0:00  
Hello, everyone. Welcome to the exchange stage. We are thrilled to welcome Beth Kanter and Alison Fine. They are co authors of the book this smart nonprofit. We are really excited for you all to hear what they have to say. And I cannot wait to get them started with introductions. Beth, you want to tell us a little bit about yourself? And

0:20  
your look up? Sure. My name is Beth Kanter. And I'm an author, facilitator, and speaker and I've worked in the nonprofit sector for several decades now. And I work in the area of workplace well being and digital transformation.

0:39  
Very cool. Thank you so much for being here. Allison, tell us a little bit about yourself.

0:44  
So like Beth, I've spent my entire career in the social sector. I had first career in program evaluation, founded an organization Innovation Network, and a second career starting in the early 2000s. At the intersection of digital tech and social good. Beth and I have written two books together the network nonprofit in 2010. And this year, the smart nonprofit, which we're here to talk about,

1:10  
we are really excited to talk about this book, The Smart nonprofit, I know, we've seen some really fascinating conversations around some of the topics you touch on. So before we really dive into how people can use these these smart tags. Can you tell me, Allison, a little bit about what smart tech is, what it does and what it includes?

1:32  
Sure. So smart tech is the next chapter in digital technology. It describes a family of technologies that includes artificial intelligence, machine learning robots, voice activated software. And what it does is it is technology that makes decisions for and instead of people. And it does that by sifting through enormous Library of Congress sized datasets to look for patterns and make predictions. It's not brand brand new technology. Places like NASA, I have been working on this for decades. It is the kind of technology that is powering Amazon and Google. What's different about this moment in time, Abigail, is that the technology over the last couple of years has become much less expensive, and much more powerful. So that everyday organizations, small and medium sized nonprofits are now in a position to grab software off the shelf that has smart tech built right into it and put it into any part of their organization, right we have products that are going to be in fundraising and accounting and communications and service delivery, that will include smart tech. And the challenge is how to use it well and responsibly and ethically. And that's why we wrote the book.

3:00  
That is a really fascinating thing. I never thought about AI or anything like that being a part of fundraising. What are some some like practical applications of something like AI in fundraising or bookkeeping or some of those areas you touched on? I'll give that one I guess to Beth, that's a hard question.

3:26  
Sure. Well, you know, as ALlison mentioned, that the technology is becoming democratized. And it is accessible to even small nonprofits, because the cost is less. And there are many different ways in which smart tech can be applied to the ways that nonprofits do their work. It's an all aspects of their of the way they operate. So it could be the back office, there and this is a big area. Everybody's hiring these days because of the great resignation. There are a lot of smart tech tools that can help automate and facilitate the hiring process. There are some challenges and Allison will talk about those in a minute. Generating financial expense expense reports, analyzing budgets, smart tech is sort of powering a lot of those tools to kind of remove kind of the grunt work and to make us more efficient. A big area of course, is fundraising and and in donor databases. Smart Tech can be used to automate some of the research tasks or some of the analysis tasks to find the donors that are most likely to make a gift or that are in danger of lapsing and might need some additional caring and cultivation. And what smart tech can do. It doesn't take the donors out to lunch, but it can help remove some of the logistical and research and desk work that just takes so much time and it's so exhausting and really can help fundraisers really shift into their focus onto the donor and relationship building. Another smart tech application and fundraising is the use of bots. And bots are as we know, we're all familiar with bots if we bought a pair of sneakers online or something, or tried to do a bank transaction, but bots can also be used to act as an information concierge is to donors and get them the right information at the right time, or get them to a human and, and the benefit for smaller organizations. They don't have the staffing to have a person there to answer questions 24/7. But a bot can do that if it's designed carefully. And we'll talk a little bit about that in a moment. So there's all different ways that nonprofits can use this technology in all areas of their operation, but as Allison said, it has to be used well, ethically and responsibly.

