Episode Summary

Most nonprofit leaders assume that passion is enough, that a motivated team is simply a team that cares, and that a performance problem is a training problem. Nancy Bacon, Founder of Nancy Bacon Consulting and co-founder of the Nonprofit Learning Center in Seattle, spent this conversation taking that apart, one piece of research at a time. She walks through self-determination theory’s three levers for real motivation (autonomy, competence and relatedness), the difference between busy and engaged (illustrated by a parent who dropped crumbs around the house just to get his kids vacuuming instead of picking up Legos), and why she rebranded a dreaded finance training as “Finance Unlocked for Nonprofits,” using Jonathan Haidt’s rider-and-elephant metaphor to show why emotion, not information, drives most decisions. She closes on the knowing-doing gap, why telling someone something once rarely changes what they do next. Listeners will walk away with a sharper diagnostic for the vague complaint “my board isn’t engaged,” and a reminder that curiosity, not another training, is usually the fix.

About Nancy

Nancy Bacon is Founder of Nancy Bacon Consting and co-founder of the Nonprofit Learning Center in Seattle, where she designs performance-based learning for nonprofit leaders and teaches other trainers how to teach well. She also leads the Whitworth University Nonprofit Certificate Program. Her path to the sector was not a straight line. She started college as a double major in economics and German literature, intent on a career in international business in Germany, before running an ESL school, teaching in the Philippines, and eventually founding an international education program at Seattle’s World Affairs Council, building it from nothing to a staff of six. She later spent eight years with Washington state’s nonprofit association. Along the way she received the Golden Apple Award, and her recent work includes a Nonprofit Management Certificate for rural leaders with the Innovia Foundation and Whitworth University. Twenty-five years in, she still calls herself a student of how people actually learn.

Resources

• Thanks to our podcast partner, Inperium

• Nancy’s LinkedIn | Nancy Bacon Consulting

• Book recommendation: Julie Dirksen’s Design for How People Learn and her newer Talk to the Elephant: Design Learning for Behavior Change

• Join the Spring 2027 Mastermind!

• Follow Your Path to Nonprofit Leadership, and please leave a review!

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