If your business needs to get rid of "stuff" - furniture, equipment, PCs, branded clothing, stationery, whatever - by registering with Giving World Online, you could benefit a charity or other not-for-profit instead of sending it to landfill.
Giving World Online is a not-for-profit organisation which links businesses with unwanted surplus to charities and voluntary groups, and the people they work to help. All details are on their website: http://www.givingworldonline.com/.
Please remember that if you donate anything containing data (such as a PC or mobile phone), you should make sure that all data has been removed before giving it away.
Wednesday, 8 April 2009
Tuesday, 31 March 2009
Getting the basics right
Today I joined a group of fundraisers at a workshop organised by the Institute of Fundraising on using the web for fundraising. It was given by Howard Lake of UK Fundraising, a hugely valuable resource (not least for its rich collection of news and articles pulled together from across the web).
Lots of food for thought during the day, but Howard rightly spent a fair amount of time encouraging folk to get the basics right - think about what your website needs to do (for you and your readers) and do that well. Look for web developers who will provide you with a content management system that takes care of the basics: consistent branding & formatting, accessibility, site maps, good navigation, generation of information that helps search engines, and so on. Make sure you have set aside the time & resources to keep content fresh and relevant. And never forget the "ask" (for money, time, expertise or whatever) from your supporters.
In many ways, it's not so very different from what's needed from commercial websites, just a different application. For "customers", read "supporters". Instead of sales, look for donations (or both!), but in all cases, make it easy for people. As with e-commerce sites, don't put barriers in their way, don't mislead them or confuse them.
Did you know that online supporters generally give 25% more than offline supporters? Or that DEC's Tsunami appeal made it into the Guinness Book of Records for donations in a 24-hour period? Or that some of the most innovative & successful online ideas come from charities (like Oxfam's Unwrapped)? It's worth paying attention to what the "third sector" is doing with the web - they may well have things to teach the commercial world.
Lots of food for thought during the day, but Howard rightly spent a fair amount of time encouraging folk to get the basics right - think about what your website needs to do (for you and your readers) and do that well. Look for web developers who will provide you with a content management system that takes care of the basics: consistent branding & formatting, accessibility, site maps, good navigation, generation of information that helps search engines, and so on. Make sure you have set aside the time & resources to keep content fresh and relevant. And never forget the "ask" (for money, time, expertise or whatever) from your supporters.
In many ways, it's not so very different from what's needed from commercial websites, just a different application. For "customers", read "supporters". Instead of sales, look for donations (or both!), but in all cases, make it easy for people. As with e-commerce sites, don't put barriers in their way, don't mislead them or confuse them.
Did you know that online supporters generally give 25% more than offline supporters? Or that DEC's Tsunami appeal made it into the Guinness Book of Records for donations in a 24-hour period? Or that some of the most innovative & successful online ideas come from charities (like Oxfam's Unwrapped)? It's worth paying attention to what the "third sector" is doing with the web - they may well have things to teach the commercial world.
Friday, 13 March 2009
It pays to plan for disaster...
A salutary tale of a charity that has faced having to repay a £185,000 grant because it lost all its records in a flood...
As reported in Third Sector, Aid & Assist, a training charity based in Suffolk, couldn't produce the evidence of what it had done with the grant income for auditors, and has been facing claims for repayment. Fortunately the Department of Work & Pensions is proving sympathetic and working with them to document what they can.
Aid & Assist isn't the first organisation, and almost certainly won't be the last, to discover too late that it is important to protect their information, whether it is held on paper or electronically. But it doesn't have to be that way...
There are some things you can do to protect your information:
First of all, for critical information held on paper, consider scanning to provide an electronic copy. Scanners don't have to be expensive, and if the scanning is done when the paper is received, it need not be a huge burden of extra work.
If that's not an option, consider copying the information and storing copies "off-site", i.e. out of the office. There are some very reasonably-priced secure self-storage options, as well as more sophisticated archive management services.
Crucially, put in place a back-up regime for electronic information. Again, this doesn't have to be expensive. Depending on what IT you have (how many PCs, whether or not you are using a server), you can:
As reported in Third Sector, Aid & Assist, a training charity based in Suffolk, couldn't produce the evidence of what it had done with the grant income for auditors, and has been facing claims for repayment. Fortunately the Department of Work & Pensions is proving sympathetic and working with them to document what they can.
Aid & Assist isn't the first organisation, and almost certainly won't be the last, to discover too late that it is important to protect their information, whether it is held on paper or electronically. But it doesn't have to be that way...
