Thanks Stuart, not just for kicking this off, but also for setting up this mailing list!
I am Craig Franklin, currently serving my second term as the Treasurer of Wikimedia Australia. My formal accounting education ended with Mrs O'Keefe's Year 10 accounting class, but I do have a degree in Information Technology from the Queensland University of Technology (where I am currently a part-time graduate student). My workplace roles over the past seven years have involved implementing, maintaining, and consulting on SAP Financials software, with a particular focus on Controlling, Management Accounting, and Business Intelligence, particularly in the non-profit and public sectors.
As Treasurer of WMAU, my prime focus has been on professionalising and developing the business operations of the chapter. On my watch, we've moved from an organisation with a few thousand dollars in the bank, a chequebook, and an accounting Excel spreadsheet, to an organisation with hundreds of thousands of dollars in assets, more robust record keeping systems, and a hell of a lot more regulatory requirements to keep up with!
At a movement level, my prime interest is in working out an equitable funds distribution model that is acceptable to all. I know it's unfashionable to say it, but I do fear that the movement will have trouble lasting another year, yet alone a hundred years, if we don't sort this out and get it right now.
Cheers,
Craig Franklin
On 10 December 2011 11:20, Stuart West
<stu@wikimedia.org> wrote:
Now that we've had some time for people to sign up for the list (28 so far), let's kick things off. I'd like to start with something that's worked well on both the gendergap and developing countries lists: quick personal introductions and then description of why we're interested in this topic and what we hope to get out of the list.
I'll go first.
My name is Stu West and I'm a volunteer on the Wikimedia Foundation's board of trustees. I am the Board's Treasurer and chair of its Audit Committee. I've been involved with Wikipedia for about 5-6 years, and on the Board since early 2008. My day job is in Silicon Valley, where I've worked for private and publicly-traded technology companies in roles including CFO.
I'm really interested in governance/transparency/accountability issues for a few reasons. In my role as WMF Treasurer, it's my responsibility to focus on these. More broadly though, my personal point of view on Wikimedia is very long term. I'm really amazed at what our community has accomplished, and want to ensure we continue to have a huge and growing impact for the next 100 years. To do that, I think we'll need to give our community the best possible organizational/legal/governance support.
As for this list, I'd like it to be a place for high-quality sharing of ideas and best practices around governance/transparency in our movement. I hope we can attract a significant portion of the treasurers, finance staff, and even Audit Committee members. I hope it can be a great way for all of us to learn from each other and hope we can have lots of emails asking for advice/support/ideas from one another. Finally and most importantly, I hope we can use this list to plan Wikimania beers and other in person get-togethers.
Who's next?
-s
Begin forwarded message:
Subject: New "treasurers" mailing list
Date: November 10, 2011 12:15:12 PM PST
I set up a new public mailing list called treasurers@lists.wikimedia.org for discussing and sharing best practices in financial reporting and financial transparency across the Wikimedia movement. The primary intended membership is treasurers, audit committees, and finance staff of movement organizations, but the list is public and anyone interested in financial reporting and transparency is welcome. This list is archived publicly.
You can subscribe here:
Please take a moment to forward this on to your favorite Treasurer or finance staffer. Thanks.
(I thought about just using internal but decided against because a) there's lots of traffic on it already and b) i'm not sure all our various treasurers both subscribe to and read internal regularly.)
-s
===============
Stuart West
Board Treasurer
Wikimedia Foundation
_______________________________________________
Treasurers mailing list
Treasurers@lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/treasurers