Thanks for pointing this out. WMF's earliest Glassdoor reviews were utterly useless, thanks to Wikipedia fans posting phony happy-talk. It looks as if someone removed the dozens of fake reviews from pre-2018. Leaving an amazing stream of 2.0 ratings, going back to 2011.
These current reviews are ALSO quite typical for nonprofits. Leaden bureaucracy, turmoil, backstabbing management that fires anyone who gives them "bad news", and massive dishonesty and lack of clarity. Once a nonprofit board figures out steady fundraising and have an endowment built up, they are "too big to fail".
This comment screams "Lila Tretikov". Rumors were commonplace about her being very quick to shitcan people. She wanted only yes-men and yes-women--just like Jimbo.
The last ED dealt with staff that challenged her bad decisions by firing everyone.
This 2016 review is one of the best encapsulations of the WMF I've seen yet. Concise and accurate for the Maher era, which was NOT much different from Tretikov--with the added "bonus" of greater secrecy.
Pros
1) Staff largely dedicated to the org's values.
2) Supports one of the most productive volunteer online communities and owns one of the most popular western online brands, Wikipedia.
3) Wikipedia is fairly independent of the actual org and will run for years unless Ops breaks down.
Cons
1) Technology is rotten to the core relative to what would be needed to move Wikipedia into the mobile area and large parts of the chaotic product team have every incentive to protect the status quo.
2) The sitting ED, in charge for nearly half a year, has neither the background required nor shown the single-minded determination to deliver the hire of senior executives capable of cleaning up the broken tech foundations.
3) The org, pressured by declining readership and challenged fundraising, apparently has no desire to focus its restraint resources on fixing the fundamental tech issues and instead branches out into novel pet projects.
There's been a lot of leadership turnover, and still, the people at the highest levels only care about self-serving antics and politics. Even though leadership pushes narratives that it is "woke" and "equity is centered" when they have the chance to live those values, they fail. The Wikimedia Foundation should win an academy award for performative activism. The good people burn out and leave. Nothing changes because no one has the energy to speak up, or they are afraid to lose their jobs so they keep taking it until they can't anymore. My advice to leadership is to face reality. Stop failing the people who are doing the work while you all sit around and play politics.
