59.039)
It's really hard to translate those numbers into something that I would have a reference for here in the United States. I mean, what, something like over a million deaths by tuberculosis every year? That's, I mean, that's incredible. That's like a quarter of some states dying. I mean, that's, I'm not sure what the numbers for COVID deaths are, but that's probably close to the magnitude of the number of COVID deaths we had. And that happens every year from just one disease that we know how to prevent. And I know death isn't the only negative outcome, right? Like some of these diseases, if they can kill you, they can probably almost kill you and leave you quite impaired for the rest of your life. What are we talking about there with regard to longer-lasting symptoms?
Liz (09:32.71)
Yeah, yeah.
Liz (09:42.825)
Absolutely. Yeah.
Liz (09:51.097)
Yeah, that is because I'm not a doctor or a pediatrician. That is a little bit beyond my scope. But whenever, yeah, I don't know. But I have a good answer for that right off the top of my head, J.D.
JD (10:05.114)
Sure, sure. You know, it kind of raises the question of why more people don't get vaccinated. I know some people have years of vaccines, but others might not just know that these are really preventable diseases. So why aren't more Nigerians, especially when new incentives work, why are more Nigerians getting vaccinated under their own will?
Liz (10:29.789)
Yeah, yeah. So imagine with me for a second. You live in a region of the world that has limited telecommunications, limited infrastructure. You have low mobile phone access, probably don't even have a mobile phone at all. You experience frequent power outages. You live in, surrounded by difficult terrain in a remote area with high rates of insecurity and banditry. Oh, and it's also hard to get running water.
Right? A good day consists of earning just enough to feed yourself and your children. Because malnutrition is a source of infant death. It's common, but not as common as death from preventable diseases. You face difficult choices daily. Opportunity costs that you have to weigh when choosing between to travel to a clinic and vaccinate your child and selling fish at the market. So you have funds to buy the necessary.
the necessary, fulfill the necessary needs of your household. You might have to go into the hot sun with the hope of gathering enough crop, right, to sell. And so the, you may also, and additionally, you might have a spouse who, for a variety of reasons, may not want you to visit a clinic or to get your child vaccinated, including the fact that social benefits that have been promised historically to you and to your family, to your parents, are almost non-existent. So the obstacles, right, and this is just a take.
of what the typically mothers face when bringing their children in to get vaccinated. So the obstacles that you and I face pale in comparison to the complex choices and obstacles that you have to overcome when living in extreme poverty. You know, my kids aren't always on time with their vaccines and because I have to take off work to go take them to the pediatrician, right? Like, and I don't have to, I don't have an obstacle to overcome with.
JD (12:19.37)
you're not working for the next meal, literally, right? You're not in that state of survival, right?
Liz (12:22.157)
Right, right. I'm not worried about putting food on my table, about paying rent, about transportation to and from the pediatrician. I even have a flexible work schedule. I mean, there are so many... I have very, very few obstacles and I have a hard time getting my kids vaccinated on time, if I'm honest. And so that's why. That's why more Nigerians aren't
Liz (12:51.101)
Just general vaccine hesitancy, which we all know about now that we've gone through COVID Everybody's very familiar with vaccine hesitancy. And so we also work in addition to cash incentives To just help overcome And compensate for some of those obstacles that they have to that they have to overcome. We also Do a lot work and do a lot of awareness in the communities where we work to spread the message about the life-saving benefits of vaccinations
as well as our cash incentive, and also address misconceptions and hesitancies among community members.
JD (13:33.09)
thinking about this, and I'm also wondering, like, why wouldn't the government step in and be more? Is this the case where the government is, is this doesn't have the funding to do it or, and this is one critique you hear of nonprofits that come in and offer social services, or like goods that some would argue the government can provide. What's your sense of why the Nigerian government isn't more on top of it when it comes to administering vaccines?
Liz (13:37.973)
Mm.
Liz (14:00.449)
So I would say, so it's important to note that our program actually works very closely with the Nigerian government. So it's administered in collaboration with local and state and the state government. So we don't build clinics, they've built clinics. We work in more than 4900 of their government clinics. We don't buy vaccines, but we support the government with improving vaccine supply as our program generates more demand, right? We also
JD (14:29.243)
It's actually a good segway. Why don't you share a bit more specifically about your program and how is it the new incentive is able to provide these vaccines and meet these needs.
Liz (14:33.903)
Okay.
Yeah.
Right, yeah, so as I mentioned earlier, our first and foremost, we're dedicated to saving lives in a way that does the most good per dollar. So we talked about just the general idea of effective altruism is cost effective, high impact, evidence-based. So guided by evidence, our particular program, we provide cash incentives to increase childhood vaccination rates. So how it works is a caregiver brings their child to a government clinic.
uh to receive vaccinations and then new incentive staff we after those are administered our staff are there um and they verify that the vaccine was actually given and then they provide the cash incentive and then remind the caregiver about upcoming visits because there are six routine immunization visits um and then uh you know we had we participated in a randomized control trial
2020. And so the results of that RCT show that our program doubled vaccination rates. So over those six visits that a caregiver comes in each time, they are, we are, we give them 1000 naira, which today exchange rate I think is about $1.30 or $1.50. So not much. It's just a little bit. Yeah. Less than a coffee, right? Yeah. I mean, if you're going to Starbucks, that's like three coffees.
JD (15:59.958)
set of coffees, right?
Liz (16:05.425)
You know, you have to have three times that amount to get a latte, right? But that's enough to provide transportation to the clinic or to compensate for lost wages for that day. So yeah, so that's what I call maybe the main part of our program, but the other two parts are very important. And one is being that we also generate awareness. So last month alone, we attended 3,400 awareness activities. So
These are just like town meetings, right? Held in the communities. The goal of these is to generate awareness about lifesaving benefits of vaccines and our cash incentive program, as well as address misconceptions about vaccines. And these, we aren't just going out and doing these solo. These are actually, we try to stay behind the scenes and just kind of like orchestrate and help make them happen. But really they're led by community leaders, right? Because they have the relationships.
and they have the sway and they have the pull on the communities. And so we're just there to support, help answer questions about the program. But really those are led by community leaders and traditional leaders that we engage. And then we also help and just support the government in ensuring there's enough vaccine supply to meet the increased demand that our program is generating. Right. So if the RCT shows that
that where we operate, it doubles the amount of children who are fully vaccinated. You got to have more vaccines to make that to make that possible. So we support the government, you know, in that way as well. So in terms of like our program, so we started in 2017, we started to scale up our program in the beginning of 2021 after we were named GiveWell Top charity. And so by the time this podcast comes out, we'll have actually reached our two million infants since enrolling.
