Internal:Strategic plan workspace

This is an unstructured workspace to float ideas regarding the Strategic Plan, 2014–2019.

Strategic priorities

Approved by the Wikimedia DC Board of Directors, September 7, 2013

1. Foster a welcoming and supportive social environment for local and remote Wikimedia volunteers.
2. Empower academic, cultural, and government institutions to contribute content and expertise to Wikimedia projects.
3. Promote women's participation in all aspects of the Wikimedia movement.
4. Cultivate diversity of participation and content on Wikimedia projects.

Every program to date

Current as of June 6, 2014

• Content Donations (various): NARA, 2011; AAA/Federal Art Project, 2011;

• Edit-a-thon (various): MLK Jr. Memorial Library (WLL), October 2011; Wikipedia Loves Libraries at DCPL, November 2011; Fine Art (self-organized), December 2011; DCPL Editing with the Blind, throughout 2012; Smithsonian Institution Archives, May 2012; SAAM, August 2012; Smithsonian Libraries, October 2012; UMD, October 2012; GWU October 2012; UMD Winter Institute, January 2013; SAAM, February 2013; DC Historical Society, March 2013; Archives of American Art, March 2013; GWU, April 2013; Furloughed Feds (self-org), May 2013; National Library of Medicine / WikiProject Medicine, May 2013; NMNH, June 2013; SAAM, July 2013; AAPG Library, October 2013; Laurel Historical Society, November 2013; International Year of Statistics (self-org w/ help of Statistics Without Borders), December 2013; NMWA, February 2014; SAAM/AU, February 2014; SIA/AU, March 2014; NMWA, March 2014; LOC, April 2014; UD, April 2014; Freer/Sackler/AU, April 2014; Smithsonian APAC, May 2014; NARA, May 2014;

• FedFlix (WikiProject Fedflix / Public.Resource.org): A nominally organized online project that has not had dedicated events, to the best of our knowledge

• GLAM Boot Camp (self-organized): April 2013

• GLAM Wiki US Consortium meeting (self-organized): April 2013

• Great American Wiknic (self-organized): June 2011; June 2012; June 2013

• Hackathon (various): Open Data w/ PopVox, December 2011; Open Government WikiHack w/ Sunlight Foundation, April 2014

• Legislative Data Workshop (Cato Institute): March 2013; June 2013;

• LibraryLab (DCPL): 2011–2012

• Mapping Party (OpenStreetMap): July 2012

• Photo Exhibition / Holiday Party (various): National Press Club, December 2012; SMCDC, December 2013

• Photo Drive (self-organized): September 2012

• Photo Scavenger Hunt (self-organized): Embassies, May 2011; September 2012; September 2013 (Baltimore); September 2013 (Richmond)

• Roundtables: Open Data with Sunlight, June 2012; Internet Freedom with the Embassy of Estonia, April 2012;

• Scanathon (NARA): August 2011; October 2011; with AU, February 2014

• WikiConference USA: May/June 2014

• Wiki Loves Capitol Hill (self-organized): April 2013; April 2014

• Wiki Loves Monuments: September 2012; September 2013

• Wikipedian in Residence: NARA (temporary), 2011–2012; AAA, Summer 2011; NARA (permanent), 2013–present;

• WikiSalon (self-organized): April 2013; May 2013; June 2013; July 2013; August 2013; September 2013; October 2013; February 2014; March 2014; May 2014;

• Women Who Wiki Workshop (Amy Senger and Steven Mandzik of 1X57; held at JESS3): June 2011

Tasks done (or will be done) by volunteers

• Administrative
  • Checking PO Box (JH)
  • Participating in board meetings (JH,JG,PM,ETW,KA)
  • Maintaining constituent relationship manager (JH)
• Communications
  • Social media (JH,GS)
  • Answering questions about Wikimedia DC (JH)
  • Writing blog posts (JH)
• Outreach
  • Volunteer recruitment (JH)
  • Representing Wikimedia DC at events and meetings (JH)
  • Following discussions online (SS,KA)
  • Building relationships (JH,SS)
  • Recruiting members (KA)
• Program
  • Event planning (JH,ETW,KA)
  • Event promotion (JH,GS)
  • Developing plans (JH)
  • Volunteering at events (PM,SS,KA,AL)
  • Taking pictures at events (GS)
  • Writing reports of events (JH,ETW)
  • Designing and administering surveys of program participants (JH)
  • Helping to train new editors (KA)
  • Edit-a-thon related preparation (KA)
• Financial
  • Writing grant proposals (JH)
  • Writing budgets (JH,PM)
  • Maintaining records (PM)
  • Develop fundraising plans (JG)
• Public Policy
  • Research and prepare policy papers (PM)
  • Participate in public policy discussions (KA)

