Episode 89: Sheena Wilde
Join Lori and her guest, Sheena Wilde, as they delve into business philanthropy. Sheena Wilde is the SVP of Corporate Philanthropy at the Kendra Scott Foundation. The foundation's noble mission revolves around empowering women and youth through various avenues such as health, wellness, education, and entrepreneurship. Corporate philanthropy enacts positive change in communities!
Here are the things to expect in this episode:
What pivotal moments or experiences influenced Sheena's transition into her role as SVP of Corporate Philanthropy?
Philanthropy is considered a foundational element of the Kendra Scott Foundation.
The changing ways to give.
How are employees at the Kendra Scott Foundation actively engaged in philanthropic efforts?
And much more!
Sheena’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sheena-wilde-4082314/
Kendra Scott’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kendra-scott/
Kendra Scott Foundation’s Website: https://www.kendrascott.com/philanthropy.html
Kendra Scott’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kendrascott/
Kendra Scott’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KendraScott/
Kendra Scott’s YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/KendraScott
Connect with Lori Kranczer!
Website: https://www.linkphilanthropic.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorikranczer/
Episode Transcript
00:20
You're listening to the positive impact philanthropy podcast where we share the journeys of everyday philanthropists as they incorporate philanthropy into their lives. Philanthropy is a personal journey, and through the stories we will share here, we hope that sparked something in you and how you can make your own philanthropic impact in the world. I'm your host, Lori kranczer, attorney, philanthropic advisor and legacy giving strategist. Together, we're going to explore what it looks like to be an everyday philanthropist and make a positive impact in the world. Before we get started, make sure to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss a new episode posted on Wednesdays. Now today, I'm really excited to have Sheena Wilde. She is the SVP of corporate philanthropy and the Kendra Scott Foundation. Welcome Sheena.
01:06
Thank you for having me.
01:07
So this is, you know, a little bit new, because I don't believe we've had someone yet on the podcast that does what you do. So why you explain to our listeners a little bit more about you?
01:21
Absolutely. Well, I'm excited to be here today, and I guess I like to always preface that becoming the SVP of corporate philanthropy and Kendra Scott Foundation has been 10 years in the making. I've been with the organization for 10 years, and really had, you know, the ability to architect what is now the role that I'm sitting in. So there's a lot that happened in the last 10 years to get to this point. But you know a little bit more about me. I'm born and raised from Seattle, Washington, but I like to consider myself a Texan now. Met my husband, my family, with my three kiddos, we all reside in Austin, Texas, and have been here for quite a while, and have really spent the last 10 years, as I mentioned, really architecting and running philanthropy on behalf of Kendra Scott,
02:08
Fantastic. Okay, so we're gonna go back a little bit more and get into how did you get there, where you're working now.
02:17
So I have always had an interest in connecting people. So driving meaningful connections has been at the core of, really what I do since I've been a little kid. So I've always found joy in driving connections, whether it's helping people find recipes or whether it's connecting friends of friends that have common interests, that's always really been something that has a has excited me, and when I first started my career out of college, I worked in digital advertising, I really found an interest in helping small and medium sized businesses be found on the internet, because what I would recognize is, if I could help them have their business become identifiable, they could gain brand awareness, and then they would get new customers, and then it would be, it would be something amazing. And so that's really kind of where my interest in driving those meaningful connections had started. And as my career has progressed in that space, when you work in digital advertising, you kind of think of, where is the holy grail, where you would go? And to me, it was Google or Facebook, and so I found myself in a career in Facebook a couple years after I had been working in the digital advertising space, and I thought that's really where I wanted to have a career. But a lot of my values changed as soon as I got married and really started thinking about how I was going to start my family.
03:41
Okay, so talk a little bit more about that. What was that triggering moment? Or if you can identify that moment in time where that happened.
