Recently, I attended an NTEN  webinar entitled:  No Wrong Door:  Tools for NP to Collect & Share Resource and Client Info with One Another, which was presented by Doug Zimmerman, President and CEO of VisionLink. 

Who is VisionLink?  According to their website, “VisionLink is the leading provider of community resource and client management systems. We offer advanced web-based software for social services, disaster management, homeless management (HMIS), information and referral (2-1-1/ I&R), elder care, and educational sectors.

We build Community Operating Systems (CommunityOS). Manage clients, resources, contributions, volunteers and much more for communities and the partnerships that serve them well. Deploy private, public and collaborative tools.”

So what did I learn?  It’s important to share, we all know that one. In this case, we’re talking about sharing data with other organizations.  Sharing information can help your nonprofit by decreasing the time spent on collecting data, save your organization money and resources.  It also helps by keeping your stakeholders informed, because you can quickly and easily provide reports on your stakeholders.  

Why Should You Share YOUR Data?  Not everybody likes to share information, especially with our competitors - that’s another obvious point.  Doug pointed out that, “Whether driven by economic necessity, or a growing expectation for more coordinated client services, the era of having data stored in individual silos is over.”

According to VisionLink, the tips to succeeding when it comes to forming sharing partnerships include:

•   “Share the Same Vision – have unified objectives,  understand each other’s languages, resources are partially shared, all sides are highly flexible
•  In a truly effective partnership, the each organization will alter their work to support common objectives, but neither partner is expected to give up the core components of their own mission.
•  Key Lesson - The specific needs of each partner need to be realized.  Without this balance the partnership breaks.”

What kind of Technology is Required to Share Information, AND Make Sure It’s customized to the Organization’s Specific Needs?

“Portal based technologies - which are new to nonprofit organizations, provide a single technical platform for integrated information, and yet allow each partner organization to fully meet their own specific needs.”  These are divided into single systems and multiple deployments.  The single systems have similar look and feel to the websites.  They also have common resources and generate common reports.  As the number of partners increases, the cost greatly increases.  Multiple deployments allow each partner organization to have a different look, different resources, different data input and different reports.

Your organization can have it’s own resources, menus, logos, forums, etc.  They all are collecting the same data from their clients, such as, name, address, email, etc.  The technology lets the partners share collected data, but also collect specific data that meets their organization’s needs.  Private data is kept private.  Common resources are filtered by portal, user type and by privacy requirements.  Sharing saves your nonprofit time and resources.

Exchanging Data – XML is the tool that helps partners share their information, whether they have similar or dissimilar systems.  Some organizations choose to share exchange data by one time imports, ongoing feeds, one-way, two-way exchange, or millions at a time.

•  The American Red Cross uses data exchange to manage 54,000 shelters across the United States.  

Standards – Data standards are common throughout many sectors, for example the HIPPA Privacy Standard.  There are standards for security, exchange, operations and procedures.  Validations tools are available throughout the web, so it’s easy to see if you’re standards are compliant.

What’s the Catch to Operating a Sharing Partnership?

•  Cost –it’s expensive to build a data exchange
•  Standard change a lot, tools are expensive
•  Maintenance – takes time and resources
•  Limitations – vendors will not cooperate, security permissions are sophisticated and hard when you exchange data
•  Rapid data exchange means error correction is necessary

Good Data Needs to be Exchanged = Good Sources

You can have the greatest resources on your site, but it won’t do anyone any good if you they can’t find your site.  How does good data get into the right hands?  It has to be fed to local sites.  The example that Doug Zimmerman gave was the U.S. Government’s Department of Aging has terrific resources, and they solve the data dilemma by feeding their information to local sites around the country.  Between the American Red Cross and FEMA, there are 75,000 disasters handled annually, and it’s paramount that they have the resources to share their data.

What does the Future Hold for Nonprofits and Data Sharing?

VisionLink predicts that a new type of contribution management is on the horizon.  In the near future, with consent from the donor, nonprofits will be sharing funds as well as data.  Nonprofits will pull resources by asking their funders to allow their excess dollars donated to a specific nonprofit automatically go to another nonprofit organization that’s in need of those funds.  Let’s say that you have $100 dollars to donate to the Humane Society, but they only need $75.  If you agree, the extra $25 will go towards the American Red Cross.  

When you share everybody wins, but no one said it was going to be economical or easy!