What it means to lead with humanity in a data-driven world | RKD Group: Thinkers

Justin McCord (00:04.94)
Welcome to the Arcade Group Thinkers podcast. I'm your host, Vance.
 
What was that now?
 
Vance.
 
The new year new name or what are we doing?
 
This is, this is your fault. You said that my shirt made you think of Jason Sudeika's character from. Yeah. Yeah. And I don't know if you realized that that character's name is van.
 
Ronnie Richard (00:38.134)
I don't think I did. But you definitely you've got the red tracksuit going and you know, it's looking really sharp. I do have to say.
 
Well, it's, you know, I realized that it's a podcast and some people just listen to the audio. I wearing jeans for those who want to know about my pants. So it's not the full tracksuit as Vance has on. Maybe our friends from the editing side for the video can drop like some sort of a GIF of Vance in the video so that that way folks know.
 
I think we to put your head on that gif of him dancing.
 
Listen, that could be the entire unfortunate teaser for someone who is truly brilliant and such a interesting thought leader with an interesting path. Tell us Ronnie about our guest on today's Thinkers episode.
 
Yeah. So we have Hilary noon. She's a global head of strategy, engagement and growth at AWS nonprofits. Hilary comes with 25 years of experience in the sector. And we kind of walk through some of that from her time at a nonprofit organization for her time at an agency and now her time at a technology organization. And what kind of stood out to me in our conversation, and I mentioned this maybe halfway through the episode is that
 
Ronnie Richard (02:16.866)
You've got these very like the two sides of a coin going where she's very talks a lot about the people and the teams she's been on in the humanity side. And then the other side being working at a technology company with data and focusing on all these very non-people things. But it's really how she, kind of brings it together that stands out.
 
yes, everything that you just said and the other tease that I'll add there, Ronnie, you know, there's a lot of times that we talk to folks and, we, talked to thought leaders and, and they present themselves. They talk about being a thought leader. All right. And, what I love about this conversation and really admire about Hilary is.
 
She exudes it. And you'll hear as she talks about her path and she talks about the way that she thinks and lessons that she's learned along the way. Man, just leadership just emanates. And I think that that is unique and to be commended. so here without any further ado or jokes about side bit.
 
characters from SNL Skets is Hilary Noon.
 
on the Arcade Group Thinkers podcast.
 
Justin McCord (03:48.77)
Hilary, as we were chatting prior to hitting record, you use the word stratosphere and connecting that to where I wanted to start our conversation. I feel like you uniquely have lived on three very different planets of your time in some serious leadership roles at a nonprofit.
 
at an agency and at a technology company. And I'm just curious, like out of the gate, how similar are those planets and how very different are the species amongst those three planets?
 
Yeah, it's a great question. It's actually interesting too, because I think if you asked, you know, 25 year old me, if I would find myself in these on these three planets, I would say absolutely not. Like I would, I wouldn't even know how that would happen. But as I look back on it, it all makes a ton of sense. So I would say probably the common thread is always this desire and interest that I've had to
 
connect the power of data technology analytics to the nonprofit sector. Like having one foot on the side that is the technology and the data, but wanting that to be leveraged for good, right? And like, how do we figure out how to make sure that nonprofits can benefit from the same capabilities that commercial entities do? So that to me has always been the common thread. Whether I'm working within a nonprofit where I started my career,
 
working at an agency where, you you do that across many different types of organizations. And then now at AWS, where I work with lots of organizations who are really trying to understand how to keep up with all of this technology stuff that's moving so fast. So that is the common thread. There's obviously a lot of cultural differences between those three types of entities. And of course, size. There's actually a lot of similarities
 
Hilary Noon (06:03.852)
between my first experience at a very large nonprofit and being now at a very large corporate entity. There's some similarities there, more than you would expect, when compared with the agency experience, which was much smaller. And the ability that I had to be a bit more of a big fish in a smaller pond, which has a lot of benefits to it, as opposed to being a little bit more of a leader, but you're still within a large machine.
 
And so there's all the complications that that comes with.
 
And certainly I think that scrappiness looks different in the agency part versus in the corporate entity and then on the larger nonprofit side. It's not that scrappiness isn't there in those. It just takes on very different forms.
 
