"Mobile technology growing in importance", say experts

IT | Gareth Jones | 25 Jan 2010

Mobile technology will leap in significance to charities over the coming year, according to a panel of experts attending the annual ‘Technology Trends Lunch’ hosted by IRIS NFP Solutions.

The 25 sector specialists predicted it to be the most important IT trend for the next 12 months, having not included it in their top six topics at last year’s meeting.

The panel felt that the increasing requirement for remote working would lead to the use of more mobile devices, greater use of geolocation and mobile phone utilities such as payment and donation facilities.

They argued that charities would also have to get used to allowing staff to use their own equipment such as laptops, PDAs and phones in conjunction with work systems.

QR codes were also predicted to take off, a technology which allows charities to put a code on flyers and posters which when scanned by a mobile device, will perform an action such as directing the user to a donation page.

The panel included representatives from charities such as Marie Curie Cancer Care and Stonewall, as well as consultants such as Iain Pritchard of Sayer Vincent and Sue Fidler.

The top five trends identified for the coming year were:

Mobile technology
Social media
Integration - between different systems, platforms and the web
Security - home and mobile working to bring heightened security challenges
Cloud computing

Directory: IRIS NFP Solutions | Sayer Vincent
Who's Who: Iain Pritchard

Comments

[Cancel] | Reply to:

Name *

Email *

Organisation

Job Title

Comments *

Verification *

* Please read our Community Standards

Close »

Community Standards

The civilsociety.co.uk community and comments board is intended as a platform for informed and civilised debate.

We hope to encourage a broad range of views, however, there are standards that we expect commentators to uphold. We reserve the right to delete or amend any comments that do not adhere to these standards.

We welcome:

Robust but respectful debate
Strongly held opinions
Intelligent relevant discussion
The sharing of relevant experiences
New participants

We will not publish:

Rude, threatening, offensive, obscene or abusive language, or links to such material
Links to commercial organisations or spam postings. The comments board is not an advertising platform
The posting of contact details for yourself or others
Comments intended for malicious purpose or mindless abuse
Comments purporting to be from another person or organisation under false pretences
Gratuitous criticism, commentary or self-promotion
Any material which breaches copyright or privacy laws, or could be considered libellous
The use of the comments board for the pursuit or extension of personal disputes

Be aware:

Views expressed on the comments board are left at users’ discretion and are in no way views held or supported by Civil Society Media
Comments left by others may not be accurate, do not rely on them as fact
You may be misunderstood - sarcasm and humour can easily be taken out of context, try to be clear

Please:

Enjoy the opportunity to express your opinion and respect the right of others to express theirs
Confine your remarks to issues rather than personalities

Together we can keep our community a polite, respectful and intelligent platform for discussion.