darkangel1(Darrell)
Gates of Antares
Master of the Ravenwing
The Dark Angels the First Legion the true Angels of Death
Posts: 1,060
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Post by darkangel1(Darrell) on May 26, 2010 17:11:15 GMT
Hello all the GCN have sent out the following poll to get an idear of what the clubs want in the next 5 years from the GCN. What i would like everyone to do is post there opinions and idears so i can see what you want the poll has to be returned by the 15th June so get your views in quick please. many thanks Darrell 1=Why did we join the GCN? 2=What were the expectations of GCN membership and were they met? 3=What are the clubs expectations now? 4=What do you see the role of the GCN being in the future in particular the relationship with our club? 5=What do we expect the GCN to achive in 5 years time and how can we assist them? 6=What in your opinion should be the mission statement of the GCN be? 7=Any other commitments in relationship to the GCN constitution 5 year plan and mission statement?
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Post by carl on May 26, 2010 17:22:00 GMT
here's my thoughts for what they're worth;
personally, i doubt that many of the clubs thoughts will be considered so this could turn out to be a fruitless exercise and waste of time.
1)Why did your club join the GCN?
I assume it joined so that it became a member of what we thought would be a national body run by and for the benefit of the member clubs, the individual club members, and these alone.
Benefits included;
PPI A wealth of like minded clubs / people to meet up with for gaming CRB checks so that parents and guardians could rest easy whilst their children were at a registered club.
2)What were your expectations of GCN membership, and were these expectations met?
My expectations of GCN membership is that the GCN looks after its own first and foremost and others second. In my view, this is not always the case at the present time.
3)What are your clubs expectations now?
My expectations are that the GCN will finally stand up for itself and stop underselling its members in such instances as the financial outlay volunteers are expected to make to help out third parties at their events. The costs to get to these things is increasing all the time what with petrol rising, and overnight stays etc so I think that third parties should be kindly asked to make a ‘donation’ to the GCN so that this then is used to hold GCN events locally and thereby clubs get localised events in recognition of their outlay at larger national ones put on by large companies.
4)What do you see the role of the GCN being in the future, in particular the relationship with your club?
The role of the GCN and the elected council with any club, not just my own, should in my opinion be one of fairness in terms of how they are treated and supported. This is something that our club has not been afforded of late in my opinion.
5)What do you expect the GCN to be achieving in five years time, and how can your club assist in this aim?
The GCN has been going for long enough to have already elevated itself to being the MAIN focus for gaming in this country, but due to many peoples perception of the CGN and it’s perceived links to a third party, this has put off many clubs joining, and other wargaming bodies taking us seriously or wanting to talk to us, even when invited. Until this perception is finally conveyed to the wider gaming community, this will hinder any chance of progress of the organisation, in my opinion.
6)What in your clubs opinion should the mission statement of the GCN be?
“The GCN and its member clubs continually strive to provide a safe and socially responsible place for like minded gamers of all ages to meet and have fun”
7)Any other comments in relation to the GCN constitution, five year plan, and Mission statement.?
The GCN council should seriously look to last years EGM, the discussions at the AGM, the failure of the Konflict event not even going ahead, and the lack of support for Gamesday from many clubs, and treat them as a wake up call.
Communication is still very poor at best, and this must be addressed with some urgency to stave off a scenario as per last November’s EGM.
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darkangel1(Darrell)
Gates of Antares
Master of the Ravenwing
The Dark Angels the First Legion the true Angels of Death
Posts: 1,060
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Post by darkangel1(Darrell) on Jun 2, 2010 19:01:22 GMT
can i please have some more input from you guys please
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Post by Simon Robinson on Jun 2, 2010 21:31:12 GMT
1=Why did we join the GCN?
since the club was already a member when I joined - no idea, ceratinly based on what the GCN appears to do - still no idea
2=What were the expectations of GCN membership and were they met?
see the above answer
3=What are the clubs expectations now?
based on what we get - very little.