5:55  
Absolutely. Allison, do you want to kind of dig into some of those challenges around adopting smart tech and using it ethically and responsibly? Sure,

6:05  
sure. So this is really a fundamentally different kind of technology Abigail than we've ever had at our disposal. You know, oftentimes, when we tell people we want to talk about smart tech and AI, they say, oh, you know, we've, we're drowning in digital tech, we've been there, you know, don't tell us it's going to make life better. That's the last chapter, right. So the last chapter of digital tech, email and social media made us busier than ever. But not necessarily smarter, and certainly not healthier, as Beth knows, well, she's an expert, and happy and healthy organizations. And it got us to the point where today, it is on, on not at all unusual for a person to check their email 74 times a day, that's just a prescription for crazy making. So smart tech, is moving us to hopefully a newer place where the technology can take over rote tasks, it can do the prospect researching that Beth just mentioned, or it can reconcile the books automatically. So that doesn't become a huge effort. It can screen resumes, it can do a whole bunch of things that takes up an enormous amount of time and energy, leaving people to do what we do best. Build relationships, tell stories, solve problems, be empathetic, be deeply, deeply human. But in order to do that, Abigail, it's important to understand that we can't just leave the technology set it and forget it, right. It needs to be overseen by people, we need to be very careful about having for instance, clients only interacting with bots and and the bots not really understanding what you know, a person's problems might be with be super careful about how we use people's data. You know, we're drowning in data. Now, it's going to be even more data with smart tech. And we have not shown as a sector, that we're particularly adept yet at taking care of people's privacy. And we have to make sure that systems that have bias built into them. And that is almost all of smart tech aren't unexplored. And I can expand on that a little bit. So for instance, if you bought a smart tech system to screen resumes, right, and you might say, here are the skills that we're looking for in the geography that we're looking for in the educational level that we're looking for. It is also likely though, that that HR screening tool is biased against women and against people of color, because most likely a white man programmed it. And then they tested it on datasets, where white men were largely selected for positions. So you grab it off the shelf, it comes with these biases, you put it into practice, you're paying forward decades of historic bias unless you deeply understand what the technology is and how to use it well. So when we talk about ethical and responsible use, that's the kind of thinking and knowledge that we're talking about,

9:20  
oh, that's fascinating. I always kind of thought of AI and similar tools as being very cold and not influenced by human biases. But that is very obviously not the case. So we've talked a lot today about some of the ways smart tech can improve our efficiency. It can free up time for nonprofit staff to do different things like tell stories and be human. Are there any additional benefits to smart tech that we maybe haven't considered or is the primary benefit that level of efficiency? And Beth I'd love to hear your thoughts on that.

9:56  
I think one of the big dangers and why We call this a leadership challenge, not a technical problem is the fact that if we get so focused on efficiency, and we're using this technology to just do more faster, that's going to defeat the whole purpose and transforming our organizations to be more human centered and, and really to develop those relationships with donors. And while we're reading this book and interviewing different nonprofit leaders, we actually heard saw the wheels turning, like, oh, well, if we use this technology, can we reduce headcount? So we have to really stay away from you know, the the drive to use this for efficiency and to just to do more, but faster, because, you know, in the last two years, three years now, with the pandemic, we've been through a lot, right, this whole transformation have been all of a sudden having to pivot to be online distributed work, and now this kind of COVID whiplash, are we going back into the office are we staying at home, and people being forced to, like, constantly adapt the way they're working people exhausted, right, and we have these back to back zoom meetings, and, and something's going to get right. And so we really need to you have smart tech be a lever, we need culture change, we need a lot more other things along with this lever, really to to make work. Work more spacious, right? So people not that time to, to reflect, to be knowledgeable, to build those relationships to do all those human things. I was just teaching a workshop, and I do a lot of work of workplace well being work life balance, and we're talking about multitasking. And if you know anything about multitasking, it's a you know, it's a myth, right? Multitasking, really, you're not really doing two things at once your your brain is just switching between the two things, and that switching, it's what causes the exhaustion, and then you're not giving your full attention to any of the tasks and you're not doing your best work. And then you end up at the end of the day being exhausted. And so I asked him, Well, why are you multitasking? Because there's so much to do, and we have to get it done. And there's more coming, we can't wait, you know, and we said, Stop. Right? So I think that smart tech, not just alone, but along with leadership support. And a real focus on changing the culture and the way that we do our work. So it is more human centered, can really have a transformative effect on on the nonprofit sector.

12:36  
I love that line about keeping it human centered. And I'd love to hear Allison, some some of the examples that you included in your book, can you share some of the way nonprofits have used this smart tech to be more human?