03:50
So I always say, you know, everything happens for a reason, and a lot of times, reasons of why things happen in the moment, they don't really make sense. And for me, when I was at Facebook, I was really excited thinking that, you know, this is where I was going to be, and this is always what I wanted to do. I was newly married, and I was going to build my career there and start my life with my husband. But, you know, in that moment, my life quickly changed because my mom, she had a long struggle with alcohol addiction, ultimately had multiple sclerosis diagnosis in middle school, and really watched her slowly progress through the stages of what happens to someone when they're experiencing those struggles. And fortunately, my mom had passed away. She passed away right before my husband and I got married. I'm very thankful, though, that my husband did get to ask my dad and my mom for my hand in marriage, and so she did get to experience that portion of that, but she sadly passed away from that in October of of 2012 and for me, that gave me a big pause and really made me reevaluate the values and the importance of what I wanted to do with my life and with my career. And I knew in that moment it wasn't going to be helping people be found on the internet. It needed to be more. And so that's really where I started to dabble in nonprofit. I started to, first and foremost, understand what I thought I was going to be most passionate about, which was multiple sclerosis. Why wasn't it here? What were those resources that my mom could have had, and how can I get involved in that? And I found myself getting involved in a local MS Society here in Austin.
05:36
Amazing. Okay, so then, and that's a very value based moment of your life that you, a lot of people go through, they said, identifying what happened to them and what life experiences that they whether themselves or community, their family, are involved with, that really shaped their professional career, but also where they're connected. And and when people experience something like this, it's really interesting that it really will shape where they start to give or be connected with so I know that you said that you were involved with MS Society there. Are you still involved? Or has your giving changed at all?
06:15
Well, my giving has evolved. I think that my giving is defined through my purpose, and my purpose has significantly shifted over the course of, you know, really the last, you know, 12 years now, since my mom has passed away. And, you know, giving at the MS Society 12 years ago was really what I only first understood when you thought about, you know, philanthropy, because I didn't really know too much about it. Giving was always introduced into me as a child, but it was more through the form of, how are we making our time and our talent and less of our treasure component, really, through our family donating, you know, things to people in need during back to school, or whether that was, you know, donating books to our local libraries and things like that. But really, the idea of what giving truly meant and is really wasn't understood for me until I got involved in nonprofit through the MS Society. And that was a pivotal moment when I said, You know what, I think that I want to go work in nonprofit. So that was a moment where I said, Am I ready to take a step back from this career that I have developed over the last several years in advertising, this job at Facebook, to take a step back and make a career shift? But I knew in that moment that it was right for me. And what's interesting about this is, you know, I wasn't looking for a new role like I have, and within an organization like Kendra Scott, I thought I was going to go into the nonprofit space, but during that time, I so happened to be approached about this opportunity at Kenner Scott, and when I learned that the core pillars of the organization were family, fashion and philanthropy, that's when curiosity sparked, and I said, I want to take this Interview. I want to better understand, how can I continue to have my role in meaningful connections, but also start to get more involved in understanding nonprofits? And that was really that pivotal moment where I realized, maybe I can do goals.
08:15
Amazing. So with your new role now, what you're doing in your role, or when it started 10 years ago, because I know it's obviously evolved over 10 years. Explain to our listeners what it is that you do, like, kind of like the day to day, your responsibilities, of what you do in your role, for those that don't have an awareness of what one does inside a corporation.
08:40
So the core pillars of Kendra Scott, when Kendra started the business, 22 years ago, as I mentioned, are built on family fashion and philanthropy. So the philanthropic giving strategy has been implemented into what Kendra stands for since the moment she started building jewelry out of her spare bedroom. So I was very thankful to step into an organization that had already integrated giving into their mission. Whereas some organizations, they are still trying to figure out, how do we become philanthropic? How do we identify you know, what it is that we stand for? Kentra already had integrated the idea of what matters to you matters to us, and we will always have something to give. And so when I came into the organization, the role was essentially to engage within the communities where we were opening stores. Because one of the things that we identified early on in at Kenner Scott was if we open our doors to organizations, we show the communities we care about your nonprofits, your schools, your businesses come into our stores, we will allow you to host an event where we will give 20% of the proceeds back to your charitable organization. If that doesn't work, then we can do what we're really good at, which is creating beautiful jewelry and provide those income donations for you to use for your charitable benefit. So for me, it was really thinking about, how do we scale this? How do we figure out how to do this through our marketing and philanthropic managers that we're hiring at the community level? How do we train them? How do we really formalize and operationalize this program and scale it as the business continues to grow, and so that's what I initially came in and started to do. But there was about a light bulb about two or three years that went off, and I said, if we're going to do this at the community level, and it's working, why can we not do this also at the larger national level, how do we truly integrate this, not just into the communities that we're working within, but into the brand and into additional brand moments. And that's really when I started taking over and truly evolving philanthropy as a component of our business at KS.
