Episode 175: Bonni Pomush

Judge
Written By Third Boxcar LLC

CEO, Working Wardrobes 

00:59:23
 

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Show Notes

Bonni Pomush, the CEO of Working Wardrobes, a leading nonprofit in Orange County, California, shares her path to nonprofit leadership and tips for leading and collaborating with others both inside and outside your organization. Named the Most Influential Person in Orange County by the Orange County Register in 2023, Bonni is an upbeat force for good, and a leader to learn from. Join this conversation and learn why nonprofit leadership can be a sensible choice for those who just finished law school and why working for impact can be the most fulfilling career choice. 

 
 

About Bonni Pomush:

With much joy, Bonni is committed to putting her strengths to work by being of service to the community.

She developed a great love and respect for research and data-based decision making while earning her master’s degree in Family Resources and Human Development. Bonni brings over 25 years of leadership experience in government and non-profit agencies. Her research- and strengths-based leadership approach has resulted in the national accreditation of centers, turning around budgets from shortfalls to surpluses, and retaining high quality employees by creating and implementing performance-based pay systems. In partnership with board members and volunteers, Bonni has secured over $6 million in capital campaign funds and $1 million from events and annual giving.

Originally from the East Valley suburbs of Phoenix, AZ, Bonni administered programs for 15 years in government agencies (the Kyrene School District, Arizona State University, and the City of Chandler). After making the move to Orange County, CA in 2009, she joined the nonprofit world at Temple Beth El of South Orange County: The Samueli Center for Progressive Judaism. Following Founder and 31-year CEO (Chief Executive Officer) Jerri Rosen’s retirement, Bonni became Working Wardrobes’ second-ever CEO in January 2022 and has focused her leadership on modernizing and preparing Working Wardrobes to scale. Since her arrival, she has been nominated for several awards (LA Times 2023 & 2024 Orange County Inspirational Women, OC Business Journal’s Women in Business 2023) and was touted by the OC Register as one of Orange County’s Most Influential People in 2023.

Bonni revels in creating and implementing strategic plans and sustainable systems, working with boards to accomplish a mission, developing and leading high-performing teams, engaging diverse stakeholders, and producing measurable results.

When she’s not hard at work, Bonni can be found paddle-boarding, walking, playing mah-jongg, hitting balls on the tennis court, traveling, or enjoying quality time with family and friends.

 

Transcript

Today, I'm very pleased to have on the show an amazing nonprofit leader in Orange County, the second-only leader of this particular nonprofit, Bonni Pomush. She's the CEO of Working Wardrobes in Orange County, California. Bonni, welcome. 

Thank you. Thanks so much for having me and highlighting Working Wardrobe.

It's such a beautiful organization that I've been familiar with the work that the organization has been doing in the county for a while and been a part of it. Still, I was so impressed when you came to speak with another panel of women nonprofit leaders in Orange County at the leadership tomorrow class that I'm in. I was like Bonni is a force of nature, so I wanted to share your journey and story. You're a very positive person and inspiring to others in their journey as well. 

Thank you so much. I think that's an incredible mirror that you’re holding up to me. I don’t think we usually see ourselves in a way that we impact other people. Thank you for sharing that positive has happened to you.

You’re just so positive. You’re amazing. I think really good in bringing people together. I wanted to talk about how it is like you not only came to Working Wardrobes but also how you came to be a leader in a nonprofit space. What sort of started you on that journey?

I think it's been more of a calling than a decision and I experienced it my whole life and what I'm talking about is even in my very first jobs, it was all about connecting with humans and uplifting my fellow humans. At first, as a camp counselor and leader to a group of children or supplementary school teacher. These were opportunities that he needed the ability to enact what I think is my calling in the world and that is really a fundamental belief. 

I share probably with more people than obviously myself and that belief is that every single person has a contribution and a unique purpose to give while they are alive. If this is mine, then I'm happy to give it. I feel like I'm giving it when I'm in that flow state that I at least track the time and I feel like I'm lost in much bigger than myself. I have really always loved being in that role with people. I think it's a very sacred place to be because it takes some vulnerability on both people's sides to both give and receive leadership. 

Every single person has a contribution, a unique purpose to give while they are alive. 

I think you have a very natural curiosity about people and it's genuine so people respond to that. It's a helpful skill in building bridges I think which is what you mean you have good connections and connect people to things that they're passionate about as well in order to lead a nonprofit successfully. 

It's true and you're up again the mirror you see me. I am very curious and it's really coming from a place of I think Stephen Covey said it really well seeking to understand and it's not coming from a place of trying to put things in a box or category just wanting to see it and understand it like it's brand new for the first time. I think it also goes back to what I was saying before which is uncovering and discovering what a person's unique contribution is, is it's an incredible high to experience like, “That's what you're here to do. Let's make that happen.” 

Helping people achieve their purpose is always gratifying. 

Helping people achieve their purpose is always gratifying. 

It's incredible too on the scale that we are able to do that with Working Wardrobes and Working Wardrobe for helping people overcome all sorts of different barriers to gainful employment. It's a very individualized and dignified process. It's rooted in these same beliefs that every person has something to contribute to the world. 

