- PNC is proud to support "Business Forward," where community leaders discuss the issues confronting business in central Illinois.

(upbeat uplifting music) - Welcome to "Business Forward."

I'm your host, Matt George.

Joining me tonight, two very special guests.

I'm fired up.

Laurie Weaver, President and Co-Founder of Impact Central Illinois, and Cathy Kwan, who is the Marketing Chair for Impact Central Illinois.

Welcome, Laurie.

Welcome, Cathy.

- Thank you.

- Thanks for having us.

- [Matt] Well, let's get right down to it because I love this concept.

I've loved the idea from the first day I heard it.

Explain to our audience what Impact Central Illinois is, Laurie.

- [Laurie] Impact Central Illinois is a collective giving group of women.

So it's where women have come together to put their dollars, to pool their resources, their dollars, in order to be able to give away a sizable grant that we wouldn't otherwise be able to do on our own.

- Pooling dollars and then, going to social service agencies or nonprofits, and then the community wins, right?

- [Laurie] Yes, yeah, the community wins, and the individual members win.

I mean, it's just a amazing process because like I said, there's programs and projects that happen in central Illinois, because we can partner with hundreds of other women.

There's an educational component, whereas philanthropists, we grow, and we learn more about what's going on in the community and, therefore, are more educated givers.

- [Matt] Yeah, so I have, personally, but you know I've been in the nonprofit space a long time, and I've seen two ideas in the past five to seven years really just blow up.

This is one of the two.

The other one's ART, Inc. with Jonathan and - Mm-hm.

- Nikki Romain.

I love them.

- Mm-hm.

- [Matt] And, but this idea, when I first heard it, I'm not joking, I sat there and I said, "This is gonna take a lotta coordination."

- Mm-hm.

- And so you have to have a very structured process.

Where did this idea come from?

- [Laurie] Mm-hm.

Four years ago, I was at a destination wedding.

My niece, Ashley, was getting married in Portugal.

So if you've ever been to a wedding that far away, you're kind of a captive audience - Right?

- with the other guests that are there.

So my sister-in-law's childhood friend, Rebecca Powers, was one of the guests also.

So one day I just happened to ask Rebecca, who's originally from Morton, Illinois, but now lives in Austin, Texas and has for her adult life.

So I asked Reb, we call her, what do you do with your time in Austin?

And she proceeded to tell me about Impact Austin, a collective giving organization that she started about 18 years ago.

She set out to find 100 women that would each give $1,000 so that they could give away a $100,000 grant to a worthy not-for-profit.

- Wow.

- In the meantime, 18 years later, they average between four and 500 members.

They've put over eight million dollars back into central Texas in the form of 88 grants benefiting not-for-profits.

- I mean, think about that for a second.

I mean, the impact, 'cause I talk about on this show all the time, it's your job, no matter what you think, and this is my theory, that you have to take care of the community that you live in.

This is the perfect example of that.

So I wanna read something.

I love the mission statement.

"Impact Central Illinois cultivates the collective wisdom "and strength of women to transform ourselves "and our communities through philanthropy."

I love that.

So, Cathy, - Mm-hm?

- very diverse group of women.

I mean, you've got business owners, and all these types of great people.

And how do you, from a marketing standpoint, how do you organize everything and get all these women together?

I mean, that's a happening.

That's a doing.

- Yeah, well, luckily, I do have a very great team behind me, so, obviously, they help, but the really neat thing about Impact is all of our members are kind of on different steps on their philanthropy journey.

So some people, this is their first time joining an organization like this.

Other people, you know, they have been philanthropists for years, and they've given to many other organizations.

So we really work with them and kind of teach them to be more informed philanthropists so they can understand why we are giving and what the needs of the community are.

So we go to all different groups in the area, and we recruit from, you know, - Everywhere.

- all different places.

Yeah, and, you know, - Everywhere.

- no woman's turned down.

If you wanna join us, we'll find a way to let you join us.

So.

- And isn't that fun because, in a way, actually, Laurie's husband, Chuck Weaver's been a mentor for years, and, in a way, you have 100 plus mentors.

(laughs) - Mm-hm, - I mean, if you think - Yeah.

- Pretty incredible, yeah.

- of it that way, it is incredible.

So one of the goals is to empower women and make extraordinary impact in our community.

So when, Laurie, when you were thinking of this idea, and you brought it back, I'm always interested, I love ideas.

