Nonprofits face a critical challenge: being asked to do more with shrinking resources. As demand for services grows, the potential loss of federal funding puts critical programs at risk—right when communities need them most.
To stay effective, nonprofits need to reimagine how they operate with limited resources, and Artificial Intelligence can be a powerful tool to help do more with less. Its ability to increase capacity has already been proven, and these tools can help nonprofits break free from siloed spreadsheets and manual reporting, which limit funding, engagement, and impact. With AI, nonprofits can work smarter and scale their mission. It’s no longer a nice-to-have resource, but an operational necessity. So, where should nonprofits start — and what types of AI are available?
AI Is Not One-Size-Fits-All
Secure, responsible AI begins with clearly identifying the core jobs your organization is trying to accomplish. Selecting the right tools to fulfill jobs like tracking donations, financial reporting, and volunteer coordination is essential to driving meaningful outcomes.
There are two key types of AI that nonprofits can leverage: generative AI and agentic AI. Generative AI acts like a digital creator, producing content such as text, images, or music—ideal for short-term tasks like drafting materials or brainstorming ideas. Agentic AI, on the other hand, helps time-strapped teams complete tasks faster, like scanning the internet for prospective volunteers, matching organizations to the right grants, and monitoring for new donor trends, by making decisions within clear, predefined boundaries. It allows nonprofit teams to stay focused on strategic, mission-driven work.
Further, agentic AI also knows when it’s time to bring humans into the mix, preserving the critical role of human decision-making while eliminating information overload. This important guardrail ensures sensitive, critical data is protected while also allowing AI agents to perform tasks successfully with human oversight.
AI: Strategic, Secure Delegation
Nonprofits understandably approach AI with caution. The idea of an AI agent running 24/7 without oversight raises valid concerns about control, decision-making, and losing the human touch at the heart of their work. But in the case of agentic AI, the technology doesn’t replace human judgment—it strengthens it.
Picture this: distilling 20 years of expertise into a single virtual teammate—one that doesn’t replace people but works alongside them. Then, multiply this by the tens of thousands of other nonprofit leaders also contributing their experience to the system. Agentic AI serves as a trusted partner, taking on tasks and surfacing insights so people can focus on what truly moves the needle— raising more money, building stronger donor relationships, and driving mission-critical impact. At the end of the day, you’re in control. With the right data and insights, you’re empowered to make confident, high-impact decisions on your terms.
Adopting AI also doesn’t require compromising on security. Agentic AI systems are integrated with tools like encryption, anonymization, and role-based access to ensure sensitive data stays protected. This, paired with clear boundaries around both decision-making and data management, results in transparent, traceable agentic AI systems that can be trusted by donors, staff, and the communities nonprofits serve.
Agentic AI Unlocks More ‘Human’ Nonprofit Work
By managing time-consuming tasks at scale, agentic AI allows nonprofit teams to focus more on the human side of their work. Imagine being able to give nonprofit employees and organizers more time to build personal relationships with the community through canvassing, volunteering, or spreading awareness. At the same time, agentic AI can be working behind the scenes, performing tedious, repetitive tasks like automatically categorizing supporters and generating customized messaging to personalize donor outreach based on each supporter’s history and interests.
What else is possible? Agentic AI can also revolutionize funding discovery through match acceleration capabilities. Acting as tireless scouts, AI agents can continuously monitor thousands of potential funding sources, evaluating each opportunity against the organization’s specific mission and programs. When the best matches are identified, agentic AI can immediately alert fundraising directors with comprehensive briefs detailing the opportunity, complete with tailored alignment points and proposal frameworks ready for implementation. This precision matching service significantly expands a nonprofit’s search capacity while simultaneously reducing administrative workload. For extra time savings for busy nonprofit directors, AI can even take the first pass at a grant application.
Want to optimize your fundraising? Agentic AI achieves preset goals to ensure a donor gets the right donation ask at the right time based on data like engagement history, network, and location. Based on previous donations, it even knows the “best amount” to ask for, helping you incrementally turn single donation givers into higher dollar sustainers. Then, giving data can be translated to measurable outcomes like ‘50 meals delivered’ to further garner support. This leads to a virtuous cycle of giving, one where clear, measurable results build trust with current and future donors.
Embracing agentic AI gives organizations a competitive edge, unlocking new levels of efficiency once out of reach. The nonprofit sector has always been resilient and adaptive—AI agents can power the next step, helping them continue doing the greatest good in a rapidly changing world.