And the crazy thing about that is 1 million of those, we've reached, we've enrolled in the past nine months. Like that's how quickly we're scaling our program.
JD (18:03.532)
Well.
JD (18:09.034)
Wow. I think I saw the history of your revenues at New Incentives and your program size, and it's like a doubling almost every single year, like the last four years or so, growing rapidly.
Liz (18:20.401)
Yeah, yeah. So like last October, so October of 2022, yeah, October of 2022, we hit an exciting benchmark. And that's where we had enrolled more infants last year than all previous years combined, which is really exciting. But we're about to do that again, this year. And
JD (18:42.517)
Is this one of the largest vaccine administrators in the world? Or what other charities are doing vaccine drives like this?
Liz (18:50.437)
Well, so we don't administer vaccines. So we are just providing the cash incentive so that people are coming to the government clinics to take advantage of the infrastructure that the government has provided. Yeah.
JD (18:56.674)
just providing me incentives.
JD (19:04.772)
Are there any other vaccine incentivizers out there? Is this a new model or has this been done in other places with other demographics before?
Liz (19:16.873)
Yeah, so there's definitely literature out there about like about cash incentives being used for a variety of health incentives. There's also there's a there was a there was a study done I think in India about incentivizing vaccinations just by giving like a by giving a quantity of lentils. So it has been tried before. When it comes to current program.
I know they're more popular in South America, cash incentive programs particularly.
JD (19:50.746)
Yeah, but it sounds like new incentives wasn't even recommitted to doing past incentives. You just wanted to save the lives, the most cost-effectively as possible. And this was shown to be one of the best ways to do it. You could give somebody a box 30, they'd be much more likely to get vaccinated. And we know that vaccines are extremely effective at reducing disease mortality. So it sounds like that was discovered, you know, years ago and you've just been ramping up since then quite successfully.
Liz (20:06.994)
Yeah.
Liz (20:12.104)
Thank you.
Liz (20:18.073)
Yeah, right. So our founder, and maybe you can link to it, but there's a great talk that our founder gave at the last EA Global Conference. And she kind of walks through the history of new incentives. And it's really fascinating. And she talks a little bit about like how, right, how she started. We actually, we've gone through several iterations. We've pivoted many times. And that's because from the beginning, the focus was cost effective, evidence based and something, an intervention that was scalable. So we are...
One of our earlier iterations was actually incentivizing the delivery for mothers to come and deliver at health clinics. But it didn't work, right? Another one was the prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV. Again, I think that one was effective, but it wasn't scalable. And so from the beginning cash incentives.
Which she'll tell if you go listen to that talk And she explains it way better than I do because she was there And but the cash incentives has really been the model from the beginning because it's been a proven cost-effective You know to pair with health intervention that was just finding that health intervention where it worked And so it took us a couple of tries, but we she finally did it
JD (21:36.746)
imagining what it would have been like, that new incentives, maybe years ago, working on some of those earlier programs with HIV and being like, oh, no, we shouldn't switch the past incentives for vaccines. Like that's the complete departure of what we're about as an organization and would be like that would be too blocked for all the people with HIV. And I mean, you know, in hindsight, we can say that was the right move, given that, you know, you did find a really, really successful program, just able to help many, many more people. And of course, somebody else can step in.
Liz (21:52.405)
Thank you.
Liz (22:02.037)
Right. Yeah, yeah. So she talks a lot about that. Of course, I wasn't there because I've been around for a year. But she did. She talks about how like the whole team invested a whole lot in that program and felt emotionally attached to it. Right. But Yeah, yeah. So she talks a lot about that. Of course, I wasn't there because I've been around for a year. But, but she did. She talks about how like the whole team invested a whole lot in that program and felt emotionally attached to it. Right. But
JD (22:05.778)
and help with HIV treatments. But I don't think he really kind of speaks for us.
JD (22:21.334)
Right, right. It's hard to pivot, right? Non-public do this, right? They get entrenched in the ways they know about making an impact and Was there something distinctive about new incentives? It sounds like it was grounded in the ethos, right? That we're going to be flexible and update to that whichever health lives most effectively and treats disease most cost effectively. It's kind of into the DNA, right, of new incentives.
Liz (22:25.062)
It is.
Liz (22:43.747)
Right, yeah, from...
Very much so very much so and that's very evident right as she tells the story of from the very beginning What what her goals were as we went through a good give well incubation grant as we? You know give well as they were kind of walking Through it with us and they were actually encouraging us to phase out of the program Because it wasn't a cost-effective scalable intervention and so that objective decision-making and ability to avoid the sunk cost fallacy
she kind of attributes that was really helpful in the decision-making process, because that is a hard decision. It's a hard decision to make. But yes, it's very much in the DNA from the beginning, or else like why would you have pivoted? Because it's a program that it still did good. You could have sold it to somebody who, right, who was dedicated to that particular health intervention and who, right, had an emotional tie to it. But that wasn't the goal. The goal was to be able to save as many lives as possible in the most cost-effective way.
JD (23:23.39)
Yeah.
JD (23:31.67)
Right, right.
JD (23:46.462)
I love that. I love it. What a beautiful way to, to try to pass for the impact. And right now, I think GiveWell, the charity evaluator estimates that it costs roughly about four or $5,000 to save somebody's life through new incentive programs. What's really the end goal? Is new incentives going to eliminate all that by preventable diseases in Nigeria? Or like, where do you draw the line as, okay, now we've, now we've made it.
fight our part. Are you looking to just expand vaccination programs across Nigeria? I know you don't run them, you just intensify them, but is the goal to intensify vaccinations for all households in Nigeria or where do you draw the line?
