Why We Partner
PSYDEH’s sustainable growth in a difficult Mexican funding climate is based on our outside-the-box thinking when it comes to resource raising and alliances.
One important resource is corporate partnerships, a unique example of which is our multi-phased relationship with Adobe. Headquartered in the USA, Adobe is one of the largest and most diversified software companies in the world empowering individuals, small businesses, government agencies, and global brands to design and deliver exceptional digital experiences.
Where We Focus Our Efforts
Our alliance started when Adobe chose PSYDEH in 2022 as one of only a handful of nonprofits around the world, the only from Mexico, to be an early adopter of their new cloud-based design tool Adobe Express for nonprofits (AX). PSYDEH, Adobe explained, is unique among grassroots organizations using creativity to make an impact. They are especially taken by our creative impact value proposition, how we “view creative processes and expressions as essential tools for building the relationships needed to make a sustainable impact“, including our novel story-telling e-book “Narratives” and extensive high-quality video library on YouTube filled with videos, short films, and animations.
As an early adopter in PHASE ONE, we were given a series of training sessions on how to use Adobe products to make an impact and market this impact to target audiences. We were invited to co-innovate with Adobe creatives new AX features in line with our wish list. We also were awarded valuable licenses for their industry-leading Creative Cloud software (CC) and a flexible funding grant.
In PHASE TWO, we converted initial backing into additional Adobe investments. They awarded us more flexible funding and a VIP invite to have one of our staff attend their 2022 Adobe MAX conference in Los Angeles, California, USA. We also co-produced this print article and promotional and instructional videos.
In PHASE THREE (2022-2023), we explore ways to grow our alliance while inviting third parties to celebrate our work. For example, the online magazine Diginomica published this piece on PSYDEH. And Fast Company selected PSYDEH as the only nonprofit in the world as one of the “2022 Adobe Creators to Watch.”
Why it is a Win-win Partnership
Our alliance gives wins to both parties.
Adobe Corporate Social Responsibility’s (CSR) investment in PSYDEH reflects the company’s unique commitment to Mexico, LATAM, and the Global South. It shows their novel perspective on how CSR collaborations can be generative and even transformational, including how private companies can co-create products with grassroots nonprofits to achieve business goals.
Second, our AX-focused initiative includes Adobe employees from CSR, new tech solution, and brand communication work areas. This gives their professionals the opportunity to cross-fertilize across departments while making an impact with PSYDEH.
Moreover, Adobe’s multi-phased model is a proof-of-concept for yielding multiple returns for all kinds of stakeholders in the short and long terms. And it is ripe to be replicated, supported, and promoted!
PSYDEH wins, too, learning new experiences and skills, scaling our impact, and obtaining the financial and in-kind resources we need to grow.
Generally, this unique commitment from a global technology company showcases PSYDEH’s ability to create the public-private-partnership ecosystem we and our underserved women partners need to participate in the digital economy. Here, Zoom choosing PSYDEH led to Team4Tech and Adobe choosing us, with all working to innovate and integrate appropriate technology solutions to challenges in our community-led development work.
Second, Adobe’s software has already played an outsized role in PSYDEH’s ability to make impact and then communicate it to local stakeholders and global donors. For example:
We use AX to help local team members and communities speaking Spanish and multiple Indigenous languages to create and then communicate a late-2022 proclamation (English and Spanish) on needed rural development policies directed at men and government. This is powerful and unprecedented, an extension of our work organizing annual public forums at which 1000+ rural and Indigenous women have created and updated their own rural development agenda based on the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda.
We use CC to produce our 2023 six video series to relate our impact in the words of women staff and partners themselves, e.g., this piece on how we cultivate intercultural cooperation or this piece on how technology connects women and their communities. CC is also how we created this mid-2023 three-minute commercial to inspire more global and national private sector partners, especially in the tech sector, to innovate with PSYDEH.
Lastly, Adobe helps PSYDEH inch closer to our goal of becoming a sustainable operation with progress around four different resource streams. Securing needed (1) financial support and (2) in-kind donated goods and professional services helps us to empower women staff and partner entrepreneurs. With more PSYDEH support, women then organize into cooperatives that harness local resources to create fair trade artisanal goods, with their story (our joint story) becoming the basis for (3) more partnerships with Mexican and global donors. Women staff and partner cooperatives then use digital platforms and tools to (4) earn income by selling goods at the national and global levels.
