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Successful Nonprofits Podcast
A Sabbatical Made My Nonprofit Stronger with Rebecca Stapel-Wax
00:30:35
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- [00:00]
A
If there are any friends who are listening, who are thinking, I'm looking to do a sabbatical in 18 or 24 months, are there a couple pieces of advice you've got for someone at the beginning of this process?
- [00:10]
B
Don't wait. Don't wait. Don't wait to, you know, make your plans, you know, dependent on what you want to do during that time. There's, there's that piece, and then there's the piece about getting prepared and preparing the organization. Foreign.
- [00:45]
A
Welcome to the Successful Nonprofits Podcast. I'm your host, Dolph Goldenberg. Friends. Today's episode is about something that many executive directors dream of, but only a few seem to actually get, and that's a sabbatical. So whether you're thinking about how do I ask my board for a sabbatical, or you've got the approval and you're planning to take it, this is going to be a great episode for you. We're going to talk to Rebecca Staple Wax, who has been on the podcast before she took a sabbatical. And I have to say, by any measure, the sabbatical was successful. But one of the measures that I always use is the organization was stronger after the sabbatical than it was before the sabbatical, and it was pretty strong before the sabbatical. So we're going to have a broad conversation with her, how she asked for one, how she planned for it, what she actually did on the sabbatical. I know that's what everyone always wants to hear. And then of course, her post sabbatical reentry. Because when you come back, there's got to be some kind of a re entry. Before we have that conversation, let me just share with you a little bit about Rebecca. Rebecca and I met long ago and far away back in the 90s when we were both working at Jewish Family and Career Services in Atlanta. She at the time was working in a different division there, but ended up working at the Rainbow center at jfncs, which eventually spun off and became its own independent nonprofit, the Southern Jewish Resource Network for Gender and Sexual Diversity, which we just call it Sojourn for short. So between her time as executive director of Sojourn and her time at JFS running the Rainbow center, she's been with this organization for over 20 years. And I think she's been the executive director for going on 13 or so years at this point now, Rebecca, along with many volunteers at Sojourn, has trained thousands of youth educators, parents, clergy and advocates to build inclusive communities. She has built curricula for all types of communities and organizations. This includes synagogues. It also includes community organizations, in some cases entire rural communities. And she builds these curriculum to really help organizations and communities be more inclusive, to dramatically decrease the rates of suicide that gender and sexually diverse people experience when not being an executive director. And to me this is so incredibly impressive because ED is an all encompassing job. It is easy for it to require everything of you. She is also an LPC specializing in work with LGBTQ people, people living with HIV, and those with substance abuse issues. In addition to all of that, she is a wife and a mother of two adult children. I also just have to share with you that Rebecca has a super special place in my heart because when I launched my consulting practice back in 2015, she was the very first person to hire me and so I'm always grateful for that. Rebecca, welcome to the podcast.
- [04:00]
B
Thanks Dolph. Such a privilege to be here.
- [04:03]
A
Again, I said this in the intro, but I know whenever anyone talks about taking a sabbatical, the first question is, what did you do?
- [04:12]
B
So it takes a lot of preparation to decide what to do and then to actually execute it. So I actually took a survey to find out what people would do if they had three months. And I boiled it down to three things for myself, which was be with people I love, to travel and to learn something. And I did all three. I. I cleaned out my entire house. So I was incredibly productive. I don't know which that falls into. And I went to a yoga retreat center that I've been wanting to go to for 30 years. And I spent some time during yoga, but I also learned from elders. I went to a seminar on Now Is yous Time. And this was for people who were older than I and to find out how to be vital in the stage of life. And that was very exciting. I traveled to Nova Scotia and New England and I intended to go to Brazil. Unfortunately that got postponed, but that was the plan and I just surrounded myself with people I love. One other thing that I did is I shut off all social media, which I know for some is like a jaw dropping, but that was essential in order to disconnect.
- [05:54]
A
But why was it essential for to shut off all social media in order for you to be able to disconnect from work?
- [06:02]
B
So much of our work at Sojourn has to do with the rest of the world and what's going on in it. And just for context, my sabbatical happened in summer of 2024. So leading up to the 2024 election was when I was away, I took apps off my phone, both email as well as social media. It took me three weeks to really disconnect. It was muscle memory. If I had just said to myself, I wouldn't go on those apps, I don't know if I would have been able to.
- [06:55]
A
I'm almost picturing you, like, picking up your phone and thinking, oh, I want to go to it. And then you're like, oh, it's not on the phone.
