Grantmakers Information Technology Survey Report 

IV. Snapshots by Foundation Type 

D. Independent Foundations Snapshot 

Sixteen percent of grantmakers reported that they did not know the percentage of the 

annual operating budgets spent on technology (Table A 5). For those that do know, the 

percentage of the annual operating budget spent on technology ranged from less than 1 

percent to greater than 10 percent. Just over one third (36%) spends less than 1 percent 

and just over one third (36%) spends 1 percent to 3 percent annually. These percentages 

continue to be surprisingly low for most independent foundations. The technology costs 

include staff salaries, consulting expenses, hardware, software and equipment costs, 

maintenance fees, telecommunications and research and software development costs. 

IT Percentage of 

Percentage of

Total Budget (n = 66 who know) Responses 

Less than 1% 

36 % 

1%   3% 

36 % 

4%   5% 

  8 % 

6%   8% 

  6 % 

9%   10% 

  6 % 

> 10% 

  8 % 

Lastly, we looked at what technology services foundations run in house versus which 

services are outsourced. Consistent with community foundations and family foundations, 

most independent foundations manage some services in house, including desktop 

support, database administration and e mail, while outsourcing web hosting. Independent 

foundations are evenly divided between in house and outsourced management of LAN 

administration, server administration and security. Independent foundations are the only 

foundation type reporting managing a fair number of WAN administration services and 

those services are evenly divided between in house and outsourced management.  

You will notice that the percentages differ between what foundations reported they 

manage in house versus what they outsource. For example, 77 percent of foundations 

reported that they manage desktop support in house, yet 42 percent reported that they 

outsource desktop support, adding up to a total of 119 percent. The variance is due either 

to different respondents answering the questions or respondents reporting that they 

manage the same function in house and externally.  

 49