This week, we speak with Janene Amick, CEO of Florida Cultural Group. Janene has been part of Florida Cultural Group (f/k/a Manatee Players, Inc.) for 19 years, beginning as a board member.
Together, we discuss her role as Chief Cheerleader, her approach for fund development, and how she encourages her board members to fundraise. We also talk about how the role of CEO for nonprofit organizations has changed, staying up to date on 501(c)3 rules and regulations, and advice for new CEOs.
Timestamps:
00:00 Introducing Janene Amick, CEO of Florida Cultural Group
03:50 What is the role of the nonprofit CEO?
06:30 How do you approach fundraising?
07:40 Not all donations are cash based
10:30 Legacy giving is long term
12:20 How do you engage your board members when it comes to fundraising?
18:00 How often and how do you interact with board members and your board chair?
22:30 How has the role of CEO changed over your career?
25:37 Advice for new CEOs
28:00 Recapping with Read
Transcript:
Michael:
This week’s episode of the i501cYou the podcast for nonprofit board members. I interviewed Janene Amick. Janene is a CEO of Florida Cultural Group. She’s a past president of the Bradenton Kiwanis Club, a member of Access Financial, Federal Credit Union and MCR Health Board of directors. And the list goes on and on with any number of awards and recognitions. She is a true leader, a leader in our community, a demonstrated leader with her board. And I think you’re going to enjoy this interview. So please join me as I interview Janene Amick.
Hey, I want to jump in real quick. Somebody asked me the other day, what does the CORLEY Company do? Well, we do three things for non-profits. One, we facilitate meetings. Yes, like board retreats where we discuss governance and strategy with all the members of the board. Number two, advise CEOs and help them as they make decisions and implement actions to drive their mission. And then finally, we produce podcasts such as this one, but also for a number of nonprofits to help you get the word out, get your message out. So if you’re interested in any of these services, please feel free to reach out to Michael@thecorleycompany.com. Now back to the podcast.
All right. On this week’s episode of i501, see the podcast for nonprofit board members. We’re actually interviewing a CEO, a friend of mine, and someone I have great admiration respect for, Janene Amick, who’s the CEO of the Florida Cultural Group. Janene, if you would, please introduce yourself and share with the audience a little bit about how you became CEO of the Florida Cultural Group and your trajectory into that role.
Janene:
Well, first of all, let me say thank you. I am super excited for this. I have seen my professional colleagues on your podcast. I was honored when you guys asked me to just talk about my passion, my love, and how my position helps community and how the community supports me. So trajectory. I’ve been with this particular organization going on 19 years and I started on the board of directors for what was then known as the Manatee Players Inc back in 2000, 2001. They were going through a campaign in a feasibility study, just asking the community, What do you think about us building a performing arts center? Long story short, I’m in a meeting we had hired at the ebbs and flows of many different development officers, and one day the board members looked at me and said, Janene, you’ve been doing this as a volunteer with the Boys and Girls Club, the foundation over there. What do you think about joining us as a team member? And the rest is history started in development. I got to work as the owner’s rep during construction, really finding out the bones of the building, letting the people know what they were investing in from there went to the executive director about three years after that, right during opening now 11 years ago. Can’t believe the building’s been open 11 years. Then I moved into the CEO position. The board at that time embraced the corporate model. We knew we were growing, we were stretching, and we couldn’t do everything. We had always done the same way in order to embrace the new facility and the campus, the vision we still have for the future. And then just most recently, you know, the CEO part of my titles, the small in actually Chief Cheerleader, that’s where I embrace. We have fun every day. I won’t say it’s a game, but as a being the chief cheerleader here and making sure that I’ve got that bullhorn and sharing with our community what we do is what brought us to today.
Michael:
And I’ve heard you introduce yourself as that recently, the chief cheerleader. And then, boy, that’s appropriate. I’ve seen you in action. So So you move into the CEO role from executive director fun development before that, which is a topic we’re going to talk quite a bit about today. And I know even before that you were in the for profit sector running a business and was quite successful in that area. But the role of the nonprofit CEO, how do you define it and how do you articulate to people what is the primary role of a nonprofit CEO?
Janene:
Well, you know, not to be cliche, I really do believe it’s the chief cheerleader. Sounds odd. But from that perspective, when you put the chief in front of it, you know, you’re the chief advocate to the donors to the staff for the board, Your you know, if you’re going to make me, you know, in just a few words, it’s the chief cheerleader. You’re an advocate. You are that leader. You’re that shoulder that needs to be leaned on. You’re the you know, the foundation that ideas need to be able to embrace. You know, one thing that’s probably a little different than myself is I believe sometimes I do the best in the middle of chaos. We’ve got a board, we’ve got a staff here that embraces risks and change. And so from a CEO perspective, you have to be able to maneuver quickly and without fear of failure, because sometimes the failures we learn are the biggest positive things that happen to organizations, and they help us redirect, realign, make sure that, you know, we’re mission focused. But being aware that, you know, as a public charity, the end user is really our community and we have to be in tune to as a CEO. What is the community need? What is the community want? And so oftentimes we just get stuck in what we’ve always done, how we’ve always done it, and then we’re missing that our community has evolved and we haven’t evolved with it. So as to as the CEO, I’m going to say it’s embracing the change, leading your staff, advocating for the community and being that voice that sometimes has to say things that you know are hard.