Liz (24:31.073)
Right, yeah, that's a great question. So yeah, I don't think we're slowing down anytime soon. So we're continuing to expand. So kind of that next step that we have talked about is that we estimate that there's 14 states in Nigeria that are cost-effective to work in, right? Because again, remember, cost-effective and evidence-based, right? Like those are our goals. And so not all states are gonna be cost-effective.
JD (24:55.287)
That's the one where there isn't like a pre-existing bias against getting vaccinated, right? You don't want to work in areas where people are already really, I mean, trends, biases again, timing up, they're just maybe too busy. They don't have, like you mentioned, they have to go to work. They don't have the time to carve out to go to the clinic.
Liz (25:05.469)
Right.
Liz (25:13.133)
Right, right. So there are states in Nigeria that have higher baseline vaccination rates and those states are not going to be cost effective for us to be in them too. You know, our current estimation is that there's 14 states in Nigeria that are cost effective to work in and we estimate that we could be reaching in those 14 states that we could be reaching up to 2.1 million infants per year in Nigeria alone. And so kind of the scale of that, right, assuming a cost per infant of $20, which is what we're currently budgeting for.
That annual budget would be approximately 42.5 million to sustain operations at that scale. Now of course as we expand, we are like those states could change because we are committed to give well to bar that wherever we expand to is going to be 10 times more effective, right? Then give directly to unconditional cash programs, right? So right now we're in nine states.
JD (26:05.259)
We had Paul from GiveDirectly on another podcast a bit earlier. So I'm sorry he's rooting for you guys. And of course, that's a great benchmark. And I think Paul would be very, very happy that you made the comparison. Yeah.
Liz (26:10.878)
Yeah!
Liz (26:18.333)
Yeah, yeah, I mean, and yeah, so, so yeah, so 10 times right more cost effective. That's, that's the bar that GiveWell set has set in order to fund expansion. Right now, you know, we started in northern Nigeria, and we're kind of expanding out from there. And so northern Nigeria is the poorest region. And some of the states that we're operating in right now are actually more than eight times.
18 times cost effective. So that's kind of what those plans look like when it comes to interventions, vaccine interventions in Nigeria. So, but I don't even think that we've already started exploring asking the question, what would it look like to go outside of Nigeria? Also, what would it look like to expand other cost-effective health interventions within Nigeria? We already have the infrastructure.
Right. We already have the data collection and the valid data validation And the oddest auditing structure the back-end side of things in place, right? So to make sure that we know that supplies get to where they're supposed to go that staff are where they say they are That's a correct amount gets dispersed. Like what are how else could we build upon that?
system and infrastructure that we've already built. But right now, the next concrete step is 14 states and Nigeria and enrolling 2.1 million infants a year.
JD (27:39.339)
Right, right.
JD (27:46.726)
Nice. I want to talk a bit more about your particular role in helping me making that happen, help closing that funding gap. I want to address real quick maybe one or two potential criticisms or challenges I've heard about this potential model. One is just this idea of what would happen if we incentivize all healthcare treatments, whether that's preventative treatments like vaccines or
be worming public, if we're paying people to do this, aren't we a risk of creating a culture where people are only going to do this if they get paid for it, right? Like if we were already incentivizing millions to get vaccines, what happens if new incentives operating overnight? Is this going to be like a Tom's
JD (28:40.97)
the natural state of things? How do you respond to that sort of criticism?
Liz (28:46.129)
Yeah. So one of the things that we do at New Incendies is we do coverage monitoring surveys. So before we expand into an area, we do baseline assessments. These were developed in line with, we worked with ID Insight to develop this, but baseline coverage surveys, as well as follow-up surveys every six months after we begin, six to 12 months after we begin operating. And one of the things that we do measure,
And there's certainly more work to be done in this area of intrinsic motivation, right? But one of the things we, we measure is a caregiver's reason for getting vaccinated. And so I would say that one of the important parts of our program is that second part that I talked about, and that's the vaccine awareness. And so we're going into the communities where we're, we're forging relationships, right? Because we hire all locals, right? So they're also a part of the community, our, our employees, and we're addressing vaccine hesitancy and misconceptions.
and educating on vaccine, on the efficacy of vaccines. And so that would kind of be the first thing that I would say is that it's more than just handing out cash, we're doing education alongside of it. And you can see in our coverage survey results online, just the initial ones that we have actually published.
JD (30:10.846)
to link this into the podcast. We'll have some more resources if you visit our website page for this podcast.
Liz (30:13.296)
Yeah.
Liz (30:17.817)
Yeah, yeah. So you can see that, right? We asked the reasons for vaccinating. And so, we can see that people, that the main incentive, the self-reported incentive is to prevent disease and illness. It's not for the cash. And so again, I would argue that cash helps, again, just overcome those barriers that I talked about earlier. But there's certainly more evidence and more research to be done in terms of intrinsic motivation.
One of the things that I will mention is the way that our funding model is set up is that we don't expand into a new LGA or local government area until we have Funding to operate in that area for two years because we don't want to go into a community and then pull out three months later And we want to build We want to build relationships with the local stakeholders and develop trust and so
If we were to pull out of an area, it would be done so responsibly and in enough time for us to disperse the promised cash incentives to caregivers.
JD (31:25.486)
That's a good response. You know, another challenge I heard, which I wasn't fully sympathetic towards, but was a bit curious how this plays out, is this question about how supply chains work with vaccines, and if in some way the way that new incentives is clustering vaccines, that this would create some supply shortages in other parts of West Africa. Is that indeed the case? Is there like a fixed amount of vaccines, and there's a...
a shortage if we will and it maybe new incentive does encourage more people to get vaccinated but in total the same number of people are being vaccinated or maybe some in some places some people in some places are now not able to get vaccinated is there any way to that argument?
