The Sector Is Shifting: Here's How to Lead

Social impact leaders are scaling back, funding streams are evaporating, and public trust is eroding. In this candid kickoff to Season 4, Eric and Jonathan hold space for what’s really happening in the field—and why this moment demands courageous communication, community resilience, and reimagined leadership. This isn’t a time to shrink. It’s a time to show up.

• The surprising parallels to early COVID-era chaos (and how that can inform today’s crisis response)
• Why you might need to ‘scale back’ strategically—and how to do it without losing your sense of purpose.
• The key to rallying donors, partners, and staff using open communication and powerful impact stories.
• The #1 mistake leaders make when forced to let go of talented people (hint: it involves your support network)

Whether you’re facing sudden federal cutbacks or seeking to maintain momentum in a tough environment, this episode is packed with actionable insights to help you adapt without compromising your impact.

Don’t let external forces derail your organization’s good work. Tune in now and learn how to protect your mission, inspire your team, and stay resilient. Even when the odds feel stacked against you.

Episode Highlights:

[00:00] - View from the field: What social impact leaders are experiencing right now

[01:50] - The ripple effects of federal policy shifts: Retrenchment and risk mitigation

[03:40] - “It feels like early COVID again”: Chaos, fear, and identity crisis in the sector

[06:20] - The grift narrative: Online misinformation and the backlash against nonprofits

[07:23] - Getting hyper-local: The strategic (and risky) pivot toward smaller spheres

[08:38] - Unprecedented losses: Real-world stories of scale-downs and shutdowns

[10:28] - Why the blame game backfires: Compassion over critique

[13:17] - From freeze to activation: What separated resilient orgs during COVID

[15:47] - "Now is the best time": Standing strong in your community

[18:22] - A call to funders: Emergency support is urgently needed—again

[19:25] - Action steps for leaders: Reconnect, recommit, and re-partner

[21:34] - Leading through contraction: Compassionate downsizing and clarity of mission

[23:53] - Over-communicating with intention: The power of transparency and storytelling

Notable Quotes:

• “Now is the best time to stand up for science… for a community that's trying to protect itself from a changing environment.” – Jonathan Hicken [00:15]
• “We need to be better at getting these stories out in a way that actually cuts through.” – Eric Ressler [07:07]
• “There’s almost this feeling that we’re not allowed to be successful or be optimistic right now.” – Jonathan Hicken [11:30]
• “Organizations that activated quickly—even imperfectly—came out stronger.” – Eric Ressler  [13:50]
• “Start to prepare to help the people on your team land on their feet.” – Jonathan Hicken [22:25]

Transcript

Eric Ressler [00:00]:

We are hoping today that we could just talk a little bit about our view from the field. What are we seeing out there from our different perspectives? What are we hearing from social impact leaders out doing their everyday work? And hopefully, and most importantly, what should we all be doing about it

Jonathan Hicken [00:15]:

Right now is the best time to stand up for these core values, right? The best time to stand up for science, the best time to stand up for a community that's trying to protect itself from a changing environment.

Eric Ressler [00:30]:

We want to make sure that we don't make ourselves smaller or that we don't feel smaller just because of even some of these realities.

Jonathan Hicken [00:37]:

We as a sector need to be lifting each other up and shining lights on possibilities rather than saying, you did this wrong or you did that wrong.

Eric Ressler [00:45]:

Jonathan, welcome to season four of Design tomorrow. It's been a while since we recorded. How are you

Jonathan Hicken [00:55]:

Season four, man? I want to say I'm doing great and for the most part I am, but we're going to talk about some stuff today.

Eric Ressler [01:02]:

Yes. So a lot has happened since we last recorded. Mainly a lot of policies in America that have trickle effects around the entire world that have really directly hit our sector pretty hard. I think a lot harder than even a lot of us had feared.

Jonathan Hicken [01:16]:

Totally.

Eric Ressler [01:17]:

We are hoping today that we could just talk a little bit about our view from the field. What are we seeing out there from our different perspectives? What are we hearing from social impact leaders out doing their everyday work, hopefully, and most importantly, what should we all be doing about it? I think that I've got some thoughts on that. I'm sure you do as well. I'd love to just hear what's the vibe like for you as the executive director of a Marine Science center? What are you hearing from different other social impact leaders? Yeah, what's your experience been in the last couple months?

