Balance Lab / Who we work with

Who we work with, and what gets in their way

Every corner of the impact sector has its own pressures. These are the six areas we focus on, the problems we hear most often in each, and where AI can take some of the weight.

Across the sector

Five pressures almost everyone we talk to shares

Reporting load

Every funder wants its own format, and the same numbers get rewritten again and again.

Volunteers to coordinate

Hundreds or thousands of volunteers who need onboarding, answers and scheduling from a small paid team.

Plain language

Information has to work for everyone, often at B1 level or below, and in more than one language.

Tighter budgets

Rising demand, and in development work, Dutch government funding cuts from 2026.

Sensitive data

Case notes, health and money worries. One careless tool choice can break trust.

At a glance

Where the time goes, by area

The recurring jobs that eat staff time in each area. These are usually where a first sprint starts.

Main pain point Common Minor or rare

From our own work

"A new tool only sticks when the people using it helped shape it. Most of the work is with the team, not the tech."

Before Balance Lab, we spent years building products, processes and businesses across tech and impact. We've introduced new ways of working inside mission-driven organisations, and seen first hand how capacity gets capped when there's always something more urgent than fixing a process.

Recognise your organisation here? Tell us what takes up your team's time.

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