Wikimedia CH/Project Guidelines

The project guidelines is a set of guidelines for project leaders and WMCH to deal with projects. It's a collection of various recommendations to apply as much as possible during the whole project lifetime from the project preparation to the achievement announcement.

These guidelines are not rules. Although they are thought to be valid for all type of projects, it could happen that for any good reason one or the other of the guidelines is not followed.

Terminology

• With project leader is meant the person of WMCH responsible for WMCH in the project, could be WMCH member (volunteer) or staff but not external.
• With board is meant the board of WMCH, but it could be any person the WMCH board has delegated this responsibility.
• With staff is meant CAO/ED and the relevant community manager if it's a volunteer driven project.

Preparation

Project leader should take care of following recommendations:

• Define a project leader
• Explain in an abstract (a few sentences) your project.
• Contextualize the project in the current environment
• Describe the whole project in details in an additional text
• Verify that your project respect the association bylaws and fit as much as possible the Wikimedia movement strategy.
• Explain the added value for the movement and WMCH
• Take care of all costs (also communication, travel, ...)
• Be in touch with WMCH experts on the topic if possible
• Set concrete objectives and methods to measure if the project succeeded or failed
• List participants, explains their functions, give a small biography (As far as possible use Member template)
• Split the work to do in different work-packages if necessary
• Define a global timeline with milestones (per work-package) if necessary
• Describe in details what for resources will be needed, do not forgot to count the volunteer time.
• If you need resources from WMCH (Money? Employee time? ...) ; be convincing: explain why this is a good investment.

Evaluation

Project leader should take care of following recommendations:

• Create a new page on the wiki and fill it with the project proposal (insert the Project template)
• Announce it on the association member mailing list and ask for review
• After the review stage, make a request (to accept the project) to the board per email

Board should take care of following recommendations:

• Give asap an acknowledgement of receipt with a precise timeline to get the final answer
• Challenge the project leader if necessary
• Check the whole quality, seriousness and robustness of the project (reduce risk)
• Give the answer with a small justification

Wikimedia CH staff should take care of :

• Check that project leader is member/employee of WMCH and does not have any conflict of interest.
• Check that it matches our bylaws
• Check if the needed resources estimation (in particular costs) is OK (not too expensive, not too short)
• If project is accepted, should communicate internally and externally about it.

Realization

Project leader should take care of following recommendations:

• Take care of the timeline, if the timeline can not be respected, inform the board.
• Communicate about each reached milestone, at least to the member mailing list

Reporting

Project leader should take care of following mandatory request:

• All necessary information to understand and follow the project should be (directly or indirectly) on the wiki
• Keep the wiki page up2date
• Monthly report on the project page or in the corresponding working group report for project without dedicated budget. Quaterly report in a format suitable for FDC quaterly reporting for project with a dedicated budget.

Project leader should take care of following recommendations:

• All non-confidential communications with the association should be visible on the member mailing list
• Communication matters, explain as much as possible what your doing the rest of the world.
• Do not forget to tell about your sponsors in your PR communication
• Inform periodically the association about the progress of the project per email

Wikimedia CH staff should take care that reporting si done on time

Closing

Project leader should take care of following recommendations:

• Challenge the achievements against the goals of the project
• Write an achievement email to the board, member mailing list

Board should take care of following recommendations:

• Evaluate the whole project
• Communicate internally about the end of the project
• Communicate externally about the end of the project

Wikimedia CH staff should take care of:

• financial report

During the whole project life cycle...

Project leader should take care of following recommendations:

• Is accountable for the project

Board should take care of following recommendations:

• Maintain the information related to the project in the official project list
• Assure that the project management guidelines and rules are respected
• Know about the project and can explain it in a few words
• Know exactly about the resources invested by the association in the project
• Secure the WMCH resources (money, employee time, ...) for the project
• Is accountable for the project

Everybody must do internal documentation and communication in English