Grants:APG/Funds Dissemination Committee/Draft FDC Proposal for the Board/Draft FDC process

Purpose of this page is to develop a draft decision-making mechanism that the FDC could use to reach decisions about how to allocate the envelope of funding it's given. The FDC would of course be free to develop & use a different mechanism. The purpose of this would simply be to give them something to start with, so they wouldn't need to start from zero. Any comments on this proposal would be welcome: if we can improve it before we turn it over to the FDC, that would be great. Thanks Sue Gardner (talk) 07:54, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Assumptions (to be confirmed)

There's an FDC of eleven members, of which two are non-voting WMF Board of Trustees members.
Therefore, nine people are making the decision about how funds are allocated.
I'm assuming the FDC has had a number of inputs to its process, including i) the Wikimedia mission, vision and values, ii) the five-year plan, the five-year strategic priorities, the five-year targets, iii) a funding allocation from the WMF Board of Trustees, iv) possibly some guidance from the Board of Trustees on how it would like to see the money spent, and v) some form of input or thinking from the global Wikimedia community. I don't know yet what that community input would look like, or how it would be developed. The first three inputs are fixed and non-negotiable. The latter two are inputs for the FDC's consideration, but do not bind it.
The FDC is giving out unrestricted operating funds, not restricted grants. Its purpose is not to tell fund-seekers what to do with the money, but simply to tell them what their allocation is.
The deliverable for the FDC is to allocate the overall envelope of funding. It should also give guidance and feedback for fund-seekers. That guidance/feedback is not binding: fund-seekers can do whatever they like with it. However, what the fund-seeker does with the guidance/feedback can be considered when future allocations are determined.

Proposed draft process

The FDC should review and discuss all the inputs it's been given. This should be the most substantial aspect of their work, and should take the majority of their time. We are not asking the FDC to function as disparate individuals: we're asking them to be a thoughtful deliberative collective body. That means they should be open to influence from each other, and should aim to benefit as much as possible from each other's expertise and opinions.

That said, as an output of the discussion process, with the purpose of enabling each individual FDC member to have influence on the final decision-making, and in an effort to mitigate against groupthink and achieve the best possible decision quality with maximum personal accountability, each member should independently develop and simultaneously submit an individual determination of how funds should be allocated. The average of all eligible individual allocations will be how funds are disseminated.

Rules governing individual allocations:

The deadline for individual member allocations is set by the FDC Chair. Ideally the deadline will follow intensive discussion among FDC members, and will be the near-final step in determining the allocations;
The Wikimedia Foundation determines eligibility for entities and for requests;
FDC members can allocate to each request an amount ranging from 0-100% of the total amount requested;
FDC members can choose to allocate to the reserve as they see fit (either because the total envelope exceeds the total of eligible requests, or because they believe an allocation to the reserve is preferable to fulfilling all requests at 100% of the requested level);
FDC members who know in advance they will not be able to complete their individual allocation on time can request to be recused. Such a request will normally be honoured by the FDC chair and will not result in their membership being reviewed;
FDC members who do not complete their individual allocation by the internal FDC deadline and who have not requested a recusal forgo their opportunity to influence the allocation, and will have their FDC membership reviewed by the FDC chair;
Once submitted, requests cannot be altered.

Scenarios

I am going to hack around making a couple of scenarios, just to see where this would work & not work.

Scenario A

Here's a simple scenario. The FDC is given an envelope of $5 from the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, and has received funding requests that look like this:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1

Entity #5: requests $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents

In this scenario, let's assume that all entities are eligible for funding, and all funding requests are eligible to be considered. This means the FDC has $5 to give out, and the request pool is $3.72.

The FDC has reviewed the inputs it's been given, and has held a wide-ranging discussion about the merits of requests. FDC members hold different views on how funds should be distributed, because although they are all seeing the same materials, their experiences lead them to come to slightly different conclusions about the merits of each request (which proposed activities are strategically most important, which are likeliest to be effective, which entities have the best track record, etc.)