- [07:01]
B
It's just like any other muscle is that. Just have to retrain it. And that's. That's. That was a really critical piece in how I spent my time.
- [07:17]
A
Given the time when you took your sabbatical, I totally understand that's an excellent reason to unplug from social media. But you've been running your organization for 20 years, for about 13 of them. As the executive director, I'd also be willing to bet that, like, your personal social media feed is pretty closely intertwined with your organization. With Sojourn's media feed, you've built great relationships with your board members, with your donors. You're connected to all of them on
- [07:45]
B
social media and staff. I would not have been able to extract myself from the daily ways in which we ingest information.
- [07:57]
A
It sounds like you would recommend that someone who's taking a sabbatical disconnect from their social media feed.
- [08:04]
B
I can't imagine how you can really focus on yourself and whatever it is that you're doing if you don't.
- [08:16]
A
For a lot of people in the executive director seat, it feels kind of scary to say to your board, hey, I think I'd like a sabbatical in my contract, or if you don't have a contract, I think I'd like a sabbatical. I've been here five years. Can I get one next year? How did you approach your board?
- [08:36]
B
I approached my board probably because of you, Dolph, and a lot of conversations that you and I had and the introduction that you gave me to CenterLink, the community of LGBT centers in North America. So how did I ask? I had been working for quite some time doing this work. So there's that credibility that I am worth it, deserve it. If I'm asking for it, I must need it. And I had a great relationship with our board and told them, and actually delivered that they could easily have somebody move into the role for three months. So my sabbatical was three months and. And it was after a very big event, and it was in a summer that was not a lot of Events. It was a very organic conversation. And I had not had a contract and this was written into it. So that was a very easy way to get it all at once.
- [10:00]
A
So this was really a part of negotiating your contract. And so how long after you all signed the contract did you take the sabbatical?
- [10:09]
B
It was a year and five months.
- [10:13]
A
Yeah.
- [10:14]
B
So to give us time to plan,
- [10:18]
A
what did you all do during that planning time so that both you and your organization would actually be ready for you to step away for three months.
- [10:26]
B
For three months. So the it seems so logical and yet it is a lot of work and preparation is to have a playbook. And we started this playbook in 2017 with your organization. And that was the beginning of having a succession plan. And we put it into action. This playbook has everything from passwords to protocol to policies. Our main donors who do we partner with, all financials, operations, insurance. But this playbook was a lifeline. In addition to that is to have the right interim. I will call this person my angel forever. But I also know that they were the same for the organization. This interim. Had known our organization from the very beginning, had been a board chair for four years, has been a donut, also
- [11:44]
A
goes way back, like worked with us at JF and CES back in the 90s and has also been an executive director. So it's not like board chair who never worked in the former board chair, never worked in the nonprofit sector, who raises their hand and says I'll do it.
- [11:58]
B
Exactly. There couldn't have been a better fit. And this is a person who's led and does lead a nonprofit that is small in size like our organization, so has a great understanding for an appreciation for that level of interaction and hats that need to be worn in many ways.
- [12:25]
A
And honestly, Rebecca, given how well I know you and Sojourn and who your interim is, I know her as well. I should already know the answer to this and I don't. So I'm going to ask a super ignorant question. What role did you play and what role did the board play in considering that person as the interim?
- [12:43]
B
So I made sure that this person was going to be available, could commit to it, wanted to do it. It's never good to have a reluctant person in the role. And when I thought that this person would be the right person, I had such a sense of relief because I really knew that it would work. Then obviously I had to make sure that the board was on board with the decision. And it was a no brainer. There really wasn't A question they knew that it could be done and would be done correct.
- [13:34]
A
Often when executive directors are stepping away for their sabbatical, they say to their board chair, the interim or whoever is going to be the lead staff person, hey, here's the situations where I want to be contacted. What did you say?
- [13:49]
B
That's exactly right. The most important piece was that if anybody, staff, board or donor had anything seriously harmful to them or their families, I needed to know my personal relationships are that important, and I would not want to have missed something so, so important to that.
- [14:21]
A
That's one of the things I really value about you is like, in all of your work, you really approach this from the heart of a counselor. Someone who says, I want to build relationships, not someone who's like, okay, well, you're no longer of value to my organization. Forget you.
