[Wikimedia-l] News from the Wikimedia Foundation Operations Department

[Janeen Uzzell]

Hi all,

I wanted to share some news. I will be stepping down as Chief Operating
Officer (COO) at the Wikimedia Foundation.

The past two years that I have served as COO have been a formative time in
my life, both personally and professionally. My time at the Foundation has
shaped me in many important ways, and I feel deeply connected to our shared
global mission--there is so much to learn and there are endless
possibilities to improve the world. Our movement is positioned on the cusp
of a more diverse and equitable future and I am so proud of the part I had
in that, and those of you I worked with to grow that vision.

I remain steadfast in my passion for sharing knowledge to any and everyone
for free, and supporting those who’ve been left out of structures of power
and privilege.

The weight of current US issues related to Black Lives Matter has had a
life changing impact on me. I am compelled to use my leadership platform to
address biases and  injustices in technology. Closing the gaps in
diversity, equity, and inclusion in technology within the US is a mountain
that I want to have a greater impact in moving. After reflection on my
strengths and contemplation of the action required to make change, I intend
to find opportunities to focus solely on racial equity and technology in my
next venture.

I’ve dedicated my career to breaking down barriers, particularly in
technology, and you all gave me strength, stories and guidance on how to do
that as part of this movement. I am grateful for the many moments we have
shared, whether at community events from Wikimania in Sweden to Wikindaba
in Abuja, or at online gatherings and on-wiki. I am not planning to travel
far from this movement, and inviting more people to participate in our
projects is a cause I will continue to champion. #WhoTellsYourStory will
always be a part of my narrative.

My decision does not change the Foundation’s plans as we move into another
fiscal year this July. With our ongoing search for a new CEO, we currently
have a Transition Team in place to manage these changes, led by Amanda
Keton, General Counsel, Jaime Villagomez, Chief Financial Officer, and
Robyn Arville, Chief Talent and Culture Officer. Our new Executive Director
will then be able to decide what they would like to do with the COO
position.

I hope to see you all out in the world speaking on tech for good. We have a
lot of work to do, but it’s worth it.

Janeen


-- 

--



*Jáneen Uzzell*

Chief Operating Officer

Wikimedia Foundation 

@janeenuzzell
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[Wikimedia-l] Moving Wikimania 20201 to a Virtual Event

[Janeen Uzzell]

Hi all,

Earlier this year when we decided to cancel Wikimania 2020, many of us were
hopeful that we would be able to postpone it a year to 2021. I was looking
forward to connecting with all of you in Bangkok in August for our first
ever Wikimania in Southeast Asia.

However, as we look forward, in spite of promising developments in vaccine
research it seems unlikely that we will all be able to travel freely and
convene together by August 2021. Over the past several months, the
Wikimedia Foundation Events team has been meeting with the Wikimania
Steering Committee[1] and the ESEAP Core Organizing Team (East, South East
Asia and Pacific regions)[2] to discuss how we can move forward with
Wikimania in 2021. Together, these stakeholders have decided that next
year’s Wikimania will be a virtual event. Instead of being hosted by the
ESEAP Core Organizing Team, this virtual Wikimania will be hosted by a
wider group of community members. Since there still is a strong wish to
host Wikimania in the future from the ESEAP team, they will remain the
hosts for the next in-person edition of Wikimania.

For many of us, hearing that we won’t be gathering in person at Wikimania
in 2021 is disappointing news. But I am encouraged by the success and
creativity of all of the recent virtual movement events, from regional
events like itWikiCon to the Wiki 20 event in Asia Pacific event to
celebrate Wikipedia’s 20th birthday  and the Movement Strategy Global
Conversations held in December. I have gotten to hear from more of you over
the past months than I could have imagined at the beginning of this
pandemic. As always, Wikimedians have adapted and found new ways to connect
with each other.

We believe that this new virtual format will create opportunities for more
people within our movement to be involved in putting together a movement
event than ever before. We will further build on the collaborative, open
process for creating a Wikimania program that we started during Wikimania
in Sweden last year. Since this is our first virtual Wikimania, we will
also be able to learn from this experience and hopefully include options
for virtual participation in future in-person Wikimanias as well. Wikimania
2021 may not happen as any of us initially imagined, but it will still be
an opportunity for celebration, especially as Wikimania 2021 will happen
during Wikipedia’s 20th birthday year.


