This is an exciting time to be a technologist, but even more so if you are a business leader, decision maker, or someone with big ideas for improving processes, member or customer experiences, or simply someone with an idea to improve society.  Technology is becoming accessible to nontechnical stakeholders in ways only one could dream of a few years ago.  

Last month Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced several new artificial intelligence (AI) products and capabilities that will help organizations operate more efficiently and effectively. If you are wondering how these emerging technologies could apply to your organization’s work.  I will briefly break down the key announcements and their potential nonprofit(and commercial) use cases in quick and simple terms/ideas.

1. Amazon Bedrock makes advanced AI models easily accessible. 

Bedrock offers pre-built foundational AI models from top providers like Anthropic and Meta. This means your developers don’t need deep AI expertise to tap into powerful natural language processing. Possible use cases include building a virtual assistant to answer donor questions or automating tasks like sorting and tagging incoming donations.

2. Amazon CodeWhisperer can suggest code tailored to your needs.

CodeWhisperer is like autocomplete for coding. The new customization feature allows it to make suggestions based on your organization’s own codebase and conventions. This will boost productivity for developers working on your nonprofit’s custom software and websites.

3. Amazon QuickSight Q — turn text into data visualizations.

QuickSight’s new natural language capabilities let analysts generate charts and calculations by describing what they want in plain English. Your data team could quickly visualize important metrics like program enrollment or fundraising progress through conversational commands.

4. Multiple model options for different needs.

With new models like Titan Embeddings and Llama 2, Bedrock offers variety to suit different use cases. This flexibility allows you to test and find the best AI approach for each task, from donor segmentation to grant application screening.

The above services will provide the building blocks and organizations will combine to create customized solutions – organizations of all sizes will benefit. These innovations and productivity boosts will unlock the potential to better achieve social impact missions.

As I noted above, this is a great time to be in technology.  

Note: originally published as a LinkedIn article