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2008 IT Staffing & Spending Report Now Available for Download
The nonprofit sector works hard to use technology effectively, but it's an uphill battle. Financial resources are limited. Technology changes quickly, and there's a lot of it out there doing lots of different things — even within the same areas. What should your organization budget for IT expenditures? How do you know if the solutions you’re getting are the right fit — for both your budget and your needs?
NTEN partnered with the NonProfit Times on this survey to offer a closer look at the current state of nonprofit IT staffing in general, and to give organizations the information they need to evaluate and improve their own IT staffing. We began this effort with the 2006 survey, the first of its kind. We repeated the survey in 2007, and plan to continue doing so annually to provide a long-term view of nonprofit IT staffing.
Our hope is that this survey will help nonprofits answer the challenging questions by providing greater context of what similar — and possibly more successful — organizations are doing.
10 Disruptive Technologies You Need to Think About
Every Wednesday, Gartner does a free webinar on a variety of topics. This week, they presented "Technology Trends You Can't Afford to Ignore." I tweeted my way through the one hour call, but here are some notes with a little more clarity and reflection.
We Can't Make Summer Last Forever, But We Can Make Membership Last Longer
It's summertime, for real now: I've been having breakfast with Wimbledon, the mosquitoes are biting, and I can't walk down the street in the evening without smelling someone cooking out on a grill.
Here at NTEN, another tell-tale sign of summer is our Summer Membership Offer: Become a member of NTEN (or renew your membership) this summer, and get member benefits from now until the end of 2010!
That means all the connecting, learning, and saving that comes with membership lasts an extra 6 months.
If you're new to NTEN or have been meaning to return as a member, check out the benefits of membership and then take advantage of this limited time opportunity.
Thanks for being part of this community!
All About NTEN in 5 Minutes
Last week, I was fortunate enough to present a session on social media with Marnie Webb of TechSoup Global, Laura Norvig of ETR Associates, Matt Sharp from the Packard Foundation, and Matt Dunne at Google. I think it's fair to say that we rocked!
While there, I was interviewed for the live stream of the event, which was run by Business Boomer:
NTEN Member Buzz Round-Up: June 29th
From the interwebs this week, I've heard about these NTEN members doing their nptechie-thing:
Amy Sample Ward reports on the new opportunity on YouTube to connect nonprofits with video volunteers, with the help of allforgood.org. Nonprofits can submit needs; video-savvy volunteers can connect with a cause.
Natural Resources Defense Council's Apollo Gonzales is interviewed by Eric Kuhn of the Huffington Post about NRDC's Social Media strategy. (BTW, NRDC was recently listed as a top Green Org to Follow on Twitter, so they must know what they're talking about ;)
Missoula Tech Club is on Facebook, thanks to the organizing of Jeanette Russell.
Speaking of Tech Club organizers, our Austin Tech Club rock star, David Neff, went homeless for 48 hours with the Austin Mobile Loaves and Fishes guide. The only tech he took with him was his flip camera to document.
Looks like members FreeCause and Charity Dynamics have teamed up to combine fundraising and web 2.0 solutions for nonprofit orgs.
As Brett mentioned earlier, Nancy Schwartz is ready to hear your nonprofit's tagline. Submit by July 31st to be considered for the 2nd Annual Nonprofit Tagline Awards!
And last, but not least, the Bayer Center for Nonprofits transformed their summer tech camp messaging into a song and shared it via video. Apparently their marketing manager didn't like it. What do y'all think?
Documenting the Digital Divide
Flickr: ThomasBrandtFrom
the number of "out of office" replies I get anytime I send an email to
the NTEN community, it looks like we're well into vacation season. If
you're one of the lucky ones taking some vacation time to get out and
about this summer, the folks at iwith.org have an assignment for you:
Take your camera and shoot some pics that demonstrate the digital divide.
It's the third season for this Barcelona and Switzerland-based organization's digital divide photo contest, and you're invited to participate. They'll be accepting submissions all summer -- through September 20th -- and they'll publish the selected photos on their site starting September 27th.
Read full contest details here, and you can see the 2008 photos here.
Things We Like (June 2009)
A monthly roundup of our favorite nonprofit tech resources. Read more posts on our blog.
- Clay Shirky thinks the Iranian election protests are "the big one" for social media.