Absolutely. Yeah, 100%. We are at AWS always encouraged to kind of invent and create new things. And you'd be surprised, like within our particular organization, we don't have a ton of resources to do things with. So I think that's probably the perception externally, but you're still having to kind of do a lot with a few resources. But that looked and felt very different in the agency world.
 
in the small organization that I was working at where, you know, you're just, you're literally, you're built differently, you're structured differently, how you work with your customers is different. And you have to really think clearly about, where am I channeling my resources? And what kind of results am I going to see from that? And then in the nonprofit world, whether you're in a small organization or a midsize, that does look really different.
 
Hilary Noon (07:52.536)
But I actually think when we, at AWS, when we work with small organizations, a lot of them, they are on the edge of innovation because they're having to be scrappy, right? And so we see these really kind of interesting and innovative growth mindset leaders come out of some of these smaller organizations because they are forced by their very nature, even more so than some corporate entities. And in fact, one of my colleagues made a connection between startups.
 
and nonprofits. When you see innovative nonprofit leaders, they have lot of similarities within a smaller organization to a startup entity.
 
so much sense. Yeah. It really does. I've never thought about it that way, but it makes a ton of sense.
 
Nothing so.
 
Hilary, I'm curious. So one of the things we always kind of dive into with our guests is how they got into the nonprofit space. And it's not always a clear path or a clear line. Can you tell us a little bit about how you got in and what led you to working in the nonprofit sector?
 
Hilary Noon (09:01.718)
Yeah. So I think it probably started with my upbringing. My grandfather was a minister and I think he raised my father and then my mom had a similar kind of upbringing where the church was kind of the center of their lives. And then I and my brother also grew up with that. And so there was always this sense of giving back to a community and
 
kind of thinking about our place in the community and how we help others, whether it's the church, but also even things like public radio and local homeless shelters and things like that, that was just part of how my parents raised us. And so I always had this desire to have a career that had that kind of a meaning, where I felt like I was doing something more than, you know.
 
lining people's pockets with money. And so even in college, I had friends who were pursuing business degrees or legal degrees or medical, and that has a very clear defined path, right? And you know where it's going and you know approximately what your career and your life's gonna look like.
 
I always pursued things that were interesting to me, and I wanted to research things like anthropology and learn about people and cultures and history. I didn't really want to do things like, for a brief period, I followed an archaeological path and thought, maybe that's what I want to do. No, I didn't have the patience for it. So I quickly then found myself in the museum and kind of arts space.
 
But I naturally gravitated to the kinds of roles that would allow me to do things that were business oriented within those organizations. So like one of my first career opportunities was at the Smithsonian, but it was in the office of product development and licensing. So it was this kind of like business aspect of a nonprofit. And I really loved that. I really loved that intersection of how you could apply some of these capabilities that were commercially
 
Hilary Noon (11:20.512)
oriented to driving greater good in the world. And so that's how it started for me. And then I ended up getting a job at the American Cancer Society. And so that was kind of my first foray into kind of the more traditional nonprofit space.
 
Um, my, my oldest, okay. So my oldest is 17 and, uh, he has shown an interest in the conversations as we're starting to go down this looking for college thing in archeology and anthropology and the classics. And I can't tell you how much of a relief it is to hear you talk about like that path versus.
 
What is this gonna look like, buddy? you know, and so if he can grow up to be half as successful and impactful as Hilary, you know, I think that it gives me relief, to be honest with you. I, okay, so I love, I actually, love your path between the Smithsonian and American cancer and then, you know.
 
Justin McCord (12:35.754)
a stint at a university and then, you know, with Pursuant and for a time period before AWS. I think it's such a unique and interesting path. I haven't always done a great job. I'm trying to be better about identifying like those pinch me moments while I'm in them as opposed to looking back. And now I can think back on like, that was a pinch me moment where, wow.
 
I get to do this. Yeah. Like, so I'm curious as you reflect on your 25 years in this space and what are some of the pinch me moments that you have been fortunate to have?
 
Yeah, so I will say some of the strongest pinch me moments of honestly being about the team and the people that I've had the chance to work with. Like as I was reflecting on and preparing for this conversation, I was thinking, you know, the things that make me the most proud are the teams that I've built, the customers that I've had the chance to work with, the organizations that I've been able to impact. Right. So that's kind of a overarching comment on your question, but like to get a little bit more specific, I think.
 
