Many nonprofits know they should embrace AI, and most are already feeling the stress to maneuver quicker than their sources enable. AI is advancing at a pace that’s laborious for them to maintain tempo with, not to mention undertake responsibly. For mission-driven organizations with lean groups and restricted sources, the query isn’t simply find out how to implement AI. It’s find out how to do it ethically and in ways in which assist the long-term wellbeing of the communities they serve.
At Cisco, we consider that technological experience, deployed with objective, is likely one of the strongest sources we are able to provide our nonprofit companions. Past monetary funding and entry to know-how, what many nonprofits want is direct entry to individuals who perceive this AI second deeply and may help them translate that information into apply.
That conviction formed our first annual Tech for Social Good Hackathon. In early 2026, greater than 160 Cisco specialists volunteered to type 27 groups and spent one week constructing AI-powered options for seven Cisco Basis nonprofit companions working throughout local weather resilience and financial alternative. Every staff began with an precise downside assertion submitted by the nonprofit group and a mandate to resolve the issue responsibly.
Contained in the construct to develop moral AI options for nonprofit companions
Throughout all 27 groups, the simplest options shared one thing in widespread: they had been constructed by volunteers who thought as a lot concerning the individuals implementing the instruments as the issues the instruments had been fixing. As Venkata Naga Rajesh Badveti, a Cisco engineer who designed a workflow resolution for Era’s curriculum improvement staff, which creates classes for hundreds of learners worldwide, put it: “AI is a multiplier, not a standalone resolution. It really works finest when it amplifies human experience slightly than changing it.”
That mindset prolonged to how groups thought concerning the communities their options would in the end serve. Sathwik Kothapalli labored with Farmers for Forests on an AI device to automate the verification of handwritten paperwork in a number of regional languages, a prerequisite for farmers becoming a member of the nonprofit’s reforestation program in India. His staff constructed for pace with out sacrificing accuracy, embedding human overview at each step with a clear-eyed understanding of what was at stake for every individual within the course of. “Realizing {that a} farmer in rural Maharashtra may get verified quicker and be a part of a reforestation program sooner due to code I wrote made this essentially the most significant mission of my profession,” Sathwik shared.
“The Tech for Social Good Hackathon jogged my memory that the abilities we hone and develop day-after-day at Cisco might be genuinely life-changing for communities which have by no means had entry to them.”
– Sathwik Kothapalli, Cisco engineer
Abhishek Kumar, who helped construct a donor prospect platform for Alternative Worldwide, introduced each hands-on engineering depth and the systems-level pondering that comes from managing technical groups. “These are the sorts of operational bottlenecks I assist my very own groups clear up day-after-day, and seeing that very same sample at a nonprofit strengthened how transferable our expertise actually are.” Greater than the technical output, although, he noticed the Hackathon as a logo of what partnership with Cisco appears like: “An occasion just like the Hackathon indicators that we see our companions as organizations with actual operational challenges that deserve the identical caliber of engineering we convey to our prospects.”
“Monetary contributions and company donations matter, however constructing a working AI resolution {that a} nonprofit can truly deploy — that’s a essentially completely different type of partnership.”
– Abhishek Kumar, Cisco engineer
For Cisco volunteers, the expertise was significant. They deepened their AI experience, collaborated throughout groups, and noticed instant impression from their work, all of which strengthened each particular person ability and organizational tradition.
Deployable instruments, lasting impression
The suggestions from taking part organizations was equally constant: the volunteers got here able to pay attention and provide tailor-made options, and left their companions energized about what else was doable. “You not solely discovered nice one-stop-shop options for a number of points we’re attempting to resolve,” says Maja Cimpric, Digital Product Lead at Era. “This complete expertise can be triggering nice follow-up conversations on our staff about our workflows and different potential for automations, which we’re assured will result in extra thrilling tasks down the highway.”
That sample, an answer that solves the issue and reframes what’s doable, confirmed up throughout organizations. Jennifer Wolford, Operation Hope‘s Chief Innovation Officer, mirrored: “Working with Cisco’s staff made it clear how rapidly the suitable technical experience can flip concepts into actual, usable options that enhance how we serve our shoppers. That type of collaboration is what permits us to undertake rising know-how in a approach that truly scales impression.”
For some nonprofits, the Hackathon represented one thing extra basic: an opportunity to maneuver previous the handbook, resource-intensive methods of working which have traditionally restricted their attain. Jessica White, Director of Information Analytics and Techniques Integrations at Alternative Worldwide, described it in concrete phrases: “They took a course of that was beforehand inconsistent and laborious to scale and turned it into one thing actionable. That shift from handbook effort to strategic motion has actual potential to extend fundraising and broaden our impression for the shoppers we serve.”
The case for skills-based volunteering as a social impression technique
Cisco has lengthy invested in its nonprofit companions by offering funding and know-how, however skills-based volunteering, at this degree of rigor and technical depth, represents one thing additive: a chance for the type of engaged, purposeful experience that helps organizations construct actual AI functionality from the within out.
“As we live and evolving within the AI period, we at Cisco have a novel alternative to make a direct impression with nonprofits via our state-of-the-art know-how,” stated Tim Barnes, Cisco engineer who labored with NESsT. “Think about if we did this for all of society’s challenges? We may streamline and improve nonprofit operations, liberating funds for them to elongate attain, widen scope, and allow them to higher assist these in want.”
The Tech for Social Good program will continue to grow. We’re bringing extra volunteers and companions into this mannequin — our subsequent cohort will broaden into Disaster Response and Schooling sectors — as a result of the outcomes counsel it’s price scaling. In a second when AI fluency is turning into a prerequisite for nonprofit effectiveness, that is yet one more approach Cisco may help shut the hole.
