Unmute Yourself
This podcast is about lifting the curtain on leadership, purpose, and the real stories behind people who dared to do things differently. We’ll talk about how they found their path, the struggles they faced, and how they built something that truly matters. These are everyday people doing extraordinary things, and I want you to know, you are capable of that too.
Unmute Yourself
S3E8: Patrice Shumate on Why Philanthropy Isn’t Working
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
There’s a moment in this conversation where everything shifts.
Patrice Shumate says:
“We don’t have a generosity problem.
We have a responsibility problem.”
And I just… stop.
Because that reframes everything.
This isn’t a polished conversation about leadership or impact.
It’s an honest look at what’s happening underneath the systems we trust.
Patrice has spent years working in philanthropy and social impact.
What she brings here isn’t theory.
It’s lived experience.
It’s observation.
It’s truth that’s a little uncomfortable to hear.
We talk about:
– The gap between giving and responsibility
– Why systems that are meant to help… sometimes don’t
– What it takes to question something you’ve been part of for years
– And the courage it takes to say what you actually see
If you’ve ever felt like something isn’t working —
but couldn’t quite name it…
This conversation will.
If you’re sitting on a decision you already know you need to make: https://calendly.com/jennifer-flashlightthinking/strategy-call
Follow, subscribe, and share:
https://linktr.ee/unmuteyourselfpodcast
What are you starting to see… that you can’t unsee?
Music: “Your Way” by Mark July
Licensed by Uppbeat
License code: KKHUU4BLYO3R5SKJ
Welcome back to Unmute Yourself. I'm your host, Jennifer Carter, and this podcast is about lifting the curtain on leadership, purpose, and the real stories behind women who dare to do things differently. We'll talk about how they found their path, the struggles along the way, and how they built something that truly matters. Now, these are normal people doing extraordinary things because I want you to know you are extraordinary too. My guest today is Patrice Shoemate. And if you work anywhere near philanthropy, nonprofits, or social impact, you're gonna want to listen up for this one. So Patrice is not here to politely nod along with the way philanthropy works today. I think she has the first true hot take on philanthropy that I've heard in a very, very long time. She's developed a sharp and sometimes uncomfortable, right? Remember, hot take perspective on the systems meant to create social change. And she asks the question many people in the sector are thinking but rarely say out loud. So I just can't wait to have this conversation. Patrice, welcome.
SPEAKER_01Thank you. Thank you.
SPEAKER_00I'm so glad to have you.
SPEAKER_01I'm glad to be here. And you are extraordinary too, Jennifer. I don't know if you also get to tell yourself that. Thank you. That's so nice.
SPEAKER_00Look, we're just uh love fest.
SPEAKER_01It's a social work thing.
SPEAKER_00It is a social work thing. Um, so okay, so we're both long time nonprofit, social impact people. And so before we get into the big ideas, when you tell people you work in philanthropy, what do they think you do besides what you actually do?
SPEAKER_01Well, for a long time, my own husband wasn't sure what I did. Um, and when I said a social worker, he was like, is that like sociology? I'm like, no, it's a thing, it's a real thing. We do lots of things. Um, and when I started doing grant work and getting into the philanthropic space and and mentioning those things, people were very quickly like, oh, can you write me a grant? You're like, I'm starting a nonprofit. I have a nonprofit. I know someone who has a nonprofit. Can you write us a grant? And my answer is always no. And you probably shouldn't be a nonprofit. Everybody's bubble bursts right away.
SPEAKER_00Right. You you told me before, what did you say? Like, poor people start nonprofits, but rich people start foundations.