- [14:37]
B
Everybody's valuable. And we all talk in nonprofits about the $10 donor that gives on a monthly basis or gives $10 a year, but volunteers all the time. We're all valuable in our own ways, and we all want to have purpose and meaning. And when somebody's in crisis or is grieving, it's really to be there with them. And through it, however, that is just maintains a good relationship, whether it's for the organization or personally. The other reasons that I offered to be contacted is cash flow. That's pretty critical at we're not going to make payroll or pay our bills. We were set up to be fine, but if the circumstances led to that, that would be important for me to have been contacted. And then again, the world as it is, if there was any threat to the people that are served through sojourn in a way in which I could be helpful, I wanted to be contacted. We've done a ton of scenario planning since the change of the administration, but I think that it was really unknown the impact that our people that we serve would be harmed.
- [16:29]
A
And was there any point during your sabbatical they actually had to reach out?
- [16:35]
B
There was a very early reach out because no one else that had the access to the information except for me. And there was mia culpa. And it was not taken lightly that they had to contact me. And I still have actually a voicemail on my phone of the interim who was having lunch with somebody very important to both of us. And they left a voicemail saying that not at all were they going to talk about the organization, but they just wanted to make sure that I had a connection with the person that we both love. I've left that voicemail because that person won't always be with us. And I was grateful to hear their voice.
- [17:31]
A
That's awesome. I love, love, love that. So you step back in after your sabbatical after three glorious months off where you've cleaned your house, you've traveled, you've gone to a yoga retreat center, you've learned from your elders what was re entry like.
- [17:51]
B
I highly recommend coming back in on a Thursday so that you have two days and then and then a weekend. I think that's how school started for me as a child and for some reason it feels like that's palatable. I really recognize that the first two days I had an attitude with my family again and that shocked me. I realized that I needed to place my phone away from dinner and prepping dinner so that I could be present with my family. Just those first two days were very telling. And then I was like, oh, that's what's happening. And I'd had no meetings the first seven days. So that Thursday, Friday and the whole next week I did not have any meetings except to check in with staff and check in with the board.
- [18:53]
A
I have to ask you how you manage that because obviously others probably knew you would come back. Like, how did you diplomatically and politely say, oh, I'm not meeting with you until the third week?
- [19:03]
B
I'm back on good authority. I had in my out of office response that I would not be checking my email when I got back, that if you wanted to connect with me, either reach out to the rest of the team or get back to me when I returned and that I gave a sense of when I returned that I would be slowly re entering and to please be patient. And I think that leeway is very healthy and I think people want to give others grace.
- [19:51]
A
So did the interim or you or someone else delete all of those emails from your inbox that had come in while you were on sabbatical?
- [20:00]
B
So I did. Although the interim had access to my emails in case it was a donor or, you know, foundation or something that didn't take that extra step to reach back out to the interim. So I took care of them. I really did not have to spend a great deal of time going through them.
- [20:25]
A
I took a much shorter sabbatical than you, a six week sabbatical back in 2013. And I actually did that as well, where my autoresponder said, I'm not going to see your email, it's going to get deleted when I come back. And it was so glorious to come back from 6 weeks off not having 5000 emails I have to read.
- [20:44]
B
Right. And we all know that some of them are very, very important and most of them are not.
- [20:50]
A
Yeah, yeah, 100%. And I also had the luxury someone else was kind of keeping an eye on my email sign. If the name was urgent, it got that for me was a real lesson learned. Just tell everyone up front, I'm deleting all my emails when I return. So don't. Just don't. So you took seven days off your reentry. Any other tips or thoughts on reentry?
- [21:13]
B
It's great to have a debrief with the interim, the board, the staff, making sure that you understand what it was like for them and really having that empathy to understand the lay of the land while you were away and how we want to adjust. There might be great new ways of doing things and to see how to improve upon them.
- [21:50]
A
If there were, what were some of those, like takeaways of like, oh, we're going to do this differently now. Now after I return,
- [21:58]
B
the team was meeting on an every other week basis. When we had gone into the sabbatical, the team was meeting on a weekly basis while I was away so that they really were staying on top of things. And we have not stopped doing that. It can be a shorter meeting, but when you also are working virtually most of the time, staying connected, face to face on whatever platform helps the energy and the understanding that we are in this together. So that was one main thing. This was the best thing for the organization. Having have a founding ed, being able to step away shows how the organization will live on for longer than that one person. And that was really important to me. This was not just for my own sake, this was really for the health of the organization.
- [23:12]
A
It was kind of like a, a test run of all of your succession planning that you all have been doing for years and you're bored and you walked away and said, oh good, it works.