12:55  
Sure, sure. And I'll I'll start with an example. And then Beth has a couple of great ones she can add as well. So in the opening chapter of our book, we talk about talking points, which is an app created by EJ Lim, a woman in San Francisco to translate the communications between teachers and parents for whom English is not their native language. Because this turns out to be a critical data point for student achievement, right if you need parents to be engaged and be able to communicate with teachers. And so he just did this in all the ways that we recommend that smart nonprofits work, she made sure that it's always human centered, meaning she's in constant conversation with the end users of the technology to make sure that they are seen and heard and it's enhancing their humaneness. And she started slowly, in 2016, with a small pilot project, one teacher, several dozen parents, and they were literally by hand translating these conversations by text, and began to program the system. And, you know, AI and smart tech are, you know, unique in that they learn over time and improve over time. But they continue to make sure that they have human facilitation available, because that communication is so critically important. You have to make sure jargon and cultural issues don't get in the way to the point where today talking points is interpreting conversations between 6 million teachers and parents. It is a magnificent use of technology to improve the medical educational outcomes for kids who might have been left behind otherwise. So that's one example. Beth can tell us about the Trevor Project. Oh, sure. So

14:53  
your audience may be familiar with the Trevor Project, which provides crisis counseling to LGBTQ+ people. And they had a problem, that they had more youth in crisis coming to them needing counseling than they had counselors to deliver that service. And the counselors are all volunteers, but they're trained in this special method of providing counseling to these young people. And so they asked the question the organization did, how might we use smart tech, you know, to help us scale, right. And so, if they just immediately didn't give it a lot of thought, and didn't think about the most human centered way to do this, they might think of like, let's use a chat bot, and let's have it deliver the the counseling service on the front line. But they realized that would be human centric, because it can be potentially deadly. We've all heard of stories of chatbots gone awry. I think one of the most famous one is from a large tech company that put a chatbot on Twitter, its name was Tay, the purpose was, how to learn how to interact with young people. And it was one of those smart bots that learns through interaction. And within 24 hours, they turned it into a racist, troll, swearing racist straw, and it had to be taken down. So the Trevor Project wanted to be really careful in the way that they use this technology to solve the problem. So they, after talking to a lot of the end users, and to the potential counselors, and the staff, they said, well, our problem is, is that we don't have enough staff to deliver the training. So that we have more counselors, can't we use a bot to help train these counselors. So they took a lot of the interactions, and a lot of this counseling is done through text or online. So they took sample conversations stripped it of all the privacy information. And that was the data that was then used to create this bot that's only used in very controlled circumstances, to train counselors. And what this did is it shifted the staffs time from delivering the training, which is very time intensive, to really overseeing quality control in those who were trained, which allow them then to scale. So this is a great example because it shows that the importance of taking a human centered approach, and to go slowly, you know, this is not something this technology is not something that we just grab off the shelf and do and solve a problem. We have to be more reflective, knowledgeable and prepared.

17:38  
That is a beautiful example. And you're right. I mean, I am not as aware of these technologies as you do. And I do still think of Tay when I think of AI and seeing that the Trevor Project was so intentional about how they use their tools and thought through all of the different obstacles or circumstances that may arise is beautiful. And it sounds like there are some steps that nonprofits can take before they even start using these technologies to make sure they use them. Well. That can you share a little bit about how nonprofits can prepare to use this technology well, and how they can kind of get ready and get started.

18:18  
I'm sure I'll start and Allison can jump on and build on it. So in the book, we have a framework called Ready, set, go. And the approach of this technology is different than we wrote a book called The Network nonprofit about 12 years ago, and that was about social media. And then we were encouraging people jump in experiment, fail fast. And I think it's a little different with this technology is that you have to go slowly, because we don't have too much time. And I know this feels like an extra step, especially for small nonprofits. But it's best to approach this technology in that way. I think about a quote from Laurie Anderson, from a recent exhibit she did at the Hirshhorn Museum. And the quote is, if you think technology will solve your problems, then you don't understand technology and you don't understand your problems. So the readiness piece is really about thinking, understanding what your problem is from the point of view of the end user. And this requires maybe talking to a few of them and observing them interviewing them and users being your donors, staff, or people who use your your program. And really the purpose here is to understand that exquisite pain point, right what is it what is that that pain point that we need to solve? And that's that's kind of step one. And I know it doesn't feel like you're moving forward because you're not grabbing that thing off that tool off the shelf and just doing but we're asking people to hit the pause button and to really reflect about what is the problem that needs to be solved. The the next piece of it is like think Going out with the flow is, as we mentioned before, and we'd like we use a term called co bonding. And that's really figuring out what is the technology do are with the machines, they're really good at doing certain tasks, like analyzing lots of data, you know, filling out forms, those sorts of things. But what are humans really good at? cultivating relationships with donors, problem solving, you know, empathy, those sorts of things. So you have to really think in your workflow. What should the machines do? What did the humans do, and the humans always have to be in charge? I know, with fundraising we have, we have something called the donor donor journey, where you like map out the relationship between the donor and your organization, what are the different stages, it's similar, we call it the smart nonprofit journey. So you have to really look at the workflow and really understand it, the set piece is about picking the right tools and picking the right technical partners. And here is the most important thing is that the vendors and the technologists align with your organization's values. And and then finally, it is the GO, which is about piloting and being iterative, starting small with a proof of concept, testing it, making sure that there's no harm being done to the end users. With a small pilot, and then iterating, and scaling and kind of inching your way to it, instead of start starting big. And I'm sure Allison has lots to add.