SPEAKER_01It's yeah, it's you know, I've been playing around in my brain on just this sort of like spectrum of where generosity and responsibility fall. And and I don't think we have a generosity problem in our country. I think we have a responsibility problem in our country. And there are amazing, generous, wonderful people that exist in the nonprofit space, in the philanthropic space, in the corporate space, in all of these different spaces. But our understanding as an individual of a collective society tends to deviate from our responsibility in that society. And so when I think about, I don't know, billionaires and what their responsibility is, they might be generous in that they start a foundation and they give to social missions or they give all across the world for these sorts of things. Great. You should do that with your billions of dollars. But what responsibility do you feel toward the society that you exist within? Um, a society that supported you in some way in building those billions, right? Through tax laws or through other types of lawmaking or through wealth inequality that happens to exist in this country. Because I feel like if we all felt a true sense of responsibility to our collective society, we wouldn't have billionaires because it doesn't make sense for a society to have billionaires, for a thriving society where everyone inside that society has access to resources and opportunity, billionaires wouldn't be a thing. So, what do you even do with that information? Like, how do you even adopt bumper stickers that say billionaires are not our friends? That's what I do with that information. Um in practice, though, currently, what I do with that is building into my business conversations that lead folks into understanding when there are significant gaps between who have things and who don't. Those are structural issues that we all are part of in some way or another, whether it's us being actively lobbying for those sorts of things, or a lawmaker deciding those sorts of things, or a community member that's ignoring those things and, you know, the apathy that goes along with that. I think everyday folks who are not sitting in Congress or are not the CEO of a major corporation also need to understand that we have a responsibility to our neighbor, to our communities, in if nothing else, understanding and talking about what makes a stronger community. And those are uncomfortable conversations because it threatens someone else's idea of their safety and their comfort, which makes none of us want to have those conversations.
SPEAKER_00Right. So what to you does make a stronger community?
SPEAKER_01Taking care of each other. Right? Everyone having some kind of fair share from the start rather than groups, businesses, individuals making sure their share is larger than everybody else's. I was, I had mentioned, I did a LinkedIn post a couple of weeks ago, very simply saying we have 930 some billionaires in the United States that hold $8.1 trillion of wealth just among them.
SPEAKER_00That's more than my brain and can't comprehend that.
SPEAKER_01I had to ask Alexa how many zeros that is because I didn't know. Right. Okay. That's larger than our entire national budget. 935 people, a mass, $8.1 trillion of wealth. And what they do with that wealth matters. What they have access to through that wealth matters. And there was a real trolley guy. Um he's also a grant professional, spoke up and said, absolutely, we need more billionaires. They're the ones that create productivity and innovation. And I'm like, Oh, I feel like I've missed something. That's a very bold thing to say. So let me do a little digging and a little research. And of course, there is nothing that is going to pinpoint billionaires create this great benefit or billionaires don't, right? Like no one is really researching that to that extent. But what we can find and understand is most of those people didn't start from nothing. And this one particular this one person cited Elon Musk specifically, like the brilliance of Elon Musk and how beneficial he is to our country because of what he knows and what he does and what he's willing to do, et cetera, et cetera. And, you know, I think it's important for people to understand in a conversation like that. Number one, Elon Musk had some considerable seed money, right? Like there was generational wealth that existed there. He didn't start from nothing. Number two, his responsibility, his generosity, he gave around like $7 billion in stock to his foundation that he started. Um, and that gave him a $2 billion tax break. But when you dig into the foundation and the good it does for the community around of it, most of that money never goes toward the 5% payout threshold that's required for philanthropic foundations in the United States, the tax code that designates that. And the money that does go out tends to go to charitable organizations like the schools that his children and SpaceX employees go to. Right. And some of those sorts of things. And yes, it has gone out in other ways, but he also gave a considerable amount of his wealth to the political machine, right? Let's say. Let us say. And ended up in a non-authorized position in our federal government making decisions for the rest of us, right? On our tax money that we've paid in as individuals. And so there's a real concern there of how philanthropy supports that kind of behavior and allows wealth to just sit idle, right? So we're getting close to there being almost $2 trillion sitting in philanthropic accounts, not being used, not being transacted charitably. It's growing. People put it in there, it can be invested, those investments can grow. And as far as foundations go, right, the legal things for foundations are you just have to give 5% of your assets every year.
SPEAKER_00I have a question. Is it 5% of assets or 5% of the interest? 5% of assets that the foundation holds. Period. So if it grew 10% over the year, okay, got it. So it's never going down really.
SPEAKER_01And that that 5% can also go toward employing foundation staff, your operations as a foundation. So still not even charitably. And if we were to, and I wouldn't recommend it for this conversation, throw in donor advice funds, they can move money into donor advice funds because those are technically 501c also, even though they're just another account and not actually going into the community.
