Episode 91: Justine Lucas
Join Lori and her guest, Justine Lucas, the Founder of Q15 Impact, to discuss how to solve significant social challenges. Justine, an expert in social impact strategies, explains her unique method for creating lasting change. At the heart of her philosophy lies the belief that building partnerships is essential for achieving significant societal impact!
Here are the things to expect in this episode:
How does Q15 contribute to making a massive societal impact?
Specific initiatives or strategies Q15 employs to achieve its goals.
Justine's current clients and projects at Q15 Impact.
How do your values and beliefs influence your approach to impactful work?
And much more!
Q15 Impact: https://www.q15impact.com/
Q15's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/q_15_impact/
Justine’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justine-lucas-4a835515/
Clara Lionel Foundation: https://claralionelfoundation.org/
Global Citizen: https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/
Episode Transcript
00:16
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 through the stories we will share here, we hope that it sparks something in you, how you can make your own philanthropic impact in the world. I'm your host. Lori Kranczer, attorney, philanthropic advisor and legacy giving strategist. Today, we want 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 you subscribe to the podcast so you never miss a new episode posted on Wednesdays. So today, I'm really excited to have, as our guest Justine Lucas. She is the founder of Q 15 impact. Welcome Justine.
00:59
Thanks. Lori, excited to be here.
01:02
So why don't you start us off and share with the listeners what you do,
01:08
Sure. So Q15 impact is a social impact advisory instructor, and our specialty is solving challenges and building the strategies pathways and partnerships needed to achieve massive societal impact. So what that really means is we focus on systems change work and new models and big visions. When I'm working at the intersection of culture and cause, so like working with influencers and celebrities and high net worth individuals, we help build their legacies. And then when I'm working with companies or nonprofits, we do the assessments and build the strategies for those entities to scale.
01:47
Great, so when you talk about systems for the average listener, what does that mean? What does that look like?
01:54
Yeah, I think what happens oftentimes in the impact base or philanthropy or nonprofits in general is, you know, sometimes strategy isn't a key component of the work. So one asks will happen. So people will throw an event, they'll do a fundraising campaign, they'll engage a celebrity, but it's not working towards the bigger goal of solving a challenge. So systems change work is really about seeing the full scope and picture of all the entities involved in a particular challenge, and really trying to figure out what is the strategy, the long term strategy, to solve a problem. The goal is to solve a problem and really walk away, not continue to chip away at it.
02:39
So when you're doing this type of work, walk us through like, who all the partners that are, are in the best systems change project.
02:49
Or, I think the way that I always see systems change work is the issue that you're trying to solve is at the center, and then there's a lot of other pieces of the puzzle, whether they're potential partners. So it might be your own nonprofit, it might be a company, it might be foundations, it might be government, social service, and then there's a lot of tools in the toolkit that you can use to solve the challenge, like you can use PR, events, marketing, influencers. There's a lot of different things that you can bring to the table. And I just strongly believe that you need to build a strategy that takes into account all the different players that are involved, and then all the tools that you have in your toolkit, and again, over a timeline, figure out how to actually solve a challenge and walk, walk away. I do believe that that should be the goal of the work that we do. It's not to create a nonprofit and continue to do the same thing year on year, where you, you might be chipping away at it, but you're not actually solving it.
03:52
Are there any particular issue areas that you work with more than others?
03:58
Well, in my career, I worked on a lot of issue areas. So when I was building Q15, I thought, did I focus specifically on, you know, climate sustainability is where I worked most recently. And I thought, maybe I focus on, on that, and organically, that has happened, but, but, but no, I'm issue agnostic in the work that I do, because I've just really worked across all sorts of issues in my career.
04:25
Yeah, me too. There's, like, everyone, but you work on, like, honestly, the people that want to do the work, I mean, it's as long as they're motivated, I'm happy to do. I mean, there's maybe a few issue areas that are not really aligned with my values, but for the most part, I want to help people so, and nonprofits. So fantastic. All right, so you mentioned in your career and how you sort of, you know a different issue areas. Why don't you share your journey, your professional journey, with us?
04:49
Sure, for the last seven years, I was the executive director of Rihanna's Clara Lynel Foundation, which focuses both on climate resilience and climate justice and the Caribbean and the US. And with the incredible team that we had, we built CLF into a place where it was named by Fast Company as one of the world's most innovative companies. We got, also our climate resilience initiative was part of the rule changing ideas climate category. We did some incredible work in 2020 with covid, we leveraged around $47 million in giving to support covid relief and racial justice efforts. So just, just incredible work, a really wonderful team. And prior to that, I was the Global Director of Programs for Global Citizen where I oversaw the Global Citizen Festival, our events programs and strategic partnerships, and I was the producer of the festival in Central Park. And in 2015 we threw a massive Festival on the National Mall in DC called Global Citizen Earth Day. Lots of wild stories from that event.