We welcome ideas for this virtual Wikimania and in January, we plan to
share more information about how you can get involved in the planning
process. We will also be able to share more information in the coming
months about what this means in terms of invitations, submitting sessions
and scholarships. In the meantime, please share your thoughts, ideas and
suggestions with the Wikimania Steering Committee on Meta[3].

As a movement, we value those opportunities to connect together in person,
and look forward to when we can all gather in person again. Until then,
stay safe and take care!

Janeen Uzzell, on behalf of the

   - ESEAP Core Organizing Team

   - Wikimania Steering Committee

   - Wikimedia Foundation Events Team

[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania_Committee

[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/ESEAP_Hub

[3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikimania_2021


-- 

--



*Jáneen Uzzell*

Chief Operating Officer

Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>

@janeenuzzell
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[Wikimedia-l] Evaluating Foundation support for movement events and opportunities to provide feedback

[Janeen Uzzell]

Hi everyone,

This year, we’ve all had to deal with significant disruptions to the in
person work that we usually do together. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic,
many of you have had to cancel movement events and gatherings, or shift to
virtual options. It’s been a year of tremendous adjustment, and I’m
grateful to all of you for your flexibility and your creativity in
exploring new ways to collaborate and connect despite these restrictions.

As we had to put movement events on hold, the Events team at the Wikimedia
Foundation decided to take the time to evaluate the support we were
providing for Foundation funded and produced movement events and identify
areas for improvement.  We are calling this exercise an “Events Refresh.”
Our goal is to look at the strategy, design and logistics of events and how
we can make them more effective and a better experience for both the event
organizers we partner with, as well as for the participants who attend.

To begin this evaluation process for events, we hosted preliminary
conversations with several community organizers and event leaders from our
movement to hear directly from them about how we can better support events
moving forward.

Our first finding from these initial conversations will come as no
surprise. The Wikimedians we spoke with emphasized, time and again, the
important role that events play in fostering community connection,
engagement, and sense of belonging. They shared with us how these in person
gatherings allow participants to better understand the scope and breadth of
the movement, to feel that they are contributing to something bigger. You
can read a summary of our initial findings from these interviews on
Meta[1].

== An Updated Friendly Space Policy for Events ==

This Refresh exercise also included a review of the existing policies we
have in place for movement and Foundation events. Following that review, we
have updated the Friendly Space policy [2], in order to have more clear
guidelines around youth safety at events. We wanted to provide more clarity
and support for community organizers that are exploring events with youth
participation.

The Friendly Space policy applies to all movement events hosted or
supported by the Foundation. It is designed to provide a safe and welcoming
experience for all participants at in-person and virtual events, and
protect against harassment. The updated Friendly Space policy contains more
explicit protections to address the safety of young attendees (generally
defined as ages 15-24 based on the United Nations definition of youth[3]).
These include a minimum age for young people to attend events without being
accompanied by a parent, guidelines on mature content at events for youth,
and a youth safety plan. We believe that these new guidelines will help
organizers who are thinking of hosting movement events for younger
attendees.

== More Opportunities to Share Feedback on Events ==

Our Events Refresh exercise is just getting started, and this work will be
ongoing. In the coming months, we will continue connecting with communities
to better understand and design for their needs. Our first three
engagements will be focused on:

* Capacity building for event organizers. How can we increase access to
high-quality learning materials about events and accelerate learning and
growth opportunities for volunteers? Chen Almog will be leading this effort.

* Participation accessibility. How can we make movement events more
accessible for participants, reducing linguistic, technological, cultural,
economic, social, and other event barriers? Rachel Farrand will be leading
this effort.

* Event Ecosystem design. How can we create a framework for events so that
community organizers and event participants can connect and collaborate
across related events? How can we ensure that events have continuity for
their audiences? Joël Letang will be leading this effort.

Starting in December we'll also be kicking off Community Events office
hours[4] to provide real-time support to current and potential community
organizers, host Q related to Events and provide other relevant updates.
Please feel free to connect with the Community Events team at
communityeve...@wikimedia.org

I’m looking forward to when we’ll all be able to gather again in person.
Until then, please share  your feedback on other ways we can support you
for movement events - we want to hear from you.