SPEAKER_00Okay, so what would you if you could redesign the whole thing? What would you make it look like? Things that a lot of people wouldn't like. This is why I love this so much. I knew when we talked earlier, I was like, I think I'm just gonna like put you on and just have you talk and let's dig into this. So what would you do?
SPEAKER_01Haven't figured it all out yet.
SPEAKER_00But you're thinking.
SPEAKER_01But you know what? It would be a combination of tax law, right? Like people just paying their fair share of taxes without being able to offload wealth and corporate dollars into these accounts that are untouchable. It would involve a much higher payout if we're maintaining these particular philanthropic vehicles. But there's a lot changing right now in philanthropy and how people think about where the money goes and how folks access it. And there's more and more people today than there ever have been putting a critical eye on how this works and having these conversations, right? There are a lot of practitioners now that are calling it out. In the last decade, we've had things emerge like trust-based philanthropy and community-centric fundraising and the work that Voulet does with nonprofit IAF and using his platform to talk about these kinds of inequities and disparities within the charitable sector, right? The third sector, uh, aside from corporate and public, right? This is a significant part of how our society functions, that our country isn't handling the societal needs. So there's a sector, a nonprofit sector, that comes in to handle things like food insecurity and housing and all of these basic rights that our government isn't going to handle. And we're left with this ridiculous puzzle of mishmatching funds and revenue sources to make sure people can eat and have a place to live and are safe and kids have education rather than it being handled on a larger scale.
SPEAKER_00It bring you're bringing giving me flashbacks of color-coded spreadsheets on allocations of staff, funding sources, which funding sources can pay for what, how, oh my gosh, how to even manage all of those funds and report on the use of the funds. It's a lot of administrative burden.
SPEAKER_01It's a lot of administrative burden that philanthropy funders overwhelmingly aren't interested in paying for. So the irony of all of this is my job was created literally out of nowhere because of the complexity of the process of getting charitable dollars to charitable organizations. And when I go request funds from funders, from private grantmakers, private funders for things like capacity building and operations and administration, they don't want to fund those things. So they require it as part of the process, but they're not interested in funding what it takes to get those dollars. It's it's mind-blowing and it's so frustrating.
SPEAKER_00Okay, so let's think about in the existing system because right now, let's just say today, you know, we're not changing tax laws yet, how philanthropic dollars flow, dismantling intentions of billionaires, right? Any of that. What would you say to foundations on how to make their giving more effective and better support nonprofit organizations and real social change?
SPEAKER_01I would say the first step is recognizing that the onus needs to be on them to being aware enough of their own process to make useful changes. But as it is, we're just on the other side of the funding spectrum. We're just absorbing all of these various program requirements, eligibility requirements, compliance requirements, because any funder can create whatever process they want, whatever eligibility they want, whatever priorities they want. And very rarely do I see those grant-making organizations spending the time and effort understanding the experience of the process they're creating. But then they rely on us to go through the process and then they rely on us to provide feedback on that process, but no avenue truly to do that. And so, yeah, it's gonna be more work on you to understand the best way to determine the need in the community that you're interested in serving, to determine the very best and most effective process for finding out who in the community is doing that work, to determining how those dollars actually get there, what reporting potentially needs to happen. And there are a few groups out there that have some really strong suggestions and solutions to it. It's just a matter of people willing to do it, people willing to remove the power dynamic to really open themselves up to humility and understanding what I am doing with this information I'm requiring from these organizations? Are we using it? Is it benefiting the community in any sort of way? Or is it fully transactional? Am I requiring A, B, C, D, E, F, G, I hand you a check, I require a few more things after the process and then what? Right. And over the last couple of decades, there's been this huge pendulum swing to tell us your outputs and your outcomes and show us the real impact and give us the data and this and that. And that's great, right? If we're doing work that matters, yes, let's measure it. Let's see how much it matters. Let's be able to replicate it across communities. But whose job is it to require that? Is it the funder's job that already has all the resources, that already has all the money, to require the organizations that are piecing these things together to provide them with the data they want to make sure their dollars are impacting? I mean, folks, I kid you not. There are 15-page applications for $4,000 that they come back in a year and ask you to prove to them how their $4,000 made a difference in a community. Well, it doesn't. It doesn't. Give me $300,000 for a real specific project and maybe I can give you something back. But there's this bizarre, I don't even know what I would call it. Like, I don't even know what people are thinking.
