Hi,
1. Everyone keeps on mentioning the word " money". How much was spent on the strategy thus far by WMF here? I keep on searching for this information I can't find it. 2. I totally agree with Anders Warnnersten 3. I believe Itzik you are doing it the right way, this is the right platform and you don't have to apologise for voicing your opinion, it's what you feel and the TRUTH, in fact I believe this conversation itself should form part of the Strategy and the WMF need to think about and address these issues you are raising honestly. 4. I hear what you are saying Itzik regarding criticising the way WMF are going about implementing the strategy movement 2030, but I don't hear what you suggest WMF or we as the Wikimedia community should do to correctly go about doing or implementing the strategy the right way. You are saying " There are so many ways in between that can combine the good in both ways." I want to hear about those* many ways*. 5. Just to be clear I'm not taking WMF side or Itzik side. I agree with Itzik and think Paulo Santos Perneta made some valid points as well, my question is can we remedy what Itzik has pointed out, how do we move forward as a movement and actually reach a place where we totally agree that what will come out of this strategy process truly represents what everyone feels and where we want to go.
Regards, Bobby Shabangu
On Sat, 6 Apr 2019 at 11:30, Itzik - Wikimedia Israel < itzik@wikimedia.org.il> wrote:
Hi Philip and all,
I debated whether to respond and continue this discussion. Finally, I decided to do it first to apologize. I stand behind my feedback about the process, but I'm afraid it was sent at the wrong time, a few days before the Wikimedia Summit. It wasn't my intention to cause a storm a moment before the summit and especially not during it, and I didn't take that it into consideration when I sent the email. It would have been more appropriate if this mail had been sent long enough before, or after, the summit.
If my email wasn't clear, let me clarify it: I think the strategy process is one of the most important steps we had so far as a movement. And I truly believe (or at least desire to) it will bring change. Saying that, I think we should also look more deeply and review how we bring these recommendations, asking ourselves if this is the only way. In the Friday morning session, two extreme directions were presented as to how the process could take place. That's exactly the point that bothered me, the look of black or white only. There are so many ways in between that can combine the good in both ways.
What saddens me the most is our fear of having an open conversation. I received many responses to this email, some off-list, but so many in-person during the last weekend in Berlin (and because I talked about it two days ago with someone, here is a screenshot just for an example: https://imgur.com/FM1naPJ).
I told many of them and I say it publicly, I didn't look for any public support for what I wrote. Each of us has a different opinion or feedback. Good and bad. And all these deserve to be said. It saddens me that we keep things in our stomachs. We do things that we don't feel comfortable with just because [enter your reason].
In one of the conversations, someone told me that he thinks that the process is problematic, but they are his friends, and he doesn't want to criticize them. That's one of the things that hurt me more and bothered me during the whole weekend, wonder to myself if maybe I did something wrong.
The criticism is not personal towards anyone. Or at least that wasn't the intention. There are questions that I think we as a movement, who responsible together to this process, should ask about it. This is our duty as a movement. Are we using the money correctly? Do we manage the work time of the staff and volunteers right? It may be that everything is fine, but it may not be. If we don't ask ourselves the questions from time to time, we will not do our job. Assessment should be done all along, not just at the end of a process. The fact this process is SUPER important is obvious to everyone. But you can not go blind because of it.
It doesn't change the fact that the people behind it are my friends too, some of them for many years. I love them all. And I know, and sure with all my heart, that they do the best they can for the sake of movement. I believe feedback, comments, are also important to them to adjust and change. To talk about them and criticize their work behind their back it's probably the most non-friendship thing to do.
Have a great weekend.
*Itzik Edri* Chairperson (volunteer) itzik@wikimedia.org.il +972-54-5878078
On Mon, Apr 1, 2019 at 3:19 PM Philip Kopetzky philip.kopetzky@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Itzik,
I'm sorry you feel this way and would hope you would still feel inclined
to
provide a critical point of view on the process. I agree with you that we're bad at changing processes that are evidently broken, but don't you think that we are exactly changing this fact by moving on from an
affiliate
system that has been broken for at least 3-4 years now and are finally prioritising measures that will support our communities in becoming healthier and more fun to work in?
Best, Philip
On Thu, 28 Mar 2019 at 19:09, Kiril Simeonovski < kiril.simeonovski@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Anders,
There is an expression in Macedonian that says „Секое вештачко нешто се распаѓа на природен начин.“ (Every artificial creation breaks down naturally.). This is exactly what is going to happen with this
strategy.
Best regards, Kiril
On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 7:05 PM Anders Wennersten < mail@anderswennersten.se> wrote:
There is a Swedish expression "har man tagit fan i båten får man ro honom i land" (If you have taken the devil into your boat you must
row
him ashore"
Independent if this process has been bad or not, I see it is as just some six month left of it. And it is important to do the best of it.
It
would be a bad move to stop it at thois point in time, and would also
be
too late to correct the process if it has been flawed.
Anders
Den 2019-03-27 kl. 14:05, skrev Itzik - Wikimedia Israel:
Hi,
Two weeks ago I sent this email to my strategy working group
(resource
allocation). I didn't plan to send a public email, just to share
with
the
rest of the group my reason to leave and just to disappear. I receive feedbacks with many of the group members and also
requesting
permissions to transfer it with others outside of the group, which
leads
to
more conversations that I had around it.