FDC members create the following allocations.

FDC member #1:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

FDC member #2:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

FDC member #3:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

FDC member #4:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

FDC member #5:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

FDC member #6:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

FDC member #7:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

FDC member #8: non-voting member of the WMF Board of Trustees

FDC member #9: non-voting member of the WMF Board of Trustees

This results in the following allocation

Final FDC allocation:

Entity #1: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 25 cents; allocated 25 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Reserve; allocated $1.28

TOTAL: $5

Scenario B

Here is a slightly more complex scenario. In this scenario, the FDC is given an envelope of $7.80 from the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, and has received funding requests that look like this:

Entity #1: requests $3

Entity #2: requests 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20

Entity #6: requests 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents

Entity #11: requests 22 cents

Entity #12: requests 29 cents

Entity #13: requests 40 cents

In this scenario, the Wikimedia Foundation has determined that the requests from Entities #11, 12 and 13 are ineligible for consideration, because they do not qualify as eligible entities. This means the FDC has $7.80 to give out, and the request pool totals $7.82.

The FDC has reviewed the inputs it's been given, and has held a wide-ranging discussion about the merits of requests. FDC members hold different views on how funds should be distributed, because although they are all seeing the same materials, their experiences lead them to come to slightly different conclusions about the merits of each request (which proposed activities are strategically most important, which are likeliest to be effective, which entities have the best track record, etc.)

FDC members create the following allocations.

FDC member #1:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $3

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.20

Entity #6: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents; allocated 70 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 29 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 40 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 8 cents

TOTAL: $7.80

FDC member #2:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $3

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.20

Entity #6: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents; allocated 74 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents; allocated 79 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 29 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 40 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 0 cents

TOTAL: $7.80

FDC member #3:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $3

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.18

Entity #6: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents; allocated 80 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 29 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 40 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 0 cents

TOTAL: $7.80

FDC member #4:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $3

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.20

Entity #6: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents; allocated 78 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 29 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 40 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 0 cents

TOTAL: $7.80

FDC member #5:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $3

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.20

Entity #6: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents; allocated 69 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents; allocated 74 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 29 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 40 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 10 cents

TOTAL: $7.80

FDC member #6:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $2.92

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.20

Entity #6: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents; allocated 80 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 29 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 40 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 6 cents

TOTAL: $7.80

FDC member #7:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $2.95

Entity #2: requests 22 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.10

Entity #6: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #8: requests 80 cents; allocated 75 cents

Entity #9: requests 15 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 29 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 40 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 23 cents

TOTAL: $7.80

FDC member #8: non-voting member of the WMF Board of Trustees

FDC member #9: non-voting member of the WMF Board of Trustees

This results in the following allocation

Final FDC allocation:

Entity #1: requests $3; allocated $2.98

Entity #2: requests 32 cents; allocated 22 cents

Entity #3: requests 10 cents; allocated 10 cents

Entity #4: requests 35 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #5: requests $2.20; allocated $2.18

Entity #6: requests 25 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #7: requests $1; allocated 73 cents

Entity #8: requests $1; allocated 77 cents

Entity #9: requests 45 cents; allocated 15 cents

Entity #10: requests 30 cents; allocated 30 cents

~~Entity #11: requests 22 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #12: requests 39 cents~~ ineligible entity

~~Entity #13: requests 20 cents~~ ineligible entity

Reserve: allocated 7 cents

TOTAL: $7.50

Scenario C

Here's a more difficult scenario. In this one, the FDC is given an envelope of $10 from the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, and has received funding requests that look like this:

Entity #1: requests $2

Entity #2: requests $1

Entity #3: requests $1

Entity #4: requests $1

Entity #5: requests $3

Entity #6: requests 50 cents

Entity #7: requests $3

Entity #8: requests 75 cents

Entity #9: requests $2

Entity #10: requests $3

In this scenario, the Wikimedia Foundation has determined that the request from Entity #2 is ineligible for consideration, because it does not qualify as an eligible entity. The Wikimedia Foundation has determined that the request from Entity #9 is ineligible for consideration, because its request was received three weeks after the deadline for submissions. This means the FDC has $10 to give out, and the request pool is $14.25.

