Life in the Fast Lane:
Getting Non-Profits up to the Speed of Business

Jillaine Smith is a Senior Associate at the Benton Foundation, an organization with the mission "to shape the emerging communications environment and to demonstrate the value of communications for solving social problems." Toward that end, Smith works for the Communication Policies and Practice Program, a Benton project that offers non-profits information on communications policy and examples of new communications tools. Recently, the staff at Connections had a chance to talk with Smith about the lessons that foundations and non-profit organizations can take from the business world.

According to Smith, traditional foundations and non-profits are behind the curve in terms of technology because they are, in a sense, products of their environment: "Foundations—like non-profits—are not in a corporate setting and don't have the same kinds of demands for producing, for providing a product or a service, that you find in the business world." She goes on to offer this metaphor: "Non-profits are not in the same lane of the highway. The corporate sector is zipping along, because it has to. It's in there to make money, and it has stockholders. Meanwhile, non-profits and foundations are over in the slow lane because traditionally they have not had to go that fast. But now, the technology has so far surpassed them that they are having trouble and suffering greatly, because they are so far behind."

This is where the Benton Foundation comes in. According to the Benton web site, the group's "mission is to promote communications tools, applications, and policies in the public interest." In other words, Benton wants to transition non-profits into the fast lane where communication technology is concerned. To accomplish this mission, they are working on a variety of fronts. For example, Benton's Communications Policy and Practice Program provides daily news briefs on communications policy issues-such as the digital divide, broadband, e-rate, FCC reform, and relevant legislation. In addition, Benton offers analysis and commentary on current communications issues, and a best practice toolkit. The toolkit is chock-full of examples for using communication technology for more effective organizing, advocacy, publicity, planning, evaluation, Web development, etc.

A Corporate Obligation
Because the corporate world has been so much quicker to embrace technology, it seems only logical that non-profits would look to for-profits for effective communication models. Therefore, along with great examples and tools from the non-profit sector, Benton also links to resources from the business world. While discussing her selection criteria, Smith noted, "We decided we could point to commercial resources and services based on the quality of the resource and its potential benefits for the non-profit sector."

Of course, corporations have the potential—Smith would argue the obligation—to offer more tangible assistance to non-profits as well: "We strongly believe that corporations—especially communications and technology companies that are making scads of money— have a duty to give back to the community." And, certainly, in recent years, many companies have stepped up to that challenge. Perhaps the most well known example is the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which funds, among other things, Internet access in public libraries.

Another example is the AOL Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Internet giant America Online. Recently, Benton teamed up with the AOL Foundation and other organizations (including the American Red Cross and the National Urban League) to create Helping.org, "an easy-to-use, one-stop online resource designed to help people find volunteer and giving opportunities in their own communities and beyond." With Helping.org, interested citizens can donate time or money to charities online. (Here, the AOL Foundation covers all costs relating to transactions and administration, passing on all of the online donation but the credit card fee to the recipient nonprofit organization.) In addition, the site offers an online toolkit, which provides advice to non-profits on planning and building a web site, communicating online, fundraising on the Net, locating grants and in-kind donations, and more. Another section of Helping.org focuses on issues relating to the digital divide. These content areas are very much in keeping with Benton's mission of using technology to address social problems.

Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth
At first not everyone was eager for Benton to work with AOL. Smith notes that many had reservations because of the way in which commercial community networks have used something of "a Wal-Mart approach" in the way that they come into town and put local non-profit networks out of business. Therefore, some members of the nonprofit sector have looked at the AOL Foundation's efforts with a jaundiced eye. After all, why would a profitable corporation be interested in the kind of non-profit work that Helping.org promotes? To explain this, Smith makes a distinction between AOL's corporate and foundation entities: "AOL is a communications corporation. Many corporations have philanthropic arms, and those arms tend to focus on areas where the corporations have the most expertise. While AOL, the company, is very much focused on consumer and commercial use of the Internet, the AOL Foundation is very much interested in how the Internet can be used for social causes.'"

A New Model for Giving
Benton's partnership with AOL gives Smith insights into the insights into the workings of the new corporate foundations coming out of the high-tech industry. According to Smith, these new, more entrepreneurial corporate foundations follow a different rule book than more traditional philanthropists: "The difference is that they're bringing an entrepreneurial business model to how they think about giving. They see a particular problem, and they're investing in a particular solution." This differs from the more traditional model of giving, which Smith described as "more about making sure that people get the services they need." She goes on to say that this newer philanthropy is more "outcomes focused" with companies expecting specific results for the money they're donating.

When asked why AOL Foundation decided to include a clearinghouse of nonprofit resources in helping.org, Smith explained, "AOL Foundation's initial flood of grant applications included many requests to support web site development. AOL Foundation realized that they needed to help non-profits think more strategically about why to online technologies. But AOL Foundation also knew that they needed to turn to experts in non-profit practice, so they turned to the non-profit technology assistance community." AOL Foundation needed a partner that could help "build a set of tools and resources to help non-profits think more strategically about using the Internet." As Benton was already working to bring non-profits to the communication technology fast lane, AOL Foundation viewed them as an ideal partner. As Smith puts it, "That's why they came to us, because it's an area that we had already filled out. We already had expertise in aggregating that information and critiquing it." Benton also had strong ties to the nationwide network of nonprofit technology assistance providers.

Where to Draw the Line
Clearly, non-profit organizations have a lot to gain by looking to the business world for models and support. As Smith indicates, "It has become imperative that non-profits start thinking like businesses. Otherwise they may disappear." That said, she doesn't feel that non-profits need to trade one form of extinction for another: "I'm not saying that they should give up their charitable mission. Absolutely not. I'm not saying that they have to have a profit motive. Absolutely not. They just need to be think more strategically about reaching their desired outcomes."