4=What do you see the role of the GCN being in the future in particular the relationship with our club?
to be honest, based on the current experience of the GCN I doubt we will be members of it, or that it will still exist
5=What do we expect the GCN to achive in 5 years time and how can we assist them?
see the answer above
6=What in your opinion should be the mission statement of the GCN be?
To promote the hobby, to support the membership at events, that sort of thing - but does this question mean that the GCN does not have a mission statement? If it does then instead of asking us what the statement should be - it should ask are they meeting it's mission statement
7=Any other commitments in relationship to the GCN constitution 5 year plan and mission statement?
yes - what are they? Does the comittee think it's meeting its own objectives? What evidence does it have that it is?
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darkangel1(Darrell)
Gates of Antares
Master of the Ravenwing
The Dark Angels the First Legion the true Angels of Death
Posts: 1,060
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Post by darkangel1(Darrell) on Jun 3, 2010 15:27:50 GMT
thank you sinon some good points there
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Post by theluckyone on Jun 3, 2010 17:59:43 GMT
Darrell, I agree with Simon's post and I wouldn't be surprised if most of the other members felt the same!
the only thing I could see that the GCN would/could provide is insurence at a cheaper rate than could be obtained by the club itself (I have no idea if we have or need insurence).
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Post by Stephen Mawson on Jun 4, 2010 10:42:13 GMT
1=Why did we join the GCN?
I believe the thinking at the time was that membership of the GCN would provide the following for our club (These are in the order of importance to our club at the time, as I saw it):
(A): Increase the general awareness of the existence of our club (through advertising in White Dwarf, and through local GW stores), and that this in turn would in turn increase the club’s membership.
(B): Allow the club to attend and run games at Wargaming events (Primarily GW’s Gamesday)
(C): Gain access to a community of local clubs, with the hope that this would lead to establishing relationships with other clubs in our local area.
2=What were the expectations of GCN membership and were they met? See above for the initial expectations.
I think that (A) was definitely met, as the increased advertising, White Dwarf and local GW shops, etc did help us attract more members.
(B) was met as well, as I think GCN membership did assist us in getting to attend events. Although possibly not quite in the way I’d expected. GCN membership allowed us to go to Games Day, and assisted us in sorting out our Slayer Day event to take over from the Conflict event GW had run in Rushden. As a result of GCN membership we also got the chance to help out at other GW run events, Warhammer launch day, etc. I think that all of that gave us the confidence to get more actively involved in events generally. I’m not sure we’d have wanted to get involved with Kelmarsh on the scale that we have done, if we’d not had the opportunity to run participation games at a fairly big event like Games Day.
The community of Clubs expectation I don’t think really ever materialised quite as we expected. When we joined the GCN had a reasonable number of member clubs (around 40 I think from memory). But the interclub communication was generally poor, with only a small number of clubs seeming interested in interclub activities and communication. Unfortunately most of these active clubs were not that close to Phoenix, which limited our involvement.
3=What are the clubs expectations now?
Difficult to say what the clubs expectations of the GCN are a whole. I’d say that for most of our members the GCN isn’t really something that concerns them that much at all. Most of what the GCN does simply has no noticeable impact on our club members one way or the other.
From a club committee perspective the PLI is fairly important, and since we do have under 16 members being able to say that the committee has been CRB checked can help with attracting other junior members.
My personal expectations are that the GCN should be there to facilitate communication and interaction between clubs. There is little point in being a member of an organisation if there is no awareness of what the other members are doing.
Admittedly I’m not the primary point of contact between Phoenix and the GCN anymore, but my impression is that the communication aspect has gotten much worse over the last few years. I’m not sure whether this is because there is less being communicated from the GCN, or simply that there is little communication of a nature that warrants passing on to general club membership.
I’d also expect that the GCN should be trying to establish good working relationships between games companies and itself and its member clubs. Unfortunately due to the poor communication I’m actually unsure whether this is actually happening or not.
