I agree! Great idea and thanks for sharing it. I'm going to take a look at the meta page, and see if there is an opportunity for some WMF support - I know Program and Evaluation could be a great support for this potentially, and organizational structures from the Learning and Evaluation side. (I'd look at it from my volunteer side, but, I don't have a chapter role to call my own,....) The timing is good and the opportunity to help build capacity and professionalization is great! Thanks Chris and all involved, (and Sophie....let's see how there is potential for cross-WMF-team-awesomeness!!) Sarah On Tue, Aug 13, 2013 at 9:05 PM, Sophie Österberg &lt;sosterberg(a)wikimedia.org&gt;wrote;wrote: much Sunday but this attending, -- -- *Sarah Stierch* *Museumist, open culture advocate, and Wikimedian* *www.sarahstierch.com* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>

Excellent and well done! It's pretty much standard in small charities that board members start off as enthusiasts on the topic, but who have *no idea* how to be a board member of a nonprofit. (Been there, done that, beg off all opportunities these days.) This is not good. Training people for the role is a *marvellous* idea.

In my opinion the real problem is that the volunteers have no time to offer being board members. Anyway people can be trained to manage a NGO or to be board members, there are some university masters to train NGOs managers. Regards On Tue, Aug 13, 2013 at 4:39 PM, Federico Leva (Nemo) &lt;nemowiki(a)gmail.com paths don't, https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l>gt;, wikimedia-l-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org&gt; -- Ilario Valdelli Wikimedia CH Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera Switzerland - 8008 Zürich Tel: +41764821371 http://www.wikimedia.ch _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>

True. Even worse, many do not even try to be board members (or active chapter members, for that matter) because they (think they) don't have enough experience. It's crucial to ensure the availability of growing paths (usually informal) for volunteers or you lose them and they lose opportunities. For me, it's been crucial to be told by a prof. "you can learn the job of a [university] board member in 6 months" (so it's inexcusable if you don't, but you must try). He was right.

Hello, Indeed it seems to me possible to fill a whole master studies with the things a board member should know :-) but I know that he meant something different. It would be a could idea to have board members going to trainings to be a board member in the specific country where they live. A course of a weekend, for example, would be already a good help. Everything must remain a little bit realistic. Possibly, some board members are more open to other Wikimedians than people from the "outside world" - possibly not. Narrowing the target group down to chapter board members to "staff chapters" is a good step, and I share the arguments on the Meta page. Maybe one should let participants apply for the seminar in a similar way as to Wikimania, in order to have those participants most likely to succeed. For example, if someone is already more than a year board member and likely to remain at least on a board for another year, that would be a pro. Kind regards Ziko Am Dienstag, 13. August 2013 schrieb David Gerard : <javascript:;>> don't, -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ziko van Dijk voorzitter / president Wikimedia Nederland deputy chair Wikimedia Chapters Association Council Vereniging Wikimedia Nederland Postbus 167 3500 AD Utrecht http://wikimedia.nl -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>

Seems good initiative! I'd like to know, who will be training the people from chapters?? It'll be more efficient if someone who specializes in management of non-profit organization can do this job.

I've left some notes on the meta talk page< http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Boards_training_workshop_proposal#Board… a US nonprofit called Boardsource that specialises in educating nonprofit boards on just the issues you raise, Chris. Though it is US centred, most of the knowledge and advice has universal applicability. You point out an important gap in our governance - the education of our boards in best practice. But I'm not (yet) convinced by anything on the meta project page or any of the above comments that an in-person training is the only or even best solution to that. Another option (if you want assessment and certification to be a part of the process) would be to commission Boardsource or a similar specialist organisation to create an online module tailored to this project's needs. That would have the advantage of not requiring participants to take several days out of their lives for the course, open the course up to many more participants, including those who can't take that time off from work and, if a good package is negotiated, should be vastly cheaper per head than an in-person course. If independent assessment and certification is dispensed with, this gap in knowledge *may* be able to be filled simply by judicious private reading. Boardsource (and I assume other specialist organisations) produce a range of books aimed directly at the very questions you cover in your description of the problem. Anthony Cole <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthonyhcole> Memberships secretary Wiki Project Med Foundation< http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wiki_Project_Med> On Wed, Aug 14, 2013 at 3:18 PM, Markus Glaser &lt;markus.glaser(a)wikimedia.de&gt;wrote;wrote: workshop. https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l>gt;, wikimedia-l-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org&gt; _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>

On 13 August 2013 15:39, Federico Leva (Nemo) &lt;nemowiki(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: A very useful book: Nonprofit Kit For Dummies by Stan Hutton and Frances Phillips. I so wish I'd read it 25 years before I did. Very US-centric, but informative outside that.

[...] All this should be cheaper, more relevant, and more meaningful than an external training. [...]

Thanks for all the enthusiasm! Hi Ted, It could happen as a pre-meeting to the Wikimedia Conference, or it could be a stand-alone workshop earlier in the year. This is to be decided. Chris _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>