Jonathan Hicken [01:50]:

Yeah, I mean, look, I have what I'm dealing with at the Seymour Marine Discovery Center, but I also have colleagues at UC Santa Cruz, and I have colleagues in the city of Santa Cruz and throughout the county and nonprofits. And by and large, what I'm hearing is everybody doing a couple of things. One, they are slowing down, they are reducing scope, they are de-risking things, and they're looking to mitigate single points of failure, meaning if they were relying on federal funding and that funding became at risk, they don't want their entire organization to fall apart based on that one thing. So they're trying to find, build multiple points of failure, but I mean, everybody that I'm talking to is being impacted by what has happened in our country in the last couple of months. So you didn't lose any federal funding. We did not lose any direct federal funding. We are not reliant on that for our business.

Eric Ressler [02:54]:

What was your first reaction slash reflection when that all started to go down? Did you have a oh crap moment, even though you knew you didn't have direct projects being affected? What was going around in your brain?

Jonathan Hicken [03:09]:

Honestly, it was very human in nature. The Seymour Center is a community institution, and so my first reaction was to go check on the people and the organizations that I thought might get affected by it on campus and throughout the community. And sure enough, in Santa Cruz, there were people I know who were let go or laid off or whose jobs became suddenly at risk. So yeah, I mean, just the human toll in a community like ours was instantly, instantly palpable.

Eric Ressler [03:40]:

So I've been hearing from a bunch of different nonprofit executive directors, some social enterprise CEOs even who are affected by this. The thing that I keep reflecting on and coming back to is this feels a lot like the early days of covid. And what I mean by that is everyone seems to be in this state of fear and this state of confusion and this kind of just general feeling of chaos. And it's really interesting because in certain ways there are a lot of parallels. There's existential threat happening largely from a funding perspective, but even more so I think from an identity perspective around there used to be this general feeling. I will say that overall, if you were doing work in the social impact space, if you were working for a nonprofit or a humanitarian aid organization or anything in that space, you kind of assume people will just be on your side. Okay, we're doing good work. Yeah, there might be some critics out there. Yeah, there's a bunch of talk inside the sector around redundancy, whatever, but you have the support of the population and of humanity and of the public at some level. And I just don't think that that feels true anymore for a lot of people and for a lot of organizations. And I think that's honestly kind of a shame

Jonathan Hicken [04:57]:

In my world. I work with a lot of scientists. In the end, the gut reaction is, oh, science itself is really under the microscope now, pun intended. But I mean, seriously, I think that the identity part is real are all this sort of self-questioning, but also a certain level of reactive self-confidence too. Like hell yeah, this is important.

Eric Ressler [05:22]:

I started to pick up on this even before some of these recent developments, even just kind of paying attention to culture and seeing this rising trend of criticism around nonprofits and social impact organizations and whether or not they were really all that effective. Where I really started to see it personally the most was online, which we'll get to in a minute in more detail I think. And specifically around homeless services and humanitarian organizations who were working on that sector and that problem. And we're both in California, there's a huge issue and problem with the unhoused population. And what I started to see, even listening to some friends who were out of the space and just seeing people comment on Reddit forms or whatever, was just all of a sudden there was this perception that all these organizations are big scam. They're wasting a bunch of money, they're total grifters, and that there's this nonprofit industrial complex that's just a big tax write off.

[06:20]:

So I started to see kind of, seeds of that argument forming. And look, I think there's some kernels of truth to some of those criticisms for certain organizations, and I think this is a theme I've been thinking about a lot is a lot of these accusations that are being thrown out and a lot of these criticisms that are being thrown out often have a small, sometimes a microscopic, but a small kernel of truth behind them, but then they just get completely overblown as a reason to just make some really poor choices. And so with all of that, what I've been thinking about a lot is how do we show up as a sector and either push back or correct the record on some of those things or just overwhelm that misinformation and disinformation war with stories of positivity? And to me, this reinforces a lot of what I think about all the time, which is that we need to be better at getting these stories out in a way that actually cuts through and breaks through. So that was one of the first things that came to mind for me.