05:57
You’ll share those after we stopped recording.
06:02
Exactly, exactly. And so I did event production in town on our position for global citizen. But before that, in the early years of my, my role there, I led policy and advocacy campaign for the US. And before my time at global citizen, I worked for both international and domestic nonprofits, working on strategy. I spent time living and working in Cameroon for grassroots human rights nonprofit. We were working on the rights of incarcerated individuals, and we're working on access to justice issues. I moved to Cameroon when I was 25 so also lots of wonderful adventures I had while living there, and I began my career at sea horizon, which is New York City's largest social service nonprofit and provides advocacy and support for survivors of all forms of violence. I currently am a term member at the Council on Foreign Relations. I'm a fellow at the Rockwood Leadership Institute. And I serve on a number of boards which I want to give a shout out to, because they're incredible. I'm on the board of directors for one for Democracy, which mobilizes resources at scale to support grassroots democracy leaders working on issues in their community. I'm on the board of Echo, which is a community of people from around the world committed to curbing the growing power of corporations. The idea with that one is we want to buy from and work for, invest in companies that really respect the environment and treat their workers well and respect democracy. And I'm on the advisory boards of Future Barbados and the Future US, which I don't know how I ended up on two advisory boards with future in the name. I might be a futurist, but Future Barbados is an initiative of the prime minister of Barbados focused on easing opportunities and partnerships and supporting entrepreneurs to propel Barbados into the future. And I want to give a shout out to the Future US as well. It's a new DC based entity that runs Design Thinking workshops in Washington with innovators and policymakers with the goal of helping them solve dynamic problems. So, Lori, I'm keeping myself busy.
08:17
Yeah, I can, I can see. So I love it. So that's fantastic. I mean, so obviously you have a very, you know, broad philanthropic professional background, so I'd love to even go before that and talk about, why did you get started in this area? What prompted you?
08:40
Yeah, I think when I think back on it, there's a couple of things that happened early on in my life that may be interested in impact and activism. When I was in middle school, my dad took me door to door to help get some petition signed around the overcrowding in our schools, our high school was one of those schools that had the trailer classrooms all filling the front yard, just so much overcrowding that it was like visibly pouring out into every single space that there existed. And so it's my first time, like really learning when I was young to use my voice to speak out, and for my dad to take me on that journey of like going door to door, asking for focus competitions, that was really fundamental for me. And when I was 16, I did an AIDS ride from Minneapolis to Chicago. I was, I was one of the youngest riders on that bike ride. And also an incredible experience to be in community with so many people that cared about that issue and to see how much we were able to raise collectively. It was really profound for me at a young age to just see what a collective group of people that believed in one thing could do, and I was also an activist at NYU, so just really involved in a lot of community and student organizing against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. So there's a lot happening in New York City at that time, and it was really powerful to be in like a learning environment, but also to to be really involved in that community organizing. And I think something I also reflect on. And by the time I was 20 years old, I'd had so many jobs like I had, I'd already been, you know, the custodian of a locker room, an executive assistant at a high rise in Midtown. I worked the night shift at a book factory. I was a personal assistant to an HR executive. I worked a phone bank. I was a rock climbing instructor. I worked for a photographer. I did, I had all these jobs before I even was 20, and it made me really reflect on if I was going to spend so much time working. I wanted to do something that was meaningful. So I feel like I learned along the way that if I'm spending so much time at work, you know, it would be really wonderful to be doing something that allowed me to learn about different cultures and really spend my, my time and energy in those eight plus hours a day working on something I believed in.
11:22
That’s great in my first job, I haven't thought about this in a while. My first job, I was hostess at I-Hop in high school, and it gave a really, really good education on how to work with people that are waiting for their table on some of the busiest days of the year, like Mother's Day, when everyone's taking their mom out to eat. So that was a great experience, also, to learn how to deal with lots of different individuals and to keep everyone happy.
11:51
So I did one one time, I just remembered I did. I sold knives for Cutco, and that was similar, like going around and doing sales. Yeah, you do learn how to interact with people and learn a lot of patience and understanding.
12:03
It’s true, it’s s true. So finesse. All right, so, so when you're looking at the work that you're doing, and you're impacting so much, and I know, I don't know if you can talk about any of the projects that you're working on now in Q15, but you know, if you can give some examples, that'd be great, because I'd love to you to share also where you see this area growing.
