Position Summary

As Programme Officer, Pilot Projects, your job will be to drive and support the growth of Indian language Wikipedias and its sister projects. Your primary responsibility will be to design and implement different pilot projects with an aim to create high quality content and cultivate new editors on different language Wikipedias in a time bound manner. One of the main pilots you will be spearheading immediately will be on ‘Indian Performing Arts’. The pilots will be premised on themes and seek to create a multi-lingual repository of knowledge  using Wikimedia projects as knowledge platforms. In addition to this you will be anchoring the development and growth of at least one Indian language Wikipedia. You are encouraged to deeply engage with the A2K Work Plan before making the application.

You will work cohesively with the Wikimedia community and the Wikimedia India Chapter to meet specific goals of each language community in India. You will be a part of a small team of 5 to 6 doing high visibility and high impact work.

Responsibilities

• Support India-focused initiatives to improve quality of India-relevant content and number of editors on Indian language Wikimedia projects.
• Support the growth of Indian language Wikimedia communities and projects by designing and implementing community collaborations and partnerships pilot projects – detailing rationale, aim and objective, execution, evaluation, timeline, resource investment, etc.
• Spearhead A2K’s pilot projects.
• Identify institutions/groups that have ready-made content/archived material and aggregate available material in respective languages.
• Create a network of state institutions, university departments, non-government organisations, academics, artists, researchers and wikipedia community members that will work towards creating a repository of knowledge on specific themes by using Wikimedia projects as a platform.
• Conduct initial meetings with the principal investigators from each of the shortlisted institutions and share project idea.
• Facilitate Wikimedia community involvement with the core network of institutions and principal investigators to collaboratively participate on specific content/area modules.
• Create social media platforms for visibility of these projects and facilitate need-based technical and online support.
• Conduct a series of wiki-training workshops for various nodes within the network.
• Conduct periodic monitoring and evaluation of the pilot projects in progress.
• Generate and document lessons from programme activities that can inform the work of Indian communities and similar programmes in other countries.
• Providing ad hoc support to the Wikipedia community on all aspects of Indian languages as may be deemed necessary.

Candidate's Background & Experience

• At least two to three years of professional experience with a strong track record of success in high performance organizations.
• Prior experience of working with schools of performing arts and/or cultural departments.
• A deep understanding of the varied cultural context of India.
• Good understanding of the basics of program design and management.
• Experience of working in a collaborative community (preferably online).
• Strong academic results from highly-regarded university.
• Strong understanding of the Internet and the forces that underpin the success of Wikipedia.
• Active participation as a Wikimedia volunteer would be an asset, though not a prerequisite (must be prepared to demonstrate knowledge of how Wikipedia works in interviews).
• Demonstrated experience working in a global, multi-cultural team environment.
• Good writing skills in English and Indic languages and must be fluent in English and at least one Indic language.
• Women are strongly encouraged to apply.

Characteristics of the Programme Officer

• High level of commitment: The Programme Officer should believe in the values of CIS and Wikimedia projects, exude enthusiasm for the mission and can powerfully embody and communicate the mission.
• Intellectual curiosity and flexibility: Must enjoy tackling difficult, ambiguous problems and able to incorporate new knowledge into how one approaches situations and generates solutions, loves learning from others while expanding intellectual horizons.
• Open and transparent: Have a high level of integrity and be comfortable working in a highly transparent fashion, open to input and feedback, a proactive and candid communicator who wants people to know what s/he is doing and isn't afraid to bring others in when things are off-track or when you need help and should able to handle criticism in a mature fashion.
• Community builder: It is essential that the Programme Officer sees herself/himself as a partner to and supporter of the Wikimedians who have and will continue to be the leaders in building the Wikimedia projects. The Programme Officer must be willing and able to work with a diverse array of people, many of whom come from non-traditional backgrounds and have a fervent commitment to Wikimedia’s community-led nature.
• Strong cultural competency: Able to navigate in a global movement and on a global team in addition to navigating the complexity of India.
• Partnership developer: Able to initiate, negotiate and operate partnerships that advance the Wikimedia mission in Indic languages and English (as relevant to India) with a wide range of institutions across the public, NGO, universities, philanthropic and private sector.
• Willing to travel: The Programme Officer must regularly travel within India to engage with Wikimedia communities and partner with institutions.

Location: The position is based out of the CIS Bangalore office.

Remuneration: Compensation structure will be determined by the level of expertise, experience and current remuneration.

To apply, please send your resume to T. Vishnu Vardhan (vishnu@cis-india.org).