[Foundation-l] New Wikimedia Committees

Mon Jan 30 02:34:09 UTC 2006

Jimmy:

> A proper executive director for the organization will have decades (yes,
> decades!) of experience at a major international public facing charity
> with a strong volunteer component.  An ideal candidate should have
> extensive experience at an executive level with: fundraising, regulatory
> compliance, international chapters, donor relations management,
> staffing, budgeting, etc.

Yes, I am quite comfortable with an outsider ED position that focuses 
primarily on administrative issues rather than on those which, as you 
say, would make them "another Jimbo". I much prefer the idea of 
decentralized committees with a reasonable amount of authority and some 
high level oversight to that of a single position of which we expect 
immeasurable ingenuity, permanent availability and infinite wisdom. 
After all, we have you for that. ;-)

What concerns me is that we make sure that a) the ED does not stand 
alone, so they cannot screw up too badly and are at least surrounded by 
members of the community, b) we leave those areas of work which require 
true innovation to the community to the largest extent possible, c) the 
Board exercises constant oversight to make sure that both the committees 
and the chapters are as open and participatory as reasonably possible.

As for b), take fundraising and donor relations management as an 
example: No area has been transformed more radically through the use of 
the Internet than this one since Howard Dean pocketed $40 million 
through his online campaign. While our Christmas cards are nice, we also 
need to systematically measure and improve our online campaign 
efficiency (Daniel has already done excellent work in this area), and 
develop fundraising methods completely new and unique.

I think your case is indeed strongest in the area of setting up 
chapters, obtaining non-profit status, complying with the associated 
regulations, making sure that our trademarks are in order, and so forth. 
Day to day legal issues are a bit more complex and I'm not convinced 
decades of experience will help in an area that is as ever-changing as 
international Internet law.

Ideally, the ED position should not matter all that much if we design 
the committees properly, and make sure that no single person can make 
too big mistakes. And, on the positive side, an "outsider" Director can 
hopefully be removed without too much of a fuss if he or she turns out 
to be a problem.

I understand that the plan is to wait with hiring the ED until we have 
the surrounding structures in place and working. That makes sense, 
because it allows us to see more clearly what role they should have in 
the organization, and very precisely define it, preferably also in the 
form of workflows and use cases. This might also lead us to using a 
different title, such as "Administrative Director", or, as you 
suggested, "Business Manager".

Best,

Erik