I think part of the anxiety is that it’s not at all clear to anyone yet (no, not even us) in what concrete ways these tools are going to be useful for the missions of nonprofit organizations. I think for some organizations in some particular situations (their main constituency is youth, they already are very online savvy, etc.) there is more obviousness to the utility of these tools. But for garden variety nonprofits, I think that they see us (and others) using these tools, hear a lot of hype about them, and don’t really know which ones are going to be useful, and to what extent they will be dropping time down one big sink hole. No wonder they are anxious!

I’m blogging, del.icio.us-ing, flickr-ing, Linking-In, facebook-ing (no, I will not twitter!) and so far, my blog is the only thing that I can be clear has lead to a (very, very slight) enhancement of my mission (that is, getting clients that I can help with stuff.) And I have my own level of anxiety about whether the time I spend doing these things (which adds up to a lot, actually,) is going to actually make a difference.

But it is fun knowing when Beth is jetlagged, and you’re “over the hump.”

The dichotomy that Beth points out – eager activists in a third world country who can’t get enough of the new tools, and a CEO of a large, ditinguished institution here who has to constantly raise money and meet the expectations of boards and funders (talk about curmudgeonly!) is striking. I felt that core of the anxiety was feeling like they’re working as hard and fast as they can — and yet, still can’t keep up with all of the gadgets and widgets.

But, you’ll see in the report that it is not a hopeless situation at all, but it’s very important that these grantees focus on connecting with their constituents in more meaningful ways — not just in faster, zippier ways fueled by the latest gizmo and widget. Thinking about how to connect side-to-side, how to become more open and better listeners (this perhaps more than anything) are far more important than jumping on the latest, greatest social networking tool bandwagon.

I look forward to hearing more about what you think once you’ve had a chance to review the report.