There's a lot of visionary people who go, and especially in nonprofit, people have a lotta great ideas, the execution pieces where they fail.

How did you put the structure together?

- Mm-hm, well, first of all, when I came home from that trip, I called my sister-in-law right away, who was very familiar with Impact Austin and what they were doing.

And I said, "I don't think we have to find 100 women.

"I think we have to find 10 women that can find 10 women," 'cause I could get my head around that.

And Shelley was on board, so she is co-founder with me.

So we set out to find, started with finding a founding board and just calling on different people with different areas of expertise, marketing, finance, somebody to address the grant piece, events.

Anyway, so we got these women around the table.

Reb Powers came from Austin to talk to us, and we decided, as a group of about eight women, to go for it, so after that, we set out to find members.

- Uh-huh.

- We ended up with 130 members that first year.

- Unbelievable.

- Once we had the members, then we, you know, had to put together, like, our guidelines of what we wanted it to look like.

Again, Impact Austin and Impact Grants Chicago were incredibly helpful to us in sharing all of their guidelines.

We, you know, in working with us to see what would fit for central Illinois.

- Yeah.

And, - And then we gave away our first grant.

- Which is, is crazy because Children's Home was the first recipient.

- Mm-hm.

- Part of the process.

But when going through that process, it's strenuous.

I mean, because the vetting of something like this, this is not a joke.

- Mm-hm.

- I mean, $100,000, that's a lotta cash.

- Mm-hm.

- And so you really, as a agency or a nonprofit, really need to think about what that looks like.

And it has to be very specific, I know, so, I'm gonna get to the process in minute, but so, now today, how many women do you have?

- This past year we had 235 women, and then I need to add to that, that for the past two years, the Bob Gilmore Foundation has generously given us money because they bought into and believe so passionately about the collective giving idea that they wanted to give us a boost, so.

- [Matt] Yeah, speaking of mentors, I mean, Bob was one of mine.

- Mm-hm.

Yeah.

Great man, great community man, and, - Mm-hm.

But, you know, I think the one thing that, I don't know if I've ever told you this, but the one thing I appreciate about this more than anything is I have four daughters, and I always have told them, "You girls can do whatever a guy can do.

- Mm-hm.

"Girl power," is what we always said.

- Mm-hm.

"Have that girl power."

Well, this is woman power right here, right?

(laughs) - Mm-hm.

I mean, this is fun.

So from a marketing - Yeah.

- [Matt] standpoint, Cathy, you've gotta be looking and saying, like, "We've got content all of the time," to sit there, and I'm gonna use the word celebrate because that's what you guys - Yeah.

- [Matt] are always doing whenever I see it on Facebook or Instagram, there's always a celebration.

- Yeah.

- How fun is that to be able to be in charge of that marketing piece?

- Yeah, and that is something that we like to do.

We like to celebrate our wins, and every time a new member comes on, it's something to celebrate 'cause that's money that gets to go back into the community.

And yeah, we constantly are having content to post about our members are doing great things in the area.

The nonprofits are doing great things in the area.

Once a nonprofit wins our grant, we then call them a community partner.

So we work alongside them for the next few years while we are giving them that grant and we mentor them, but they also mentor us.

So it's, you know, a reciprocal process, and, yeah, we stand alongside them through the process, so.

- Think about this.

Think about the learning curve of all the women of this group, learning about what actually happens with these agencies in the community, because you've gotta sit there at times and just be in tears, right?

- Yeah, yeah.

There's so much need, and it's been really eye opening to see how deep those needs are in the community.

- [Matt] Yeah, and one of the best CEOs around is Carol Merna.

- Mm-hm.

- She's with the Center for Prevention; I know they won a grant.

- Yeah.

- through Impact, and so when she's going through the process and you're jumping in and, as a team, so to speak and learning that process, how long does that process go?

I mean, like, what is the grant process?

Kind of tell our listeners what that is.

- Yeah, so basically they have two years to spend the dollars, but so, from the beginning, when a nonprofit wants to apply for our grant, it is a pretty extensive process.

I mean, we are giving away these high impact grants, and we are in charge of, you know, 200 plus women's dollars.

So we wanna make sure that we're good stewards of their money, and we wanna make sure that we're really vetting these organizations to see that they can handle this high dollar grant.

So basically, we follow a five-phase funnel process.

Say that five times fast.

(laughs) - [Matt] I won't, but I'll let you do it.

- And so basically, we start off with the financial review.