The American Cancer Society was, you know, I kind of grew up in that organization. I was there for 17 years and ended up in a leadership role. And I, I'm so proud of the team that I built. Like the team there was just phenomenal and produced amazing results for the organization. We won a, an award from Forrester Research for kind of our customer insights and really being able to understand.
 
what was motivating not only donors, but also patients and volunteers and like having that kind of external recognition from a commercial entity of our work within a nonprofit was just a real stellar moment and watching how the team got so excited about that and felt very proud of their work. So that was one. And then I think as I flash forward to my work at Pursuant at the agency, you know, our ability to kind of produce and create this
 
Hilary Noon (14:49.378)
body of analytics and data offerings that really helped even small nonprofits. So, you know, I come from this bigger organization and be able to bring some of those skills and capabilities to these smaller organizations or mid-size organizations that just didn't have that skill set. That was pretty exciting to watch them, you know, kind of light up with, this is data that we can use, that we can harness to be more effective with our mission.
 
and to drive more revenue for the organization. And then honestly, I would say I'm still kind of in a pinch me situation with AWS. I never thought I'd be working for Big Tech. It's like, I can't believe that I'm here and I get, I have the power of this like really large brand and incredible scale and scope, but I still get to work within the nonprofit space. And so that to me, like every day that gets me going every time I get to, you know, there's stuff internally always it's.
 
may be frustrating on a day-to-day basis, but the conversations I get to have with our customers, the things they're trying to do, it's just a privilege. And so that kind of is a continuous moment of, I guess, tinge me.
 
Hearing you talk, there's like these very two interesting threads going of the people side, the team building, the leadership, and then you're also dealing with the data and the tech and AI and all of this very non-people parts. Focusing on the people side, I want to ask along your path, what are some lessons that you've learned about managing people, dealing with people, even
 
potentially going back to this, you mentioned the study of anthropology. I mean, that's the study of human behavior. there, are there things that you applied from that? Just tell us a little bit about it.
 
Hilary Noon (16:40.11)
Yeah, so interesting. It's funny, you know, this is a little bit of an aside, but when I got to AWS, I thought I was a real fish out of water because I'm not a strong technologist. I've always been more about how you apply tools through the lens of a human, right? Like really always thinking about it from a business perspective. And one of the first colleagues that I met that's still one of my most trusted colleagues here at AWS,
 
he also had a kind of social sciences background. And that was one of the first moments where we both were like, it's not so unusual for somebody with like this kind of social services, social sciences kind of background to come into a company like this and actually find your way. And I think what it actually uniquely does is it helps you to prepare for and navigate, help others navigate the human part of
 
these types of transformations, which we know are actually super complicated and the harder part of doing that. So I think to answer your question though, think going back to even my studies, my academic studies, the reason I think I really enjoy history and anthropology and archeology and kind of, it is because those things repeat themselves, right? We see those same dynamics repeat themselves through the years. And so if you understand some of the dynamics that drove people to do certain things in history,
 
it just starts to help you understand why things are happening a certain way. And then applied to my own career, one of the first things I learned is you can't always be a friend when you're a manager. And that, I was asked to manage people at a very young age and I was not equipped for it. And there really wasn't much training in my first role on how to be a manager.
 
You know, it's just, you go. You're, you're, you're a high performer. So we're just going to give you somebody to manage. And, I think, I think a lot of companies do that frankly. and so I wanted to be that person's friend and I quickly realized that's not, that's really not the thing to do. You can't, you can't do that. You can be supportive and you can be empathetic, but you can, you can't really, in fact, it actually hurts the dynamic. So that was, I think a really important learning. And I had a mentor who reinforced that for me.
 
Hilary Noon (19:06.764)
when I got into another role at the American Cancer Society where I had a bigger team. And then the other thing I think is, you know, set a vision, create some guardrails, but then let people do their best work, right? Let them really tap into their superpowers and set them up to be successful and then just be a guide and a sounding board for them. So that, and that has continued to be something that
 
I remind myself of in every situation where I'm working with my team members or even as a mentor to somebody else's team member. It's just always this notion of coaching, not necessarily telling people what to do, which sounds obvious, but it's sometimes harder. Especially if you're somebody who is a high performer yourself and really cares a lot about the work to not just roll up your sleeves and want to do it yourself.
 
but empower others and help guiding guide them along the way.
 