21:37  
I want to I want to speak a little bit about the selecting of the vendors part, Abigail, you know, nonprofit, nonprofits generally think of themselves as little sisters in the TechSoup, you know, that we are not worthy of, you know, up to date technology. And that passive approach to it. You know, if you're talking about word processing, or cloud computing, you know, that may work for you, it will not work when we're talking about smart tech, because the implications of turning work over to technology, right, the tasks that only people could do until a couple of years ago, without really thinking it through, has really harmful possibilities for an organization. So when we're talking about in order to be a smart nonprofit, you need to be prepared and knowledgeable, which is that leadership piece here. We're not saying you need to be a programmer, Beth, and I aren't programmers, but you need to understand what it is that your organization needs from this technology. So for instance, we talked about bias a few minutes ago, we want you to be able to ask vendors, how they have accounted for bias, how have they tested for it? How have they accounted for it? Now a lot of technology vendors are going to say to potential buyers and clients, we can't tell you about that, because it's proprietary, right, we have a secret recipe here for our technology. That's why we're in business, and we can't, you know, lift up the hood. And our advice to people who are getting that message is then find another technology partner find another vendor, there are lots and lots of them out there. We are not in the business of telling people which you know, which technologies, the technology companies to work with. However, I would want to work with a vendor who is transparent with me about how they built this system, what assumptions they made about it, how they tested it, and how they're going to help me to make sure that it isn't biased or you know, isn't poorly used. So that's, that's really incumbent on the nonprofit, to prepare themselves to use this well. The other piece of this that we've kind of danced around but we really need to name right now is that ultimately the return on investment of using smart tech is what we call the dividend of time, right? When you when you're combining, as Beth said, and you've got the technology doing what it does best, those really time consuming rote tasks, and you've got the people doing what they do best, which is being deeply relational. The return is that people have more time to do our, you know, uniquely human tasks. And, again, that's a leadership issue because if organizations are just using smart tech to do more of the same, only faster it is a huge lost opportunity versus being able to pivot from transactional fundraising, which is just frantically trying to fill up the leaky bucket of donors with ever more the sky is falling emails, not one more which anybody in the human race could possibly need. Versus really deeply getting to know your donors, and having conversations like why is our cause important to you the kind of conversation development folks would love to have, but don't have the time to have right now. But they could if they use smart tech, well,

25:16  
that is a wonderful approach. And you both have challenged so much of the I think perceived norm about how people can use this technology. And I love, love, love, your emphasis on using this technology to be more human. That's a beautiful framework that I it's still very new to me. And I'm so excited that we're starting to have these conversations in the nonprofit industry. I could keep you all here all day asking you questions about this. But I know we've got other sessions coming up in the conference. But I wanted to thank you to both so much for being here with us and for sharing your expertise and for starting conversations around how nonprofit staff can use this technology to be more human and to connect with more humans and to do more, not necessarily faster, but to do more. Good. So thank you so much, both of you for being here with us. Thank you for having us,

26:10  
of course. Thank you so much. All right,

26:14  
everyone. I hope this has been a great little conversation for you to tune into. I hope you have some really great ideas about how you may be able to explore, explore smart tech at your own nonprofit. We hope this is just the start of a great afternoon for you enjoy the rest of the conference.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai