Philanthropy Meets Technology

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By Madison Mikhail Bush

A few years ago, I was sitting in my dorm room ordering GrubHub and looking at spring break flights and Airbnbs after Ubering home, thinking about how crazy it is that I can do all this with a tap of a button. Then it hit me. It was easier for me to coordinate a trip halfway across the world from my bed than to do something good in my own city.

Why? There was an app for almost everything, just not for volunteering, because nonprofit tech is stuck years behind other industries.

Without proper tools, nonprofit admins spend way too much valuable time on tasks that could be easily automated. After surveying more than 40 nonprofits in Columbus, I learned that not only are the majority still recruiting volunteers through word of mouth and checking people in with a pen and paper system, the nonprofits that do use tech solutions are paying high costs for decade-old resources.

At POINT, we know that when nonprofits have reliable tech to find and manage volunteers, that frees them up to do what they do best – improve our communities. Our POINT app connects people to local nonprofits, and since we know they need affordable management tools, we built a cloud-based software for them organize and analyze volunteers (without manual data entry or paperwork!).

Looking forward, the next few years will bring a tech boom for nonprofits. POINT, among other companies, is helping nonprofits escape the Stone Age through multi-faceted and affordable solutions for some of their most time-consuming tasks. In Columbus alone, tech is paving the way for in-kind donations using registry systems, trackable Venmo-esque donations, and better corporate engagement with nonprofits.

Columbus: you can get your dog walked through an app. Imagine the possibilities tech innovation for nonprofits could bring to our city.

The author is Founder and CEO of POINT. Download POINT on the App Store or get it on Google Play.