Due June 15! Tech Session Suggestions needed for #14NTC!

Social Media and Communications session suggestions out number the tech and tool session suggestions in mass quantities.

We need your help to get the NTEN Nonprofit Technology Conference to have a better Technology focus.

Here is some of the feedback that is listed on the NTEN website about what people are looking for:

More than 70% of 13NTC attendees surveyed identified as either managers or directors at nonprofits. More than 60% of that number also identified as intermediate or journey-level learners. When asked what kinds of content they're specifically looking for:

• 53% indicated they'd like to see an emphasis on technical how-tos
• 50% indicated they'd like to see an emphasis on programmatic uses of technology
• 40% indicated they'd like to see an emphasis on management strategy

I suggested sessions on:

1. Tech planning: When to use tactical vs strategic vs mission impact planning
2. How to process map

I would love to see some others that have experience suggest some of the following:

1. Working with technology consultants - how do you pick?
2. Using a managed network vs hiring your own network admin
3. My favorite Network and technology management tools: what do you use to monitor your network, run help desk, measure bandwidth, review capacity, audit security, etc?
4. Data mining and dashboards
5. Office365 vs Google Apps
6. Back to the basics on Project Management
7. The value of a technology committee (project review, peer advisory, etc)
8. Best practices in desktop support\management
9. BYOD and other policies needed for todays tech
10. Governance of all kinds, data, process, etc

Anyway, that is just my initial list, I am sure you have ideas, so go suggest them now!

But before you do! Be sure to read this awesome post from Peter Campbell about how to suggest a session.

Then go to NTEN and suggest your session! Before June 15, yeah, only 4 days left.

Prove me right about the YMCA!

I am no longer a YMCA member.

That is a strange phrase for me. I have been a YMCA volunteer, member, staff person for over 35 years. But with recent changes and management decisions that has changed. But I do not want to go down that road in this post.

Instead, I am hoping you can help me.

When the YMCA of the USA started it's rebranding process, it developed the strategy, worked with CEOs, consultants, key staff and whatever.  Then they worked with Marketing Depts and Leadership at local Y's to roll it out. They were trying to change the YMCA to be seen as a cause driven nonprofit, not a place to go.  But Marketing won't change that (in my opinion).

Ever since I started in the Y as a kid learning to swim and then becoming a volunteer as a Teen, I always knew the real mission impact was done by the program and membership staff at the local Y. It is the staff on the front lines working with the members that make the real difference. And these staff tend to be overworked and treated as just another employee by big Metro offices. These staff have the real power to change the YMCA image and impact. Not a new logo.

My theory has always been that the real power of the YMCA is the everyday staff. It is the lifeguard that takes time to high five a kid for getting in the water even though they were afraid. It is the Day Camp staff person that is purposeful about talking about Christian values, instead of barking orders about rules. It is Fitness Staff that encourage the Health Seeker by being realistic about body image, slow change and gradual progress. It is the Front Desk staff willing to chat with members and knowing the names of their kids. These are the YMCA Heros. These staff matter.

So what does that have to do with me not being a YMCA member? Well I still love the YMCA. I still cherish the friends I have made with other YMCA staff. But in the end, my YMCA career took turns that I didn't choose and now I am in a different place.

Over the years, I have collected mounds of YMCA logo stuff. Sweatshirts, T-Shirts, mugs, luggage tags, USB drives, etc. I want to share my collection with people who also love the YMCA and want to help me prove my theory right about the YMCA. The staff make the Y what it is.

My wife and her friend have started their own organization, Leap of Faith Arts Ministries (http://leapoffaithartsministries.org/). This organization embodies everything that the YMCA used to be for me, plus a strong emphasis on Worship which plays a larger role in my life today. Everything is focused on the mission and the kids in the program.  They are consistently asking themselves, what can we do to help these children learn to use their gifts to praise God and to know they are perfect just the way they are.

Kids today are under so much pressure to achieve, to be better than the rest, to rise above. What ever happened to having a heart eager to serve?

