GroundWork group, with support from IBM, has developed “A Board Members Guide,” a comprehensive new volunteer development course designed for:

• Corporations with executives that are on Nonprofit Boards
• Nonprofit Organizations that would like their board members to learn more about making technology a strategic aspect of their business
• Nonprofit Board Members who want to learn new ways to be even more helpful to the nonprofits they serve
• IT Professionals who would like to help nonprofits take a strategic approach to technology

“A Board Members Guide” was developed to expand the knowledge of nonprofit board members and to support local corporate efforts to foster volunteerism among their employees.  Participants in the workshop will:

• Gain a better understanding of the nonprofit landscape
• Understand how nonprofits can learn from for-profit business practices
• Understand the Corporate Social Responsibility strategy
• Gain a better understanding of how technology can be applied to nonprofit business
• Identify how to apply course information to nonprofit businesses and utilize GroundWork group’s tools to help nonprofits make technology a strategic aspect of their business
• Become more effective board members and volunteers!

GroundWork group will bring the course to you!  We will present this workshop to your nonprofit board of directors or to your employees who currently serve or wish to serve on a nonprofit board.

Did you know that GWg’s Constituent Relationship Management System offers a comprehensive means of creating blast email messages and managing contact lists?  Our Blast Email Tool fully integrates with your constituent records.  Recent updates make our Blast Email Tool even more user-friendly. 

• Create and Manage Multiple Contact Lists.  Easily connect with various segments of your constituents by creating separate Contact Lists for groups like: Volunteers, Donors, Ticket Buyers, Members, Clients, Board Members and more.

• Compose/Edit Messages Easily.  Compose your message in its entirety or cut and paste text directly from a Word document.  Create attractive messages by using a variety of font styles and sizes and background and text colors.  Personalize messages by inserting your organization’s logo and other images.  Include links that will direct recipients to your website.

• Message Preview.  Avoid embarrassing mistakes and typographical errors.  The Preview feature sends the message only to you, allowing you to verify message contents before sending to everyone in the Contact List.

• Send Results.  Results of your Blast Email “send” will inform you of the number of emails that were sent successfully and give a detailed description of the failed attempts.

• List of Emails Sent.  A library of sent emails is created automatically.  You may examine old messages to view the recipient list, subject and message contents.

• List of Emails Received.  Attached to each of your constituent records is a listing of every email successfully sent from your organization, including date, address, subject and message contents.

The recent installation of a new HTML editor boosts our Blast Email capability.  Creating emails is much faster and easier than before. 

• An important new feature is the ability to cut and paste text from Word directly into the Blast Email Tool. 

• Viewing the message can be clearer by the new ability to compose and edit messages in the optional Full Screen Mode. 

• Additional editing components allow you to perfect your messages, including Spell Checking, Find and Replace, Undo/Redo and more. 

• The latest Picture Manager simplifies the process of uploading and inserting logos, pictures and other images. 

Creative Living is celebrating 35 years of providing housing and support to physically disabled individuals.  A relatively new member of GroundWork group, Creative Living operates two apartment complexes adjacent to OSU.  Residents benefit from handicap accessible apartments as well as 24 hour on-call Resident Assistants to address any needs, giving the residents the valuable opportunity to live independently.

Over the past 35 years, 150 individuals have called Creative Living “home.”  Each resident has a unique story, and it is inspiring to see individuals that face the challenges of being physically disabled rise above their everyday struggles and build productive, fulfilling lives.  They consider Creative Living a huge factor in their transition and success.  Resident Steve Swisher, who was injured in a diving accident, said, “Creative Living means freedom.  Freedom from being any kind of burden on my family, freedom to come and go as I please, freedom to work and be a better person, and freedom to live life and not sit around feeling sorry for myself.”

Creative Living  began working with Groundwork Group in August 2009, shopping all the options looking for a new way to set up their database and manage constituent records.  Creative Living feels that, “Groundwork Group is a perfect fit for our needs; they have been extremely helpful in streamlining our database and reports.  They are a local company, so meeting face-to-face to discuss our needs was a plus; everything was set up with our individual needs in mind.  We have an on-going relationship with them –  they set up our ability to accept donations on our website, and they are in the process of setting up event ticket purchase capability.  It is great to have a trusted source that can help us with our needs.”

For more information on Creative Living, please visit their website: www.creative-living.com.  For more information on GroundWork group’s Constituent Relationship Management System or other services, please contact Bryan Butler,  bbutler@groundworkgroup.org or 614-884-7780, ext. 104.

Have you made your list of New Year’s Resolutions yet?  We have –  but they aren’t the typical resolutions – they are technology-related  to optimize the technology tools we use every day.   Now is the time to begin thinking about your technology and how you can be more efficient and effective this year!

Here are four things you can do:

First, consult with your IT Specialist before making changes to equipment and systems.

