Grants:APG/Proposals/2012-2013 round1/Wikimedia Sverige/Staff proposal assessment
Wikimedia Sverige received a funds allocation in the amount of 341,570 in 2012-2013 Round 1.
This funds allocation was recommended by the Funds Dissemination Committee on 15 November 2012 and approved by the WMF Board of Trustees on 1 December 2012.
This staff proposal assessment for Wikimedia Sverige's proposal to the FDC for 2012-2013 Round 1 may be viewed in tab view or standard view. To discuss this aspect of the proposal to the FDC, please visit the discussion page.
Applicants should read this document to familiarise themselves with the assessment criteria; however, it should be edited only by FDC-related staff. The staff will use the document to set out their objective assessment of each funding request from eligible entities – specifically, to determine the extent to which plans align with the mission goals of the Wikimedia movement, and the extent to which the entity is well-placed to execute those plans effectively. The staff will base this report on proposals from entities and input from the community and other stakeholders (including, where required, deeper due-diligence on the entity's previous track record within the Wikimedia movement). The staff will provide completed reports to the FDC, which will then make a recommendation to the Board of Trustees on funding allocations.
Proposal overview
| Wikimedia Sverige | [Responses] |
| Date of submission [mm/dd/yy] | 10/01/12 |
| Adherence to proposal process [yes/no] | yes |
| Adherence to legal, regulatory, and policy regulations [yes/no] | yes |
| Adherence to US anti-terrorism laws [yes/no] | yes |
| Currency requested (e.g., EUR, GBP, INR) | SEK |
| Exchange rate used (currency requested to $US) and date accessed (mm/dd/yy) | 6.88 |
| Total amount proposed to the FDC for the upcoming year annual plan [in $US] | USD 341570 |
| Total amount proposed to the FDC for the upcoming year annual plan [in currency requested] | SEK 2350000 |
| Summary staff assessment [substantial concerns: none/some/many] | some |
Annual plan
Table I: Financial summary
| FDC funds allocated last year ($US) | FDC funds proposed this year ($US) | Change from what was allocated last year (as a +/− %) | Proposed change in staff costs (USD and % increase or decrease) |
| USD 0 | USD 341570 | NA | NA |
Strategic alignment
To what extent does the plan address the strategic goals and priorities of the movement (one to two paragraphs)?
- WMSE’s plan is aligned with the strategic priority areas Increase quality and Increase participation.
- Within its program initiatives, WMSE emphasizes participation, but successful results presented through its annual and monthly reports and within the proposal itself seem to primarily emphasize content-focused programs. WMSE seems to be successfully facilitating the contribution content relevant to Swedish participants and readers through partnerships and volunteer support.
Context of the entity and community
- To what extent does the context of the entity (e.g., community participation, fundraising context, sociopolitical environment) enable or inhibit the entity's potential for impact?
- To what extent does the entity's experience or maturity enable or inhibit the entity's potential for impact?
- WMSE’s appears to be a healthy, maturing chapter that has consistently shown an interest in reporting, developing more effective metrics, considering their activities strategically and that is gaining credibility within Sweden.
- Activity emphasis is within a Swedish context: there is not a strong emphasis on global or international activities. WMSE is targeting a diversified community within Sweden through minority language groups and more geographically diverse programming and participation.
- WMSE has an excellent history of reporting within the movement and compliance with WMF grants, demonstrated by WMSE’s responsibly and proactively documenting their activities, and executing and reporting upon grants responsibly. They have participated successfully in past fundraisers as a payment processing organization, and they have diversified their funding base to include several funding partners within Sweden.
Feasibility and risks for the annual plan
How feasible is the annual plan (one to four paragraphs)? Specifically:
- To what extent are the budget, staffing, availability of volunteers, and other resources realistic for achieving the anticipated outcomes?
- Are the timelines realistic for the proposed initiatives and associated activities?
- Are there acknowledged and/or unacknowledged risks in the proposal?
- WMSE’s budget has an unusual emphasis on staffing: staffing makes up about 65% of the total budget and programs about 35%. There are serious questions about WMSE’s emphasis on staffing. While it seems that WMSE will be able to execute its programs effectively with the staffing plan proposed, a heavy emphasis on hiring staff may not position it for maximum efficiency. Furthermore, WMSE has raised concerns about its ability to recruit and hire staff in the past and there are still questions about whether there are adequate resources available to recruit the new talent needed to successfully execute the hiring plan.
