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Grants:PEG/WM EE/Continuing office rental/Report

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Report accepted
This report for a Project and Event grant approved in FY 2013-14 has been reviewed and accepted by the Wikimedia Foundation.
  • You may still comment on this report on its discussion page, or visit the discussion page to read the discussion about this report.
  • You are welcome to Email grants at wikimedia dot org at any time if you have questions or concerns about this report.


Project status

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Did you comply with the requirements specified by WMF in the grant agreement?
YES
Is your project completed?
YES*

*Office rental is continued with the funds of 2015 Annual Plan Grant.

Activities and lessons learned

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Activities

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1. Regular board and other meetings taking place in the office.

During the project period 27 board meetings, 1 general assembly, 7 project team meetings, 2 workshops, 1 edit-a-thon and 1 public event for new editors were held. The tranquility of an office space was also required for holding development talks with employees and recruiting a substitute for assistant.
General Assembly in autumn 2014

Wikimedia Eesti has a long tradition holding weekly board meetings, which supports good communication within the governing body of the chapter, as well as decision making processes. During its beginning years Wikimedia Eesti used both public space in local library and rooms of employers of board members to carry out the board meetings. As using public space proved to be rather inefficient and it was no longer possible to use other rooms, renting an office became the most reasonable option for continuing quotidian activity of the chapter. As a result 27 board meetings were held in the office during the project period and the tradition continues in year 2015.

Wikimedia Eesti has also welcomed community members in the office. Although the office space has not become as popular as we hoped, some community members have found their way to the office. In September 2014 also the general assembly of Wikimedia Eesti was held in the office, as to make people more acquainted with the working space of the chapter.

An important role of the office space is being the meeting place of project teams of Wikimedia Eesti. Before having the office it was really hard for Wikimedia Eesti to call together physical meetings of project teams, which made project management and execution more challenging. During the project period 7 meetings were held in the office, including education and GLAM team meetings, meeting for Tartupeedia team, as well as meetings of organisers of article and photo competitions.

Office space has also been used for training new and even experienced editors. 2 workshops were held on specific topics, there was 1 edit-a-thon organised and also a meeting organised to introduce new editors to Wikipedia. Without an office space organising such events depended largely on partnerships and their interest, but with the office it has been possible for Wikimedia Eesti to be more active in planning events that have a direct online impact on Wikimedia projects.


2. Installing and re-organizing accounting and administration-related documents.

During the project period all paper documentation related to the activity of Wikimedia Eesti was archived in the office. Although the process of re-organising them in a more structured manner is still under way, access to them has been significantly improved.
Wikimedia Eesti office

Before renting the office, all the documents of Wikimedia Eesti were scattered between accountant and responsible board members, usually ending up in the hands of one designated board member, which made managing of the documents rather challenging and also impeded access to all accounting materials for interested parties. With renting of the office space it was made possible to store and collect al the documents in one place and also increase their accessibility level. Although restructuring the process of managing administrative documents has proven to be slower than expected and by the end of the grant period Wikimedia Eesti still experienced problems with document management, things are improving and Wikimedia Eesti will continue its progress in archiving and document management practices in the year 2015, which is significantly supported by available office space.


3. Introducing and maintaining open office hours for general public.

On the 24th of September 2014 open Wednesday kicked off in the office of Wikimedia Eesti. During the project period the office doors opened on 12 Wednesdays, for more than 60 hours alltogether.
Edit-a-thon organised in the office of Wikimedia Eesti on the 11th of September 2014.

One of the aims of Wikimedia Eesti is to increase notability of the chapter, Wikimedia projects and free knowledge and culture in general with the physical presence of the office in the cityscape. Part of the plan is to open office doors for general public. Usually Wikimedia Eesti announces most of the edit-a-thons and workshops publicly, but having an office space created a possibility to have open office hours for general public.

Although during the project Wikimedia Eesti opened its doors for a total of 60 hours on 12 days with the help of volunteer board members and staff input, such open Wednesdays did not prove to be popular and Wikimedia Eesti will inquire into possibilities to be more visiple in the public space in the future.