I think it's always hard. to your point, and it's remarkable, it's not that I don't know why we do this, but I don't know why we do this. we all have experienced being a high performer and then put in roles where you're immediately responsible for someone else's trajectory and growth. And that transition is massively difficult. And...
 
Also, casting a vision is massively difficult, right? And so those are, I think I have seen at a certain point, you have to make that transition from being about the work to being about the people. And that can be a complicated transition.
 
Ronnie Richard (21:05.078)
often not with the right training either. You you started a job, you get training on how to use the tools, the technology, you get training on what do we do, what are we about? But that soft skills, it's not as clear what the path to training for that is sometimes.
 
Yeah, it's so true. also, other learning that I've had along the way, I tend not to be overly emotive just as a human. just my kind of, which has helped me in a lot of ways. But I know that other people, everyone's gonna react to things differently. And that's been a learning for me also, is to not assume that my way of responding to a particular change, because change is hard for humans,
 
and especially in a work environment where we may not always have control over that. That's another thing, going back to your question about the differences between the planets. You know, your ability to control things is so different in a big company like this, where I am now, versus a small agency where, you know, you have a lot more control. And so I think how people respond to that has been a big learning. And for me to make sure to take a pause and...
 
and understand that people are gonna respond in different ways and give space for that.
 
there, a lot of what we're talking about are timeless, like timeless attributes of leaders, timeless threads within the nonprofit sector. And yet we continue to find ourselves living in times that we feel like or that we characterize as unprecedented. And even now in the last couple of weeks and as we start 2026 can in some ways feel
 
Justin McCord (22:59.308)
like an entirely new set of noises around us.
 
How do you think that we can do a better job of holding those things together? To not be so swayed by the things that we can't control, like the noise? And then reground ourself in those timeless lessons.
 
the
 
Hilary Noon (23:30.124)
Yeah, it's a difficult question to respond to, but I will say what I always say to my team members when they ask questions about things that may be happening in our company that may affect us. We hear rumors, there's always the rumor mill about what might be coming and how do I deal with that. Yes, you can give that brain space, but it doesn't help you in any way.
 
My advice is always to focus on what you can control. Let's go back to what we're here to do. What are our goals as a team? What are your individual goals as a person in your job? And then obviously we all have personal things we're trying to do at home as well. We may have personal goals we're trying to set for ourselves. Stick to those. Stay true to those things because you can control the quality of work that you do.
 
you can control your ability to focus on particular things. And yes, the noise is going to get in the way. And everybody has their way of kind of dealing with the noise, whether it's exercise or meditation or, you know, time with friends. And so make sure you do those things as well. Make time for those things. But I just I always come back to focus on the work, focus on doing delivering really well for your customers and for your team.
 
That idea of what's ahead and what's coming and rumor mill and all of those things. I will spend that just a little bit. When you, when you think about the nonprofit sector where we sit right now, what do you see in the next three years, five years? What, does the future look like for our sector? and where we're headed.
 
Look into the crystal ball. I think we're going to see some consolidation in the sector would be my guess. And I think that could look a lot of different ways. I hope actually that we see stronger collaborations across common missions, across organizations that each contribute differently to a common cause.
 
Hilary Noon (25:53.794)
but strengthen those collaborations such that the funders can have a more impactful result and it can amplify the work that's being done. And also resources can be shared. There's so much good work being done, but it's often being done in separate places and not necessarily in an integrated fashion.
 
And I see it all the time with our customers. Like we work with thousands of different nonprofits and there's so many repeatable things happening. And it's honestly, it's frustrating to me as somebody who comes from this sector and who loves this sector and who wants the nonprofit sector to be successful and to have all of the impact and more that it can have in the world. Technology really is the catalyst for that. But for us to be able to
 
kind of unleash that technology in the most impactful way, it needs to be scalable and it needs to be harnessed and focused. And what we often end up doing is kind of going off and supporting one organization with this particular part of us. It's not the whole solution, but it's part. And then another one with the other part and, they'll work together. Of course they talk to one another, but it's not in a strategic manner. And so that's.
 
