I am choosing to go. I am choosing to follow Jesus. I am choosing to obey the Great Commission. I am choosing to love the way that He first loved us. I will not settle for anything less. I am choosing to be a disciple of Jesus. Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth. I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73, 25 and 26. Whether you're here in Richland or watching online or at Portage, I want us all on the count of three to say desire. One, two, three. Desire. Desire. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled. Hunger, thirst. Matthew 5, 6. Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall not hunger and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. John 6, 35. Jesus. I want us now to shout the name that's above every name and that's Jesus. One, two, three. Jesus. Jesus. Desire. Hunger. Thirst. Jesus. I'm going to say it again until you get it. Desire. Hunger. Thirst. Jesus. Mmm, Jesus. Our hearts desire. What our soul longs for, the very appetite of our lives finally fulfilled in the person of Jesus. If you're a believer, you have something to shout about because you have what your heart has been longing for. Amen. Which begins, which leads us now to how we began the Disciple Series. If you have your Bibles and I hope that you do, turn with me to John chapter one. The Gospel of John chapter one, beginning with verse 29. Desire. Hunger. Thirst. Jesus. John chapter one, beginning with verse 29, the word of God says, the next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and said, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is John the Baptist. John wants everyone to see what he saw. Who he saw. John sees Jesus coming and shouts, behold him. See him. Don't look at me.  Look at him. I must decrease. He must what? Increase. Don't look at me. Behold this Jesus.  John declares that Jesus is the very Lamb of God. Now why does that matter? Because in this world, in this life, the world can give us and offer us a lot of things in this life, but the world can't take away our sin which will keep us from having eternal life. Behold Jesus. See Jesus. Now look down at John chapter one, verse 35. Look a couple of verses down. Verse 35. The next day, again, John was standing with two of his disciples and he looked at Jesus. And as he walked by and said, behold the Lamb of God. So sometimes the Bible repeats itself because we need it, right? So he sees Jesus again. Behold the Lamb of God. Look at him. I want you to get him. I love what John says. John is pointing them to the one who he said is far greater than him. He's saying the one that's coming after me, he's going to baptize you with fire. And all you know right now is water. This is something other Jesus is different, different. This is the one. So let's see how they respond. Verse 37. I love this. The two disciples heard him say this and they followed Jesus. Jesus turned and saw them following and said to them, what are you seeking? So imagine this. You hear, you're there. You hear the arrival of the Lamb of God, the Savior of the world.  You see this man with your very eyes. And you stop what you're doing and you begin to follow him. Now the Bible doesn't tell us how long they were following him. But can you imagine that? Like, yo, that's Jesus. That's Jesus. And you just begin to follow him. And Jesus turns. The Bible says he turns and he looks at them and says, what are you seeking? Imagine that Jesus just walking, doing what he does. Turns, captures their attention, says, what are you seeking? Another way of saying that is this. What do you want? A hoodway. Which you won't. What do you want? Like really, what do you want?  Think about that. Imagine if Jesus was hearing a flesh and listen, they had some idea of who he was. And their answer had to contain some type of truth. And Jesus looks you in the eye and says this, what are you desiring? What do you hunger and thirst for? How would you respond? How would you respond when the very love of God personified is looking at you in your eyes and saying, hey, what do you want? What do you really want? The disciples answered Jesus with another question. It goes on later in verse 38. It says, and they said to him, I love this, rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? Now they're not concerned with the location. Pastor Lee spoke on this. They're not concerned about where he's going. No, they're saying this, Jesus, wherever you are, that's where I want to be. Wherever you are, I want to be there. So I love this. If we put this together, right? Jesus asked them, what do you want? You know what the disciples say? We want you. We want you. Oh, I love that. Jesus, what do you ask you? What do you want? Can you honestly, from the depths of your heart say, I want you. This is the creator of the world. You know he can give you anything you desire.  I want you. Here's my first point for today is this. Disciples want Jesus. You want to be a disciple? Disciples want Jesus. Disciples desire, hunger, thirst after Jesus. So how does Jesus respond to this question? How is Jesus, is he going to say, no, not really? How is he going to respond? Look at verse 39. It says, he said to them, come and you will see. So they came and saw where he was staying and he stayed with him that day for it was about the 10th hour. What I love about Jesus is this. Jesus doesn't reject their requests to be with them. He doesn't reject them at all. And he also invites them to come be with them, stay with him and follow him wherever he goes. Now this truth mattered then and it matters now. God is the same yesterday, today and what? Forever. And the reason why I want to harp on his truth is this. Jesus did not and does not reject those who want him. Jesus did not and does not reject those who want him. Let me remind you of the gospel. The gospel teaches us that God pursued us, revealed perfect love to us through the person of Jesus. And what do we do? We rejected him. But that rejection led to a cross. Then it led to a resurrection that made the relationship with God possible.  He won't reject you because he was already rejected to have you. Can I get an amen? Somebody in here. If you're afraid that Jesus is going to reject you, he's like too late already happened. You've already offended me. You never deserve this. That's why I came to offer grace. Don't be afraid for those who really want Jesus to go after him. He wants you to follow him more than you want to follow him. I guarantee you that. Why? Because he knows what he has in store for you. I love when I have surprises for my kids and my daughter is sick. She goes, Daddy, what are we doing? What are we doing? What are we doing? I'm like, you have no idea. It's going to be glorious. Even though she's happy, she's like anticipating something, she doesn't even know what it is. I know what it is. And I'm like, it's going to be great, right? Jesus wants you to follow him way more than you want to follow him. He won't reject you. What a privilege it is to be a disciple of Jesus. It's amazing. I love what I get to do. I get paid to be a Christian. Most of you do it for free. It's awesome. Right? I'm sorry, Pastor Lee. I'm sorry. I have to throw that in. It's pretty cool. But what is a disciple? Pastor Lee did a phenomenal job defining a disciple as someone who finds, follows, and it's becoming fully formed to be like Jesus. Here's the thing. Why would anyone find, follow, or be formed by something or someone that they don't really want? Why?  We won't become like him if we don't like him. I'm not trying to speak about your family. At least I'll talk about mine. But in my family, I have family members who I love, but I don't like. You laugh, and you might be sitting next. Anyway, but there's people in your family who say, hey, I love you, but you don't like them. And because you don't like them, you don't pursue them. Because you don't pursue them, you're not around them. Because you're not around them, you don't talk to them. And so, of course, you're not like them because you don't like them. It's the same way with Jesus. If you have an area, we have areas in our lives that aren't like Christ. Well, that's the area in our life where we don't like Christ. We won't become like Jesus. If we don't like Jesus, disciples like Jesus. Let's get real simple. Why did I marry my wife? I like her. Why do marriages fall apart? They stop liking each other. That's where somebody ain't here. But anyway, here we go. 1 John 5, verse 3. Here we go. Disciples like Jesus. For this is the love of God that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. Disciples don't view the commands of God as a burden. They're built up by the Word of God. Not broken down by it. Disciples follow the will of God, the commands of God, the rules of God because they actually want God to rule their lives. They actually want it. But let's be honest at times, speak about myself. I don't want to. I just don't want to. Tim, do you want to pray? Nope. Do you want to read? Not really. Do you want to sing? Not again. I just don't want to. And I've heard it said this, that God doesn't want robots. And so this is what happens. We justify our sin actually. There's no other really cute way to put it. We think God is going to let us off the hook because we say this about Him. Because He wants us to love Him from a pure heart, I'm not going to be fake about it. So I'm just not even going to follow Him. But here's the thing. We're not off the hook. You know why? Because God already thought that through. He's so much smarter than you, right? And me, right? So that's what He did. He's so generous. He's so gracious that He will give you the want to want to. Let me say that again. You're not off the hook when you don't want to follow Him. Because He's so awesome, He will actually give you the want to want to. He'll give it to you. Tim, where is that in the Bible? I'm going to show you. Philippians chapter two, verse 13. For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. Tim, break that down. Well, God gives us the desire to do what He created us to do for His glory. We please God because God puts in us the motivation and the power to please Him. How many of you know the... You're familiar with the greatest commandment.  