I’ve been doing these “where I’ll be at the NTC” posts for many years, but this year I’m lagging behind the pack. Steve Heye and Cindy Leonard have beat me to it! But I’m excited to be back at NTC after a rare skip year. This will be my 11th ride on the NTC train and it is always a great one.
First up on Wednesday will be #ntcbeer! This year we’re back at the Black Squirrel, the place we filled to capacity three years ago, but larger options weren’t really available. Booking the Squirrel was a bit last minute, and it supersedes a plan 
to just have groups self-organize, which wasn’t going to work too well. For those of you counting, this is the 9th annual #ntcbeer, so 2018 will mark a decade of social good-minded geeks raising pint glasses and chatting away in anticipation of the packed event dead ahead.
On Thursday, I plan to start my day early at breakfast – one key to a great NTC is taking every available opportunity for a quiet chat with an old or new friend. Then I’m attending “Shared IT Services in 2017—Nightmare or Dream Come True?“, so that smart people like Karen Graham and David Krumlauf can school me. This is assuming that David isn’t too hung over after #ntcbeer – I’m glad that my sessions are on Friday!
After that, I’m torn. I might go to “Yes, We Need a Technology Plan, but Where Do We Start?“, which has some smart presenters and is a topic close to my geeky heart. But maybe too close, so I’m also considering “Scale Change, Activate Support, and Invite Stakeholders Inside through Network Leadership“. That one’s headed up by Debra Askanase, and is bound to be good.
For the third session on Thursday, it’s an impossible choice. Should I go to Johanna Bates and Cindy Leonard‘s “From Accidental to Intentional: Taking Your NPtech Career to the Next Level“? or Steve Heye and Peggy Duvette‘s “The Role of Technology in Managing the Operations of a Nonprofit“? Help me out here. And, given that Cindy Leonard and Steve Heye are the two people to the right in the picture below, factor their appearance into your argument, please!
On Friday morning, assuming I’ve recovered from the progressive parties, I’ll be presenting with my friend Edima Elinewinga, VP of IT at the UN Foundation, on “The Fully-Informed Approach to Calculating Return on Investment” in room Maryland C. This session is an expanded talk based on my recent Techsoup article on Calculating ROI and Edima’s experiences. If you want to discuss strategies for assessing the value of strategic technology investments, as well as promoting an organizational culture that knows how to make smart decisions, this session is for you.
Following that, at 1:30 I’ll be presenting with Dahna Goldstein on “Leading in Uncertain Times” in the Coolidge room. Topical, given press reports that my place of employment might be defunded (we are confident that we have solid, bipartisan support on the hill that will keep this from actually occurring). But we all know that nonprofits are often at risk, from economic downturns, variances in funding sources, and political or social circumstances that impact our mission-focused strategies. We’ll discuss how an organization can be agile in times of uncertainty, with a focus on tech.
Do you work in Legal Aid? And are you going to NTC? Then definitely ping me – if there are enough of us, we should have dinner on Friday night.
On Saturday morning, “Nonprofit Execs Talk about Strategic Assessment” looks good to me, followed by Joshua Peskay‘s “The Dollars and Sense of Nonprofit Technology Budgeting“.
The big event is less than two weeks away as I type this. I hope to see you there!
