Chatterbox : philanthropy

The Nonprofit Technology Community

Lindsey Robbins — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 18:12:00 GMT

Wow, for a geek, I'm sitting here even more geeked up (especially for a Monday). I recently found out this blog is included on the Nonprofit Technology website as a blog source.

Nonprofittech.com is a website that was started by Beth Kanter as a way to bring together bloggers and others to create a content community. This community makes it easier to find and organize good content around use of technology by nonprofits. Tony Karrer, CEO of Techempower coordinates new content and works with Beth to moderate the site.

So yeah, I'm feeling pretty great that not only do I have a forum through Blackbaud to help out nonprofits with technology *stuff* but now a wider audience can read my blogs. No pressure eh? I'm more into the idea that we can lean on each other as we learn, explore, and hopefully master how to use social media and technology to our advantage. After all, when you want to help people like those in the nonprofit community do, you can use all the help you can with or without hard economic times.

Thanks to Beth and Tony for creating such a great resource. I know I'm going to look forward to all the learning opportunities.

Co-Authoring in Microsoft SharePoint

Lindsey Robbins — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 20:55:00 GMT

Authoring in SharePoint – a world unto its own for those of you brave enough to venture into adding web parts, setting up sites and workspaces, and playing around with site settings. I find it’s often more like a treasure hunt than a systematic process. I’m not entirely complaining; I have had the opportunity to keep some skills fresh including the creation of a wiki for my team’s internal documentation.

However, I’ve been thinking recently about SharePoint and the concept of community or team authoring. I find if you’re tasked with authoring a SharePoint site, at minimum get regular feedback and at best get a couple of co-authors. Why?

Well as an example, another fun role I have at Blackbaud is on a voluntary team of employees who promote philanthropy and volunteerism within the organization. Participating on Team Blackbaud – Charleston is rewarding in so many ways but especially within context of our corporate value that Service to Others Makes the World a Better Place.

One of my fun tasks for Team Blackbaud – Charleston has been to update our SharePoint website. We encourage opportunities to volunteer, recognize employees’ philanthropic achievements, and promote our philanthropic quarterly initiatives. We need to educate, advertise, and encourage participation. But, for a while I was the only one working on the page. I’m not saying I’m terrible at SharePoint web design but I did learn that if you only have one perspective (and limited time to devote to the site) you can quickly find yourself on a sinking ship. We started off small and received input. However, with every quarter we kept adding content to our page. A year later and we suddenly had this lightbulb moment where we realized the page wasn’t working for us. It wasn’t achieving the desired result.

How to clean up an out of control page?

#1 – Get a couple people to thoroughly evaluate the website including an evaluation of what the desired result would be. If you have some subject matter experts in design, by all means solicit their help.

#2 – Find Help! We decided to change this position on Team Blackbaud – Charleston this year from one person to two. And instead of being the main contributer, I’m stepping back to a more supportive role. If you work on something too long, you can easily lose that fresh perspective.

#3 – Don’t let a page sit static for too long, keep the feedback ongoing and the content engaging.

#4 – If all else above fails, just delete everything and start from scratch. Seems drastic but if your site isn’t being used because it’s so unfriendly, then what do you really have to lose?

If we have some success re-inventing our site, I’ll be sure to share our results with you.

In the meantime, remember that your time and skills can be just as valuable to a nonprofit as your wallet!

Supporting Your Causes in Facebook

Lindsey Robbins — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 19:58:00 GMT

I noticed this week that Causes in Facebook seem to have improved their ease of recruiting. I was recruited to a couple of my favorite local nonprofits and in return could invite others all without much effort. The other nice part about Causes in Facebook? Once you invite someone and they join, you can thank them! We all like thank you’s and it shows that you appreciated someone supporting your causes. The value of social networking – shared philanthropy and hope of making the world a better place.

Other Causes features I love:

Easy to Feature the cause on your profile (on your wall, info, and boxes tabs)
When you thank or recruit someone, it can show up in yours and their news feed. From the news feed, people can click to join, view, or invite people to the cause.
Hall of Fame for top recruiters – recognition!
Media Board to share links, photos, and videos
Discussion Board and Wall to spark conversations.
Easy to Donate!
And lots more, check out http://apps.facebook.com/causes for more information and to see how you too can make an impact. Halos and Fields to Families are great examples of two small nonprofits jumping into social meda!

A Day of Caring

Lindsey Robbins — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 14:38:00 GMT

When does social media not matter? I found out that answer for myself yesterday when I participated in United Way’s Day of Caring. Groups of Blackbaud employees, organized by our awesome Corporate Relations and Philanthropy team, dispersed into the community to help our local nonprofits.

I was part of a team assigned to the Lowcountry Food Bank. The Lowcountry Food Bank is an amazing organization who’s mission is to feed the poor and hungry of the ten coastal counties of South Carolina. They are currently in construction on a new warehouse in Charleston where they are going to be able to grow and help even more people in need through education and feeding the hungry.

My fun assignment was to pull and cut vines and trees off a fence at the back of their new property as well as rake the debris from the ground near the fence. They even gave me some shears, crazy huh? And even though I did battle with some sharp vines that left me scarred today, I loved every minute of the physical task. It wasn’t about social media, software, or technology. It was about doing one small task to give back. Eventually, they are going to be able to use the reclaimed fence to grow fruits and vegetables. How cool!

I’m so thankful Blackbaud encourages us to live what we believe. Yesterday was such an awesome opportunity to really get involved and directly help a nonprofit. And, we in turn were given a tour and educated on the mission of their organization. Now, I want to volunteer there more!

I hope everyone else was able to do something philanthropic for Day of Caring and if not, every day can be a day of caring. After all, volunteering rocks!