Transcript Future Trends in Technology IS Strategic Perspective for

The Future of ICT in Relief
RedR Conference, London
December 5, 2007
Edward Granger-Happ
CIO, Save the Children
Chairman, NetHope
"The art of prophecy is
very difficult-- especially
with respect to the
future." --Mark Twain
2
Looking Back
"Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on
retentiveness. Those who cannot remember the past are
condemned to repeat it.” --George Santayana
The world is an increasingly unsafe place to be
4
Banda Aceh – Ground Zero
5
5
What are the key questions?
1. What is fundamental in disaster relief?
2. What is fundamental in long-term
development?
3. Is technology a benefit to communities in
crisis?
4. For relief operations, do we bet on on-line or
off-line applications?
5. Can supply chain management (SCM) be a
competitive advantage for nonprofits?
6. What is commodity and what is value-added
for a non-profit?
6
What is this large object?
a very large ship 5 miles inland in the middle of the road
7
Changing Priorities By Program Type
Factor
Cost
Time (Speed)
Quality
Volume
ER
4
1
3
2
Program Type
Trans
Dev
3
2
4
4
2
1
1
3
Ranking factors 1-4, 1=highest
For emergency response, time and volume are king;
for development, cost and quality reign
8
In 7 yrs, cost drops 30x and speed increases 400x
Mobile Data Cost versus Speed for 100 KB
300
16
$ Cost for 100KB Message
12
200
10
150
8
6
100
Speed Observed in Kbps
250
14
4
50
2
0
0
Codan HF
(1998)
Mini M
(2000)
Thuraya
SatPhone
(2001)
Iridium
SatPhone
(2002)
RBGAN
(2003)
BGAN
(2007)
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Stages of a Disaster
Stage 0: Preparedness
– Relief agencies:
• Collaborate and determine roles in a disaster
• Determine systems of data, voice, video and
physical exchange
• Develop a protocol for engagement
• Catalog relief resources
• Partner with local communities
• Prepare to engage, inform and steward potential
donors
– Example: STC earthquake preparedness in Georgia
10
Stages of a Disaster (cont.)
Stage 1: Within hours of disaster striking
– First relief workers arrive on the ground.
– Survey and assess damage, transmit pictures,
security information, relief material and personnel
requirements to Head Offices.
– Agencies decide how deeply involved they will be with
relief efforts.
– Locating family members (people don’t eat, clothe
themselves or sleep until they found their loved ones)
– Example: CRS in sectarian fighting in eastern Congo
– This is the Highly Individual, Highly Mobile ICT
stage
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IRAQ
12
12
Stages of a Disaster (cont.)
Stage 2: Within two weeks of disaster striking
– Teams begin to arrive on the scene as risk of disease
and malnutrition escalates.
– Requirements are continuous monitoring of disaster,
assessment of victim needs, management of relief
material deployment between and across aid
agencies, personnel security, application and
reporting of donated funds, uploading of case studies,
pictures and relief reports.
– Example: Relief International in Bam, Iran earthquake
– Small Group, Highly Mobile/Temporary ICT stage
13
Stages of a Disaster (cont.)
• Stage 3 – From one-six months following a
disaster striking to multi-year.
– Agencies provide resources for building
reconstruction, counseling, family reunification, food
distribution, water purification, etc.
– Agencies become part of the community over a long
period of time.
– Example: Actionaid in tsunami relief in southern India
– Large Group - Permanent ICT stage
14
Stages of a Disaster (cont.)
• Stage 4 – Learning
– Lessons learned:
– Agencies determine what worked and what
did not work
– Then make adjustments
– Example: NetHope members in Pakistan
earthquake response
15
An NGO Supply Chain
Country – Sub-Office
Assessment
Plan
Procure
Ship
Warehouse
Ship
Reporting
Ben. Track
• For development, procurement is competitive; for
emergency response, procurement is pre-determined
and agile
• Beneficiary tracking is key in the NGO supply chain;
commercial SCM applications lack this
16
Looking Ahead
A Triad of IT Drivers
Metcalf’s Law
the network effect is exponential
Nielsen’s Law
high-end user's connection speed grows by 50% per year
Moore’s Law
CPUs double
every 18 months
18
Verizon FIOS Service
• 100 MB/sec fiber to
homes!