Take care and stay safe,

Janeen Uzzell

Chief Operating Officer

Wikimedia Foundation

[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Events_Refresh

[2] https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Friendly_space_policy

[3] https://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/youth-0/index.html

[4]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Events_team/OfficeHours


-- 

--



*Jáneen Uzzell*

Chief Operating Officer

Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>

@janeenuzzell
___
Wikimedia-l m

[Wikimedia-l] [Covid-19] Introducing a new risk assessment tool and guidelines for in person gatherings

[Janeen Uzzell]

Hi all,

Last month, Katherine shared with you a preview of the work that the Events
team has been leading on resources to support in-person gatherings. We have
seen more countries shift restrictions on in-person events, and we want to
respond to those changing realities for communities that live in regions
that are beginning to open.

The Events team has been working hard over the past few months to consider
what’s needed to safely and effectively support in-person events. We
developed several iterations of tools to assess risks and provide
precautions, and shared these with affiliates along the way to gather
feedback on what was most helpful. Thank you for all of the feedback we
received!

== New COVID-19 Risk Assessment Protocol ==

Today, I want to introduce our new COVID-19 Risk Assessment protocol for
in-person gatherings. This protocol is designed to be sensitive to the
constantly changing circumstances around this pandemic, and will allow
potential grantees and community members to assess their own ability to
safely host events and activities. With this protocol, we will be able to
provide a consistent analysis of risks and policies for in person events,
including guidelines and suggestions for mitigation across all affiliates,
chapters and user groups.

The COVID-19 Risk Assessment protocol includes several steps that are
outlined below. We wanted to get this information out to you as quickly as
possible - we are also working to get this protocol and the attached
documents up on Meta-Wiki by the end of September. [1]



Step 1 - First, review this list of events that falls under the
Foundation’s eligibility criteria [2] and current restrictions, to ensure
that your event is within the scope of the current limitations.



Step 2 - Will your event be larger than 10 people? If it is only ten people
or less (including the organizing team that will be onsite at the event),
then we ask that you will follow local health guidelines for your region or
country. Please go ahead and submit for a grant for your event, or move
forward in case it’s an Annual Plan Grant (APG). If your event will be
larger than 10 people, then please go to the next step.



Step 3 - For events with more than 10 people, use the Risk Assessment tool
[3] to evaluate the potential risks for your event. The first tab provides
instructions on how to complete the tool. Once you complete it, you will
have a total risk score, a number that determines your overall level of
risk, and a control percentage, a figure that assesses if there are
additional precautions that you need to take. Together, these will make up
your total risk score, found on the final tab.



Step 4 - Go to the Matrix Results Framework [4] and identify the color code
that matches your total risk score. The color code includes guidelines to
advise you if the gathering should proceed or not. Follow the appropriate
instructions for APG or non-APG grantees.



From here, you can submit a grant proposal. When you submit your proposal
to the relevant program (Rapid, Conference, Project or Wikicite) you will
be asked to attach your copy of the risk assessment tool. Your proposal
will be considered under the program’s eligibility criteria. Each program
has different deadlines for submission - reach out to the relevant Program
Officer for more information. [5]



Step 5 - If your gathering or activity is approved, please review the
Checklist of guidelines for in-person events. [6] This includes necessary
precautions to take when hosting.

== Feedback on the new protocol ==

This pandemic is an unprecedented situation for all of us, and we want to
ensure that you are able to assess potential risks and conditions as
thoroughly as possible. Our goal is to make sure that where local
regulations allow, you can resume in person events safely and effectively
with the resources and support that you need from the Foundation. We have
also created a video demo, found on the Meta-Wiki page, that walks through
the steps above in order to submit a grant for an in person gathering. If
you have questions or feedback on this process and the new protocol, feel
free to share on the talk page on Meta-Wiki. [7]

I so miss seeing so many of you at events, whether it was Wikimania last
year, or Wiki Indaba or one of our many regional events and edit-a-thons. I
look forward to the day when we can all gather again and celebrate our work
and our communities.  Until then, stay safe and take care.

