[Osmf-talk] The 'Paying People' question

Simon Poole simon at poole.ch
Sun Nov 29 11:35:13 UTC 2015



Am 29.11.2015 um 12:03 schrieb Robert Banick:
> I’ve personally always thought that the paid staff vs. not- paid staff
> dichotomy was a false one. What about temporary consultants hired to
> accomplish specific tasks or build specific tools? What about
> part-time staf who hold down unglamorous functions so we the community
> can focus on the bigger picture? I’m more interested in those two
> options coming to pass than I am full-time paid staff, thogh I don’t
> recoil in horror from the latter. I just think that OSM needs a lot of
> love on specific tools and more resources for community-building.
>
It probably needs to be repeated: the OSMF already outsources and pays
for work done on its behalf, for example: accounting, 3 different groups
of legal counsels (IP NA and Europe, corporate UK, the later pro bono)
and in the past has paid for software development. There is no reason
the board couldn't, and I suspect nobody would oppose, engage a
secretarial service if deemed necessary (secretarial work seeming to be
the current beef the board has).

> I understand paying people in general is a change for OSM but as
> Frederik mentions, it doesn’t have to be an extreme.
>

The questions raised centre more around (when this was raised by
Frederik a couple of months back):

- giving up the pay as you go model without clear reasoning
- employing somebody without a clear job description (aka lets employ
somebody and then find something for them to do)
- doing the above and as a consequence entering in to larger and
potentially longer financial commitment without a jota of financial
planning (at least nothing that has been presented in any form to the
membership)

Simon

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