4. Furnishing of the office.

During the project period the office was equipped with shelf and closet, as well as 2 tables, 6 chairs and 2 armchairs to meet the needs of archiving documents and exhibitions, shelving books and holding regular public and private meetings.
Coffee cups in Wikimedia Eesti office

As a result of the project, office of Wikimedia Eesti is well equipped to host smaller events, to store property of the organisation and to archive all its documents. Wikimedia Eesti reduced furnishing related costs with buying furniture from second hand shops, which proved to be rather successful. Although the styling may not be completely homogenous, Wikimedia Eesti has everything it needs to carry out board and project meetings, edit-a-thons and workshops.

Wikimedia Eesti has had a tradition to make itinerant exhibitions of the best pictures from its various photo competitions and without an office space storing of all these pictures became a problem. Having an office space has given an opportunity to store all these pictures in a common and easily accessible place.


Addendum: Use of the office space

Although Wikimedia Eesti did not measure the use of the office space throughout the period, there was measurement done in 2 randomly chosen periods, one in the beginning of the project and other in the end, i.e. in the week from the 28th of April 2014 to the 4th of May 2014 and from the 8th to 14th of December.

Office use between 28th of April 2014 and 4th of May 2014 visualized

Day User 00:00-07:59 08:00-08:59 09:00-09:59 10:00-10:59 11:00-11:59 12:00-12:59 13:00-13:59 14:00-14:59 15:00-15:59 16:00-16:59 17:00-17:59 18:00-18:59 19:00-19:59 20:00-20:59 21:00-21:59 22:00-23:59
Monday 04 / 28 /2015 Employee 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
Board member
Other
Tuesday 04 / 29 /2015 Employee 1 1 1 2 1
Board member 3 3 1
Other
Wednesday 04 / 30 /2015 Employee 1 1 1 1
Board member 1 2 2
Other
Thursday 05 / 01 /2015 Employee 1 1 1 1
Board member
Other
Friday 05 / 02 /2015 Employee 1 1 1 1 1 1
Board member
Other
Saturday 05 / 03 /2015 Employee
Board member
Other
Sunday 05 / 04 /2015 Employee
Board member
Other

Numbers in the box show the number of representatives of group being present in the office in designated time

Office in use Office out of use

Office use between 8th of December 2014 and 13th of December 2014 visualized

Day User 00:00-07:59 08:00-08:59 09:00-09:59 10:00-10:59 11:00-11:59 12:00-12:59 13:00-13:59 14:00-14:59 15:00-15:59 16:00-16:59 17:00-17:59 18:00-18:59 19:00-19:59 20:00-20:59 21:00-21:59 22:00-23:59
Monday 12 / 08 /2015 Employee
Board member 1 1 1 1
Other 1 1 1 1
Tuesday 12 / 09 /2015 Employee 1 1 2 2 2
Board member 1 1 1 1 1 1 4 4 4
Other 1 1 1 1
Wednesday 12 / 10 /2015 Employee 1 1
Board member 1 1 1
Other
Thursday 12 / 11 /2015 Employee
Board member 1 1
Other 1 1
Friday 12 / 12 /2015 Employee
Board member
Other
Saturday 12 / 13 /2015 Employee
Board member
Other
Sunday 12 / 14 /2015 Employee
Board member
Other

Numbers in the box show the number of representatives of group being present in the office in designated time

Office in use Office out of use
Short analysis

The office is not used as much as it could be, with only 18 hours per week in the second week of December and 27 hours per week in the end of April and May. Nevertheless the office provided a quiet meeting place for the right moments during that time, namely a place to work on 2013 grant report with all the financial documents reviewed during the process, have board meetings and also meetings with candidates for the position of the assistant (as the assistant had received a scolarship to be an exchange student). Although the absolute numbers of office use are not high, the use of the office is of extremely high value for the organization, making it possible to have open discussions behind the closed doors of an office space. As a result, the office has helped to sustain a healthy climate within the chapter, even in difficult times.

A second aspect that is not well reflected by hours spent in the office, is the possibility to store the equipment and posessions of Wikimedia Eesti in the safe place. The most problematic storing issue before having an office was related to pictures of itinerant exhibitions, which took up a notable amount of private space of chapter members. Also memorabilia used by Wikimedia Eesti can be now stored in an accessible place and provides more possibilities to really use it. And although there have been some problems with archiving all the documents, office makes it possible to store the documents in one place, increasing accessibility to them and their usability.