10:53
Great. And so I want to get into that also now. So you're, when you think of the philanthropy for Kendra Scott, what comes to mind, like, what do people know that what you stand for, like, certain areas or geographic locations, policy versus, you know, programs, and what is it that you're looking at, and what kind of metrics do you look at?
11:14
So in the beginning, as I mentioned, like, what matters to you matters to us. We always have something to give. And so in the beginning, we were giving really broadly, to identify with the customer that was walking into the door, and given that we are a jewelry organization, our organization is 95% female based, we were seeing a significant amount of charitable organizations that align with that Breast Cancer education. Those were really the types of organizations that were coming to the forefront. And so using all of the data of who we were hosting these give back events, looking at what our founder is very passionate about, understanding what our employee base is also passionate about, is what really helped us form our mission, which is to employ youth in the areas of health, wellness, education and entrepreneurship. So when we formed that focus, we're still able to give back to the majority of people that need to reach out to us that want support, but we're really able to nail more of a concise message to the consumer to best understand the ideas of you know, how we're giving back to support women who health, wellness, education, entrepreneurship, and from there, that's where our programmatics have really been built, focused and our partnerships,
12:32
Yeah. And have you noticed a change when you focus on certain areas? Has there anything changed within your philanthropy of how it's grown, how or where you're giving?
12:42
Absolutely so really, where we're nailing, which is why we launched the foundation. By the way, we started to see that we were really making drastic impact. The consumer was really relating to some specific areas. And that's when we decided to go deeper, go deeper through partnerships with other charitable organizations, but also dabble in creating our own philanthropic programs. So what I mean by that, for an example, is Women Entrepreneurship, core value of our founder, core value of what most of our employees at Kendra Scott stand for, leading with that entrepreneurial mindset, owning their like role as if they own the business of Kendra Scott like their name is on the door. So what we wanted to do is figure out, how are we creating a pipeline of create creative and courageous female leaders, providing them with the toolkits that they need once they leave college to go out and be successful entrepreneurs and or intrapreneurs within the laws of corporations. And so that's where one of our philanthropic programs, which is the Kendra Scott women's Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute that we have at the University of Texas, it's essentially a program that's now been operating for four years, where we are preparing female leaders to entrepreneurs, or, like I mentioned, intrapreneurs, another core program that we've really seen that has been, you know, really over the years continue to build, is Kendra cares. As I mentioned, a lot of people that shop with us are moms. A lot of people that shop with us are, you know, have some sort of connection to a child. And what we were seeing is, how do we take the magic of our beautiful jewelry and our philanthropic efforts into children's hospitals to bring a little bit of joy to patients and caregivers during really difficult times? And so we also built a program where we take our color bar on a monthly and quarterly basis to over 40 children's hospitals across the country, where we are donating a piece of jewelry and creating an experience for them, and it's bringing them some joy. And we've also done some other things in the children's space as well, but those are just two big goals of how philanthropy for us has evolved, because we've been able to identify, where do we really make strides and make the biggest impact, and what do our customers and our employees relate to the most?
15:15
Yeah, so it's it's a parent that is baked into philanthropy is baked into the business, which is fantastic. Now I'm curious, you mentioned your customers and your team. How do they have a role in the direction of your philanthropy?
