Wiki Workers United/Message to employees
Hello,
I hope this email finds you well. I am writing to you today, on behalf of the executive team, about an important topic relating to our organization's culture and ways of working.
Our values at Wikimedia Foundation are focused on being in the mission together, constant improvement, welcoming people in, and listening and sharing with curiosity. These values apply to all of us and the highest accountability for how they play out in our culture and workplace sits with leadership. For this reason, we acknowledge the concerns raised by staff in the context of internal discussions about unionization at the Foundation.
We want to continue to build direct dialogues between leadership and staff about our organization's culture and ways of working, regardless of what comes next. At the same time, as we outline in more detail below, we don't believe that a union would effectively address the concerns being raised or meet the Foundation's needs at this moment. We understand that change is necessary and have also proposed below several ways we can continue these constructive conversations. We want your input on the methods and approaches that work for you.
We respect employees' rights
We respect the legal right of eligible U.S.-based staff to organize if they choose. That decision belongs to those individuals. Unions have historically played an important and constructive role in supporting labor standards and representing workers' rights. Two-thirds of the Foundation's executive team come from union families and/or have been union members themselves. Today, many unions are giving a voice to social justice at a time of division. We believe those contributions are real and meaningful.
Our position on unionization is shaped by the Wikimedia Foundation's unique organizational context and how we can best meet staff needs, serve our mission and support our global communities.
The Wikimedia Foundation's unique organizational context
The Wikimedia Foundation is a globally-distributed, multi-layered organization with over 680 staff in multiple countries. In the United States (U.S.), where the Foundation is headquartered, federal law limits who can join a U.S. union: some U.S.-based individual contributors, but not managers, and not staff in other countries. In addition, Foundation staff outside of the United States are hired by employers of record (EORs). Because of differing legal requirements and contractual arrangements in every country, no one union can legally represent our global staff.
We are committed to a positive culture and workplace experience for staff across all of our operating regions and legal systems, so our approach must be fair and responsive to everyone. We don't believe that a union representing only a subset of U.S.-based individual contributors is the best way to resolve the concerns we're hearing.
In a global organization like ours, we continue to examine how to give our staff an equitable work experience and address challenges country to country with employers of record. We are concerned that even a well-intentioned and effective union for some U.S. staff could create new equity challenges for non-U.S. staff, since it could establish policies or benefits that don't apply across locations. Instead, we want to focus on solutions that can include and benefit all staff.
Serving our mission and supporting our global communities
Right now, we are facing the challenges of reuse and declining readership and contributions to Wikipedia. These challenges require close collaboration between staff and managers across the Foundation. We must also think about how to allocate resources effectively and show up as one Foundation in the context of our communities.
Solutions that benefit all staff help us more effectively respond to our communities in relation to these growing external threats. Unions are not structured to represent non-union members or formally negotiate issues on behalf of non-union groups. This is important because of concerns raised about the Foundation's relationship with the Wikimedia movement around how decisions are made. We care deeply about this and are working to address it through different avenues.
This makes even more important the need to talk with each other, move quickly, and keep improving how we work. There are new demands on creativity, resources, collaboration, and flexibility. Being nimble and attentive to the needs of global staff, and the public and communities we serve in this environment, will make a big difference to our future. We are, after all, a unique organization with a unique movement. The world is changing, and to support the projects and communities in this moment, we must leverage our openness and strengthen our internal culture.
Leadership has more work to do
We want to be responsive to staff concerns regardless of the structures in place. There can be many ways to resolve questions and challenges at work—some that even unions can't address. It matters to us that everyone feels informed, so we encourage you to take time to understand both the strengths and the limitations of unions in the United States, what they can and can't do, and how this relates to the concerns being raised.
We know that we have more work to do. We have heard concerns about clarity around how decisions are made, input into policy and planning, and inconsistencies around staff departures. We are committed to doing better in partnership with you and taking responsibility for meaningful change. To get started on this process without delays it's important that we leverage the resources already in place. As a result of staff input over the last two years, we created new feedback structures including Making Space and Constructive Conversations, to ensure that leadership hears staff voices directly.
We are creating some Making Space sessions to hear from staff. The first will take place on Tuesday March 3 at 1700 UTC, and following sessions will take place the week of March 16.
Regardless of how staff choose to proceed, our commitment remains the same:
- To listen with respect
- To improve the staff experience globally
- To provide clear information about organizational decisions
- To nurture an environment where staff feel safe to raise concerns
I invite you to reach out to me, Bernadette, Selena, Stephen, Lisa, Jaime or Anusha with any questions and input. Alternatively, Brandi Monroe can relay any messages to us