What an honor it is to unlock that ability and to harness that talent by bringing whether it's a certification program or a soft skill training, whether it's just preparing for interviews and having a talk about our skills and our experiences, or if it's that confidence and that outer shell which everyone knows Working Wardrobes for the successes and these transformations we make on the outside. They are sincere like representations of the transformations that have happened on the inside. 

Yeah, so can you talk about that overall I would say the focus of the programs or the goal of the programs is helping people blossom and become true to whatever they want to do or here to do in the world. Maybe you can talk about how it all fits together because I think certainly those in Orange County who have encountered Working Wardrobes may have encountered it for exactly what you're talking about the success suit part, right, in helping people get very nicely dressed for their job interview and they're in their new job. 

It’s true. I think about the clothes as sort of like an easy place of entry. We are on the donation side of that. It feels really good to donate something that maybe you wore it maybe you didn't but you know that when you're donating those clothes, that it's helping the broader community by empowering one person at a time. On the receiving end, I think that there is there is an energy exchange that happens. The energy exchange that happens starts with the donor saying I want to help uplift. I want to help my fellow humans. I'm going to give this thing and I'm going to do this deed.

Then that energy comes through the clothes and into the person but all the people that it touches on its way to its final destination, which is that's success suit for hearing a person for an interview. Working Wardrobes the part in between is really the core of the work. For every single person that we have the honor of being on their employment journey with, we start with an individualized employment plan. The idea is, let's first discover where are you, and then let's discover where you are heading. For many people, the discovery of what's even possible is the core of the work maybe they never considered a position as a fill-in-the-blank. 

Maybe they didn't even know to dream about being a paralegal but it was something that they had a curiosity about that were able to uncover through some assessments and conversations. We call these coaching conversations. We do this whether we think we are or we're not, right? Every engagement we have with our fellow humans is kind of a receiving and co-creating process. There's this feedback loop that we're constantly a part of where it's I'm experiencing the world that I'm contributing to the world and it keeps going and going and going.

That experience happens with all of our clients as well. That is this iterative process of discovery. The discovery can be a test. It can be also an informational interview. It can be a job shadowing. It can take a lot of shapes and forms and that's both on the client's side to desire that but it's also for you and me to give. When we help uplift as a mentor, as a coach, as a door opener, as a connector, we are investing in our fellow humans. In Working Wardrobes we do that process of where you are at, and where are you going and then we don't talk about case management. 

We talk about career navigation. Our team of career navigators will help from the passenger seats, right? Our clients are driving. It is more light. It is your direction. We are here to resource, to support, to help and we literally navigate a course over those barriers. Kind of in priority order, I always think about the mass loss hierarchy of needs, right? You can't really work on your self-fulfillment. If you are not housed, not healthy. We work on basic needs first, and we completely lean on the collaborative organizations that have expertise that we don't have to deliver this part of our mission. 

That's what I was going to ask you about. You must have to work with a lot of other organizations because you can't be everything to everyone. 

That's exactly right. In fact, it takes 185 partnerships. Actually more than that, but I'm rounding. Over 185 relationships that we have with other agencies programs organizations that are delivering their mission really well. We together then can serve a person. We call it wraparound services and that's what it looks like. Here's a card to go call someone but we call it a warm hands-off or a linkage which means that we are connecting a human with a human on the other side of that partnership. Once we've addressed those basic needs, then we can start to get to what I think about is the intellectual property like in this to a phone, right, we update operating systems. 

You name it. I give you a few examples, could be an informational interview, a certification program, a college class, or a soft skill webinar. There is a huge range of skills that we are able to develop in our clients. Once we are on that course, we can simultaneously or in sequence then begin preparing resumes and mock interviews. Once you know where you're headed, then the job search becomes its own learning, and school job searching is one, part of how you represent yourself on paper. Two, how you can get in that door. I skipped a step. In between those two is getting past the AI.

These days it’s true, isn’t it? Yeah.

It really is. Then once you've got that interview landed, we prepare mock interviews. For many people that were serving, how do I explain this gap in my employment history or how do I share with you that I do a nontraditional education path? I don't have maybe a bachelor's degree, but I can show you the skills I can demonstrate for you behaviorally and how I have been able to achieve those kinds of goals or have that knowledge. Then as you already said right this wardrobeing experience is sort of the cherry on top. 

I think about it operating system gets updated then we make sure the packaging matches. The packaging matching is sort of twofold. On one side, it's the obvious. It's the physical transformation. It's this you're in a suit where your shoulders are back your heads held high and you've got this. On the other side, that kind of transfers in and you see yourself in a different light. You see now a physical manifestation of the person that you are becoming and what's really possible becomes something tangible and that is a confidence and esteem builder. It's another barrier removed. 

I was thinking about that too that clothing is really important on the internal side, the interior side of being confident, and how you would present at the interview, too. 

It's not any one part, right? All of those parts create the whole and the ability to contribute oneself. We're helping over 5,000 people every year. When you think about just one person standing taller in their own power, that is the same power we each hold and it's this power that we have to create and to contribute in a meaningful way and that ripples out. It's not just affecting me but it's affecting my family. It's affecting my circle of influence and my network.

Just one person standing taller in their own power creates a ripple effect on the people around them.