Liz (32:19.233)
So we work with, we work in close collaboration with the government with cold chain officers, right? So those are the government employees who are responsible for keeping those vaccines cold and moving them from one location to another. And so we have worked on, we communicate with them often and they have been able to procure more vaccines as we've been able to increase demand. So the kind of collaboration that goes on there
So the cold chain supply in Nigeria, it looks like comes from the manufacturer to the national cold chain store, then those vaccines go out to the zonal. So like Nigeria split up into different zones. So it'll go to the zone and then it goes to the state cold chain store, then to the LGA, down to what's called an apex health facility. So that's the facility that typically, the bigger one that has refrigeration, then down to the clinic, and then even sometimes then out into villages.
as they do outreaches to reach those hard to reach infants. So we have been working closely with the government to just help with coordination, communication, and identifying bottlenecks. And so we've been able to work with them to identify when additional vaccines might be running low and they can provide top-up supplies. Sometimes it's not even getting more vaccines.
or procuring more, sometimes it's just being able to transport them to the right place. Because global development is messy. And there are things like vast power outages and there are civil, you know, there can be violence, there are, you know, armed, you might have to have like an armed guard, like escorting the vaccines like down the road that is right. And so, so there's, there's lots of
JD (34:06.486)
Okay.
Liz (34:10.229)
coordination and we're able to share data to say, hey, this is where, our officers are noting that there are, there are stock vaccine stock-outs. How can we get this remedied? And so that coordination has been really helpful in just getting vaccines to, to where they need to go, just because we're being able to share data and you know, and just support them as they make that possible.
JD (34:36.458)
I'd like to talk a bit about your specific role working in communications and fundraising. I want you to summarize that in about a minute or two, besides coming on a podcast like this. What is it that you personally do for new incentives and what's that been like for you?
Liz (34:49.697)
Yeah, so at New Incentives, so I, my, my title is Senior Communications and Development Associate. I focus more on internal communications as well as external communications, whether it be social media, website, or building relationships with some of our funding partners. The GiveWell side of things has always and will remain with some of our senior leadership, like our CEO and COO. So...
It's ranged from database management with all of our individual donors and those donations that come in through organizations like Giving What We Can or other funding partners, website, being able to communicate what we do. One of the things that we're focusing on right now is more photos and stories because that is really important, but we're also like beings who resonate with story. And I think that's...
And I think that's important. And I think being motivated by narrative and story is a good thing, especially when it's paramedic because it provides more context. We can talk about two million infants. But if I tell you about Rashida and her baby, like it just provides some context there for those really big numbers. So that's kind of what I work on.
JD (36:10.826)
Yeah, yeah, that's what's that been like working as someone who was active in communications roles in the past or other charities, I think also Christian charities, who's coming to a secular organization that talks all about numbers and data and is working with all these
JD (36:39.67)
probably part of the reason why they hired you. But what happened like working at new incentives versus working at other organizations that maybe, maybe not, I'm not as familiar, but maybe weren't as data driven as new incentives.
Liz (36:52.817)
Yeah, so the two previous organizations I worked with, neither of them were actually Christian organizations. But they were, the first one was not really focused on data at all. And that was really.
frustrating to me because I felt like part of it was the sector that it was in, but also the way it went about it. It was frustrating because I felt like, what are we really accomplishing here? The second organization definitely valued data. And so one of the projects that I got to work on and was really rewarding to me was I worked with our chief academic officer. So we provided one-on-one tutoring to second graders who are behind in moving.
Liz (37:34.933)
a tool to assess students and how they were progressing in their skills, in different skill sets. And so it was this system that we created that the tutors could actually give to the students so we could get real-time data on how they were progressing through the curriculum and give feedback, right? Like that feedback loop to the tutors to say, hey, this is where, this is what's missing and this is what they're doing well in. So anyways, so that was...
Um, I enjoyed that. That was like an awesome project. And I don't know that I could have put into words, but I didn't even know that this whole, like that you could totally take data to the next level. Right. And so coming to new incentives is actually for me been really, uh, refreshing because we look at the data and that's how we make decisions. We're not making decisions based on emotions. We're not making decisions based on what the donor wants, which is just.
Being in the fundraising world.
JD (38:35.302)
What's that like, right? Cause you, I mean, you're having conversations with major donors who obviously care more about just the data, right? Donors are generally, I guess it depends on the organization. I imagine the donors you're talking to are pretty motivated by data if they're giving to new incentives. But how do you strike that balance also knowing when a donor cares about data or when a donor cares about stories? Is it just talking to them, getting a sense of what they care about and then playing up that part of what new incentive does?
I imagine it takes also a lot of like soft skills to be able to read that in a donor. And I'm assuming a lot of your time is talking to donors and imagining what donors are thinking, right, with crafting communication techniques and outreach campaigns.
Liz (39:15.669)
So, so I, yeah, I mean, so, so I would say, so we don't spend a whole lot of, well, let me put it this way. So my time, the way that it's divided, I probably spend more of my time actually communicating with our funding partners, right? Like giving an update to the life you can save so that they can disseminate that information because most a lot of our funding, right? Besides obviously like give well.
A lot of our funding from individuals comes in through what we call these funding partner organizations. Right?
JD (39:49.486)
These are communities or funds of givers who are really data driven, who are motivated to save lives at a low cost.
Liz (39:51.825)
Right, right, right. And so these funding partners, they are already associated with the EA community, right? And so they're coming in through different channels just because of who they're connected with or they live in Australia and they wanna get through an organization that they can get tax deductibility from, right? As opposed to directly through us. And so the feedback that I've actually been hearing, which I feel like has actually been a little bit of a shift
in the EA community over the last year. Maybe part of it's because I've just been diving deeper into it in the past couple of months, but I feel like there's a shift going on where more and more EA minded donors want, they wanna hear the stories. They don't wanna do away with the data by any stretch of the imagination, right? And when they go to their website, they're still gonna click on the policy brief for the RCT that we were involved in, right? But they want that context of...
JD (40:38.647)
Right, right.
JD (40:46.006)
You're right.
Liz (40:49.905)
of the real person of the, of Rabiatu or of, of our caregivers and their infants and the, and how this has affected their, their lives. Right? So we have, we have a mother who enrolled her children, twin girls in the program. Her name is Kari Matu and her children's name were Rabiatu and Miriam. And after her neighbor's child nearly died for measles, she was just dedicated to getting her children.
vaccinated. So, um, and that money that she has received bringing her twin girls, you know, instead of carrying two children and walking however many miles or kilometers to the clinic, she's been able to do that to use that money to get a bike ride and to buy other things that her that her children need. And so those sorts of stories, that's what I that's what people are asking for.