The FDC has reviewed the inputs it's been given, and has held a wide-ranging discussion about the merits of requests. FDC members hold different views on how funds should be distributed, because although they are all seeing the same materials, their experiences lead them to come to slightly different conclusions about the merits of each request (which proposed activities are strategically most important, which are likeliest to be effective, which entities have the best track record, etc.)

FDC members create the following allocations.

FDC member #1:

Entity #1: requests $2; allocated $2

~~Entity #2: requests $1~~ ineligible entity

Entity #3: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $3; allocated $3

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Entity #7: requests $3; allocated $1

Entity #8: requests 75 cents; allocated 50 cents

~~Entity #9: requests $2~~ ineligible request

Entity #10: requests $3; allocated $1

Reserve; allocated 0

TOTAL: $10

FDC member #2:

Entity #1: requests $2; allocated $1.50

~~Entity #2: requests $1~~ ineligible entity

Entity #3: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $3; allocated $1.50

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Entity #7: requests $3; allocated $2

Entity #8: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

~~Entity #9: requests $2~~ ineligible request

Entity #10: requests $3; allocated $1.25

Reserve; allocated 50 cents

TOTAL: $10

FDC member #3: is busy with other things, and doesn't feel he or she can responsibly make a determination: recuses him or herself from making a determination

FDC member #4:

Entity #1: requests $2; allocated $2

~~Entity #2: requests $1~~ ineligible entity

Entity #3: requests $1; allocated 75 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated 75 cents

Entity #5: requests $3; allocated $2

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Entity #7: requests $3; allocated $1.50

Entity #8: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

~~Entity #9: requests $2~~ ineligible request

Entity #10: requests $3; allocated $1.50

Reserve; allocated 25 cents

TOTAL: $10

FDC member #5:

Entity #1: requests $2; allocated $1.25

~~Entity #2: requests $1~~ ineligible entity

Entity #3: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $1

Entity #5: requests $3; allocated $2

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 50 cents

Entity #7: requests $3; allocated $2.50

Entity #8: requests 75 cents; allocated 75 cents

~~Entity #9: requests $2~~ ineligible request

Entity #10: requests $3; allocated $1

Reserve; allocated 0

TOTAL: $10

FDC member #6:

Entity #1: requests $2; allocated $1.40

~~Entity #2: requests $1~~ ineligible entity

Entity #3: requests $1; allocated 70 cents

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated 70 cents

Entity #5: requests $3; allocated $2.10

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated 35 cents

Entity #7: requests $3; allocated $2.10

Entity #8: requests 75 cents; allocated 53 cents

~~Entity #9: requests $2~~ ineligible request

Entity #10: requests $3; allocated $2.10

Reserve; allocated 2 cents

TOTAL: $10

FDC member #7: is busy with other things, and misses the deadline for making a determination

FDC member #8: non-voting member of the WMF Board of Trustees

FDC member #9: non-voting member of the WMF Board of Trustees

This results in the following allocation

Final FDC allocation:

Entity #1: requests $2; allocated $1.63

~~Entity #2: requests $1~~ ineligible entity

Entity #3: requests $1; allocated $0.89

Entity #4: requests $1; allocated $0.89

Entity #5: requests $3; allocated $2.12

Entity #6: requests 50 cents; allocated $0.47

Entity #7: requests $3; allocated $1.82

Entity #8: requests 75 cents; allocated $0.67

~~Entity #9: requests $2~~ ineligible request

Entity #10: requests $3; allocated $1.37

Reserve; allocated $0.14

TOTAL: $10