---
tags: sustainability
---

# DAOhaus Sustainability Session (6/8/22)

## Overview

These summaries were distilled from the burn rate survey sent to Warcamp contributors. The survey was largely an ideation process, so many of the patterns or trends that we outline here only scratch the surface. Please read the the full answers and wihteboard used for organizaing responses in the [Figjam](https://www.figma.com/file/EGqpBXDUwqJpBl8hXzLCze/DH---Burn-Rate-Survey-Whiteboard?node-id=178%3A656).

## Summaries

### Are you currently compensated through the retroactive track or the commitment track?

### Do you feel like we need to reduce burn?

### Do you think there should be a monthly cap/target on all DAO spending (wages, expenses, grants, etc)

Given our interpretations of the responses we received, we found that there were 4 focused categories of response to this question.

1) Broadly supportive (5.5)
2) Supportive, but no hard caps (5)
3) Broadly 'No' (1.5)
4) Maybe/muddled (2)

Note: The .5 indicates a split response between *Yes* and *No*

Overall, a very large percentage of the respondants were in favour of some sort of monthly budget. However, about half of the respondants that were in favour of a cap/target mention explicitly that the target should be flexible or non-arbitrary (a budget or target). A key takeaway here is that the DAO is largely in favour of some sort of budget and it will likely need to be flexible.

### Should we change how retroactive contributors currently bill the DAO? If so, then how?

All respondents agreed that the overall process for Retroactive contributor compensation needs to be changed in some way.

One third of Warcamp respondants expressed a desire for more *explicit comparison* of work completed/contributions made to the compensation requested. Many surfaced the need for a *review process*.

Roughly half of Warcamp respondents went a step further, suggesting that Retroactive compensation be standardized in some fashion. Potential ideas surfaced were looking to fair-market value for work and roles whereas other respondents expressed interest in replacing/augmenting the Retroactive track with a bounty system.

There is another thread around *standardizing process across tracks*. A few respondents expressed interest in creating more alignment in compensation standards (across both Commitment and Retroactive tracks), including giving Retroactive contributors a value-level similar to the Commitment track.

Another suggestion is to combine the reporting and request processes across both tracks. One respondent mentioned that the *lack of standardization* in expectations and level of evaluation across tracks potentially creates perverse/unwanted incentives for *staying* on the Retroactive track. We found this observation noteworthy.

Next steps:
- Drill down further into what *review* means since there is some nuance here
- Drill down further into common forms of standardized retro practices (fair market value, bounty boards)
- There is a review of both the set rate and that the work matches it

### Should we change how we determine value levels for commitment track contributors? If so, then how?

A quote that summarizes the challenges of this problem:
>‘A big challenge is that this impacts both the DAO's resources (ie runway) as well as contributor identity/psychology/reputation. So it needs to carefully designed and respectful of both considerations.’

Overall 6 of respondants incidated ‘yes’, we should change how commitment track values are determined. The others responses weren’t as straightforward with yes, just providing ideas and insights. The indication is that there is a large overall majority that believe this needs to change.

The responses to this question are extremely varied, we highly recommend you go look at the responses yourself.

4 of the respondents referenced moving compensation into individual circles to decide.

>‘this should likely be done within Circles since folks within Circles know each other's capabilities more than folks cross-Circles. This gets tricky if someone splits their time, but their value should be assessed based on time % and value claim per Circle.’

4 of respondents noted that more accountability and standards would be useful to implement.

>‘creating a clear objective standard for evaluation supplemented by an option for individuals to submit their own highly subjective standards.’

#### Notable ideas
A number of ideas for implementation were given for this question, and given the distinctions between ideas, it was nearly impossible to group them succinctly.

Here are a few that stood out that had multiple people giving similar answers.

**Worksteams/Projects vs Roles**
2 responses brought up determining value based on project vs. role-based compensation to help with accountability or time and value.
>‘Evaluate projects, not people’

>‘There needs to be more accountability. If contributors were more dedicated to smaller workstreams with clear deliverables we might be able to better understand where people are not delivering.’