Time spent on activities

• JH: 20-25 hours/week
• PM: 8 hours/week
• KA: 6-10 hours/week
• AL: 5 hours/week
• SS: 4-5 hours/week
• JG,GS,ETW: 1-2 hours/week

Perceived organizational roles

• Making sure organization moves together
• Fundraiser
• Photographer
• Organizing and sustaining
• Partner and evangelist
• Planner
• Social outreach
• Editing support at events
• Prospecting for opportunities to improve underrepresented topics and populations, esp. Africa / women / Native Americans
• Asking questions to ensure Board activities can be explained in plain English
• Moral and material support to get more editing and content creation done

SWOT

Strengths Good at building relationships with cultural institutions (and gradually at other institutions) Holding regularly scheduled, engaging events with face-to-fact interactions Particularly good at edit-a-thons and large events in general Good website We are a friendly organization, open to new members and free of drama Talented, excited people in our organization Relative gender parity Good organizational governance; effective leadership Good at working with WMF and other Wikimedia organizations in a diplomatic manner Good at reporting events Planning events with organizations Small grants program is beneficial Growing social group

Weaknesses Experienced Wikimedians moving out of DC We need to be better at sharing information amongst ourselves Engaging with other groups We need more women on the Board We need more people of color participating Linguistic diversity would be good Clearly defined volunteer roles Writing down best practices Over-reliance on WMF funding We do not involve members enough in planning and outreach Following up with members and ongoing communication with them Scaling up to respond to requests from institutions We are in need of more staffing to expand volunteer base and respond to requests Meetups are same group of people Haphazard event promotion

Opportunities Tech sector outreach in DC—growing community we need to stay in touch with Open government outreach—we can help them in their mission Progressive community outreach—intrinsic interest in our priority of reducing systemic bias Legislative affairs Participation in international organizations Federal civil service staff Wealthy donors we could reach out to More GLAM partnerships! University and school outreach Community centers Networking at Wikimedia conferences and other events Enough organizations in DC to keep us busy for at least ten years Expanding base of volunteers so we can move on opportunities offered by organizations A coordinator tapping in to local universities could bring education program editors together with cultural institutions / non profits working in their specialties Many diaspora language communities in the area are an untapped resource-- takes consistent participation in their communities to make Wikipedia happen for them With old fashioned volunteer outreach, we could coordinate a national scanning corps / digitization effort. All this would take is elbow grease Getting Wikipedia work on the list of acceptable AmeriCorps projects would open up a whole new world for underemployed, educated people to work with us Wiki Workshop / Wikipedia corner where we assist the public with editing on a walk-up basis (say at a flea market, cafe, or festival) Giving more talks at DC events Putting together a standard talk on "how to evaluate the quality of a Wikipedia article" Putting together a standard talk on "working with you on improving that BLP of concern ..." Publicizing our events on DC-area forums Events specifically geared toward training; Andrew Lih is willing to help here

Threats Too much interest in Wikimedia DC's services and no way to accommodate; cannot respond in timely manner Shortage of information management infrastructure, causing things to get lost Lack of leadership back-bench Getting funding proposal rejected by WMF Present lack of tax-exempt status Drama in Wikimedia movement Over-reliance on unpaid volunteers; risk of loss of specific leaders in Wikimedia DC Potential lack of awareness of friendly space policy The threat posed to a free and open internet with acceptable costs and upload/download speeds Getting in political / PR hot water by making public statements that get us caught up in the current political culture of disparagement in DC Shortage of legal expertise Burnout by members whose employers lose patience with Wikipedia holding weekday activities Burnout on paperwork and reporting requirements by volunteer Board members Burnout on managing HR-related activities required for grantmaking/supervision of paid people working on our projects Getting hacked because we keep material in the cloud instead of in our own secured system Present lack of capacity for independent fundraising

Insights from other people

• Jim Hayes: Wikisource needs more love, grants for that; photography grants to get a day to take pictures during events w/ high concentrations of notable people; bad process workflow on Wikipedia especially AFC; officer training (how to plan a meetup, run the organization); hard (statistical modeling and data) vs. soft (taking care of people), noting that soft is indeed hard; you can train people in editing all you want but you also want to nurture and pay attention to your volunteers and their risk of burnout