Grantmakers Information Technology Survey Report 

V. Challenges/Emerging Issues 

Technology Planning 

how foundations use technology/technology best practices document,  indicating that 

foundations want to learn from the experiences of other foundations. The second most 

popular request was for  information on technological developments,  with 55 percent 

responding.  

Type of External Assistance Wanted (n = 245) 

1   Examples of how foundations use technology/technology "best practices" document 

2   Guidelines on structuring a website or LISTSERV 

3   Information on technological developments 

4   Reference information about software 

5   Web page templates 

6   Technology support 

7   Assistance with technology planning 

8   Access to fee based information vendors (Lexis Nexis, Factiva, Dialog, etc.) 

9   Archiving & electronic storage of materials 

10   Records management 

11   Organization & retrieval of materials (indexing, cataloguing) 

12   Knowledge management planning

Technology Staffing 

Most survey respondents (65%) had no in house information technology professionals, 

and among the 35 percent (113) that did, most (73 of 113) had only one such person on 

staff (either part time or full time). Only 40 respondents had two or more IT staff (Table 

A 1). Among grantmakers without dedicated technology staff, the finance/administrative 

staff or the executive director/CEO is responsible for the organization's technology 

systems and support (Table A 2). Grantmakers without dedicated IT staff are more likely 

than those with dedicated IT staff to characterize their technology adoption as  lags 

behind  or  in trouble  (29% versus 14%) (Table A 3).  

The number of days of training for IT professionals is insufficient, with 15 percent 

getting no training and 55 percent receiving 1 to 5 days of technical training a year (Table 

A 32). The Technology Affinity Group believes that IT professionals should be going to 

a minimum of 2 weeks of training to keep up their technical skills. 

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