Janeen Uzzell,

Chief Operating Officer

Wikimedia Foundation

PS. A copy of this message is available on Meta-Wiki for translation:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/?curid=6726

[1] Meta-Wiki page:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Risk_assessment_during_COVID-19

[2] Eligibility criteria:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Hi5DpUOf10OcWiWWh3_RhyNquubLbeMkVMjWDnUCFkY/edit?usp=sharing


[3] Risk Assessment Tool:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1B96k62CHCFcFvoLVo7Fy0oxH751hY6sV3mVKWgArJR4/edit?usp

[Wikimedia-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Annual Plan Mid-Year Report 2018-2019

[Janeen Uzzell]

Hello Everyone,

The Wikimedia Foundation is pleased to present our *Annual Plan Mid-Year
report for 2018-19*
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_Plan/2018-2019/Mid-year_review>,
published on Meta-Wiki.

The mid-year report represents the halfway point of our progress against
the goals we set out in the Annual Plan, it describes actions and
measurable goals for each of our 3 priorities in the Annual Plan, the
status of each of the proposed actions and what results we have achieved
against the measurable goals. *If you have any questions on the content of
the report, please leave us a note on the talk page. *

We would like to extend our appreciation to all of our teams for their hard
work through the first half of this fiscal year. Also, thank you to the *staff
and community members* for your input and support as we continue to improve
our planning and reporting practices.

Thank you,
-- 

--


*Janeen Uzzell*

Chief Operating Officer

Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Update on the Wikimedia Foundation’s planning process

[Janeen Uzzell]

Pine - thanks for your email and I do hope to meet you at some
pointresponding inline.

On Sat, Mar 16, 2019 at 1:37 PM Pine W  wrote:

> Hi Janeen,
>
> Thanks very much for the update. I like the sound of these goals.
>
> I have a question regarding the first goal. Does growing participation
> refer to growing human readership, or to both growing human readership and
> growing data reuse such as from Wikidata, or to growing human readership
> and data reuse and contributorship?
>
> We are referring to all aspects: readership, the WIki projects, not just
increasing readers but where are readers are globally. We want to expand
access to knowledge globally through all of our projects, languages and
increase our diversity of users.


> Contributorship seems to be very low as a percentage of Internet users in
> many languages including English and German, while readership levels are
> relatively high in some languages and geographies and relatively low in
> others. I hope that WMF tries to grow contributorship in all languages and
> geographies, while also trying to grow readership and data reuse in
> languages where Wikimedia readership and data reuse seem to have
> significant opportunities for growth.
>
> Absolutely agree. We need editors that reflect the world we are serving
and this is inline with our growth as well as our plan for a thriving
community...we need to ensure that everyone that participates feels welcome
and able to contribute.


> I would also like to know how WMF plans to become more nimble. I think that
> increasing agility is a good goal. Can you share more specifics?
>
> In terms of nimbleness, I can certainly say this is a priority - which is
why I was hired. None of the work we want to deliver externally will be
possible until we improve our organizational effectiveness. That will be
the first order of business and I look forward to sharing more as we
finalize the plan and begin execution.

Thanks,
> Pine
> ( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )
>
>
>
>
> On Sat, Mar 16, 2019, 11:37 AM Janeen Uzzell  wrote:
>
> > Greetings! I'm excited to be the new Chief Operating Officer at the
> > Wikimedia Foundation and look forward to meeting many of you as I grow in
> > this role. Until then, feel free to reach out to me at
> > jan...@wikimedia.org.
> >
> >
> > I've been busy supporting the Medium Term Planning team and wanted to
> send
> > an update on our process.
> >
> >
> > The Wikimedia Foundation is currently engaged in the process of creating
> a
> > medium-term plan that will support our 2030 Strategic Direction. This
> plan
> > is a representation of how we will lead, build, design and serve the
> global
> > world and provide access to free knowledge.
> >
> > In the process, we are setting up the Foundation to be more nimble so we
> > can adapt to recommendations coming out of movement strategy. In the
> past,
> > we have typically planned one year at a time. This new process that we
> are
> > using will allow us to plan for longer-term goals aligned to knowledge
> > equity and knowledge as a service.
> >
> > For the next three to five years, the Wikimedia Foundation will focus on
> > these two goals that will support our strategic direction to become the
> > infrastructure of free knowledge:
> >
> >-
> >
> >Grow participation globally, focusing on emerging markets
> >-
> >
> >   Grow the use of Wikipedia and Wikimedia across the globe. Focus on
> >   increasing Wikipedia use in low-awareness or low-use geographies
> and
> >   languages, in order to bring Wikipedia’s use in line with rates
> > of overall
> >   internet usage.
> >   -
> >
> >Modernize our product experience
> >-
> >
> >   Make contributor and reader experiences useful and joyful. Move
> from
> >   viewing Wikipedia as solely a website, to viewing the Wikimedia
> > ecosystem
> >   as a collection of knowledge, information, and insights with
> infinite
> >   possible product experiences and applications.
> >
> >
> > To create our medium-term plan, we have been conducting a collaborative
> > process to gather ideas and input from across the Foundation to help us
> > narrow in on a set of key priorities and outcomes that we need to
> > accomplish to achieve our two goals.
> >
> > The medium-term plan is intended to stay at the strategic level so that
> it
> > describes what we want to accomplish, without going into great detail
> about
> > how we are going to accomplish it.  This level of focus will allow u