As a result, it changes my neighborhood, it changes my community. I think about it. It changes the world. I recently came into the statistic that the average person has a circle of influence of 135 people. Since Working Wardrobes' inception in 1990, we've reached over 125,000 people one-to-one. Then if I multiply that by 135, that's 16 million plus people who have been touched as a result. That is an incredible impact. 

I think that there isn't as much focus in society right now on the importance of the individual in that way that the ripple effect of the individual. They certainly talk about institutions and how much the sheer number of people who are directly reached but there is that power of making especially a deep impact like that on an individual in terms of how likely that is to ripple out and not only impact their lives but others. Yeah, it's pretty cool. I think it's interesting too because I think you talked about all of the different experiences you had professionally before coming to Working Wardrobes.

One of the themes that I've gleaned over time from different guests is the sense that like now looking backward, it makes total sense that I am now here. At the start of the journey or the midpoint of the journey, never would have figured out this is where I would be so just sort of stayed on the path and going to where your move to go next. The second thing is skills, right? When you're talking about your prior experiences those are very different skills, but they're building on each other to lead to the point that you're leading this really impactful nonprofit. How do you see that in terms of how the skills from your different experiences kind of interlock to allow you to do what you do? 

It's interesting because I think about, and I mentioned this, the very beginning of my career was, I don't know. My mom used to referred me as the Pied Piper right, and that the Pied Piper loves to with enthusiasm and love bring your groups of children on a journey. Then I took that and harnessed it in one of first favorite other jobs, I spent almost 10 years working at a school district in Arizona. It was the entrepreneurial side of the school district. Everything we were doing was intended to make money to support what was happening and not being funded but happening in a classroom. 

When I took on that position, I was hired as a regional supervisor only for the tuition-based programs and I had a couple of hundred people on my team and was able to really lean into and learn a lot of facilitative leadership, a lot of training, and leading meetings and really how do you achieve strategic initiatives with not being a direct super direct service provider? How do I incentivize motivate and lead with vision a team? Part of that incredible that's puzzle piece in my career was offered to me in the forms of mentorship and opportunity and the ability to practice what I had learned over and over and over. 

One of the poignant moments for me in that position was my direct supervisor forwarded me as a good candidate for the school district from the entire School District strategic planning process. By being chosen to be the facilitator of that entire process for the entire School District, they took a risk, right? They didn't know I'd never done it before but they learned quickly that I was the right person because of that Pied Piper. My capability to bring people with me. I didn't have a preconceived notion of where we were headed, but to make sure that all the voices were heard and that everyone had a place in a way to contribute and that was reflected then in where we ultimately built consensus. 

After leaving the school district, I saw myself in this place of I think I could run a business. I think I would like to really lean into this training, the facilitation, the leading strategic initiatives, but I fell in love and I moved to California and I didn't have a position when I arrived here. It seemed like the perfect time to labor through this business idea I had. For me, being a stranger in a new place meant that I went to my community of faith to begin to lay roots and build my own network and have friends and family. 

Well, it turned out and this is what you were talking about before it became a left turn for me. I walked in the door just wanting to volunteer and meet people and I walked out the door with a job. I ended up working there for 12 years. The last six of their executive director and the first six in a variety of jobs. What that whole piece taught me was not only all of the relationships and getting those roots laid here in Orange County, but it also taught me about the nonprofit side. Whereas I was coming from this government perspective of something is provided. 

We are creating more but we're able to leverage this huge institutional set of resources. The general counsel. We have a superintendent. We have this infrastructure. Now, I come to the nonprofit side and it's, “You're on your own. Good luck.” There's not this see, “I couldn't walk downstairs and talk to an expert in employment law. I had to go seek one out and find a resource,” right? I share that with you to say that what it went about the nonprofit sector from that position was this other piece that now looking back like you said, I see it makes perfect sense. I needed that skill. I needed to not just learn the fundraising side, but the how do you resource and get information expertise to your organization when it's not built in. 

Yeah, that's a really great distinction between those. I was thinking about that as there's a very set institution when you're dealing with government. There's also probably a little more administrative and bureaucracy to that which is sort of the flip side of a nonprofit which is very up by the bootstraps and today, I'm doing this. Tomorrow, I'm putting on this hat and I'm doing something else. I have a colleague who was in law practice and now is like you like the second-generation executive director of the Harriet Buhai Center in Los Angeles and she says, “Today, I'm the general counsel.” 

You’re all of the various things and it actually really helps to have all of those different experiences. At least knowing how to go about finding the resource that you need and encouraging that resource to come on board or at least help you in a pinch. It helps to have that kind of broad experience to do that. To that degree, I think is a corollary to just startup culture in a for-profit space. We don't have a whole bunch of employees so everybody's pitching in on different points. Yeah. 

Exactly. I think for me, very personally right, that became a place where I got good at asking. I didn't know that I didn't have that skill or maybe I bet it was a muscle that I just needed to build the reps on and asking for help is not an easy thing to do, but when you are in that position you got to keep asking until you get what you need. 

Yeah. It’s easier to help someone else like for an organization or on behalf of someone, I find that's easier or harder to ask for yourself, “This is for the benefit of others.” 

