Umm....what the NDA says is very much a part of employment standards. The
NDA is an employer-employee agreement. It is not subject to the wishes of
the Wikimedia community, except in a very indirect way. NDAs are used to
control people's behaviours - if they're employees, they get disciplined up
to and including termination should they violate them. In the case of
volunteers (and yes, there are many volunteers who sign NDAs for various
types of access, myself included), their privileged access can be removed
and potentially they could face legal ramifications for disclosure
depending on the nature of the disclosure.
There have been transparency problems, no question about it. But they had
nothing to do with NDAs. Let's leave NDAs out of it at this point.
They're absolutely not within Community Engagement's purview.
Risker/Anne
On 12 March 2016 at 22:11, Andreas Kolbe <jayen466(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Anne,
This is not a question of employment standards – it's not about what these
NDAs etc. should or shouldn't say. We are talking about publication of
existing boilerplate agreements that are in routine use.
It's a question of transparency. When volunteers talk to staff, it's useful
for them to have an accurate understanding of what staff can and can't talk
about, in particular as some staff members have raised this as an issue.
If preparing this for publication takes a month or two, because there are
more pressing things to do right now, I have no problem with that. What
isn't good is if the community is told in response to queries, "Yes,
publishing the NDAs etc. is a reasonable idea", and those words just fade
into the mist because the task has never been actioned and delegated.
Perhaps we can agree on that.
As Sarah says, a dedicated transparency officer within the community
engagement department would be a great idea, because this is a
community-facing issue. I'd be interested in hearing Maggie's views on
that.
Andreas
On Sun, Mar 13, 2016 at 2:25 AM, Risker <risker.wp(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Really, Andreas? You're complaining that the
resigning ED didn't do this
and the one appointed less than 36 hours ago hasn't got around to it?
This is not Maggie's responsibility - she is not responsible for
employment
standards or expectations. That would be the VP
Human Resources...who
has
just resigned, too, and has yet to be replaced.
Risker/Anne
On 12 March 2016 at 21:09, Andreas Kolbe <jayen466(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On March 1, Jimmy Wales wrote:[1]
things like standard boilerplate language to be signed by
> all employees doesn't strike me as something in and of itself to be
kept
> > private - there is a valid interest in showing that our policies are
> > fair and humane for employees, responsible in terms of the privacy of
> > personal information, etc.
> >
>
> Nothing appears to have happened since then – we seem to be no nearer
to
transparency about the non-disclosure agreements and non-disparagement
clauses WMF staff have to sign than we were two weeks ago, when
discussion
around this topic kicked off in another
thread.[2]
This seems to be a recurring (and daunting) pattern. People call for
transparency about a particular issue. Eventually, someone in a
leadership
> position responds that yes, demands for transparency about this issue
are
> quite reasonable, and in fact more
transparency would be absolutely
> desirable.
>
> At this point, people relax, feeling they have been heard. The
clamouring
crowd
disperses. But in fact, nothing happens, and the same questions
arise
> again some weeks, months, years down the line.
>
> Maggie, is this something your department could take on? It would be
good
> to have one identified person at the
Foundation who is responsible for
> tracking such queries and reporting back to the community, one way or
the
> other.
>
> Andreas
>
> [1]
>
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-March/082852.html
> [2]
http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/wiki/foundation/685183#685183
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