Tech Tips for EDs: 5 Must- Have Tools

MUST-HAVE TOOLS FOR EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS from holly ross nten’s executive director As an Executive Director, I especially love talking to other leaders about technology. No matter what prompts the conversation though, it almost always circles back to the same place: productivity. For the ED, the ultimate win for technology comes when we get even 1% more efficient. That’s all it takes. See how easy we are to please? So, for my fellow nonprofit leaders, here are the technology tools I can’t live without.

1Evernote – As the leader, I have a lot of things to keep track of – from human resource to program to fundraising to, well, technology. It’s exacerbated by the fact that it’s a 24/7 job. I have some of my best ideas while washing dishes, and I find some of the best sites while on the train. Evernote lets me organize files, web sites, pictures, audio, and notes, from any device. If I see conference signage I want Anna to use at the next NTC, I snap a picture and save it in my NTC notebook. If I find a great article on IRS cell phone reimbursement policies,

5I can clip it straight from the browser into my Operations notebook. I can retrieve these items from my phone, my tablet, my laptop, or any computer with a browser. 2Dropbox – Did I already mention that this is a 24/7 job? Another resource that lets you work on the files you want, when you want, is Dropbox. I save all my presentations into Dropbox, so I can download and edit them on any computer or tablet. I can also email a link to the file to anyone else, like a collaborator on the document or a staff member that needs a copy.

3Expensify – No more lost receipts – and automagical expense reports! That is all, and that is enough.

4Tripit – If you travel more than once a month, you need TripIt. TripIt organizes all your travel information into a cohesive file for each trip, keeping your confirmation numbers and locations all in one place. It works on a computer, tablet, or on your phone. It can even send you text message travel updates and reminders.

5Spotify – OK, it’s not about productivity, per se. But FLICKR CREDIT: LOVEBUGSTUDIOS streaming KClark’s new album always makes me work a little faster. As a nonprofit leader, what technology tools make you more productive? Share your suggestions with us!

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hoW do you encouraGe your orG to fail informatively?

“Failure is success if we learn from it. ” —Malcolm Forbes

Failing informatively – deliberately learning from experiences in order to guide decisions – can help a nonprofit better meet its mission. The challenge of failing informatively is really about shifting the game: expect to fail, and plan ahead so that failures are small, early, and frequent, rather than big, late, and disruptive.

The nonprofit sector is, generally speaking, reluctant to discuss failure. This reluctance is symptomatic of a larger problem: the inability to have a learning conversation with all the key stakeholders, including funders and program officers, nonprofit field staff, and executive leadership, about the failure of a specific program or project. Avoiding admitting failure is a natural human instinct. However, unless organizations are able to talk about failure in an open, honest space, they will be doomed to repeat the mistakes of their past, and possibly the mistakes of other organizations as well. Case in point: we put out a call to the NTEN community to share nonprofit technology failure stories, and got exactly zero responses.

Failure is key to learning and growth. Of course, not all failures are created equal. Experimenting with a new content management system by migrating your whole website before testing it can be a recipe for disaster, for example. But there is such thing as a good failure. In our experience, a “good nonprofit technology failure” is a learning experience that provides the basis for future growth, efficiency, and impact, without negatively impacting your organization.

As a rule of thumb, fail early and often. Work with people who are open to failing, and embrace the idea of risktaking. Take educated risks early on in a project, knowing that some of them will fail. When they do, acknowledge the failures, make a point of reflecting on what you can learn from them with a minimum of judgment, move on, and try again.

The only way to never fail is to never try anything new. Technology changes are by definition new – whether it’s

new to the whole organization, to one department, or just to a handful of individuals. And taking on that new thing, whether it’s starting to use social media or implementing a new donor management system, involves some risk. There is no way to completely eliminate any possibility of failure. So what’s a nonprofit to do? The best way to address the possibility of failure is to try to mitigate it somewhat, but mostly to embrace it.

What that means is that you have to create safe spaces to fail in your organization, and safe spaces to talk about failure. You can try this in small ways at first: hold a departmental meeting and make it clear that any information that is divulged at the meeting a) stays with the participants in the meeting and b) won’t be used punitively. In fact, you can even provide an award for the greatest failure—provided that the story of the failure is accompanied by an explanation of lessons learned, and how whatever caused the failure won’t be repeated.

Once you start to make it clear that your organization won’t punish informative (early) failures, you can start to encourage people to share their lessons learned more broadly within the organization so that others can learn from small, early failures.

Creating safe spaces to talk about failure:

• Safe spaces are judgment-free. It’s about the lessons

learned, not assigning blame. • Model discussing failure. Be the first one to talk about failure openly. Make sure to share a key lesson learned. • Root cause analysis: try to get beyond the symptoms and get to the heart of the failure. Try using a “fishbone diagram” or the “5 whys method” to identify the various facCREATE SAFE tors that went into your failure. SPACES TO FAIL • Maintai parency n is confidentialit best. Don’t air y di wh rty en lau necessary, ndry unnec but transessarily, but IN YOUR ORG, share lessons the sector at l learned arge. broadly in your organization and in AND SAFE • Stakehol involved de at r involveme the table so nt. It’s the dis helpful cussion to h can ave all parties be productive SPACES TO TALK and substantive. ABOUT FAILURE. an Imagine a d lessons nonprofit sec learned were tor sh in which technology ared broadly so that fail no ures two organizations ever had to make the same mistake. While that vision might be utopic, you can start by creating safe spaces within your organization to talk about technology failures and what you have learned from them. Marc Baizman, My Computer Guy Nonprofit Technology Consulting, @mbaizman Dahna Goldstein, PhilanTech, LLC, @philantech

How does your organization encourage “failurefriendliness”? Please email publications@nten.org with your answers. (We’ll keep them anonymous if you like!) Or: Share your tips, examples, and questions at http://facebook.com/nten.org