I think you just have to do something really big and bold. I remember winning this from someone like you’re not really asking for yourself or giving someone an opportunity. That mind shift for me was like, “Yeah, I'm giving you something. I'm not even asking you. I put that on that script. That script was held in my own head and it changed everything. 

Yeah, it changes how you approach things and how you ask and all of that. Yeah. Looking back now, you're kind of putting together the different skills and skill gaps that you filled in to be ready for this job. I think there's something in just thinking about skills as being the building blocks to a position is really important because if you look at it in terms of it's sort of mindset of what you were talking about. If you say well I've never been a leader of a non-profit in this space before so maybe I don't check all of the boxes to apply for that position, but if you think of it instead about skill sets and how those translate to different arenas, then you more likely to put your hat in the ring, I think. 

You're totally right and I think there's also a gender divide on this that women are exponentially harder on ourselves whereas a man might say I have five of those 10 criteria on the job. 

Right, exactly or done something close to that once a month. That's fine. I can apply. Yeah. 

Right. Where's the woman is more likely to say, “Oh, no, I can't do that.” I think about our clients deeply when I think about this and I’m talking a bit about the paper ceiling and that is that a lot of positions require a degree that really don't require a degree. It's a systemic marginalization that we continue to perpetuate when we don't say this or that right? Sure, I can show you I have that. I think what you're describing to is a lot of this sort of constellation of soft skills that we learn how to make an act. 

We learn how to make a presentation. We have all these adaptable skills. This is again, Working Wardrobes' sweet spot. We love investing skill sets into people that are transferable across occupations, about industries. Just learning if you have exited the workforce for let's say 10 years, you're coming into a whole new world and that whole new world is there's multiple generations in the workforce. Many people who have retired are coming back to the workforce. The younger folks that are coming in have completely different experiences not just with technology, but with communication and how they solve problems having engaged and there are literally five generations working together right now. 

That's a lot to figure out and navigate especially if you haven't figured out how to fit yourself into a new culture, how to read the culture, how to assimilate to it, and to contribute to it. That's a huge soft skill that you have got to develop like the world's not going to all acquies to your needs. You have to find a way to bring yourself into it. I just share all that is demonstrations of what you're saying that it's all of it.

Yeah, and that's important what you said too in terms of I mean, you're equipping a person for success which requires adaptability and transferable skills. Not just making sure that someone becomes an engineer or whatever it is, but that they have the wherewithal to navigate that or whatever else they would like to do. 

Yeah. We talk about this like off the cup often about our education to some rate, I'm going to refer to every conversation. You probably had over a cup of coffee or a bar at some point. That is we need our our pipeline of talent to come into the workplace prepared to solve problems to think critically to be adaptable to be dependable to demonstrate responsibility. We teach our clients these skills in a very tactical way because if you haven't been in a situation whether it's ever or in a long time, it's hard to prepare yourself for them very much culture shock. You get it, by the way, I see it's take it with you. No matter where you go, you can use these skills. 

We need our pipeline of talent to come into the workplace prepared to solve problems. 

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Knowing what now, what kind of advice would you give to someone who might think they want to contribute to the world in the nonprofit space and maybe eventually become a CEO of one? What kind of advice would you give to someone navigating that path? 

I have a lot of thoughts going through my head. I'm laughing because I'm thinking to myself like think twice but I think really hard about it. No in all sincerity, my very first piece of advice would be to just get clear about what you want and go get it. It's okay to try and fail. It's okay to try and decide I don't like it. It's okay to try and succeed like it's okay to want something to go after it, to get it, and see what happens next. I learned also actually from one of your guests this idea. I repeat it so often because it’s so powerful and what she said to me was, “As a leader, we're making decisions all the time or the information we have at the time were making the best decision we can.” 

It's okay to try and fail. It's okay to try something and decide you don't like it. It's okay to want something, to go after and see what happens next. 

What's the worst-case scenario? Doesn't hang up and then what do you do? The same thing. You make another decision with the information you have at the time and it's the best decision you can right then. Zooming back out, I would say get clear about what you want and go get it. When I say get clear about what you want, do your research. You will be surprised how open and inviting people are to come to shadow me for a day. Come see what again life of a CEO is like. Call me. 

Let's have a discovery interview. Ask me all the weirdest questions you can possibly come up with I'll answer them. I think as as humans, we sort of, I don't want to say hunker down, but we sometimes doubt that people want to invest in us and I think that that's the wrong assumption to make it. Try making an assumption that people do want to help other people succeed and be open to these discovery processes, experience whether it's an interview or a job shot or something like that, but check it out to know what you're getting into. 

Yeah. I think that's important. I mean you might know theoretically or think theoretically that sounds really great. I would like to do that. Do you know what's actually involved in doing that particular job might be good to find that out in whatever ways and I think one of the goals of the show is to allow people to kind of get a sense of people's paths in different directions of particularly legal training that many different paths that can lead to.

If you don't necessarily think about law school, but you see all the different things you can do with that training and apply those skills and so many different ways that maybe people will put their name in there for law school or for whatever leadership positions they might be inclined to do. Definitely on board with that and I hope that even if they're too shy to call someone up and ask at least they would get some information through the show and they might be willing to follow up and ask someone after that too. 