1.   Spring Clean your PC/Laptop

• Always do a full backup first, and consult a technology specialist.
• Maximize space by defragmenting your hard drive and clearing files, saving/moving to a separate location or external hard drive.
• Minimize clutter – Is your desktop full of unused icons or shortcuts? 
• Clean and protect – Install a spyware program to remove spyware; make sure your antivirus is up-to-date.
• Remove old applications and files – Still have those spreadsheets or documents from 1995?  Consider permanently deleting them or moving them to an external hard drive.
• Decrease memory usage – Check the system tray in the lower, right-hand corner of your screen.  There could be many programs that launch automatically upon startup; too many of these make your startup longer and decrease available memory.
• Physically clean your computers, including removal of the cover and cleaning out all the dust.  You can do this with a can of compressed air purchased from an office supply store.  Never use a vacuum or a blower or any device not approved for computer cleaning.

2.  Get Organized

• Develop a technology inventory list – good for insurance purposes.  This could be as simple as a spreadsheet, or you could use an inventory application.
• Implement asset tracking labels – Utilize asset tracking labels to help with inventory.
• Develop technology policies and procedures.
• Develop a Disaster Recovery Plan (aka Business Continuity).  Depending on your needs, simply document answers to some “what ifs”.  For example, what if my server crashed?  What if my laptop got a virus?  What if my IT person went on a permanent vacation?
• Lots of digital files?  Move them to an external hard drive or copy to CD’s.

3.  Go Green

• Do you have lots of hard copy files?  You might think about electronic scanned copies, or using a document imaging application. 
• Get rid of that old PC equipment in the back room by donating it or finding a disposal company.
• Replace those old CRT (big white box) monitors with more efficient flat screens – but be sure to dispose of this old equipment properly.

4.  Increase Data Protection and Organizational Continuity

• Backups – Buy external hard drive and backup.  The point of backups is to have an extra copy should a virus or hard issue strike your machine.  There are 1 and 2 Terabyte external drives now available for less than $200!
• Check your backups – Are you sure that those backups you have will work should a crisis occur?  If possible, regularly do a sample check to restore a grouping of files.
• Reset your password.  Do you still have the same password that you used last year?  For maximum protection, passwords should be changed on a regular basis.
• Firewall audit – Do you use a firewall?  When was the last time the configuration was audited to be sure it is protecting you in the way you think it should be?
• Assess Vulnerability – How vulnerable is your organization to cyber-hackers or others?  Have a vulnerability assessment performed to better understand this issue.

Nonprofit IT Forum – Simple Security: What a Budgetary Challenged IT Manager Can Do
Tuesday, February 9 – Noon to 1:30 p.m.
Jewish Family Services, 1070 College Ave., Columbus, 43209

Anyone who is currently accredited or certified, or is pursuing accreditation or certification, by any of the accrediting bodies (CARF, JCAHO, COA ... ) should come to this session.  Anyone wishing to learn more about HIPAA requirements should come to this session.  Anyone whose job would be jeopardized should data be lost or stolen, should come to this session.

In honor of Valentine's Day, we are encouraging everyone to bring a guest from a nonprofit that doesn't usually attend our gatherings.  It doesn't even have to be a GroundWork group member.

No cost to attend.  Pizza and salad lunch provided courtesy of the Tony R. Wells Foundation. 
Please RSVP by Friday, February 5, to Brenda Grosse, bgrosse@groundworkgroup.org or 614-884-7780, ext. 101.

Stretching the IT Dollar
Wednesday, February 10 – Noon to 4 p.m.
United Way of Central Ohio, 360 S. Third St., Columbus, 43215 (Parking at City Center Garage)

Do you feel like you are stretching your IT Dollars to the max?  Are you open to some creative ideas to do this?  If this is of interest to you, we have the answer for you!  GroundWork group is conducting a half day workshop on how to leverage IT by utilizing a systematic approach that encompasses all aspects of your business operations.
 
John Hrusovsky, CEO of GroundWork group, will be conducting the workshop and guide you through the step-by-step process by using the GWg Nonprofit Business Questionnaire, GWg Continuum of Technology Maturity and the GWg Service Delivery Model.

Business Productivity Classes –Microsoft Office
Monday, February 22
Platform Lab, 1275 Kinnear Rd., Columbus, 43212
8:30 – 11:30 a.m. Outlook 2003, Intermediate Level
11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. Lunch on your own
12:30 – 3:30 p.m. Word 2003, Intermediate Level

Microsoft Outlook 2003, Intermediate Level
This course is designed for users with basic Outlook email and calendaring skills.  This class will build on your current knowledge and will provide you with the skills needed to change views, personalize mail, organize items, share and link contacts, carry out a mail merge, and will include quick tips and tricks to speed up projects.

Microsoft Word 2003, Intermediate Level
This course is designed for intermediate Word users who have a basic understanding of Word.  The focus will be about creating and editing documents, the Word interface, navigating, editing and working with text, spell checking, printing, formatting, styles, templates, borders, tables, columns, lists, and using images in your documents.

Cost per person for each session: $30 Full Member; $40 Associate Member; $50 Non-Member/Corporate.  Please RSVP by Friday, February 19 to Brenda Grosse, bgrosse@groundworkgroup.org or 614-884-7780, ext. 101.