• This is the same speed
as the backplane of a
laptop 3 years ago!
19
Bottom Line?
Don’t Bet Against
the Network!
By the time it will take
you to work around the
connectivity issues, the
network will be where
you need it to be.
20
What if we’re wrong?
Strategy is about making bets!
21
Advice from a Hockey Legend
“I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.”
--Wayne Gretzky
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A Leading Indicator
23
Another Leading Indicator
24
Current University Students
• I asked Dartmouth Graduate students:
– So what do you use to communicate more, IM or
Texting?
• Answer: Neither
• Neither?
• We do everything in Facebook
25
It’s the Social Network not the Wired Network
26
Why?
• The social network is the future
• Working together in loose-tight ways
– “Loose” geography (e.g. the NGO community)
– “Tight” purpose (e.g. disaster relief)
• Richer collaboration (e.g. NetHope)
27
“If you’re a CIO, you need to spend a lot of
time out on the fringes of the Web because
that’s where the innovation’s taking place.
You need to spend a lot of time with people
under 25 years old.” –Gary Hamel
28
“Did You Know?” presentation, Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colorado, United States.
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For the rest of the world, this is the Internet
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Key strategic questions
1. If we will have all the bandwidth we need
globally, what changes for relief
applications?
2. If the #1 device used in emergency
response is the cell phone, what changes
when the cell phone can operate like
today’s laptops?
3. Do we build disconnected applications for
the interim or wired applications for the
future?
ONE MORE TIME: Where is the puck going to be?
32
Questions?
33
Appendix
• Additional detail slides
34
Top Ten Themes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Continuing explosion of computing hardware triangle
Global communication growing geometrically
Commoditization of technology components
Retirement of the current middle class
Flattening from triple convergence
Run-the-business software (ERP)
Increasing regulatory framework
Results-oriented philanthropy
Rise in world-class, operational excellence
Rise in merger and acquisitions
35
On Leaders and Followers
• First-movers – the pioneers, trail-blazers, fast &
agile leaders; but with higher costs and higher
risks—requires serious focus
• Second-movers – the fast followers; capitalize
on the mistakes/learning of pioneers; follow the
successes, but need to overcome the leaders
• Frugal-movers – the pragmatic followers; more
cautiously follows industry leaders, picking what
works well, waiting for lower costs of entry; may
constantly be in catch-up mode
• Late-movers – the laggards, miss most
opportunities, resist change; sometimes luck-out
36
Key strategic either-or bets
Follower
• IT focused on operations
• More effective-efficient
service dept’s
• Add results-oriented M&E
data/reporting when donor
demand is unavoidable
• Build technology and
operations incrementally
• Capacity building by staffing
and training
• MOS operations
Leader
• Programs leveraging technology
• More effective and efficient
programs
• Lead NGOs and set the resultsoriented M&E data and reporting
standard
• Leapfrog competitors by buying
the best operations
• Capacity building by staffing,
training & leveraging technology
• World class operations
37
Pendulum Dichotomies - IT cycles over the past 50 years
Left Brain (60s, 90s)
• Centralized
• Standardized
• Generalized
• Rationale
• Autocratic
• Big is Better
• In-source
• Tight
Right Brain (70s, 80s)
• Decentralized
• Customized
• Specialized
• Creative
• Democratized
• Small is Beautiful
• Outsource
• Loose
The next wave?
38
1. Continuing explosion of the computing hardware triangle
•
•
•
•
•
Applications & data will be distributed in-country, closest to sources & lowestcost-to-maintain locations, yet will seem as if we are running programs on our
desktops.
Continued time-compression made possible by readily available, cheaper &
faster technology means an increasing real-time involvement in each others
work, and donor participation in programs. This will drive greater levels of
collaboration, but not always in ways we expect or want. For example, fact
that donors & providers will be able to virtually participate in program
planning, delivery & evaluation, may be unwelcome, but inevitable.