- In the past, WMSE has shown the most success around initiatives of content liberation, education, and workshops. Examples of successful initiatives that WMSE would like to continue include GLAM partnerships, Wikipedians in residence, and technology pool. Yet, WMSE’s Community support initiative is their most heavily resourced program area at SEK 555,000 or about 11% of the total budget proposed, which initiative is focused in part on encouraging participation of underrepresented groups in Wikimedia projects. While outreach to underrepresented groups seems to be a new area of focus for WMSE rather than an area in which they are experienced, in order to accomplish this more feasibly they are partnering with organizations more experienced in this area to offer more effective programming to these groups.
- Overall, while WMSE is a maturing chapter with strong leadership and strong potential to execute its initiatives successfully, there are questions about the efficiency and feasibility of its staffing plan and its potential for achieving the desired impact with the funds requested.
Summary of expert opinions and/or community commentary
- Summary of the opinions of subject-matter experts on the plan
- Summary of community commentary on the plan
- Please see the proposal discussion page.
Table II: Scores, comments and feedback
Scores provide only a preliminary assessment for consideration by the FDC. The rubric for scoring is in table III.
| Dimensions | Criteria | Score (1–5) | Comments and feedback |
| Potential for impact against strategic priorities | (A) The plan addresses the Wikimedia movement global targets | 4 | The plan addresses some global targets. |
|---|---|---|---|
| (B) The initiatives in the plan have the potential to lead to the global targets, if executed well | 3 | While some initiatives have the potential to lead to the global targets, there are questions about the ability of other initiatives to successfully lead to global targets. | |
| (C) The initiatives in the plan have the potential to lead to significant impact, given context and amount of funds proposed | 3 | The funds request (and increase in funds request) is high enough to require a greater impact and more impactful initiatives. | |
| Ability to execute | (D) The entity has the resources, skills, and capacity (staff, volunteer, non-staff) for the plan to succeed | 4 | The entity is well-staffed and has some active volunteers. |
| (E) The entity has a record of success in similar initiatives | 3 | WMSE has a track record of success in many initiatives with which it has experience, but new initiatives are on the table which are more uncertain. | |
| (F) The entity's leadership is effective, committed, and relatively stable | 4 | Leadership (board and team) are relatively stable and committed | |
| Efficient use of funds | (G) The funding requested is reasonable given the proposed initiatives | 3 | Staffing costs, as a percent of total, are fairly high. Programmatic focus may not justify increase in staffing costs. |
| (H) The entity has a record of using funds efficiently and staying on budget | 4 | Responsible reports have been submitted in a timely manner; funds are typically well spent | |
| Quality of proposed measures of success | (I) Clear indicators of success are outlined in the plan | 4 | Clear indicators of success outlined in the plan |
| (J) A plan is in place to track the proposed metrics | 4 | For most indicators and initiatives, there is some high-level plan to track metrics | |
| (K) The entity has a feasible plan in place to track the proposed metrics | 4 | There is sufficient staff capacity to track metrics, if properly deployed | |
| Potential to add knowledge and/or other benefits to the movement | (L) The initiatives in the plan, if successful, could be helpful and/or productively replicated elsewhere in the movement | 3 | Initiatives in this plan are not necessarily innovative, and therefore may not lead to much replication |
| (M) The entity is ready to share with the movement the lessons learned from the initiatives | 4 | There is engagement with the rest of the movement and shared learnings |
Table III: Scoring rubric
| Dimensions | Evaluation criteria | 1 = Weak or no alignment with criterion | 3 = Moderate alignment with criterion | 5 = Strong alignment with criterion |
| Potential for impact against strategic priorities | (A) The plan addresses the Wikimedia movement global targets | The plan will not directly address any global targets | The plan will partially address global targets or other goals that are closely related to the global targets | The plan will directly address several global targets |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (B) The initiatives have the potential to lead to the targets, if executed well | The initiatives have no clear connection to global targets | Some or all of the initiatives have an unclear relationship to global targets | The initiatives have been shown (by the entity or the movement) to lead to global targets | |