Michael:
Change is hard, well-stated. And you really described leadership in in totality there. And I and I appreciate that. I know one important role that you have is the the CEO and the chief cheerleader is raising money. What you approach what’s Janene’s approach to fund development. You’ve been very successful. And what do you have a an approach, a philosophy. What could you share with us?
Janene:
Well, I’m going to share the secret sauce. It’s don’t ask me. I’m going to say don’t ask for money, but I ask every day for help, for investments and for advice. You know, sometimes when you ask for a donation, it can come across so one and done. And in regards to fundraising, it’s about this is just the first step in a journey. So you want to embrace the person, the group of individuals, the particular avatar may be your marketing too, from a perspective of this is the first step in a journey. So from my fundraising, it’s about sometimes it’s about asking for advice from new audience members. Sometimes it’s about reaching out and getting them involved just from their time investment. I’m a true believer that not all donations that really have major impacts in organizations are cash based. You know, I know for our organization I’ll give you an example. My assistant, she’s got a desk, she’s got an e-mail about her own computers. She didn’t like the one we gave her. And she has been my assistant for a minimum of two days a week for 17 years. And she’s a volunteer. Wow. And every year we articulate that in dollars. So, you know, sometimes it’s not about raising those dollars to find somebody to pay, but it’s about building a relationship with what are the skill that sometimes that people have that they can provide that then allows us not to make an expense. So it’s sometimes it’s a different philosophy. It’s like match funding, and sometimes that funding is a human being. Human capital is huge. I also learned that in regards to human capital, those people who give of their time really get into the weeds of the organization. Michael, those are the ones that you wouldn’t believe the legacy and the endowment gifts after. So it’s just a one path. But, you know, as I said, it’s about meeting them where they’re at and then making sure you’re asking for the right thing for where they are. Advice has always been one of the best ones, which some of my major donors, they have seen far more than I ever could in their corporate experiences, maybe on their boards in other organizations that as they relocate here asking for advice, they open my eyes to needs I didn’t realize we had. And then I asked them, what do they think about, you know, the approach we should take in order to get those things funded. A lot of times they’re the first ones to step up and say, How about a matching campaign? And I’m ready to do that today.
Michael:
You know, you articulate that so well because people want to help people who ask for help. And, you know, I’ve seen you do it. You don’t do it insincere, really. You sincerely want the help and assistance you digest and listen to what the person has to say. And then you you move accordingly. So you’re very humble in that regard. You are not a CEO that has all the answers. You will get the answers, but you don’t have to originate with all the answers. And I want to touch on something that you said, which I thought was really profound. Janene, And that was the legacy giving aspect of it with the volunteers. You know, legacy giving is a long term proposition. Everybody thinks we can start let’s start doing legacy giving. And in six months they’re going to have to have money. That’s not really how it works, is it?
Janene:
No, no. You know, I as a CEO, you have to remember a lot of times we are so focused on numbers now and we have to realize that a real good portion of what we’re doing is we’re managing now, but we should be focused as well as on financial stability later, well beyond when we’re not going to be here. You know, we’re probably won’t even be remembered for it. But if your passion and your moral compass, the values you hold true, really help you lead, You know, all of those things. I truly believe come back as blessings. And those people make those decisions because as you said, you have to be real with them. And in regards to realism, you know, not everybody wants to volunteer for the same types of organizations. Not everybody wants to donate to the same types of organizations. So as a CEO, I would just remind my fellow CEOs, it’s not always about getting, that new donor who walked into town, because I’ve moved into town because we know they donated million somewhere else and we spend all kinds of time trying to get that one person because we’re looking for a big dollar and we miss building the relationship.
Michael:
Well stated. Now, let me move on to the board a little bit. In your relationship, your management, the board, and you are masterful at it. So how do you encourage engage your board members when it comes to fundraising? How do you encourage and help them see that it’s a role of the board? So the fact that they contribute and they go, you know, go get.