You can adapt these different skill sets in a different way. I was thinking instantly of a friend of mine who was a practicing attorney, but she loves teaching. She became an attorney who advises judges and she's the council to the judges and I think, “We don’t even know that was a job.” 

There's such a variety and figuring out different ways to have first figuring out what it is that you really love to do and puts you in that flow state as you talked about and that can come out in a number of different ways. If you think about it broadly enough, this is what I enjoy doing. There are a lot of different ways to achieve that and apply those skills in different ways. I think the other thing too is that if you've made one decision to do one thing, you're not stuck with that for your whole life. 

If you want to apply your skills in different ways, you can do that permission to make that decision. I think in law school in particular, you're really taught that there's your whole career will depend on where you go, or where you work for the summer or passing the bar and immediately what you do after law school. If you haven't done whatever the right things are at that point, it's just irretrievable in your career. Life doesn't work like that. Being open to that and how you grow too, right? You might find something interesting at one point in time, but you've grown and you find new ways to use your skills. 

Well then, what you're describing is trusting. Trusting your inner compass and if you're interested in it, follow the interest, right? Like I think what you're describing is so like the system of the world we've all been experiencing and that there's like it has to be that when you say it that there's only one route. 

Yeah. It's like linear just totally linear. Yeah. I think that just hearing the journeys of individuals you like well might make sense in retrospect but you realize all of the things are building on each other and expanding and just to keep that in mind, might happen the same way in your life instead of being one straight line that is exactly the same. 

One of the things I mentioned earlier and something that I thought was an interesting discussion that you had in the leadership tomorrow panel with your fellow nonprofit leaders was I think people have thought about this in the past but it feels like it's people are more willing to openly discuss it this way that nonprofit is their business. Having certain leadership and entrepreneurial and business focus skills are helpful in that space and that is in fact what you're doing for the benefit of others. You're just not keeping your profits. You're putting that back into the community. 

Definitely, the different business model and I often think about it that it's like at the nonprofit level, we're doing the same work, but we're doing it with fewer resources. We somehow as a society have deemed that less valuable which just blows my mind when we sort of justify that compensation for nonprofit employees should be lower because we're creating impact and not profit. 

That paradigm makes no sense to me. When you think about what we’re talking about the ripple effects. The only way the world even works. I mean the government depends on non-governmental organizations to provide impact on citizens and contribute and that communities can be sustained. I hope that I live to see the sort of paradigm shift happen and see what you described. Also, where the opportunity is. It's a problem and it's the opportunity. 

Opportunity is when people like you and lots of people in the community say, “I raise my hand to offer assistance in my expertise on a nonprofit board or as a volunteer in this capacity.” That is not just a gift of oneself to an organization, but it is a gift of oneself to the world. I think I already made that case. When we change one life, we're ultimately changing the entire world. The nonprofit sector really depends on people sharing of themselves generously not just their pocketbooks, right because those donations obviously make a huge difference too to operate at all. The intellectual expertise and gifts are completely priceless as well. 

Yeah, that's an important point. I think about board leadership because there may be some folks who are like, “Well, I'm fine practicing law and I really want to go into being a nonprofit leader myself, but there's a way to contribute your skills and critical thinking and whatever else you might have to the organization by serving on a nonprofit board. 

It's like you can have it all. You can volunteer in a way that is not just gratifying but I think about it like honing your skill, right? You're taking your craft and putting it in a different setting and owning it. I love the idea that it's a free gift meaning that it is like it is your gift to share with the world and that it is a way that you can help on a much broader scale. 

I think I've been on various boards for very many years and I have seen one consistent thing that lawyers or whatever type they might be, anyone with legal training, brings to the board usually is an ability because it was put into us in law school, is this ability to analyze, summarize good things down really quickly and like pull everything away that isn't the actual issue or problem that needs to be dealt with and breaking that down.

If there's some big issue that the organization is facing, the lawyers are the ones on the board even over the business owners will say, “Okay. I see we have 1, 2, and 3 and we can approach it with A, B, and C and our job is to figure out which of those we want to do and everybody is always looking shocked how did you figure that out? The lawyers are all like well it was obvious. That's why you have different skill sets on the board. For something else, we'll be obvious to something to someone else on the board. 

Exactly, right? 

Yeah, so it's good to have diverse experience on the board so you can all and leverage all of these different pieces of knowledge. 

That's exactly right. At Working Wardrobes for some time, we have done this exercise and we call it a board matrix where we look at what are the expertise areas that are on the board and what's missing. What are the perspectives that people bring that are here and are missing just demographics? All the things. We always identify we could never have too many attorneys because of exactly what you said just the thinking process and the ability to adapt to every problem are extremely helpful. 

I think that's you like we have some unique areas where we have expertise that's coming to us that you wouldn't maybe expect like we have two people on our board who are executive leaders at retailers and those are giving us insights for our social enterprise about what to expect about retail behavior, what to expect about inventory. We depend on donated clothes not just from individuals but also from retailers. People don't know that.

Makes a lot of sense. Yeah. 

