Talk:General Priorities

Thoughts on prioritization

Establishing priorities will never boil down to generating just one list, highest to lowest. It will always be more complicated than that. For instance we might have a list of three things we want to do in this order:

Interrelated projects

1. Hire Tennis Ball Coordinator
2. Start tennis ball collection program
3. Give away tennis balls to the needy

These three are "projects" are interrelated. They are therefore arranged in order of dependency since we need to do one before we can do the other. Abstractly the highest priority might need to be done later than a lower priority, but the lower priority must be done first since the higher priority depends on it. We would want to consider all three as a package, maybe even integrate them into a single proposal.

Considering real world constraints

1. Hire Tennis Ball Coordinator (costs $50,000 per year)
2. Start Ping Pong Ball Collection Agency (costs $500 per year)
3. Start Basketball Collection Agency (costs $600 per year)

These three items are unrelated, but we need more money for the highest priority item (item 1). We might look at our books and decide that we only have enough cash for items 2 and 3.

We might also decide that items 2 and 3 are income generating, and therefore (if successful) could financially allow item 1 to be established. This kind of converts the list into a list of interrelated projects.

Fundable or not?

1. Hire Tennis Ball Coordinator (costs $50,000 per year, but the Pollywog Memorial Foundation might fund 50% of this)
2. Start Ping Pong Ball Collection Agency (costs $500 per year, and we'd have to use our own money)
3. Start Basketball Collection Agency (costs $600 per year, and we'd have to use our own money)

If we have enough money, we'd write the grant and commit to doing item 1, but that creates a condition ("if we have enough money"). We need a note about that included with the proposal, something like: "If it appears we can raise $25,000 for the project, we should apply for the Pollywog Memorial Foundation grant to fund the rest. If that is successful, then this is a very high priority."

Types of priorities

1. Things we are already doing -- List D
2. New things we are committed to doing (assuming we have enough resources to do them)
3. New things we would like to do (assuming enough resources)
4. Things which there is no consensus around (yet) -- List E

RfS 09:49, 25 October 2006 (PDT) Each of those might require separate lists. Lists 2 and 3 should be vetted by the fundraising group.

Council is updating priorities

Council is responsible for establishing priorities. This table was drafted to help with an updatefor the next few (years? months? decades?). It is a draft of current priorities, as of July 2009. Here is how the list was derived:

Council did two priorities brainstorms in the last few months. Those brainstorm lists were compared with The General Priorities List, (current as of 2008) and Program Planning Sheets (more out of date). THIS LIST IS NOT PERFECT AND IT NEEDS TO BE REVIEWED BY COUNCIL. In particular, some items from older lists were removed if they seemed to be accomplished already.

Next steps for long term planning, fund raising, hiring decisions, building searches and etc: Reviewing individual FG program areas, updating plans and priorities in each area, and facilitating consensus on long term plans.

Priorities raised in May & June 2009 Council meetings:	General Priorities from wiki page, not raised in Council:
grant away 50% more computers (in the next year), and track some how better who we give them to.	Tennis Balls -- Technocrats
more classes, currently we have 9 classes a week. more serious classes. track classes (people who show up. promote open source to grantees.	Fundraising -- Outreach
expand tech support, keep it free.	Grantwriting -- Outreach
reduce the amount of time it takes to get into a program (build, adoption) eliminate bottle necks.	Media Outreach -- Outreach
coding help. Coding project manager.	System Administration --
project managers for not day to day functions. produce thing that are useful out side of Free Geek.	Alt build -- Reuse
1 year grant plan.	Computers for Kids -- Knowledge Bees
We also discussed: When will the Store need more space. There are many options pertaining to ways to grow the store.	Corporate Donation w/o vehicle -- Reuse
produce code useful outside of free geek? -- staff	Corporate Donation w/ vehicle -- Reuse
americorps -- Council	Movable Storage -- Action
ADA compliance for bldg -- Council	Printers -- Reuse
someone to set up capital campaign -- Council	Online Sales -- Reuse
raise staff salaries -- Board	Move to a new building -- Outreach
more formalized education -- staff	Volunteer Pickups -- Action
thanking & encouraging volunteers -- staff	Media Lab -- Knowledge Bees
	Advanced Receiving -- Reuse
	Coders -- Technocrats
	Emerging Media -- Knowledge Bees