Notes 2012-07-14

These minutes were approved at the Board meeting on 14 September 2014.

Notes from an informal board meeting held in Washington on 14 July.

Present:

• Jon Davies [JD]
• Mike Peel [MP, Minutes]
• John Byrne [JB]
• Doug Taylor [MP]
• Joscelyn Upendram [JU]
• Fæ [Fæ, Chair]

Five-year plan

We have previously agreed that the one-year plan from the 5-year plan could be used as a basis for the 2013 budget page, and that discussion on the 5-year plan would continue. Comments have been left on the talk page. Some of those comments were on operational issues. One point was about integrating the staff costs into the individual budgets. John commented on the reporting and accountability sections.

Thus far we have had six versions of the 5-year plan. The most sensible thing to do at this point might be to take on board some of the specific comments, incorporate those into the working practices in the office, and park the plan for further community comment/discussion and return to it in a year's time.

We Need to assess the amount of growth that we want the chapter to have. JB pointed out that some of that is out of our control - in particular, the amount of volunteers that we have. MP pointed out, however, we do control our funding (largely) and staff/office capabilities. There was discussion about WMDE and staff vs. volunteer roles.

Jon proposed parking the 5-year plan until September, once the 2013 activity plan is done, and then re-integrate the 1-year element into the plan and integrate suggested changes in order to create a document that can continue being discussed. The "One-year plan" is for 1 February 2013 onwards.

There was discussion about Tom Dalton's alternative strategy, which was to define the objectives and then move on to the details. We are currently implicitly using the WMF's objectives.

MP recommended parking this, and revisiting it in a board meeting/strategy workshop once the the 2013 activity plan is out of the way.

JU pointed out that there are different expectations - that some want SMART goals, and some want more strategic goals. We need to come to a consensus on what the document is aiming to do.

There was discussion about the budget for next year, including the overall budget, the ratio of operational to programmatic spend, and benchmarks (comparing to other chapters - particularly DE, FR, NL). Also discussion about doing scenario planning.

The focus now will be on 2013 activity plan, and for there to be consensus prior to the September board meeting.

There was also discussion about budgeting for our contribution to the WCA - we are currently budgeting 5% of our UK spend for WCA.

The agenda items for the next board meeting were discussed, and the following draft agenda was assembled:

1. WCA
   1. Fæ report from WCA first meeting
   2. Financial support for the WCA in the rest of this financial year.
2. Progress on 2013 activity plan
3. CE report on interns, developer post, etc.
4. Treasurer report
5. September meeting
6. Any other business