Why IT Matters Why IT Matters

This conversation digs into some of the fundamentals regarding our own assumptions about what things should look like for marketing and business, how those tropes got created, and offer a vision for what can be when we reassess what’s important. There’s a lot of hype around bringing marketing to the masses, and our guest Lindsay unpicks the inefficiencies and false narratives that make common approaches counterproductive and costly. This is a conversation about humans and how meeting human needs where they’re at is a scalable approach to bringing more successful outcomes and mitigating externalities that get in the way of genuine connection.
Episode Show Notes

This episode is as much a Coda to some of the discussions we’ve been having throughout 2022. It is perhaps an opportunity to change the narrative and set a new course for how we engage with the impact economy as businesses and technology leaders. We also announce some exciting news: Tim has officially launched thehumanstack.com as the outcome of work that has taken place over the past four years. Travels, connections, trust building, mentorship, and the value of constantly iterating our thinking are the themes of this discussion. Along the way, we make a bookmark for a future episode called “Tim and Tracy Tell All The Stories.” Tell us what resonates with you on this one because we’re trying to tackle some big themes in the context of what feels like a constant crisis happening around us. Enjoy!

Tim and Tracy take a deep dive into an uncomfortable place regarding the technology industry's externalities and how they are addressed.  This is a conversation about what drives us apart as much as what brings us together and what it means to have a shared value system, guidelines, and parameters of use.  This episode is for the dreamers and thinkers - industry leaders, nonprofit executives, leaders of reconciliation on the Left and Right, and those who want to create a third pillar of understanding how the impact economy works with technology.  Suppose we're willing to accept that we are lost without creating mechanisms that identify and remediate these externalities. In that case, the challenge becomes what the shared definitions and means that can be equitably and inclusively established are.
 
Episode Show Notes

Listen to this episode to learn how data can be shaped toward human dignity. It’s easy to get bogged down in abstraction when it comes to understanding the importance of data in our world. What we collect informs what we accelerate and act upon, and unless what we collect inclusively represents our humanity, what we accelerate will continue to exclude. Our guest Meena Das walks us through a tactical series of connections that will better inform our data collection mechanisms and lead to greater impact and empowerment for humanity. The most important takeaway from today’s discussion is that what moves us towards better outcomes isn’t rooted in performative or feel-good intentions but requires us to return to our roots of connection with each other, first and foremost. Otherwise, everything else built on top of our data collection, including artificial intelligence and public policy, will remain part of the enforcement of power and privilege rather than democratizing the same.
Episode Show Notes

You’ll learn so much from our guest today, including that civic association was built on volunteerism, that there are nearly forty thousand nonprofit technology organizations, and how important the makers of this space are. This episode connects a history of movement organizing with the world of information technology. We talk with Billy about his groundbreaking work navigating the local, ad-hoc, democratized, and unseen work of technology makers with the global need for infrastructure and support. Billy’s history uniquely positions him as a leader in bringing to light what it means to be in service to the impact economy with technology instead of being in service to technology as consumers. Along the way, we also talk about how polarization has crept into technology and the need for breaking down barriers to dialogue - which are frequently erected when technology is created to stimulate addition, gamification, and reward ever-divergent narratives.

Digital security has always been something that nonprofits and the greater impact economy need to consider – as the world of technology has grown and evolved, so has the need for organizations to consider the why, how, and where of their data.  More importantly, what it means for the constituents they serve.  This discussion is both eye-opening and for everyone in nonprofit leadership who needs to understand these evolving needs.  However, the most important thing for us all to understand is that we can no longer live in a reactive space, and there are attainable, understandable means by which this can become proactive and beneficial.  We’re joined today by Joshua Peskay and Kim Snyder from RoundTable Technology for a discussion on making these shifts across the impact economy. 
Episode Show Notes