There are some things you can do to protect your information:
First of all, for critical information held on paper, consider scanning to provide an electronic copy. Scanners don't have to be expensive, and if the scanning is done when the paper is received, it need not be a huge burden of extra work.
If that's not an option, consider copying the information and storing copies "off-site", i.e. out of the office. There are some very reasonably-priced secure self-storage options, as well as more sophisticated archive management services.
Crucially, put in place a back-up regime for electronic information. Again, this doesn't have to be expensive. Depending on what IT you have (how many PCs, whether or not you are using a server), you can:
- use an online backup service - typically this notes when you change something or add or delete a document, and mirrors that change over the internet to secure servers
- use tape back-up for servers - this involves running a back-up (preferably daily) and then removing tapes from the office - tapes can be reused over time
- archive or copy information to a separate hard disk, preferably one that can be taken off-site - as with tapes, these can be recycled over time
There are far more sophisticated solutions available, and IT service companies (or disaster recovery specialists) are well placed to advise where this is needed. But simple basic protection is affordable and, as Aid & Assist have found, would pay dividends when & if disaster strikes.
Wednesday, 4 March 2009
It's not just poor suppliers...
A recent article in Information Week examined how buyers of IT feel about their suppliers of IT. It was a mixed review with highs and lows, with buyers disappointed in suppliers who left them with unfulfilled promises and who used irresponsible practices. Salesmen who promised much and delivered less. Products that turned out to be less than a perfect match to the buyer's requirements.
But not all the problems lie with the suppliers. As the article points out "When things don't go well, tech buyers also deserve a chunk of the blame. They do a poor job communicating requirements. They fail to bring the right people to sales presentations and don't ask the right questions. They don't always allocate sufficient resources to deploy and operate products...".
The absence of good requirements as a cause of IT failure (not merely disappointment) was underlined in 1995 by the Standish Group Report. They found that nearly a third of projects were cancelled before completion, and just over 50% of the projects cost almost double the original estimates.
Poor and changing requirements accounted for over a third of project failures. Add in requirements-related issues of unrealistic expectations or timescales and a lack of objectives, and together these are the primary causes of more than half of the IT failures described in the report.
Clearly the lessons from the Standish report still stand today - if you want to buy IT that delivers what you want, you first of all have to be very clear about what you want. (You also need to find good suppliers who are honest about what they can deliver, but at least you will have made a start!).
But not all the problems lie with the suppliers. As the article points out "When things don't go well, tech buyers also deserve a chunk of the blame. They do a poor job communicating requirements. They fail to bring the right people to sales presentations and don't ask the right questions. They don't always allocate sufficient resources to deploy and operate products...".
The absence of good requirements as a cause of IT failure (not merely disappointment) was underlined in 1995 by the Standish Group Report. They found that nearly a third of projects were cancelled before completion, and just over 50% of the projects cost almost double the original estimates.
Poor and changing requirements accounted for over a third of project failures. Add in requirements-related issues of unrealistic expectations or timescales and a lack of objectives, and together these are the primary causes of more than half of the IT failures described in the report.
Clearly the lessons from the Standish report still stand today - if you want to buy IT that delivers what you want, you first of all have to be very clear about what you want. (You also need to find good suppliers who are honest about what they can deliver, but at least you will have made a start!).
Sunday, 1 March 2009
What's a CIO?
With my IT background, the CIO is a familiar concept. Chief Information Officers are senior head honchos in the IT world. One of the many so-called CxOs (Chief Something-or-other Officers) like Chief Executives (CEOs), Chief Finance Officers (CFOs) and Chief Technology Officers (CTOs).
So I was surprised to see a comment about "the long-delayed arrival of CIOs" in Third Sector (a magazine for people working in charities, voluntary organisations and social enterprises) and was wondering how come CIOs and their seemingly late arrival could be important to charities. Were charities particularly slow to adopt the role of CIO? I asked myself...
However, reading on, it's apparent that the CIOs being referred to are "charitable incorporated organisations" and the delays are those in establishing them and a suitable regulatory regime.
Lesson for me: just because something is familiar to you doesn't mean it will be to people reading what you write. It would have been enormously helpful for me if Third Sector had expanded the acronym when they first used it. No more unexplained TLAs* for me!
* Three Letter Acronyms
So I was surprised to see a comment about "the long-delayed arrival of CIOs" in Third Sector (a magazine for people working in charities, voluntary organisations and social enterprises) and was wondering how come CIOs and their seemingly late arrival could be important to charities. Were charities particularly slow to adopt the role of CIO? I asked myself...