Right? I mean, I recently learned that it is a trend despite what retailer you are that if it's raining, retail sale numbers go down. I didn't know that. Now I know that okay, if we have a rainy season, we should expect some numbers to go down and this is the kind of expertise that is brought to the table and it's nope prepare for it or in another example, we have several people in the financial services industry that are advising us about not just haven't invested Working Wardrobe's funds but have a mitigate risks, how to make a calculated risk. All of these pieces matter. 

Yeah, that's interesting insights on the retail side because you also have stores too, right? 

That's right. We have three stores that help farm our mission. I love to share this with people because it's part of the world that again we were talking about the business versus for profit not for profit. Well, a social enterprise is a business that is not for profit, it is for impact. Our social enterprise is we run these three retail stores that are business and people come in and spend money and buy things and we pay sales tax for all that. Then the dollars that we generate as a profit then fund our mission so that not a single person that receives services from Working Wardrobes is paying for those services and receiving them free of charge because of this social enterprise plus individual incorporated giving plus what we call client services, which is where contracted provider of the city to State, the county.

Right. Got it. Yeah. That's an interesting breakdown or mosaic of all the different things that you're doing. Yes, I mean speaking of the entrepreneurial part, I think that's an important aspect for nonprofits to consider as well, which is, is there a way for you to generate for yourself? You're of course going to have donations and all that, but is there something that you can produce or do yourself but feeds back into the nonprofit's mission and provides at least some funding for that? 

It's just like with a diversified portfolio. 

Yeah. Exactly. That’s part of the portfolio.

Exactly.

Yeah, and I think donors like to see that to you that we're doing our own thing to self-sustain some portion of it we're doing ourselves. It's a great way to get the word out and have other people contribute in different ways by shopping at the store, right? Really nice clothes that are donated whatever and contribute to the work in that way if they wish. 

Exactly. 

Yeah. 

It's an interesting dichotomy right though, but it's another on-ramp another opportunity for businesses to support their local communities and it's oftentimes to release overstock or items that you are going to count an inventory. It's going to cost you more to have them in your warehouse and donate them. You're going to get a huge write-off on your taxes and a nonprofit is going to then use that to help people get jobs like what would you say after that?

Yeah. It's a great positive on many different sides. That's neat. I want to talk a little bit about mentors or sponsors or your experience with having a mentor and what impact that's had in your career and your mentoring others as well. 

It's so paramount to everything we do. Frankly, we were talking about just my sort of innate curiosity and I think I sincerely look at everyone and think what am I going to learn from you? Or what are we going to learn together in this experience? While I had to have formal mentor relationships, I think really every interaction is a possibility for learning and sharing. I mentioned a little bit with the school district. There was a mentor I had. Her name is Candy Roche and I feel like Candy Roche really changed my life in a lot of ways. She was my direct supervisor and she invested in me. 

She invested her time with me. She spent time processing thinking together letting me hone my own ability to solve problems in a safe space. She gave me these opportunities to practice what I had learned and to have a sit. I want to say a sitting net but just to know that it was okay to fail. It was okay to make this thing. What was most important was, what did you learn from it? Right? It shifted my perspective in so many ways and I think no matter what, whether again, formal or informal mentor relationship in this relationship, I knew that Candy believed in me.

I knew that she wanted me to succeed, that she was invested in my humaneness and giving me those chances to shine when she could have shone but handed it over and said, “You want to give it a shot kid? Go for it.” Right? Those were the opportunities that really shaped me and how I am able to show up. It was really investing in me that time and not to process with me believing me and helping me see other perspectives and just literally the opportunities to practice. I often am probably too transparent with people and I will just overtly share. Like I think you could do this.

Can I help you get there? Or this is something that I just saw you do that was magnificent, do that more and constantly being a positive cheerleader, but descriptively. I think I really learned that skill, I'm back in the beginning when it says, “Thank you for walking. Thank you for talking softly in the library. Thank you for helping your fellow person.” Just describing the behavior. You're specific about what it is that you want the person to continue or change that also is just a part I think mentorship that we don't we kind of take it for granted that loop that's happening all the time. 

Those moments are happening. I don't think by accident and I think if we bring that intentionality of my desire is to not just lift me. My desire is to lift the ocean. Lift all of us together. If I do that, by the way, I show up with you. If I try to bring my best self, if I try to help you bring your best self, then that is mentorship and it's happening in real time all the time. 

Yeah, it's kind of integrated into your whole operating system body. 

Yeah. It is 

Well, that was interesting in terms of the skills of being able to reinforce by being specific about what you're seeing someone do and how they operate. To get more of that say, “Hey, this is really great.” I also think I knew you would say something like this so that's why I was like so grateful. I'm like, “That's great.” That's what I thought Bonni would say because I asked the mentoring question for a couple of different reasons. 

One of them is I think that some people especially younger people have this image of like, “Well, all I need to do is get I'm a mentor and the rest of my crew will be taking care of because that person will just kind of direct me all the way through.” I think that sometimes people think about that is that's what mentoring is but it isn't always that way. It's just different and to be open to looking for different kinds of mentoring opportunities. 

