[Wikimedia-l] About the concentration of resources in SF (itwas: "Communication plans for community engagement"

[Everton Zanella Alvarenga]

2013/8/25 Federico Leva (Nemo) <nemowiki at gmail.com>:

> This is important to keep in mind, but I don't think it's related to what
> Romaine is talking about. Those were not just "offices", they were offices
> for a project. Distributing existing projects (like engineering) in
> different locations is an entirely different matter than establishing new
> activities in new locations, not that I have opinions on either.

Yeah, Nemo, I think you're right. But at the same time there are still
things in common that can be used from these experiences. Like setting
an office in a place with a legislation totally different from US for
instance, which can have complicated implications and new challenges
in several aspects. You should make this in such a way to protect the
organization and the new employees, and also find the local
requirements to make this happen. Think about the risk, for instance,
of employees being sued in name of WMF. Or also the new rules WMF
would need to understand about the local workers legislation. This is
not in any report, but there were several surprises during the
catalyst, like "1. Oh, really that Brazilians have right to one month
of vacation? 2. Oh, that is true, in Brazil there is also holidays. 3.
Damn, how expensive are Brazilian taxes!" These (basic) things were
not taking into account and they are some of things you have to think
about before trying to set new physical offices. There are other
things we can think of.

Tom

-- 
Everton Zanella Alvarenga (also Tom)
OKF Brasil - Rede pelo Conhecimento Livre
http://br.okfn.org