Image is everything. You have to have the right clothes, cars, house, cell phone, etc. Girls are encouraged to dress like they are 25 at age 5. Body Image is so distorted. Where is our sense of values?

Leap of Faith Arts Ministries is having a real impact on changing this. It isn't about the Arts that they learn, even though they are getting high quality, professional instruction. They are changing lives.

This is not some new start up though, Leap of Faith is new as a nonprofit, but has been around for years. They just recently went out on their own though. And this first year in their new building is proving financially challenging. They have a solid business plan for operations and funding through program and membership fees. However, they do want to go down the path of relying solely on charging more or running more programs to generate revenue to expand their impact.  They want to begin with a foundation of support from donors, so they can grow the program and not put a heavy burden of cost on the members.

This is their first attempt at real fundraising and we need your help to kick start it and show the board and parents that this is worth fighting for and raising money can be done.

So here is my ask. Can you show support for my wife's new org that is living out what I think is the best quality of YMCA staff today?

Here is the fun part. The first thirteen people that make a donation over $50 can get a Thank You in the form of random YMCA logo items. You will get one of the 13 piles in the picture below. Each contains some clothes and a random item.

Here are the rules:
1. Make a donation of $50 or over at http://leapoffaithartsministries.org/
2. If you would like the YMCA thank you, leave your name in a comment below in this blog post. I will get your address from the donation, so just your name, indicate you would like a "YMCA thank you" and any other thoughts in a comment. First 13 comments from people that live in the United States will get an pile of YMCA stuff shipped to them.

NOTE! so if you want to make sure you are one of the first 13, just count the comments below.

Here is another picture of all of the items.

Or if you would just like to show your support, you can make a donation or share this post with others. If you want to leave comments, without donating, that is welcome also. We also ask that you keep Leap of Faith in your prayers as they look to ensure their future growth and impact through their first fundraising efforts.

Thanks, Steve

Identify the Gaps #MMM Episode 3

2013 has been a year of documentation and process maps at work for me. I just can't stop thinking in flow charts. It has made me crazy enough to try another song.

That is right, get ready for sore ear drums for the May version of Monday Minute Movie. I know you have all been dying to see it since I did not do a #MMM in April.  As if anyone noticed.

Well here goes. My apologies.

And in case you actually wanted to learn something about Process Maps....

Outcomes is where "ITS" at! Or is it?

Metrics and outcomes are all the rage! 

Big data, improved systems, infographics, return on investment, grant reporting and more trends have pushed us to focus on the outcomes and metrics. Which as a Finance major, I love!

However, this weekend I was with my son at a swim clinic at the Y with Rebecca Soni and she got me thinking. She said something like (not an exact quote, paraphrased):

Know the outcome you want. But in the moment, focus on what you are doing, not the outcome.

This really made me appreciate my work at The Cara Program even more. We have an intense focus on outcomes and metrics. The numbers surround us each day. They are posted, they are talked about, they are emailed and everyone knows their part to make the number goals.

But at the same time, we are consistently living in the moment. Each morning we have motivations with our students, in which we celebrate the small achievements. 

I could ramble on with this thought, but I will just leave you to finish the thoughts in your own way on this one. 

All hands on deck! We Need MORE Staff! not.

“if we had more staff we would..

…engage better on social media!”
…create more content!”
…serve more clients!”
…analyze metrics and segment audiences!”

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We have all sat in breakout sessions where there are countless good ideas, perfect strategies and amazing resources. But there is always that group of people mumbling or outright yelling, we can’t do that, We DON’T have ENOUGH STAFF. Blah, blah, blah.

First, a big shout out to Kivi for an article that inspired my post! You should read it! Kivi always has terrific resources and her blog post on this topic is much richer in content. I hope I didn't overlap content too much. Some of our examples are similar, but I tried to come from the tech side.

