Many nonprofits know they should embrace AI, and most are already feeling the strain to maneuver quicker than their assets enable. AI is advancing at a velocity that’s onerous for them to maintain tempo with, not to mention undertake responsibly. For mission-driven organizations with lean groups and restricted assets, the query isn’t simply tips on how to implement AI. It’s tips on how to do it ethically and in ways in which assist the long-term wellbeing of the communities they serve.
At Cisco, we imagine that technological experience, deployed with goal, is among the strongest assets we will provide our nonprofit companions. Past monetary funding and entry to expertise, what many nonprofits want is direct entry to individuals who perceive this AI second deeply and may also help them translate that information into observe.
That conviction formed our first annual Tech for Social Good Hackathon. In early 2026, greater than 160 Cisco specialists volunteered to kind 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 crew began with an precise drawback 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 best options shared one thing in frequent: they have been constructed by volunteers who thought as a lot concerning the folks implementing the instruments as the issues the instruments have been fixing. As Venkata Naga Rajesh Badveti, a Cisco engineer who designed a workflow answer for Technology’s curriculum improvement crew, which creates classes for 1000’s of learners worldwide, put it: “AI is a multiplier, not a standalone answer. It really works finest when it amplifies human experience relatively than changing it.”
That mindset prolonged to how groups thought concerning the communities their options would finally serve. Sathwik Kothapalli labored with Farmers for Forests on an AI software 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 crew constructed for velocity with out sacrificing accuracy, embedding human assessment at each step with a clear-eyed understanding of what was at stake for every particular person within the course of. “Realizing {that a} farmer in rural Maharashtra may get verified quicker and be part of a reforestation program sooner due to code I wrote made this probably the most significant venture of my profession,” Sathwik shared.
“The Tech for Social Good Hackathon jogged my memory that the talents we hone and develop daily 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 considering that comes from managing technical groups. “These are the sorts of operational bottlenecks I assist my very own groups remedy daily, 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 seems 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 carry to our clients.”
“Monetary contributions and company donations matter, however constructing a working AI answer {that a} nonprofit can truly deploy — that’s a basically totally 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 affect from their work, all of which strengthened each particular person ability and organizational tradition.
Deployable instruments, lasting affect
The suggestions from taking part organizations was equally constant: the volunteers got here able to hear and provide tailor-made options, and left their companions energized about what else was potential. “You not solely discovered nice one-stop-shop options for a number of points we’re making an attempt to resolve,” says Maja Cimpric, Digital Product Lead at Technology. “This complete expertise can also be triggering nice follow-up conversations on our crew about our workflows and different potential for automations, which we’re assured will result in extra thrilling initiatives down the highway.”
That sample, an answer that solves the issue and reframes what’s potential, confirmed up throughout organizations. Jennifer Wolford, Operation Hope‘s Chief Innovation Officer, mirrored: “Working with Cisco’s crew made it clear how shortly 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 expertise in a means that really scales affect.”
For some nonprofits, the Hackathon represented one thing extra elementary: an opportunity to maneuver previous the guide, resource-intensive methods of working which have traditionally restricted their attain. Jessica White, Director of Information Analytics and Methods Integrations at Alternative Worldwide, described it in concrete phrases: “They took a course of that was beforehand inconsistent and onerous to scale and turned it into one thing actionable. That shift from guide effort to strategic motion has actual potential to extend fundraising and broaden our affect for the shoppers we serve.”
The case for skills-based volunteering as a social affect technique
Cisco has lengthy invested in its nonprofit companions by offering funding and expertise, however skills-based volunteering, at this stage 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 singular alternative to make a direct affect with nonprofits by means of our state-of-the-art expertise,” 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 Training sectors — as a result of the outcomes counsel it’s value scaling. In a second when AI fluency is turning into a prerequisite for nonprofit effectiveness, that is yet one more means Cisco may also help shut the hole.
