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Week 44

Mon 27th Oct - Sun 2nd Nov 2025

Tuesday 28th October 2025

Governance Workgroup

Narrative:

This was a discursive meeting, introducing some new ideas, and wasn't aiming at making decisions at this stage.

KEY QUESTIONS:

  • Should rewards be based more on impact and outcomes, rather than (as at present) on budget requests in advance, and KPIs?

  • What changes would be required, and how might it affect funding and accountability?

  • How should we measure impact?

BUDGET APPROVAL IN RETROSPECT? This idea originated from discussions in a long Gov WG meeting last year, where it was suggested that rather than putting forward a budget plan for the coming Quarter, and getting consent in advance for things that might not happen (e.g. due to changes in token price), it might be better if WGs made spending decisions ad-hoc, and then reported at the end of the Quarter on what that had done, and if the community's consent for them to continue was given in retrospect on the basis of how they had managed their budgets. So WGs make no specific promises on what they will spend money on, other than that they will spend it wisely; and during the Quarter they can be responsive to changing conditions; and at the end, they are assessed on their results, not their promises So although there would be a danger of a WG mismanaging funds for one Quarter, after that they would no longer get the community's consent to continue.

This becomes easier now that we have implemented budget caps, so a WG cannot go above a pre-agreed amount.

And incorporating more recent discussions in GovWG about impact and outcomes - should we be asking WGs to report on the impact of their work, rather than outputs and KPIs, and is that what we should be asking the community to assess them on? So not so much "was it done?" but "was it a good idea?"

HOW TO MEASURE IMPACT? Should we use a WG's past performance / track record as a guide to assessing its impact? Perhaps not, because even a group with no track record could still have impact.

Should we take the radical approach of putting all WGs on “probation” next Quarter, and they must prove their impact in order to continue? Could be a bit too harsh - but addresses the issue that at present, if no impact is made, nothing happens and it's not a problem. But overall, people felt the "everyone is on probation" approach would be unfair, since some WGs have been producing impact.

Each WG could create a simplified / minimal Theory of Change to make intended impact cleearer - they could point to what has happened to move them towards their intended change? Or a Social Value / Social Return on Investment approach?

Problem with measuring impact is that it requires gathering data, often qualitative data - which is expensive work that WGs rarely budget for.

IMPACT, EXPERIMENTATION, RISK, AND SUSTAINABILITY OF THE PROGRAM? Guillermo: if some WGs are not bringing outcomes, it raises concerns about the sustainability of the Program. Fairness - we should not treat all workgroups the same when they have different track records. Acccountability is important - but we shouldn't be too ready to experiment or change the whole process when token price is so low.

The alternative view was that low token price is the time to experiment with our processes, as we have little to lose in financial terms.

Should we be more cautious and less experimental when token price is low? And would an "impact-based" approach mean more experimentation and risk taking, or less? If a WG tried a new idea and it failed and had no impact (even if they did other work that did have impact), would that failure mean they risk losing their funding in the following Quarter if the rest of the community disapproved? OR is the focus more on a "consent process" idea of "has it caused harm?" i.e. even if one part of a EWG;s work fails, the community would still consent if they felt that continuing to give them a budget was sufficiently safe and they were not going to keep wasting money?

REPORTING GUIDELINES, CONSENT, AND THE DANGERS OF A MAJORITY VOTe Advance planning can helps maintain focus and accountability However at times of falling token price, the need for constant "budget fitting" is a lot of overhead. It might be better to leave WGs free to decide on spending ad-hoc, in response to conditions, rather than having to conform to an advance plan that might not be sustainable. Planning would of course still be done, but it would be more internal.

Perhaps a WG's Theory of Change would become its "plan"? Keep the focus on what the impact needs to be, and respond to changing conditions to determine the best way to achieve it?

Alfred: We need clearer reporting guidelines. And - will the decision on how well a WG spent its money be a consent process, or will it morph into a majority vote? Will it give WGs too much freedom to do things without having to seek approval first? Without proper guidelines, the process couldturn into a popularity contest; and WGs with large memberships could secure majority approval even if they are not showing much impact.

IMPLEMENTING CHANGES? We noted that not all WGs are represented in Governance meetings, so they cannot be decision-making in and of themselves. But we also noted that meetings are open and people could attend if they chose - and also, any decision we suggest will be posted in the Decision-To-Be-Made Discord channel, and given a week for objections to be raised

FINAL THOUGHTS We agreed to a) reflect further on the idea of not submitting budgets in advance, and b) try to come up with other ideas for how to connect rewards with real impact. We will discuss further next meeting - the planned topic is ideas for changes to the consent process, so it's part of the same overall subject.

Discussion Points:

  • Should we shift from budget-based to impact-based rewards for workgroups.

  • Budget approval in retrospect?

  • How to measure or track impact?

  • Experimentation, risk, and sustainability of the Program?

  • Reporting guidelines, consent, and the dangers of majority voting

Decision Items:

  • A follow-up discussion will take place in the next meeting, alongside broader talks on improving the consent process. Members will reflect on alternative ways to connect rewards with demonstrated impact before then.

    • [rationale] Because the discussion today was inconclusive.

    • [opposing] Experimentation and sustainability of the Program?

    • [effect] mayAffectOtherPeople

Keywords/tags:

  • topics covered: Consent Process, transparency, fairnesss, accountability, flexibility, probation, theory of change, token price, impact, outcomes, KPIs

  • emotions: Collaborative, forward-looking, insightful, informative, Measuring outcomes, Only a few of those present spoke

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