While I will immediately acknowledge that many (if not all) nonprofits are under resourced, I do not think adding staff always solves problems. More staff = more politics, more management, more red tape, more, more, more, then you need more staff because you have more staff.

I think many of our challenges could be solved if we used a more important resource better, time. If we start to value each staff person’s time more than adding more staff, we may just solve some of the issues leading to the need for more staff.

Example 1: We need more staff to engage better on social media.

You can interpret this statement a few different ways. We don’t have a social media expert on staff, we don’t have time to manage all of those different channels, we don’t know where to start or we don’t even have a marketing staff. Whatever.

What I hear: Social Media is not a big enough priority for me to make time for it.

I would argue that this is a time issue, which could be solved with planning, a volunteer (or other staff) and tech.

1. Make time to create simple content plan (better yet, start with a template from a colleague, NTEN, Idealware, TechSoup or wherever)
2. Find someone with existing experience with social media (volunteer or staff) OR learn by DOING it, just find an easy place to start, then budget time to do it. If it is a priority you will find the time.
3. USE TECH! There are so many tools like Buffer, Hootsuite, etc that are free\cheap built to help you listen, engage post.

MOTTO: Don’t work harder. Work smarter. More staff may not fix it. Find existing experience and let the tech do the work.

Example 2: We need more staff to analyze metrics and segment audiences.

What I hear: we don’t care what our audiences want to hear, we just know what we want to tell them. (maybe a little harsh, but eh.)

I would argue that this is a time issue, which could be solved with planning, a volunteer (or other staff) and tech.

1. Make time to create a simple content plan and profile of your audience needs (better yet, start with a ideas from a colleague, NTEN, Idealware, TechSoup or wherever)
2. Find someone with existing experience with metrics and segmenting (volunteer or staff) OR learn by DOING it, just find an easy place to start, then budget time to do it. If it is a priority you will find the time. (Also check out the analysis exchange, free metrics help)
3. USE TECH! This one isn’t cheap but you can solve the segmentation with Tech. Tools like Informz or Higher Ground will do the segmenting, metrics, audience profiling and so much more for you. But you do have to pay for that. BUT that expense is still cheaper than the staff it would take to do it.

MOTTO: Don’t work harder. Work smarter. More staff may not fix it. Find existing experience and let the tech do the work.

Oh, wait, did I sorta say the same thing for both examples? Weird.

Maybe that is because that is what we do, we do the same thing over and over. We have a need, we hire more staff.

Before hiring, think about:
… your process, can it be improved?
… your staff skills, can they be trained?
… your tools, can tech solve the problem?
… your strategy, are you being purposeful?

I am not trying to say we need more tech and less people. I am saying, let's think through some of the challenges we are facing and think through all of the options.

What I learned at #13ntc

#13ntc was different than any other conference for me. With my new role as Manager of Technology at The Cara Program, I really focused more on the IT track at the conference. So here is what I got out of the conference this year! NOTE, I learned more than can fit in this single blog post, so watch for a series of posts after this with further thoughts.

#13NTCfoodie - Weds, April 10
At dinner I learned about the crazy things that Locale (an android app) can do. Detect where you are and redirect your Google voice number. Turn off notifications if face down. Basically you program it to take different actions based on your location or phone functions.

#13NTCbeer - Weds, April 10
OK, not sure I learned a lot. But got to reconnect with numerous great NPTech staff.

Breakfast Meeting - April 11
My wife and I met with Marc Pitman on a suggestion from John Haydon. Marc is famous for his book, Ask Without Fear, which I hope to buy and read. Marc is a fellow Christ Follower and has some amazing resources that tie stories in the Bible to fundraising strategies! We really hit it off and plan to connect again soon.

Welcome - Thurs, April 11
Some fun Minnesota facts, info and sayings, dontcha know. Minnesota had the first indoor mall? Nice because of all of the crazy snow. Don't they know it is spring?

