On A Mission

The expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) is accelerating the pace and promise of technology to create a level of unprecedented productivity in several sectors, including nonprofits. 

Concepts like crowdfunding have been around for years and enable nonprofits to tap the generosity of donors. According to Statistica, $17.2 billion in crowdfunding occurred just within North America in 2021and is expected to show an annual growth rate of 1.43 percent through 2028. 

AI can make content used in fundraising campaigns more compelling by quickly providing information and ideas to engage audiences through photos, videos or text. Gen AI can help a creator to quickly assimilate an understanding of a particular audience or market and develop or refine creative ideas to engage audiences. 

In the marketing and communications world, AI can draft a communications plan, provide initial ideas to spark a new campaign and draft letters and content for review. The quality of the information fed back is largely dependent on the way the prompts are written. I signed up for the Copilot Pro and found a version offered specifically for nonprofits looking for a productivity assistant to free up its employees to focus on the organization’s Mission.

Keeping a human in-the-loop to review information for accuracy is an important part of responsible AI use. According to the PMI, it considers AI as a “C” for consult or “I” input, so humans make the final decision. Phew, that’s a relief!

Using generative AI for creative endeavors raises a lot of ethical questions, some of which I will be discussing in next week’s blog. 

Working Lunch of the Future

This week I tried the text-to-image technology called DALL-E and in a few seconds flat I got several image options in response to this prompt: AI doing human thinking while a project manager has a client meeting at a table of four people, mixed races talking over lunch.

Generative AI Overview for Project Managers

I just completed a short course by the Project Management Institute (PMI) that outlined how AI can help those charged with running projects of any kind to quickly learn enough subject-matter knowledge to lead a project. As this quote captures, the changes are going to be vast and not just at IBM:

“77% of IBM’s entry-level workers will see their jobs shift by 2025. Over the next few years, the use of generative AI will dominate all roles and all levels across an organization.”

Project Management Institute, Introduction to AI Course

One project manager spoke of AI tackling more of the “behind-the-desk” repetitive assignments including meeting prep and recaps, report writing and analyzing data sets. In doing this, it frees people up for more face-to-face interactions.

Regardless of the chosen AI tool, keeping a “human in the loop” approach to using AI means quality is still a factor as is how this technological powerhouse will change peoples’ roles and their overall psyche.

A good place to start is for nonprofits to explore the AI options and have one or two people who are technologically inclined to test them to start an organization on its path to enhanced productivity.