I feel so stupid. Sorry, I came back after an exhausting day at work and spent few hours reading the report and response to him that I didn't even noticed that I posted my response or the wrong meta page :)
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:FDC_portal/Annual_report_on_the_Funds_Dissemination_Committee_process_2012-2013#I_would_like_to_response_to_some_of_the_points_you_raised Itzik On Thu, Oct 3, 2013 at 10:36 PM, Itzik Edri <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi Sue, > > Thanks for this great and detailed report. Although that I thinks it was > worth to publish it a month before this current FDC round, I understand > that you didn't want your comments to influence the chapter's proposals. > > Let's talk about growth - when you grove from zero employee to even one, > especially if he is a ED (and a good one) – the influence of this step on a > small chapter budget could be a very big one. You are talking about the > grove of the chapters, but the WMF isn't really different on this issue. > Right, it's not really fair to compare the foundation to chapters in the > matter of the core daily work the foundation deal with and her > responsibility for the entire movement, but it worth to look on that. I > didn't did a real research on that (sorry that I don't have the time or the > manpower to ask them for that), but from a quick looks on the WMF reports > over the years - 2004 - 56,666$, 2005- 283,487$, 2006 - $1,066,785 (376%), > 2007 - 1,696,569, 2008 - 5.6M (335%), 2009 - 8.6M (152%), 2010 - 15.4% > (178%), 2011 - 26M (170%), 2012 - 37$ (141%). So if according to the FDC > 120% growth is the rational growth for organization, the WMF never wasn't > even close to fit this growth. Now, when during her ten years existence the > foundation started to focus on *HER* evaluation? When they had one staffer > or 40? And let not forget - the foundation in her daily program don't deal > daily with volunteers working as part of their core programs of operate > from their office, something that it's different from the chapters. > > I admire evaluation, I admire audit and failure reports. I think we should > know what we are doing and learn from the past. But I'm also realistic, > knowing that good evaluation require knowledge. Most of our volunteers are > great editors, some of them even great developers, some of them even know > how to run a great projects and creating amazing partnerships. Only few of > them like to make reports, only few of them know how to evaluate correctly > their work. And it's totally ok. You have big expectations from the > chapters, and this is totally ok also. But you have also a huge doubt on > their true impact. And this is not new for none of us. Even before the FDC, > and even before the staff grove that you mentions on your report, you liked > to show what the "community" thinks about the chapters from a surveys that > we agreed that are not fair (Wikimania 2012?). So yes, we need evaluations, > and we need more reports. I totally agreed. The questions is how and when. > It's different to ask from an organizations with 40 staffer the same > evaluation level and knowledge that you require from a chapter that just > got his first staffer. Especially with chapters that their staff are doing > less programs work and this been done mostly be the volunteers. > Expectations and results are harder, although they are needed. When a > volunteer arranging a Wikipedia Academy conference with 150 people attends > without staff that involve with all the organizations, his success is > probably much worth for us than a same conference been arranged by a full > time staffer. And its work for the two-side. I can expect and demand higher > targets from my employee, but not from a volunteer who does the same thing. > So, because I cannot surly measure the volunteer's success – from now we > will decide about if project is going to exist or now only if I 100% can > measure him on the level of how many women editors was at the room and how > many of them had laptops (not far away from a question that we been asked > by the WMF of how many people with SLR cameras came to our photo tours)? > Should we start chasing just after numbers? > > Over the past month I personally and all my board dedicated one > face-to-face meeting every week, alongside with at least 2 hours daily work > on team to build together with our new ED our annual plan, budget and > strategic goals. This is huge amount of time for volunteers. This huge > amount of time for board that didn't has the time deal with nothing else > and asking his partners and volunteers to wait due the lack of their time > for others things. I will be honest – we not sure all of our targets are > really realistic. We didn't measure till now most of our work because of > lack of time, manpower, and knowledge. And probably some of the numeral > targets we set to ourselves this year we will not achieve at all and some > of them we will achieve more that we planned. But it's not because we did a > good or awful job. It is also because lack of knowledge and experience the > volunteers have to reach such level of evaluation – but more than that - > the difficulty in the measurement we faced. I can do in one month 200 > editing workshops and brings 10,000 editors to Wikipedia. But I can also > reveal one month after that only five remained active editors - because the > community's internal procedures make it hard for them to be accepted, > because the editing interface problematic, because of limited knowledge in > areas they can contribute against the areas already covered in Wikipedia > and hundreds of other parameters that require a great deal of experience > and learning. > > The FDC is a great success, but also let's not forget what you mention on > your report – that the consultancy fees was US$294,186 (more than half of > an average chapter budget according to your report), not including the > amount of time and staff that was spent on this process from the WMF side – > making this process a really expensive one. I don't mean to say that's not > ok or that it was waste of money, not at all. I only meant to point that > even a large organization like the WMF, with many experts and more than 100 > staff need outside support sometime. Support that costs a lot of money, and > require a big knowledge and time. Can you honestly say the WMF till today > give 100% of the support the chapter's needs in order to reach for the > great stage you dream of when the money is 100% used in effective ways and > when we know exactly how to run programs and deal with volunteers? Or maybe > *each* one of the chapters also need to spend quarter million dollar of > donors money to hire kind of Bridgespan for each strategic step that that > faced with? > > I posted this comment also on Meta: > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:FDC_portal/Proposals/2012-2013_round1/Wikimedia_Israel/Progress_report_form/Q2#I_would_like_to_response_to_some_of_the_points_you_raised > > > Regards, > Itzik Edri > Chairperson, Wikimedia Israel > > > On Thu, Oct 3, 2013 at 3:47 AM, Sue Gardner <[email protected]>wrote: > >> Hi folks, >> >> As you know, in July 2012 the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees >> asked me to set up the Funds Dissemination Committee, a volunteer-driven >> advisory committee created to make recommendations to the Board allocating >> funds for chapters and other Wikimedia movement entities. I did that, and >> the FDC has now been fully operational for a little more than a year. >> >> As part of the FDC framework, I committed that after the FDC’s first year >> of operation I would create a report for the Board that documented the >> state of the FDC at that moment in time, and told the Board about any >> revisions we had made to the process as a result of stakeholder input >> during its first year. >> >> The purpose of this note is to tell you that report is now posted. It’s >> here: >> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FDC_portal/Annual_report_on_the_Funds_Dissemination_Committee_process_2012-2013 >> >> If you’ve got comments on the report I’d suggest that rather than >> replying to this list, you leave them on the talk page. And, my thanks to >> everyone who contributed to the FDC's first year of operations, and also to >> the report :-) >> >> Thanks, >> Sue >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Please note: all replies sent to this mailing list will be immediately >> directed to Wikimedia-l, the public mailing list of the Wikimedia >> community. For more information about Wikimedia-l: >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l >> _______________________________________________ >> WikimediaAnnounce-l mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaannounce-l >> >> > _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe>
