An Austin-based software company focused on technology solutions to help scale the social impact of nonprofits and public sector organizations is gearing up for its third annual Impact Summit.
Social Solutions provides easy-to-use software for organizations to track data, manage data and measure outcomes. It recently partnered with Ballmer Group, which was co-founded by former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, to use technology to advance the nonprofit and social impact sectors for decades to come. Ballmer will be the all-access keynote speaker at the 2018 Impact Summit Oct. 29-31 at the Fairmont Austin.
“The work that we were doing in the ordinary course of business and the work that the Ballmers were doing collided in a very fortuitous way,” said Kristin Nimsger, CEO of Social Solutions. “The Ballmers have a very strong philanthropic presence and one of their areas of particular interest is around students in the K-12 education space, but they support a number of nonprofits that are in other causes as well.”
It was through their philanthropic work that the Ballmers discovered many of the nonprofits they support use Social Solutions’ software services and decided to learn more.
“Steve (Ballmer) being a technologist at heart came into those conversations with a strong belief that the greatest way to impact any effort, philanthropy not excluded, is to use technology to scale one’s work and to scale one’s impact," she said.
Social Solutions shared its vision for its technology platform that includes a 360-degree view for clients that Nimsger describes as the Neflix of philanthropy effect.
“We’re building data science solutions that leverage the collective wisdom of the philanthropic sector in order to make programmatic recommendations for programs that people should be in right at the point of need, sometimes even before the point of need,” she said. “What was really interesting is that we found that Steve and his communications with the sector had already been talking about a 360-degree view of students and so we found that our future visions were entirely aligned.”
The conference serves as a broad philanthropic thought-leadership event.
“In addition to three days of events and 50 hours of sessions, some of which are very focused on using software to the highest and best-use training and user-community connection, there are also a number of really important conversations about how nonprofits are interacting with their funders, putting their data to best use and really a number of topics that go well beyond the tactical, and allow the community to collaborate with each other on best practices and issues that are most pressing for them,” Nimsger said.
The Impact Summit is open to technology users and experts -- and nonprofit leaders looking to expand the impact of their respective organizations and the nonprofit sector at large. The event offers more than 50 hours of sessions, including hands-on training and practice workshops, led by industry leaders nationwide. A Q & A and “appreciation party” are also on the three-day agenda.
Keynote speakers include Nimsger, herself, and John Manganaro, senior vice president of product management and data science at Social Solutions Global. Panelists include leaders from AMD, National Instruments, The University of Texas, Fidelity Charitable, KLRU, Texas Food Bank, Austin Community Foundation – Women’s Fund and The Contemporary Austin, and more.
All-Access Pass holders will join Ballmer in his exclusive keynote, as well as an extended conference led by Friends of the Children and nonprofit consultant Treadwell and live demonstrations and support desks related to Apricot and ETO software.
Passes start at $795 with registration open through 11: 59 p.m. CST on Friday, Oct. 26.
Social Solutions will also announce three winners of Impact Award, all of whom have shown a “proven dedication to supporting their communities, measuring their progress and bringing their impact to life.”