But do you know what the Bible says? How that happens? Deuteronomy chapter 30, verse 6. And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart in the heart of your offspring so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul that you may live. Do y'all see that? God circumcises our hearts so that we can even begin to love Him. You want more scripture? I got some more. Ezekiel 36, beginning verse 25. I will sprinkle clean water on you. Listen to the words of God. I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness and from all of your idols. I will cleanse you. Verse 26. And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statues and be careful to obey my rules. How beautiful is our God. You don't mind that I brag on Him a little bit. Listen, the Bible says God cleanses us, gives us a new heart, fills us with His spirit so that we can follow Him. Church, God will give you the want to want to. But Tim, I don't want to. That's all right. He'll give you that too. Jeremiah 31, 33 to 34. For this is the covenant that I make with the house of Israel. After those days declares the Lord, I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people and no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother saying know the Lord for they shall all know me from the least of them to the greatest declares the Lord for I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more. Listen, church, God removes our sin, remembers them no more and teaches us who He is by writing His very law on our very hearts. Man. Let's put this all together. I know I'm saying a lot. Well, come right, come hungry, right? I'm feeding, all right? Let's put this all together. So God circumcises. God cleans. God removes. God gives. God fills. God writes. God teaches. God forgives. So that we can know love, know His grace, and walk according to His will for His glory. Praise God for God. Praise God for God. All right. How about this? Listen, listen to these precious truths, these promises. I'm not trying to show you how smart I am. I'm trying to show you how faithful God is. First Thessalonians 5, 23, 24. Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. Let me say that again.  Now may the God of peace sanctify you completely. And may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless in the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Verse 24, He who calls you is faithful. He will surely do it. He will surely do it. Do it. How about the grace of God? What if I told you grace does more than save us? Titus 2, For the grace of God has appeared bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in the present age. Waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. Why do I want God?  We're found in Jesus and we're going to be spotless and blameless because of what he did for us. Some of us fear the second coming of Jesus, but the spirit and the bride say come on. I don't know if you've ever seen the matrix where Neil goes what up? I'm not afraid of Jesus nor should you be nor should you be. Jesus gives his disciples the want to want to. Why? Let me close this. Here we go. Because it takes God to love God. It takes God to love God. It takes Father, Son and Spirit to love Father, Son and Spirit. It takes God to love God. Have you ever prayed this prayer? Have you ever prayed, hey God, help me talk to you more. Help me read my Bible. God, help me pray to you more. Have any of you ever prayed that prayer? You know what's crazy about that prayer?  Is that your spirit praying to God or is that the Holy Spirit? Oh, I'm a go, I'm a go J. I'm a go. Right? So when you pray, look how cool this is. When you pray, hey God, help me pray. He's like already doing it. Maybe not that voice, but he's already doing it.  The Holy Spirit is doing that. He's doing that. He's already answering that prayer. One of the values here at Radiant Church is Spirit and Power. What does that mean? One take on that is this.  We believe that. We believe that. That the Father is so gracious that he didn't just give us Jesus. He actually gave us his Spirit. Can I preach a little bit? Come on, y'all. Caleb, this one I wish I had an organ. That's what I wish. So don't do it. Seriously, I don't want to get fired. Okay, here we go. So watch this. Jesus was on the cross, right? Y'all remember he said it is but he didn't say I am finished. He said it is finished but he didn't say I am finished. They put Jesus body. We just sung this in worship. They put Jesus body in a tomb but he didn't stay there. The Holy Spirit rose Jesus from the grave. Jesus ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father but guess what? He's not just sitting there. He's working. He kept his promise to the disciples to send another helper the Spirit of Truth that will dwell with them and be in them. So the Spirit that went inside Jesus tomb is the same Spirit that lives inside of us. The Spirit that descended on Jesus baptism is the same Spirit that baptizes believers for his glory. Come on church, this is the Holy Spirit. God will give you the want to want to. It takes God to love God and the third person of the Holy Trinity will change you and transform you not just save you. Not just save you. We can't be settled for just going to heaven because that's not the goal. Heaven's coming to earth. There's going to be a new earth and I'm looking for Holy Ghost Christians. What happened to the Holy Ghost? Y'all remember that language? Why are you afraid?  Greater is He that is in me than He that is in this world. I'm not afraid of ghosts. I got the Holy Ghost. I'm not the priest. But see me like we got to believe these things, these truths. Holy Spirit we're Spirit empowered. We are disciples. They come to understand that long before long before they pursued the Father that He was already pursuing them. Disciples come to understand that they love God because He what? First love does. Disciples come to understand that they are saved and sustained by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Disciples. Disciples. You may be here but like Y'all but tell me here we go. Unlike the disciples in this story I can't see Jesus in the flesh. Like if I was here and I could see His beard and see the miracles and hear His teachings. I would devote my life to Him. I would drop whatever I'm doing and I will follow Him. So I'm a little bit off the hook because they had an advantage right? They can actually see Jesus. We really can't see Him. What does the Bible have to say about that? First Peter chapter 1 verse 8 says though you have not seen Him you love Him. Though you do not now see Him you believe in Him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory. John 20 verse 29 Jesus said to Him have you believe because you have seen Me bless are those who have not seen and yet have believed. We are not off the hook because we can't see Jesus the way we saw Jesus. When Jesus himself says there's a blessing for those who believe and haven't seen Me yet. There's a blessing for us but there's more. Even though we can't see Jesus in the flesh what if I told you you can see His body? I won't tell you how does that act. Well look around. If you're at home look at yourself like hey look at yourself.  Right? How beautiful is that? The church is not only the bride of Christ it is also the body of Christ. The body of Christ the church God's people is so important to Me. Why? Because I am a disciple of Jesus because of other disciples of Jesus. To be conformed into the image of Jesus to be fully formed to be like Jesus. We need people we need disciples to to get close enough to see their walk to see how they follow him to see how they desire him. You've heard the same monkey see monkey do? Let me give you a theological statement blow your mind ready. Disciple see. Disciple do. It's the same. John I mean 3rd John 111. Beloved do not imitate evil but imitate good. 1st Corinthians 416 I urge you then be imitators of Me. What is Paul talking about? 1st Corinthians 111 I urge you then be imitators of Me as I am of Christ. Christ. Yeah you can't see Jesus but that's no excuse because Jesus left us the church. His very body. And when I look in this crowd. Yeah I see people but I see the very body of Jesus Christ. The body the spiritual community. I'm here because men they loved God enough and loved me enough and invited me into their lives to get close enough to see how much they love Jesus and taught me and trained me. There was a time in in high school for a time where I was just homeless. It's a story how I got there I don't have time for that but there was a time I was living and I was an upperclassman there was a time I was living on the school bus that was parked in a school parking lot. I remember that time. But thank God for Miss Cousins. Who's Miss Cousins? That was the school's cafeteria lady. Who loved Jesus. And she invited me to stay with her and her family. Why am I hospitable? Why do I love having people in my home? I want myself to your home. Why do I desire that everyone knows that they're no loved and cared for? Because a disciple with a hair net and an apron. Show me the love of God. And let me be a part of her family. Yup. I thank God for this church called Mechanicsville Christian Center. I just came to the Lord. I was new, grew up in inner city.  