Lessons learned

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What worked well?

Support of Wikimedia Foundation and the decision to give advance to Wikimedia Eesti to rent an office made it possible to make use of a good offer, as well as ensured rapid installment of the organization in the office space. As a result operational effectiveness of Wikimedia Eesti increased in an important time for writing grant reports, discussing the development of organization and restructuring the staff.
Also the costs of moving into the office were lower than expected and as the board and employees helped to furnish the office, there was no need to spend too much time for furnishing activities. As the human resources needed to settle in the office were minimal, it also guaranteed an increase of inspiration and motivation within the chapter. The need for an office for Wikimedia Eesti was discussed for a long time and finally getting an office space with reasonable effort had a really positive impact on motivation of active chapter members.

What didn't work?

Good archiving practices and easy access to all the documents was a fundamental goal of this project and although it can be stated that it has been easier to access the documents in general, some major problems with archiving have surfaced during reporting period of 2014 grants. Wikimedia Eesti did not manage to take the most of the space made available for proper archiving activities.
Wikimedia Eesti hoped to increase its visibility in city of Tartu through having a public physical office space. Unfortunately, public office hours have not been popular and the participation levels of meetings oriented towards new and unaware users of Wikimedia projects have been very low.

What would you do differently if you planned a similar project?

We would prioritize installing proper archiving practices as soon as we can use the office space.
We would try to foresee our essential needs and plan better to eliminate the need for a separate grant proposal for an office not included in the annual plan.
Reconsider the strategy for increasing the visibility of the chapter through physical presence in the cityscape.

Learning patterns

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There is a possibility to create learning pattern about using the office for outreach activities and for proper archiving of and accessibility to the documentation of the organization once we have found solutions to these problems.

Outcomes and impact

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Outcomes

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Provide the original project goal here.

The main goals of the project were:

  1. to increase the organizational effectivity of Wikimedia Eesti by providing a convenient and private space for discussions and coordination activities;
  2. to improve the level of documentation, archiving and reporting activities of the organization by assembling all the relevant documents in one, generally accessible locus;
  3. to increase public recognition of Wikimedia Eesti by establishing its physical presence.

Did you achieve your project goal? How do you know your goal was achieved? Please answer in 1 - 2 short paragraphs.

  1. The goal to increase the effectivity of Wikimedia Eesti was reached on a certain level, as many of the processes (restructuring staff, conducting development talks, hiring employees, dealing with the reporting issues) would have been much harder without the office space (as months before the rental proved). It was easy to hold weekly board meetings which improved internal communication and helped to avoid further difficulties in management of chapter.
  2. Although steps were taken to improve the level of documentation, archiving and reporting activities of the organization by assembling all the relevant documents in one, generally accessible locus, these were not executed with sufficient effectiveness and in year 2015 Wikimedia Eesti encountered severe difficulties related to archiving issues.
  3. Public recognition of Wikimedia Eesti was not suffciently increased by establishing its physical presence and public office hours did not meet expectations.

Progress towards targets and goals

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Target outcome Achieved outcome Explanation
Problem free renting of the office space until the end of the year 2014. Done No problems were encountered during the year - working in office was comfortable, rent costs did not change and the prices of utilities were as expected.
Fully operating organization throughout the year (i.e. no or few coordinational or operational drawbacks during the year).  Partly done Having an office space most certainly supported the effective operating of Wikimedia Eesti throughout the year. Nevertheless, there were some drawbacks with some projects, but many of them were related to external factors and not to ineffective use of the office.
Archiving and accessing the documents of the organization is easier than ever.  Partly done Although practices were set in place, Wikimedia Eesti did not manage to archive documents in the most effective manner, which resulted in drawbacks related to reporting activities. Access to documents, which were archived properly were significantly improved.
All the financial and activity reports presented in time or with minor delays. Not done There were already some minor delays with some project reports in year 2014, but it escalated in 2015 with several reports to various partners became overdue.
Making the office of Wikimedia Eesti visible in the city space of Tartu.  Partly done Although some efforts were made to make use of office in outreach efforts, the physical space of Wikimedia Eesti did not become as visible as it was hoped for.
Public reception hours created to serve a possible public interest.  Partly done Although these public reception hours there held, they did not meet the expectations.


