CC/internal

Internal Environmental Analysis

COMMENTS IN CAPITALS

About PERC
The Peace and Enviromental Resource Center, also refered to as PERC� was formed in 1982 by a few volunteers with the support of 50 local peace and disarmament groups.

PERC serves as a media center to disseminate information to the public on peace and enviromental isssues. This is accomplished by the publication of the PEN, which covers issues that are not or incompletely dealt with in the mainstreams press, and a free resource center, where books, magazines, videos and computer databases are available.

Today, PERC has approximately a hundred volunteers working for it. PERC's revenues come mainly from two sources membership and donations. The PEN may also receive grants for special issues that it produces through out the year. PERC also raises funds by holding special events, such as square dances and garage sales.

Strengths & Weakness
STRENGTHS

PERC creates and maintains an atmosphere that is supportive, creative and challenging to its volunteers. At PERC, volunteers are always encouraged to learn many different skills, such as, volunteer management, fundraising, IT, group and media relation skills.
 * Great Volunteer Environment

PERC also provides its volunteers a supportive aura. People volunteering for this organization will get help more beyond the technical skills. such as, social & personal caring community,etc.

PERC designs a unique training program for its volunteers, which is not provided by many other NGOs. Through this process, volunteers receive some training in library and basic office procedures, which are important areas for them to be skilled in. Volunteers are also given a brief explanation of the roles of the individual committees, overview of PERC's mandate, constitution and history.

Unlike many other NGO, PERC is self supporting and not depednet on a single or few agencies or grants. It rises money mainly by recruiting memberships, holding the special events and advertising in its own newspaper, etc.
 * Independency

PERC has both its own newspaper and website to conduct the message to the public. The PEN is a free newspaper published by PERC. The PEN is published montly and issued about 5,000 copies annually. It primarily reports the activies about the peace, environment and social justice issues in local organizations. It is the only news paper of its kind in the region focusing on local issues and highly regared by its reader. Through the PEN, PERC keeps good public visibility to attract and maintain its members.
 * Own media publication

PERC maitains its free resource center, inncluding library  and computer database. PERC’s library is the only libarary in the region dedicated to peace, environment and social justice topics. It has extensive collection of books, magazines, video and adudio tipes and resource boxes. Besides the library, PERC also offers a large computer database for the public to search the related toptics, such as online publication and PVN.
 * Free Resource Center

Without volunteers and its coordinator, Perc could not exist! PERC’s core volunteers and staff become its body and soul. They produces the “PERC’s products”, from PVN to writting the bylaws. People here are working for their belief but not money. All of them dedicate their effect and time to PERC either without being paid and be paid little.
 * Dedicated PERC employers

The members and donors of PERC are quite loyal and generous. Approxmately 100 out of 300 people in the regional area made either financial or in-kind donation to PERC. The PERC’s membership renewal rate also keeps higher, about 65%.
 * Loyal and generous members/donors:

The organizational structure of PERC is built in a most effective and efficient way for the organizational communication. Most of the volunteers at PERC belong to committees or sub-committees. The indivdual committe set up its own plan for what needs to be done. The voluntary Board of Directors, on the other hand, makes PERC policy and planning decisions. The coordinator is an employee of the Board of Directors. Members of the Board sit on the various committees as a Board Liason, to ensure good communication throughout the PERC.
 * Efficient organizational structure

PERC’s office is located at First Ave, downtown area. This location provides both PERC’s volunteers and clients some convenience in their transportation.
 * Convenient location

WEAKNESS PERC has been experiencing financial instability for the last 5 consecutive years, from 2000/2001 to 2005/2006 fiscal years. Currently, the funding of PERC could not even make the organization sustainable. The decline in annual income and increase in expense were mainly contributed to the PERC’s recent negative net income.
 * Chronic financial deficit

The most recent statistical data indicated that the number of membership has been declining for the past four to five years, dropping from average 350 members /per year to 285 members/per year.
 * Membership declining

The volunteering reasons have been changed for the recent decade. Many individuals volunteer due to the culture and job issues, such as, learning language, obtaining working experience and improving the job opportunities. Therefore, after getting the jobs or acquiring the social skills, most of them give up volunteering. The transience of volunteer for PERC is increasing; the average volunteering time for PERC is about 18 months now, comparing with 27 months before.
 * Volunteer turnover rate increasing

The PEN is a free newspaper published by the PERC. It also plays a critical role for PERC to communicate with its members and clients. For a long time, PERC has heavily relied on PEN for its visibility and to attract or keep its members. PEN became the only program for PERC to connect its community. With the recent decline in the number of membership, PEN issues fewer copies than before, sequentially, PERC is becoming less visible in the community.
 * Limited visibility

Unlike other NGO’s mandates, PERC’s is not very glamorous. In contrast, it is more intangible and difficult to articulate. The actions that PERC takes to accomplish its mission are mostly diffuse and abstract, such as, providing information on peace and environmental issues through its publication, resource center and web site. The benefit behind those activities is not easily assessed.
 * Abstract Vision/Mission

Although PERC’s organizational structure is established on committee base, it still lacks adequate feedback loops between PERC’s volunteers. The communication between the volunteers is poor and it is less transparent in the organization.
 * Poor internal communication

The outside funding for PEN has been progressively dropping from $11000 to $3500 for the last five to seven years. The funding sources are shrinking due to the reduction of the governmental grants. Some regular fund, which PERC got before, no longer exist, such as Canada Peace Fund, Bob Heal Fund, etc.
 * Outside funding sources for PEN are shrinking

Since no rigorous standards in PERC’s management system, the output of PERC’s work is variable, such as, software usage, documentation maintenance, as well as volunteering training process. The quality of the output varies from one committee to another and could be very difficult to control. Furthermore, the coordinator usually has heavy load of unfinished job left by volunteers, which either because of the unskilled volunteers or lack of the standard for the work.
 * Lack of Standard/Surveillance

Like other NGO, PERC heavily relies on electronic document system to finish its most jobs. Computer software plays a critical role in running PERC’s business processes. However, lack of adequate software support, such as no clear manual or instruction for specific software usage, no contingent computer system, etc, is becoming one of the major hurdles to speed up the whole organizational business process.
 * Lack Of Software Support