Piper Hendricks

As important as words are, think right now an important thing in storytelling is also to bring our curiosity, to bring our patience, and to listen even when there's a word where we may think, it's not the word that you would use, but can you push through and keep listening beyond that? Can you listen under that?

Mary Knox Miller

Welcome to Speaking Human First, the podcast that explores the art and science of communicating world-changing ideas. I'm your host, Mary Knox Miller, and today we dive into the world of advocacy and policy change with the inspiring Piper Hendricks. Piper's unique path led her to create Stories Change Power, a nonpartisan nonprofit dedicated to empowering individuals to make a difference in their communities.

She shares how personal narratives can fuel activism, how words can become tools for justice, and the importance of listening to meanings and emotions expressed through those words. Without further ado, let's dive into this conversation about social impact storytelling.

Piper, thank you so much for being here. I am so excited to talk with you about all things policy and advocacy, but also your journey that you have been on, which I cannot wait for people to hear about because it is not the norm. And I think I love speaking with anybody who's not in the norm. So thank you so much for being here.

Hendricks

Mary Knox, it is a pleasure to join you today. It's funny, I've described my career. in many different ways, but now I need to add abnormal. It is different. We'll dive in.

Miller

Exactly. All right. So let's just talk and kind of lay some groundwork about who you are and what you've done. So you are an advocacy professional. Can you just tell us exactly what that is and what all is involved and where this in your belly came from to advocate for a just and peaceful future?

Hendricks

Absolutely. Advocacy is anything that shapes laws, policies, and systems. And my organization, Stories Change Power, we equip people to make a difference in their neighborhoods, in their communities, and countrywide through effective advocacy. And that's really broad. I mean, we have, if you think about where there are policies, that can be your school, that can be in a hospital, that can be in a business, that can be at the local, state, and even federal government. It's very, very broad.

And what I find fascinating about advocacy is that all these things are invisible in a way, right? You can't look outside your window and see a policy or see a law, but it's sort of like the wind where you see the impact of those, see the results. And not always do we recognize the role of policy or laws and systems. It just feels like, that's just the way it is. That's the way it's always been.

And so part of what we do at Stories Change Power is make that invisible visible and make the impact that people can have, their voice, their power, more visible and more tangible and equip people to make a difference in a way that is long-term. There's a lot of short-term. I mean, we live in an era of social media and wow, are there things that can be kind of a flash in the pan, but you what is that long-term impact? We're incredibly people-centered, meaning we focus both on the people in our programs as professionals and also personal because, you know, this whole notion of work-life balance, it makes for really good conversation, but there's an artificial divide. We're still the people who show up at work even if we're feeling particularly discouraged one day. The work might still be there if we're feeling really determined. mean, there's all the ways that we show up as people. That is a focus of ours at Stories Change Power and on the people who are impacted by the policies that we're seeking to shape by laws, by systems. So it is many, many things all wrapped into one focus also on data. We want to be research backed in our approach. There's a lot of wonderful work out there, so we don't believe in reinventing the wheel. If there's already good work and insight, that's what we equip people in our programming with.

I think as to what lit the fire in my belly, it's two big things come to mind. A short answer would be it's all the things that I experienced in my own career, things that I wish that I'd known at the very beginning. And so if I can equip other people, whether they're at the very beginning of their career or further along, that's a huge goal of mine.

And I think the other side of that is just something even earlier in my childhood. I grew up in a small town in Texas, and all of the laws and policies and things, I mean, those were invisible to me as a kid. All that I knew is that when I went off to elementary school, I went to something called a magnet school, which I've since learned was Texas's version of a response to integrating schools. And so that gave me the opportunity to be in classrooms with kids who were not in my neighborhood. I didn't know anything about redlining. I didn't know about the history of slavery in this country. I didn't know about racial divisions. I did know that I was carpooling from a nearly exclusively white neighborhood into black neighborhoods and seeing differences there that did not make sense to me as a kid. It felt like there were big differences in how people were living, how people were treated, and that really stuck with me.