What I hope happens is that there is more of a forcing function for organizations to come together in a much more strategic way in order to move the needle. I also think we're going to see intermediary organizations doing more. So these hybrid types of organizations as kind of the social consciousness around the world forces more entities to have a, whether it's a B corporation type of entity or just
 
stronger ESG commitments or those types of things. So we're gonna see these kind of hybrid players in the space, I think gaining more traction and driving a stronger need, cause they'll have more resources for the investments that are needed to really accelerate the goals that we have to reach. mean, if you look at the UN sustainability goals, we have a long way to go with a lot of that. And in order to
 
Hilary Noon (28:18.584)
to reach those, we just have to think differently about how, as opposed to being millions of separate organizations doing some similar things, let's try to harness that a little bit more. So I think that's kind of what I see in the sector. And then on a technology front, organizations are really going to have to think differently about how they operationalize their mission. And there's going to continue to be fewer resources.
 
Having a growth mindset and being open to innovation, I know it's very hard in an environment where you are stewarding donor dollars, it's always the risk aversion is real. But the organizations that I see that are doing super innovative and kind of impactful changing work, world changing work, are being led by leaders who are willing to take some risks and who are willing to think differently, who are willing to step into a
 
quasi commercial space who are willing to think about monetizing aspects of their mission so that they become resistant to things like we experienced last year or massive changes in the economy because they've diversified, because they've thought differently, because they've created really strategic collaborations. that's a little bit now, technology where it goes, mean, my goodness, the speed at which things are going, it's...
 
almost hard to predict kind of how that's going to evolve. But for this sector to stay alive and healthy, those are some of the things that I really hope we start to see.
 
It is a, each of those things to me feel like a natural evolution that we can take. Like those aren't far fetched. Those are in a lot of ways it's, it's back to something that you said earlier about like that scrappiness and startup mentality. It's about thinking small, right? In a way that has clarity that you can act on.
 
Justin McCord (30:24.43)
I do feel it feels like there's a natural connection here even to the imagine grants that AWS has, right? Like that there are opportunities for people to, if I can say, think small and have that be supported by folks like AWS. And that can help fuel some of that transformation in a way that doesn't feel big and overwhelming.
 
Maybe you can you give a little background to how the Imaginretts came to be?
 
Yeah, well, really came, almost everything at Amazon and AWS comes as a result of seeing a customer problem or a customer challenge. And as you all know very well, in the nonprofit sector, the number one issue that we always encounter is budget and resource constraints, as well as then closely followed by talent constraints, which obviously feed one another. And so, so we were, we saw that as a real problem in the space and we wanted to be able to create a
 
environment where nonprofits could not only get access to credits and funding, but could also have the tools to be able to bring an idea to life. Because we often find that just providing funding or just providing credits doesn't do what the nonprofit really needs, which is guidance and the ability to kind of frame the idea that they might have. Because nonprofits are incredibly innovative and incredibly creative.
 
But they don't always have the access to or the understanding of the breadth of technology that can help them bring that idea to life. And so I think the Imagine grant was really created in a way to say, how can we solve these challenges that are really innate to a nonprofit, while at the same time making sure that they are best positioned to be successful with those challenges that they're trying to, or those opportunities that they're trying to bring to life? So that's kind of where it came from, and it's just evolved from there.
 
Ronnie Richard (32:27.351)
It's so cool.
 
The Imagine event is by far, it's one of my favorite events in the nonprofit universe, just because it feels very different than lots of things that you attend.
 
That's great to hear. Yeah. Our Imagine conference is in its 10th year this year, March 19th in DC. So we're very excited to see that come to life. And we've seen it now also expand into the UK and Australia. yeah, it's a, mean, we know this sector loves to come together and share and learn from one another. And that's really what we try to create is an environment where both
 
the business side and the mission and the program side of a nonprofit can learn and be excited and inspired and as well as the technologists.
 
Yeah, that's just the work you're doing and the work AWS is doing so exciting. we're just thrilled to see how much you're helping nonprofits right now. And Hilly, just wanted to say thanks for joining us today. Thanks for sharing your path with us. And we look forward to what's coming next.
 
Hilary Noon (33:39.842)
Thanks so much. appreciate the time and the opportunity.
 
Group Thinkers is a production of RKD Group. For more information, including how you can partner with RKD to accelerate growth for your fundraising and nonprofit marketing needs, visit rkdgroup.com.