We wanna really make sure that the financial integrity of this organization is strong enough to handle this grant.

We look at financial statements, and so once they pass through that phase, they go then go onto the LOI.

So the LOI, this year, we're kind of changing things up a little.

It's gonna be more of a checklist - Right.

- just to make sure that they meet the benchmarking criteria, that they're qualified to - Okay, - then apply for the grant.

So the third step would be the application process, and that's really the meat of the process.

It's very, very extensive.

We ask them a lot of questions about their organization as a whole.

We ask them about their project or program that we will be funding.

And we have teams of grant review committees, so every step of the way, we have our members make up these teams of grant review committees, and they are directly involved in the process.

- Wow.

- And they are directly reviewing all of these applications, having discussions, you know, really just talking it through and saying who should move on to the next phase.

So phase four is a site visit.

- Yes.

- So that's when we actually get to see the day-to-day operations of these organizations.

We talk with the executive directors.

We talk with the financial officer.

We, you know, just see how - Right.

- their organization runs behind the scenes and get a feel for, you know, what's really going on here.

And so that's definitely - Yeah.

- An integral step in the process.

And then, after that process, our grant review committees meet again.

- Okay.

- And they narrow it down to a few organizations that they think we should present to our full membership.

- Okay.

- So this is where it gets cool.

So after that process all happens, we bring a few organizations forward to our annual meeting.

And so, this is a live in-person meeting with all of our members there.

Our members hear from every single organization.

They present their project or program.

It's a really fun social time - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- for our members.

It's just a big celebration.

And every woman votes at that meeting.

- Oh, wow.

- So it's one woman, one vote, - Okay.

and you get to rank who you think should get the grants.

And then we tally 'em up, and we award them that night in an exciting live presentation, so - Awesome.

- The room is electric.

You can't beat that energy.

It's just a really, really neat night.

And yeah, we present - Yeah.

- the checks; we get those big jumbo checks, 'cause yeah, - Oh, I know.

- Yeah.

(laughs) - I love those big jumbo checks, and every agency loves the big jumbo check, right?

- Yeah.

(laughs) It's fun.

- Right, so let's take one piece of that process, Laurie, - Yeah, thanks a lot.

- and talk about the site visit.

(Laurie and Cathy laugh) So the site visit is where, a lotta times I think the learning piece really goes in because not only can you feel how the senior exec team or the exec team what they're doing, but they can really almost, when you see me telling a story, you see a CEO telling a story - Mm-hm.

- that is where it really hooks you, and that empathy piece comes in, doesn't it?

- [Laurie] Mm-hm, well, and a lotta times, you're going into an organization and you've been trying to visualize whatever that project is, but until you get there, you go, "Oh, this is "where you're gonna put this new community kitchen.

"Oh, these are the cottages that need the furniture.

"Oh," you know, you could actually see, "Okay, now I get it."

And the women that participate in those site visits come back to their grant review committee teams, and they're sitting around a table with 15 to 20 other women, and then they can paint the picture of, "Okay, now I get it.

"Now I understand where this playground that "the Dream Center wants to put in.

"Now I understand where it's gonna go and what it's gonna do "and why they need it."

- I see.

- So it becomes real.

- [Matt] See, that would be my favorite part because I say all the time, - Mm-hm.

- most people do not realize what's underneath your nose in a community.

- Mm-hm, yeah, and what's right - They really don't.

- Next door, yeah, yeah.

- Right, right.

And you know, I was just thinking, another cool piece about this is a lotta times, like, if I went to Chuck and Laurie Weaver, and I said, "Would you donate $1,000 to whatever?"

- Mm-hm.

- You may or may not give it to us, but you may or may not, or probably don't know exactly what the dollars are going towards, - Right.

- and that happens to a lot of people - Mm-hm.

- who donate money.

They're like, "Where does my money go?"

- Yeah, yeah.

- You know, where, I don't even know.

- Yeah.

And all those dollars are obviously crucial.

Unrestricted dollars are needed.

Somebody's gotta pay the light bills.

- Yeah.

- And fix the sidewalk and that kind of thing.

But one thing that we do that is different is that our women get to know exactly where their money's going.

- So really the only criteria is there's just a fee to join, 1,100 bucks or something like that, right?

- [Laurie] $1,100, and you have to be a woman.

- (laughs) Yes.

- We are not anti-men.

We take, - We'll take their money.

(laughs) - contributions from men.

(Matt laughs) They can sponsor a woman, but they are all women around the tables.

