Reports 27Aug11

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Below are the Board reports to the Board Meeting on 27 August 2011; see Agenda 27Aug11.

Templates for actions: {{done}} Yes check.svg Done, {{cf}} Go-next-red.svg Carried forward, {{canc}} X mark.svg Cancelled.

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Roger Bamkin (Chair)

Done recently
  • Attended Wikimania and gave talk on "GLAM in a small museum"
  • Arranged travel assistance offer to Wikimania delegates
  • Arranged board meeting
  • Installed extra 100 or so QRpedia codes in Derby to make it a multi-lingual "Wiki museum"
  • Wright of Derby Award ceremony (live on web next Saturday at 10)
  • Discussions with Sue, Barry, Board and ppt drafted with AT regarding WMF Fundraiser decision
  • Chief Exec applicant triage with MP, AT
  • Recruitment of office administrator with CK
Actions
  • RB to talk to Terence about how the ownership of QRPedia can be transferred to WMUK by the end of the year.{{done}}
Upcoming
  • Wright of Derby Award ceremony with Mayor
  • Chief Exec interviews with AT, MC
  • Bristol talk with SV
  • Specialist Library talk
  • GLAM presentation at Euopeanna

Mike Peel (Secretary)

Done recently
  • Reports/2011/July done - next up Reports/2011/August. Input would be greatly appreciated.
  • Reported abuse to the Guardian regarding someone using 'wikipedia' as a username to comment on their articles [1]
  • Microgrants/2011 process revision assembled; put forward for board decision on 6 August, and now largely implemented. 1 microgrant approved this month; several others pending.
  • Assisting with chief executive recruitment (and occasionally also the office admin recruitment)
  • Pushing forward with Geocamp
  • Helping Martin with the Physics World article on "Physics on Wikipedia"
  • Gauging interest in having a UK OTRS workshop
  • Moved to new server with increased capacity. Need to undertake a security review. Dialog ballons icon.svg Discuss
Macrogrants
Membership approvals
  • Have been working through records, ensuring that all board-approved members are marked as such.
  • List of members to be approved has been sent around, and is in the in-camera minutes
Tasks to do
  • Closing off Britain Loves Wikipedia Symbol wait.svg Doing... - two prizes now awarded, with the rest in progress
  • Sort through / close off old email addresses Symbol wait.svg Doing... (low priority)
  • Update blog to use Vector skin [2]; specify license (the standard CC-BY-SA?) Go-next-red.svg Carried forward (ideally needs tech person; currently low priority)
  • Need to know attendance numbers, and number of votes, for Annual Conference 2011 AGM Minutes
Actions
  • MP to offer OTRS access to specific known and trusted volunteers Yes check.svg Done
  • MP to come back to the board with a revised microgrants process. Yes check.svg Done
  • MP to add text of vision and mission to the Minutes 11Jun11 Yes check.svg Done
  • MP to upload the 11Jun11 in-camera minutes and circulate them to the board for approval. Yes check.svg Done

Andrew Turvey (Treasurer)

Activities to report

Recruitment

Chief Executive
  • Continued regular weekly calls with our recruitment consultant
  • 83 people applied for the position
  • Fiona Wansborough, our recruitment consultant, longlisted 13 of these for an initial meeting
  • Mike and I reviewed the CVs and asked Fiona to add four others to the list and remove one (one later dropped out)
  • Fiona met with all the remaining 16 candidates
  • Roger, Mike and I visited London on 24 August and agreed a shortlist of six for interview
  • Interview location arranged thanks to the British Library
  • External members of the interview panel arranged (Sebastian Molenski, President of Wikimedia Deutschland; Matthew Cock, Head of Web at the British Museum and Nick Poole, Chief Executive of the Collections Trust)
  • Dates for interview agreed (1st/2nd and 9th September)
  • Discussed the recruitment process with other board members (Steve, Martin, Chris) and agreed to share the shortlisted candidates to gain their input
Temporary Office Manager
  • Forwarded draft contract and payroll information for new starter
Permanent Office Manager
  • Agreed recruitment timetable with prospect-us to allow for the earliest possible start whcih also gives the new Chief Executive input into the role specification and selection

