[Foundation-l] Update of Foundation organization

[Sebastian Moleski]

On 3/5/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Based on the fact that Wikimedia Foundation has such a large pool of
> volunteers, I think the 40 hour week difference makes little
> difference. Is there a reason why Wikimedia Foundation can't contract
> volunteers (as charity shops do)? Similarly, there is no reason why
> the Foundation can't give official positions to volunteers who can be
> trusted to work a minimum number of hours a week (with or without a
> contract). Such volunteers would be given a job description and be
> asked to do things by the Foundation in the way an employee would.


I've recruited and manged a great number of volunteers while working at a
university. The main problem with them is that, unless they have some sort
of alternative source of income/wealth, it's just not economically feasible
for them to put in more than a few hours a week. So you could say: why not
hire a lot of volunteers that just do a little bit of work? The problem
there is that lack of communication, variety of approaches to solving tasks
compounded by geographic diversifcation will make it very unlikely that such
an arrangement can be effective and efficient. This holds especially for the
kind of jobs Florence was talking about. Unless we're talking about small,
well-contained tasks, volunteers just won't be able to do them in a speedy
manner.

Regards,

Sebastian