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Nonprofit Online News Journal: September 2006 Edition

Are you stuck at the top of a short hill? The September 2006 Edition of the Journal is now available and has a Quicksheet on the subject of The Problem of the Local Optimum. This month's articles are mostly about relationship building. My piece on "The Permeable Nonprofit" looks at how organizations can walk the middle path as the world of communication changes radically around us. "Harnessing the Word-of-Mouth Power of Influentials" reminds us that we are part of a web of relationships and that the web itself needs tending. "The Taxonomy of Public Communication Campaigns" will help you think critically about how purpose, scope, and maturity affect the planning and evaluation of your communication efforts. "Please Don't Send Me Microsoft Word Documents" reminds us that we can care for the web of our communities through our choice of tools. Finally, my look at "The Dialectics of Knowledge Management" presents four recommendations on how to be mindful as we prepare ourselves for the vast amount of learning that will be expected of us in the years to come. Posted: 9/27/06; 10:39:59 PM #

Online Technology for Social Change: From Struggle to Strategy

The dotOrganize project has released the results of its nine month study of social change groups, technology providers, and nonprofit technology capacity builders: Online Technology for Social Change: From Struggle to Strategy. (The report is available in a thoughtfully presented web format, as well a 33 page PDF.) It should come as no surprise to any of my readers that lack of data integration and interoperability emerged as a major impediment to effective organizing. The report actually focuses on a rich set of recommendations, including: (1) Define Best Practices for Online Organizing. (2) Enhance Strategic Support and Information Resources. (3) Provide Robust, Flexible, Documented, and Sustainable Software for Social Change. (4) Support Adoption of On-Demand Software. (5) Prioritize Documentation, Ongoing Support, and Training. (6) Aggregate and Share Information on Technology Costs. (7) Increase Offerings to the Full Spectrum of Social Change Groups. Although I'm not sure that any of them will successfully address the data integration issue that they raise as a key issue, I think they have compiled a fantastic set of high level capacity building ideas here. Posted: 9/27/06; 11:47:06 AM #

Online Politics 101

Colin Delany's Online Politics 101 (44 page PDF) is a great little guide to current electoral practice. I particularly like his Five Simple Rules for Online Politics: (1) Think about the ends before you think about the means. (2) Brilliance almost always takes second place to persistence. (3) Integrate, integrate, integrate. (4) Content is key. (5) Is selling an idea (or a candidate) like selling soap? Yep. Posted: 9/27/06; 11:27:30 AM #