Cheaper, faster information & communication technology (ICT) will also mean
that where work gets done will become less relevant & highly flexible.
Working real-time in groups while in different locations will become
commonplace, as will employees working from home, on road, etc.
These trends will also drive greater levels of collaboration among NGOs, as
is already evident with consortia like NetHope, LINGOS & IWG/ECB.
Increased 24 x 7 connections will continue to drive up stress & make it more
difficult to unplug from work. Productivity gains rapidly produce information
saturation, high stress & burn-out. Managing work-life balance will therefore
become a major organizational issue & need in near future.
39
2. Global communication will -continue to grow geometrically
1.
2.
3.
4.
Digital divide among world's population will widen rather than
narrow as acceleration in computing outpaces global adoption.
Efforts to bridge this gap will need to double & triple. Educating
adolescents on use of computers as a way to break cycle of
poverty will become increasingly important from a programmatic
standpoint.
Need for technology education programs among emerging
countries will increasingly become a requirement for children to
thrive as productive adults.
Most strategic use of technology is to deliver wholly new
programs, or existing programs in wholly new ways, that would
not be possible before application of technology. This means
thinking abut programs in a new way
For dissemination of information (outward flow), technology can
play a more capacity building role. This impacts all of sectors.
flip side is collection & reporting of information (inward flow) from
beneficiaries to providers in terms of basic M&E data.
40
3. Commoditization of technology components
•
•
shift from development to integration (already
one of IS strategic shifts) will continue to
accelerate.
Moving IT work to regions and country offices will
need to become part of our IT strategy.
41
4. Retirement of the current middle class
• Immediate impact will be on staffing positions
(technology and others!), with a resulting sellers
market and bidding war among organizations.
This will require three responses:
– moving more jobs offshore, developing our field
locations to do more headquarters jobs,
– moving up food chain to do higher-level tasks in HQ
(e.g., integration rather than development for IT),
and
– use of more standard, off-the-shelf software and
tools.
• opportunity is keep aging workers engaged, with
more creative retirement and semi-retirement
plans
42
5. Flattening from triple convergence
1.
2.
Internet revolution means (1) new global playing field, (2)
new businesses processes & (3) entry of huge workforce
of China, India & Soviets
Donors will increasingly expect to work directly with field
programs, & to do so virtually, working through the
Internet. Those nonprofits that are able to offer this will
increasingly attract donors who expect this.
43
6. Run-the-business software
1.
2.
3.
4.
Save will increasingly be in catch-up mode if we do
not make leap to enterprise software.
time & investment to take this leap will become less
attractive the longer we delay, forcing us to look to an
acquisition strategy of buy it now rather than build it
for later.
most effective program delivery organizations will
attract a greater share of donor contributions from
ever more sophisticated donors who will have had
first-hand experience with efficiently run corporate
organizations & expect this from nonprofits they
support.
success of the Alliance & its long-term initiatives of
Unified Presence & Stronger Members will
increasingly demand shared enterprise software.
44
7. Increasing regulatory framework
1.
Increasing administrative & systems support
will be required to meet growing regulatory
demands. Compliance will be more expensive
than our physical security costs to-date
Choices:
1. Do we build now in anticipation, or react afterthe-fact?
2. When is the right time to invest?
45
8. Results-oriented philanthropy
1.
Investment in higher-order systems will be
required, such as Executive Information
Systems (EIS), Balanced Scorecard systems
(BSC), & GYST-like program tracking systems
Choices:
1. Do we lead NGOs and set the standard, or do
we follow when donor demand is
unavoidable?
46
9. Rise in world-class, operational excellence
•
•
•
increasing emphasis on process will require
new sets of expertise among our employees
to work in process-improvement mode
Significantly more data collection & reporting
on administrative & programming processes
themselves will be required. demand will rise
for data, data, & more data.
