On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 5:16 PM, James Alexander jamesofur@gmail.com wrote: It is probably best for me not to get into a long count/counterpoint here but I couldn't avoid not responding at all.
James, several staffers have talked about feeling unappreciated and demoralized. But that's how quite a few WMF staff made us feel before Lila arrived. WMF-community relations couldn't have been worse. It certainly looks from the outside as though Lila fixed a lot of that.
The question now is how we move forward, with no more casualties.
The best thing is surely for WMF staff to help Lila weather this storm, which seems to have blown up around mistaken ideas about the Knowledge Engine proposal.
In the longer term we need to brainstorm about how to manage Foundation-community relations. Lila wanted to speak to the community earlier about the Knowledge Engine grant, but was afraid to. Why was that? A lot of the community's suspicion of change stems from us feeling we could be separated from our work at any minute. That conservatism causes a lot of frustration within the WMF. How can it be fixed?
Does the Board give enough support to the ED and leadership to the rest of us? Can something be put in place within the WMF to help staffers so that things like this don't blow up in public? We also ought to discuss asking the WMF to become a membership organization with different bylaws so that we really do elect the Board.
These are the discussions that will move us forward, because the real problem here is not about individuals. It is about structure.
Sarah