Gartner has been producing its Hype Cycle reports for years now, and I’ve always found them to be useful in my quest to better understand:

• maturing technologies that are still relatively new
• emerging technologies that are gaining traction

The audiences for Hype Cycle reports are commercial sector enterprise-level managers and execs, so what can those of us in the nonprofit space take away from the approach?

The concept of a Hype Cycle is powerful– for any organization in any sector– because we all depend on technology and need to understand how to evaluate it. Here are the 5 phases that ALL technologies go through:

1. innovation trigger
2. peak of inflated expectations
3. trough of disillusionment
4. slope of enlightenment
5. plateau of productivity

You can learn more about the approach on the Hype Cycle methodology web page and how the concept might apply to your organization. Are you an early adopter? Are you more risk averse? Many nonprofits don’t have the capacity to adopt emerging technologies, so they’re more likely to wait until the tech climbs out of the trough of disillusionment (love that phrase!).

For the different “flavors” of AI, many nonprofits will – and should – wait until the slope of enlightenment or the plateau of productivity before wholeheartedly adopting the technology. Gartner’s 2023 Hype Cycle for AI shows most AI-related technologies reaching the plateau of productivity in 2 to 10 years!

But this doesn’t mean you should ignore AI for now. You must stay on top of AI for 5 reasons:

1. There are real risks that come with using the technology, so you must understand these risks and develop policies to manage them.
2. Some nonprofits are early adopters, and you can learn a lot from the work they’re doing.
3. You’re already using AI, since many of the tools you use are increasingly adding AI-driven enhancements. Are there small things you can take advantage of now that will help you improve your productivity and become more familiar with AI?
4. The marketing onslaught from organizations that see a way to cash in on the AI hype is relentless. You need to be able to sift through the BS so you aren’t hit by shiny object syndrome.
5. You’ll understand that the trough of disillusionment is a phase, so won’t be tempted to give up on a particular AI technology because it’s not currently helping you deliver meaningful results.

Fortunately, there are organizations that can help. For starters, steer away from vendors, who often produce useful information but are at the end of the day trying to sell you something (see #4 above). Start with philanthropic and nonprofit support organizations like:

• Project Evident
• Technology Association of Grantmakers
• AI for Good Foundation
• NTEN
• Community IT Innovators

Who are your go-to sources of nonprofit AI guidance?

Let’s use concepts like the Hype Cycle methodology to make better decisions about how to adopt AI in social sector organizations.