| (C) The initiatives have the potential to lead to significant impact, given context and amount of funds proposed | The initiatives will have marginal impact in the local community and the broader Wikimedia community, given context and amount of funds proposed | The initiatives proposed may have a significant impact in the local community, given context and amount of funds proposed | The initiatives could have significant impact at scale, both in the entity's local community and in the broader movement, given context and amount of funds proposed | |
| Ability to execute | (D) The entity has the resources, skills, and capacity (staff, volunteer, non-staff) for the plan to succeed | The entity has neither the number nor the amount of resources, skills, and capacity needed for success. | The entity has some relevant staff and volunteer capacity, but may be under-resourced for some initiatives | The entity is well-resourced with the relevant skills and capacity for success |
| (E) The entity has a record of success in similar initiatives | The entity has had trouble succeeding in similar initiatives | The entity has not engaged in similar initiatives in the past | The entity has conducted similar initiatives in the past and has been successful in achieving desired results | |
| (F) The entity's leadership is effective, committed, and relatively stable | Leadership has been unstable (e.g., changing on an annual basis) | Current leadership is committed to the entity; some concerns exist around stability or effectiveness of leadership | Current and past leaders have demonstrated the ability to develop and execute on strategic plans; leadership team has been stable and transitions have been smooth | |
| Efficient use of funds | (G) The funding requested is reasonable given the proposed initiatives | Based on FDC experience and relative to other proposals, the plan contains significant over- or under-budgeting, and/or has not thoroughly accounted for costs | Based on FDC experience and relative to other proposals, the budget is generally consistent with the initiatives; some initiatives are likely to be over- or under-budgeted | Based on FDC experience and relative to other proposals, the budget is reasonable, and rigorous cost projections have been presented |
| (H) The entity has a record of using funds efficiently and staying on budget | The entity has a poor record of budgetary management: e.g., consistently and significantly below budget (such as 50% underspending), and drawing on organizational reserves due to overspending | The entity has a middling record of budgetary management; e.g., generally on-budget for its biggest initiatives and cost items, properly recording any over- and under-spending, and with plans in place for improvements | The entity has consistently strong record of financial management; e.g., consistently staying on or below budget (within ~5% of budget), and putting surplus funds towards the entity's and/or movement's goals | |
| Quality of proposed measures of success | (I) Clear indicators of success are outlined in the plan | Initiatives have no associated indicators of success, or the proposed indicators are unrealistic and/or unmeasurable | Each initiative has indicators of success, but at least some indicators are unrealistic or are not clearly connected to the initiative | Each initiative has a realistic and carefully framed set of indicators of success associated with them, which are rigorous and time-bound |
| (J) A system is in place to track the proposed metrics | The plan does not include methodology or timing for tracking and collecting metrics to measure progress against proposed indicators of success | A proposal to track progress against indicators exists, but has flawed methodology or unrealistic timelines and initiatives | The plan includes timing and tracking of proposed metrics, and additional initiatives (e.g., surveys, research) to track indicators | |
| (K) The entity has a feasible system to track the proposed metrics | No systems are in place to track metrics, or staff or volunteer capacity to manage metrics tracking | There is some overall capacity (e.g., staff, volunteers) to track and monitor metrics, but the entity does not clearly have the relevant skills to do this | High-quality systems, and the necessary skills and capacity to manage these systems, are in place | |
| Potential to add knowledge and/or other benefits to the movement | (L) The initiatives, if successful, could be helpful and/or productively replicated elsewhere in the movement | The initiatives would not be relevant to other movement groups | Some initiatives may be relevant to other movement groups | Many initiatives proposed are new or have seldom been tried elsewhere in the movement; if successful, other movement entities would benefit from doing similar initiatives |
| (M) The entity is ready to share with the movement the lessons learned from the initiatives | The entity is isolated from other movement groups and rarely shares information; the entity's leaders and members seldom participate in movement-wide functions | The entity is somewhat active within the movement, and is developing more relationships with other movement entities with which it could share lessons learned | The entity has regular communication with other movement entities, is a regular participant in Wikimedia events, and has a track record of sharing with others |
This form was created by: Wolliff (talk) 04:53, 26 October 2012 (UTC)