Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Finance Fellows to develop first-ever movement-wide financial report and metrics

Thanks for the replies. They've calmed my fears a fair bit, but I'm still a little concerned - even simple questions like* "of your administrative costs, **how much were your travel costs"* don't really make a lot of sense to us, because some of our travel costs aren't administrative - and we don't track "administrative expenditure" because that term isn't a definition we use, and it's not clearly defined. This is why we've been having trouble with understanding some Grantmaking/FDC reports in the past - our method of reporting our financial information differs from the way that teams at the WMF would like it to be presented, because our key definitions differ (not to criticise the grantmaking team, who are very helpful in this regard!) I think that this project is trying to fix these problems, and it's a commendable effort - but: 1. Your team can't create entirely new definitions for organisations to report to (because we simply can't afford to increase our finance team to report to another definition - we already report to three different definitions). There is very little appetite in the movement for bigger or more professional finance teams and any big changes to reporting requirements simply won't be possible without more resources going that way. 2. Your team may not be able to get all the information they need from participants because participants are simply too busy - in which case, the results of the report will go ahead and be used by the movement even though it may not be accurate or indeed fit for purpose. If the FDC process then goes ahead and uses the report outcomes to ask for financial information, then it means that the inaccurate report will have a direct effect on the metrics we're marked against, and thus a direct effect on movement funding. 3. As WMUK, I fear that the less effort we put into involving ourselves in the process, the greater the chance that the final outcome will be a poor one for us. This in turn means that this actually has to be something that WMUK put a fair amount of effort into influencing, to ensure that our views are listened to and that the final report is something we can actually report against! I worry about how smaller chapters, like Ghana, Ukraine or Hungary - or the fledgling user groups - will manage, if the final definitions don't reflect their views at all. 4. You say that if an organisation can't give your team the information they want, a phrase will appear in the final report along the lines of "there are concerns about the quality of the data provided by Wikimedia UK"... which won't be true, and will be read into by the community as "WMUK has been audited and found wanting"! 5. The report is intended to make data* "consistent, meaningful and comparable among the chapters, thematic organizations, and the Foundation" *- a laudable goal and one I fully support - but it appears that the Foundation aren't being consulted by the Finance Fellows at all. Where will their views and date be taken into account - will they be using the same process as everyone else, or a different process? I am not a cynic and I don't think that the WMF will use this process to dictate what reporting requirements should be, but I do worry that unless the WMF go through the same process, the end result will be relatively easy for the WMF teams to accomplish and rather harder for the rest of us! This increases our back-office costs and makes thorgs appear less efficient when that won't necessarily be the case. I trust the team - they are a group of keen, young, idealistic people - and I know that this is going to be done in good faith, but I don't see how it can be done fairly without a lot of work from the organisations involved - if they don't get involved, their views won't be reflected. In order for this to be successful, his has to be a* team effort*, from all the financial and project teams (and individuals!) across the world, and at present it isn't - and given that this is the first the rest of the movement has heard of the report, it will be very difficult for the rest of us to help at such short notice. I really, really appreciate what you're doing - but I want to be part of this endeavour, and I hope you see my worries! Richard Symonds Wikimedia UK 0207 065 0992 Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513. Registered Office 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London EC2A 4LT. United Kingdom. Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a global Wikimedia movement. The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects). *Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.* On 31 October 2014 20:46, Michael Guss <mguss(a)wikimedia.org> wrote: