1. Very little technical knowledge is required in order for nonprofit CEOs to participate actively in strategic IT planning.
As long as you thoroughly understand your organization's overall mission, strategy, and tactics and (are willing to learn a little bit about the technology), you can keep your information technology infrastructure on target... more »
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Saturday, January 23
Ten things (just ten!) that every nonprofit executive needs to know about information technology
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Sat 23 Jan 2010 11:01 AM EST
Sunday, January 24
ResourceMatcher.Org - what are we waiting for?
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Sun 24 Jan 2010 03:32 PM EST
Wednesday, January 13
Searching and aggregating online answers to frequently asked nonprofit management questions
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Wed 13 Jan 2010 10:30 PM EST
Thursday, January 7
A cash grant and in-kind donation opportunity from C3 Conferencing
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Thu 07 Jan 2010 07:34 PM EST
 C3 Conferencing, which provides audio, video, and web conferencing services for nonprofits, has just announced a program that combines $2,500 in cash with $2,500 in in-kind donations for enhancing communications... more » Saturday, December 19
Compiling the "Directory of Awesome" - Online tools for resource matching and capacity matching to assist nonprofit, philanthropic, and community-based organizations
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Sat 19 Dec 2009 11:14 AM EST
 As readers of my blog know, I'm working with an informal brain trust of nonprofit, philanthropic, and technological professionals who are focusing on online tools that assist nonprofits and philanthropies with capacity mapping and resource matching. I'm currently compiling a directory for the brain trust of projects that are relevant to the topic... more » Tuesday, November 10
Grantmakers, Grantees, and Tweeters for the Common Good
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Tue 10 Nov 2009 07:32 PM EST
 MNN has recruited me to be its official twitterer (or should I say "tweeter?") for "Grantmakers and Grantees for the Common Good" conference, an assignment that I relish... more » Thursday, October 15
It's Blog Action Day - time to take action on climate change
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Thu 15 Oct 2009 12:00 AM EDT
 October 15th is Blog Action Day, and this year's theme is climate change. I'd like to take this opportunity to call attention to the perspective of an esteemed client of mine, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War... more » Monday, September 28
What if? A thought experiment for Beacon Hill
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Mon 28 Sep 2009 09:50 PM EDT
 When Joseph Porcelli volunteered for my eHope crew, it became well-nigh inevitable that I would inexorably be drawn into a position as a volunteer evangelist for his online nonprofit social network, Neighbors For Neighbors... more » Thursday, May 21
eHope: I'm not just a fan!
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Thu 21 May 2009 03:06 PM EDT
 When I first heard about eHope, over a year ago, I was excited! Here was yet another great example of how face-to-face relationships, online networking, and heightened awareness of the importance of social capital could be combined in powerful ways. Jeffrey Wood, eHope's founder, is a visionary who is bringing all this together to help communities support people who are facing life-threatening illnesses. I lost no time in calling him up and arranging for him to be a featured guest at the Ethos Roundtable. He came down from Maine to Cambridge for the Ethos session, and impressed us all not only with the wisdom of the eHope model, but with his own spiritual depth. As many readers of my blog know, I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 1999. There was no such thing as eHope at that time, so I got by with a lot of help from my wonderful and supportive friends, but the coordination involved was an extra source of stress. For ten years, there's been no recurrence of cancer, but recently tests confirmed that I have a minor malignancy, and will need surgery. I'm one of the lucky ones - my condition is not at all life-threatening. However, I've been worrying about all the logistics involved in surgery and after care. Yesterday, it occurred to me that I should ask my buddy Jeffrey for some coaching about how I could set up an eHope "Lite" version for myself, so that I could do some of the coordination online. He very graciously called me up today, and offered to work with me to set up a full-fledged eHope community; it turns out that I'm eligible, even though I'm not based in Maine and am not facing a terminal illness. So now, I'm not just a fan - I'm going to be a client! This is not just a boon for me, but an opportunity to bring eHope to the greater Boston area and raise a wider awareness of what it offers. Monday, May 11
Thanks to Yves Dehnel, Easy Peasy provides a solution, although not as easily as I would have thought
by
Deborah Elizabeth Finn
on Mon 11 May 2009 04:29 PM EDT
 Yves Dehnel of Tech Networks of Boston is my new hero. As readers of my blog know, I bought an Asus Eee PC 900 in July, but have run into obstacles in trying to use it in my habitual way. After Twittering about it, blogging about it, going online to various nonprofit technology communities, posting a plaintive request for help to GetSatisfaction, and - yes - even after checking with Asus customer support, I still couldn't install any new drivers or applications on my Asus netbook, and therefore I couldn't use my AT&T mobile broadband with it. Several people suggested that the version of Linux that comes installed on the Asus Eee PCs as an operating system (Linux Eee PC 1.1.0.66) is very tightly locked down, and that I should replace it with a version of Ubuntu for netbooks called Easy Peasy. Well, I tried, but I couldn't figure out how to do it. I'm one of those folks who thinks that "computer literacy" in any generic form is a myth, and I try to be brave and admit it when an IT-related task is beyond me. Having admitted that I couldn't get Easy Peasy installed on my Asus, I took the radical step of mentioning my problem in a face to face conversation. The ever-helpful Tuan Pham of Tech Networks opined that he could probably find someone, and that someone turned out to be my buddy Yves Dehnel, also of Tech Networks. It turns out that installing Easy Peasy is a three-step simple process, albeit a slight different one than what is described on the download page: Drop off your Asus at Yves's shop. For me, the real work began at that point: settling down to the effort of acclimating myself to the Easy Peasy operating system and an Asus keyboard.Take a phone call from Yves a couple of hours later, so that he can inform you that he's done it. (Don't forget to thank him profusely.) Return to his shop, and spend a few minutes with him, tweaking the settings so that your Sierra 881 USB connector card works with the Asus. (Don't forget to thank him profusely, once again.) When I first wrote about my Asus notebook, I said: "If
I had to make the purchase from scratch today, I'd probably choose a
newer, cheaper model in the Asus Eee PC line, and I'd opt for Windows
XP as the operating system, just to ensure ease of connectivity." This is still true. I would never recommend an Asus with a Linux operating system for use in a nonprofit where the staff members weren't burning with curiousity to see for themselves what open source platforms are all about. It's too much trouble for folks who have enough to do with nonprofit programs and operations. An Asus loaded with XP as an operating system would do the job. But speaking just for myself, I'm glad to have the opportunity to live and work with an open source operating system, especially if colleagues and buddies such as Yves are willing to get my back. (Full disclosure of financial relationship: TechNetworks of Boston is a client of mine, and I bartered my services in exchange for Yves's. Had I been a paying customer, I would have been charged about $150, which I consider very reasonable.) |
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