We recently connected with Katie Doughty and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Katie thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?
The seedling of Team Kind Humans was planted the day I was sobbing in the kitchen after receiving a text message from a neighbor. Her six-year-old daughter was diagnosed with Leukemia. My own daughter, Alice, was seven, so this diagnosis hit close to home. When I found out the child needed a stem cell transplant, but no one in her family was a match, I made it my mission to help her find one. Along with other mamas in the neighborhood, we began organizing a Be The Match (now called National Marrow Donor Program) swab event to try to get more candidates on the list of potential matches.
Alice was always watching. One evening she came up to me and asked if she could help. My gut reaction was absolutely not. I feared what would happen if this child didn’t make it. How would I even begin to parent Alice through that? I also worried that I would be judged for involving my child in such a big, grown-up sized issue. I said no.
But she was persistent. Hesitantly, with a nauseous stomach, I agreed to let her help. We settled on making bracelets to raise money for our neighbor’s Go Fund Me campaign. She was thrilled to have a job and willingly got to work. She spent time designing bracelets, finding color choices and sizing, and working on a logo for her posters. People are very generous when I child is on a mission. She ended up raising over $2,000 to donate.
We donated most to the Go Fund Me campaign, a portion of it went to Seattle Children’s Hospital for research, and we took some of it to Target to pick out things for our neighbor to do in the hospital. I watched Alice browse the aisles looking for things our neighbor might enjoy. I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced taking a child to the toy section of any store, but it was here that I completely changed the way I parent. She did not ask for a single thing for herself. Not once. For a child that would always be asking for toys when we shopped to not ask for anything for herself, I knew I might be on to something. When she was focused on helping someone else, she wasn’t focused on just herself.
Kids are capable. They are willing to help and want to be included in showing up for others but are not given enough opportunities to do so in a meaningful way. Team Kind Humans is a space for kids to learn through the KIND method (Know, Inquire, Noodle, and Do!) and complete activities and service projects that center around helping others. I’ve seen a transformation in my own children and have witnessed countless kids light up when they are involved in community service.
The term community service gets a bad rap. It’s usually associated with negative terms like punishment, time-consuming, or required. Team Kind Humans flips the narrative around this term and creates impactful, kid-friendly ways for kids to get involved using activities they already love like art, nature play, baking, and reading. My mission is for families to make small, simple changes that give kids an opportunity to experience the joy and mental health benefits of getting involved.
Kindness is simple, but it needs to be intentional. Team Kind Humans makes it easy to add kindness and service into what you’re already doing without adding more to your plate. It shows kids how to use their own interests and talents to give back to others, show up for a friend, or spread kindness in their community in a meaningful way.
(side note: it’s been five years, and my neighbor happily rides her bike past my house) :)
Katie, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I knew I was going to be a teacher since the age of 7. One time I thought I might want to be a sandwich artist at Subway, but that was fleeting. The answer was always a teacher. I got my degree in elementary education from Washington State University and happily accepted a first/second grade combo class as my first teaching role at Seattle Hill elementary. I taught for six years before becoming a stay-at-home mom. When Covid hit in 2020, I found myself homeschooling my second grader and preschooler. I assumed they would go back to public school the following year, but we fell in love with the lifestyle and never looked back. Homeschooling has given me the freedom to get back into curriculum development and find ways to help my own children fall in love with learning, seek out opportunities to help others, and find joy in everyday adventures.
Through Team Kind Humans, I create hands-on, engaging kindness and community service activities for kids using a strategy I created called the KIND Method. The KIND Method takes kids through four intentional steps that result in a community service project.
KNOW: This step gives kids an opportunity to learn about a topic they love, whether it’s their favorite animal, video gaming, skateboarding, or horseback riding, kids can dive into furthering their understanding of the topic through books, videos, articles, or experiences.
INQUIRE: This is where kids get to ask big questions about their topic. The most important one is, “Who are the helpers?” By searching for a nonprofit that benefits their topic, kids can find out about the people and companies already doing good in this area.
NOODLE: This step is playful! It gives kids an opportunity to play around with their topic through games, science, art, etc. Adding in the fun is crucial to helping kids develop a passion for helping others.
DO: This is the step that helps kids choose a community service project to give back to their topic. Oftentimes, nonprofits have opportunities already, but kids get to be creative in what they choose. The simplest way to make an impact is to teach someone else about what you’ve learned and encourage them to get involved.
My membership, the Team Kind Collective, delivers monthly themed guides that take families through the KIND Method. I make it simple for parents to add kindness to their everyday life. Using kid-friendly activities and topics, families can connect with each other while instilling a culture of kindness in their homes. It’s simple, stress-free, and impactful.
I have also created a digital kindness preschool program called Leaping Letters. By simply grabbing the provided supplies and pressing play, kids get to play through the alphabet through letter writing, letter recognition and voicing, Play-Doh, process art, kindness activities, and gymnastics. I love this program because it’s focus is learning through movement, so kids get to wiggle their way through the alphabet.
Practicing kindness builds confidence, improves mental health, strengthens problem-solving skills, and sets kids up for success in whatever career they choose. Team Kind Humans gives families and teachers the tools they need to be successful.
Alright – let’s talk about marketing or sales – do you have any fun stories about a risk you’ve taken or something else exciting on the sales and marketing side?
My favorite marketing story centers around collaboration and koalas. I reached out to Izzy Bee, the star of the Netflix series Izzy’s Koala World to see if she would be interested in coming on my podcast. When she said yes, I knew I had to make the most of my time with her. I pitched her (and her mom) the idea of doing a fundraising event for their new koala hospital they were building. When they agreed, I got to work putting together a “Meet Izzy Bee” campaign where kids could meet Izzy on Zoom, ask her a question, and learn to draw a koala that they would use for their marketing to raise money. The campaign was so successful that I had to open two extra sessions for kids to meet Izzy. Together, we raised money for koalas, gave kids an opportunity to meet the beloved Izzy, do something impactful for her koalas, and, as a bonus, brought hundreds of people into my Team Kind orbit where many of them turned into customers.
Collaboration has been the best marketing strategy for Team Kind Humans so far. I’ve partnered with amazing athletes, like the captain of the Seattle Kraken, Jordan Eberle, and Hall of Famer Cammi Granato to raise money for the Sticks and Strings Foundation. I’ve worked with nonprofits like Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation and the Growing Kindness Project. I’ve also worked with cool companies like Ridwell. All these collaborations have helped me spread my message of kindness, show families what it looks like and give them opportunities to opt-in, as well as grow my audience and e-mail list. It’s a natural way of connecting with potential clients while also giving back to important causes.
What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?
Podcasting! Podcasting has opened an entire world of connections and new audiences. I host two podcasts: Raising Kind Humans and SuperKind Kids.
Raising Kind Humans focuses on the grown-up and connecting families with authors, experts, and nonprofits that will help them raise their kids to be courageously kind, empathetic, successful kids.
SuperKind kids is just for kids! I interview their favorite authors, nonprofits they would find interesting, or people they look up to. I also do solo episodes that take them through the KIND method with different topics related to the Team Kind Collective.
Hosting my own podcasts as well as being a guest on other podcasts has helped me grow my audience, meet new clients, and reach a wider variety of families that want to raise kind kids. 10/10 recommend!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.teamkindhumans.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/teamkindhumans/
- Other: FREE KindSchooling Guide from the Collective: https://www.teamkindhumans.com/free
BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/teamkindhumans.bsky.socialPodcasts: https://www.teamkindhumans.com/podcasts
Image Credits
Cassandra Hamilton Photography
Katie Lomax