[RIDERS-TALK] Non-profit Data Standards [was funder-built online "databases"]

["Ed Dodds" <dodds@e-dodds.com>]

Thought you folks might want in on this <ed dodds/>

-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Gianni [mailto:andrew@newkenmore.com] 
Sent: Thursday, June 26, 2003 9:28 AM
To: riders-talk@npogroups.org

>Consolidation is happening in every other sector -- non-profits know
that if 
>they can make it difficult to merge they can hold on to their jobs a
little 
>longer. 

I'm personally very anti-consolidation for most situations with
nonprofits. I think there's a lot of value in the trust and relationship
building that happens with local organizations and centralization of
nonprofits would be the corporatization of nonprofit sector.

I also think that it's unlikely that we are likely to come up with any
standard like those Ed lists, but rather a meta-standard that provides a
means for relatively low-cost (which is key) bridges to be built. One
vision I have is a customizable open-source database console that acts
as a front end to any number of database systems. Modules could be built
that would allow the console to interface with any number of other
databases including offline ones (like ebase, paradigm, quickbooks etc.)
Building such a system and having it adopted would allow those
developing new online databases a de facto standard to build an
interface or module for. I know this is kind of pie in the sky but I'm
just tossing out ideas.

Andrew

---

Andrew Gianni - Sole Proprietor
New Kenmore Online Communications
Technology Planning and Implementation
web: http://www.newkenmore.com
phone: 413.367.9719
mobile: 413.575.2046
fax: 413.254.4004
post: PO Box 207, Montague, MA 01351

email: andrew@newkenmore.com
aim: andrewsgianni
yahoo: asgianni
msn: andrewgianni0175
icq: 75849277
 
 

-----Original Message-----
From: Ed Dodds [mailto:dodds@e-dodds.com] 
Sent: Thursday, June 26, 2003 8:49 AM
To: andrew@newkenmore.com; riders-talk@npogroups.org
Subject: RE: [RIDERS-TALK] Non-profit Data Standards [was funder-built
online "databases"]

Andrew:
Part of the problem is that while the fed government/states/NGA,org are
atleast looking a standards like GXA, and financial services have mark
ups for derivatives, financial services, and reporting/interchange,
non-profits (who from the donor's perspective are about 1) services and
2) finances) are slow to adopt standards or maps which allow for
transparency to a degree which will allow an orgs budget to be compared
to another similar org at the line item level.
Nascent standards of which I am aware (if there are more please let me
know):
1) Universal chart of accounts
2) EDIN/independentsector.org/NCCC "E-990s"
 3) www.nten.org/other Non-profit Data Standards Initiative 
4) http://www.mip.com/xbrl/ DRAFT: Prototype Financial Reporting for
Not-for-Profit Organizations XBRL Taxonomy
Intuit has developed qbxml which will allow xml import/export out of
QuickBooks and xbrl will be included in a Microsoft Excel Add-in in the
fall (if there production schedule holds).
What I AM SCREAMING to the non-profit sector is "regulate yourselves" or
somebody else less favorable to your goals will (McKinsey & Co., etc.).
A second aside is that non-profits ought to start lobbying congress re:
tax code for volunteers to be able to write the value of their volunteer
time off of their fed income taxes at the rate a fed employee would be
paid to complete the same task – this will put the onus on the
“Compassionate Conservative” crew to “put up or shut up.” If non-profits
really desire volunteers and not just more paid positions this would be
one way to prove it.
Ed Dodds
-----Original Message-----
From: Andrew Gianni [mailto:andrew@newkenmore.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2003 6:46 PM
To: riders-talk@npogroups.org
Subject: [RIDERS-TALK] funder-built online "databases"
I’ve been seeing a disturbing trend over the past year that I’d like to
share and request comments on.
 
I’m seeing more funders -- particularly in the social services realm --
developing online databases for their grantees that allow them to track
some class of information related to their funding while reporting to
the funder. A number of agencies I’ve been working with are running into
situations where they now have three or more of these systems to deal
with. The reason I put “databases” in quotes in the subject line is
because in most cases these are primarily reporting tools and
secondarily internal data management and reporting tools for the
organizations and often the organizations don’t understand how to use
any of the reporting functionality.
 
On some level I think there are some potential benefits to this system,
and if the application was well built and a given organization only had
to deal with one (and the funder offered training?!?!) it could be
great. It’s the multiple data sources that concern me. I’m sure there
could be some way to make these databases talk to each other or to a
central application that an organization could use (some form of XML?)
that would not breach confidentiality between the data sources.
 
Has anyone else dealt with this situation and found ways to make these
types of databases communicate? Does anyone know of an online
database/reporting tool like this that has some kind of XML like
interface? I think this is only going to become a bigger problem as time
progresses.
 
Andrew
---

Andrew Gianni - Sole Proprietor
New Kenmore Online Communications
Technology Planning and Implementation
web: http://www.newkenmore.com
phone: 413.367.9719
mobile: 413.575.2046
fax: 413.254.4004
post: PO Box 207, Montague, MA 01351
 
email: andrew@newkenmore.com
aim: andrewsgianni
yahoo: asgianni
msn: andrewgianni0175
icq: 75849277
 
 
 

_________________________________________________________________

Nonprofit and Nongovernmental Technology Assistance
Providers (Circuit Riders) - General Discussion

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