Jonathan Hicken [07:23]:

Well, one of the things that I continually notice is this reaching or this desire to make sense of what's happening. And I know certainly one of the ways that I'm doing it personally just in my own life, but also in the way I talk to my team and the way I'm kind of communicating our work is I'm getting much more local, much more community oriented. Now, we were already oriented that way coming into this moment, but I'm hearing other people talk about that too, reducing or at least coming to terms with this sphere of influence that we have and really sort of looking around at the people who are most connected to our work and calling for attention, calling for support, which by and large I think is a good thing that we are getting focused within our sphere of influence, but it also feels like if it swings too far, it could get too insular or too siloed or two exclusionary. So there's a balance that I'm still, honestly, I'm still sort of sorting out what's going on there, but there does seem to be this reducing of scope or reducing of size that's happening, and I wonder if that's good or bad.

Eric Ressler [08:38]:

Yeah, I mean, I think it depends, right? So a couple stories come to mind for me. One is we were talking to an organization that was actually out of Jamaica and they had a huge commitment of funding from USAID that had been approved and they had programs already spun up around it, and that went poof overnight. They're in a position where they were forced to scale down because they lost a large percentage of the resources that they had earmarked, allocated, planned for, and started to implement. I think there's these different scenarios. One is being forced to scale down because you just lost a bunch of funding. I actually want to say something about that briefly because I've seen a lot of stuff happening, especially online around folks even like myself who are consultants or advisors or partners to nonprofits saying, see, we over relied on federal grants and we shouldn't have done that, and now we need to use this as opportunity to correct that.

[09:33]:

And I've said that before too in various ways, not quite as strongly. I've seen some pushback on that perspective that I think is very valid, which is that for a very long time, a lot of these organizations have with really good planning and partnership with the government, built a model around that funding. And another thing that's been really interesting to me is I've heard a lot more about our sector from people outside of our sector than I ever have before because of these federal cuts and USAID being spun down and drastically defunded. And it's really interesting to me to hear how people who are in the space are thinking about this. What it got me to realize is that a lot of people have no idea how social change happens in the world and how integral nonprofits and other social impact organizations are to actually implementing that change.

[10:28]:

And that's not to say that there's not other ways to make that happen. And certainly I wasn't super informed on that either until I worked in the space. I think there's a lot of just connective tissue behind the scenes that's making our world work the way that it does. And often these organizations are picking up some of the hardest problems and doing their best to fix them. But the point I want to get to is that I think we have to be careful to jump to conclusions around like, oh, well, you shouldn't have ever been so dependent on that one source of funding in the first place, because I think a lot of really smart people did a lot of really good work on that model working for a long time. And what's happening is literally unprecedented.

Jonathan Hicken [11:08]:

There's a certain level of shame or blame going on right now, which especially when it comes to problems that span political loyalties, I feel like the blame game and the shame game are not productive for our work. I mean, maybe you're going to get a momentary boost in your engagement or your attention or whatever, but by and large, for our sector, when we start to get into that, I think that it's a net negative, and I've seen it. I'm seeing that myself. There's almost like this feeling that we're not allowed to be successful or be positive or be optimistic at this moment, and we're quick to throw shade each other and other people and look for good reason. There's a lot of people hurting, and there are a lot of organizations who have either closed up shop already or really feeling like that's getting close. And so I don't mean to diminish the impact of what's going on. And also I believe that we as a sector need to be lifting each other up and shining lights on possibilities rather than saying, you did this wrong or you did that wrong.

Eric Ressler [12:20]:

Yeah, I agree. And I think that that is the hardest thing to do in a moment like this, is to look at what for many organizations is going to be and maybe already is one of the most challenging times they've ever had to navigate and figure out how to reframe that into an opportunity instead of a challenge. And that's one of those things that's a lot easier to say than it is to actually do. What I want to reflect on just briefly going through a similar-ish period during the pandemic is what I saw happen in that time period watching different organizations and how they reacted. And what I noticed then, and what I'm starting to notice now is that some organizations really just kind of freeze up and scale down and kind of hunker down and do that sort of protective play. They don't want to rock the boat, they don't want to be in the limelight.

[13:17]:

They want to just kind of hunker down and just get through it, weather the storm. And again, without being critical, because there's certain situations where that is the right call, I do sometimes worry that that default reaction can be shortsighted. And what I noticed through the first major disruption in the sector since I've been in the sector professionally, is that the organizations that yes, took a moment to breathe and orient, but then activated very rapidly and strongly, even if they ended up pivoting that activation or that play that they made, those were the organizations that ultimately came out stronger. Again, much easier to say that than to actually do it, but I've been really impressed that amongst all of this chaos, working with some organizations who were literally very directly affected with funding or extra scrutiny or both of those things or whatever, who found a way to show up for their community and really just opened up communication channels around that backed by action in the real world and are on a path to figure out how to navigate a landscape that's very different, that's very fluid, but made an active choice not to just kind of freeze up and hunker down, but to move into action in a way that is really courageous and admirable in my opinion.