I'm like, what is that? It's a worship service. What is that? We're going to sing songs. The whole time? Right? I'm being real. That's all we're going to do. Yeah. All right. Show up. Man, I didn't know any of the songs. I barely knew anybody. I was like, I'm going to judge me for this. Ready? The song shout to the Lord came on. And I'm not talking about the shout. Not that one that I grew up with. I'm talking about shout to the Lord. Y'all remember that one? That thing came on. I was like, what is happening? And there was a line that changed my life. Mountains bow down. I'm from the city. I saw a deer in my 20s for the first time. All right? And I was like, I don't know what's happening. I was like, what is going on? It's the first time I felt the presence of God. So why am I passionate about worshiping God through song? Because the disciples of Jesus loved Jesus enough to sing to him for hours. And even though I didn't know the song, I knew they were singing. I was like, I don't know what's happening. I was like, I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. And I began to raise my hands and start crying. Like, what is going on? And even though I didn't know the song, I knew they were singing to God and I knew that God was in the room. It changed my life. It changed my life. I need disciples. Why am I here behind this pulpit today? Because of men like Pastor Lee and Pastor Sonny who have their own families, they have their own schedules, their own problems. When my family and I were going through a hard time in Virginia, picked up the phone multiple times just to check in on me. Just to make sure that I was okay. Because of people like Pastor Lee and Jane who were willing, willing to move my family from Virginia in the middle of a pandemic so we could be a part of the family of God called Radiant Church. I can see God. I can feel the heartbeat of God when I hug the men and women of God. I know He loves me. There's so many others that I can think that comes to mind but here's the point. The body of Christ, we need disciples. We need to once again be disciples.  It's not perfection He is after because He's already perfect. It's progress. It's progress. The disciples in Scripture were commissioned to make disciples from every nation, weren't they? Here's the key. You and I have that same mission. We've been given the same mandate. Think about this. When Jesus went to heaven, aren't you happy that He left His disciples? Why is that important? Well, Jesus didn't take His disciples with Him so that we could see Him. Jesus wanted us to believe the gospel. Well, if He took all His disciples who knew the gospel, who was going to share the gospel with you? Aren't you happy that somebody at some time told you about Jesus? I am. That's why I'm here. In Matthew 28, you see the Great Commission and I actually want to go there real quick. In Matthew 28, listen to this. This is our mandate as disciples. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Verse 20, Matthew 28, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. I'm just using my holy imagination at this moment, but stay with me. Know what I think the biggest motivating factor it was for these disciples to make disciples of all nations? I don't think they were just excited about the activity or the teaching or anything like that. I think the promise that Jesus was going to be with them no matter where they went was the motivating factor for them to work for Him. Because more than anything else they wanted Jesus. What's him where you getting that from? You ever remember in John you were like, hey, can we go with you? Can we go with you? Take us with you.  They wanted him so bad that I believe that Jesus, he's so brilliant. He says, hey, when you do this work, I'm with you in a special way. Yes, God is everywhere all the time, but this is a special with you.  He's leaving and Jesus knows to motivate them. I have to tell them that I'm going with them. But is that enough to motivate you? No one should motivate us on mission more than hell, more than certain nations, more than certain people's groups because Jesus is with us when we do His work. Jesus is with us. Do you, do we want Jesus? People need to see disciples. When I came to the Lord, the Holy Spirit just began to do some crazy work in me. He gave me like a true hunger and desire for the Word of God and so much so when I was a basketball player at that time and I wanted to get trained and God sent this man of God by the name of Seth Franco, a former Harlem Globetrotter and I saw him play. I'm like, man, this dude can ball. So I came up to him and I was like, hey, Seth, would you train me? And I just came up and I said, I would train you, but this is what you have to do. You have to get a Bible. You have to start in Genesis. You need to read X amount of chapters a week and then you need to write down what these chapters mean to you and before we even touch a basketball, we're going to talk about Jesus. And when I didn't have my chapters and I showed up, he was like, bye. He did that. No, it was crazy. Many years later, I graduate from a school of ministry and a gift he gave me was those scriptures and those chapters that I wrote when I was 16 years old. That's a disciple. And that's how you make disciples. I want to invite us all. Please stand. Please stand. Let's respond to God tonight. If you would just close your eyes and tonight I want everyone here to want Jesus. I want you to be able to see him just like John the Baptist. The call is behold him. Don't look at me. Don't look at this thing. Look at him. Look to Jesus.  You know if you have a relationship with God or not. Maybe you just don't and maybe you feared rejection and maybe I don't know what it is, but you just know that there's a gap, a separation between you and Jesus. You're not here by accident. And today if there's anyone here who says you know what, I want to follow Jesus. I want to know this man that the scripture talks about. I want to start this relationship. I know I'm a sinner. I know I'm not perfect. Yeah, I do feel that I'm under this weight. I do feel like God isn't around and maybe you just want to start a fresh start anew. I just want to pray for you quickly. If that's you tonight, would you just raise your hand so I could just pray for you? I see that hand. Thank you, sir. Praise God. Let me pray. Father, we we love you. Jesus, we adore you. Holy Spirit, we desperately need you. And I ask you right now, Holy Spirit that you would do a work in the lives of those who are saying I want to see Jesus. Give me the desire to even desire him. Holy Spirit, do a supernatural work. Give them a hunger and a thirst. Father, would you draw people into Jesus so that they can be saved, so that they can be forgiven, so that they can experience the grace that you already purchased? Father, show them who your son is. Show him that he is Lord.  Like, God, please reveal Jesus to them. Jesus name. Tonight for closing, well, the way I was, as I was preparing, I thought it would be a great way for us to close this. For all of us who know the Lord, who are disciples to sing this old song, the good one. It's a Odie Bagoldi. It's a song that I remember even before I came to Christ that was like my grandma and other saints were singing and other disciples were singing. It's just like I have decided to follow Jesus. Not in a legalistic way, but what we recommit, what we concentrate ourselves to the Lord and say, man, I'm deciding to follow you, but let's take it to another level. Jesus is calling his disciples not just to follow him, but to go and make more followers to actually help people come to know and see the Jesus Christ. So when we sing this song, you're not just deciding to follow him personally. We're not even just deciding to follow him corporately. We're saying we're making the decision tonight to follow him and for him to take me wherever he wants to take me for him to use me so that people will come out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light and we will teach them the ways of God. We will preach, we will prophesy, we will pray, we will sing and we will worship the way that people who don't know Jesus will begin to desire him. People will come and look at us and say there's something different about you and we're not going to say this because we're great. We're going to say this because God is great and you need to know that God that we know. So when we sing this song, it's not just something cute, it's a declaration powerfully saying that I am going to decide to follow Jesus. If Jesus heard the world upside down with 12, there's more than 12 people in this room. Let's follow the Lord. Let's change the world. Let's not be afraid of the darkness when he's called us to be the light. Let's sing it out to Jesus. Come on. I have decided. Let's sing every voice. No turning back. No turning back. No turning back. Make the decision to follow Jesus with all our hearts, our strength. Come on. The cross before us. Come on. How about this Donunga with me. Let's do that. This is a big one. This is a big one. Donunga with me. Yes. Come on. Just the voices. I have decided. Just the voices. Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Amen. We love you. We love you. We'll see you next week. Love you.


