HERE to Listen
Program Overview
HERE to Listen: Listening for Racial Equity Impact in Philanthropy is a one-day immersive, virtual workshop designed for foundation staff to build and deepen their equitable listening and feedback practices. Developed using research from ProInspire’s Leadership Model for Race Equity Impact, HERE to Listen offers participants a framework of practices that further racial equity. By exploring ProInspire’s core commitments and corresponding practices, you will deepen your racial equity analysis so that you are ultimately better able to be in community with colleagues and grantees.
Prepare to reflect and discover practical tools and strategies to advance racial equity, shift power, and build shared responsibility and reciprocity with communities and partners.
Why HERE to Listen?
For decades, philanthropy has been “here” to solve; “here” to set priorities for communities; “here” to define success or evaluate impact. We invite foundation staff to consider an alternative—“here” to listen—through the acronym:
Honor lived experience
Exemplify equity
Responsive and
Engaged
You should register if:
- You are seeking a community of peers to wrestle with how the philanthropic sector upholds characteristics of white supremacy culture
- You are committed to centering the voices and perspectives of people who have been most impacted and made “least heard” by structural racism and other systemic inequities
- You want to better understand your blocks to listening in order to be in deeper partnership with colleagues, peers, and community
- You are a reflective and curious leader, and enjoy exploring alternative and inclusive practices
- You want to deepen your power and racial analysis in order to create and sustain racially-equitable experiences and outcomes within the social sector
- You enjoy exploring various digital tools and using virtual platforms for learning, reflection, and interaction
- Having a mix of in-session and before/after session learning opportunities energizes you
- You are looking for a blend of analysis and action steps to apply in your day-to-day work
Program Outcomes
- Understanding how your lived experience and aspects of identity shape how you listen and give feedback
- Examining and exploring how high-quality listening shows up in your decision-making, and communication styles
- Practicing how to apply a racial equity and power analysis when giving and receiving feedback
- Exploring ways to create and assess processes of accountability to apply inclusive leadership practices in your day-to-day work
Program Structure
HERE to Listen is facilitated over the course of one half-day virtual workshop with optional office hours. It is open to foundation staff from all different roles and levels within a foundation and varying backgrounds and lived experiences. In this interactive workshop, participants are guided through day-to-day practices that embody racial equity values so that they can better show up in conversations with colleagues and grantees. By interrogating and disrupting biases and mental models, and committing to centering relationships in their work, participants explore inclusive leadership practices and apply a racial equity and power analysis to their listening, feedback, decision-making, and communication styles.
The curriculum is designed to reflect the opportunities that come with having a multi-racial space where people can connect with others who hold different identities. We are excited to offer HERE to Listen once in 2023 for free. Registration is open and available first-come, first-serve.
Looking to strengthen your foundation’s internal culture through an in-person or virtual in-service training? ProInspire can customize HERE to Listen for your full staff, department, or team. For more information, please fill out our inquiry form.
2023 Training Dates
We are excited to offer our Fall training with sponsored seats made possible through our partnership with Shared Insight.
Fall Training Date
Wednesday, November 1 – Workshop | 20 seats available | 12:00-4:00 PM ET
Thursday, November 2- Optional Office Hours | 12:00-2:00 PM ET
Team-Based Participation
Feedback from partners indicates that having multiple participants attend together adds significant value to an organization so that learnings and action steps for implementation are shared across multiple people within an organization. We highly encourage 2-3 staff from the same foundation to enroll together.
Looking to strengthen your foundation’s internal culture through an in-person or virtual in-service training? ProInspire can customize HERE to Listen for your full staff, department, or team. For more information, please fill out our inquiry form.
Meet Your Facilitators
In Partnership with Shared Insight
HERE to Listen was conceptualized as part of ProInspire’s participation in Fund for Shared Insight’s Funder Listening Community of Practice, which included representatives from seven philanthropy support organizations and intermediaries around the country. We are deeply grateful to this community and the feedback, problem-solving, and collective learning that has happened together.
Fund for Shared Insight is committed to building a culture and practice of high-quality, listening and feedback that supports foundations and nonprofits as they partner with and share power with the people and communities at the heart of their work. In addition to the Funder Listening Community of Practice, Shared Insight supports projects including a “Funder Action Menu,”a resource for foundations implementing listening practices throughout their organizations, and #Listening4Equity, a space to examine and promote listening in service of equity. Shared Insight also created and launched Listen4Good, its signature initiative offering expert tools, coaching, and resources to nonprofits seeking to build equity-based, client-focused feedback loops to help them listen and respond to those they serve.