Technology's impact: Cisco backing workers' philanthropy. (Cyber Frontier).

Wanting its workers to drive its philanthropy, Cisco Systems aims to back causes its employees care about and help nonprofits be more productive through the use of technology and business processes the San Jose, Calif-based tech firm develops.

Now, guided by a newly rehired employee who spent a year on charity's front lines after losing his corporate-giving job at Cisco, the company is working to make it easier for nonprofits to tap into its philanthropy. That giving spirit totaled nearly $109 million in cash, donated products and volunteers in the fiscal year ended July 31.

"Historically, the character of our philanthropy has been to follow our employees into work they're already doing," said Peter Tavernise, executive director of the Cisco Systems Foundation. "It's part of our mission to provide them with the tools and resources to help them give back to their communities."

Based on his own nonprofit work, Tavernise hopes to help Cisco become more productive in matching nonprofits with its know-how, technology and money. A former corporate and foundation fundraiser at Duke University in Durham, N.C., and a former program officer for the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation in Winston-Salem, N.C., Tavernise was laid-off as Cisco's head of philanthropy in the Southeast in April, 2001.

Under a Cisco program that pays laid-off employees one-third of their former salary plus full benefits, Tavernise became a Cisco Fellow, spending a year as a full-time fundraiser and strategic planner for Durham-based North Carolina Public Allies. That experience is helping to shape his work now, to try to simplify and make more accessible Cisco's corporate-giving program.

"I found certain corporate-giving programs to be opaque, not very-user friendly, with some stellar exceptions," he said. "We would like anybody who comes to our Web site or hears about our programs to understand instantaneously what we do," he said." We are about dollars, people and products."

Cisco will continue to concentrate its giving on addressing basic needs and education, and providing tech help for nonprofits. But it has recast its programs to emphasize that it supports a continuous "cycle for self-sufficiency and giving back," Tavernise said.

The company's goal, he said, is to help people move from crisis to self-sufficiency, and acquire skills and knowledge to sustain themselves economically and contribute to their communities.

Helping to drive those efforts will be Cisco's work to help nonprofits become more productive, Tavernise said.

Thus, Cisco will make grants in four areas in which it aims to have an impact -- living, learning, civic life and productivity. In addition to sharpening the focus of its grantmaking, Cisco wants to improve the way it makes grants and is launching a Web-based system to handle and track grants.

The system, to be piloted early this year, will let nonprofits apply for grants by filling out an online form. Nonprofits will have continuing access to any applications they make through the system, which will "remember" nonprofits' organizational data when they submit new applications.

Grant applicants will receive automated email messages at each stage at which Cisco reviews the applications. Once grants are made, Cisco and the recipients can fill out online forms that will be used throughout the period of the grant to assess its impact.

Despite the economic downturn, grants by Cisco's foundation have grown steadily to roughly $12 million in fiscal 2002, up from $9.9 million in 2001, $8 million in 2000 and $7.5 million in 1999.

Annual grants also represent a steadily growing share of the foundation's endowment, increasing to roughly 11 percent in fiscal 2002 from 8 percent in 2001, 6 percent in 2000 and nearly 6 percent in 1999.

Cisco offers gifts that match employee volunteerism, which totaled 38,170 hours in fiscal 2002, when the company also donated $66 million in products.

Habitat tech effort grows

A pioneering initiative by a North Carolina affiliate of Habitat for Humanity International to put computers m homes it builds and wire Habitat homeowners to the Web is poised to give birth to pilot projects in 10 other United States cities. And, it could expand to Habitat homes abroad and to low-income families in the United States.

Sonja Murray, who spearheaded the "Digital Bridge" initiative for Habitat for Humanity of Forsyth County; has resigned as the Winston-Salem affiliate's director of development to oversee the expansion as a consultant to Habitat for Humanity International in Americus, Ga.

Habitat International wants to boot up Habitat homeowners in other countries, too, she said, and other likely partners want to give access to technology to low-income families not living in Habitat homes.

"The funders I'm working with do not see this initiative as Habitat families only," Murray said. "They would like to take what we've learned from Forsyth and Habitats across the U.S. and eventually roll out affordable technology to all families of low income in the United States."

Murray, who first must raise money and find support, expects partners to include groups that have backed Winston-Salem's initiative, including AOL Time Warner, Dell Computer and HATCH, a Winston-Salem firm that builds computer centers for early-childhood programs and instigated the local project.

Other likely partners, she said, include Cisco Systems, which has worked with Habitat International to put technology in Africa, and One Economy Corp., a national nonprofit in Washington, D.C., that helps put technology and Web resources into the hands of public-housing residents.

At the end of 2002, Forsyth's Habitat had built 161 homes and wired 111 of them.

Ted Swisher, Vice president of U.S. affiliates for Habitat International, said plugging into technology was a critical challenge for Habitat homeowners.

"We want a decent house in a decent community," he said. "And today the digital community is getting increasingly important. You really can't be fully a part of the American community unless you are capable of connecting to that digital community. "

Todd Cohen is editor and publisher of Philanthropy Journal, an online newspaper at www.philanthropyjournal.org. He can be reached at [e-mail]