From San Francisco, it's theCUBE, covering Samsung Developer Conference 2017. Brought to you by Samsung. Okay, welcome back everyone. Live here in San Francisco for day two, we're winding down day two of two days of wall-to-wall coverage of theCUBE's exclusive coverage of Samsung Developer Conference. I'm John Furrier, the founder, co-founder of SiliconANGLE Media, co-student of theCUBE, our next guest, Larry Cutler, co-founder and CTO of Baobab Studios. You got it right. And your co-founder and CEO, Maureen Fan, was at our Grace Hopper event. Yes. Well, thanks for joining us. Thank you for having me. So you guys are doing great. So I love the storytelling, gaming, tech culture coming together here at Samsung. You see the future, right? The future, if you connect the dots is obviously augmented reality, voice activated, headphones that can be hacked and programmed and customized. You guys are doing some interesting things because some good awards. Take a minute to talk about your studios. What are you guys doing? What's the aha moment for you guys? What should people know? So we, at Baobab Studios, we're reinventing animated storytelling using VR. And so what we've, our aha moment was feeling that you could completely immerse yourself in the world in VR. And when we started thinking about, well, what is so special about an animated film? It's really about transporting you to faraway worlds and making those worlds so real that you could like reach out and touch them. And then if you think about VR, that's kind of the same thing where VR's promise is being able to transport you to incredible places and to make you really feel like you're in those worlds and you're part of those worlds. And to relax and chill a little bit too. Well relax and chill as well. Or entertainment or be through. In our case, we wanted to take all the experience that we have telling stories at places like Pixar and Dreamworks and apply that into this new medium. And so we found that, you know, VR is an incredibly powerful medium and it really is one that's unlike film and unlike games. So you were talking about, you know, bringing together the expertise of people from films and people from games that's critical to what we're doing. And yet at the same time, the experience is something that's totally different. Yeah, we were commenting with some of our guys in our office how Twitch was experimenting with using the comments that drive the game behavior. You're starting to see new kinds of game systems develop around the storytelling as more of a behavioral dynamic, not the boring game I figured out or the multiplayer game with my same friends or whatever that's going on. We're seeing a whole new level of creativity going on. One, two, the other question is, how much does it cost to make these things? Because Dreamworks and these guys have spent a lot of dough to do animation. Yes. I mean, it's not cheap. Right. So how do you guys crack the code on keeping it low, not low budget, but low cost and also intelligent? Yeah. Is that the secret sauce? Yes, well that's certainly super important for us. You know, we're a startup company so obviously we need to be able to have a pipeline that we run efficiently. And for us, I think what we've done is we've brought together some of the best people. So we've hired our friends, we've hired people who are really experts in the field and we're really creating a next generation VR platform so that we can actually create these animated experiences, be able to experiment in the space, sort of try out different techniques and storytelling methodologies and at the same time do it in a way that we can sort of experiment as much as possible. So how about some of the awards you guys had? I mean, you guys have done some things to share some of the accolades you've gotten. Yeah, so I mean, you know, what's amazing is, is that we started with our first piece of content invasion and we premiered it last year in April at Tribeca Film Festival. And it's really gone on to first of all, from a consumer standpoint, it's one of the most popular downloaded pieces of content on all the VR platforms. And at the same time, it's been shown at a number of different film festivals and it recently won an Emmy so we're very excited about that. And what we realize is that audiences just fell in love with this bunny character, Chloe. So invasion is a story about two aliens that try to take over Earth and they're thwarted not by humans with powerful weapons but by cute little woodland creatures. And in the first episode in invasion, they're thwarted by this cute little bunny, Chloe.  And audiences, the viewer just reacted in ways that you would never do in a film. Like people are waving at Chloe, a lot of people reach out and try to pet Chloe, a lot of people mimic what Chloe's doing. And in short, people are just treating Chloe as if she's real. And it made us realize that there's something really powerful here that is really worth kind of leaning in and digging deeper into. And what was the next step after that? So you went, what? You went through some development? Was it the game? Was it the character development? How do you double down on that? I'm just kind of curious on thinking about it. It was really interesting because in invasion, we were kind of the first to make you a character in the story. But at the time, there really weren't hand controllers or any of the devices so that you could actually really have sort of a more increased role in the story. And so at the same time, people really felt that they were front and center and they felt a sense of protecting Chloe from the aliens because you're placed right in the center of the story. And so with Asteroids when we started, we just wanted to dive deeper into that idea of you playing an active role in the story. And so in Asteroids, we focused on the two alien characters, Mac and Cheese and their relationship and you're a helper robot on the ship. So you have- So how do I get involved and get these stories? Do I have to have a VR kit? So I don't have, I haven't bought anything yet VR-wise. So for me, how do I engage with you guys? What do I do? Do I buy Oculus Rift or with certain headsets? So our stuff is meant to be available for everyone. We really want to have as many people be able to see our content as possible. And so first of all, if you have a VR headset of any type, our invasion is available on all those platforms. So that's the high-end headsets like the Rift and Vive, the PlayStation VR for Sony, as well as if you have a mobile phone, like a Samsung phone, you can plug it into a Gear VR. At the same time, we also have a Baobab Cardboard app. So you don't even need to have VR to see our product. So you just get an iOS or Android Baobab app. So I'm in the market to buy a headset. I don't mind, I'm not price sensitive. What should I buy? What would you recommend? Well, there really are so many options. So, you know, obviously- What would you get? Well, at the highest end, you know, getting a Rift or Vive really gives you the full VR experience because it's really tracking your position and orientation. So you can actually walk around a space. The characters can react to you in believable ways and it's all happening in real time. And on the other hand, you know, the Sony PlayStation VR is really affordable. If you've got a Sony PlayStation, you just buy the PSVR headset, you plug it right in and you're ready to go. I'm really excited looking forward to a world where you're not tethered to your computer. And so it's really exciting to see these standalone headsets that are going to come out that basically there's no tethering to a computer and yet you have that same inside out tracking so that- And this is the Samsung Vision, right? The Samsung Vision is to use their- Exactly, so right now what you have, which is, you know, which is already really exciting is you take your Samsung phone, you plug it into a Gear VR. And the one thing that's missing is that you're not able to track both the position and orientation of where you are. And so the next generation headsets are going to have that. Yeah, and then the experience is going to be much higher for them. All right, cool. So then I actually download all this stuff. As the CTO of the venture, your job is to kind of look over the landscape. You have to have the 20-mile stare of the future. That's right, that's right. Not screw it up, but you've got to win the present. Yes, we're all about being able to deliver in the present and look forward to the future. And that's the key. And you have that unique skills on entrepreneur. What are you guys doing now, technically, and with the product? What are some of the key things that people should know about? Because I mean, I look at the CG and the animation world and you see the Moore's Law kind of coming that way, right? Wow, I mean, as someone who did a live video, I would love to have a bunny in the Cube set right here. Yeah, exactly. So we see a future where I want to immerse myself with characters. Yes. Not just stickers. Yeah, we of course see that as well. So, you know, obviously... It's expensive. I mean, it must be, because the old days, what? It had artists, monster storage, tons of compute. Yes. What's it like now? Well, we're a really small startup company. So we're not a 300-person organization that is producing a full animated film. We're a small team of artists and engineers working together in the same way that we had that same excitement in the early days. I started my career at Pixar in some of the earlier films, and it was that same... Power workstations, yeah, that high-end gear. Yeah, so it was that same excitement of in those early days, we just had to figure out like, how are we going to actually create the shot? How are we going to build this character? How are we going to finish this on time? And we have that same exact excitement in the office. You have Pixar, you have the Toy Story kind of thing? Yeah, so I worked on the Toy Story films and A Bug's Life and Monster's Inc. And then I went over to DreamWorks and headed up all of their character technologies on their various films. Okay, so you guys doing anything different than those guys, or you guys more focused, more simple? I mean, what's interesting is that is that this is really a new medium and it's a new skill set, because what's happened is that you are part of the world and for us, the thing that's most exciting is that by you being a character, first of all, the other characters are not just able to have sort of high quality animation, but they're able to react to you. And so there's A, a number of technical innovations that you need to overcome so that we can have that same high quality character performance that I would expect from a Pixar or DreamWorks film happening running in real time at 90 frames a second on my headset. And at the same time, also be able to have those characters react to you and respond to what you're doing. And so we've scratched the surface on that. So one of the things that's really interesting is how two people will actually have all these subconscious communication cues, whether it's eye contact or whether it's two lovers sitting across the table and mirroring each other's behavior. That's the type of thing that we can add in to our animation. And at the same time, we have stories where depending on what you do, whether you choose to participate or not, that actually affects the outcome and affects the way that characters respond to you. And so having much smarter character performances is certainly one area that I think is really exciting. And that's going to be interesting for you guys because you have some structured ways to do that. There's some unstructured ways to do it with community data, machine learning. And then you can use bots in a way to help you get data but you almost can have character developments be dynamic. You definitely could. And for us, I think the thing that is always the biggest point that we come back to is story. And so on one hand, we want to tell one story that's really told well, not 10 different stories. And on another hand, because you're part of that story, depending on what you do, that's actually going to affect how the characters respond to you. And that can be in a really nuanced way. And so building up AI systems and building up the smarts so that you can actually have that type of response and yet still feel like these characters are live. Well, like the Chloe example on Invasion is a great example. You'd love to have that automated. So when you see those magical moments, the story could evolve. You can kind of give it that programmable, it's policy-based. Yeah, exactly. So this is the type of thing. We're geeking out here on the stuff here. Larry, great to have you on. Super informative content. And I love the world you're in. I think the world's changing. I think you're going to see some interesting dynamics coming. Have the historical view, Pixar and DreamWorks, old school, if you call that old school. That's right. Now the new school's coming in. Certainly AR looks good too, off. Yeah, we're really excited about AR as well. When we think about stories, VR is about transporting you to a different world and having a story take place there. AR is about the characters being alive in your world. Both are really exciting. Have you seen the Magic Leaf demo? Yes, yeah. What's it like? Can you tell us? I'm not allowed to tell, but I think it's a good... Is it good? Yes, yeah. I have a billion. Oh, yeah, I can't wait. Well, that I can't say. I can't comment on their business, but yeah. I think there's a lot of exciting things, you know, AR. They must have a killer demo. Yeah. I want to find out. I want to see this demo. Magic Leaf, I want to see your demo. All seriousness, great to have you on. And certainly come down to our Cube studios. Want to follow your story. I think you guys are on the cutting edge of a new user experience that's going to be computer animation, community graphics into, I think new persona is a storytelling. So congratulations, Larry Cutler. How do you say that? Baobab. Baobab. B-A-O-B-A-B studios in Redwood Street City, California. It's a Cube live coverage from Samsung developer conference. I'm John Furrier Moore after this short break.


