CTOs for Good is a small group of chief technology officers (CTOs) at innovative nonprofits focused on scale and engagement.

In 2011, NTEN, with support from the Knight Foundation, convened the CTOs for Good forum and conducted follow-up interviews with the participants in order to document and share the group’s experiences and challenges.

The group addressed a number of issues over the course of the year, many of which are reflected in this white paper.

> Download the White Paper (PDF)

The Nonprofit Technology Network (NTEN) conducts an annual Community Survey to find out more about the individuals and organizations in the NTEN community: we want to find out how these individuals and organizations use technology in their work, gauge the impact of NTEN programs and services on their professional development and their organization’s missions, and track trends in the nonprofit technology community over time.

> Download the 2011 NTEN Community Survey Report

For many nonprofit organizations, as with the wider public and private business sectors, the last couple of years have been impacted by a general economic downturn. Did we see evidence of this in our annual Nonprofit IT Staffing & Spending survey conducted at the end of 2010? Well, yes and no.

Compared to previous years (this is our 5th year of conducting the survey), certain areas of investment did seem to drop. However, for the most part, investments in IT staffing and other areas stayed remarkably steady, and we even saw some year-over-year growth in some areas.

> Download the Report for Free

In the spring of 2010, NTEN contracted with Intentiō Consulting to develop a strategic plan. The primary component of the plan is the organization’s theory of change that provides a framework for NTEN to use in developing a strategically focused programmatic and operational plan for 2011-2014. The strategic plan is freely available to the NTEN community.

> Download the NTEN 2011-2014 Strategic Plan

There were four main elements of the strategic planning process:

1. Participation at the 2010 NTC
2. Stakeholder Input Collection 
3. Board and Staff strategic planning retreat in Portland, Oregon
4. Regular calls with the Strategic Planning Committee

This plan covers 2011-2014 and will be treated as a living document: it will be reviewed and revised as circumstances and context require. In particular, this plan is being developed during a time of great economic uncertainty for nonprofit organizations. NTEN will develop the corresponding implementation and operational plan in light of both its financial state and the broader economic state of the nonprofit sector.

> Download the NTEN 2011-2014 Strategic Plan 

The Nonprofit Technology Network (NTEN) conducts an annual Community Survey to find out more about the individuals and organizations in the NTEN community: we want to find out how these individuals and organizations use technology in their work, gauge the impact of NTEN programs and services on their professional development and their organization’s missions, and track trends in the nonprofit technology community over time.

> Download the 2010 NTEN Community Survey Report

The NTEN Community is made up of both dues-paying members (referred to as Members in this report) and program participants (Non-members), with just over 8000 individuals represented in membership and a total of more than 25,000 members and non-members engaging with NTEN programming and resources at the time the survey was conducted.

We received responses from 1,021 individuals in the spring of 2010. A majority of respondents were NTEN members (72% answered that they were members, 23% said they were not members, and 5% did not know whether they were members).

The second annual Nonprofit Social Network Benchmark Report, a joint project of Common Knowledge, thePort, and NTEN, has hard data and insights on the trends surrounding social networking technology as part of nonprofit organizations' marketing, communications, fundraising, and program services.

As it turns out, Facebook and Twitter really do count as work. That's right: the survey found that 86% of nonprofits have a presence on Facebook, and 60% are on Twitter, increased percentages over 2009 for both commercial social networks.

> Get the Full Report (for free)

We conduct an annual Community Survey to find out more about the individuals and organizations in the NTEN community, to learn about how they use technology in their work, and to gauge the impact of NTEN programs and services on their professional development and their organization’s missions.

> Download the Report

The NTEN Community is made up of dues-paying members and program participants, with just over 7000 individuals represented in membership and a total of 15,000 members and participants who engage with NTEN programming and resources.

We received responses from 1,000 individuals in the spring of 2009. A little over half of respondents were NTEN members (56.48% answered that they were members, 34.4% said they were not members, and 9.2% did not know whether they were members).

According to a survey conducted in March 2009 by NTEN, Common Knowledge, and ThePort, social networking has become an integral part of nonprofits’ online strategy. Of the 929 respondents to a survey, nearly three-quarters (74.2%) have a presence on Facebook, and 30.9% have one or more social networking communities on their own web site.

> Download the Social Network Survey Report

You'll also learn:

• Besides Facebook, which commercial social network sites are nonprofits using most?
• How many members do nonprofits have on their social network communities?
• How are nonprofits marketing their social network sites?
• Are nonprofits successfully getting revenue from social networks?
• How are nonprofit peers resourcing social networks efforts?

But don’t take our word for it. Download the report and read it yourself. It's free!

Staffing Information Technology is frequently a challenge for nonprofit organizations. Financial resources are typically limited, and hiring managers often feel overwhelmed and under-educated when it comes to IT. Determining where IT should fit into the organization, how many IT staff people are needed, and what those people should be spending their time doing can be difficult decisions.

In order to shed some light on these questions, NTEN and the Nonprofit Times teamed up to create the Nonprofit IT Staffing Survey. The results of this survey will be presented in two parts. The first report, "Nonprofit IT Staffing: Staffing Levels, Recruiting, Retention, and Outsourcing" focuses on the nature of IT staff and departments in nonprofits.

> Download the report for free!

Additional findings of the Nonprofit IT Staffing Report include:

Staffing the information technology (IT) function is frequently a challenge for nonprofit organizations. Financial resources are typically limited, and hiring managers often feel overwhelmed and under-educated when it comes to IT. Determining how much time and money to invest in information technology can be difficult decisions.

In order to shed some light on these questions, NTEN and the Nonprofit Times teamed up to create the Nonprofit IT Staffing Survey.

This second and final report covers "Budgets, Salaries, Training, and Planning".

> Download the report for free!