[Wikimedia-l] Update on the Wikimedia Foundation’s planning process

[Janeen Uzzell]

Greetings! I'm excited to be the new Chief Operating Officer at the
Wikimedia Foundation and look forward to meeting many of you as I grow in
this role. Until then, feel free to reach out to me at jan...@wikimedia.org.


I've been busy supporting the Medium Term Planning team and wanted to send
an update on our process.


The Wikimedia Foundation is currently engaged in the process of creating a
medium-term plan that will support our 2030 Strategic Direction. This plan
is a representation of how we will lead, build, design and serve the global
world and provide access to free knowledge.

In the process, we are setting up the Foundation to be more nimble so we
can adapt to recommendations coming out of movement strategy. In the past,
we have typically planned one year at a time. This new process that we are
using will allow us to plan for longer-term goals aligned to knowledge
equity and knowledge as a service.

For the next three to five years, the Wikimedia Foundation will focus on
these two goals that will support our strategic direction to become the
infrastructure of free knowledge:

   -

   Grow participation globally, focusing on emerging markets
   -

  Grow the use of Wikipedia and Wikimedia across the globe. Focus on
  increasing Wikipedia use in low-awareness or low-use geographies and
  languages, in order to bring Wikipedia’s use in line with rates
of overall
  internet usage.
  -

   Modernize our product experience
   -

  Make contributor and reader experiences useful and joyful. Move from
  viewing Wikipedia as solely a website, to viewing the Wikimedia ecosystem
  as a collection of knowledge, information, and insights with infinite
  possible product experiences and applications.


To create our medium-term plan, we have been conducting a collaborative
process to gather ideas and input from across the Foundation to help us
narrow in on a set of key priorities and outcomes that we need to
accomplish to achieve our two goals.

The medium-term plan is intended to stay at the strategic level so that it
describes what we want to accomplish, without going into great detail about
how we are going to accomplish it.  This level of focus will allow us to be
clear about what the Foundation will achieve in the next several years,
while giving ourselves the flexibility to adapt to recommendations from the
Movement Strategy process, take advantage of emergent opportunities, and
experiment with tactics and strategies.

We will soon be finishing a draft of the medium-term plan to present to the
Board of Trustees at their next meeting on March 28th, 2019. After we share
the plan with the board, we will be requesting feedback from you and from
all parts of the community from April 7-20th. We are looking for your
feedback on whether the outcomes we hope to achieve over the next 3 to 5
years are appropriate given the goals of the overall Wikimedia Movement and
our strategic direction. We want to know: are these the right “big things”
to accomplish in the next 3-5 years?  We would also like feedback on
whether our overall metrics are appropriate and aspirational enough given
our ambitious vision. Are we setting the right targets for how we will
measure our progress?

After we receive all comments and feedback, we will make a final round of
updates to the our Medium-term plan before publishing it again back on meta
at the end of May.  In subsequent years, we intend to update the plan on an
annual basis to adapt to new information, changes in our environment, and
the things we learn along the way.

We hope that you all will provide your insight and thoughts to help the
Foundation build this plan and continue to make progress toward our
strategic direction.

Thank you,

Janeen Uzzell


Timeline:

   -

   March 28 - We will share the draft plan with the Foundation’s Board of
   Trustees
   -

   April 6 - Plan published on Meta Wiki
   -

   April 6-20 - Community review and comment period
   -

   April 21-May 10 - Revise plan as needed based on community comments
   -

   May 31 - Publish revised plan on Meta
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