Co-managed IT: the benefits of hybrid IT outsourcing for nonprofits

In today’s digitally driven world, technology has become a central component of most charities – from managing operations, measuring impact, connecting with supporters, coordinating volunteers, and enabling organisations to develop new services. Indeed, in our Charity IT survey we conducted earlier this year, over half of the leaders that took part are considering outsourcing via…

Charity Digital Skills Report 2023: Our Analysis

The Charity Digital Skills report, now in its sixth year, is widely regarded as an annual barometer on digital maturity, skills and priorities across the nonprofit sector. It’s the digital sister of our own annual Charity Tech Leaders Report which focuses on IT infrastructure, M365 & cloud, outsourcing and cyber security. In this blog, we…

Information Governance & Data Protection Workshop for Charities – 17 October 2023

How do you keep your charity up to date with ever changing data protection law, GDPR standards, Subject Access Requests and data breaches? This is just one of the questions we answered in our Information Governance and Data Protection workshop for nonprofit organisations, in partnership with Charity IT Leaders. Andrew Coyle, our Director of Information…

Getting ready for AI at your charity

Welcome to the Smartdesc July newsletter. In this edition, we cover how you can utilise Microsoft’s new productivity tool Copilot at your charity, including: A blog introducing Microsoft Copilot, its capabilities and some important considerations Further resources from Microsoft and the National Cyber Security Centre Our Charity Technology Leaders Report 2023 Resources In this blog,…

AI for charities – what is Microsoft Copilot and what can it do?

Since its arrival in November last year, ChatGPT has taken the world by storm. This powerful new chatbot with seemingly endless possibilities took 3 months to reach 100 million users; Facebook took 4 years to reach the same milestone! Microsoft is leveraging some of this technology to introduce AI into Microsoft 365 this year –…

Technology insights for charity leaders

Welcome to the Smartdesc June newsletter. In this edition, we share our Charity Technology Leaders report released earlier this month, including: Our Charity Technology Leaders Report 2023 A webinar and blog on our insights from the report A video case study on our Modern Workplace Project with national charity Mind, featuring testimonials from key Mind…

Charity Technology Leaders Report 2023 – key trends and insights

Earlier this year, Smartdesc conducted a survey of Charity Technology Leaders to ask what their strategic technology priorities are for the year ahead. We received responses from senior stakeholders from a range of large UK charities, with an average organisation income size of £30m.  We shared our findings in our Charity Technology Leaders Report 2023,…

Charity Technology Leaders Report 2023

We are delighted to publish the Charity Technology Leaders Report 2023. Earlier this year, Smartdesc engaged with senior leaders involved in technology across a wide range of charities in the UK, to find out their priorities for IT in 2023/24. The report shares these findings and what they mean for charity IT leaders across the…

Defending against phishing

Welcome to the Smartdesc February newsletter. This month we focus on how charities can protect themselves against phishing attacks and offer the following resources: Guides on common charity cyber attacks and measures you can take to prevent them Phishing Simulation Service and Cyber Security e-Learning, tailored to charities Further resources from EasyDMARC and Charity Finance Resources…