As still in tuberculosis, the Cano State Government has reassured of its commitment to its kicking out the disease from the state. The commemoration of World TV Day coincides with when the renowned dentist, Robert Koch, discovered the disease. According to the Governor's representative, Government's collaboration with health partners in the state has helped reduce the burden and transmission of TB in Cano. Five percent detection rate compared to seven percent for the previous year. The highest TB detection rate ever in Cano State and by any set in Nigeria. This is because any untreated TB patient, as we know, can transmit the disease to at least 10 to 15 individuals in India. Please do subscribe to our YouTube channel and don't forget to hit the notification button so you get notified about fresh news updates.


Yes, yes, please. Actually, why am I? Never mind. I'm so glad I got to the save point. Oh, so not a long time from now then. Oh, so not even the year when we are. Oh, gosh. Machine lifeforms that all but annihilate human civilization. The handful of survivors that remain fled from earth seeking refuge on the moon. 5204 AD. Is that when we are? Humanity launched its counterattack. All right, not quite. From a network of orbiting bases. But after more than a dozen large-scale descents upon the enemy, we still haven't managed to repel the invaders. I'm gonna go ahead and guess that it's going to take a lot of work. So we're basically the good robots. Glory to mankind. All right. So we're part of the mankind cult. I'm okay with that. I like mankind anyway. First you'll want it. So all of this has an explanation. That's right. It looks perfectly all right. Roger, Roger. Well, I should probably let you know that this inter-process is being recorded for posterity. On the other side of mind though. My voice recognition. Oh, I'm going to call out to you now. Mom. That's awesome. That is funny. This is the weirdest way to go about video game settings that I have. It's so weird. Inactive sound. What? What? What? Self-destruct. Oh. All right. I believe that's that. Morning. Hey, I could see my eyes for a moment. I wonder why we hide them away. Interesting. I like this. Hmm? What? So I can do plenty of things. Uh, no, thank you. Let's talk with 9S. You want to adjust my combat style. Let's go for balanced. Since we have yet to do any combat. Oh, I can buy stuff. All right. I'm going to buy. Let's buy. I actually don't have any of those. Do I? Five of those. Let's buy 10 of those. Let's see. This player has HP Gorge. I have one of those. Sound waves. This player's sound analysis graph. That might be interesting. And an experienced gorge. It's really cool how they have integrated all of these things in the game. And you actually kind of have fishing spots, really.  I still can't get all the fishing bones out of Noctis's belly. But sure, I will take it. I think I'm going to take this. Sounds more interesting than the HP Gorge. Although I would like it. Can I sell anything? Oh, it's cheap. Oh, removal means death. So I should probably not sell these. I guess. Interesting. I've got mail. Quest items killed. Intel? No. You need data perhaps? How do I open mail? You need to be near an access point to save your data. You can see access points on the close-range map. Be sure to save often. Yes, sir. Oh, access points. Mailbox. Select inbox as an access point to check your mail. Serve and manage a test mail. This message is intended for the verification of your mail account. Oh, God, I... It's not like I have... I get like five of these every day. Verifying different services and whatnot. All right. Quick save. I still... I still have mail. I thought I checked it. Did I not? Can't I remove it? Oh, now it's gone. Guess this is where I'm going. Sure, let's use the fancy elevator. Sisters! Why don't you sweetheart? This is really like all the old-school road-playing games. I like it. Don't worry, I can take care of myself. Ouch! I just bit my tongue. Ow. Plenty of recovery items. Me too. Me too. I obviously need them. Hello, Commander. Ah, 2B. Maintenance finished? Yes, Commander.  Bold. But risky. Try not to be so reckless next time. Understood. I know you're fresh out of maintenance, but I have another mission for you. I need you to head to the surface. Rendezvous with the resistance and do some recon. Doesn't Yorah have a dedicated resistance contact already? We haven't been able to get in touch with them. So we'll need you to look into that as well. Understood. Interesting. Saving? Possible. That's really interesting. All of this, this entire game. I find it to be absolutely fascinating. And you can probably tell that I have been enjoying myself quite a lot. The surface? That means we'll be getting flight units, huh? Better head for the hangar. Usually we can't get near flight units. They're way too expensive for us grunts. Too bad they can't mass produce these things yet. I'm not a grunt. I'm awesome. No need to save here. No need to go to my quarters. I think it's time we go to... Oh, hello operator. So we go to the surface. I never get tired of looking at her. All right. Hangar, you can get it from the elevator to my left. All right. I really like the walking animations. She looks very regal. The hangar's up ahead. Look at her. Let's go. They have put so much work into her model. I like it. I can walk like that all day long. I'm falling in love with this game. I am already in love with this game. So far, I don't see any big issues with the port either, which makes me really, really happy as well. And final time around probably means that I don't need any oxygen either. So hopefully there will be no annoying little poison-based puzzles and restrictions, which are so much, so much better. I just think they sent a combat model like you to a recon job. If all they want is intel, we scanner models are built for that kind of thing. Orders are orders. All right, all right. So the atmosphere is guarded by them without sound.  Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Sorry. Kind of super surprising. I was surprised. I was completely bewildered by...  Yep. I just did that. Whoops. My bad. I sent a combat model like you to a recon job. If all they want is intel, we scanner models are built for that kind of thing. Orders are orders. All right, all right. As they are, I suppose that's as much a new topic that we have to say. Anyway, let's liven up a little. I got a bit distracted. Apologies. I'm going to stop from here on out. I'll put up instructions for you. Make sure to commit them to memory. All right. So, Missile Barrage. Ridiculous and ridiculously awesome. Am I even trying to kill them from... See? Better.  