Creating an Operations Plan for 2019

Well, I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving break. Last week your assignment was to think about your fundraising plan for 2019 while enjoying family and friends! This week are going to think about our operations for 2019 and what sort of goals we would like to set for next year. Below are some thoughts and questions you might ponder when thinking about next year.

1. What did we do this year? Are we making the impact that we thought we would? Do we feel like we’ve been successful in our efforts? How are we measuring our impact? Do we feel like are swimming against the tide?
2. How did we do this? Are we burned out? What is our team like? Is the staff changing? Do we have a lot of new energy on board? What are we capable of doing?
3. Let’s take a look at the finances: Do we have to scale back or did we get a windfall and need to move forward?
4. Are we a niche organization? Do we specialize in kittens? TNR? Foster care? Emergency rescue? Do we know what our community cats need?

These are all some key questions to ask your board or leadership team when thinking about the year ahead. Once you have answered the above questions, then you can look at your 2019 program schedule and think about where you might want to make adjustments. Maybe you don’t need to do free adoption weekends for kittens anymore — but maybe your microchipping and vaccination clinics are always crowded with people. You may want to increase community outreach. Or you may want to consider a transport program within your state to better reach out to all organizations and make sure there is a better balance of cats and kittens in area shelters. It is so easy to feel overwhelmed with operational goals, so it’s really important for everyone to have a clear direction in mind for for the organization so that there can be unity within the group.

It is so easy just to react to what is coming your way — but planning is really important for any organization.

Good luck!