And then you add to that the fact that I was raised by a mom who, I don't know, folks who are listening will remember Russell Stover candies. There's a little box of four chocolates and I had two little brothers. And rather than have us all just pick a chocolate and eat it, she would cut these little things into four pieces so that we could all try each one. And that may sound, you know, awfully silly as an example of what might influence a professional career, but it stuck with me. The notion of how things could be fair, you know, how we could share, how everybody got to try the strawberry cream and the orange cream and the caramel, that just really that shaped my worldview in ways that I don't think I appreciated until later on in life.

Miller

What an incredible story on so many fronts. I can just see you pictured in school with your classmates there, and then I can picture you with your mom and your brothers with the chocolates. And then you were talking about how policy, it's like the wind. You can't see it, you can't hold it, but you can feel it and you know when it's there and you know that it's right. What an incredible breadth of experiences. And so of course it makes complete sense to me now that this is where you would end up, that this is where you would, this is where you would be. So I want to talk a little bit about this path and this journey that you have been on.

Piper, you started out as a lawyer fighting for human rights at the national and international levels. You became an advocacy communications specialist for organizations, including Habitat for Humanity. You leveraged your video and storytelling prowess for policy change work with a video production company. And now you are at the helm of Stories Change Power, which you have done a beautiful job describing. This is just a phenomenal path, a phenomenal journey.

Tell me why you made these moves and what it was about each of these particular pivots to you makes sense now in retrospect.

Hendricks

I appreciate the question and I may even take a step back a little further for you know how I got from the small town where I grew up to to where I am now and I think that's important because that town revolved around a major hospital and so the story, so to speak. I think when people hear the word story, sometimes we still think of, what do you read to your child before bed? Or a story in an ongoing Netflix series or something. And when I use the term story, I think of it much more broadly. What are the stories that we're telling ourselves in the sense of how are we understanding the world? And the way I understood the world as a child in a small town where there was a huge hospital, and that was the one way I saw to do good, to help others. I thought if I want to be helpful in my career, I need to be a doctor. And so I started pre-med. And I suffered Mary Knox through organic chemistry and biosci and all these things that were fascinating, but were absolutely not me.

And I took communications courses as well, and I jokingly said, those are my dessert. Those are my sanity saver, you know, after eating the vegetables of science classes. And then the world started to open up a bit more when I took a course called Ethics, Law, and Medicine. And I took it for the medicine. I thought, ethics sounds great. I mean, who's not on board with ethics, you'd hope. And, ugh, law. I mean, I'll I'll suffer through this. And I'd grown up with people who I think weren't entirely joking when they said, you can do anything you want to in life, just don't be a lawyer. And I thought, why would I, why would I do that? And yet being this course was taught in the law school and I somehow snuck in as an undergrad.

And so got to hear the ways that the law school students approached problems, the way they thought, and it just resonated. I just loved it. And so pretty quickly pivoted from taking the MCAT to taking the LSAT, which was just this, this huge fun logic puzzle and went off to law school instead and thought there's so many ways. I you're talking about justice. It felt like a great place to be as a career.

And I hope anybody listening to this thinking about law school will, you know, I will never be one of those people who say don't go. I think if you go with clear eyes and knowing why you want to be in the field, absolutely go. I absolutely adored my education and the experience there.

I went into practicing litigation and then specifically human rights litigation and that's where I started to realize just how many assumptions, how many stories, so to speak, about the justice system I'd been told and how many of them were not true. And that was deeply, deeply discouraging. I was bringing cases that felt that they absolutely should go to trial. There was a need for justice. There was a need for a response, a solution.

And specifically, the types of cases I was working in were international, where there were people who had been wronged by major, major corporations. And you've got a huge power up against, I guess I'm saying that backwards, very, who were smaller communities that didn't alone have much power against these huge corporations that were not treating people fairly, were not treating them decently. And so that was a type of work I was in.

And when those types of cases were delayed, were dismissed, I thought, I can't do this for my entire career. It was too discouraging and it felt so limiting. And there were times that it genuinely felt like the judge either didn't read our briefs or just didn't care.