**Industry Standard Pay**
2 reponses noted using industry pay levels to help reflect compensation level.

>‘Probably a mix of industry standard amounts contrasted with the level of demand in the space.’

>‘The scale that we have created gives no deference to the individual role. Doctors have very specialized abilities and are compensated on a different pay scale than Nurses. Maybe it takes creating different scales for each circle?’

Honorable Mention: Adjusting levels for Nuance
>‘we should consider increasing the number of value levels from 5 to perhaps 7-9. I've observed that contributors (understandably) want to be recognized for growth, but in some cases, from the DAO's perspective, the step up to a new level is higher than the growth the contributor has demonstrated. The result is that we now have everybody claiming they are either a 4 or a 5, which is not true; the distribution of value created by contributors varies much more than by 1 level.’

See additional responses for more ideas not pulled.

### How could we detect & handle a disparity between an individual's compensation and their contribution?

When detecting a potential disparity between an individual's compensation and their contributions, the majority of Warcamp respondents suggested *peer review* as a model to help us decide. Of that group, there was a variety of suggested mechanisms to help us get there, such as 1)review by a small group, 2) the buddy system, or 3) within circles/workstreams. One of the key strengths of this approach is that the reviewers have context and valuable insights into the value contributed.

Outside of the peer review model, some respondents mentioned using a project/task model "to evaluate projects, not people." Other respondents recommended an escalation or flag system with the distinction being that we only run the evaluation process if there are enough flags raised.

One participant raised a concern that it is difficult to make informed decisions about this without more *objective metrics*.

There were a few fairly specific suggestions, so we recommend that folks review the [Figjam](https://www.figma.com/file/EGqpBXDUwqJpBl8hXzLCze/DH---Burn-Rate-Survey-Whiteboard?node-id=0%3A1) with the survey responses.

### How do you feel about delegating authority and responsibility to elected representatives to determine compensation values and resolving disputes?

Forty percent of respondents were *against* this, and 33.3% responded that it would depend on other factors.

Two respondents quantified their answers in such a way that suggested that there may be a *softer* approach than what the question is asking.

> "Not sure I feel good about reps determining compensation, but like the idea of dispute resolution committees."

> "The point of web3 and DAOs is to build and use better systems of coordination. Tools are out there, they just need to be put to effective use."

> "There are too many contributors for us all to be aware enough of what one another are doing and there are also enough of us to create tragedy-of-the-commons type conditions for doing this kind of evaluation."

- As a followup: "Do you want a dispute resolution committee?"
- Element of power as a thread throughout the responses. Worth noting that the phrasing of the question lumps in a simple dispute resolution committee with a broader delegation system. Definitely worth drilling deeper before we can confidently say how the DAO (respondants) feels about this.

- Sharp question -> responses around power

### Should tools like Coordinape factor in to compensation levels? Do you feel like it represents value created?

Fairly polarized responses to this with nearly a split down the middle between **Broadly No Leaning** and **Broadly Yes Leaning**. Interestingly, in each bucket there was a bit of a mirror image:
- 1 outright yes and 8 yes, but...
- 1 no w/ caveats and 5 outright no

This may indicate that folks do see potential usecases for Coordinape, but less so as a factor in compensation since there was only **1 outright yes**.

Interestingly, there was common feedback themes between the Yes and No responses. This made some of these slightly difficult to categorize since many with caveats could potentially go either direction depending on how the responses are read.

Some of the *Yes, but...* and *No* responses had similar feedback, so it seems that **folks see Coordinape as imperfect as the sole tool for impacting value levels and governance.**

**Common feedback points across both spectrums:**
- Imperfect in current form
- Useful as one of many inputs
- Potentially biased toward social/visible contributors
- Lack of granularity / objective evaluation
- Useful as a signal but not as a primary tool for evaluation
- Concern around Coordinape being sole method for allocating governance shares

**Coordinape is good for/at...**
- bonus or supplementary comp
- as a reference point or one of multiple forms of input

**Coordinape is bad for/at/because...**
- measures visibility and popularity, not value
- as a result, determining primary compensation and/or governance power

**Suggestions for how to better use Coordinape**
- smaller and multiple circles
- better weighting of individual input

### Would you be comfortable with expectations increasing or compensation rates going down during a bear market?

We skipped distilling this answer due to a few reasons:
- Other solutions will likely help addressing concerns here
- It may be too contextual to this current moment in the market
- Results were too mixed to provide any actionable takaways, given the strict deadline for this initiative.