Sometimes it could be just that somebody says sees something in you either believes in you and gives you opportunities which increases your confidence or sees something in you some skill that you don't even know that you have and comments on that and then it helps you see yourself so you can enhance that and become better at that. All of those are, I would agree with you, are forms of mentoring and to take advantage of those just as much as you might say, “This is this one person who's going to make my career,” because you may not have that but you may have a whole lot of assistance and support in all of these other ways, which are no less valuable. 

I think also like there's a quote about, like when the student becomes the teacher. I think that that is also like to know that you can also trust yourself as your mentor. You are included in this next and you're getting that feedback loop of, “That didn't feel good. I didn't like that,” then stay away from that. If you got that feeling of like, “What I'm alive. Let me do more than that,” then go or do more of that.

I think too to trust the universe in the sense that when you need the lesson the teacher will arrive and the opportunity will be given. You were talking a little bit about the law school journey. Again, this is my belief system but just to have faith that it's kind of work out the way it's supposed to. It’s not taking yourself so seriously like every moment is and this is it. I used to be a thinker like that totally guilty of that but life has taught me that it just doesn't work that way. 

When you need the lesson, the teacher will arrive. 

Yeah, experience. I was going to say definitely I think we all can be reinforced and different educational settings, but definitely I think very seriously when you're younger and take these things each of like, “No, this is going to be the thing that makes or breaks something.” It might but it doesn't mean that there isn't some other door that will open or some of their opportunity. I really like also what you said about self-trust and trusting your own intuition because that is what you carry with you everywhere. 

Mentors are nice, but you need to have your own sense right of what it is that you want to do or where you get your joy, and I think you're saying that sometimes people won't make decisions unless they have both the analytical and the spark, they kind of both. Well, this makes sense for the following reasons plus I kind of like this. There's freedom in following the spark and the joy because you may have no idea how that's going to turn out but being open to the different ways it could turn out and being fulfilled along the way that's another approach. 

It's true. Again, it's rooted in this belief. This is my belief that sort of the engineering of my creation of my human form has something in it that is different than yours and that difference is what you were describing. I have different things that spark and enlighten me and those are my gifts. Again, a muscle to train and reps matter and that is listening to it. Even just hearing it in the first place and knowing ourself well enough to know that this is what it feels like. Okay, take note.

When I feel this way. I'm doing something I love and then you'll start to see it show up later. Of course, the reverse is true too, but to really trust that that consciousness is I think about it like navigation that it is a true north. It is a place I need to go. There's a lot of ways to get there. I can make a lot of wrong turns on the way, but I'll still get it. 

Yeah, it's like a general direction. Right? You're like, okay, it's a sort of like the old game of like hot, hot cold, cold but having that internal feeling of like, “Okay. Yeah, that feels good. No, no, not so much that how about this.” 

Exactly, which is not to say like when we do whether it's in the gig economy or it's in the workplace setting and there's a person I work with that Working Wardrobe does it calls it. You got to eat the Frog meaning that there's some part of your job that you're going to need to do that you don't like. 

You just want to reduce the percentage, right? 

Exactly. 

I think 78% of the time I mostly really have that great vibe and feeling I'm doing great. The rest of the time there's always some part of it that is not what you love but still needs to be done because it's part of the job. That's so true. You're right. You can always be in that spot of flow and joy, but you try to be there more often than not, and at least the ones that the part you don't like at least that's in service to the part you do like to some degree you hope so it just needs to be done, but you can see something larger that it's helping and so it helps you get through the stuff you don't like as much. 

I’m thinking about what you said, like this is the thing to outsource. This is the thing to get somebody else to do. 

Yes. There's not to. You don't have to slog through it and you're like this person actually is really much better at it than I am and that works out well. That is so true. Delegating is often an answer to that too if you can. Yeah. 

It's an opportunity, right, because you described it perfectly. That might be their sweet spot, don’t take it away from them. Give them the opportunity to do it. I just recently my board chair shared this sheet with me is like a cheat sheet for great ways to say no and it's something I struggle with. Instead of eating that frog, how can I get someone else the opportunity or to say MC would be a lot better at making that presentation than me? Why don't I introduce you to her, right? Get the right word to the right people so that right we are like you said, more in our sweet spot than not. 

Yeah, exactly. Well, that's an important component of leadership. Right? You're not doing it all and figuring out how to more appropriately engage everyone on the team in a way that's helpful for everyone. That's an ongoing lesson of leadership. I think trying to figure that out. 

Sure. 

Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing the Working Wardrobe story in your approach to things as well. You have a beautiful approach that I think really engages people in the mission as well as with you. That's a real benefit to Working Wardrobes I think and to our community in Orange County. Usually ends with a little lightning round of a few questions. The first one is which talent would you most like to have but don't? 

The talent that I most like to have but I don’t. I would love to be a speed reader. I would love to be able to read a lot more a lot quicker. It's that curiosity. I just want to feed my curiosity more and I don't have enough time. 

Yeah, you could read a lot more books that way or at least get the information. 

Totally.

Well, you may not get to read that much but who are some of your favorite writers or books? 