SPEAKER_00I wonder, but like why, like, how did this start? Do we know how this started? Like all of the documentation for funding applications and reporting.
SPEAKER_01Do we know why or what fueled that rather than just it's it's just one of those kind of strange somebody started, it got picked up by others, and then it somehow became some sort of industry standard, right? There isn't clear documentation that shows it should work this way. And there is a lot of money that's been Center on Effective Philanthropy studies this stuff. They're a $10 million budget organization that's doing nothing but studying this process versus I'm working with organizations in my community trying to make sure pregnant homeless women have a place to stay and resources to get them jobs and housing, working on $2 million. It's it's this really strange dynamic in this sector where very few of us on any side, grant-seeking side, grant-making side, whatever, are willing to pause and just flat out say, this isn't working. Find any community. We are no closer to ending hunger or homelessness or any of these things that billions of dollars are poured into across communities from multiple sources because they're so disjointed. They're so separate. And our system perpetuates that every single day. There shouldn't be a grant profession, in my opinion. What would happen instead? It would just be easier. Like people working in these organizations could just access the stuff easier.
SPEAKER_00You had said something when we met before about if all of the billionaires in the world we took all of this wealth and focused on one specific problem to solve, what a difference that would make.
SPEAKER_01It would be crazy and fascinating, right? It wouldn't solve everything. And one of the big themes last year, right, when the federal government was slashing programs right and left and community-based organizations that were relying on federal dollars for their programming. Because for folks who aren't familiar with how these dollars kind of work, your larger grants and contracts are going to come from a public source, likely, right? Through a federal source or through a state source or even potentially, you know, local municipalities versus piecing together 5,000 here from this foundation, 10,000 here from that foundation, 20,000 from there. And the regulations of the organizations that are eligible and receive these sorts of public funds are a lot, right? There's a ton of compliance that goes into it. The application process is really, really difficult and complex. Managing and maintaining the money for your programming is really difficult and complex. And there's a lot of dollars that flow in contracts and grants through the federal government. And so when those started to being slashed and everyone's like, hey, philanthropy, where are you? What are you doing with this almost $2 trillion that you have saved for a rainy day? Right. Like it's raining. Let's talk about it. And overwhelmingly, philanthropy as a group kind of came back and was like, listen, we can't cover federal dollars. So we're not going to try, right? We're not going to step in at a higher level. We're not going to give more than 5% of our assets. I don't know how many for funder newsletters I'm a part of that like had some real clear justification as we're not going to pay out more than 5% of our assets. It's in our bylaws. Our founders created that rule, whatever. The family isn't interested in that. We want this money to exist into the future. Well, what happens when we don't have a future? Girl. Why, why does philanthropy think the dollars that exist today will only exist today? And there will not be future philanthropy dollars that we'll use in the future. It's scarcity mindset. Yeah. And it's power. I mean, it's power. Glenn Gaelich, he works for the Subski Foundation and they're sunsetting. And so he's been very vocal in his work in encouraging his philanthropic colleagues to look at what they're doing, to pay attention to how they're doing it. Because not every foundation needs to be around forever. When you can potentially work to solve something today, why do you want to be around forever?
SPEAKER_00I have never even thought about that. And I think most of what you're talking about today, people have not thought about it because it's such an ingrained system and it's just how things are. You know, I've been in a nonprofit world for over 20 years and I've never thought about why. Or could there be a different way beyond making it easier or better record reporting requirements or capacity building versus like why is money held forever and ever and ever without really focused problem solving now? Okay, so if you had a room full of billionaires and foundation presidents and nonprofit leaders, what would you tell them to stop, stop doing right now? And what would you tell them to start doing tomorrow? That's so hard.