### Currently, we have a 50% limit on the amount of compensation we can receive in HAUS. Should we remove that limit?

Nearly 2/3 of respondents think we should either raise the 50% limit on HAUS compensation or remove it altogether.

Most suggest doing this without reservation, citing a mix of advantages to the warcamp runway, increase to contributor choice, and better matching of risk and reward.

A small number want to remove the time lock requirement, while an equal number of others want to keep the time lock in place.

Three respondents think we should not change the limit, with two expressing concerns about the impact of raising the limit on issues of equity and a desire to avoid too divergent a distribution of HAUS tokens.

### Should we change how we're onboarding? Should we still continue to actively recruit contributors?

The majority of respondents expressed a desire to continue onboarding new contributors, as long as its done deliberately and only where appropriate or needed.

Suggestions for how to do so include establishing a target number of contributors, more clearly identifying needs and skill gaps, and introducing a more robust application process for prospective contributors.

A minority suggested that we should pause bringing on new recruits until we don’t have concerns about our burn rate, we have a process for offboarding existing contributors, and/or until we’ve given an opportunity for existing contributors to ramp up their engagement as much as they’d like.

A couple contributors suggested that we eliminate the retroactive track altogether and replace it with bounties.

### Do you have any ideas to help make DAOhaus more efficient/lean?

There is sentiment that “focus” needs to be prioritized. There also seems to be a push towards leaner, efficient teams that are held accountable to the work they do, possibly even placing more importance in sub-DAOs. There is a feeling that we should be dealing with our current workflow and reduce unnecessary overhead. There also seems to be a push towards a bounty system for non commited contributors.

While a core theme is "focus," this question had a variety of responses, so we encourage folks to visit the [Figjam](https://www.figma.com/file/EGqpBXDUwqJpBl8hXzLCze/DH---Burn-Rate-Survey-Whiteboard?node-id=178%3A656) to read through the responses.

### Are there any other general thoughts or ideas you'd like to share?

On this question, 58% of respondents provided comment regarding being valued and providing value. 25% were more in the accountability and production count. 17% commented on the survey itself.

Was pretty tough to gleam any insights from that summary, so we used the open comments to help draw our conclusion.

## Conclusions

Given that much of this survey was open-ended there were several ideas generated throughout. The core value of this is in the [Figjam](https://www.figma.com/file/EGqpBXDUwqJpBl8hXzLCze/DH---Burn-Rate-Survey-Whiteboard?node-id=178%3A656) itself, and we encourage folks to read through the responses, categorization, and summaries. We've categorized the questions in each section, but there are several threads throughout the entire survey.

As this survey was so broad, our immediate next step is highlighting items that are *actionable* that can be put into a proposal. With that said, there are other items that are *starting points* for additional discussion and deeper dives.

*While it may look like it, Jeremy is not the author for every single response in the Figma file.*

## Proposal Approach Ideas & Next Steps

- **Red Team/Blue Team** for the process proposal
- Short term & long term
- Sticking with current system with iterations & revamping completely from scratch
- Both teams revisit the data and draw conclusions and we see where there is emergence
- Ideas and concepts throughout responses that coalesce around *returning to Circle primacy* which is in contrast with the current direction we're going in
- Whoever writes the proposal can have the autonomy to approach this however makes sense based on the inputs/data from the survey
- Near term solutions would be more mandatory, but should ideally include longer term propositions as well
- Not more than 3 folks per team to keep things moving forward
- Async work to refine the survey process
- Open call for proposals
- Won't need to be fully flushed out -- can be ideas/outline
- Deadline would be Monday before Warcamp