Clearly the GCN has a relationship with GW, and in theory a relationship with Battlefront. I’m not sure whether there are any relationships with other companies, or even if any attempts to form any have been made.
Whether these relationships actually extend to the clubs I’m not so sure. From my perspective GW appears to be less engaged with GCN clubs than it was. The process for participating in Games Day for example has grown more restrictive and less easy than it used to be. This year we decided that it probably wasn’t worth the hassle to actually take part.
Another expectation of the GCN is that it should be there to provide some support for member clubs activities. By this I mean in terms of providing a pool of advice, contacts, assistance with advertising and possible source of volunteers for clubs who wish to organise an event (Tournament, show, etc), or simply wish to take part in an established event.
I don’t think however that the GCN should be looking to support clubs activities financially.
4=What do you see the role of the GCN being in the future in particular the relationship with our club?
Ideally I’d like to see the GCN acting as a source of information about club activities, events, shows and so on. I know there was a newsletter that used to go around, but this appears to have died a death. Maybe simply some kind of regular email update (perhaps monthly). Of course this kind of this works both ways, it’ll only work if the clubs are willing to keep the GCN (and whoever is putting the email together) up to date with what is going on with them.
I’d also like to see the GCN trying to actively encourage interclub communication and activities in local regions. This interclub communication does happen to some extent already, but as far as I can see only with clubs that build up their own relationships with each other. GCN assistance in this area currently appears to be slight. This may be down to the scattered nature of the member clubs, and fact that GCN officials are sometimes covering large areas.
I’d also like to see the GCN acting as a support mechanism for clubs who want to organise, run, or participate in events. This may already be happening, but if so it’s not being publicised very much.
5=What do we expect the GCN to achieve in 5 years time and how can we assist them?
This is a very difficult question to answer, partly as I’m not sure if the GCN currently has any clearly defined goals. Other than trying to encourage more clubs to join the GCN what is the GCN actually currently trying to achieve and why?
I think the GCN may need to determine exactly what the point of the organisation is? Right now I’m not sure if anyone really knows what this is.
For example is the GCN primarily there to provide support and assistance for the activities of its member clubs, and to encourage interaction between war gaming clubs. Then presumably the goals should be improving inter club communication, setting up inter club activities, and providing support for clubs who need it. This would include trying to build up good relationships between games companies and the GCN and its member clubs.
Alternatively if the GCN is there to encourage and improve the war gaming hobby in the UK in general, then this points to a very different set of goals. Presumably this would be more along the lines of trying to encourage more people to take part in the hobby, promoting or organising events that are aimed and drawing more people into the hobby, and encouraging and assisting in the formation of new clubs. This would have knock on benefits for all member clubs, as more people in the hobby means more potential members, more shops and traders, and the possibility of more successful events and shows.
6=What in your opinion should be the mission statement of the GCN be?
First question is simply does the GCN need a mission statement? Personally I feel that most mission statements don’t actually make any real difference to the way any organisation behaves, or gives a very good idea to anyone outside the organisation as to what that organisation actually does.
Primarily this is as they tend to be vague, and written in jargon or management speak. Exactly what benefit would having a mission statement provide to the GCN. Little or nothing I suspect.
However I am all in favour of the GCN setting some broad public goals or objectives. This I think might help keep everyone in the GCN focussed on exactly what the GCN is actually trying to accomplish, which I think is something that often gets lost, if indeed most GCN members even know what its objectives are.
It’d also help in explaining to people outside the GCN exactly what it’s for, which is currently quite hard to do. It’s easy to explain the benefits of membership, but what the purpose of the GCN is, is much harder to define.
7=Any other commitments in relationship to the GCN constitution 5 year plan and mission statement?
I think I should probably actually read the 5 year plan (whatever it is) before commenting.