- [23:23]
B
Yes, gleefully. But holding our breath, you know, beforehand and maybe for some during, but after really knowing that we can exhale and do it again if needed or warranted when we talk about the investment, because I think that that's a really important piece of is what, what's the cost? And so our organization is smaller and so we did not have to have a full time interim. This person, I believe, worked 20 hours a week and we wanted to compensate them in a way in which they felt appreciated for that three month period of time. I happen to have a paid sabbatical, so it is an investment. It's not as though it's nothing. However, I am just as responsible for making it successful for everyone. And if we want to do it, we have to do it together.
- [24:38]
A
I once had a board chair who said to me, dolph, we can certainly increase your salary, but you're going to have to go raise it. So, sure, we can pay an interim while you go on sabbatical, but somebody's got to raise it.
- [24:52]
B
And it is the truth. And I think that the board should want that for their executive director. And the cost of having a burnt out executive director is enormous. And this is a way in which to show them their worth and that they are appreciated and that we want them to stick around
- [25:30]
A
100%. Now, I have a quick question for you. If there are any friends who are listening, who are thinking, I'd like to talk to my board about this, or maybe even I just got my board's approval and I'm looking to do a sabbatical on 18 or 24 months. Are there a couple pieces of advice you've got for someone at the beginning of this process?
- [25:51]
B
Don't wait to, you know, make your plans dependent on what you want to do during that time. There's that piece and then there's the piece about getting prepared and preparing the organization. It is incredibly stressful to do it a month ahead of time, which I would say is not what we did, but it is really. When I got serious, we had had a major event two months prior or six weeks prior, and we had some changes in our staffing two weeks prior. And so that was a hefty load. And so it's never too soon to plan.
- [26:48]
A
I could not agree with you more. Now, Rebecca, I always want to make sure we've got some time to play one of my favorite games, even though I'm horrible at it. Two truths and a lie. I feel like I know you pretty well, so I might actually get this. But if you were to tell me three facts about yourself, two of which are true and one is not, I'm going to try to guess which one is not.
- [27:10]
B
Okay. I have heard you play this game, and so those that hesitate might indicate things more than I. So I've written them down. I am a Yankees fan even though I am from Boston. I journal every day and if you've seen me, you would know that this is kind of extreme. Once I dressed as Dolly Parton, this
- [27:42]
A
is tough because I could see any of these. So I think you probably dressed as Dolly Parton at your organization's Incredible event, which is called poor Em off Pons shorthand pop. So I think that one is true. But now I have to decide if you journal every day, which I could see. But it also might be a trick because you might be like, oh, I try to every day, but I don't really. Every day. Nah, nah. I know you're from Boston, but I'm trying to rule it out. Your parents had roots in New York, so I'm going to say the lie is that you are not a Yankees fan. You're a die hard Boston Red Sox fan.
- [28:21]
B
Absolutely. I mean, how could you ever. I do have family that lives in New York, but they're all Red Sox fans.
- [28:31]
A
Also, I've known you for so long, I would feel bad if I got that wrong. Thank you so much for making it easy enough because you could have. You really could have scrambled it. You. You totally could have scrambled, and you did not. So thank you. Now, friends, if you want to know more about Rebecca's organization, I want you to go to sojourngsd.org or go to their Facebook or Instagram page at sojourngsd. And in case you're wondering why you'd go there, they are the single best resource for information about the intersection of Jewish and gender and sexual diversity in the South. They're doing an amazing job here in the South. And if you want to know more, please make sure you check them out@sojourngsd.org Additionally, if you like this episode, if you're like, huh, I'm thinking about a sabbatical, there's two more I think you might really like. One is episode 303, I took a sabbatical and so can you with David Wietzman. By the way, shameless plug for Centerlink. Like Rebecca, David is also a member of Centerlink. I was a member of Centerlink long ago when I was running an LGBTQ center. And one of the things I do love about them is they really emphasize the importance of leaders taking care of themselves. And then the second episode is episode 295, tips for making your sabbatical a reality with Emily Raskin. Rebecca, thank you so much for joining us today. I'm incredibly grateful you did.
- [30:00]
B
Thank you, Dolph. So glad to revisit my sabbatical with you.
- [30:07]
A
All right, friends, you know, I got to do the disclaimer because the lawyers make me. I'm not an accountant nor an attorney, and neither I nor the consulting practice provide tax, legal, or accounting advice. Please don't try to get that from a podcast. Just don't. But let me also say, if you need that, find a licensed, qualified professional in your area and get the counsel you need.