- Notice how we used quotation marks to, you know, quote somebody? That's what they're for. Everything else ends up on the "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks.
- Someday soon, you'll be able to type ON your hand, not just with it. And figure out if a brand of toilet paper matches your green ideals -- by pointing at it. The folks at MIT are up to some crazy stuff.
- What the heck is this thing? It looks like a giant face with feet. Sure is cute, though.
- Ever wonder what the Cloud everybody keeps talking about actually looks like? Turns out it's really heavy -- and consumes more electricity than Sweden.
- Michelle Murrain's up to something interesting: she defriended all of her nptech acquaintences on Facebook. She doesn't mention whether she installed Whopper Sacrifice first.
- The underground comedy movement on Amazon.com. Check this out. No, not the shirt (though it is quite splendid): the reviews of the shirt. They're hilarious. Then, go to the "Customers Who Viewed This Item Also Viewed" section to follow the writers to other products. One guy wrote a complete parody of Poe's "The Raven" to review a gallon of milk!
- Speaking of putting your excess free time to "good" use [Ed. note: Don't provoke me...], here's the Google Analytics interface laid out in wireframe on a single page, with links to descriptions of each report.
- Network for Good just came out with a new guide, "7 Steps to Better Email Fundraising and Communications". And Wired has the "Top 10 Ways to Provoke a Geek Argument". Bonus points to the first person to combine those memes. (Bonus points may be redeemed for one of our free webinars.)
- Two animal-themed links in one month? You lucky readers! There was just no way we could not link to video of apes laughing. If you don't feel good after watching that, you may be a curmudgeon.
2009 Nonprofit Tagline Awards
Ah, summer movie season, when studios try to cover up bad movies with even worse taglines. In the running for worst of the year so far (and this works better if you think in gravelly movie trailer announcer voice):
- Terminator Salvation: The End Begins
- The Crypt: Some Things Are Better Left Buried
- Life Is Hot in Cracktown: Be cool. Life is cool. You're so cool in Cracktown.
Yes, that last one is a real movie. But none of them rival Crank: High Voltage: "He was dead... but he got better."
And these are taglines from companies with millions of marketing dollars. Clearly, writing a good tagline is hard. How can nonprofits compete?
Pretty well, according to Nancy Schwartz. Last year, she found that 72% of nonprofit organizations don't even have a tagline or rate theirs as performing poorly. But she's trying to change that with her annual Nonprofit Tagline Awards.
You should take just a few minutes to enter your nonprofit's tagline today. (The deadline is July 31st.) Come on -- it's gotta be better than Crank's.
Google Grants Workshop
The Google Grants team has announced their very first grantee conference, to be held in early August at Google HQ in Mountain View. That's right: you'll get to learn how to maximize your AdWords account while visiting the mothership.
From the Google Grants blog:
During the event, grantees will have an opportunity to learn tips and tricks from successful grantees, attend AdWords seminars taught by in-house experts, and learn how to maximize Google for Non-Profits products. Our goal is to provide content for a diverse mix of attendees with different interest areas, locales, sizes, and levels of AdWords experience. In the typical Google spirit of making information accessible and useful, we will record this event and post the videos online after. So, even if you aren't able to attend, you won't miss a thing.
But are they running an AdWords campaign to promote the event?
Due to limited space, they're going to hold a lottery to select the invitees. You need to enter the lottery by June 30th, so I give you permission to hurt our bounce rate by going to sign up right now.
Lights, Camera, VOLUNTEER!
I'm in sunny San Francisco for the National Conference on Volunteering and Service this week. It's one of those events I'm delighted to speak at because volunteers are at the center of social change: It's the folks who pick up paintbrushes, organize community meetings, and meet with their elected officials who make so much good stuff happen.
The last few administrations have begun their terms by issuing calls to service, but it's never felt more real than now. Obama's call for service is being met with enthusiasm and engagement like I've never seen. I think they're doing a bang-up job of using media to drive the message home, leveraging media outlets from the TV networks to YouTube.
In fact, leveraging media is something many nonprofits need help with. The costs of video production and distribution are so low at this point, every nonprofit could become its own media channel -- if it knew how.
That's where you come in.
If you have a video camera and some know how, YouTube and the administration want you to become a Video Volunteer:
