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Wikimedia Foundation employees in the US vote 158:14 for union representation

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https://web.archive.org/web/20260904013711/https://www.nlrb.gov/case/20-RC-391740

Lisa Seitz-Gruwell departs Wikimedia Foundation, Wikimedia Endowment

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A woman with shoulder-length light-brown hair wearing a brown jacket and blue jeans sitting smiling on a low wall in a garden
Lisa Seitz-Gruwell has departed the Wikimedia Foundation after 15 years

Wikimedia's longstanding Chief Advancement Officer Lisa Seitz-Gruwell left the Wikimedia Foundation last month and has been replaced as Chief Advancement Officer and President of the Wikimedia Endowment by Sheetal Puri, who has taken on both roles in an interim capacity.

Lisa had announced her upcoming departure before Wikimania, reflecting on 15 years at the WMF:

[...] When you spend a decade and a half immersed in the Wikimedia ecosystem, it fundamentally alters your worldview. We live in an era defined by digital fragmentation, where the dominant internet business models are built to monetize outrage, construct walled gardens, and divide our attention. Wikipedia stands in contrast to this, and it has been immensely rewarding to be a part of it.

What this community has proven is that humanity will actually choose to build something beautiful, collaborative, and entirely dedicated to the public good if they are simply given the space and the tools to do so. Protecting this global information commons has been a defining privilege in my professional life.

But I want to be entirely transparent with you: when I first arrived 15 years ago, I didn’t fully understand how this magic actually happened. And the community, quite healthily, didn’t fully know what to make of me either.

I think back to my first Wikimania, where I was viewed with a healthy, distinct dose of Wikimedian skepticism. To many of you, I wasn’t quite a peer yet; I was a walking dollar sign. I was affectionately—and sometimes pointedly—dubbed “the money lady.” There is a world where an executive might find that frustrating. But as I grew to understand this community, I realized that skepticism wasn’t a bug; it was a feature. It was the natural, protective immune system of a community that fiercely guards its independence and its values. It took some time to earn your trust, and honestly, that’s exactly how it should be.

In the process of earning that trust, you fundamentally changed me for the better.

Before Wikimedia, I thought I understood what collaboration meant. In the outside world, “collaboration” is often just a buzzword for a top-down committee meeting. You taught me what true collaboration looks like. It is messy, it is passionate, it requires patience, and it demands a profound willingness to listen to voices across different cultures, languages, and perspectives. You taught me that the best consensus isn’t the easiest one, but the one forged through rigorous debate and a shared devotion to truth. You patrolled my understanding of the community with the same terrifying, beautiful precision you use to patrol the edits on a featured article.

While my role focused primarily on building financial sustainability, I have always been acutely aware that the real value of Wikipedia isn’t the capital we raise—it’s the billions of edits you make. It is your late-night citation hunts, your copyright verifications, your formatting fixes, and your radical commitment to neutrality. You are the ones doing the heavy lifting. [...]

Lisa has now joined the Buck Institute for Research on Aging as Chief Advancement Officer. The Signpost wishes Lisa all the best in her new career setting. AK

Requests for comment

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Good article nominations process rehashed

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WP:GAN mega RFC (located at Wikipedia:Good article nominations/August 2026 RfC)

There were 35 separate proposals up for comment, grouped into these topics: nominators, nominations, reviews, reviewing initiatives, volunteer roles (coordinators), and other.

A special issue of Good Article Gazette "With several major discussions underway" preceded the RfC.

See The Signpost's 2010 "Dispatches" piece comparing Good Article review to other content rating and improvement initiatives.

Arbcom elections

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Watch Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee Elections December 2026, add content here. Possible addition of an affirmation that the candidate is using two-factor authentication for account security.

Brief notes

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