Global Metrics

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We are trying to understand the overall outcomes of the work being funded across our grantees. In addition to the measures of success for your specific program (in above section), please use the table below to let us know how your project contributed to the Global Metrics. We know that not all projects will have results for each type of metric, so feel free to put "0" where necessary.

  1. Next to each required metric, list the actual outcome achieved through this project.
  2. Where necessary, explain the context behind your outcome. For example, if you were funded for an edit-a-thon which resulted in 0 new images, your explanation might be "This project focused solely on participation and articles written/improved, the goal was not to collect images."

For more information and a sample, see Global Metrics.

Although office rental does not really have a direct impact on Wikimedia content, on the 11th of September 2014 an edit-a-thon was held in office to try its potential for increasing participation in Wikimedia projects. 6 persons participated on the event and global metrics apply to measurement of the results.

Global metric for office edit-a-thon

Metric Achieved outcome Explanation
# of active editors involved 0 The event held in office was targeted to newcomers.
# of new editors 6 Although the event was announced quite late, there were still some university students who decided to take part in the evening edit-a-thon event.
# of individuals involved 9 1 Wikimedia Eesti board member and 2 employees attended the event besides 6 newcomers participating on the edit-a-thon.
# of new images/media added to Wikimedia articles/pages 0 The event was targeting article creation and not media uploads.
# of articles added or improved on Wikimedia projects 8 Some new pages were created, some articles were somewhat improved and some language editing was done.
Absolute value of bytes added to or deleted from Wikimedia projects 3609 added

158 deleted

Edit-a-thon lasted for 2 hours and the result is rather good for the number of participants, taking into account that they were newcomers and 2 out of 6 concentrated on language editing. 1 of the 6 participants also edited during 6 months following the workshop.


Learning question
Did your work increase the motivation of contributors, and how do you know?
All the contriubtors stated orally that participation on the edit-a-thon was very interesting for them, however only 1 of them made contributions to Wikimedia projects in 6 months following the meeting.


Impact

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What impact did this project have on WMF's mission and the strategic priorities?

Option A: How did you increase participation in one or more Wikimedia projects?

Wikimedia Eesti organized events in the office to initiate participation. Only the edit-a-thon for the newcomers can be seen as a successful event.

Option B: How did you improve quality on one or more Wikimedia projects?

Option C: How did you increase the reach (readership) of one or more Wikimedia projects?

Wikimedia Eesti tried to increase its visibility in the cityscape of Tartu and although it was not as successful as expected, it hopefully contributed to some interest related to Wikimedia projects. (This result has not been correctly measured)

Reporting and documentation of expenditures

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This section describes the grant's use of funds

Documentation

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Did you send documentation of all expenses paid with grant funds to grants at wikimedia dot org, according to the guidelines here? Answer "Yes" or "No".
Yes, on the 15th of September 2015

Expenses

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Please list all project expenses in a table here, with descriptions and dates. Review the instructions here.

Advance

Number Document Date Paid to Purpose Total
I Rent 180.48
A Actual rent 150.40
1 Invoice nr. 140123 28.04.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for the 14th to the 28th of April 2014 54.40
2 Invoice nr. 140156 12.05.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for May 2014 96.00
B Taxes from rent 30.08
1 Invoice nr. 140123 28.04.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for the 14th to the 28th of April 10.88
2 Invoice nr. 140156 12.05.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for May 2014 19.20
II Utilities 69.18
A Utilities per se 57.64
1 Invoice nr. 140156 12.05.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for May 2014 57.64
B Taxes from utilities 11.54
1 Invoice nr. 140156 12.05.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for May 2014 11.54
III Installation costs 0.00
1 0.00
Advance total 249.66

