Sofia Balderson on how rejection can help you grow as an advocate

Sofia Balderson is the co-founder of Hive, formerly known as Impactful Animal Advocacy, an organisation that aims to improve coordination and collaboration in the farmed animal movement through cultivating impactful, intentional, and serendipitous communities

Many listeners may be on the Impactful Advocacy Slack – a Slack workspace with over 2,000 animal advocates and a great place to connect, learn and share ideas. Today, we spoke with Sofia Balderson, one of the originators of that Slack Channel about lessons in starting new projects, the importance of facing rejection, how much you should listen to philanthropic funders to understand the value of your project and tangible ways to measure whether your work is providing value!

This was a very fun and candid conversation which I really enjoyed, so I’m sure you all will too.

Relevant links to things mentioned throughout the show:

• Our website: joinhive.org 
• Chi from Global Vegan inspiration 
• Hive Slack joining link 
• Hive Newsletter (free biweekly) 
• Hive volunteer moderator role 
• Hive channel lead role (volunteer)
• Hive events 
• Our Theory of Change (general + for each program)
• Our metrics: what we measure (including our OKRs and KPIs)
• Our impact estimates for 2023 and 2024
• Our cost-effectiveness estimates: spreadsheet
• Our Year in Review 2023: insights in our programs and results
• Weighted factor model explanation
• My EA Forum post: Writing about my job: co-founder of an early stage charity
• Sofia’s productivity course (Clariteam)
• Hive Fundraising wiki 
• Rethink Priorities cross cause cost-effectiveness comparison tool
• Leader Lab book  
• Obstacle is the way by Ryan Holiday 
• The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday

Chapters
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00:00 // Start
04:25 // History of Hive/Impactful Animal Advocacy
06:43 // Who is the Hive Slack for?
10:24 // Hive's biggest challenges so far
14:19 // Example of projects that didn't work out
18:08 // How important is funder feedback?
26:30 // What value does Hive provide?
30:26 // Advice for new founders
33:07 // Personal development advice
36:10 // Books on professional and personal development
37:46 // Facing rejection
42:00 // Motivation for sharing personal experiences
45:40 // How people react to Sofia putting herself out there
47:56 // What do many peopl

With thanks to Tom Felbar (Ambedo Media) for amazing video and audio editing!

Note: My (James') views here are my personal opinions and don't represent those of Coefficient Giving.

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