IT Director Meet up - Thurs, April 11
Good conversations about challenges that IT Directors are facing. There was a lot of discussion around migration to the cloud and Office365. Interestingly enough there were staff in the room moving to the cloud and those moving off. It seemed that those with more custom needs and larger IT staffs wanted to move tech back in house. While those with limited staff were willing to live with the limits of the cloud to allow staff to focus on other needs.

We also had conversations about BYOD. There are real challenges with network security when you don't manage the devices. But another challenge is that if the device gets lost, we will want to wipe the device clean to avoid losing data\confidential information. Many orgs were having staff sign an agreement about wiping the device if lost. But when you actually do wipe it when it gets lost, then they find it, they aren't so happy.

Filmed a Movie Monday - Thurs, April 11
I was asked to be filmed for a Movie Monday about the role technology can play in fundraising.   I went on a bit of a RANT about how we throw people resources at some of our fundraising challenges because we either don't have or don't know about the technology that can do it for us. For example, we spend a lot of time on email segmentation and email list creation. There are tools that can automate that whole process. But we don't buy the better email blast solutions because they are too expensive. So we just continue to miss opportunity or force staff to waste time on work-arounds. I will let both of my blog readers know when mine is posted.


IGNITE! - Thurs, April 11
I gave an IGNITE session about how the Cloud is trying to KILL tech strategy. And for the first time ever... I sang it! These are 5 minute presos with with 20 slides that auto-advance every 15 seconds. NOT AN EASY TASK TO PRESENT, but so fun to watch. Watch mine on YouTube!

Opening Plenary - Fri, April 12
Quite controversial. Stirred a great conversation across the conversation.There were so many key points that Dan Pallotta made that I loved, I  paraphrased a couple below.

• Why don't we have a visceral reaction to, "it is good to make a salary while not helping people." But a NPO CEO with a big salary is a problem?
• NPOs criticized for spending on ads & taking risks and all failure is bad! How can we innovate within that?
• The concept of too much overhead NPOs limits the ability to have the overhead needed to grow to the scale needed for real impact!

I did not agree on the overall premise of his presentation. I would offer my opinions on this, but I am still thinking them through. But my gut reaction is that I do not like the glorification of Capitalism and make as much you can applied to social good.  Here are some smarter summaries and reactions:
http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/persistent_poverty_in_a_smug_meritocracy
http://www.tacticalphilanthropy.com/2008/12/uncharitable/
http://rootwork.org/blog/2013/04/uncharitable-how-businesses-co-opt-nonprofits-undermine-their-potential

But regardless of whether you agree with Dan, the plenary did the job of spurring buzz and conversation.

IT Governance - Friday, April 12
This session was one of my favorites in years! IT Governance definition - The essential organizational structures and processes that ensure that the organization’s IT sustains and extends the organization’s strategies and mission. (revised ITGI, 2012)

As IT gets more complex, tech ownership becomes disparate and information increases in value, you will need IT Governance to manage the structures and processes. 

Fantastic conversations about the changing role of IT, Mission Alignment, Process, Risk Management, Resource Management, Performance Measurement, Accountability and Value Delivery! The slides and the speaker, Matthew Eshleman - @meshleman, were great, but the conversation in the room was Awesome! Check out the slides!

Project Management - Friday, April 12
Battle Royal - Agile vs Waterfall! OK, not really, because at the end of the session there was a general consensus that both are valuable in the right situation.  And we came to the same consensus around the best Project Management tools, it just depends on your situation.  Here are a few key points:

• Project management is 90% communication. Best PM knows their audience & targets them with the right info. Project plans are just about managing steps, more importantly they help define what the project is. Project charters are a key. Boil the project down to the 2-3 key outcomes\goals. Expectations are everything in PM. 
• If I know exactly what the end product looks like, I use traditional project management, waterfall. If I see a lot of iterations, then agile. 
• Key to waterfall project management is the work-breakdown structure. Think about it in term of deliverables, those are your milestones. Agile project management prioritizes communication, constant review and collaboration over steps\dates. 
• RACI - Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed. Create a decision making process. 
• Sharepoint has many decent project management tools, task list, wikis, doc mgmt, calendar, communicate. Jira is an open source project management tool, from the makers or confluence. Hosted tools available. Greenhopper, Q&A are good add ext. Basecamp is cloud based agile tool. elegantly simple-but many of us need deeper tools. Match the Project Management tool to the audience, scope, size of team, detail needed, size of project. 