15:30
So there's a lot of different ways that employees are involved in philanthropy. Because what I always like to say is, you know, our employees are asked to use their time, their talent and their treasure to lead with our philanthropic mission and ensure that philanthropy is at the top of their mind in every business decision that you make. So whether you work in our distribution center, whether you work in IT, everything you do impacts the purpose that the mission withholds. But we want them to feel connected to that. One of my benefits is we give them 16 hours of paid time off to go and be of service to the community. So whether they choose to get involved in one of our existing philanthropic programs, be a mentor with our Ks women's Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute, attend a Kendra cares event, go out and Team Build and volunteer in the community. They're encouraged to do so, and that's something that we are consistently encouraging them to do. We also have an employee grants Review Committee, which is really exciting. We give the power to our employees to make grant decisions on behalf of the Kenner Scott foundation, so they are managing a Grants review process where we have submissions coming in from different organizations. They get together as a group and they review these and then they're empowered to make those grants, and they get to see the work and the decisions that they're making and the power that it has. And, you know, employee giving is really important. It's instrumental to ensuring that we’re creating loyalty with our employees, we are helping them know that they are coming to work and they’ve got a bigger purpose each and every day. It’s also helping with employee retention and recruiting. A lot of people come to Kenda Scott specifically because they know about the power purpose and how embedded the philanthropic mission is. And they want to work, they want to work for an organization that stands for something. So we see that a lot in a lot of new employees that are coming to KS specifically because they love the mission of philanthropy.
17:34
Oh, yeah, that's great. Um, so talk a little bit about where you're headed, vision for where you're going, and then for that's, you know, for Kendra Scott then. But then I also want to get back to you on a personal level and your philanthropy. So let's go one at a time.
17:52
So the Kendra Scott foundation and just the Kendra Scott mission in general, is just to continue to really scale and to continue to create that impact, first and foremost, at the community level, how are we going to continue when they need us the most, whether it's a family tragedy, a community tragedy, a natural disaster, everybody we always want to know and understand as we open new stores and we continue to grow within those communities, first and foremost, we will be there. We will be there for you. In regards to the Kendra Scott Foundation, how are we continuing to double down scale and make an impact in the programs that we have identified we can do the most work in? And so how do we continue to scale our Kendra Scott women's Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute to other universities outside of the University of Texas. How do we increase the number of children's hospitals through our Kendra cares program, so that we are touching more lives? How are we focusing on more work within the breast cancer space? So as I didn't really get a chance to get into with breast cancer, you know we're really looking at the full diagnosis that somebody experiences when they get diagnosed with breast cancer. How are we touching on the research? How are we taking care of the individual? How are we looking at the disparities and the inequities that exist within the healthcare space, and how are we looking at preventative and advocacy of preventative measures that we can take. So the foundation is really going to continue to be going deeper into those core areas that we have already identified are so crucial to what the foundation stands for and also what our customers and our employees care about as well.
19:38
Fantastic. So when we wrap up, I want you to share all the information about what you're doing and all the links, yeah, go back to you personally again, so I know that your giving has evolved over the years, which is what happens with people. It's, you know, it's, it's very fluid. When I work with individuals that they don't it's not a static way of giving, because the old life events will affect the way that we give back. But I would love to know other things that you're doing besides ms, because you mentioned it's evolved over the years. You have a family. I'm curious if there are others that join you and you're giving back. So if you can share more about that.
