Dear Wikimedians,

The Movement Strategy core team is proud of having reached the milestone of sharing the final recommendations in mid May [1]. We have been engaging with affiliates, communities, the Wikimedia Foundation, and other stakeholders eversince to ensure the recommendations and principles are received and understood. 

Phase 2 of Movement Strategy is wrapping up

As shared in an email earlier [2], phase 2 of Movement Strategy has wrapped up with the finalization of the recommendations, bringing to an end the mandate of the working groups, writers, reviewers, strategy liaisons, and other individuals who contributed to this movement-led process.  The core team is also concluding its work by the end of June 2020. We are reflecting on what we have learned together and making sure that the volumes of knowledge generated in the process is made available for the benefit of the movement as well as a smooth transition to implementation. 

The transition to implementation

From here, focus and collaboration will shift to the implementation of the recommendations and the required transition steps to ensure the process remains open and transparent. The Movement Strategy principles [3] will be the guiding framework to ensure transition will be inclusive and empowering for the movement. The global pandemic forced us to cancel this year’s Wikimedia Summit in Berlin and we lost the chance to work together. Yet, we gained the opportunity to expand the circles of participants in virtual implementation discussions. Particularly, the aim is to better include online contributors, technical developer communities, and smaller user groups. 

The transition to implementation needs to be carefully and inclusively designed, with multiple pathways for engagement and with urgency so the momentum that we have generated together over the past two years is not lost. Implementation discussions will take place virtually commencing September 2020. The goal is to produce a one-year plan that identifies which parts of the recommendations need to be worked on first, in what sequence, and with what resources and support structures. 

Call for nominations

Online engagement with a high number of diverse participants from across our movement will be challenging. Therefore, the Wikimedia Foundation is convening a small design group to collaboratively shape the transition to implementation, including the setup and scope of the virtual events. The idea for the design group is to bring together community members reflecting different parts and regions of the movement (CEE, ESEAP, Indaba, Iberocoop, North America, South Asia, WikiArabia, WikiFranca), representatives from the EDs and chairpersons groups, and WMF staff. The design group will have project management and facilitation support.

Open design will be used for this work so anyone interested can participate, share insight, and provide feedback on the discussions. Community members and Movement Strategy enthusiasts who are not part of the design group are invited and highly encouraged to provide feedback online in parallel as reviewers, and to later take part in the decisive virtual discussions. 

For the design group, we are asking for one individual nomination from Wikimedians from South Asia (Wikimedians from India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Srilanka, Pakistan).

• The task will be to work with a diverse group of people from across the movement to design how the process of online events will be set up.

• The nominee should be familiar with the Wikimedia movement, interested in strategy, and ideally an active online contributor from the projects OR from an underrepresented community. 

• The work is scheduled to begin in the third week of June and planned to conclude at the end of July. 

• During this time, you will meet 5 times virtually as a whole group for two hours each time, and you will be expected to carry out some asynchronous work in between meetings. 

• Please also consider diversity criteria during the nomination. Traditionally we have lacked prolific online and technical contributors in the discussions, and there has been an inclination towards male participants and those from high-income “Western” countries. We hope that you can help us bring a more diverse range of perspectives into design discussions.

We will organize office hours Wed. June 10 @ 17:00 UTC (Google Meet link) and Thurs. June 11 @ 08:00 UTC (Google Meet link) to answer any questions. We are also available to clarify things via email, in your wiki or on social media. Kindly indicate your nominee by June 21, 2020.

We look forward to hearing your thoughts and receiving your nominee for the Movement Strategy transition design group. In the meantime, please don’t hesitate if you have any questions. 

Regards,

[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2018-20/Recommendations

[2] https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2020-June/094960.html

[3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2018-20/Recommendations/Movement_Strategy_Principles