Back in December, Maclean’s magazine released what they charmingly call their end of year “Chartapalooza.” Basically, a prediction of “which charts/economic graphs to watch” for the coming year, in 2020’s version – their seventh – was not surprisingly quite different.

The reason? Covid-19. They reached out to out to “…scores of economists, business leaders, investors and analysts and asked each to choose a chart that will be important to Canada’s economy in 2021 and beyond, and to explain why in their own words.”

You can read more about it here.

They explored:

• COVID-19
• Jobs and work
• Government finances and monetary policy
• Households
• Housing market
• Businesses, growth and competitiveness
• Energy and environment
• Markets

But one “chart to watch” was missing. Charitable organizations, and how they are faring after a year of pandemic-driven economic uncertainty.

The answer is: Not great.

Charity Begins at Home

They say that “charity begins at home.” And for the most part, that’s true. But look around you, in your local community - and I’ll bet you’ll see people in need.

The problem is that charitable donations are nose-diving. In fact, predictions show contributions will fall by 30 percent by 2028. Seven short years away.

Even prior to Covid-19, charitable organizations have been literally working on a shoestring budget. According to my guest on this week’s “I’m a Millionaire! So Now What?”, of the 86,000 charities in Canada, 91 percent of them are run by 10 staff or fewer.

And these small local charities are the organizations that contribute most significantly to our neighborhoods, helping the most vulnerable and marginalized members of our community.

Meet Kelly Emery!

Kelly Emery, an up-and-comer in the Self Made Nation, is working to provide a bit of a safety net to local communities, and assist local charities at the same time. Driven to ensure technology is used for good, and a year of Covid-19 driven job loss and increased debt-load (for many) her company, Troop, is helping to fill the gaps that traditional charitable organizations simply don’t have the resources to fill.

As she says, “We’re on a mission to make it easier than ever to lend a helping hand. Through our partnerships with charities and nonprofits, we’re using technology to match our community’s drive for purpose to their capacity for all kinds of generosity, starting with the fulfillment of local, everyday needs. All the needs come from local charities and nonprofits, unmet in your own backyard.”

Neighbours Helping Neighbours

Kelly has definitely found a way to make technology give back, as it were, and Troop is now ranked in the top 100 of 2020 Canadian recovery projects.

A graduate of Wilfrid Laurier University’s business program, Kelly has been at the helm of a few tech companies prior to launching Troop. An avid traveler, Kelly jokes that she had to go all the way to Auckland, New Zealand (on one of two co-op exchange programs) to meet a guy from Burlington, Ontario.

She describes herself thusly, “I'm a founder, I'm a mother of two amazing children. I'm a partner, sister, a daughter…a learner? And I'd say right now I'm very much on that journey of trying to answer that question, ‘who am I’?”

Here’s a bit of what we talked about:

Scary Trends in the Charitable Sector

“I had an idea in terms of what I wanted to do next, in terms of the space, but this specific kind of concept and business model really wasn't there yet. So, I just spent a lot of time talking to people in the space, doing some volunteering in order to figure out what it was that I was going to build. And what I was more interested in in those days was just this notion around technology for good. And that technology could be used to solve really important problems. Exactly what that was, I had no idea. I basically just called up a bunch of charities in my area. Fourteen. Not one of them called me back. But I was persistent in following up. That was when I realized, the reason why I wasn't getting call-backs was because the person who's responsible for the volunteer coordinating is also the one that’s writing the grants or running the programming or doing the bookkeeping. And, it was really this understanding that I then had, how smaller local charities run and that they're really under resourced. There's just not that other person on the other end of the line, making sure that everybody who wants to volunteer gets an opportunity, right, they just don't have that luxury. And so, I then kind of took it a step back, in order to understand the space from a macro perspective. And that's when I realized the various trends - quite scary trends really - that are taking place in the charitable sector!”

Eh Voila! Troop Was Born!

“Troop today is where we feature local, tangible needs in order to try to ignite generosity and communities. What that looks like is, if you're a neighbor, and you sign up for Troop on a Sunday night, you get a text message or an email about a local need. It might be a refugee mom that needs a baby stroller, it might be the local men's shelter that needs more toothpaste, but it's local, and it's tangible, so that you know exactly what the need is, you can kind of see and feel where your contributions are going. We try to close the need on the Wednesday, and on the Friday, we feed back with pictures, and thank you messages, and then we start all over again on Sunday. I just really believe that we should be living in communities where these types of basic needs don't go unmet. You know, there shouldn't be a kid that needs a backpack or a new pair of winter boots. The long term is to help create communities where these basic needs don't go unmet.”

Fun, Frank Advice?

“I might go back to a quote that I spent a lot of time contemplating during my transition between moving out of that personal finance/insurance sector space and into something that I thought would really spark more joy and passion. And that was a quote that says, “It's not how well you play the game. It's deciding what game you want to play.” At that time, I recognized that I was playing a certain game, and I was fairly good at that game, right. But in my heart, I just really knew that it wasn't the game that I was supposed to be playing. So, making that decision to walk away from something that you're fairly successful at, and moving in a new direction that brings you more passion and joy, I think it's very difficult for people to make that decision, because chances are, they're very successful in one area. But that question of whether or not that area actually brings you joy, and passion. That’s what you need to determine.”

Kelly’s absolutely right. Charities simply can’t “do it all.” I hope you’ll check out Troop in your neck of the woods.

I really enjoyed getting to know Kelly (virtually, of course!) and we had a really great conversation about her background as a business leader, an entrepreneur, an executive, as well as the genesis for truth and where it's at right at the moment.

I hope you can take a quick break and have a listen!

Are you an entrepreneur looking to exit, or at the helm of a thriving business or startup? I would love to talk with you about your stories! You can drop me a line here.

And watch this space for more details about future Elevated Conversations.