Capacity building

Q 1 What is your Recommendation?

Capacity building, facilitation, coaching, leadership development will be built into future movement to enable all entities to develop and this will be supported by staff

Q 2-1 What assumptions are you making about the future context that led you to make this Recommendation?

The future movement will have a strong focus on reaching out to new partners and communities, and this will require skills and support in capacity building both for staff and volunteers.
The movement will continue to consist of many different organisations, groups and online communities. They should have what they need in order to grow and develop in a way that best serves their needs and goals. Many of these groups and organisations will require support and guidance in developing leadership and governance capabilities, and this must be built into structures and resources.
Currently, the access to resources and facilitation is very unevenly distributed across the globe. We need to make sure that all stakeholders have equal support and access to resources, ideally not only in English and tailored to their needs in their individual context.
Presently the movement lacks skills and processes to handle difficult conversations between different entities and different communities and we need to embed the skills needed to facilitate conversations and ensure all voices are heard, and to resolve conflicts between different parties.

We endorse thoughts of Capacity Building Group on Recommendation #4

There is no one way to organize;
Organizations must lead this process;
Relying on volunteers is complicated;
Affiliation models will be rethought;
The movement needs to grow to move towards the strategic direction;
It will not reinvent the wheel.

Q 2-2 What is your thinking and logic behind this recommendation?

Self-managing organisations invest significantly in helping groups work through issues and find solutions together. By contrast, Wikimedia has given this almost no attention and this causes problems on all kinds of levels.

Creating the skills and roles to enable conversations to happen effectively is crucial to making our other recommendations work. Giving people and organisations more responsibilities only works if these stakeholders are also enabled and empowered to make the best use of these decision-making powers. While we can assume that our communities - who have been successfully self-organising for 18+ years - are well suited to take on more and new responsibilities, we must be aware of the differences in different contexts and make sure they have what they need to tailor required support structures for themselves.

Movement organisations reflect on successes and failures and contributed to a shared culture of learning.

Q 3-1 What will change because of the Recommendation?

WMF structures on Capacity Building such as Community Engagement will be impacted by this change, further devolving this role and responsibility to the structures that will be shaped by our recommended model.

Movement organizations (including volunteer organizers) methods on capacity building will be harmonized and customized depending on the movement organization and the movement organization end user’s needs and preferences.

Q 3-2 Who specifically will be influenced by this recommendation?

All stakeholders involved in Capacity Building, including the WMF, affiliates and informal communities.

Q 4-1 Could this Recommendation have a negative impact/change?

The risks of this were well stated by Capacity Building Recommendation # 4:

Investing in formal organizations without rethinking movement structures could lead to duplicate efforts and conflict in regions with multiple organizations. Ultimately, this could scuttle our efforts to achieve growth at scale and even lead to brand damage. To mitigate this risk, these things must happen hand in hand.
Relying on formal organizations with unpaid organizer labor as the backbone for these organizations is likely to continue to burn out volunteer organizers and will result in a structure that only includes people with enough privilege to participate without support. We should only encourage the propagation of this model if we understand these risks and if we are willing to rethink this reliance on unpaid labor.
Investing in the short and medium term without a long term plan to sustain support is unlikely to yield any results, since organizational development is a long term project. The project sponsor must offer a long term commitment to launch this work.
Support that is driven and defined by a centralized body is unlikely to be effectively in serving the diverse needs of organizations working in different context, and overly proscriptive support is likely to backfire and make organizations less effective. To mitigate this risk, these efforts should not be led by WMF but by a centralized global body that is well-resourced and led by multiple stakeholders.
Power structures and support could become too focused on organizations, at the expense of other ways of organizing as individuals and informal collectives. Given the current trend of prioritizing individual support, it seems unlikely that this will occur.
Overinvesting in formal organizations could lead to a significant resource drain with minimal impact.

Q 4-2 What could be done to mitigate this risk?

Our proposed structural model addresses these risks by placing the responsibility for capacity building on regional and thematic Hubs, and by creating additional structures and resources (Coaches and the Ombuds Council) for dispute and conflict resolution. These bodies will be well placed to ensure that capacity building responds to genuine needs without a one-size-fits-all solution.

Q 5 How does this Recommendation relate to the current structural reality?

This recommendation would markedly increase the amount of focus on capacity building (particularly on governance-related issues) in the movement.

Q 6-1 Does this Recommendation connect or depend on another of your Recommendations? If yes, how?

This recommendation connects to all other 6 recommendations. The success and failure of the other recommendations will depend on each stakeholder’s capacity and capability to formulate decisions, plan activities, implement programs which we hope will be shaped by this 7th recommendation.

Q 6-2 Does this Recommendation connect or relate to your Scoping Questions? If yes, how?

This recommendation have been developed in response to the scoping questions and community input through Meta, social channels, local and regional gatherings, and collaboration across the Movement working groups.

Q 7 How is this Recommendation connected to other WGs?

This recommendation connected heavily with the Capacity Building Working Group

Q 8 Do you have anything to add that was not covered with previous questions, yet essential for understanding the recommendation?

None at this time.

Q 9 Who needs to make a decision on this Recommendation?

Decision this recommendation will depend on the body or bodies that will be shaped by our recommended structural model.

Q 10 How should the decision be made?

The process may take some time as all subject matter experts on capacity building will make collegial decision on this recommendation through a series of workshops and/or meetings.

Q 12 How will this Recommendation be implemented?

Similar to the decision making process, an implementation plan may require a series of workshops and/or meetings. Simulation and trials may also be needed.

Q 13 What are the concerns, limiting beliefs, and challenges for implementing this Recommendation?

Similar to any other recommendation by this group and other working groups, the stakeholder’s adaptation to change may challenge the implementation of this recommendation.

Q 14a What resources would be needed to implement this recommendation?

This recommendation would require large amount of human and non-human resources. Trainings, workshops and meetings alone will consume resources.

Q 14b How much money in particular is needed to implement this recommendation?

This will depend on the implementation plan. This requires large investment in capacity building.

Q 15a What is the timeframe of this Recommendation in terms of when it should be implemented?

4-9 years. Workshops within Wikimania 2020-28 or Thematic events could be a venue to simulate this recommendation.

Q 15b Does this Recommendation have an urgency or priority?

Capacity building must be in the change pipeline but not urgent. This may take some time to implement. Constant collaboration on Capacity Building working group, and all other working group will also be a factor in how this recommendation would take into action.

Q 16 How should the implementation of this Recommendation be monitored and evaluated? By who?

Two bodies. One body who will execute the plan will monitor and self evaluate and one third party body who will gather feedback and perform the evaluation.

Q 17 Anything else you would like to add not covered above?

None so far

Movement Strategy/Recommendations/Iteration 2/Roles & Responsibilities/7

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