{"id":2485,"date":"2015-07-12T15:47:00","date_gmt":"2015-07-12T15:47:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thebeagle.itgroove.net\/?p=2201"},"modified":"2023-02-24T21:39:42","modified_gmt":"2023-02-24T21:39:42","slug":"a-nonprofitable-journey-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regroove.ca\/archive\/2015\/07\/12\/a-nonprofitable-journey-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"A (Non)Profitable Journey — Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am embarking on a series of posts about how non-profits can benefit from Office 365, the Microsoft programs for non-profits and a bunch of other goodies on the side, all to better help non-profits squeeze every ounce of value they can from their limited financial resources.\u00a0 And this won\u2019t all just be \u201ctheory\u201d, I\u2019ll be detailing how a non-profit that I volunteer with \u2013 Swan Lake Christmas Hill Nature Sanctuary in Victoria, BC (www.swanlake.bc.ca<\/a>, check it out, it\u2019s pretty special) \u2013 is growing and leveraging the tools at their disposal.\u00a0 Kathleen Burton, the\u00a0 new Executive Director, has a vision of where she wants to see Swan Lake go and she has a background that has exposed her to many of the tools that larger organizations are used to having at their disposal.\u00a0 She wanted access to some or all of those tools if possible to modernize Swan Lake and set it on a path to the next level.\u00a0 Kathleen discussed her vision with me and I decided that Swan Lake was fairly representative of non-profits everywhere \u2013 lots of good ideas, supremely strained finances and needful of help to get to where they want to go.\u00a0 I also decided to dive in and help because it is \u201cthe right thing to do\u201d to give back to the community.\u00a0 I can\u2019t help every non-profit out there, at least not directly, but if our efforts at Swan Lake are documented and if we can highlight a path that others can follow, then we all benefit.<\/p>\n

So there you have it, I\u2019m going to lay it all out, warts and all.\u00a0 I hope your non-profit can benefit from the things we learn on this journey!<\/p>\n

First, some background on Swan Lake.<\/p>\n

Like all non-profits, Swan Lake\u2019s technical infrastructure is a mixed bag.\u00a0 They have a number of PC\u2019s of varying ages and specification, all running Windows 7.\u00a0 They have an older HP server (government surplus)running Server 2012 as a Hyper-V host with two VM\u2019s on it \u2013 SBS 2011 and a non-used Server 2008 R2 terminal server.\u00a0 There is a mixed bag of software including Microsoft Office, graphics programs, Basic Funder (a fund raising management system) and a few other programs.\u00a0 There is no central anti-virus in place, SBS is not leveraged, Exchange is not properly configured (they rely on POP3 downloads from their external email provider), group policy is pretty much non-existent.\u00a0 They have two office buildings, both on separate Shaw feeds, each building has a small Linksys router with a site-to-site VPN in place between the routers. Networking and DNS is poorly designed and implemented between the sites.\u00a0 In fact, overall, the implementation of SBS and the Hyper-V host is very poorly executed.\u00a0 Backups are non-operational.<\/p>\n

So, yes, it\u2019s a mess.\u00a0 But, sadly, not atypical of your average non-profit.<\/p>\n

TechSoup<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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They have done a few things right, though!\u00a0 First and foremost, they have signed up with TechSoup and they have made some smart Microsoft licensing purchases through them.\u00a0 If your are a non-profit and if you have NOT signed up with TechSoup, then you are missing the boat.\u00a0 TechSoup acts as a \u201cclearing house\u201d for a number of tech vendors and their programs for non-profits.\u00a0 Each vendor sets their own eligibility rules but TechSoup manages the processes and makes it pretty easy for non-profits to navigate the various vendor\u2019s plans.\u00a0 Microsoft has some very particular rules (in Canada you have to be a federally-registered non-profit or charity to qualify) but if you do <\/em>qualify they offer some pretty incredible deals to non-profits on pretty much the whole product lineup.\u00a0 This is also true for many of the other vendors that are offered through TechSoup.\u00a0 If you have not checked them out then now is the time to do so, in Canada it is www.techsoupcanada.ca<\/a>, in the US it is www.techsoup.org<\/a>.\u00a0 There is a global TechSoup site that can help you find your regional TechSoup, it is at www.techsoupglobal.org<\/a>.\u00a0 If you take nothing else away from this series of blog posts, take this away and sign up now.<\/p>\n

Office365<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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The second thing they have now done is to sign up with Office365 as a non-profit.\u00a0 This process is separate from TechSoup (although you can initiate order through TechSoup if you wish) and is actually pretty easy.\u00a0 You sign up for an Office 365 non-profit trial<\/a> then apply for non-profit licensing.\u00a0 If you are accepted for non-profit licensing you can get \u201cfree\u201d licensing for a number of users at the Business Essentials level or super cheap licensing (in Canada it is $2\/mth per user) for Business Premium that provides Office 2013 licensing on top of all of the Office 365 services.\u00a0 This is a monster value for any qualifying non-profit and kudos to Microsoft for really stepping up to the plate with this one.\u00a0 This is not a \u201cstripped down\u201d or otherwise hobbled service offering, it is the same O365 service that businesses pay decent money for on a monthly basis.\u00a0 This is the other big takeaway from this post \u2026 sign up with O365 and leverage the daylights out of it!<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll be detailing how Swan Lake makes use of O365 in future posts as well as describe\u00a0 how they moved on to the platform from their SBS.\u00a0 Kathleen is keen to start making use of SharePoint and OneDrive and is also looking at Yammer.\u00a0 I\u2019ll talk about a of that and more in future posts so please check back on a regular basis.\u00a0 I think there is going to be some interesting stuff happening!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am embarking on a series of posts about how non-profits can benefit from Office 365, the Microsoft programs for non-profits and a bunch of other goodies on the side, all to better help non-profits squeeze every ounce of value they can from their limited financial resources.\u00a0 And this won\u2019t all just be \u201ctheory\u201d, I\u2019ll … <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":2094,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[246,247,269],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nA (Non)Profitable Journey - Part 1 - Archive<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/regroove.ca\/archive\/2015\/07\/12\/a-nonprofitable-journey-part-1\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A (Non)Profitable Journey - 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