Patiently destroying the list of black bolts of murder. Not taking any damage. Because damage is... Oh, whoa, whoa. Awful. Fantastic. I'm almost dead again. One bolt is all that I need in order to die. Wonderful. Please don't kill me. Please land. I'm all right with that. Perfectly fine with me. Just get me off this thing. Please. It's fun as a gimmick, but I'm really bad at it. What is it? Choose a combat style. All right. I can heal myself now. Perfect. See? Everything is much better in high definition color. All kinds of goodies. What? I can't access this right now. Make note. Return here someday. Let's see. Let us look at the beautiful, destroyed Pocalyptic City. I like the colors. Proposal. Proceed to target location. Minimap. The minimap shows the geography around your current location at the bottom right of the screen. All right. Can I... Yep. Hey, Tupi! What? What's wrong? Where's the cream? Really like gliding. That's a nice thing to do. Animals! Hello! Uh oh. Other players' bodies. If you have the network features option turned on, you'll be able to see other players' dead bodies. By exiling these bodies, you can do the following. Retrieve. You'll temporarily gain three random effects based on the chips the player had equipped. Repair. The body will follow you around in a doing combat. Let's... Retrieve. Money. Shockwave. Offensive heal. Taunt up. All right. So I'm going to be killing animals then. Moose. Neat. Delicious. I think. This is really big, isn't it? I'm playing on medium, by the way. A cart to our intel. None of the machines in this area are hostile. There's been more and more enemies like this lately. They just stand there and stare into space. It's pretty... Perhaps... Perhaps the aliens have abandoned them. That could be one explanation that I can think of anyway. All right. Guess I can't pass from here. I really like the detail. It gets better. See? That's real pretty. And sad. I mean, imagine... What power did to destroy this thing? Start fishing. I'm enjoying the... Ah, fine. Commencing. Report failed. Well, that's sad. Well, this is really weird. Well, I can at least enjoy the view. Oh. No response. Aw. Complete. Fine. By the way, listen to the background music. I'm gonna let it play for a little while once I kill the robots. Amazing. Haven't played a game that has me feeling so giddy, so interested in a very long time. I have actually seen this a bit. I have seen about 15 minutes of gameplay. It's how I fell in love with the game originally. And why I decided to pre-order it, which I do really, really rarely. So this is the resistance camp, huh? We should probably go talk to their leader first thing. Who am I? Well, no friend. You could say that. I'm not sure when I was manufactured, so... Strange resistance woman. She has the mask. By the way, for those of you who are not familiar with the creator of Nier, here's this Japanese guy who walks around with this exact mask in real life. And it's ridiculously awesome. Although his mask has a really creepy smile as well. Treasure. No, no. I didn't want to talk with you. Nice. Anything else around here? I really like the acoustic guitar. Guitar. Come on, Nines. I have to... All right. I am. Uh-uh. I am not buying this. You know something about me that I do not know? All right. Oh, you must be with Yora. I heard about what happened. Ideal in weapons, if you're interested in that type of thing. What kind of weapons? Basically, I reveal and repair relics from the old world. Although, to be honest, my tools are in pretty short shape at the moment. But if I can get the servicing device and that toolbox up and running, I could start fixing and selling weapons again. Take a look at it, will you? That looks bustful, right? You know it. Now, I bet you can tell I'm no good at households of delicate repair. Sure, I'm going to help the others. That would be a huge help. Most likely, the servicing device, shorted out, must have put too much load in it. And taking four complex gadgets will be enough to fix it. Any idea where I'd find complex gadgets? Folks say you can find them over in the city ruins. You can. But I assume here the place is crawling with incredibly aggressive machines. All right. Subquest progress. Your subquest has been updated. You can check your progress on the quest tab in the system menu. Oh, chest. Medium recovery. Supplier trader. Welcome, welcome. It's always great to get new customers. It sounds like the kind of guy who would speak with that sort of voice. You're some kind of supply trader for the resistance. You know it. Every time here is handcrafted from abandoned parts and stuff blundered from enemy corpses. So then, to business, what can I get you? What can you get me? Animal bait. Sushie. A pouch that emits a scent. Animals love. Prevents them from running when approached. That's cool. I could take this one. Give it to an animal in order to ride them. Oh, I should probably take one. And sure, this one as well. Do you sell plug-in chips? You mean those little doodads that serve as power-ups for your body? Red knots. I love to sell plug-in chips, but I don't have the necessary raw materials. Now, if I happen to get those raw materials, I bet we could do business. But until then, say, now there's an idea. What if you got materials for me? I've got this bum leg, see? Don't quite see, no. Can't really get around myself. Can't you just repair your own leg? You work in the supply trade. After all, you finally, unfortunately, all of our paths are dedicated to the war effort. Can spare any for myself. Personally, I'm hoping you wipe out those machines so I can start dancing again. Wow. But until then, will you look for what I need? All right. Oh, thanks a million. Okay, if I need one broken spring, one small gear, and one broken circuit, you can smash up a few small machines to find them. You can obtain them from enemies that the big open area to the left when you exit the camp. Target location data obtained. Marking on that. And you possibly develop a woman of the game. Hey, you're with Yoroh, right? Hmm, my mask. It's an electromagnetic wave shielding device. I worry to limit unnecessary information from the world. What? Ha, just kidding. I knew it. I called bullshitting that one right away. What I say, what should I do if I die? That's a good philosophical question. After Yoroh's body is destroyed, only its memory data... I knew it! I knew this would be the avatar for the main guy who made up the game. He's giving me information about the game mechanics through a virtual avatar. Basically, you need to recover everything from your previous body immediately. Sure. All right. So what do you want? Are you worried about something or whatever? This game is too difficult. I feel motion sick. Sure. That's maintenance. They handle everything from body maintenance to body adjustment. Um, I'm good. It was fun talking with you. Come back any time. Great, amazing, fantastic. They said to the left, right? Oh, by the way. Shouldn't there be somewhere to save around here? Yeah. Map information? Map information? Interesting. Oh, I can transport. Bunker. All right. So I can transport, why not? I just want to open. All right. Another shop. Maintenance shop owner. My service in console and all types of android bodies. Can I help you with anything? Let's see what you can offer me. Files bar for laser? There's a laser in this game. Oh, so many different things. Mirage. These are basically upgrades to my... To me. Weapons. Additional blades, I suppose. Additional attack types. That's really awesome. Being an android, you can greatly increase your combat abilities with just a few tweaks here and there. Excellent. If you obtain any new chips or problems, make sure to try them out. Now the question is, how exactly do I do that? Let's see. Do I have any chips? Items. Enhancement items? No. Materials? Key items. Materials are items I suppose I either sell or use for some sort of crafting. Humohistory state silver was used to defeat demons, but machines seem impervious. Simply because machines are not demons. See, mind learn. Grimoire wise. Pod model. High capacity device used in the... Oh, interesting. Let's see. Retro pod. Pod skin. I can equip different skins to my little pod thing. Fascinating. Let's try out... Let's take a look at the other items. Key items, right? Valve, left eye, right eye, both eyes. Head. Oh, yes. Now I have a valve.  You can turn me off if you try. Please don't try. Again with the changing perspective. Up ahead is the material storage site. Sorry, but it's off limits. Fair enough. I like my little valve. It gives a lot of character mittings. All right, so I need to climb back and open the box then. Fair's fair. Oh, there's a jukebox. Shall we rest a bit? Do we get anything when we rest? Yup. Oh my god. A jukebox. As long as you have the necessary records, it's yours to use. Sound data. What song would you like to play? Significance. Normal, I suppose. Let's see. All right, back to business. What works? What am I, a profit?