And then it's $1,100.

So $1,000 of that contribution goes directly to the not-for-profit, mm-hm.

- Isn't that cool?

What a process, and how many members again do you have now?

Like 200 something?

- This past year, we just gave away grants in June.

We had 235 members.

- Wow.

- And then with the Bob Gilmore contribution, we were able to give away $260,000.

So, to date, we've given away in three grant cycles, $595,000.

- [Matt] Cathy, I think one of the things that I think about is I always say when I'm in the fundraising mode, that I've probably told no more than anybody ever, right?

So like you make 10 asked, eight outta 10, people are gonna tell you no, and that would be defeat to a lotta people.

I've never looked at it that way, but that would feel that way.

- Mm-hm.

- And so, like, if somebody applies for something, for one of these grants, and don't get it, there's a learning curve there, and I would suggest, as a former CEO of a nonprofit, I would strongly suggest use that feedback, and go get it the next year.

- Mm-hm.

- Go try again two years and so on.

Is that how it works?

- Yeah, that is an important part of it, so if somebody doesn't make it this year, they're fully welcome to reapply the next year.

And we actually do provide that feedback, and we kind of coach them, you know, these were the reasons maybe why you didn't get it, or these are the ways you can improve and then come back and reapply.

So we do definitely walk with them through the process.

- Okay.

So I'm gonna put you on the spot here.

- Okay.

- Center for Prevention of Abuse, like what would be a scope of their grant that they use the dollars for?

- [Laurie] So you wanna know what the project was?

- Yeah, well, like what, - Yeah.

- Give me some examples.

It doesn't have, like, I know Dream Center was part it.

Andy King, another great CEO.

- Yeah.

- Urban Acres.

What, like, what did Urban Acres do?

- Urban Acres is putting a springboard kitchen in their building that they own down on Spring Street.

That kitchen will be used for food entrepreneurs that need a licensed kitchen to make their salsa or barbecue sauce or whatever.

- Yeah.

- You know, maybe the next kitchen cooked potato chips.

- Right.

- So they need a kitchen to work out of, so that's one of the things that they'll use that kitchen for.

And then they'll also use it for nutritional classes and, you know, education - That's awesome.

- for people in that part of the community that don't maybe - Have access.

to serve things.

- Have access and don't know what to do with it - Right.

- if they did, you know, get a cauliflower, I don't know.

If they-- - Yeah, right, but I mean, those are great examples because those are all what you just said equals economic drivers.

- Mm-hm.

And so if you teach someone to cook, and look, the whole restaurant sector right now is looking for chefs.

- Mm-hm.

- Right?

- Right.

- So Stefan Zeller at Avanti says, "Hey, I can work with Urban Acres "and get somebody in there to do, you know, "whatever it may be."

- Mm-hm.

When you review grants, are there certain, like, education, is that a piece of it?

Or like, what are the scope?

I'm trying to figure out, like, what nonprofits have a chance to get these grants?

- Oh yeah, great question.

So we have three focus areas.

- It wasn't a well-said question, but I was (laughs).

- Yeah, no, I get it.

I heard it.

So we have three focus areas that we look at.

So when a not-for-profit's applying for our grant, they can put it in the category of health and wellbeing, - Health and wellbeing.

- family and social services or education.

- I figured education was one of 'em, okay.

- Yeah, so then they pick the category, and then, we also, so that's for our big grant that is at least $100,000, and then we, last year, also gave away two smaller grants of $20,000 - I mean, that is so cool - that, it was very exciting, so we have grant review committees that look at all the education grants, all the family and social service, all the health and wellbeing, and then another committee that looked at all of the smaller applicants.

- Do all of the potential recipients or applications have to be 501c3s?

- Yes.

- Okay.

- [Laurie] And they all have to be in the Tri-County area.

- Tri-County area, okay.

- Mm-hm.

And for the big grants, they have to be able to show three years of financial review, because, like Cathy mentioned, we're responsible for 235 women's dollars, so we have to make sure that the organizations can digest a grant of 110 or $130,000.

- Which is part of your vetting process.

- Yeah, mm-hm.

- I mean, that is, most people think, "Oh, well, you get the money, "and it's an easy process.

There is a fiduciary responsibility - Right.

- Of accepting these dollars, and it better be used right.

- Yep, yep, and as we, I do have to say that as we grow and develop and Kristin Zika is our Grant Chair right now, as we grow and develop, she is working really hard to streamline that process as much as possible to make the LOI a little bit more concise so that we're not asking an, so it's not a burden on the not-for-profit - Yeah.

