User:Smallbones/draft form

This is a discussion draft for a new FDC proposal form based on Grants:APG/Proposals/2013-2014 round1/Example/Proposal form and comments at Grants:APG/Funds Dissemination Committee/Nominations/Q&A

The form should consist of 2 pages

• basic textual information that is not expected to change often
• a single numerical form or spreadsheet that contains all the numbers needed to evaluate an FDC proposal

This covers almost all of the information asked for in the current FDC application, but more could be removed IMHO.

Each organization should have the basic page on Meta. The spreadsheet could be linked from here, but I suggest that it have its own page so that people will see it ahead of the application process and be able to comment as early as the drafts are put up. Similar spreadsheets could be used for updating the results for e.g. a 6 month review; or for next year's proposed budget. Of course next year "last year's budget" would be in the same format for most organizations, and the spreadsheets could be linked in order to show percentage growth rates, etc.

Basic information page

Please update this information as changes occur in your organization. It will serve as a portal for all who wish to know about the financial plans of the organization. Make sure to review it every time that you present a proposal for funds to the FDC.

• Legal name of organization:
• Date founded:
• Website:
• Chief executive (sign with ~~~~):
• Board structure:
• Primary financial contact (name, position, e-mail, sign with ~~~~):
• Secondary financial contact (name, position, e-mail, sign):
• Person in charge of budgeting (name, position, e-mail, sign):
• Fiscal year (mm/dd–mm/dd):
• Organization's mission statement (one paragraph):
• How the organization's mission supports the WMF's mission (one paragraph)
• List and prioritize 3-6 measurable organization goals (top priority at the top): (examples given below)
  • Growth in readership
  • Number of new editors
  • Number of editors retained six months after events
  • Number of new content pages from partners
  • Partnerships formed with GLAM/cultural institutions
  • Number of project done with women's institutions
• Members (number and the requirements to become a member):
• Volunteers working with your organization (number and the work they do):

Descriptive material

• Describe your strategy for getting input and feedback from editors, members, and volunteers (1 or 2 paragraphs):
• Describe 3 successful recent projects or events and why you consider them successes (1 paragraph each)
• Describe a recent project or event that was less successful and what you've learned from it: (1 paragraph)
• How do you share what you've learned about your operations and programs with the international Wikimedia community (one paragraph)
• For this year's projects explain the SMART measurements you will use to evaluate their success (one paragraph for all major project categories)

Links

(omit any that are not completed, include other links that illustrate material covered above)

• to strategic plan
• to last annual report
• to financial report for last completed year
• to older financial reports
• to plan for next fiscal year
• to any draft plans for future fiscal years

Financial plans and worksheets

should be on a separate page. The following is just a screenshot of a spreadsheet, not the actual spreadsheet, which I can send to anyone interested.

• The blue cells are just basic information to identify the organization
• The yellow cells are just the major cash inflow or outflow categories, where the organization may want to add or subtract a few lines depending on where they get their money and how they spend it.
• There are just 15 numbers that need to be added by the organization - if they don't know these numbers, they don't know the organizations financials very well. All other numbers are calculated in the spreadsheet
• Note that I use the usual terms for cash flow accounting - the simplest accounting there is. Thus I didn't use the terms "Expenses" and "revenues", though it technically doesn't matter for 1 year budgets. I just don't want to imply that we are actually doing anything with accrual accounting (depreciation, etc.) which suggests that we would be using a specific set of accounting standards (e.g. GAAP or IAS) which we're not (and probably don't want to).