Do you have visuals? Do you have short stories just to accompany the data? Because the data is awesome, right? Like again, what's the context of 2 million people? Because that's really hard to wrap our minds around. Or the fact that last month we enrolled over 200,000 infants just in 31 days across nine states. But to just bring it down to that personal relational.
JD (42:00.061)
That's a wild number. Yeah.
Liz (42:08.962)
I think is a really good thing and I think that's just part of being human to be honest.
JD (42:14.51)
Yeah, and I'm curious how this all, I don't know, this is an incredible development and I love these numbers. As a Christian, do you ever get a sense that like, who wants to talk about the numbers, right? Or do you connect this back with your Christian faith? I often think that 200,000, you know, that's hard to conceive, but I know that every single one of these individuals is a proud of God, made in God's image. And...
they have lives and stories and it's just as valuable as my own life and my own story, right? And to me it's hard to feel the difference between like two people and 200,000 people. It's hard to feel, right? Like two people in front of me have measles, 200,000 people somewhere have measles. Like I feel the same way, right? How do you relate to that as a Christian and how do you interpret that through your Christian faith?
Liz (43:03.122)
Mm-hmm.
Liz (43:10.733)
Yeah, I mean, I think one of the things is that a constant reminder that, right, we're all made in the image of, we're all made in the image of God, right? And so whether that's here or across, across the Atlantic, they're still made in the image of God and they deserve, they deserve, you know, as Christians were called to care for the downtrodden, right? And so I would probably go as far as, this might be a little bit
but I would go as far as that I think as Christians, we're called to prioritize things like global health and property over things like animal welfare because human beings are made in the image of God. And so I think just from like a faith perspective, that's where priority should be. And don't get me wrong, like I think the meat industry is atrocious, right? That's just one of many reasons why my family moved to.
a farm, bought a farm with our best friends and my sister and brother-in-law, we want to be closer to the food that we're feeding our family. But I think that there is that, you know, Jesus said, let the little children come to me. Like human beings have inherent value no matter what they might produce and give and benefit society, right? So like my child, my two month old, right? She can do nothing for herself.
let alone to benefit other people, but in the eyes of God, she is immensely valuable. And so I think, like, as Christians remembering that, and of course, like, if you're, if you're within a Christian context, a Christian organization, right, that's a little bit easier to constantly remind individuals of, right, because there's that inherent, that shared, hopefully, value system as opposed to working for a secular organization. But, but I think that's, that's one thing is just remembering, like, they are.
are children of God and they're made in the image of God. And yeah.
JD (45:08.206)
Yeah, how is that working for a secular organization? I've heard some Christians say things like, oh, I would only work for a non-profit if it was Christian. And it's clearly articulated, Christian mission statement. But the non-profit rebirth was, we're not Christian, the one you're with now is not a Christian, and yet it's doing these wonderful things. What would you say to a person who feels like they, you know, they need to work for a Christian organization and how's it been for you?
Liz (45:34.449)
Yeah, I mean, I feel like if that's what you want to do, I think there's effective Christian organizations out there, right? It's a little bit harder in terms of the evidence. I was listening to your podcast episode with Jay Dijkstra. I'm not sure if that's how he pronounces last name, but he was talking about the measurement of impact can be very different with Christian organizations, right? Because they're measuring things in terms of number of church plans or discipleships that's happened. I think in one of the other series.
Evidently there's been an RCT done in regards to the, gosh, my mind's just blank, but the sponsoring a child program. I just forgot my name is, compassion, right? Right, the compassion has participated in one. So I think there's definitely, I think Christian organizations that are doing good things and are doing it effectively and well. But I would say just because
JD (46:10.254)
I think it was in the 90s and it was, yeah, but it needs a recess. Yeah, that's right.
Liz (46:31.837)
just because we aren't, a secular organization isn't sharing the gospel, I still think that they are doing, they're still doing good in the world. And there's, right? Like we obviously find life valuable because we think a child in Nigeria deserves the same shot at a healthy life as my child does in East Tennessee. And so, I mean, I think if you're, if you wanna work for a Christian organization, go for it, find it, I would.
I would encourage you to look for organizations. I think Jay Dishra's organization, right, has worked with several that are Christian oriented, but still, they are Christian organizations that have the desire to be cost-effective and evidence-based and driven. So I would encourage you to go that route, but I think that Christians can still do a lot of good in being in the world.
JD (47:25.174)
I agree. And I think saving a life to be something we all can agree is important, regardless of our flavor of Christianity or even our faith. I think that's like one of the beautiful things about working in global health and development is this could be like an uncontroversial cause that we can all get behind. Like we shouldn't have children dying of measles when they're six years old, right? Like, but even I think even from even if you are a Christian who is laser focused on evangelism, and this is like
Liz (47:46.749)
Right.
JD (47:54.55)
This is the one thing you feel God has called you to do. And part of that is proclaiming the gospel in word. And part of it is proclaiming it in deed. I don't see how you can really proclaim the gospel when someone is dying within your reach to save, right? I mean, I think this is in a very practical sense as well. I don't see how someone who dies at the age of five can really grow up to live the life that God has set out for them and a life in the fullness of the riches of Jesus, right?
JD (48:24.234)
I think that to be something that turkists can rally behind, it should be something we can all rally behind, even regardless of our faith. So yeah, I'm totally sold. I think they stated a Christian argument to go something like, well, this is obviously a very good thing to do to help people regardless of their faith who have venable diseases in Nigeria or in other low middle income countries. But I have specific duties to
Liz (48:24.306)
Yeah.
Liz (48:33.954)
Right.
JD (48:54.503)
my local community, I have either a friend who just got laid off or, I need to take care of my kids first. Do you think this person has a good argument for not giving or not prioritizing the extreme poor in West Africa, for instance?