SPEAKER_01And the reason that's so hard is because not that there aren't ideas and solutions that can be presented, but there's a difference between shouting out into the ether, the problems of our world and our society, and talking directly face to face with somebody that participates in that. And I've been playing around for a while as someone who's willing to use any sort of leverage, privilege, you know, platform to scream out into the ether. But when I have opportunities to be face to face with staff at foundations here locally, especially, or am working on behalf of a nonprofit client that I'm working on, there is a delicacy that has to happen there. Because number one, these are not bad people. None of them are bad people. They're again, we don't have a generosity problem. But there's this awakening that needs to happen across the sector. And until that happens, the one on one conversations, the rooms of philanthropists. Are really difficult to crack because I can show up and say things that I've been researching and talking about and practicing for many years. It doesn't mean they're ready to hear them. And so you have to find this sweet spot where the information can penetrate somewhere and has a place to go without sounding accusatory, without triggering that emotional defensive response that usually happens in these kinds of conversations. And unfortunately, it usually waters down the message when you are paying really close attention to who that audience is that needs to hear that message. And that's why it's taking so long. That's why we can only say so much at one time. That's why, that's why it's easy for people to see or hear something that's real and then sink back into the comfort of their lack of knowledge or their apathy or whatever it is. And so if I was standing in a room of local philanthropists, I would have to start small, right? What if I would call them in as partners and make them feel like comfortable and ready, ready to do something together?
SPEAKER_00But what if what if they were ready to hear it? What's your big message without diluting it?
SPEAKER_01Work harder to understand where you fit. Stop acting as an individual funder. Know, truly know, and partner with other philanthropic organizations, other organizations doing the frontline work that you prioritize and care about. Um, I get that there are funding priorities, right? I get that not every funder is going to fund everything. And I think generally that's okay as long as you understand where you fit, as long as you can stand back, look at the community that you care about, that you want to support and invest in, and truly understand what the needs are, not just what your preferences of giving are. And if they were talking more to one another, if there were real communication avenues between them and organizations that they're interested in supporting, if they genuinely care about the data and the community need, I think their behaviors and their process would naturally change on its own without someone having to force them to.
SPEAKER_00It sounds like the desire to solve a focused problem and be willing to learn, ask, and evolve.
SPEAKER_01Yes. And and position yourself on the same level as everyone else as a partner in the work, not as somebody who has the power and the money and oversees other people doing the work.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Beautiful. Okay, so we're gonna jump into a quick lightning round.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_00First answer that comes to mind. What part of yourself are you finally letting the world see?
SPEAKER_01Because actually, I think in this stage in my life, I've always been someone that's showed up pretty fully. I've never been shy or had a confidence problem. I think now it's more strategic what I'm showing versus showing things that I've never shown before.
SPEAKER_00So choosing what to share when into whom for a real specific purpose. Got it. Okay. What does it cost you to be authentic and why is it worth it?
SPEAKER_01It can cost you everything. And I think it costs some people more things. As someone with a lot of privileged identities, have I now more fully understand what it costs other people to have the same authenticity that I'm trying to have in the in the place where I work. And I I want to be mindful of that and use what I have to create more space and opportunity for others to be able to show up as authentically as I'm trying to because there is a higher cost to them than there is to me. What boundary have you set that protects your sense of self? None. I'm terrible at setting. It's true. It's the worst. I I have some ethical boundaries that I don't waver on, but personal boundaries I'm not very good at.
SPEAKER_00This is so good. You just do all the things, don't you? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. If you could unmute one truth people are too afraid to say, what would it be?
SPEAKER_01Philanthropy and nonprofit work isn't working. It's not working.
SPEAKER_00Damn.
SPEAKER_01For the most part, right? Like as a social worker doing case management, working with organizations, right? The work that I did with individual people mattered. What we're doing matters. It is not getting us closer to the goalposts than it we ever have before. We're actually sliding backward in some regards.
SPEAKER_00Okay. What keeps you grounded when you feel pressure to perform or fit in? Like that dilution.