Welcome to the nonprofit show.   I'm going to go off below has joined us. She is Director of New Client Experience and Technical Services at Chazen and Company. You know, Michelle, we've had a couple of different representatives on from Chazen and Company. Excited to have you here with us to talk to us about getting it right, talking about board orientation. So stay with us. Michelle's also going to tell us a little bit about what this title means for Chazen and Company. So we are thrilled to have you here. Julia Patrick is here as well, CEO of the American Numb Profit Academy. And I'm Jarrett Ransom, your nonprofit nerd and CEO of the Raven Group. So extremely honored to have the ongoing trust, respect, support, investment from these partners. And they're really, they're not just here for the show, they're really here for all of you, all 1.8 million nonprofits registered around the country. So thank you to Bloomerang, American Nonprofit Academy, Fundraising Academy at National University, Nonprofit Thought Leader, your part-time controller, Staffing Boutique, Nonprofit Nerd as well as Nonprofit Tech Talk. Check out these companies. I feel like I just said like Ted Talk. And so I paused, I was like, wait, do we have a Ted Talk now? But it's very similar. Yeah, it is. Very similar. And hey, if you missed any of our previous episodes, fun fact, we've produced over 900 episodes and you can find them, you can scan the QR right here on the screen and download the app. You can also find us on podcast platforms as well as broadcast platforms. So without further ado, Michelle, I would love to hear more about you, but let me remind all of our viewers and listeners who they're about to hear from. So Michelle Filot has joined us, Director, New Client Experience, as well as Technical Services at Chasen & Company. Now tell us what exactly does this title mean? Thank you, Jared. And I'm excited to be here and be a part of the nonprofit show. But yeah, so New Client Experience is sort of all-encompassing for our onboarding process. When we have new clients join Chasen & Company, we wanna spend a little more time upfront learning about what they do and their goals and objectives and how we can enhance their internal staff and what we will be doing to work with them. So that's sort of onboarding any systems that we're gonna help put in place. That all happens while they're with my team. You know, I've gotta believe that's a pretty heavy lift, Michelle, because what you're all doing is somewhat new to the sector. I mean, moving everybody into this more digital format and remote working and leadership and all that, it's probably somewhat of a newer path, like say within the last five years, right? It is and it can be a little daunting to some of our clients because they've been used to their paper process and having someone in the office and we do work remotely. And what we do as part of our onboarding process is really meet with the client regularly and get to know the team, make sure that we're providing feedback that's needed as we guide them through that process that can be a little bit uncomfortable in the beginning. Well, we're thrilled to have you here and I think the link between what you do with your new clients and what nonprofits should be doing with their new board members is really gonna be a symbiotic conversation. So we're talking about onboarding board members. It's a big topic. Jared and I, we have this woven through so many of our conversations, but as we were saying in the green room, we've never done an episode in three plus years now about this specifically. So start us off, you talk about having strong foundations and objectives. How does this play into things? Sure. So one of the things we wanna do is have an orientation process for our new board members. We don't wanna just hand them a book and say, bring this to your next meeting read it before you come. We wanna have a process. We wanna have goals and objectives for what we want them to learn during that process and really put together well thought out materials, not just our board policy, which I'm hoping we all have written board policies, but we should have our bylaws, our mission statement, our strategic plan. That's a key tool for board members. We should have our most recent financial statements again and key for our board members to understand as well as any marketing materials that we're distributing to our donors or through our programs. So that our board members have that pre-packet to really see the full picture of what this organization is, what they do and then what the board's role in helping them accomplish these goals and objectives. This is fantastic. When we think about 1.8 million non-profits in the US, if we were to, I don't know, just imagine on average, on average that they each have seven board members, right? Some are gonna have fewer than that. Some are gonna have so many more than that. This is a really big process. So having that strong foundation of objectives, you might've seen me, Michelle, I clapped when you said strategic plan because that to me is like chef's kiss, right? Like it absolutely needs to be there. There's three documents that I always say you want to make sure you get. And that's the DNO policy, the strategic plan, right? And then that expectation. What do you expect from that board member? So I love that you mentioned the strategic plan as well. And I really think, putting all of this together, I'm curious, you mentioned a book. Are we doing this book digitally now? Is that the process? Well, that would be my preference is that we have PDF versions of these documents and a packet and a drive on our shared, whether it's Google Drive, SharePoint, whatever drive we're using, it may be a Strapbox, but let's have shared documents that are living, breathing documents and living, breathing folders for our new board members to go in and really prepare themselves for this orientation. Some of my clients put together videos that they use in marketing that they also shared with their board members so they can really see the team in action. I love that so very much. Yeah. And I love that you can change them. So like we have the shared drive, right? The latest impact report was just released. Let's upload that now into the shared drive. So the board members have access to it and can share it with their contact. So it just really makes a seamless process is what I'm hearing. Julia, do you find that this happens? No, no, I don't. And it's super frustrating. You know how I'm always on the like bandwagon of you need to have a board liaison. Yeah, it's one of my big things. And you need to have a digital board portal. So in essence that shared drive or whatever, I love that you added the marketing pieces because that's something that we don't see enough of getting that everything from like the press releases to brochures, if you're doing digital, radio, broadcast media, all of that should be conveyed. And it's not. It is just not. So yeah, good job. Well, this is, we need to have you on more because you've like drank our Kool-Aid. You must have been sipping out of Julia's talk. Talk to us about the, you know, designing and engaging this orientation experience. You've given us some examples of what needs to be in who owns this process of designing and engaging the orientation experience for the new board members. Well, it can be a key member of the team internally. Like you mentioned that board liaison, but it's often another board member. It's a key board member. It's perhaps your board chair, but it can be a key board member who's introducing new board members to what the current board is doing and designing those goals and objectives and really making it a dialogue, not just here I am telling you about these things, but I've given you these materials in advance. Now let's talk through what you read, what you saw and your ideas because everybody's going to bring new experience to the table and new types of experience. So how can we utilize that? I also think these new board members should be key members of the team to really begin developing a relationship and understanding who they're guiding and who as a board they're leading. Do you see the peer to peer as the mentor process? I hear that, I don't know. I was gonna say, I hear it often. I hear that it wants to be implemented, but it doesn't really take off into a successful nature. Michelle, are you seeing like this mentor process happening in part of the orientation experience? I think it should. I think particularly if you have a new incoming chair, the outgoing chair should help with the orientation. If you have a new treasurer, that new treasurer needs to understand what their role is and what their role in the whole process for internal controls will be. Yeah. I think that's a really important argument for having defined next bench leadership, right? So that you know who the oncoming or incoming board chair, committee men, all of those positions are gonna be so that there is like a chain of command, but there's more a chain of disclosure, right? So that everybody kind of knows what's going on so that day one, when they take that new position, they're ready to go as opposed to waiting for six to 12 months to figure things out. I mean, it's time wasted as far as I'm concerned. So yeah, really, really important. One of the things that Jared and I talk about in terms of how shocking, literally shocking it is that most board members get all excited about the prestige or that they were asked to do something on a board. And then they find out that there's governance, that there's legal issues, that there are roles, that there are responsibilities. Talk to us about that because I feel that we have a huge miscommunication on this between our organizations and our boards. I think it's so important because it is very much an honor to serve on a board, but we all need to understand what we're getting ourselves into as board members, not just treasurer, but all board members have a fiduciary responsibility for the organization. They need to know their legal obligations when they're making decisions. If they don't know the bylaws and don't follow process or vote correctly on a decision and follow the standard decision-making process, they can find themselves in trouble. So there is an ethical responsibility to the organization that we need our new board members to understand. So maybe not just ask our friend to be on the board, but really seek out what we need to replace and what skills that we need to replace on the board. Yeah. You mentioned earlier board policies and I'm very familiar, there's some annual policies that need to be signed, some documents that board members need to make sure they're dotting eyes, crossing T's right on an annual basis. If this gets skipped, it's like, really puts the organization in hot water. So I'm really curious from both of you honestly, like why does it seem that board members don't really fully understand that fiduciary oversight and that responsibility? Where do you think we're missing the mark when it comes to the orientation experience? So from my perspective, we always look for written policies. I think that's key because it's documented. It's not just being passed on verbally from one member to the next, but you're correct. There should be a conflict of interest policy that board members actually sign and then disclose any potential conflicts of interest. There should be a risk assessment annually and last year's risk assessment should be available to our new board members so that they understand what those critical weaknesses are within our organization and how we're addressing those. I love that input. I really do. I love that you said too, that there should be not only all the policies, the strategic plan, but also the financials. Yeah. And I can think of the number of boards I've been on and I have never been offered the financials upfront before I came on. I think that's crucial for a board member to know what they're getting into.  