Liz (49:13.337)
Yeah, that's a really good question and actually that's actually one that I am parsing through personally myself right now. You know, I do think that there is something to be said like that God has called us to where we are right now, right? And my first and foremost responsibility is to my, it's right like my immediate circle, like my family providing for my children and that and it kind of goes out from there. I also like I grew up.
I grew up Southern Baptist and you type 10% to the church. And I think that's like, and my husband and I have maintained that. We find that very important. I think that, um, you know, we, we make that a priority. And so that's actually something I've been struggling with is, um, you know, say somebody gives away 10% of their income, but it's, it goes toward the church, which I don't, I don't think we should, I think the local church is incredibly important, right. And, um, and so.
How do you then, so then are you just giving above and what does that look like, right? Like giving away, let's say a total of like 15 or 20% of your income. And so I think those are, I don't know if there's like, I don't, you know, I'm a very black and white person and I'm trying to figure out what the black and white answer is there because I don't know. And that also, that takes a lot like just like to, to be very frank, like that takes a big sacrifice, like going from giving away 10% of your income.
JD (50:27.276)
Right.
Liz (50:37.457)
Right? To upping that to say 15 or 20 percent.
JD (50:39.374)
It's not like you have a whole lot more to give, right? I mean, it's already, you know, most people don't have that much, just a little income to give. And so it does feel a little bit like there's a trade off there, right? There's some tension there between local giving, through your local church and global giving, whether it's through a global church or through global outreach or global health charity.
Liz (50:59.353)
Yeah, yeah. I mean, but so but if you're if the framework is the greatest impact for your dollar, then I would never suggest somebody to like not give to their local church. But okay, what does it look like then to give one or 2% right to a cost effective, you know, charity that's working right in West Africa? What what does that look like? You know, and we are all right, when you were all incredibly wealthy, right? And so what does that look like in terms of just self
Liz (51:30.701)
and being a good steward of the funds that God has given you.
JD (51:34.554)
This is a good plug for anybody listening to take something like the Giving What We Can pledge, which is a pledge to give 10% or more of your income over your lifetime to causes that you believe are the most effective. And maybe sometimes that is a local organization or your local church. But I think for many of us listening to this talk back, that would also include charities like New Intentives. And I don't want to plug New Intentives specifically. We cover a lot of great charities. But I think...
Liz (51:39.23)
Good.
JD (52:00.91)
I think just being really intentional about that radical generosity, especially given what you said, like you're all so wealthy, Jay talks about that quite well. The average American is something like in the top 97 plus percent of wealth by global standards. I mean, it's just phenomenal. Yeah, yeah.
Liz (52:17.873)
Yeah. So that's a good question. I don't have an answer to it and I'm still struggling through and figuring that out myself as really I'm relatively new to the community and trying to figure out, okay, what does this look like, like personally for my life? And how might I be convicted to change my, my giving and spending habits?
JD (52:39.855)
That's wonderful. So I'd like to wrap up here with just a few more questions about concrete recommendations and also just more reflections on your current job and for others who might be interested in doing something similar, right? So...
It sounds like the work you're doing with internal communication, but also communicating to key voter communities, like the Giving What We Can community, or like you can save community. Sounds like you do, I mean, you obviously have really excellent top skills. You have worked experiences across other communication roles. If someone was looking to do a role like the one you have now, would you recommend a reverse engineer your work history? Or would you offer any specific?
Any specific recommendations for good roles to test their fit? Or even specific majors that you think would be good for someone in a role like yours?
Liz (53:36.185)
Yeah. All right. So if I go on a tangent, you can feel free to bring me back. So, um, you talked about soft skills. I think soft skills are so important, right? Google at some time in the re relative years in past, maybe five years, right? They stopped hiring for hard skills and started hiring for soft skills because they're that important, no matter what job you're in, no matter what career path you take, like you need to be able to communicate, right? That's obviously very important in fundraising, but like being an articulate, an articulate communicator.
JD (53:40.642)
very
Liz (54:05.777)
Right? Problem solving is really important. Again, I think most of these are just kind of general, whether you want to go into communications and fundraising or whether you want to go into operations, whatever the career path, right? EA, organization or otherwise, but like you have to be able to creatively problem solve, right? Another one is like being organized, right? And so I think you could, right? That's definitely something, right? Like these take honing.
Right. And so being organized in, in your work such that other people can come in and join a project and it doesn't look like chaos, right? Like people can follow along. Um, taking personal responsibility and initiative. That's, that's a huge one is developing the soft skill to be able to, to take responsibility for when you mess up. Cause we all do. Right. And you need to be able to take initiative when you see a problem, you need to be able to take initiative.
to solve that problem and to come up with a solution. And that can happen in an internship. That can happen in the current job that you're in. You don't have to be in a fundraising job to be able to develop these soft skills. So those are some of the soft skills that I would say that I look for when I'm hiring. I would say, you kind of talked about, okay, would you reverse engineer your job experience?
I think there's lots of different paths to that. So I majored in communications, and then I have a master's in nonprofit administration. So if I had to go back and do it again, I would probably, I think communications was helpful. I probably, I wish that I had maybe a minor in business. I'd get some of that accounting, some of that business side of things, which nonprofits are businesses, and so those skills are helpful.
I would I do my master's program over again? I don't know. The experience that I got at my last nonprofit definitely trumped what I learned in that degree. Because I got the experience. If you were to go into a small nonprofit, right? Like if you can choose a small nonprofit that's gonna be data driven. And if you're gonna go to a small nonprofit, you have to wear lots of hats in a small nonprofit, right? Limited budget, limited staff.
Liz (56:30.897)
Right? Like Jay, you probably experienced that, right? Being the only full-time employee, right? And having some contractors, you have to wear lots of different hats. And so you could experience in lots of different veins and you oftentimes have the ability to kind of pick and choose what interests you, right? So for instance, I talked about that, that the previous nonprofit I worked with, our chief academic officer to come up with this whole, like this assessment model for our students.
