Towards a definition of a technology charity
I wonder if we’ll ever have ‘technology charities’ like we have technology companies?
Well, there doesn’t seem to be an agreed definition for tech companies to use as a basis for a definition of a tech charity so I’ll have to do a bit of creative thinking.
To give myself a frame to work within, I’ll start with three criteria, and I’ll make each criteria on a four point scale. So, a charity that is
The criteria are:
- How they approach developing software to deliver value (including using data as part of the value)
- How they approach using software to interact with beneficiaries
- How they approach technical capabilities within the organisation
Low-tech charity | Tech-enabled charity | Tech-first charity | Technology charity | |
Software | Uses COTS platforms in isolation and doesn’t collect data from them. | Uses multiple COTS platforms to deliver value and connects some of them to allow data exchange. | Develops software on top of COTS platforms to deliver some core value and collects and uses some data to add value. | Creates proprietary software to deliver the core value of the organisation and collects and uses data as part of the value. |
Interaction | Interacts with beneficiaries over separate channels with no single view of the interactions. | Interacts with beneficiaries via multiple channels and records interactions in separate platforms. | Interacts with beneficiaries via multiple channels and has an incomplete view of the interactions in a single platform. | Uses proprietary software as the primary means of interacting with beneficiaries and creates a single view of all interactions. |
Capabilities | No internal or outsourced capabilities. | Very limited internal or some outsourced capabilities. | Internal capabilities across general skill sets. | Full internal capabilities for managing proprietary software, data, etc. |
Next step is going to be to test these definitions against some real charities.