Mission-driven organizations are dedicated to making a positive impact on the world. The most effective of these also prioritize embodying progress within their own structures. Technology, and particularly artificial intelligence (AI), is emerging as a powerful tool to accelerate this progress by fostering diverse perspectives, overcoming obstacles to participation, and amplifying positive change.
Nonprofits are increasingly leveraging technologies like Microsoft 365 Copilot to boost internal inclusion and champion equity in the communities they serve. Innovative by nature, nonprofits often find creative solutions to challenges, frequently developing approaches that outperform conventional methods. They also benefit from close relationships with the communities they serve, and they can quickly identify opportunities to improve outcomes. Today, mission-driven organizations have access to powerful technological tools to further increase their impact.
AI is particularly well suited to accelerate the values many nonprofits promote. Two organizations that Microsoft partners with – Arapahoe Libraries and the McKnight Foundation – are excellent examples of this dedication. Both have adopted Microsoft 365 Copilot early on to increase productivity and creativity. They are using the AI assistant across their organizations in two key ways: first, by applying Copilot to increase inclusion internally; and second, by leveraging AI to free up staff to focus on ways of achieving greater organizational progress.
As these social impact organizations tackle a variety of persistent challenges, AI is a valuable tool for experimentation, promoting justice, and including a wide range of perspectives. Trisha Harms, Senior Communications Officer at the McKnight Foundation, explains, “We need to steward our resources effectively and responsibly. Copilot is one tech solution we use that allows everyone to connect, align, and move forward on our mission.”
Advancing Inclusion Internally
Both the Arapahoe Libraries and the McKnight Foundation are deeply committed to ensuring participation for all staff and partners.
Anthony White, Arapahoe Libraries Director of Innovation and Technology, notes, “We know every single person in this organization has a diverse, important perspective that helps them serve our patrons.”
Built-in features across the Microsoft suite, including Copilot, help Arapahoe Libraries adhere to a recently-enacted Colorado accessibility law and bolster the organization’s internal accessibility framework. The organization invested in Copilot licenses for every employee so that they can all benefit from the AI assistant. The system’s AI tools can search across internal platforms like Microsoft SharePoint, Outlook, and Microsoft Teams – taking complex questions that previously required 3 to 5 minutes to answer and surfacing answers in under 15 seconds. Copilot also recaps content across Teams chats and user inboxes into easy-to-digest summaries. These time-saving applications allow staff to apply their skills to their jobs.
Similar time savings are being realized at Arapahoe Libraries. AI allows staff to quickly locate and access the resources they need to best perform their duties.
“We see so much time savings, it’s creating a level of transparency and accessibility across all our teams that we didn’t have before,” says White.
The McKnight Foundation is using Copilot to make organizational knowledge more accessible as well. Staff can now more easily search for and synthesize information within company documents. Copilot also helps staff improve the accessibility of presentations, graphics, and documents. For example, it recommends adjusting the visual colors of a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation to make it more accessible to colleagues who are low-vision or color blind. This feature assists those less familiar with accessibility guidelines in creating content that enables the participation of all staff and partners.
“We really do care about making sure every staff person feels included and like they belong; technology is one part of our holistic approach to making sure everything we do drives our mission forward,” says Harms.
Promoting Equity in Communities
Arapahoe Libraries and the McKnight Foundation are dedicated to promoting equity in their communities. Arapahoe Libraries is actively working to remove barriers to library services. They achieve this, for example, by providing incarcerated individuals access to books, automatically providing students with library cards so they can access digital content, and placing library “Lending Machines” in areas with limited library access. To further identify and bridge gaps, Arapahoe Libraries is using Copilot to categorize and find themes among 64,000 pieces of patron feedback. This used to be separated by branch and program, but now the AI assistant can distill them into ways to improve across the library district. The organization will use the data to best meet the community’s changing needs and ensure all community members can benefit from the libraries’ services.
In addition, Arapahoe Libraries is reviewing its policies for accessibility using Copilot. For example, they plan to roll out AI-enhanced Surface laptops for checkout. The Copilot review identified disparities in patrons’ capability to travel to physical library locations and found opportunities to improve technology access across the district. “Copilot has helped us identify gaps in our policies so we can better serve our patrons,” White says.
The McKnight Foundation also has a strong dedication to equity, both locally and globally. The foundation supports projects that empower Native nations through renewable energy infrastructure, expand home ownership for diverse communities, cultivate resilient food systems, and much more. When the foundation was looking for an AI assistant, its ethical AI journey prioritized a tool that would not plagiarize material. They chose Copilot because it runs on a model that does not draw from the public domain. This enables the McKnight Foundation to gain the benefits of an AI assistant without appropriating others’ output.
The foundation has found that Copilot has significantly saved them time and catalyzed the creative process. By streamlining daily operations and overcoming creative blocks, the AI assistant allows staff to focus on their mission—from advancing climate justice to fueling economic mobility.
Harms notes that any increase in efficiency and productivity allows the organization “to do more for and with our grantee partners.”