Banking

  • Resubmitted forms for internet banking access for AT, MP and RB
  • Sent a change of address form in to redirect to RB, per accountant's advice
  • Made various payments (see office wiki for details)
  • Obtained form for signing to change bank signatory mandates (for re-signing at the meeting)

Finance

  • Signed annual accounts with RB and returned to the auditors for their signature
Actions
  1. AT to send a memento of our gratitude to the teller, outgoing board members, and speakers (excluding new board members), from WikiConference UK 2011 Go-next-red.svg Carried forward
  2. AT to email around details of the interested candidate to be an office manager, and to also draft a blog post to advertise the position X mark.svg Cancelled
  3. AT to investigate how we can move to multiple signatories for large transactions. Symbol wait.svg Doing...
  4. AT to investigate debit cards for bank account signatories. Symbol wait.svg Doing...
  5. TD to give AT the password for the main paypal account. AT to give all board members read-only access to the paypal account. Dialog ballons icon.svg Discuss
  6. AT to investigate term deposits and return to the board with options. Go-next-red.svg Carried forward
  7. AT - In camera minutes of 2 February 2011 Go-next-red.svg Carried forward
  8. AT - written legal advice onto wiki Go-next-red.svg Carried forward
  9. AT to circulate results from WikiConference survey once complete Yes check.svg Done - see [3]
  10. AT to prepare a new budget reflecting the costs of the new profile of staff recruitment
  11. AT to discuss financial regulations with the co-op bank, particularly with regards the transfer of signatories after the AGM. Yes check.svg Done
  12. AT to investigate alternative banks, with a recommendation to be made at the in-person board meeting Go-next-red.svg Carried forward
  13. AT to request a quote for insurance for board members against the risk of personal liability and negligence. Go-next-red.svg Carried forward
  14. AT to follow up outstanding payment of previous office manager with payroll. Yes check.svg Done
  15. AT to take text from the strategy document, polish it, and circulate it to the board prior to it being sent around to chief exec applicants. Go-next-red.svg Carried forward

Chris Keating (Director)

Report
Fundraiser
Review of upcoming fundraising-related deadlines
Worked with Foundation staff to conduct a second fundraising test, documented here. Testing was then suspended pending clarification of the situation.
Set up arrangement with SmartDebit for them to process direct debits for us on a Facilities Managed basis.
Recruitment of office administrator - Richard Symonds has been appointed starting on September 1st.
Decision needed re my proposal previously circulated by email for offline fundraising.
Drafting a 2012 offline fundraising proposal as an input for the 2012 budget.
Internal Comms
have applied gentle pokes re Blog but more poking is required.
intending members' email re 2012 budget and activity plan. Awaiting outline proposal from AT before producing/circulating for comment.
Outreach
National Maritime Museum project up and running. Ideally I would find a volunteer to help take over the implementation of this.
I have registered us as a partner at the World War I Centenary project coordinated by the IWM and am exploring ways forward with them.
Engaged with the en.wikipedia Military History Wikiproject about their future outreach activities
Actions
Sort out print items to support outreach (carried over)
- not done, still vaguely on the to-do list.

Martin Poulter (Director)

Recent activity

In the past month, I've been working more-than-full time at my normally part-time job to meet end-of-project deadlines. Hence I've been at reduced capacity for WMUK work. I have focused on things with an oncoming deadline. This burst of day-job work means I will have more time for WMUK work in the future.