And so I took what felt at the time like just this huge jump, this leap of faith into documentary film, knowing nothing about film other than that I'd seen many documentaries and seen firsthand the transformation that film can have on an audience. You know, I'd go to film screenings there thinking that I was on my way to becoming a lifelong litigator and who just happened to have an interest in film and watching screening audiences go from sitting very quietly in our chairs before the screening and talking to someone next to us and munching on our popcorn to after having really robust discussions and having this connection because we just had the same experience for 90 minutes watching what unfolded and then having this common thing to talk about and it was amazing.

I remember even at the time when I first started going to see more films, if you had told me then, you're gonna drop everything and do this, I would have thought, what planet are you from? No way, no way. I am firmly on this path to be a lawyer and litigate and I had a clerkship, I was all set to go. And then just, I think pure, even desperation, maybe I'm not giving my younger self enough credit, but it just felt like I really want to do something that matters. I want to have a diff, you know, make a difference. And that led me into film. And that was an amazing world to be in. I mean, I feel so lucky to have met so many different filmmakers and see all the work. You know, I'd never even seen, you know, the editing software before. So just, you know, peek behind the scenes and know how film was made.

That was really a deep dive for me into storytelling, which wasn't a word, I don't think that was in my legal vocabulary, but recognizing then how stories help us make sense of the world, how we can transport ourselves with the amazing technology we have now to sit in a theater in a small town in Florida and watch and hear and understand the experience of someone half a world away. So that was my world for a while.

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a friend recommended a position at Habitat for Humanity and they sent this description. I need to go back and ask them why. I think maybe they were job hunting at the time, but sent this description and said, I don't know why, this just really sounds like you. And I read it and I thought, you know, he's right. It's bringing together a focus on policy and also the elements of communication, also the storytelling that I've been doing.

And so I applied and had some really funny interviews where they looked at my resume and were like, what on earth is happening here? I'm like, let me explain. And so, so took this position with the government relations group and, and proceeded to bring together those passions of advocacy and communications into, into that position at Habitat. Which then, and I probably feel like I'm, I'm, I'll wrap this up because there's other things we want to talk, talk about, but that, that world of advocacy communication really got me thinking about how do we, when we want to influence policy as organizations, what does that look like and how can we be most effective? And so I gathered a lot of information as I was working in these roles directly, as I was consulting with a variety of organizations, and then went on to last year, found Stories Change Power to help equip people who want to put these strategies, who want to be effective. in their advocacy.

There's a lot of elements of communication and a lot of strategy, all of this in the world of advocacy and that's what I'm doing now.

Miller

What you've just touched upon are these experiences where you're feeling new like a fish out of water. At the same time, I think that that is what grows one of the most important character traits, especially when we're talking about people who are trying to make a difference in the world and that is humility, right?

Humility is so absolutely critical to making sure that you walk into any situation, any particular place where you're coming with a certain preconceived notion and ideas and you know that they're gonna help, but at the same time, you have to be very respectful of what it is that you're seeing right in front of you. Absolutely. Yeah, so I wanna talk about that humility when it comes to stories change power and when it comes to storytelling just in general. So tell me what Stories Change Power is. It is a nonprofit and what it is that you are doing there on a day in and day out basis so that people can better understand and get a sense of where you're coming from.

Hendricks

Yeah, thank you. Stories Change Power is a nonpartisan nonprofit. And I emphasize the nonpartisan because right now there's a lot of feeling of division across the country. There's a lot of talk of polarization and of lack of trust. A big part of what we do is rebuilding that trust, is wanting to build bridges to encourage more understanding, including in our advocacy. see advocacy is a wonderful route to building more trust, to bridging these divisions and understanding each other and, you know, back to that notion of policy and law and being an invisible wind.

The wind also impacts everybody. And so how do we have laws and policies and systems that serve everyone in our neighborhoods, in our communities, in our country? So all that we do is under this umbrella of advocacy. And that looks like a number of really exciting programs. One is our learning communities, which is a small by design community that comes together to learn the nine rights framework.