Janene:
So I know many of my board members are going to watch this when it is aired, so I don’t want to give out all my secrets so they stop doing what they’re doing. But, you know, sometimes it’s getting them involved but not telling them their fundraising. Fundraising is a big, scary word. And, you know, a lot of people make the assumption because we have telemarketers, we have, you know, people calling us at home. We have people following us to work, people coming in. And, you know, and they think that’s what it is. They think it is that one in done moment where they’ve got to ask for a specific amount of money. So some of the things we do here is we get our board members involved in the thank you’s. So our board members really are involved in the beginning and the end of the process. So the beginning invite your friends to the theater, open doors, encourage them, just walk alongside of them to a variety of our programs so that our board members are proud. You know, they are the ambassadors. They’re that mouthpiece walking alongside, you know, they’re the proud. It’s almost like they’re proud parents to walk people through, to meet and to talk about, hey, let’s go to a rehearsal. Let’s go see a show. you’re coming to a nonprofit event. I’m going to be there to backstage tours, the beginning of that process. Then we have staff. We do the middle. What can we learn about them that maybe our board member doesn’t know? What are some of the hot buttons we’ve realized? So then we can feed the board member more information for the follow up the second time. And then when that person does make some type of commitment time, treasure, talent, making sure that board member has the ability to say thank you timely, you know, that in itself builds another type of relationship. We here we always choose a newer board member once they start their first term as one of our older board members who might have done nine years or six years has left. We ask, okay, who is going to make a commitment to come in once a week and just make phone calls and say thank you? And we normally do it with a newer board member because they just call say thank you. They’re not asking for anything but then they get all kinds of questions at the same time. It is training that new board member because they’re learning probably more the programs, getting into some of the weeds of what people appreciate and passion. But from that perspective, we rotate through. We have board members who are on active committees. So you know, you’re on a marketing committee, we’re performing Arts Center. You would think that marketing means we only talk about advertising shows. It’s not it’s okay. How do we make sure that that brand element of advertising shows in line with the you know, that your ticket only covers half of that performance? What materials do we need? So marketing is doing it from behind the scenes, making sure that those others who are doing those backstage tours, you know, are have the materials that are in line with the same discussion. So our board members are great about actually being people who work the process and each of them, you know, do it in their own way. But you have to find their comfort level and sometimes you find their comfort level by making them uncomfortable. You know? And so you just ask everybody to try it once and like making phone calls. Normally people don’t like calling strangers. Okay. Right. But what we’ve noticed here is that you can get a board member to make at least ten phone calls because you got to make at least ten because they’re going to leave at least eight messages. But if you can do that and those two phone calls of people who pick up and say, wow, a board member called me, asked me how I’m enjoying, you know, what I’m investing in. And then the board member is so psyched up. You know, they find, okay, it wasn’t hard, you know, I really liked it. I found out something that other board members don’t know right now. And so I really endure and, you know, encourage my colleagues, my friends and others to just push them a little out of their comfort zone into something like that. Gratitude when board members can hear it from others who are actually making the investment will provide that particular board member courage to go to even more beyond just making phone calls.
Michael:
No, I think that’s great and admire how you manage the board because you really do a remarkable job. So how often do you interact with your board members? And I’m sure the chair a little bit more frequently, but committees, us CEO, give us a little bit about the time, commitment, managing and interacting with the board and board members.
Janene:
Michael For me, I wouldn’t if somebody was asking, how do you manage your board? I don’t know if I’d use that word because I will say I stretch my board and I will tell you I my board stretches me. We have a philosophy here at the organization that if there isn’t stretching going on, then we’re really not growing. And so in that regard to the time investment on behalf of both, I am a part of all of our active committees and for us, that’s quite a few. You know, we we have a campus, so making sure that the facilities committee really understands the bones of what we have. So I’m going to say probably 10% of my time every month is spent with board members. I also have to be sensitive to the fact that our board members are donors. And sometimes I think that gets lost. You have this amazing, unique relationship with an individual who’s a donor. Then you get them to join the board and sometimes they’re learning other information. Now they’re getting reports they didn’t otherwise get. But I’ve seen and I have to be sensitive to that because there’s a new relationship evolving from a business perspective. You kind of forget that they still need this other side because they’re not always going to be that board member. And you want to make sure that this particular relationship that got them involved to be a board member in the first place stays first and foremost. So it’s a balancing act. But I have to be sensitive to know that you know, cards, birthday cards, anniversary cards, I don’t take that for granted just because they did it. They’re now on the board. And I’m like, well, they know we do those things so I don’t have to do them do those. But then we personally invite our insiders, a donor of $1,000 annually in about we, we mail them, we call them, we follow up with them just because they’re board members and they hear it in a board meeting doesn’t mean that three days later they’re not getting that personal call. I know that was a little rabbit hole off topic, but back to what you were saying in regards to, you know, 10% of my time is spent. And for my board chair, it’s once a week that we carve out a time so that they understand where we’re going on our board chair This particular one doesn’t go to all the meetings because they’re employed, you know, So I have to be sensitive. Since I’ve been here, I have had seven different chairs in each one of them, I will promise you, has had a different depth in their leadership, how they want to manage the process of running meetings. And I learned early on that probably when they first come on as chair or even the month before, their chair is taking extra time to say, What did you really like about how the meetings were? What did you want to change? What do you think’s missing? What do you think’s too much? So that the expectations to make sure that they are successful as a chair are really articulated before they even bring down that gavel the first time, or send out an email where at the bottom of their name says Chair. So I think that that’s important to spend that time probably two or 3 hours, two times before they take that role and just talk about the processes of disseminating information and running meetings.
