Well, I finally jumped on the band wagon. I have a blog.

For a month or so now I’ve been thinking about it. Thinking about the thoughts I wanted to share. About the time I don’t have to devote to a blog. About how a blog fits into my professional development and my work. I’ve decided its time.

I’ve been working at NPower Pennsylvania for over a year and a half now. NPower PA is a non-profit consulting company in Philadelphia. We work only with other non-profits and help them use technology to achieve their mission — our somewhat cheesy tagline is “Your Mission, Our Technology.” I started doing IT consulting — fixing servers and networking equipment, checking backups, reinstall windows, etc — but I’ve moved on to technology planning, requirements and business analysis, training, and just about anything else people related.

Non-profits are curious beasts. They are both like (not that many like to admit it) and unlike their for-profit counterparts. They are often driven by a toxic mess of politics, fundraising, personal missions, and alcohol. And their relationship with technology is complex. Something about non-profit organizations’ unwillingness to adapt or change and their conflicting propensity to adopt novel and forward thinking programs raises tremendous challenges for their often outdated infrastructure.

And that is really what has driven the development of my personal mission. I want to help non-profits (and other public service organizations) use technology in ways that support their mission. I want to help them use technology not just as an operational tool but as a force for transformation within their organization. Technology drives business and business drives technology, and its time non-profits woke up and realized that fact. I don’t want to just help these organizations get new servers, new workstations, and new databases; I want to help them fundamentally change the way they think about and plan for technology.

On this blog I’ll share some of my experiences with non-profits. Some of my hair brained ideas. Some of my wild aspirations. By writing these things down I hope to further hone my understanding of the non-profit world and possibly give someone else a glimpse into the sector.

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