It’s tempting for people from the tech world to think they have the answers to the nonprofit sector’s woes, the challenges faced by communities, social problems, etc. While technology is awesome and will become more so, and in many ways makes nonprofit work easier, this assumption that tech will save the world is not just false and arrogant, but potentially harmful and should be qualified with some thoughtful considerations.
"It becomes irritating when one group seems to think they can do a better job than another, and for some reason, we nonprofits have been the de facto group that needs “fixing.” This is BS, and offensive, and we need to keep calling it out from time to time before we internalize it, feel bad about ourselves, and get distracted from doing our jobs. Yes, technology is great, but if we think it’s going to be the holy grail, the magic bullet, the panacea, the Swiss knife of the world’s problem, we’re wrong."
Vu Le, who runs a Seattle nonprofit, let's loose on corporate folks pushing the idea that everything can be solved with "disruptive tech." Disclaimer: I love this blog.