Jonathan Hicken [14:36]:

I think I'm actually thinking about this. You've just articulated it in a way that I hadn't been, and thinking about Seymour Center and being a science center and what science means right now in this time, yeah, we have this core business of a traditional science center of admissions and education exhibit hall and our school programs and all that stuff. And as I've alluded to in previous seasons, we are pushing towards a new role in our community. And really, I have been thinking about, oh, actually in a way right now is the best time to stand up for these core values, the best time to stand up for science, the best time to stand up for a community that's trying to protect itself from a changing environment. It's a sense of, hey, we're making sense of this chaos that's happening both sort of at the national level, but also what's going on in our community. And we right now have an opportunity to stand up strong and continue to make that case. The alternative is to step back, slow down, reduce scope, and go back to the core bread and butter of the business instead of reach.

[15:47]:

In any case, it's really interesting that you're bringing this up because I've been thinking about it, and this conversation affirms like, Hey, yeah, it is actually the time to tell the story.

Eric Ressler [15:55]:

And I think we have to acknowledge that that might not be possible for everyone. So again, I'm not here to kind of throw shade at anyone who of

Jonathan Hicken [16:02]:

Course not

Eric Ressler [16:03]:

In a situation where that isn't possible. So I don't want to name any specific organizations we're working with, but we've worked with some organizations that I know were extremely forward thinking around inclusion and diversity and equity programs in their actions, not just their words, and in a way that was really pragmatic and smart and data-driven, not just performative, who have made the choice a strategic choice to remove all of that language from all of their marketing communications and did that in a way that they were really sad to do it, but they made the choice because they were scared that if they didn't do that, that they would lose funding, they would be extra scrutinized, partnerships would fall apart, et cetera, et cetera, and that ultimately it would be a net negative on their impact. Multiple organizations that we've worked with have had some version of this that they've had to navigate, and I think we have to acknowledge that that is okay too.

[16:59]:

But if you are in a position where the net negative is not as existential, then I think especially you sort of owe it to the movement, so to speak, to be strong and to not just roll over and to basically just throw in the towel on these things that you believe in As a leader, as an organization, I think it would be good for us to shift a little bit to how can we best show up right now? What are some actual actions that social impact leaders can take from various positions? How are you thinking about, you mentioned you're already in this moment of shifting and rethinking and reinventing, so you're already in motion, right? So maybe that in certain, I don't want to say makes it easier, but allows you to keep that momentum going. But one thing that I've thought about a lot, and I've put a little bit on social media out about this and seen other people do it as well, is that sort of a call to action to anyone who is in a position to fund or to invest in these organizations that now is a really good time to write some checks because there's a lot of folks out there who are hurting, who need help, who had funding just kind of go poof overnight with no real warning and no real strategy or a grace around how that happened.

[18:22]:

And I believe there's a time for measuring effectiveness and being really strategic about these investments. I don't think we have to throw that away, but one thing I did see during covid is a lot of foundations and funders step up and provide emergency relief for these organizations. And although there are some organizations leading by example doing that, I'm a little underwhelmed frankly, about how little funding is being brought to these organizations in kind of an emergency response way. So that would be one call to action to any funders listening to our show is please consider loosening up those checkbooks a little bit right now.

Jonathan Hicken [18:59]:

Yeah. What I would say to the executive directors and CEOs listening as a couple things, A, I would say check in with your donors and your funders and also in an altruistic way, like check in with them. Hey, you've really helped me and our organization deliver impact, and I know you care about this impact, and I want to help you make sure that you're feeling really good about that, whether it's with me or another organization.

[19:25]:

I just want to check in with you and make sure that we're still in this together and which donors to reach out to and not, but think about who that would be appropriate to reach out to. The second is to reach out to your partners. So if you're collaborating with other organizations, I know a lot of us do, that's the recipe for impact in a lot of cases, is to check in with them and ask, is there anything that you can do to help? How can we strengthen our own networks, our own webs of impact, and just be checking in with people and strengthening, at least in my work, the thing that ultimately is going to create the long-term impact. These are two actions that I'm taking that I'm trying to take and look, I'm not going after an immediate return on those things. It is a long game play and it takes time, but I think it's really worth it.

