User:Mpande

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Revision as of 20:40, 27 March 2011 by Mpande (talk | contribs)

Mani Pande is the head of research in the Global Development Department of the Wikimedia Foundation.

In this role, Mani works across the Global Development team and the organization as a whole to design and lead research work that helps us make good strategic decisions and evaluate the results of the work that we do (to make even better decisions). Mani is heading Wikipedia's quantitative research efforts to understand editors and readers. Her work also involves working closely with the engineering and product team to design the next generation of Wikipedia's mobile platform. In addition, Mani is designing and deploying metrics for key Global Development areas so that we can monitor our performance against the strategic plan.

A native of New Delhi, Mani brings a global perspective to our work. Her passion lies in understanding how users use technology to map opportunity spaces for new product strategies and industry growth. She has a special interest in the transformative technology experiences brought about through the use of mobile devices in the Global South.

Mani is an accomplished quantitative researcher & has conducted surveys studying technology usage, sustainability and health in US, India and China. Mani is an experienced ethnographer having conducted work in India, Brazil, Russia and China on technology usage and studying women in the software industry. Mani worked for the Institute for the Future, a forecasting research organization based in Palo Alto, for over 5 years, before joining the foundation. She has a PhD in Sociology from Kansas State University and an MA and MPhil in Sociology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Before moving to the US to pursue her PhD, Mani worked as a reporter-cum-sub-editor for The Times of India. Her beats were media & crime.

Mani is an active user of social networking technologies. You can find her on twitter (@manipande. You can also follow Mani's thoughts on research on her personal blog.