Many nonprofits know they should embrace AI, and most are already feeling the stress to maneuver quicker than their sources permit. 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 sources, the query isn’t simply learn how to implement AI. It’s learn how to do it ethically and in ways in which help the long-term wellbeing of the communities they serve.
At Cisco, we consider that technological experience, deployed with function, is likely one of the strongest sources we are able to provide our nonprofit companions. Past monetary funding and entry to know-how, what many nonprofits want is direct entry to individuals who perceive this AI second deeply and may 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 consultants volunteered to type 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 downside assertion submitted by the nonprofit group and a mandate to unravel 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 widespread: 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 resolution for Technology’s curriculum growth crew, which creates classes for hundreds of learners worldwide, put it: “AI is a multiplier, not a standalone resolution. It really works greatest when it amplifies human experience slightly than changing it.”
That mindset prolonged to how groups thought concerning the communities their options would in the end 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 evaluation 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 essentially 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 day-after-day 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 pondering that comes from managing technical groups. “These are the sorts of operational bottlenecks I assist my very own groups clear up day-after-day, 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 alerts that we see our companions as organizations with actual operational challenges that deserve the identical caliber of engineering we deliver to our clients.”
“Monetary contributions and company donations matter, however constructing a working AI resolution {that a} nonprofit can truly deploy — that’s a basically totally different form of partnership.”
– Abhishek Kumar, Cisco engineer
For Cisco volunteers, the expertise was significant. They deepened their AI experience, collaborated throughout groups, and noticed quick influence from their work, all of which strengthened each particular person ability and organizational tradition.
Deployable instruments, lasting influence
The suggestions from collaborating organizations was equally constant: the volunteers got here able to pay attention and provide tailor-made options, and left their companions energized about what else was doable. “You not solely discovered nice one-stop-shop options for a number of points we’re making an attempt to unravel,” 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 street.”
That sample, an answer that solves the issue and reframes what’s doable, confirmed up throughout organizations. Jennifer Wolford, Operation Hope‘s Chief Innovation Officer, mirrored: “Working with Cisco’s crew made it clear how shortly the correct technical experience can flip concepts into actual, usable options that enhance how we serve our shoppers. That form of collaboration is what permits us to undertake rising know-how in a approach that really scales influence.”
For some nonprofits, the Hackathon represented one thing extra basic: an opportunity to maneuver previous the handbook, resource-intensive methods of working which have traditionally restricted their attain. Jessica White, Director of Information Analytics and Techniques 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 handbook effort to strategic motion has actual potential to extend fundraising and develop our influence for the shoppers we serve.”
The case for skills-based volunteering as a social influence technique
Cisco has lengthy invested in its nonprofit companions by offering funding and know-how, however skills-based volunteering, at this stage of rigor and technical depth, represents one thing additive: a chance for the form 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 novel alternative to make a direct influence with nonprofits by means of our state-of-the-art know-how,” 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, releasing funds for them to elongate attain, widen scope, and allow them to raised 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 develop into Disaster Response and Training sectors — as a result of the outcomes counsel it’s value scaling. In a second when AI fluency is changing into a prerequisite for nonprofit effectiveness, that is yet another approach Cisco may help shut the hole.