"While the TSC is proud to make the AST Trust seamless processing solution available to the field, we are all too aware that this is the tip of the needed infrastructure iceberg," says Sid Hartman, TSC Chairman. "Work within the TSC has come a long way in the last year."

The CRM Subcommittee met recently in San Mateo to judge best of breed solution provider proposals (see details below). According to Deborah Whitehurst, CRM chair, "The field should be reassured to have leaders representing a diversity of community foundation perspectives engaged in this process. We gained invaluable knowledge during two days of presentations from eight solution providers. Through careful review of available solutions and intensive questioning, we are working to prepare the field to make key decisions for our field's needs in the areas of online grants, CRM, accountability and web presence."

The Community Foundation Technology Initiative

Update June and July 2004

API and Development Standards

The API Subcommittee continues to monitor the progress of Microedge/NPO toward the development of application program interfaces. The seamless processing API has progressed into the PRD (product requirements document) phase during which final details will be outlined.

On July 27 and 28, the CRM Subcommittee reviewed finalist presentations resulting from a Request for Information (RFI) which was sent to 19 potential providers with 12 responding. After narrowing the field to eight, the subcommittee reviewed presentations in person at their meeting, agreeing that all were impressive. It is clear that given the right circumstances, each one offers viable solutions.

The CRM committee expects to spend the next 4-6 weeks evaluating the proposals and undertaking comparisons of a subset of the eight finalists.

The Accountability Subcommittee is conducting an RFI to select a provider who will develop the field's definitions of accountability policies and protocols for:

• Minimum data quality and formatting requirements that enable community foundations to effectively communicate accountability information

• Minimum technology requirements for software products that community foundations use to collect and eventually share accountability data

• Business models and related fee structures that may be used to support the collection and dissemination of accountability data

The provider should be identified at the subcommittee's August meeting. At that time, members will also provide feedback to the CRM Sub-Committee regarding its efforts to select on-line grants management and accountability systems as part of the broader RFI. Two members of the Sub-Committee, Jeremy Arkin of Atlanta and Anne Camp of Omaha, also serve in an advisory role to the CRM Subcommittee whose work is closely aligned.

The subcommittee requests input from the field and has used a recent field-wide email announcing the expansion of the website to solicit contributions.

Subcommittee priority projects determined in May included:

• personalized home pages for donors, grantees and professional advisors, including 'single log-in' for each type of constituent
• e-marketing suite (a suite of tools that providing e-newsletter and email marketing and communications services with template and tagged content from Websites)
• advanced communications training on using technology as part of an overall communications plan

Because this functionality will be included as part of broader technology component, they were included under a comprehensive RFI conducted by the CRM Committee (an RFI that also included requirements from Accountability, signs of close coordination of the subcommittee work).

The Web Presence Committee provided feedback to CRM's analysis of vendor proposals in these three combined areas during their August 5 meeting. Rebecca Arno, who serves on both Web Presence and CRM, provided perspectives and insight from the CRM deliberations.

In addition, the subcommittee commissioned a white paper to help community foundations build and refine their web presence by:

Online discussions to help educate the field about the TSC seamless processing with American Stock Transfer (AST) Trust have been conducted in July and August. Four discussions reached 90 representatives from 76 community foundations. They have focused on the business opportunities of seamless processing, as well as actual demonstrations of the AST software. For future sessions (as well as recordings of the sessions) see www.cftech.org.

Five community foundations — Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta, Foundation for the Carolinas, New York Community Trust, Marin Community Foundation, New Jersey Community Foundation — have begun to implement seamless processing and others can do so at any time. If your foundation is ready to explore how this solution can improve operations, contact Mike Flinn, Senior Vice-President Wealth Advisory Support Services, for AST Trust Company. He can be reached directly at 602-296-0658 or via email at mflinn@asttrustco.com.

AST will act as an intermediary, managing relationships with investment managers that interact with a foundation