And by rights, I mean the right framing, having the right actor you're trying to reach with the right messenger, the right message, you get the idea. And so everybody comes together and learns with and from each other, that framework. We also do a lot of one-on-one coaching for folks who are wanting to be effective advocates. We do public speaking training. We also do organizational workshops. And so really excited to have ways to reach people in all walks of life you know, all across the country and helping them be effective in their advocacy. And in that, there is humility.

And that is, you know, one of our key area in our values where we talk about radical growth, being able to come into a space and say, I don't know whether that's in your own team at work, whether that's going into a community that you're trying to support and saying, I don't know yet the best solution. Let's work on that together or going to a policymaker and saying, here's a problem. Maybe I don't yet have the exact solution, but I want to work together with you to fix it.

And I think that we live in a world that does not promote humility. Also, often that can feel very different. And yet over and over again, I've heard so many people say that it's a relief to be in a space where they can say, I don't know. I don't have all the answers, but I'm here, I'm open, and I'm ready to learn.

Miller

that's fantastic. And you keep talking about this, you know, the work that you do with StoryChangePower. It's rooted in a vision for a just, equitable and peaceful world. That is beautiful, but that is daunting. You know, what would achieving it exactly look like? What is it that day in and day out with everybody who is in your programs, what is it? What is this goal that you're working towards?

Hendricks

Yeah, I appreciate the question and really intentional about the language we use. Just wanting things to be fair, equitable, and I use that knowing that is a word that folks have really strong feelings about, and there's a specific blog that we wrote explaining what we mean by equity, and I think when folks dig into the definition, it's not as controversial as it may seem, and peaceful. think that's something that we don't stop and think about it. We have a lot of influences outside keeping us busy, busy, And unfortunately, you know, also often divided. But I think when we stop for a moment and think, humans want to be in a place of peace. It is exhausting to our minds, to our bodies, to constantly be in conflict. And so that's the world that we're envisioning and wanting to move toward together.

So as we think about this just equitable and peaceful world, we know we're not there right now. We know that there is a path to get from here to there. And your organization is doing that through stories. This is a podcast that storytelling is beloved by all. You have had so many different experiences in your career. It's a zig, didn't a zag, but what's incredible about that is that it seems like the through line in your career has been storytelling. Over the years, what has consistently proven be most effective in communicating ideas and ways that move people to action? What have you seen firsthand of things that work versus not work?

I appreciate the question and appreciate your listeners who already love storytelling. that's in short, that's the answer. It's humans are wired for for stories. Even if I were to say, let me tell you a story in saying that, that there's a little part of our brain that like lights up. mean, we just, we're excited. We follow. Those are more memorable. I could sit here and spew facts all day long and give you tons of data. And I don't mean to suggest for a second that data isn't important. It is. And we live in a time where there's so much of it. There's so many ways to understand the world, but those numbers alone don't bring things to light.

A life rather, that they're not going to stick with us in the way that a story does. There's a way that we can tell stories where someone else is transported, where you understand, you know, as a fellow human, you can find that connection and walk in someone else's shoes, even if it's someone who seems to be so incredibly different than you. It's a feeling of human emotion. There's things that we still have in common underneath the differences. And so those stories are how we understand the way other people are living. And in the context of advocacy, I would argue you can't effectively advocate without stories. I can't go and just talk about a policy for the sake of policy, and we should pass this policy because policy, policy. It's the people, right? It's how we're impacted. It's understanding, particularly, here are the people who elected you and here are the ways that they're being impacted and here's the way that we can change. So that, you know, even if it's a 90 second story that you're sharing during a very fast meeting in your legislator's office, you know, one of 30, they'll have that day, then by all means have that much more of a memorable story because that is what is going to leave a lasting impression. Or maybe it's a 90 minute film, maybe it's a multi-part, many seasons long story. These are the things that we as humans understand and we follow and it's incredibly important that we use and respect storytelling as a tool for change.