Nonprofit donors will increasingly expect direct
access to this data
47
10. Rise in merger and acquisitions
•
key opportunity is for buying rather than
building impact
•
For example, we are faced with prospect of
spending $3-5M over next 3-5 years migrating
from our legacy donor management system to
a world-class system. Yet at end of this
process, we will be where some of our
competitor agencies are today
Choices:
•
Do we build incrementally, or leapfrog
competitors by buying the best?
48
From IS Staff Briefing
49
1. Continuing explosion of the computing hardware triangle
•
Hardware triangle:
–
–
–
•
Bandwidth: Verizon FIOS service
Disk storage: Google server farms
CPU speed: Moore's law
As all three of these factors accelerate, the cost per unit
continues to fall.
–
–
–
“…the cost of computing power is now around 1/1,000 of 1
percent of what it cost 50 years ago.”
PCs have dropped in price an average of 21% per year since
their introduction
“If the automobile had followed the same development cycle
as the computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a
million miles per gallon, and explode once a year…”
50
2. Global communication will continue to grow geometrically
• By 2010 there will be 2.5B mobile phones subscribers-twice as many as PC's
• 88 per cent of e-mails are junk including 1 per cent virusinfected
• e-mail messages rising by 84 per cent each year
• 1,035 million mobile phone text messages sent each
month in Britain
• 37 average texts per user sent per month compared with
21 in 2001
• 1 million children aged under 10 in Britain (1 in 3) own a
phone
• 8 years old is the average age at which a child gets a
mobile phone in Britain
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4. Retirement of the current middle class
•
50% of people in technology jobs will be leaving
their jobs in the next 10 years. With this will go
their knowledge & experience. More importantly
there are fewer technology people to take their
place.
–
–
–
NASA has 3 times number of people over 60 versus
those under 30
More than 50% of IT workers in US government are
eligible to retire by 2013
Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) Case: 40% of
TVA’s staff is eligible to retire in 5 years
52
5. Flattening from triple convergence
•
Internet revolution means:
a) new global playing field,
b) new businesses processes
c) entry of huge workforce of China, India &
Soviets
•
See Thomas Friedman’s book, The World
is Flat for an abundance of evidence of the
trends so far in the 21st century.
53
6. Run-the-business software
•
There will be nonprofit Enterprise Resource Planning
(ERP) systems that will standardize and streamline all
administrative processes. It will then extend to the
processes of delivering programs themselves.
–
–
–
Blackbaud’s new strategy to be the Enterprise Resource
Planning (ERP) vendor to nonprofits
Children International’s (CI’s) recent porting of a midenterprise ERP to their sponsorship business model
CARE, World Vision and the World Food Program’s adoption
of the enterprise-wide GYST program management and
reporting system
54
7. Increasing regulatory framework
•
Following the impact of Sarbanes-Oxley
(SOX) on for-profits, we can expect an
increasing regulatory framework for nonprofits.
–
–
Changes in the annual IT audits at nonprofits
strongly indicate this trend as do recent charitable
regulation changes in CA and NY
For example, the total SC/US audit costs have
increased 38% since FY04; the IT portion has
increased 50%+ based on time required to
complete it.
55
9. Rise in world-class, operational excellence
•
•
Following corporations, we can expect a rise
in world-class, operational excellence to be a
factor in nonprofit success.
We will see streamlining programs such as
Work Out, Six Sigma and Lean Thinking
applied to nonprofits
–
Our own recent experience with business process
improvement (BPI) in Leadership Giving, and the
streamlining task force are cases in point.
56
10. Rise in merger and acquisitions
•
We can expect to see a rise in merger and
acquisitions for the nonprofit sector. This will
result in combining of operations and the
systems used to support them or the migration
of one partner’s systems to the other
–
–
“Having seen internal consolidations succeed for
such recognizable groups as the Girl Scouts and
the American Lung Association, nonprofits of
various shapes and sizes are testing the waters for
possible mergers and are often taking the plunge.”
CSM notes that there are 1.3 million nonprofits
today, growing at the rate of 7% per year (80,000 to
90,000 new nonprofits are created each year)
57
Worldwide cellular access is exploding
58
International Internet Bandwidth Growth by Region, 2002-2005
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