Heart, Head, and Hands: Challenges and Hope in Advancing IDEAA and Truth and Reconciliation

FRANÇAIS

The AFP Daily sat down with three leaders in our sector during Black History Month to talk about the challenges we face as a society, as a sector, as a profession and as an association in advancing inclusion, diversity, equity, access, anti-racism (IDEAA), and also truth and reconciliation. They also share their thoughts on what gives them hope and energy for this work.

Tanya Rumble is the co-founder of Recast Philanthropy and is the Executive Director, Development for University-Wide Initiatives at Toronto Metropolitan University. Tanya recently completed a five year-term on the AFP Canada Board as board Secretary and chair of Governance. Tanya lives in Toronto, Ontario.

April Howe is the founder and CEO of Crayon Strategies, a Diversity and Inclusion consulting firm that partners with organizations to foster diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplaces. April worked with the Nova Scotia chapter of AFP to develop their IDEAA pathway. April is based in Kipuktuk (Halifax), Nova Scotia.

Jackson Lee Davis IV is AFP Global’s new vice president of culture and belonging. Jackson is a globally recognized leader in IDEAA and brings more than two decades of experience driving organizational culture transformation across the corporate and nonprofit sectors. Jackson is a fourth-generation Washington, D.C. resident.

Below are some of their thoughts, condensed here due to space.

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What do you see as the challenges we are facing at this time?

April - It’s been a long and often difficult journey for AFP to gain meaningful traction nationally around diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). The intentions have been strong. The expertise brought in has been solid. But expertise alone doesn’t move culture. There has to be authentic internal commitment. You have to feel it. DEI is heart work first. Then it becomes head work. Then it’s hands work — in that order. When organizations rush to the “hands” before doing the internal reflection, or stay stuck in intellectual analysis without conviction, the work becomes performative. And performative work doesn’t hold.

Tanya - Progress seems to be slow. I’m seeing less and less organizations interested in focusing their grant programs or fundraising programs on creating specific pathways for structurally disadvantaged identity groups, including the Black community. Organizations seem to have less reporting on their IDEAA initiatives, their cluster hiring, etc. I would say there is a quiet rolling back of concerted effort across the sector. I think that is something we should all be concerned about, because I don’t think of IDEAA as being only relevant to those with structurally disadvantaged identities, whether Black communities, Indigenous communities, queer communities and so many others. It’s really about us ending the harmful power dynamics that exist in our sector and that would really benefit everyone that works in philanthropy, everyone that works in the charitable sector, anyone trying to create social impact.

Jackson – This work does take time. I've got a long background in corporate and, you know, they want to see things change every quarter. We'll certainly have milestones and markers along the way, but we also have to be willing to talk about and solve root causes. The structures and systems that are in place were created for a specific output, and that’s what we are getting. If we want something different, then we've got to create different structures or systems. They didn't come up overnight and solving them is also not going to occur overnight.

This is not a widget that we're talking about. It's not a machine that we put a little oil on. You need to take time with people for genuine and authentic conversation. Whatever industry you're in, there is no silver bullet. You have to roll up your sleeves and have conversations that sometimes may be uncomfortable and not be afraid to take on the real underlying issues and tasks.

April – Because we live in Canada, we value humility and kindness. But being nice is not the same as being equitable. For those who live outside the majority experience — those who are equity-seeking — there is still an emotional tax that comes with simply showing up. And well-intentioned people often struggle to see and understand that.

Sometimes you can’t reach people because fragility blocks the message. And sometimes, grace and polish aren’t what’s needed. There are moments when I stop code-switching. When I allow myself to show up fully — as an unvarnished black woman.   That may not always feel “comfortable” to others. But authenticity is necessary. And sometimes clarity of message requires directness.

Jackson – From a different vantage point, you know, here we sit today with the passing of Jesse Jackson. This is really personal for me because I actually went to high school with two of his sons. And I listened to the messages that he was very clearly articulating in the ‘80s and the’ 90s, calling on governments to invest in communities and challenging authorities to do the right things. And it's like, where are we 30 years later? It’s Kafka-esque, certainly with what we have been seeing with the overreaching detention efforts and the most recent deaths in Minneapolis. It's really tough right now at many levels.

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What is giving you hope or energy at this time?

Tanya – When I was a young fundraiser, I definitely didn’t feel like I was able to center my identity as a place of strength in fundraising. It was something to minimize, make as invisible as possible. And what I see in the new generation of fundraisers is a kind of pride of identity, a self-assuredness and confidence in what they bring to the table that centers lived experiences, intersectional identity, and power dynamics in ways that I could never have been able to articulate as a young professional. That gives me a lot of hope and optimism.

If I think about professional conferences, publications, and research in our sector, often times there were special features that related to reconciliation or identity-focused fundraising, or diversity in philanthropy. And now that content, those perspectives are consistently offered at conferences, in our professional publications and research about the sector. I see that as an acknowledgment that this should be relevant to all folks working in a variety of roles and positionalities in our sector.

April – The work my firm and I did with AFP Nova Scotia really stands out for me. At their conference, we didn’t start with solutions. We started with how this DEI is actually making people feel. The conversation was open, honest, and vulnerable. It was emotional. It was uncomfortable. And it was real.

Too often organizations want a quick fix. They want someone to “solve” diversity and inclusion. But real progress begins with courageous conversation. It requires vulnerability — especially around issues like white fragility, guilt, misunderstanding, and fear.  This chapter leaned in. They didn’t want a false start. They were clear: if we begin this journey, we need to see it through. And they did.