Miller

So I love this. When somebody tries to ask, explain to me what a story is. I love that you just went through and listed it could be 90 seconds, it could be 90 minutes, it could be a multifaceted, multi-season long container that is talking about stories, but that there can't be policy without stories because it is affecting every human being that's out there. And like you said at very beginning of this interview, policy is not something that you can see or feel or touch, but it is everywhere just like the wind.

Can you tell me what do you think is the most underestimated aspect of communicating that people often overlook?

Hendricks

That is a wonderful question. And I think there are many different potential answers. I think right now I would answer the words we choose. And I say that because there's so many words. I even, you know, we touched on one earlier with the notion of equity and equitable. And unfortunately there are folks who will hear that and make all kinds of assumptions immediately. If I were to say illegal alien, for example, your listeners are probably going to make an assumption about my politics, who I am, what my position is going to be. If I say undocumented person, they're going to make different assumptions. When we have words, and to be clear, words matter. I will not suggest for a second that they don't. However, words can stop a conversation.

When I make assumptions I won't even listen to somebody because I think I know everything I need to know about them already. That's a big problem. And so I think as important as words are, I think right now an important thing in storytelling is also to bring our curiosity, to bring our patience, and to listen even when there's a word where we may think it's kind of, you know, it twinges at you a bit and it's not the word that you would use, but can you push through and keep listening beyond that? Can you listen under that to the meaning, to the humanity, to the fear, to the sadness, to whatever that is?

So that, think, right now is one of the biggest challenges in storytelling, and it is awfully complicated.

Miller

So Piper, I love what you just were talking about in terms of the power of each and every individual word, because each and every individual word combines into sentences, which then combine into stories that we either tell ourselves about ourselves, or we tell ourselves about other people. And when all of those stories combine, suddenly we have this narrative of what we think is what's currently happening. And right now, especially in the United States, there is so much being discussed, so much being talked about. What is it that we need to remind ourselves as storytellers to do or to say or to how to be or approach a given story so that we are telling stories that don't isolate, but instead embrace stories that promote equity instead of difference? What is it that we need to know?

Hendricks

It's such a good question. And I think my answer might surprise some people. I think what we need to know is ourselves and what's going on internally first, but not stop there. Also seek to understand externally. I know that sounds really squishy, so let me explain a little bit. I think understanding our own stories, our own way of seeing the world, and I say that meaning.

There was a webinar that we hosted in April of 2024, all about political psychology. And the speaker started with how we're raised, which might sound, you know, when we're young, we're not voting at age 18 months. You know, we start voting at 18. But all of our entire experience on this planet shapes how we see the world. And it sounds obvious when we say, and yet we don't always remember that. So thinking about what are the assumptions we have inside.

If I'm raised in a really small rural town by parents who are incredibly strict, I will look at the world differently than someone who grew up in a big city with parents who are very permissive and easygoing. And that then shapes, you do I see the world as a place that's you know, generally safe and sure there are some bad apples, but generally that it's a place of safety, there's abundance, there's enough to go around for everyone. Or do I see the world as a place of scarcity, where I really need to fight for what's mine, for my family? Is it a place to be fearful? And those are things that, again, are invisible, but really understanding where we're coming from.

And then approaching the world with curiosity to understand where other folks are coming from. And that's where I think if we look at our lives as a journey and we're talking about walking in the shoes of another person, there can be words that they use that we stumble on. But do we stumble and keep going? Or do we stop and stomp our foot and say, won't listen to you anymore. We have nothing in common. I've got nothing to learn from you.

And if we do the latter, we get nowhere that that does us no good and i think that there's a lot of bigger stories that we need to be examining i've been thinking a lot about this this story about consumerism and by story i mean the other messages that were surrounded by this notion if i just buy one more thing i'll be happy you know that there's a book that's now hard to believe this over ten years old called winning the story wars and it talks about the dark art of marketing where there was a time when we wouldn't have been surrounded by messages saying you're not good enough if you don't buy Listerine. mean, one, Listerine didn't exist and there just wasn't this need to constantly sell products.

