The Global Pro Bono Summit Raises Questions about Service in the Tech Profession

This week marks the 2^nd annual Global Pro Bono Summit – a joint convening between US-based Taproot Foundation and Germany-based BMW Foundation. It is a gathering of leaders across sectors and nations, who come together to drive the pro bono ethic within their respective professions and countries.

A major theme this year has been the state of pro bono in the technology space. This is an increasingly critical need for nonprofits, and yet one in which the professional community has not yet risen to the occasion. There were many potential causes identified – for example, the tech industry is so often characterized by the startup model. New ones are popping up all the time, and new organizations are of course the most strapped in terms of time and money – how can they spare any of the talent they’re barely able to keep on staff doing projects for free?

But the issue may in fact be more specific than that. Because the fact is – there is a significant amount of pro bono happening in the tech space. Enough that it is one of three fields represented at something called the “Global Pro Bono Summit”, after all. The issue is that the support provided isn’t moving the needle in the nonprofit sector. There are many anecdotes that connect tech leaders – especially those with a high net-worth that have made a move toward a philanthropic strategy – with high-profile, cutting-edge solutions in the sector (think DonorsChoose.org or Kiva). But what about the other organizations? Those for whom technology is not the basis of their model? They still have needs for technology to communicate to stakeholders, manage data, and make decisions. These organizations make up the vast majority of those in the sector, and yet their needs often seem to go overlooked.

 If the problem is fatigue in the tech community for completing these perhaps more mundane projects on a pro bono basis, then maybe additional funding is the solution,. Or perhaps a different model of pro bono service. Project-based, team-driven models are the norm at present, but others exist. A loaned-employee model, whereby a tech company places an engineer or data scientist full-time at a pro bono client site for the duration of the project, might also be the answer.

Whatever the solution, I’m convinced that there is an opportunity for innovation here. The talent exists to meet the needs of the sector, and I believe there is an ethic in the professional community to engage in service to help meet this need. We just need to figure out how to connect the two.