Last week we had our weekly phone call, during which we discussed
our
feelings and opinions about the process so far. From our long
conversation
and the conversations with the others, I learned that many of these feelings exist among the other members, as well some ideas on how
to
make
it easier and less demanding and at the same time publishing the conclusions sooner. Yesterday, following a good conversation with one of the WMF's
board
members about it, I was asked to share these thoughts with the
movement's
list, so that it may also involve the community's feedback as well.
*Itzik Edri* Chairperson (volunteer) itzik@wikimedia.org.il +972-54-5878078
---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Itzik - Wikimedia Israel itzik@wikimedia.org.il Date: Wed, Mar 13, 2019 at 2:08 PM Subject: I decided to leave the working group To: wg2030-resourceallocation@wikimedia.org
Dear friends,
For a long time I have been considering leaving the working group
but
each
time I decided to give it another chance. Yesterday, after long consideration, I decided to write this email.
I must be honest - I was skeptical from the first moment about this process. The huge amount of money which the board allocated to this
process
together with the complicated and (very) long process planned for
it
make
me doubt the ability to really have a real outcome in a reasonable
time.
For the past two years, it seems to me like the strategy took over
almost
every movement event and activity. I feel bad for investing
millions
of
dollars from our donations and uncounted hours of volunteer time
into
this
process.
I also felt hypocritical in the way the foundation acts - while
"freezing"
grant programs (such as APG) and holding affiliates from increasing
their
programs and budgets, "because of the strategy process" while simultaneously approving itself to increase its budget and staff
year
after
year by tens of percentage.
Despite my distrust of the chances of this process and the
criticism
I
felt
for it, I instructed my organization to give it the full support we
been
asked, as all our movement did. Later on, I decided to join this
working
group as I felt we almost reached the final step of the process
and I
wanted to help shape the recommendations. I was totally wrong.
In the first months of the workgroups, I felt it was completely
wasted
of
time. I saw how wonderful volunteers tried to lead the process
within
each
group (thank you Daria!) - but it wasn't their job, nor none of
us. I
felt
like I was returning to university, and every few weeks I received instructions and homework from the lecturer, with assignments to
the
following week - and in between, that we need to lead it and solve
things
by ourselves. It took the core team a few months to change it and
bring
external support, but even after the (right) change, it continues
to
feel
like I came *to work for *the strategic process, not with.
I felt like nothing happened for the past year(or years?) before
the
working groups started to operate. As if we didn't have hundreds of meetings around the world, with a total of tens of thousands of
people
and
an enormous amount of hours of conversations - and aside from a
short
few
sentences of a strategic direction, we started from scratch. A
completely
new process. From scratch to have discussions about what this process is,
definitions
and concepts. What is the problem with the current system? What are
the
challenges? What people shared during the first phase? Information
which
wasn't available and ready for the group, and still isn't. Eight
months
after we start, the real conversation about the subject which I
joined
to
discuss about and help shape recommendations around it, is far, far
away
from even to start.
The more I spoke to more and more people who are part of the
process, I
realized that this despair is not only with me but with many. But
we
are
a
real Wikimedians, and we are committed to the things we start. We
are
bad
with stopping things when they don't work or have real reviews of
the
things we do when we have the belief that this is the right thing.
I
completely stopped thinking it is the right thing to our movement.
Last month, in our in-person meeting in Berlin, one of the opening activities was to sum up the number of years we were all members of
the
movement. Just think about doing the same, and sum up the number of volunteer (and staff) hours invested until now in this process. We
are
talking about tens of thousands of hours of work not even taking
into
consideration the huge amount of money involved. And the end of the process is very far away.
In one of our discussions, we doubt if to include volunteers as a
resource
which can be allocated. We decided at the end it can't as such, but
just
try to imagine it was, and try to think about a future
whatever-will-be
the
resource allocation body/structure: how he would deal with the
decision
whether to approve such a huge amount of volunteer time and money
in
the
process. Did the WMF's board even consider and discuss these
resources
and
how it will affect the movement during the process years? I doubt.
We tend to say that the movement newest project is WikiData. I
think
we
may
need to start address WikiStrategy as the newest project. Just
think
about
what we could do with that amount of resources.
The idea to massively involve the wide community within this
process
was
the right decision - but the implementations from my point of view
were
wrong. If the last strategy process was totally handled by outsiders - we
took
this one completely to its opposite, without finding the right
balance.
A strategy process is important, there is no doubt. And our
movement
needs
one, there is no doubt. But a strategy process can't take over the organization' activities
for
*years.*
I want to warmly thank you, my teammates. It is heartwarming to see
the
commitment and amazing energy of all the members of this process,
and
of
course, the core team which is dedicated to bringing a change. I
have
no
doubt that we all want to secure the future of our movement to
years
to
come and I don't know of such a high level of engagement and
commitment
anywhere else. But at the same time, I think we should put limits
to
it
and
reconsider it - and think how to make it shorter, lighter, less
demanding
and expensive - both from the perspective of staff/volunteer time
and
money.
Yours, Itzik.
*Itzik Edri* Chairperson itzik@wikimedia.org.il +972-54-5878078 _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
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