Based on what I heard from Anasuya and members of the FDC over the years, I feel that asking the FDC to take on the WMF budget is too much of a scope expansion, unless a third round of reviews is added each year and is dedicated to the WMF budget. The only realistic alternative that I can see is a new committee, which I think would be better anyway because the members of that committee could develop deep familiarity with the WMF budget. WMF is an unusually complex organization so this added depth would be valuable. Also, this would let the FDC staff stay completely clear of the awkward position of reviewing the budgets of their colleagues elsewhere in WMF including the budgets of their managers.
Pine On Nov 27, 2015 5:51 AM, "Dariusz Jemielniak" darekj@alk.edu.pl wrote:
On Fri, Nov 27, 2015 at 3:50 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Perhaps there should be a new Budget Committee of the board, with a
similar
composition to the Audit Committee in that the membership would include some WMF board members and some community members. The Budget Committee could do FDC-like reviews of WMF's Annual Plan proposals each year.
It is an idea worth considering, but setting up yet another committee gives me goosebumps...
I personally would prefer to avoid the "core" and "non-core" division of the WMF budget, since I feel that the whole budget and the performance of the whole organization should be reviewed at least annually. The Budget Committee could look at the big picture in more depth than the Board as a whole and the FDC would have the time to do.
I understand this view. My concerns are related to scale (the most common FDC applicant has a budget 1000 smaller than the WMF), FDC's competence to review such budgets with the same professionalism in a highly limited time, and also mixing the cashflows (after all, the FDC's allocation is also part of WMF's budget), but these issues can probably be addressed somehow.
In general, I strongly believe that the WMF should lead by example - it will be much easier for other organizations to prepare strategy, goals, budgets, plans, etc., if they have a clear good example set by the WMF.
Dariusz _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe