The Wikimedia Foundation is the nonprofit that hosts Wikipedia and our other free knowledge projects. We want to make it easier for everyone to share what they know. To do this, we keep Wikipedia and Wikimedia sites fast, reliable, and available to all. We protect the values and policies that allow free knowledge to thrive. We build new features and tools to make it easy to read, edit, and share from the Wikimedia sites. Above all, we support the communities of volunteers around the world who edit, improve, and add knowledge across Wikimedia projects.
Summary
The Community Resources team distributes funds and other resources via several participatory grantmaking programs, aimed at supporting mission-aligned organizations, groups, and individuals around the world. These programs support a variety of inspiring community-driven experiments, projects and programs, from outreach and events to research and tool-building.
The Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) seeks a Program Officer to support WMF’s Simple Annual Plan Grants (APG) program. The WMF has participatory funding streams in its Grants program. The Simple Annual Plan Grants Committee is a volunteer committee that makes recommendations to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees or WMF staff on how funds should be allocated to advance the movement’s mission and vision. This Program Officer will help coordinate and support the people and processes that lead to decisions. They will work together with committee members, grant applicants and grantees, and members of the Community Resources team.
In the role, this person will also contribute to the current development of a new grantmaking strategy to 1) Grow our communities of volunteers, especially in places in the world that are just coming online, 2) Empower our existing communities to be more effective in their work and 3) Ensure that community investments are made more equitably around the world. Ultimately we expect the strategy work to review and if necessary alter to the current program structures.
This is a remote role and interested applicants from outside of the US are encouraged to apply.
You are responsible for:
Supporting the grants cycle:
- Oversee the Simple Annual Plan Grants proposal process from start to finish
- Manage communications related to the grants cycle
- Work closely with grant applicants in the preparation of their proposals and reports, providing guidance on strategic planning, programming, staffing, board development, and financial management
- Support due diligence and eligibility reviews for interested organizations
- Coordinate WMF staff, committee, and community inputs following the APG process, and ensure timely creation of expert materials in preparation for proposal review
- Work together with the Grants Administrator and the Finance & Administration team to obtain approvals, disburse and track grant funds, and ensure that accurate data is maintained in the Fluxx grants database
- Evaluate the annual plan grant process after each round, summarize feedback and implement recommendations for process improvements
- Review mid-term and final grant reports, provide feedback to grantee, and share findings with committee, fellow staff, and the community at large
- Support grant analysis on impact of funds, share results publicly
- Hold regular meetings with grantees
- Conduct site visits, perform on-site financial review, and document and share learning with relevant stakeholders
- Update the Simple APG space on Meta wiki as needed
Facilitating the grants committees’ participatory decision-making
- Recruit and orient new committee members
- Facilitate regular committee meetings
- Create and analyze the results of surveys and other assessment tools at all stages of the review process
- Co-create and publish detailed public staff assessments of each proposal
- Create or coordinate analysis, including detailed financial analysis, and oversee all material in preparation for deliberations, and be prepared to field detailed questions about proposals and analysis from the committee during the deliberation
Additional operational and strategic support
- Continually develop the program to support the priorities of the Foundation and the goals of the Wikimedia movement
- Support the development and implementation of a measurement and evaluation system for the grants program
- Support the design and implementation of solutions that achieve the desired outcomes of the 2030 Strategic Direction and Movement Strategy
Skills and Experience:
- 5+ years experience with program and process management that preferably includes project planning, evaluation, budgeting, workflow management, contracts management, grant monitoring and reporting, and document management
- Experience supporting the organizational growth and development and/or volunteer engagement programs.
- Proven ability that would translate to creating constructive partnerships with the Wikimedia community, stakeholders, and fund-seekers: skills in facilitating engaging, motivating, coordinating and supporting volunteer communities, and in negotiating the sometimes chaotic and contentious nature of free-thinking communities
- An open and transparent communication style; ability to engage and have dialog with individuals in a public setting and in a non-polarizing way
- Willingness to accommodate scheduling requirements of frequent interactions across time zones, with individuals and organizations across the world
- Proven English proficiency in written and spoken communication, including speaking in front of large groups and reacting publicly in high pressure situations, and comfort in producing widely distributed written material
- Demonstrated commitment to and belief in equity, inclusion, and diversity
- Fluency in another language other than English, preferably Arabic, French, Spanish or Swahili
- A global perspective, with significant experience living or working internationally
- This position may require 3-6 international trips each year.
Additionally, we’d love it if you have:
- Experience in grant making, particularly in an international context
- Experience working with online communities, particularly in the free knowledge movement
- Experience in participatory decision making structures
- Passion for or experience contributing to Wikipedia/Wikimedia projects
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