SPEAKER_01I'll tell you, I struggle with that less in a professional space because I think I have a very clear, confident idea of who I am professionally. I struggle with that in my personal world. Like mom, neighbor, you know, CTO kinds of things that I do not bring the same level of confidence and clarity to who I am. And part of it is I like being different people too. I I grew up as a drama girl, like put me on a stage, good to go. Yeah. Yeah. And we've moved a lot in my adult life. And so I've had opportunities to just be whoever I want in that space. But I don't think it's been particularly helpful to me, having done that over the course of my adult life. Because it I don't know who I am. I don't, I don't know who I am as well there than who I know I am in a professional sense. And I think sometimes those two things are at odds with each other. And there's there is some heaviness and guilt that I carry around between the two. When you spend your entire career working with populations that quite clearly have always had less than you, and you're still living your life in a comfortable kind of way, for me at least, it it creates some difficult emotional and mental conversations.
SPEAKER_00Guilt. Are you too comfortable? Who are you? How can you say this to be true when you're living this certain kind of way? Am I gonna fit in and PTO and my neighbors? I really don't want to bake these cookies. But if I don't, are you gonna judge me? Yeah, I feel that. That's real, man. Well, Patrice, this conversation has been amazing. Thank you so much for your presence and your authenticity. So if listeners walk away remembering just one thing, what would that be?
SPEAKER_01Whether you work in a nonprofit, whether you have wealth that you share through philanthropy, whether you understand how any of that works, I think all of us, as a member of our society together, have a responsibility to the well-being of our society and our neighbors. And that can come out through dollars, it can come out through actions, it can come out through advocacy and platforms and leveraging privilege. But if it isn't something you've thought about or are thinking about, there is a place for you and bettering our society together. And I'm happy to talk to anybody about what that means. Or a powerhouse.
SPEAKER_00How can people connect with you?
SPEAKER_01Um, I'm on LinkedIn every now and again, usually shouting out into the ether. My website is a villageforgood.com. And I don't really do other social media because I don't like it. It's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot. So yeah, I and and there is a space to connect with me on my calendar on my website. And I'm always happy to have random conversations with people I've never met before about things that they care about and wondering how to build our communities to be stronger.
SPEAKER_00I feel like that's how I found you. Right. Random into the ethers. Oh my gosh, that's so cool. Yes. Okay. Um, and then lastly, what has it meant for you to share your story here on Unmute Yourself today? Love.
SPEAKER_01When there are people who are curious about the world and give space for those curiosities to come out in connected community kinds of conversations, right? You and I have had a couple of conversations, but I feel like I've known you for my whole life. And so being somebody that can connect personally with someone and give them the opportunity to talk about much larger issues and themes creates this really cool connection to people who listen, right? It puts together different parts of their brain that make that information feel real, feel close to their own identity and experience. And then it sinks in deeper. And those conversations and those feelings then become how people act in the world. So I'm very grateful to be on this podcast and this platform to help those neural pathways to the actions that people might take one day.
SPEAKER_00Well, thank you so much. And before speaking with you, like I just, like I said earlier, like I never even thought about it. I knew it didn't work well, but being on the nonprofit side of it is always like, okay, this is what you have to do, and this is how you do it. So I appreciate you thinking big and I think I appreciate you shouting it in out into the ethers. Because that's you're creating it, Miss Patrice.
SPEAKER_01So I'm not the only one. Again, there are some really cool, super badass people out there talking about these sorts of things. The data's there, right? Like if you're just curious about the evidence behind us being like, this isn't working, that exists too. Because when you are in the midst of it, working with the groups that you're working with, trying to create solutions to problems in a community, you do not have the time, the bandwidth, the capacity to deal with the nonsense of this transactional process that just doesn't work to begin with. Right. You shouldn't require people to have to do that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we don't have time for all that. But thank you so much, Patrice. And thank you to everyone listening and for true choosing truth over comfort and alignment over approval and courage over silence. And just remember, I work with senior leaders navigating high-stakes decisions, delivering keynotes that go beyond motivation, and coaching women leaders who are ready to move past being stuck in choices they already know they need to make. So if this episode resonated, share it, subscribe, and stay with us as we explore what it really means to live and lead without muting who we are. Until next time, unmute yourself and be who you already are.