Grant

Number Document Date Paid to Purpose Total
I Rent 806.40
A Actual rent 672.00
1 Invoice nr. 140188 15.06.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for June 2014 96.00
2 Invoice nr. 140218 23.07.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for July 2014 96.00
3 Invoice nr. 140249 11.08.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for August 2014 96.00
4 Invoice nr. 140282 15.09.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for September 2014 96.00
5 Invoice nr. 140317 13.10.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for October 2014 96.00
6 Invoice nr. 140352 10.11.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for November 2014 96.00
7 Invoice nr. 140387 15.12.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Office rent for December 2014 96.00
B Taxes from rent 134.40
1 Invoice nr. 140188 15.06.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for June 2014 19.20
2 Invoice nr. 140218 23.07.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for July 2014 19.20
3 Invoice nr. 140249 11.08.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for August 2014 19.20
4 Invoice nr. 140282 15.09.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for September 2014 19.20
5 Invoice nr. 140317 13.10.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for October 2014 19.20
6 Invoice nr. 140352 10.11.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for November 2014 19.20
7 Invoice nr. 140387 15.12.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for office rent for December 2014 19.20
II Utilities 564.12
A Utilities per se 470.11
1 Invoice nr. 140188 15.06.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for June 2014 65.11
2 Invoice nr. 140218 23.07.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for July 2014 58.48
3 Invoice nr. 140249 11.08.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for August 2014 61.85
4 Invoice nr. 140282 15.09.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for September 2014 62.95
5 Invoice nr. 140317 13.10.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for October 2014 63.28
6 Invoice nr. 140352 10.11.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for November 2014 76.27
7 Invoice nr. 140387 15.12.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Utilities of office for December 2014 82.17
B Taxes from utilities 94.01
1 Invoice nr. 140188 15.06.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for June 2014 13.03
2 Invoice nr. 140218 23.07.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for July 2014 11.69
3 Invoice nr. 140249 11.08.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for August 2014 12.37
4 Invoice nr. 140282 15.09.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for September 2014 12.58
5 Invoice nr. 140317 13.10.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for October 2014 12.66
6 Invoice nr. 140352 10.11.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for November 2014 15.25
7 Invoice nr. 140387 15.12.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes for utilities of office for December 2014 16.43
III Furniture 188.70
1 Cost report 14-35 23.05.2014 Kaarel Vaidla Chairs and table 88.00
2 Cost report 14-37 23.05.2014 Teele Vaalma Internet cable and office supplies 18.55
3 Cost report 14-49 05.09.2014 Kaarel Vaidla Office supplies and chairs 82.15
IV Office signs 49.20
1 Invoice nr. 140282 15.09.2014 TA Haldus OÜ 3 office signs (building guide, floor guide, office door) 41.00
2 Invoice nr. 140282 15.09.2014 TA Haldus OÜ Taxes from office signs 8.20
Grant total 1,608.42
Total project budget (from your approved grant submission)
Advance: €486.48 and Grant: €1,769.40
TOTAL: €2,255.88
Total amount requested from WMF (from your approved grant submission, this total will be the same as the total project budget if PEG is your only funding source)
Advance: €486.48 and Grant: €1,769.40
TOTAL: €2,255.88
Total amount spent on this project
From advance: €249.66 and From grant: €1,608.42
TOTAL: €1,858.08
Total amount of Project and Event grant funds spent on this project
From advance: €249.66 and From grant: €1,608.42
TOTAL: €1,858.08
Are there additional sources that funded any part of this project? List them here.
There are no additional financial resources, but employees and board members gave some furniture to the disposal of Wikimedia Eesti to esnure a better working environment in the office.

Remaining funds

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The funds remaining from this grant in the amount of 397.70 EUR were deducted from another grant payment for Grants:Simple/Applications/Wikimedia Eesti/2016.
Are there any grant funds remaining?
Answer YES or NO.
YES
Please list the total amount (specify currency) remaining here. (This is the amount you did not use, or the amount you still have after completing your grant.)
€397.80
If funds are remaining they must be returned to WMF, reallocated to mission-aligned activities, or applied to another approved grant.
Please state here if you intend to return unused funds to WMF, submit a request for reallocation, or submit a new grant request, and then follow the instructions on your approved grant submission.
We would like remaining funds to be deducted from future payouts of Wikimedia Foundation to Wikimedia Eesti.