20:17
So first and foremost, I am a mom. I am a very strong advocate of the working mothers, really ensuring that working mothers know that they have the power and the support to do it all, to be able to have a career, to be able to be a mom that is present, and to be able to have grace and for themselves, and figure out how you can accept that it's okay to not be okay. It's okay to not give 100% at all times. And I really try to do that for the community and for the community at Kendra Scott because my kids are I have twin girls who are six and my son who is eight. And so I am very, very busy, but ever since I've had children that’s where my philanthropic giving heart and my husband's heart has really shifted. MS, society will always be core of something that I want to contribute to, because I want to ensure that my mom still has a story and a legacy to be told. But really where my husband's passion and my passion lies is really within the children's healthcare space, as well as in children's education. I'm a firm believer that your zip code should not find the level of access to education that you get to ensuring that you have proper resources to learn how to read, to learn how to spell, to learn how to do mathematics, and so my family works a lot in that way. My son is a big baseball player, so I'm also very passionate about the inequities that exist within the sports world, also working to really ensure that not only is access to education, and so is access at to sports, arts. And so I also spend my time advocating and working for organizations specifically within that space too. So I serve as a board member for a charitable organization called the JC seven foundation. It's was launched, and I started the family launched after a little boy passed away tragically on his way to the baseball fields, our family and my son were personally connected, and I felt a calling to step up and give back to that family, get that organization started for them, and help them live out that mission, To be able to connect kids to, you know, the arts and to sports, but so to be able to be there for families that experience the sudden loss of a child from funding, how do they cover funeral expenses? How do they cover medical expenses, making sure that those barriers are removed when families are facing things like that. And then I also, you know, my kids love giving back. We, we are really proactive with giving back right now through books. I love my kids to read books, but then I like them to go through their books and figure out, how might we be able to give those books to kiddos that don't have access to the coolest copies, they don't have access to Diary of a Wimpy Kid, or all these other books because, you know, their families might not have the funds to do those, and so we're consistently recycling books and dropping them off at bookspring and other organizations, and really teaching my kiddos that we we need to give back, and we need to give back in in very small and meaningful ways, because ultimately, they all make an impact.
23:39
Absolutely and the way that you're giving back, I people don't realize this is, we don’t just give back as the spontaneous thing. As we grow older, we are taught this, and when you're teaching your children when you're young, just like you had learned also when you were growing up, by giving back, this is the way that we raise the next generation of philanthropists, or those are going into nonprofit sector, or are just giving that they can give. So, so that's great to hear. Um, so we're getting closer, ending our time, and I wanted to really get a sense, and I have, I have a feeling where this is going, because I'm pretty good at reading the patterns in people's interviews. What do you consider your legacy to be?
24:27
There's a lot of that. I think that you know my legacy for me, is that I can leave an impact and create a connection for somebody, whether it's big or small. How do I continue to open up my network? How do I continue to open up my knowledge and all of the tools I put in my toolbox, over the years, to help somebody? That's really what I love to ultimately do. I love to drive meaningful connections. I love to use all of the resources, as I mentioned, to drive an impact, meaningful change. I love to continue to find the white spaces, and maybe where there's areas, that don’t exist yet. And how do I use my time and treasure to build, you know, programs or build purpose to fill those gaps and how do I leave a family of my children to just become king, generous, humans. I think that, you know, that's a big thing in this world nowadays is, you know, a smile, a “How are you doing?” A little thing, a little gesture like that can go a really long way. And so my legacy is also just making sure that, you know, I'm giving back to creating kind, generous humans, identifying and creating meaningful connections and impact wherever, wherever I can.
25:49
Fantastic. Oh, yeah. So that's a pattern that I saw. So I had, I've written down my notes as we're going through connections and builder. So that's what I see in you. And I think you're creating a fantastic legacy. So thank you for sharing that. Thank you. So where could more information about you and, or the Kendra Scott foundation?
26:12
You can find more information about me on LinkedIn, so, easy to connect with me. Sheena Wilde on LinkedIn, in regards to finding more about Kendra Scott as well as the Kendra Scott foundation, you can find us on Instagram, Facebook. You can also visit us at Kendrascott.com we have a wealth of information and impactful videos and how you can get involved all within within those resources as well.
26:40
Fantastic. So we're going to post all the links in the show notes. Anything else you want to add before I wrap it up?
26:47
I think you hit on a point earlier, just about what philanthropy means. I spend so much time trying to break that word down for people, so often that people don't think they can be a philanthropist unless they have a wealth of funds, and every gesture as small as writing a handwritten note is being a philanthropist. So I just like to challenge people about how you can use your time, your talent, and your treasure to start being a philanthropist as young as you possibly can and not think that comes into how much money you can give.
27:23
Absolutely.Thank you for sharing that. And that’s what exactly we strived to do here by sharing stories on how everyone gives, and everyone gives sobroadly and differently and collectively and collaboratively, it is just a wonderful experience to share all these stories with ourlisteners. So thank you for your story Sheena, and thank you all, our listeners for joining us. I hope we provided some insights and inspirations that you can use for your own philanthropic journey. Until next time!