November 10, 2009

Technology Conversation Without The Heartache

In the movie “Desk Set,” the employees in an information reference office headed by Katherine Hepburn felt threatened when Spencer Tracy was brought in to computerize the department. Kate's girls, thinking they were going to lose their jobs, resisted the new approach, and Spencer couldn't understand their lack of cooperation. In the end, humans and computers learned to work together and everyone was happy. Kate and Spencer even fell in love.

It makes a good movie scenario, but in fact, introducing new or updated technology can ruffle feathers in any organization.

In the chapter titled “Managing Technology Change” that appears in the book “Managing Technology to Meet Your Mission,” edited by Holly Ross, Katrin Verclas and Allison Levine, Dahna Goldstein advises nonprofit managers to start a conversation with staff about technology change before it happens.

Goldstein noted that the following questions can be useful for sparking a dialogue and leading to a more successful implementation.

• What are you looking forward to about the project?
  
  
• How do you think this project can help your work?
  
  
• What other opportunities do you think this project creates for your department or the organization?
  
  
• What difficulties do you think this project might cause you, individually?
  
  
• What problems might this project cause for your department or the organization?
  
  
• If you were leading this initiative, what do you think would be the most important success factor?

This article is from NPT TechnoBuzz, a publication of The NonProfit Times.

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