Summary
This proposal clearly defines a Workstream Leader.
Abstract
This proposal explicitly defines the roles, responsibilities, and authority of a Workstream Leader, as it relates to
- A workstream requiring a single leader
- The authority to hire and fire within a workstream
- Discretion over the allocation of a budget approved by governance
Should this proposal pass, it will take effect after 14 days, and apply to all workstreams without a passed superseding proposal.
Current workstreams with multiple leaders are encouraged to expediently elect a single leader and adopt this definition via a separate proposal specific to their workstream.
Future proposals that create, renew, or amend workstreams will adopt this definition of a Workstream Leader by default unless explicitly defined otherwise.
Motivation
There is not an explicit definition of a Workstream Leader as approved by governance.
This proposal seeks to formalize an agreed upon definition of a Workstream Leader, including roles, responsibilities, and authority.
Resourcing and budget are intrinsically linked. A Workstream Leader cannot control one without the other.
A single Workstream Leader is proposed as a clear, effective, and familiar way to mitigate complexities that can arise with multiple Workstream Leaders related to responsibility, accountability, and conflict resolution.
Specification
Single Workstream Leader
A workstream shall have a single Workstream Leader.
The Workstream Leader shall be responsible for the direction, resourcing, budget, performance, deliverables, communication, and representation of the workstream.
The Workstream Leader may only be changed via governance. In the event of a sudden or emergency departure of a Workstream Leader, a Workstream Leader may appoint an Interim Workstream Leader by a forum post, which shall immediately follow the standard governance process.
Resourcing
The Workstream Leader shall be delegated the authority by governance to make decisions pertaining to resourcing, that is, how the funds allocated to the workstream are used to provide the services and meet proposed goals, including hiring and firing of workstream contributors.
Budget
A budget is an estimate of income and expenditure for a set period of time.
The Workstream Leader shall be delegated the authority by governance to have full discretion over how an approved budget is spent.
The Workstream Leader shall not be able to spend more than the approved budget by a proposal, without a proposal to amend said proposal.
Workstream proposals must include timephased budget estimates broken down by each month of their proposed cycle (e.g. $15,000 July, $10,000 August, etc.).
The Workstream Leader shall be responsible for coordinating with DAO treasury multi-sig signers to ensure sufficient funds are made available in Colony to ensure expenses can be paid monthly or on-demand.
Benefits
An explicitly defined and shared understanding of how workstreams and their leaders operate will remove the ambiguity that currently exists within the DAO.
Without a defined and granted delegated authority - a Workstream Leader is unable to lead. The leader role becomes that of a secretary, coordinator or spokesperson.
Drawbacks
There could exist a perceived centralization risk that arises from delegating authority to Workstream Leaders.
This is mitigated by the following
- Delegated authority is well defined and scoped to an individual workstream.
- A Workstream Leader can be removed via a governance proposal at any time.
- A Workstream Leader’s term is always limited and thus up for renewal and potential replacement at the end of any given term.
Vote
FOX Governance Process How to link legacy forum history to your Metaforo account Anonymous Feedback Submission Form 🏛️Proposal template and instructions
I would change this to say, “The Workstream leader shall be delegated the authority by governance to have full discretion over how an approved budget is spent within the bounds of that which is explicitly outlined in a proposal”
Without a change to that specific language, I would not vote for this proposal.
I agree with theobold on this. I will vote no if this is in the proposal as written
The primary issue that I take with this is the combination of sweeping responsibility and onset of effect. As I’ve explained at length in the previous forum post, the terms outlined here do not provide adequate checks against the authority granted to workstream leaders under this proposal. It is not clear that this extent of authority is at all necessary for workstream leaders to wield, and the potential for abuse is obvious.
While this may be appropriate for some workstreams, this is not generally applicable, and a problem around the onset of effect arises in the specific case of the engineering workstream. The 14-day delayed onset gives other workstreams that would prefer an alternate operating agreement time to draft a superseding charter. On the engineering workstream, however, the majority involved find these terms to be highly inappropriate, while disagrees. With these terms, is directly incentivized to do nothing during the 14-day period which follows should this proposal pass, triggering the fallback case and granting himself powers which most of those with the relevant subject matter expertise and context on the situation agree that he should definitely not have. If workstream renewal is contingent on a charter being submitted along with the proposal, since the workstream proposal requires buy-in from the contributors, then must work with the contributors to derive a fair operating agreement.
This provides an underhanded mechanism for forcing organizational decisions on a group who in majority believe this to be wrong.
A competent leader should work with his/her team to leverage the collective experience and judgment available to find optimal solutions to problems instead of forcing his/her singular opinion on the group. It is obvious that the aggregated experience and viewpoint diversity of a skilled group will far outweigh that of any individual, and it is more likely that the optimal solution can be found in the extended solution space available to the group than in the narrow solution space available to an individual.
Aside from the specific terms of the proposal, the spirit of this strategy seems to be below board and against the ethical standards of this community. This kind of behind-the-back political strategy is unhealthy for the DAO and is not what we should be doing here if we are interested in finding optimal solutions and maximizing our chances of success.
I would not vote for this proposal.
I dont disagree with your wordage. The workstream leader should be upholding the proposal, and its values. Hhowever, if this prevents the WS leader from making needed changes based on random changes that happen in the ‘world’ then this might be also be wrong. with the above, it leaves some leeway to fit with those changes. I am not sure which way is better. (I will still follow the spirit of this proposal no matter what)
Maybe someone would put up a post/proposal, with the different wordage to have that looked at?
I’m working on an alternate default agreement and example charter for the engineering workstream and will post those here in the next day or two.
Thats fine. but i was thinking more about the WS Leader post, for this topic, seeming to be contentious.
Still a ‘no’ on this.
I would much prefer the folly of governance to respond to an existential threat, than the folly of governance to respond to a theoretical, malicious actor (which should be assumed at all times).
In addition, I see no utility to the single workstream leader mandate. I would not vote for this proposal until that is also removed.
Nothing here yet, be the first one to comment.