12:29
Yeah, for sure, right now, the few clients I'd love to share a little bit on, one of which is a one of the largest regenerative agriculture projects in the Caribbean. It's called Walker's Reserve. It's in Barbados. It's an, it's amazing group of folks that have been taking what was a former sand mine, so an extracted industry, and converting the land into one that is regenerative. There's a beautiful fruit forest, there's mangrove restoration, there's lots of species of animals on the reserve, and it's an ongoing, beautiful project, lots of research. There's a nonprofit associated, so a wonderful place for education, but also a really beautiful model of extraction to regeneration. So that is one client I have. Another is the Tony Snell foundation. So Tony has been an NBA player for years and years, and their stories as a family is so incredible. And Tony was diagnosed with autism fairly recently, and their son as well. And so they have a nonprofit. They've just got it, gotten it off the ground that helps bridge, build awareness around autism through sport. And so that's, that's also a really incredible project, and that Tony and his family are working on building out their legacy, and this is how they want to as a family, spend all their time. So that's really beautiful. And then another client I'll share in salon is Sustain, it's a sustainable home goods company founded by this amazing woman, Jacqueline Tracy, and it's sustained, Sanford sisters and sustainability. And, you know, it's, it's a really, really inspiring project in that he wants to the big ambition, the big vision of this project, is to essentially create almost the equivalent of fair trade or one of these certifications, but for sustainability, but an overarching like resource, where, instead of you trying to find out on one product or one brand, like what their ESG standards are, the diversity that they have on their board, their supply chain information, whether the ingredients are toxic in the products, like it's so much research. There are so many certifications out there. So Sustain wants to really simplify it into a place where people can go and find products that pass due diligence across the board, and they can be educated more on sustainability efforts, they can track the progress of brands that are really making headway. And the really wonderful thing is that, that community, as people that are purchasing from sustain that are part of that community, can hold companies to account to do better. So three, three great examples of clients that are touching both, you know, climate sustainability, but also just some important legacy work.
15:43
Absolutely, wow, you got me at the legacy work because, you know, that's what we specialize here. But I'm so curious because I, because I know when I work with either nonprofit, when they want to do legacy down to planned giving non cash assets, pretty simple, right? Like, it's pretty straightforward, but when you're doing or working with my individuals it's a little different. I'm curious when you're working with individuals that want to do something but not quite sure what it is. You know, when you get that, how do you help them frame that out? Because you just named three different clients that do their different types of things. Did they come to you with this idea, or do you help shape that?
16:21
I think it's a combination of both, you know, I think inherently, we all have a desire to leave the world a little bit better than we found it. And I think I start by a lot of listening, you know, really trying to understand the root of where people are coming to the desire to do the work and try to help them articulate the vision and because it's always like inside of them, but just getting it clear. And I think where I try to push is, I try to push it towards something that's bigger, so that I really always have like legacy in mind. Again, you're not trying to create a nonprofit that, just for now, is doing a little bit of good work. It's about, what do you want to leave behind? What is the change you want to create in this life? So that the vision is bold and big and there's something aspirational to it that allows, I think the individuals or families or nonprofits do think bigger, think a longer trajectory, and then I think everything will line up behind that, like a powerful, long term, very impactful strategy, and then fundraising goals that are ambitious.
17:39
I love that. Okay, so now we talk about legacy, we're at that point that we talk about your legacy. So what do you consider your legacy to be?
17:48
Well, Lori, I knew you were gonna ask this question, so I did think about this a little bit, and it is such a big question, I think it extends for me beyond the professional in that I, if I really think through the time I've spent so far on this planet, and you know, the time I have left, I want to have really gone and saw as much of the beauty of the world that I could. And I, I hope I'm able to squeeze out the most experiences in the little time that I have, and I think for me, I hope that it is now, and that will continue to be, that I show up for the people in my life. And then, you know, quite simply, I don't know how to articulate this, but that I try my best to lead the world a little better than when I found it.
18:40
Perfect, I couldn't think of anything better than that. So that's why you all do that, right? So Justine, might you share with our audience where they can find out more information about you?
18:51
Yeah, I think the best way is probably on social media. So Q15 impact has handles on LinkedIn and Instagram, and my personal profile on LinkedIn is just Justine Lucas.
18:53
Yeah, Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for joining us today. We really appreciate your insights in this area. And I know that you're making a huge impact out there. So, thanks again.
18:58
Thanks Lori