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  • We found no cohesive trend in changes in staff size over the past three years: 38% of respondents reported staff had grown, 38% reported staff had stayed the same, and 25% reported decline in staffing numbers. WMF grantmaking staff has increased, due to introduction of new grantmaking programs.

WMF also diverged from the majority of the other analyzed funds in a few key ways. Many of these are due to WMF being a much larger organization than the other funds we studied, with major program areas beyond grantmaking.

  • As discussed previously, both WMF overall organizational budget and total annual grant amount are significantly higher than all other organizations we analyzed.
  • The funds featured in "Who Decides" reported granting predominantly to small organizations with annual budgets of less than $75,000. While the Annual Plan Grants are much larger than this, WMF's IEG and PEG programs align more closely.
  • "Who Decides" respondents showed grant sizes ranging from $500-$54,000 with a median grant of $15,000 across three fiscal years.[1] In contrast, across the past three fiscal years[2], WMF grant sizes have ranged from $105 to $1.79 million with median grant sizes ranging between $7,865 and $276,000 in FY 2013-14.
  • Most funds have term limits for their grant review committee members/panelists. At WMF, the FDC has a renewable two-year term, and the IEG Committee has a renewable one-year term. The GAC does not have a term limit.
  • While on average, 61% of the budgets of the "Who Decides" funds go directly to grantmaking, for WMF as an overall organization, the number is much smaller - projected at 17% in FY 201314. This is, of course, due to the many other programmatic priorities of the WM F, including high product and engineering costs. However, if we assess the grantmaking budget alone (total grant amounts plus total grantmaking program costs for FY 2013-14), we find that 72% of funds go directly to grants.
  • Of the eight "Who Decides" funds, 75% reported average Peer Review Panel/Grantmaking Committee size of up to 30 people. As of June 2014, WMF Grantmaking had 17 IEG Committee members, 28 Grant Advisory Committee members, and 9 Funds Dissemination Committee members. While these numbers align with the other participatory grantmakers, WMF grantmaking processes also include open comment periods, and as of December 2014, over 1,500 unique Meta-wiki users have contributed by submitting requests, commenting, editing, etc.[3]
  • The other funds we analyzed have small staff sizes, ranging from 2 to 6 full-time equivalents. WMF has about 230 employees and independent contractors, overall.[4] The Grantmaking team includes 4 Program Officers, a Grants Administrator, and the Director of Grantmaking, with programmatic support from other staff.[5]

In the other areas of variation between WMF and the other funds we looked at, the difference is tactical - a reflection of the specific culture and needs of the Wikimedia Foundation community.

  1. ↑ For the last three fiscal years we asked them about (FY 2010-12).
  2. ↑ FY 11-12, FY 12-13, FY 13-14 (with fiscal ears ending June 30). Staff survey results.
  3. ↑ http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/fbundation/e/e0/2014-15_Wikimedia_Foundation_Plan.pdf. Page 37.
  4. ↑ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/\Nikipedia:Wikimedia_Foundation#Staff
  5. ↑ https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Staff_and_contractors

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