And I'll spare your listeners the history lesson, but suffice to say, we live in a world now where there's a lot that depends on us buying more, more, more, more, more. Don't buy a sweater and then use it for 20 years. Buy one that's only good for one season, get rid of it, and on to the next thing, on to the next thing which is exhausting for us as humans. It's exhausting for our environment. And it just really isn't helpful to us as individuals. I if we're looking for our happiness externally, then one, other people can get in the way. And two, we're ignoring a lot of what's going on internally. So I hear myself getting into some really big themes for what was a, you know.

A question that I think we could talk about for a long time, but that's where I would say is, know, start with understanding ourselves a bit more in service of seeking to understand others. And I think after the election of November, 2024, there were a lot of things to explore. There were a lot of different emotions. And I think if we stay only in our own understanding, then we are going to be deeply frustrated. I think the way forward for all of us is to better understand all of us. And we do that through understanding other folks' stories. We do that through effective storytelling and effective listening.

Miller

Piper, you have given us so much, not only wisdom that you have gleaned over the decades that you've been here, but also in your capacity as somebody who is leading an organization, trying to help all of us who are trying to change the narratives and for the betterment of all.

I just have one last question, which is something that I always love to ask people who are guests on this podcast, which is knowing what you know now, what would you tell your younger self about embarking on this journey of a career that not only seeks to have an impact, but also to make an income?

Hendricks

Such a great question. And I am old enough to remember when we did not talk about, like self-care did not exist as a term anyway. there, know, starting my career as I did in law where you're billing every six minutes, I adopted really quickly this notion of working as many of those six minute increments as you could. And that was true even when I left big law and no longer had the financial incentive.

But taking on big problems can be exhausting and it can also maybe counter intuitively be really hard to step away from. When you have this notion of this is a huge problem, how dare I rest? You know, the people that it's impacting, they don't get to take a break from poverty, you don't get to take a break from a natural disaster. And so as someone who comes in wanting to be of service, wanting to help, there's a need to make sure that we still can keep showing up over the long term.

Another blog that I wrote, a little bit of a rant in this case, was against the notion of put your own oxygen mask on first. People say that all the time. It comes from a good place, but for some of us, if you use that F word first, I'm going to tune you out. How dare I put myself first? There's so many other people who have so much need. So what's really worked for me is to think of the notion of I can't pour from an empty cup or how am I, how am I keeping my own soul charged and, thinking about not running down our solar powered battery entirely and how if we exhaust ourselves, we're truly not able to be of service to others. And so I think for my younger self, as much as I admire her drive and her dedication, I would have said, take just a bit of time to pace yourself.

And there's a wonderful quote about, I don't have it right at my fingertips, but the notion of running the part of the race that is ours. A lot of this work may not be completed in our lifetimes. That's not an excuse to sit back and do nothing. But if we're expecting ourselves to do it all and to do it all in one grant cycle, to do it all in one year, in one whatever unit of measurement, other than the course of human history, we're setting ourselves up for trouble. So think finding a bit more of that balance is what I would tell my younger self and happily I think, you know, it's still a struggle even now, but I think I'm getting more of the hang of.

Miller

Piper, thank you so much for being here, for sharing all of your wisdom and your knowledge, for inviting us into your community Stories Change power, to learning more about it and to just realizing and accepting the fact that it is okay to just be where we are in the moment and that knowing how we move and breathe in the world that could look like being a lawyer or a doctor or it can look like being a filmmaker or it can look like leading a nonprofit and a group of people who are hungry to make a difference in the world. Thank you so much for being here, for sharing your story, and for showing us along the way how perhaps we can change the story we're telling ourselves.

Hendricks

Thank you, Mary Knox. It has been a joy to be here and to be in conversation with you today.

Miller

Piper's work reminds us that advocacy begins with truly hearing one another and listening for the emotions and intent behind words. As you reflect on this episode, consider the experiences and stories that have shaped your perspectives. How might you share those to spark empathy, to illuminate injustice, or inspire action? The power of storytelling lies not just in captivating attention and weaving a narrative, but in creating space for others to be seen, heard, and understood. Until next time, keep leading with purpose and speaking human first.