Eric Ressler [20:14]:

Yeah, I think I especially resonate with your second point around just really doubling down on those partnerships. We've been in a nice position to be able to make some introductions between different clients that we work with who have opportunities to collaborate, but I think even more so it's okay to have just a moment of solidarity, of like, Hey, we're going through some rough stuff right now. And even just acknowledging that as a sector and helping other people is a great way to make yourself feel better about a bad situation that you're in. So I know a lot of organizations, most organizations that we've worked with and are working with and talking to are actually kind of thankful because they have at least one story of someone they know really well who's going through it even worse than they are right now. And that's maybe a weird way to think about it, but that's something that I'm kind of hearing out there.

[21:05]:

And I do wonder though, could we come up with some tips or takeaways for folks who are maybe really in it who are facing huge gaps in funding, staff reductions, having to let go of their team, having to reduce the scope, how to handle that gracefully as a leader to your team? I know that's something you think about a lot, not specifically with this situation, and you're luckily in a position where you're not having to navigate that right now, but if you were, how would you be thinking about it? What actions would you be taking?

Jonathan Hicken [21:34]:

Yeah, so this is a bit hypothetical, but on the fly, but if I was faced with contraction of some sort, the first thing I'm doing is I'm going back down to my core impact, even going back all the way to the origin story if I need to, really going back to what is the very essence of what I'm doing and starting to think about what work is absolutely necessary in order to continue delivering that, that is so much easier to say than to do, especially when you have people on your team who are relying on you and your organization for their livelihood. That is a really hard in practice. But eventually there is a way to do cuts compassionately. So A. go back to your mission, B. is start to prepare to help the people on your team land on their feet, right?

Jonathan Hicken [22:25]:

Because if you're going to need to let people go or contract your team, the best thing you can do for the fabric of your community or for the fabric of your cause is making sure those smart, capable, passionate people can continue doing that work, even if it's not with you. So starting to think about how you might equip these people with the tools they need to move on. So those are the two knee-jerk reaction things I'd be thinking about, really thinking, get down to the very core of the work, cut anything else that's not central, and help the people you have to let go land on their feet.

Eric Ressler [22:58]:

Yeah, I think the last point before we wrap up for today, we alluded to this at the very beginning of the episode, but I think now is an extra important time to be over communicating to your community and to your supporters about what's happening, because I think because of all of the scrutiny, because of the uncertainty, because of the chaos, a lot of organizations are kind of, especially when it comes to strategic communications, kind of scaling back, maybe even just because they're overwhelmed and other higher priority things are happening, totally get all that. But I think a lot of people don't actually know what these orgs are going through, even their supporters, maybe even their partners maybe. And so not that you need to do this in a woe is me sob story framing necessarily, even if it's justified, but just kind of keeping your community abreast to what's going on, what you're going through, what you're struggling with right now, how they can help.

[23:53]:

I think doing that in an authentic way and doing that in a personal way is going to be really important. And I also hope that going back to turning a challenge into an opportunity, how can we take this as an opportunity as a sector to make sure we really elevate telling stories about why our work matters, why it's important, why it's worth doing, why it's worth supporting in a way that can counter some of these disinformation narratives around a grift economy of the nonprofit space, which is just so ironic in amidst what's actually happening at a federal level. So I think that's something I've, obviously, this is very close to the kind of work that we're doing, and so that's top of mind for me, but I've seen that the organizations who have taken the time to come out with an authentic message around how they plan to show up, have received an outsized amount of support from their community, and even having people thank them for being brave enough to say something and keeping them in the loop around how they're thinking about it.

Jonathan Hicken [24:54]:

Yeah, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, impact stories, all that stuff. Now's the time to do that.

Eric Ressler [25:00]:

So this season, we are hoping to cover a lot of topics that will help folks in the social impact space make some big moves. Even amongst all this uncertainty, we're going to do our best to keep in mind what the playing field is right now and what the realities are right now for you as a social impact leader. And at the same time, we want to make sure that we don't make ourselves smaller or that we don't feel smaller just because of even some of these realities. So hopefully this season, listeners, you'll get a lot out of this. Jonathan, I'm excited to keep this thing going, so thanks for joining me today. 

Jonathan HIcken:
Thanks, Eric.