Michael:
Now, very good. I like that intentionality and that as we’re we’re winding now down the last couple questions. So you’ve been CEO for a quite a period time. We’ve given the organization 19 years, you said. How has the role of CIO changed over your career?
Janene
Yes. You know, I think the role of the CEO in our industry has changed. I think that those who are keeping their ear to the ground have realized that it’s not just about the management and administration, but it’s about the relationship building. I am a firm believer that the CEO is also the chief development officer. Even if you have a development officer, that relationship with the development staff has to be embraced. I’ve seen a lot. I’ve seen quite often where the development office is like, That’s your responsibility, Those are your numbers, but it isn’t, you know, So from that perspective, the CEO needs to embrace fundraising themselves and advocating for their entire organization. It’s not just about telling people what’s going on, it’s about inviting people in to see what’s going on. And it’s not just about creating charts and presentations or reports, but it’s about setting goals and being active in those goals being met. So for me, I’m going to say that’s one of the biggest changes I’ve seen. The other change that I have seen is that CEOs need to be much more intentional about being personally responsible, about the rules and the regulations that are changing, about how. 501c3’s operate and making sure their board is educated on those things as well. You know, our board doesn’t know what they don’t know. And we as CEOs, although the community sees us as the one who is responsible for everything, we have to remind ourselves it is our board that at the end of the day really has the final say. So embracing that through the last couple of years and being mindful that, you know, legislation on our leaders at the federal level are always talking about nonprofits and charitable changes. And I believe that it is the role of the CEO now to be intentional about educating ourselves on those things, those potential changes so that we are ready to educate our boards and our donors.
Michael:
Very good. And you’re right, that has been a significant change and I know you’re right on top of that. So as we wind down the last question, if there’s a new CEO out there, what advice, what tips would you give to him or her?
Janene:
Find four other CEOs who are willing to mentor and coach in four different sectors? You know, I received advice when I took the CEO position. It’s lonely at the top, but it doesn’t have to be. So you need to remember I’m speaking directly to those new CEOs. You know, we are empowered to lead in our positions. You know, don’t get caught up in trying to get your emotional feel at work. It doesn’t work. And but when you can find three or four other people in those positions who’ve been there for quite a while, believe me, anything that you’re experiencing as a new CEO, people have experienced the same thing. The questions you have are the same questions we have. And I know here specifically Manatee, Sarasota, DeSoto, the Tampa, Hillsborough region, we have phenomenal CEOs. They’ve never closed a door on me when I’ve reached out to one in particular, stretch yourself and just introduce yourself and say, Do you mind, you know, with your level of expertise, if I needed to, could I ask your question? I know that my information will be shared through this podcast. Please feel free to reach out to me. You can use me as that wall to throw spaghetti against and see what sticks, but make sure you get quite a few different perspectives. Each nonprofit is uniquely different. We don’t do all things the same way because we don’t serve all the same clients. So makes sure that you are filling your toolbox as a new CEO with a variety of tools that are going to help you build the best organization you can.
Michael:
Wonderful advice from Janene Amick, and she is one of the good ones out there, one of the best ones in our area, CEO of Florida Cultural Group. Janene, I can’t thank you enough for being on the podcast today and the wisdom you’ve shared.
All right. What a wonderful interview with Janene. And this is recapping with Read. Read, what were your observations from this interview with Janene?
Read:
So my first observation is that the CEO needs to be the chief cheerleader, and they’re also the chief advocate to all the stakeholders.
Michael:
Well stated that chief position. And she represents that very eloquently. Number two.
Read:
The secret sauce to fund development is not to ask for money. Ask for help. Ask for advice. And do also realize that not all donations that have major impact are cash based. They can be volunteer based, they can be time giving time. They can also having major impact.
Michael:
Yeah, they can. And she is a master at that. And number three.
Read:
And my third piece was from the very end, the advice to new CEOs find for other CEOs who are willing to mentor and coach you that are in four different industries because they’ve gone through what you’re about to go through.
Michael:
Nothing like having a strong support peer group or a mastermind to be part of to help you as you navigate your leadership roles. There you go. Recapping with read three significant aspects from the interview we just had with Janene Amick and we will I501(c)You next week.
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