Yeah, I do love to read. I would say I have a pretty broad range of books I like to read. I love some good chiclet around the pool and I'm a big Jennifer Weiner fan. I love her books. Mrs. Everything was the last one I read of hers and I absolutely treasured it. I also really love leadership books and pretty much anything written from Gallup is my jam because I am pretty obsessed with database decision-making and research backs and approaches. This is really from my college days that I fell in love with data. There's a meta-analysis telling me this is the way that it works in 50 countries with two million people. I think I'll try it. Anything in that genre like First Break All The Rules, Second Discovery, and Restraints. All of that is some of my favorites. 

Yeah. Well, and that testing is so helpful I think for so many people and kind of helps you make sense of where your strengths are and how to combine those in different settings. It really is a great tool for that. 

Like we were talking about how do I make my weaknesses irrelevant? How do I get those out of the picture so that we can work around them quickly and keep down the strengths? I think the last sort of genre I really and I kind of leave this to what gets recommended or what I hear a lot about is definitely in the self-development and spiritual works. I love reading Brene Brown. I love reading What Happened To You? The different books are a little bit more cutting edge on combining again research with life and humanity than what I do with this. 

That's sort of a more practical approach to academic research. 

Yeah, you just like cut right to my soul core because this was like when I was getting my Bachelor's degree, I really loved the research, but I wasn't seeing the practical applications. For my Master's, I made sure I was in a program where the two appeared. I can understand we're not lovers hitting the road. How are we using that research to improve our practice? 

Yeah, exactly. That's where the immediate value comes from. The other is more academic debates about things. I'm always interested in that. How can we use this interesting research, data, or insights to help us make better decisions or take better approaches now? 

Exactly. 

Who's your hero in real life? 

Not in fake life, in real life. Sincerely, it's not a one-person answer. My hero is the underdog. My hero is the person who has overcome like the person who is able to traverse barriers and not give up. The person who it's like maybe weepy but just the underdog in every story people who are able to just hold on to that whether it's a hope or a concrete vision or goal and whether they achieve it or not that they continue in that trajectory. That's that's my hero. 

My hero is the underdog. My hero is the person who overcomes barriers and does not give up. 

Yeah, that's the best of humanity, right? 

It really is and no one's going it alone and that's also what's best in humanity to be uplifted and hold each other. 

To those of us who believe in a higher power and all of that too. That also would transcend the individual. For what in life do you feel most grateful? 

Many things. I have to say the top of my list. I am so grateful to live a lifelong dream of mine, which is to be really close and accessible to the ocean all the time. I treasure being in nature, but there is something out of this world to me about the ocean. It's vastness. The fact that it's like infinity and seeing it. It’s like I can't see it or understand it, but it's so big just it demonstrates to me how small I am and I don't see that as diminishing. I see that as empowering but I'm just going to stand this gigantic orchestra that's happening. How amazing is this to be a part of it in any way? I think it is incredible to get to be by the beaches. 

I really appreciate the value of the ocean too for some of the reasons you mention about still that despite the vastness of that sense of return the waves are always coming back. I've had that same feeling like I appreciate living close to a body of water, especially the ocean and when I moved to Los Angeles to work for a while. There were parts of LA I could not live in I realized. It took me a moment, but I was like I can't live there, it's too far from water. I was like, “Where did that come from?” There is something about that and I think also spiritual about the ocean too. 

My mother-in-law said something about there's like charging effect of moving.

Yeah, I've heard that too. 

I don't know if it's true but I definitely feel it. I feel like every cell of my body is a little bit more alive when I’m in the water.

Yeah. Some people resonate more with that than others. They're more aware of it of the impact. Okay, given the choice of anyone in the world, who would you invite to a dinner party and it could be a live or not alive or whatever combination of folks you might want? 

This is probably going to sound ridiculous. I mean it sincerely. I am inviting Oprah and Gayle King can come. I absolutely think the world of Oprah. I think she asks the best question. She's curious. She has such just like a library of knowledge to synthesize and experiences with people that I would I'm sure be like an interrogation of 5 million questions for Oprah, but I would love to have a very very long dinner with Oprah and you. 

You would ask her questions?

Sure.

Because she couldn't help but ask you questions because she has curiosity too. I think. 

Yeah, maybe breakfast to then. 

A two-parter, one word. You ask a question and then she does yeah. All right, last question. What is your motto if you have one? 

I absolutely do. It's my true north. My Angel little side that people forget what you said, they forget what you did, but they don't forget how you made him feel. When I think back on each day and how I showed up in the day that’s how I’m evaluating myself. How do they show up? How do they make people feel? I think if that was maybe shared by more quotes, we would have more peace on earth. 

Yeah, that's so funny that such synchronously I was thinking about that myself this morning about that exact quote and maybe it's like preparing for the interview. I didn't even know it, but I do think that you exemplify that. I can see that in how you are with people you want to relate at that level and have that connection with people and like I said, it's very genuine and I can see why because it's part of your overall approach. Yeah, really cool. It kind of comes through so I can see so people have seen that and when you say that quote at the end people will say, “Yeah, of course.”

The highest compliment you could possibly give me, so thank you so much, MC. What a delight to even just reflect on some of your questions and sheer joy to be with you today. Thank you. 

Thank you so much, Bonni, for participating. You’re a lovely person and doing amazing work. I just knew that whatever you had to say would be inspiring to others. Thank you very much for joining the show. 

My pleasure. Thank you. 



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