Right? Like that didn't really fit within the purview of fundraising and marketing. But because I was overseeing operations at the time, and I also really did everything like technology communication related, he was developing this assessment tool. And I said, no, we're not doing that with pen and paper. We're going to digitize this. And I mean, it was very rudimentary, right? Like we had a I had a job form that like connected via Zapier to like to like a Google. Right. Like it was very I mean, like anybody can figure it out. Like.
Go, if there's a problem, go YouTube it. Go figure out how to make a new software work to be able to, you don't have to go hire an engineer to do a lot of these things these days with all the technology out there. So in terms of, so I don't know, that covered soft skills, that covered my previous work experience.
JD (57:47.055)
I think this is giving a picture, also that you're a generalist, right, that you can learn a lot of these other skills and you can do well in many different kinds of domains of work. I think for some people, they're more of a specialist. They have a few technical things they like to master and do very well, and maybe that leads them to be excellent programmers for some...
some applications that are really important to the organization. Would you consider yourself a generalist? Because you come off as one.
Liz (58:14.875)
Yes. Yeah. And I would say...
Like I didn't make the decision to hire myself, but I would say for both this job and the past job, I think that was one of the things that was appealing is that I, right, because I was hired, I was pretty, I was the first full-time hire for communications, marketing, donor relations side of things for new incentives. And I was one of the first hired, yeah, the first hire for volunteer and marketing at my previous job. And so the ability to be able to...
to figure, right, to do your role well, right? Like I'm kind of like self-taught in some graphic design. I, right, I can communicate just written and orally, like those sorts of things. But the fact that I can go and figure out how to do other things is immensely valuable, particularly in a small nonprofit world. But, and I can really only speak to new incentives culture, but because I'm at the beginning of...
you know, one of the first full-time hire for really this new team at the organization that's focusing on communications and marketing, the fact that I could do many different things, I think was appealing. So I would say for like the fundraising marketing communications world, I think being able to hone several different skills is really valuable. I don't know that I can really speak to like, right, if you're an engineer right now, you probably just...
really need to hone your one craft really well. So I don't know that really translates to other career paths, but for mine, I think.
JD (59:46.62)
Right, right.
JD (59:54.732)
And if you have recommendations specifically for any listeners who might be thinking, I would love to customize my skills and my work experience so that I can fundraise as effectively as possible for something like new incentives or some Christian charity that they believe does tremendous amount of good in the world. Do you have any recommendations? We haven't had any fundraisers of any sort on our podcast before. Any broad recommendations for?
how to prepare for a career in fundraising, or even just how to test your fit.
Liz (01:00:24.386)
Yeah, I mean, so I would say internships and
even volunteering, right? I think a lot of nonprofits that are smaller, right? That they would welcome a college student to help develop a social media strategy or to redesign their website or to offer those services if they don't really have a communications team. Like you could totally create an opportunity for yourself even before you get out of university. So...
JD (01:00:59.298)
I think a lot of the time, I think this is right, I think a lot of, uh, college students or people interested, they're waiting for like an official job posting for something like this. When I think a lot of nonprofits are really short on time and they just want someone to show up and be like, I'm good at this. I can offer this with minimal management. Just give me a shot. I'll produce it for you. And I think that kind of proactive outreach, like would be at least in my, for any listeners, if you have skills, please reach out. But, um,
Liz (01:01:07.821)
Yeah.
Liz (01:01:18.98)
Right Right, yeah, I mean and I think again it rated depends on the type of organization you're reaching out to if they're like a bigger Established nonprofit like they're gonna say no
Because it can take more time and energy to manage a volunteer than actually the work you get out of it But I think I think there's there are some organizations and some nonprofits right that would welcome that opportunity So I think searching for those opportunities and I think some simple things like if you're still in cut like joining the debate team I didn't do the debate team in college, but I actually participated in speech and debate all through high school and I really attribute
JD (01:02:02.163)
in general or specifically for communication fundraising roles.
Liz (01:02:07.037)
I would actually say for really just about any role. I mean, particularly fundraising, but I think it's helpful in a variety of ways, right? In honing your communication skills, right? Because again, I think that's a soft skill that is beneficial no matter what career path you take. I also think it helps with critical thinking, right? And logic and those sorts of things. So I think it really just contributes to you being a well-rounded.
person, no matter what field you go into. But then particularly helpful for, for those who are in forward-facing positions where they're, you know, at the external communications, obviously that's incredibly helpful. Um, I think there's some, there's lots of, so there's some resources out there, like Business Made Simple. That's a Donald Miller course. Um, and he has, it's like a university, you know, he wants to reimagine what school looks like because people are wasting.
tons of money on college and then not getting jobs, right? That's kind of his whole pitch. But he actually wrote the book, some listeners actually might be familiar, I think he wrote the book Blue Like Jazz. Anyways, which is a Christian book, but that was very popular maybe in the, I don't know, 15 years ago probably. But anyway, so he's a storyteller, that's what he is. But he has several different courses, right? Just about marketing and communications.
you know, developing pitches. So I think I've gone through several of his courses, like just how to create like the narrative of a story, right? When it comes to, he talks about specifically for business, but it's very easily translatable to the nonprofit world. And I think that for specifically for those in marketing, communications, fundraising, I find his content to be immensely valuable. He also, I mean, you can pay for the courses or access to the courses, but he also has
cleans up free content and he's got he's written books too. I can keep going. But you might want to stop me.
JD (01:04:11.318)
I'll include a link to that in our page. So I'd affected about if there's any differences in fundraising approaches with Christians versus non-Christians. I was talking to someone who worked with Ventures recently and his response was something like, Christians have shared, something like a shared heart that when you're fundraising with other Christians and you can effectively communicate that you...
Liz (01:04:14.214)
Yeah.
JD (01:04:39.034)
worship the same God and that you are part of the same story, but there's a sort of instant thrust to that win. And that when you are a Christian fundraiser, you are not neglecting that reality, but really tapping into that reality and using it to build up the cause that you're promoting. Whereas I guess with maybe more secular fundraising, maybe you're tapping into adjacent stories, not religious ones, but
Yeah, how would you describe any relevant differences between Christian versus non-Christian fundraising? I guess you've worked in non-Christian spaces, so maybe that's what you can speak to. But I imagine you also have Christian fundraisers at Christian charities as well.