Morning Plenary - Sat, April 13

Fail Panel. Beth Kanter hosted a panel to celebrate embracing failure. Last year this panel talked about innovation and they ended it by talking about the need to allow for failure to be able to innovate.

I really enjoyed the concept of learning from failure and not hiding it. I loved the concept of budgeting for failure, set up a specific amount of your org's time to experiment in ways that are more risky but could have big potential while still managing that risk.  Love these phrases:

Failure is not the opposite of success, failure is a step in the process of success.

Embracing failure is not the same as accepting failure.

There is a difference between failing and being a failure.

How long before failure is connected to PUPPIES? How do puppies learn? Lots of accidents.

I am not a complete convert to Celebrating Failure though. New word for failure: my thought, not the optimal result but success is clearer now.  At some point in the panel I just felt like they turned a corner where talking about failure so much really seemed like success wasn't possible.

Read Beth's blog post on this plenary, Seriously, Do it NOW.

Nonprofit Leadership and IT - Sat, April 13

The only constant of technology and the role of IT is constant change.  The panel in this session rocked the house with their experience, thoughtfulness and expertise.  Here are some key points:

IT should represent the full org.  The role of IT is to change the way we work and the way we deliver our services. Bring insight into the unknown that tech brings. Everything is radically shifting as mktg/comm, fundraising, program service & full org collides w/tech! We work to integrate it. IT can see business processes that existed forever, that just don't make sense. But you have to carefully change, no blame.

IT should have vision.  Data, systems, infrastructure, communication tools, tech impacts everyone, so why not include them in planning conversations. The role of IT is often being the person in the room that says:"hey did you think about? Vision. If nothing else IT director needs to be known for having vision. Earn the right to be at the table.

IT should be at the leadership level. IT needs to be at the "C" level because so many IT projects require org change, peer support & policies. ALL organizational change REQUIRES technology to support it. So why would you not have tech represented at the "C" level? If IT isn't at the "C" level then they may not be seen as peers in leadership and may be given the same access and authority to have impact.

How can you have a Brand Voice without and Internal Conversation - Sat, April 13

Dan Michel from Feeding America and myself presented on the need to provide resources to your staff to enable them to use the brand voice. It was a fun session! Dan kicked it off sharing the new brand voice that Feeding America is launching for all of the Food Banks in the network. They did a lot of research on the right voice and are making every effort to get buy in.  They are using their extranet, webinars, in person events, emails and more to get it out there.

I then shared some information about the recent YMCA rebranding. There was some unknown work that was created to change the image of the YMCA from a place to go to a cause driven org. We worked at the Chicago Y to use the rebranding to enable the membership and program staff at our Ys to create digital content. But to top it off, I ended with the amazing passion and buy-in that the staff at The Cara Program. They have taken every effort to put the mission first, share stories consistently, live by mission metrics and so much more! I LOVE it!

Read the session notes

Geek Games! - Sat, April 13

Dodgeball. Karaoke. Legos. The conference ended with me and Shannon hosting the Karaoke at the first ever Geek Games. I was fearful of noone singing and I would have to do it, but WHAT! WHAT! NTC got talent! So many awesome singers and we had a blast! And only 1 injury in Dodgeball, Shannon got to fulfill a dream by asking "is there a doctor in the house?" on the mic. Kudos to the singers!

The Cloud. Our Hero. (My #13ntc IGNITE session)

There are no words for this.  In this version you do miss out on my wig and stage presence, but hey whatever.


An IGNITE presentation is 5 minutes, 20 slides, 15 seconds per slide and the slides auto advance. Not easy.