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