However, reading on, it's apparent that the CIOs being referred to are "charitable incorporated organisations" and the delays are those in establishing them and a suitable regulatory regime.
Lesson for me: just because something is familiar to you doesn't mean it will be to people reading what you write. It would have been enormously helpful for me if Third Sector had expanded the acronym when they first used it. No more unexplained TLAs* for me!
* Three Letter Acronyms
Tuesday, 10 February 2009
Garbage in...
It's not always the technology that lets folk down. More often, it's the quality of the information held in a system that's the problem. Especially when it is a contact management system with incorrect information about your contacts in it. All the more embarrassing if your company sells such systems to its clients, and advises them on the need for clean data, which is checked and kept clean...
So embarrassment all round for a systems company whose salesperson had made an appointment with me to tell me more about their products and company. When the salesperson left the company, someone was asked to contact me to cancel the appointment but... they had an incorrect phone number for me, an incorrect email address and an incorrect web address!
The lesson here is about how important it is to make sure information is accurately recorded.
And for me, the lesson is to check with people I plan to meet the day before an appointment just to make sure it's still happening!
So embarrassment all round for a systems company whose salesperson had made an appointment with me to tell me more about their products and company. When the salesperson left the company, someone was asked to contact me to cancel the appointment but... they had an incorrect phone number for me, an incorrect email address and an incorrect web address!
The lesson here is about how important it is to make sure information is accurately recorded.
And for me, the lesson is to check with people I plan to meet the day before an appointment just to make sure it's still happening!
Sunday, 18 January 2009
Taking your own medicine...
In my business, I set high standards for all Clearsight's approved suppliers and conduct evaluations with our clients of the suppliers that win their contracts. As part of developing my business, it seemed only fair then that I should taste my own medicine. So I asked Webber Marketing to conduct a survey of clients and suppliers about their experience of working with Clearsight.
It was very educational to see the responses (anonymously, of course). The very first question asked people to describe what I do - their answers underlined the need to be clearer about that. It's something I thought I had worked on this past year, but obviously there is still room for improvement!
It was great to hear clients enthuse about the projects we'd worked on, giving very positive responses. Interestingly, suppliers were mostly enthusiastic too, even some of the ones who hadn't won contracts (yet). All of them could see the value of an explicit statement of requirements, for example. One client said "It meant that the company knew what was needed and could produce the website quicker". And one supplier commented "it was the most comprehensive tender ever but though it was onerous at the time, it meant that no significant changes have arisen, therefore no additional cost – very smooth for everybody".
Lessons learned? Lots of them, but the main one is the difficulty of balancing the needs of my clients and the needs of potential suppliers. Clearsight clients are looking for a fair & independent selection of a good, cost-effective & reliable supplier for their IT. Suppliers value the introduction to these potential clients, but the cost of sale involved in a competitive selection process can be something of an issue. I already use a lighter-weight approach for lower-value projects but, judging by the feedback, it is still too much in some cases. I'll be looking at how I can adjust the specification and selection process for these smaller projects in future, without compromising the needs of clients.
Best bit? Being scored 12 out of 10 by two clients! :-)
It was very educational to see the responses (anonymously, of course). The very first question asked people to describe what I do - their answers underlined the need to be clearer about that. It's something I thought I had worked on this past year, but obviously there is still room for improvement!
It was great to hear clients enthuse about the projects we'd worked on, giving very positive responses. Interestingly, suppliers were mostly enthusiastic too, even some of the ones who hadn't won contracts (yet). All of them could see the value of an explicit statement of requirements, for example. One client said "It meant that the company knew what was needed and could produce the website quicker". And one supplier commented "it was the most comprehensive tender ever but though it was onerous at the time, it meant that no significant changes have arisen, therefore no additional cost – very smooth for everybody".
Lessons learned? Lots of them, but the main one is the difficulty of balancing the needs of my clients and the needs of potential suppliers. Clearsight clients are looking for a fair & independent selection of a good, cost-effective & reliable supplier for their IT. Suppliers value the introduction to these potential clients, but the cost of sale involved in a competitive selection process can be something of an issue. I already use a lighter-weight approach for lower-value projects but, judging by the feedback, it is still too much in some cases. I'll be looking at how I can adjust the specification and selection process for these smaller projects in future, without compromising the needs of clients.
Best bit? Being scored 12 out of 10 by two clients! :-)
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