Liz (01:05:22.522)
Yeah, I mean, yeah. So like you said, my experience really is with non-Christian fundraising. Like you said, I think there are narratives to tap into because we're all human and we all live in a broken world and we all have this desire in us for that broken world to be healed. Even though I think my answer to that question is going to be different than somebody who's not a believer.
I would imagine though, I can only imagine that the individual you're talking to you that the reality of raising funds for a Christian organization, right, there is that inherent trust like that makes all the sense in the world. I would also think like, because it's not just about data, right? Because if you're raising for a Christian organization, there are other things that you both like, it's kind of assumed that you all find that valuable, whatever that not product, but whatever that
program is or whatever you're doing is valuable within the context of our faith. And so I can imagine it would definitely be easy to connect with donors because you do have that automatic connection when you share the same faith. But I don't know if I can really talk any more to that.
JD (01:06:34.67)
I wonder if that, yeah, that's interesting. I do wonder if that helps explain some of the things that Jason Dyer was talking about with regards to lack of measurement in some Christian parities. Then maybe because the fundraising churches don't have to relate to the data because they do have a common story they can tap into, maybe the data gets forgotten in many parities that are Christian.
Liz (01:06:51.985)
Mm.
JD (01:06:56.306)
I think that's quite the same, right? Because there's no reason it needs to, especially for all the reasons they mentioned and we've mentioned on other podcast episodes. If anything, Christians should value the truth. That's much more given John 1 and all the Christian expectations of the New Testament towards truth-seeking. So.
Liz (01:07:06.889)
Mm-hmm.
Liz (01:07:13.269)
Sure, sure. Yeah. It's just like our truth can't always be, you know, founded in RCT, right? Yeah.
JD (01:07:19.566)
Sure, sir. Yes, yes. On any other career heuristics or imagine your 22 year old self is graduating university and feel really called by God to tackle these pressing global problems of children dying from preventive seizures and feeling maybe they have similar skills, maybe they are generalists, maybe they are communication savvy. Are there any other
or recommend them to consider any other roles that you intended or other services like new incentives, you think there's considerable bottleneck in any other ideas?
Liz (01:07:59.817)
Hmm a bottleneck and rolls
JD (01:08:06.254)
I'm sure these roles exist in New Incentive or at other charities you found out where it's like, if only we had one more really good marketer who could just communicate our fundraising strategy well, or just someone who's really good with like a really good people manager. Maybe drawing on, you know, it is at New Incentive now or if nothing comes to mind, that's fine. But if you're interested in your experience, there are other opportunities for people with these kinds of sales that you have.
Liz (01:08:13.556)
Mm.
JD (01:08:36.142)
that maybe aren't your specific role.
Liz (01:08:40.321)
Yes, that's hard to answer just because my role, right, being a generalist and the first one on the team, right, I do things in like internal communications and marketing and fundraising, right? And, and, right, we have an HR team, but as I'm building the team, like I also there's some HR elements there as well. And so, um, yeah, I mean, I would say if this sort of role appeals to you, I think there's right and HR role.
potentially, right? As your community, right? Like that is another role that you would be like, um, communicating right with it with an exterior audience, right? To try to build, build the team. Um, you know, I think find the things that like, that you're interested in. So for instance, if you're interested in websites, like go, go figure out how, how to build a website, you can do that like in essence for free by like web flows, what we use for our website.
for our website, like you can get, Webflow has like a whole university that you can learn how to create a website on their platform for free. And so go spend the 40 hours it takes to figure out how that platform works because being able to build websites, that's important, right? And that's a valuable thing. One of the other things that, and I don't know if this is just an art culture at Noon Center, but I'd imagine kind of in like this data-driven world, like,
learn how to use Google Sheets or Excel proficiently, because whether you're gonna be using it in communication, you would be using it if you're in operations, if you're in HR. We use it across every single unit. That's the mutual language that all of the units communicate on is Google Sheets, right?
So I would, yeah, I would be open. I would just like, right, get on the 80,000 hours. Like if you're committed to working for an EA organization, get on the 80,000 hours job board, right? Or you guys might have like a list of job openings. I'm not sure, JD, but look at that. And just if something appeals to you and you feel like, hey, I have some of those skills, then apply for it, right? Or if you think, oh, this sort of.
Liz (01:10:48.861)
this sort of position is intriguing to me. What are the skills that they are looking for and go develop those skills, right? Whether you can teach yourself, you don't have to have a degree in it necessarily, right? Whether you go teach yourself or at your current position or at an internship or a volunteer opportunity, right? Like you can hone those skills by solving a problem that organization has and figuring it out. So,
So if you're looking for an adjacent sort of position, I would just like go look at job boards and see what's available and see what organizations are looking for.
JD (01:11:27.994)
If anything else you'd like to mention before we wrap up here? Any other plugs or yeah, any other recommendations?
Liz (01:11:37.073)
Yeah, I mean, I don't think so. I think we covered a whole lot and grateful for that opportunity. You know, I would encourage you all, everyone's listening, right, to just further look into, expand your horizons to figure out, OK, what organizations out there are, right? It's not just the Give All Top charity list, right? Like we might be on that list and we're proud to be on that list. But there are so many organizations out there.
that are focused on impact and cost-effectiveness and scaling a data-driven program. You might be surprised what you find and who's hiring and who might be calling for volunteers or even contractors. I saw that Giving What We Can is trying to hire a contractor to work on social media and an e-newsletter. They're looking for, I don't know if it's part-time or not, but maybe you guys go check it out if you're interested in this line of work.
JD (01:12:33.644)
I saw the same ad this morning. It's funny. Yeah. Okay.
Liz (01:12:35.441)
Yeah, the ad was brilliant, by the way. Shout out to Giving What We Can. I don't know if Grace was in charge of that or not, but that ad was just brilliant.
JD (01:12:38.438)
It was very good. Very good ad. So good. All right. Liz, thank you so much. I'll keep you in my mind in prayers. And yeah, thanks for joining us today.
Liz (01:12:52.445)
Thanks, JD.
JD (01:12:59.974)
Okay.
