12-17-2017, 09:06 PM
Leaders in many companies, nonprofit organizations/NGOs, and government bodies make strategic plans to help articulate their organization's purpose and strategy. For many organizations, developing these plans is an elaborate undertaking that takes many months and involves hiring a really expensive consulting firm - and if you’re not careful, writing a lot of hokey things. However, developing and communicating a good strategic plan can help lead to better and more purposeful decision-making at all levels of the organization. A couple of members suggested that we write at least a mission and vision statement (the typical starting point for a strategic plan) for MFGG, and I've been wanting to do such a thing for quite a while.
Obviously, MFGG isn't a for-profit business or a major governmental organ, but like every organization that has ever existed, we're responsible for managing finite resources (in our case, people's time and talents that they generously volunteer to us) and using them to produce some kind of outcome (in our case, games, mostly fangames and freeware indie games). This strategic plan is obviously simpler than anything a Fortune 500 company would make - I spent less than an hour writing this, compared to the months it would take for a large organization to build a strategic plan. Still, I hope that someone finds this helpful in understanding why we're doing what we're doing. And if you don't find this interesting, that's OK - at least it finally gives MFGG a chance to use the phrase "SWOT Analysis".
Mission
MFGG is a community for making, sharing, and discussing games, especially fangames based on the Mario universe.
Vision
To be the most vibrant fangaming community on the Internet.
Core Values
Objectives
SWOT Analysis
Strengths
+ Massive library of resources
+ Site is focused on a well-known franchise that remains popular
+ Moderate-sized community - large enough to be reasonably active, yet small enough to be intimate
+ Members have a wide range of skills and experience they can share with others
+ Forum is now running on modern software that supports new features not available in phpBB 3.0.x
Weaknesses
- Aging mainsite software
- Highly PC-centric - not a lot of resources for mobile development
- Scarcity of 3-D games and resources
- More resources for older Mario games than for newer games
- Some mainsite resources are redundant or poorly-organized
- Struggles in attracting new members during the last 1-2 years of the phpBB era
Opportunities
+ Success of the Nintendo Switch could increase interest in Nintendo in general - there's a strong correlation between MFGG activity levels and popularity of Nintendo's official games
+ Updating the mainsite software could help revitalize the mainsite
+ Increase in the number of people with high-speed Internet access, especially in developing markets
+ Fan cultures are gaining more popularity and relevance
+ Growing concern about trolling and harassment in big social networks could drive people back to smaller communities where conversations can be moderated more effectively
Threats
- Possibility of interpersonal drama driving away good members
- Concerns about copyright issues
- Inaccurate information about fangaming being disseminated on social media
- Independent, nonprofit forums have become less popular compared to newer, better-funded social networks
- Rapid pace and unpredictable nature of technological change
Implementation
Obviously, MFGG isn't a for-profit business or a major governmental organ, but like every organization that has ever existed, we're responsible for managing finite resources (in our case, people's time and talents that they generously volunteer to us) and using them to produce some kind of outcome (in our case, games, mostly fangames and freeware indie games). This strategic plan is obviously simpler than anything a Fortune 500 company would make - I spent less than an hour writing this, compared to the months it would take for a large organization to build a strategic plan. Still, I hope that someone finds this helpful in understanding why we're doing what we're doing. And if you don't find this interesting, that's OK - at least it finally gives MFGG a chance to use the phrase "SWOT Analysis".
Mission
MFGG is a community for making, sharing, and discussing games, especially fangames based on the Mario universe.
Vision
To be the most vibrant fangaming community on the Internet.
Core Values
- Fun: We want people to enjoy playing games and interacting with the community.
- Friendly: We want everyone to feel welcomed on MFGG.
- Fair: We strive to be equitable in making decisions when accepting submissions, moderating the forums, and promoting new staff members.
Objectives
- Increase mainsite game submissions and games posts in the Development Showcase forum by 75% in calendar year 2018 (compared to 2017)
- Increase mainsite graphics submissions and sprite posts in the Arts and Music forum by 50% in 2018
- Increase new member registrations on the forums by 50% in 2018
- Increase new member registrations on the mainsite by 40% in 2018
- Increase forum posts and topics by 40% in 2018
- Maintain high service quality on mainsite - accept or decline 75% of new submissions within 3 days, and 95% of new submissions within 7 days
- Increase retention of new members by 100% (as measured by the number of new members who register, post, and continue participating in the community)
SWOT Analysis
Strengths
+ Massive library of resources
+ Site is focused on a well-known franchise that remains popular
+ Moderate-sized community - large enough to be reasonably active, yet small enough to be intimate
+ Members have a wide range of skills and experience they can share with others
+ Forum is now running on modern software that supports new features not available in phpBB 3.0.x
Weaknesses
- Aging mainsite software
- Highly PC-centric - not a lot of resources for mobile development
- Scarcity of 3-D games and resources
- More resources for older Mario games than for newer games
- Some mainsite resources are redundant or poorly-organized
- Struggles in attracting new members during the last 1-2 years of the phpBB era
Opportunities
+ Success of the Nintendo Switch could increase interest in Nintendo in general - there's a strong correlation between MFGG activity levels and popularity of Nintendo's official games
+ Updating the mainsite software could help revitalize the mainsite
+ Increase in the number of people with high-speed Internet access, especially in developing markets
+ Fan cultures are gaining more popularity and relevance
+ Growing concern about trolling and harassment in big social networks could drive people back to smaller communities where conversations can be moderated more effectively
Threats
- Possibility of interpersonal drama driving away good members
- Concerns about copyright issues
- Inaccurate information about fangaming being disseminated on social media
- Independent, nonprofit forums have become less popular compared to newer, better-funded social networks
- Rapid pace and unpredictable nature of technological change
Implementation
- Finish and launch new mainsite software
- Continue adding new features to the MyBB forums, including more uses for the currency system
- Consider ways to broaden MFGG's scope and potential audience without drifting from MFGG's core purpose
- Continue to use social media and video to increase awareness and activity
- Host more competitions and events
- Hold a mainsite cleanup initiative to remove redundant or poor-quality submissions - we haven’t done that in a while
- Promote new mainsite staff (if necessary) to maintain service level targets
- Promote new forum staff (if necessary) to facilitate events and moderate the forums