  • Revisions to Physics World article with MP (publication imminent)
  • Wikimedia Girl Geek Dinner in Bristol
  • Interview in "The Spark" was published this week.
  • Regular meetings with Sam Knight (University of Bristol Outreach Ambassador)
  • Met with representative of Centre for Public Engagement at University of Bristol (along with Sam)
  • Meetings with ARKive about collaboration project, and with SV & local PR about publicity opportunities
Coming soon
  • IoP workshop in London (smaller event than envisaged), 1st Sept.
  • Meeting Vinesh at Imperial College to talk about education project, 1st Sept.
  • Wildlife-themed event in Bristol with Andy Mabbett, 15th Sept.
  • Still waiting for dates for training workshops for Medical Research Council, Arts & Humanities Research Council, and Food Standards Agency
  • Writing guide to Wikimedia Commons for JISC Digital Media (advice site for creators and users of digital media for education)
  • Investigate possibility of Welsh-language event in Cardiff
  • Start arrangements for training event (later in year) for contacts made at GGD event
Actions
  • Strategy, publicity & event preparation for Wikimedia Universities ProgrammeGo-next-red.svg Carried forward
  • Follow up on business cards Yes check.svg Done
  • Look into a team for a training event for Food Standards Agency in Autumn (arranged by SV)Go-next-red.svg Carried forward
  • Log into OTRSGo-next-red.svg Carried forward

Fæ (Director)

Report
  • The last BL editathon has resulted in a New Yorker article, making us all famous. Discussions with the BL continue there is a proposal under-way for AHRC funding (possibly joint funding) and Roger & Fae will be presenting as planned to all BL staff in September.
  • Progress slow as expected through August due to holidays, illness and WikiMania, however there have been discussions about future events with the National Archives, Wellcome Trust and the British Museum. The BM has booked internal training events which Johnbod is leading. The National Archives have outlined a number of projects covering QR codes, digitization (proposal for funding planned) and edit-a-thon events; Leutha is leading. We will know more about the Wellcome programme and funding available after their significant internal meetings at the beginning of September.
  • New contact from the Society of Biologists provides a way of engaging with their 70 member institutions. First meeting deferred to 30/8.
  • Panyd has raised the prospect of a new WIR at Manchester U. Library, this will be self funded but the GLAM network will help with engagement.
  • Dominic (NARA) has summarised his problems with Commons culture and this may be a future area for better GLAM communications and engagement at an inter-chapter level.
  • (Note) Due to a error during server migration, emails from Fae were lost/slow-bounced and this has caused some delay and confusion over the last week. There may be an opportunity here for an external review of server setup, backup, processes and security in advance of the Fund-raiser.
Actions
  • Fae/Roger - GLAM coordination should be proposed as a paid programme activity (not office role) due to the ramping up of the programme, particularly in expectations of growth throughout 2012, and the significant coordination, backroom planning and communication is putting significant burden on a few key volunteers and is beginning to fail to be delivered as a result.
  • (TBA, getting urgent) The Strategy Workshop results should be incorporated into the WM-UK wiki, this may be useful to time with further announcements about an EGM if needed to support transition to charity status.
  • Fae - Add general simple guidelines to the WM-UK wiki defining what travel expenses WM-UK are prepared to cover for volunteers supporting events.
  • (Note) All - Better solution needed to how we regularly pick up emails to OTRS. We recently missed a request for interview with the BBC WRT NOTW situation. (Changing to a note as the solution may be to opt in for email alerts in OTRS; please do so.)

Steve Virgin (Director)

Report

Spoken to Invest in Bristol - now brand new million pound museum (MShed) is open they are keen to reopen discussions about working with us in the GLAM sector

Spoken to Invest in Swindon - They are trying to organise a follow up meeting with Wroughton National Science Museum Archive for WMUK + our University of Bristol contacts so that we can widen their involvement (Centre for Public Engagement is based in West and idea is to get them behind the project)

National Science Museum (Rod Hebden) - contacted SV and asked for permission to 'sell us' in to the National Trust (also based in Swindon) - agreed on basis that we fix up a meeting first before 'doing anything'

ARKIVE - attended a meeting with CEO & our marketing contact. Forthcoming 'Editathon event' that will be organised by PigsonTheWing on September 15

Spent time checking out venues for events with Sam Knight (our University of Bristol Ambassador) - visited 3 and suggested one for the ARKIVE event

Met and discussed ARKIVE event in September with Bristol Natural History Consortium - will pass on to members and try and get them to attend

Prepared draft presentation for Fund Raising discussion

Kept monitoring the situation with Stone King hoping for feedback from our charities application

Actions
  • Priority - managing the ARKIVE/University of Bristol processes DONE