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darkangel1(Darrell)
Gates of Antares
Master of the Ravenwing
The Dark Angels the First Legion the true Angels of Death
Posts: 1,060
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Post by darkangel1(Darrell) on Jun 4, 2010 12:03:45 GMT
thanks steve some good comments
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Post by stunties on Jun 13, 2010 10:17:02 GMT
some very good points steven im sure you opinion is right in almost everything youve put, our two penneth with regards to GCN is at present we abstain from membership as do several other clubs i could mention and heres why. - After the cheaper insurance no benefits
- Crb quango (we believe strongly in collective responsibility) and whilst we have had these checks carried out on committee members this is a club with 50+ members that leaves 47 unchecked members, as is the case in most clubs.
- No feedback or communication unless a payment is due
- little or no interclub encouragement
In short the GCN "was" a useful tool to the GW money machine in a few ways, it seems that relationship is all one way these days. I may be wrong but our general con census is that the GCN has become GW's little unfunded lap dog. A couple of benefits i forgot to mention was the opportunity to be involved the "GW" gamesday event, as long as we play ball and put on a demonstration that falls with the strict guidelines of GW. Secondly we also get to put a poster in our local GW shop (in 2 years we have had 2 or 3 of our 50 members come from this avenue) Sorry to sound so negative guys but at NCC we feel the GCN has been failing for some time and we think it may have run its course. Whilst i appreciate that it would be far easier to breath new life into an already established organisation, i feel that they have lost touch with their members and that is curtains broadly speaking. I also understand just how much work it would be to set up a new dynamic national membership, but it is usually the best way forward to start afresh. A new organisation may be funded by the companies that benefit the most, i.e 3 or so membership levels depending on supplier size etc. Also the new org would have a yearly "Gamesday of its own" something along the lines of salute (which is very well run) but on the scale of GW's sellathon marketing extravaganza where punters pay for the privilege of paying again for something they can get at their local GW. i apologise for ranting, also if i have upset anyone for disrespecting the GCN. this is the general sentiment of the Norman Cross Crusaders. cheers guys
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Post by wstevens on Jun 13, 2010 11:54:19 GMT
Why not look at it from a different angle - a what if? if you want.
What would happen if we were not affiliated with the GCN?
Would we "suffer" terribly as a club?
Understandably there are certain venues and shows that we just would not have gone to if we were not a GCN club - or am I just supposing this? Are there clubs that put on Games at Gamesday that are not affiliated to the GCN?
How many people have we actually gained from posters at any local GW shop? I'd say not much - in fact they have mostly come from the hard work that certain members have done over the years promoting the club on the Internet via forums, advertising tournaments that we run and of course Kelmarsh. Are there any Phoenix posters or flyers in GW shops anyway?
How did I find out about the Phoenix Gaming Club? It wasn't at a local GW store it was the Independent second hand guy down in Wellingborough. I don't think I have ever seen a poster / flyer / or leaflet that actually advertises us. However there is the flip side as we do have a number of members and at times we have a serious table shortage on club nights. Is our intent to increase our membership and forget about our capacity to accomodate them all?
So are we actually looking to expand the club's membership or is this not a notion? Something else that has been missed totally - let's not kid ourselves but none of us are getting any younger and I haven't seen a big influx in "youngbloods" to the club to bolster that end of the frequency table.
From what I have got from the above the GCN has done the following for us
1) Cheaper insurance (surely there is cheaper alternative) 2) Allowing us to participate at GW run shows (although my previous question still stays) 3) Connections to other clubs (something we do over numerous Internet sites anyway) 4) Bucket fulls of snidey remarks (we can handle that even with apologies) 5) CRB checks (are GCN the sole CRB checkers in the UK?) 6) Assistance and help at any of our events (none has materialised at Kelmarsh - at all!) 7) Assurances (broken) 8) Advertising the Phoenix in GW White Dwarf Mag (not anymore) 9) Given us a supposed "bad name" with other clubs (successful) 10) When asking yourself what the GCN will achieve in the next five years you may want to hold on and retrospectively ask what have they done for us in the last five years?
There are many other issues but as I abhor politics in any form I will stop just there and let others contemplate.
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