- that's applying.

And same with our grant application - Okay.

- is that we are working to try to, you know, get down to what we really have to have - Yeah, make it efficient.

- and not, yeah.

- Yeah, so is there a recruiting piece here?

So I guess you're always looking for new people, but when you start seeing the, well, I'm gonna say this to Cathy here, because (Cathy laughs) this is a marketing piece.

When you start seeing those celebrations, it almost just starts happening, right?

Because I guess your best sales people are the women on the board currently, because they can actually feel, and actually tell a story, - Mm-hm.

- because this is what this is, this is storytelling, right?

- And the members, - Yeah.

- not just women on the board, but all 235 members.

- That's what I meant.

Yeah, good clarification.

- Yeah.

- [Matt] That's what I meant.

You take 200 women, that's 200 mouths out there - Stories.

- telling stories.

- Mm-hm, yeah.

- Which, you know, I love stories.

- Mm-hm.

- So when are these grants awarded?

- We officially do our annual meeting every June.

- Every June.

- So our fiscal year falls from July to June.

We are recruiting, you know, constantly, and we're soliciting nonprofits.

Our cycle kind of starts around January.

So we'll have a nonprofit info session where they can really learn the guidelines of our grants and ask questions.

- Okay.

- And then the whole grant cycle kind of starts January through June.

- I think a lot of people, Laurie, when they start thinking about nonprofits, they think of, you know, Children's Home, Boys and Girls Club, and you go down the list.

- Mm-hm.

- But 501c3s can also be churches.

- Right.

- They can be-- - Well, and Urban Acres actually did it in collaboration with St. Paul Episcopal Church.

- Well, there you go.

I didn't even know that.

- Because they weren't a big enough organization to apply for that big grant, so a small not-for-profit can collaborate and work together with a larger one if they'll take the financial piece.

- [Matt] So this is an opportunity.

This wasn't even part of my questioning, but I guess this would give an opportunity for a smaller nonprofit to collaborate with it.

Because we talk about - Right.

- collaboration all the time.

- Mm-hm.

- I say it all the time, nobody really knows what collaboration means, or - Right.

- They don't implement it.

- Yeah, yeah.

The other thing I will say is that $20,000 to a, to a small not-for-profit, that is also can be transformational.

Invictus Woods, and - Yeah.

- Center for the Blind that were two smaller recipients this year.

Those are the two that wept.

I mean, they were so moved, not just as Camilla Rabjohns would tell you, not just to receive the grant, but for Invictus Woods addiction recovery, - Yeah.

- To get in front of 235 women that now there's 235 people in Peoria that know and understand what they're trying to do there is huge.

- [Matt] Well, and if you think about that branding piece for all of 'em, it doesn't matter whether you're the largest.

- Yeah.

- [Matt] Or you're the smallest, it gets you, like you said, it really, you get to tell your own story.

- Yeah.

And another piece is, even if they don't win our grants, they have that exposure.

And there's been many women from our membership that, you know, "Oh, I never knew about that organization, "but now I'm gonna go off and support them," even though they didn't necessarily win the grant, so.

- [Matt] And, and we go back to what I said earlier too.

And keep chugging along because - Mm-hm.

- you can have opportunities and it may turn into other things.

It may turn into board members.

- Right, yeah.

- So Dawn Zinc.

- I was just gonna say, - Yeah.

- Yeah.

- is one of the best board members Children's Home's had.

- Mm-hm.

- Yeah.

- And she came from this great group that you have, and so, what does community mean to you?

'Cause you're family.

I mean, you and Chuck and his parents and your whole family do a lot for the community.

- Mm-hm.

- What does community mean to you?

- Hmm, ah, it's where I live.

- Right.

- You know, it's where I live.

And so, I mean, I am concerned.

I have children, I have grandchildren here, I have lots of nieces and nephews.

It's where I live, and I want Peoria area to be as healthy and vibrant as possible.

I want to love where I live, and I want, and I care about all of the neighborhoods and the needs.

It's, - All right.

That's awesome, well, I mean, I wanna thank you, Cathy Kwan.

- Yeah.

- [Matt] Proud of you.

Laurie Weaver, awesome job.

Impact Central Illinois.

I'm Matt George, Laurie Weaver, Cathy Kwan, Impact Central Illinois, and this is "Business Forward."

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