As a Black woman, that experience mattered. Watching leadership commit to cultural humility — choosing not to let bias or defensiveness drive the process — was validating. It illustrated that when people are willing to sit in the discomfort, growth is possible.

Tanya – I’ve also seen a concerted effort on the part of professional associations like the AFP, Canadian Association of Gift Planners (CAGP), and others to undertake research, advocacy, and look at governance systems to mechanize IDEAA practices and systems rather than relying on individuals who have structurally disadvantaged identities to take on that work, to take on that leadership, to take on that advocacy.

I did a case study on University of British Columbia’s (UBC) naming policy. They are one of the big universities and among the largest fundraising enterprises in the country. For them to say we’re going to consider our Indigenous communities and the relationships we have there as a central and key principle of our naming policy and practices, I think that is a huge bright spot. That is a policy-focused initiative that we should look at. How do we find more opportunities to do this in other large-scale institutions? They should be breaking the wake for the younger and smaller ones, because they have the endowments and financial insulation to make those kinds of choices.

Jackson – Even given the challenging time that we're in, as I come to know people across AFP and learn about why they're involved, why they support the association and our IDEAA work, it’s like wow – there's a lot of good work going on and there's a lot of good hearted people in and around this profession and what we're trying to move forward on a day-to-day basis. That is so heartening and I think that's part of where we can go for resilience and support. We have more than 25,000 members, and I've only been exposed to a fraction of the work at this point, a month into my tenure here, but it comes through. It is genuine.

Our members and volunteers are truly committed to the vision and mission of this association. They work their butts off every day to try and make sure that that we are promoting an ethical profession, a profession that more people should join and that we want to see grow. There are some really positive green shoots that I feel have finally taking taken root. Yes, there are definitely going to be down days, but to expect that there wouldn’t be is unrealistic. So that's why we struggle onward and keep tapping into those sources of strength, hope and resilience to bounce back even in the face of challenges.

April – I also get energy from the individual moments. The conversations where someone pauses and says, “Wow - I've never thought of it that way.” I genuinely love engaging with people who don’t yet see it. Not to win the argument — but to create a shift. One person at a time. It’s not just about doing the work. It’s about getting to the other side of it — where insight is created and understanding expands a person's mindset.

Tanya – I have a lot of amazing colleagues in the sector that I trust and I rely on that continue to offer me support and counsel, pushing me in my thinking and my perspective, and challenging me and helping me, but also offering me support in times of challenge and despair. The “Recast Philanthropy” community of practice has always been a bright spot for me, to continue to connect with professionals and folks across the sector and always new ones, bringing new perspectives. I think that’s always offered me a sense of shared accountability, of shared care in the work. When you know there’s other people that are showing up voluntarily, not because it’s their job, but because they believe in the shared values and principles. I think that gives you so much hope and optimism.

Jackson – I think acknowledging and celebrating our differences is important – all the rich experiences, gifts and uniqueness that people bring to the table. Once we begin to crack the nut on working across differences, we invite conversations, invite interactions, provide a space for those to occur. That's, I think, where the magic starts to happen. When people feel they belong and have an opportunity to contribute, that's when we get the best and the most out of people.

One of the key questions for me is how do we create an environment that's inviting, where anyone now feels like they can contribute, raise their voice, or raise their hand to volunteer for an IDEAA committee or one of the new FORGE (Fairness, Openness, Respect, Grace and Empathy) committees that we'll be rolling out. We want a rich diversity of perspectives to understand the community better and serve the community better than we have in the past. At the end of the day, we all want to enable a greater impact for ourselves, our profession, our donors, our sector and our communities.

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Any final thoughts?

Tanya – I would encourage AFP members and fundraisers to ask themselves “What assumption do I hold about effective philanthropy that I am willing to question or unlearn in order to better serve donors whose giving is shaped by culture, by family and community.” It’s not only a way to challenge ourselves, but also to help our donors upend their own expectations about who is worthy, who measures what is effective, and centering humanity at the heart of effectiveness.

I hope that the charitable sector continues to be a place that truly loves all of humanity, including those people that are closest to the missions of the organizations that we serve, because those are the ones doing the hardest work. If we are not truly engaging with community in the multitude of ways that it looks like, then I think we are missing an opportunity to do fundraising most effectively and most impactfully for our sector and our profession.

April - I’m speaking soon to Black Professionals within the federal government about Black History and Resilience. And I’ve been reflecting on how we define resilience.  We often think of resilience as pushing through at all costs. Enduring. Staying the course no matter the challenge. I say that's tenacity. It's grit. But that's not resilience.  

Resilience is different. It's doing the work AND thriving. It’s not just surviving the pressure and paying the price for it — resilience is moving through it and staying whole in spite of it.  For me, that distinction matters. Especially for those who carry both leadership responsibility and lived experience. Thriving — not just enduring.  Resilience is the path for this sector.

Jackson – [On Truth and Reconciliation] If we're going to move anywhere positively within our countries, we've got to work through cultural erasure and recognize what truly happened historically, not some fictitious or convenient version of what happened. Canada is clearly ahead on this and needs to continue to lean in and lead on that work. We are at different places right now, but I think we can learn from your journey and hopefully we will start to see Truth and Reconciliation work emerge increasingly in the United States as well.

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Tanya Rumble can be reached at Recast Philanthropy

April Howe can be reached at Crayon Strategies

Jackson Davis can be reached at [email protected].