What are they monitoring? And I think seeing those financial statements is the only way that a new board member would really be able to familiarize themselves with what's going on within the organization. Yeah. You know, one thing I'm hearing, Michelle, and I'm just curious for, you know, we mentioned 1.8 million nonprofits in the U.S. However, more are started at daily, weekly, monthly, right? What's the thought for these newer organizations that are a little bit hesitant and they're like, we don't wanna share this. Like this is really privy information. Should we have an NDA and non-disclosure agreement signed annually for our board members or is that just part of an understanding? Because again, I'm really taking the side of a new organization that might not have that comfort muscle built to say our financials. I think you certainly could have a written NDA, particularly Celebrity Foundations. We see that a lot. We wanna make sure that we're not talking about who gave what type thing, but that should also be an understanding. And no, we shouldn't hide our financials from our new board members because they are tasked with governing the organization and developing a strategic plan and they really do need to know what they're getting into and what they're working with. Yeah, I agree with that. Yeah, I think that, you know, there's a lot of NDA type of issue. So depending on if you're an organization that has to deal with anything with health, you know, you have HIPAA regulations. If you're dealing with minors that's, you know, under the age of 21, children under the age of 18, there are a whole bunch of layers that our board members need to understand and will have a legal tie to depending on what the service area is. But I also think that there is that concept of who's giving what, how are they giving it, especially when we look at, you know, larger estate kind of planning, you know, multi-generational planning. Those things can be very tricky and our board members will be talking about it or at least the development teams will be reporting in and they need to know what's appropriate and what's not. So to me, Jarrett, that should be in the policies in terms of board roles and responsibilities. I mean, it could be a simple paragraph that is put in there so that it is reviewed annually. So people are like, hey, it's not just for the new folks, but every year in December, not January, get all this done before the new year starts. I feel like that should be revisited. I really, really do.  I really, really do. Well, let's move on to something and this is what got the big hand clap from Jarrett. And that is strategic planning and leadership. Talk to us about that and how this would come about in a board orientation piece of it. Well, your new board members need to know the current strategic plan. It's also important that during that orientation process, they understand the short-term goals and the long-term goals and what the board is doing to help guide the organization in the right direction. It's even budgeting for that strategic plan and the board should take a critical role in that as well. So let me throw a curve ball. You know, it is playoff season, so I gotta weave in. Yet again, another baseball issue here, but what if a new board member comes on and they're like, oh yeah, I read the strategic plan and I don't agree with it? How do you address that? Do you say, okay, well then when we go to redo the strategic plan, that's when you can voice your opinion or how do you navigate that new board member that comes in and they're all excited and they wanna make change, right? I think first they need to, we need to back up and talk about how we got where we are with the strategic plan and that's why that orientation does need to be an open dialogue. And they may have some valid ideas that we need to consider and that may be going back as a board and discussing those things, but talk about how we got where we are, what the team is doing. They also may need to understand those financials or that budget to know we do have some limitations on what we can do in the short term versus long term. But definitely, I think that's why we say, have it a working dialogue for that orientation, not just a monologue, one-way discussion. And I love the strategic plan so much, Michelle, because as a new board member, I really coach to say, understand, and I love that you said, understand how we got to where we are, where are we going? And then I really coach for the individual who wants to serve on a board to read the plan and say, okay, of this plan, where can I serve as a champion, right? What can I do to help forward this momentum, what connections, what skillset? Where can I best use my time and my expertise? So that's why I just, I love it so very much. Like, please absolutely include this. And you're right, to Julia's question, let's understand how we got there and then welcome their input as it's related to the short-term, long-term goals for that. And really seeing that as part of the leadership conversation, hopefully that's happening at every board meeting. And I think it's interesting, Michelle, that you talked about the budget, because that to me is a fascinating link that a lot of times we lose. You know, we look at the strategic plans as these like grant things and these roadmaps and everything, but then we don't discuss the funding of it. Could you talk a little bit about that? Yes, as a board, we can't just come up with these grand ideas. We have to determine how to pay for it. What do we need development to do? What do we need for accounting to do? And then how does that impact program? And what's our timing of it? Does it take six months to get this grant? Does the funding window not open until next year? So really understanding the budget and what's behind it. And again, it's setting those short-term and long-term objectives, but the budget monitoring, that's up to our board to really lead us in the right direction. So then let me ask you another question. I feel like when you look at board members, I mean, they're generally leaders of a community, they're high functioning, have strong egos. I find that a lot of board members are afraid to ask about the financial issues. I mean, we know in the nonprofit sector, accounting is a little different, the vocabulary is a little different, right? And I mean, the principles are the same. We all look at gap and we look at the structure. But how do you navigate that board member that might just be brilliant? And one thing that your board needs, but not so strong on the financial part, how do we get that piece in this onboarding? Or should we worry about it at that point? I do think it's important for our board members to see those financial statements and meet the finance director and work with the treasurer on understanding the financial statements. Often our board is not seeing the detail, right? They're seeing a higher level of financial picture than what we have behind the scenes. But we set up for our clients dashboards within the system that we have a board dashboard where board members can log in and see financial reports and certain key metrics that they would like to have on their dashboard. And really explaining those to our board members and what they mean and what our goal for that metric is. Wow. Okay. I think that's really important. One thing that I see, and this is across all age demographics, Michelle, is the resistance to log into a portal or the drive. It's like the board members want it to be emailed to them as opposed to going into the portal or the drive to find said document. How do you take the orientation process into that day-to-day experience for a board member? Can you talk to that? It might be a curveball, but I'm just curious. It's a good question. It's a weird question. Yeah, no, it's a great question. But I think really navigating them through what we have when we set up dashboards for board members, they're often just excited because the information is at their fingertips and they aren't having to wait until two days before the board meeting to see the financials for that quarter, they can log in at any point during the month or during the quarter and see where the metrics are and have the ability to ask questions because again, they have a fiduciary responsibility. And so it's important that we have those things available to our board members, but particularly our treasurer. And our treasurer should know the makeup of our board and really work to make sure the information being presented is understandable and make sense. Yeah, and usually there's a finance committee and I always say, and maybe this isn't etiquette for everyone, but I always say, if you're interested in learning more about the financials or maybe that's not your strong suit, join the conversations at the finance committee. To me, it doesn't necessarily mean you have to be an active committee member. It's just really taking what I'm gonna call like tutoring time, right? You just, you show up for the conversations, you listen, you're privy to a little bit deeper conversation level to start to understand what's happening at the board meetings and how they got there. Because I've said this before numerous times, accounting, bookkeeping, financing, it's not my strongest muscle. So I've really had to train myself, Michelle, into knowing how to read the documents, but then also how to apply them right into the conversations and into the impact for the organization. So I don't know if the two of you have seen that, but I would love to just recommend for those of you that are listening, watching and listening and say, I'm with Jared, I'm not in this ballpark of, I love numbers. Just trust your gut, do more digging into those committee meetings. Yeah, I think it's important. I really, really do. And I think you can say, do it, you may not love numbers, but you love this organization. Yeah. It's due to that. Yeah, you have to do this. We don't have a lot of time left, but I'm really interested in asking you this one final question. And that is, we've talked about onboarding new board members. And there's a way to think about this. They're new to board service, right? Or they're just new to your organization. I'm wondering if this would ever be a good idea for a review for existing board members because things change and we're moving through to the digital age of nonprofit management. How do we look at this or should we just really be focusing in on those new folks coming in? From my perspective, as a board, you should have an annual retreat and walk through these things and any new ideas or new dashboards or new reports that your team has decided might be more important or more impactful for the board, but also take that annual time to look at your audit report, look at your internal controls, your policy manuals, how recently have those been updated? And now we've learned we can do that via Zoom. So we don't all have to take a week off of work and travel someplace. We can have some Zoom meetings, but really dig into what's there and then are these goals and objectives we set be met or are we falling short? And if so, what are our critical risks and identify those and determine a path to lead the team to overcome them? Yeah, I love it. I think this, yeah, this has been great. You know, Michelle, we could be, I could talk to you for so much more on this topic because it's just to me and I know Jared and I, we've talked about this. This is the critical piece that's missing. And when our boards aren't strong with leadership and understanding what they can do and how they can do it, it just makes achieving mission vision and value so hard. So Michelle Fiello, director and new client experience and technical services at Chasen & Company. Hey, we've been at the American Nonprofit Academy a part of a really exciting program with Chasen & Company called Counting on Chasen. We have several dozen videos that we've done. They are free. You do not have to be a client of Chasen & Company. They go through all things in a very conversational way about how the nonprofit sector should be thinking about accounting and finance. Michelle, you've been on a couple of those episodes with me and they're really fun. They're really great. They take you through higher level things, lower level, but if you visit Chasen & Company, for those of you listening, C-H-A-Z-I-N-A-N-D company.com and you will find Counting on Chasen the series there. Michelle, this has been a lot of fun. We're gonna have to continue this conversation because I think this is an ever-evolving issue with our boards and how we train them. Again, I'm Julia Patrick, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy, been joined by my nonprofit nerd, but she can be your nonprofit nerd too, Jared Ransom, CEO of the Raven Group. Of course, we have amazing partners that join us day in and day out. They include Blumerang, American Nonprofit Academy, your part-time controller, nonprofit thought leader, fundraising academy at National University, staffing boutique, nonprofit nerd in nonprofit tech talk. Whew, that's a mouthful, isn't it, Jared? I know, that's why I got caught off guard when I was like, wait, are we doing TED Talks now for the nonprofit sector? Which, I mean, we absolutely should, but Michelle, I feel like this was a TED Talk. I loved what you're bringing to the conversation. I feel like this really should be another back to basics, getting down to, this is a foundational best practice for all organizations, but the three of us know it gets missed and overlooked quite often. So, so glad to have you joining us today. Thanks to all of you that joined us to start your week here at the nonprofit show. Thrilled to have you here. And as we end every episode, as we have for over 900 episodes now, we invite you, we encourage you, and we remind you to please stay well, so you can do well. Thank you so much, Michelle.