Who Comes to NTEN: Ciaran Hayden and Eamon Stack from Enclude, Ireland

This is the first in a series of posts back from NTEN's Non-Profit Technology Conference NTC08.

I first met Ciaran Hayden in DC during NTC 07. It was end of day and we both had drifted into an Irish Pub for a pint to end the day. Ciaran's (Kee-ron) story was spell binding. Development work in Cameroon, including the equivalent of micro-loans. A home in Cameroon and being treated like a king by those he had lent a hand to when he returns("it's embarrassing!") A small Consulting Compnay that he and his partner were building in Dublin. And the trust and the traction they were getting with the Irish Government.

As I packed this year I shot Ciaran a note, hoping he would be headed to New Oleans for NTC 08. Three minutes later, he got back that he was. And this year his partner, Eamon Stack was along too. Eamon's academic training was with the Jesuits. If that does not resonate for you - ask a freind who was raised Catholic ;-) - think rigorous.

Not to wreck a grand tradition, one year running!, on Wednesday night we pulled up stools at Patty's Irish on Decatur Street in N'Orleans. A friend had tipped me off - when in New Orleans, try the Abita Amber and we did, a good tip as it turns out. And we settled in to solve the world's IT problems.

Enclude is continuing its roll. First they had been selected to be a sort of Tech Soup for Ireland. This from the About section of The Enclude website:

Martin Cullen TD, Minister for Social and Family Affairs, formally launches ENCLUDEit - Technology Donations for Irish Nonprofits - on December 12th at 15 St. Stephen's Green. Present were Paul Rellis, Managing Director of Microsoft Ireland, Austin McCabe, CEO Symantec Europe, Michael Galvin of CISCO Ireland and a large gathering of nonprofit organisations. The Minister emphasised the importance of this programme and congratulated Ciaran and Eamon on the development of ENCLUDE and the ENCLUDEit Programme.

At the heart of their work is a thorough IT needs assessment that they conduct for non-profits across Ireland (the focus of Ciaran's work), followed by implementations that often include Salesforce (Eamon plays the lead in these.)

Visit their site for more of their story.

It is one of the hopeful and exciting aspects of our current world that Ciaran and Eamon can come to the states and exchange ideas with 1,100 colleagues all with a focus on how "to bring affordable, trustworthy systems and IT consultancy" to non-profits around the world ...

Thanks to NTEN