The following report outlines the impact of the team’s goals during the transition period of Season 1 as a measure to share progress and stay accountable and transparent with the community. The goals stated in the proposal included maintaining the essential services of the TEC, defining accountability systems, clarifying project management and governance processes, clarifying the relationship between voluntary and paid contributions among the Coordination Team, and the stewardship transformation. In addition to these, the team also worked on a series of crucial and really exciting initiatives that we would like to share some progress on. And lastly, we’d like to invite you to complete a team’s performance poll that can be found at the end of this post.
Initiatives:
The team delivered a strategic framework to help the TEC clarify desired outcomes and align these outcomes with its resources, stakeholders, and workflows. You can learn all about it here.
The team has been collaborating intensively with Angela from the Token Engineering Academy in pulling together a plan for merging the two entities. They have investigated various legal structures and have developed a joint strategy for coordinating operations between both entities going forward, as detailed in the Joint TEA-TEC Plan for AI-Powered Token Engineering and $TEC Utility. Learn more about this here.
We started working on our new “Token Engineering Grants Program ‘’ by becoming one of just a few early stage Gitcoin Allo partners to be able to run our own quadratic funding rounds that will aim to increase funding dynamism for token engineering projects. To achieve this, we obtained an ENS small grant, and secured a $25k matching pool for the program through a successful proposal.
The Schelling Point Initiative has been experimenting with the use of Research and Interest Groups as a method for bootstrapping the use of the Curation Service. Currently, the SPI has onboarded three unique groups: The Reputation Systems Open Research Group, the Bonding Curves Research Group, and the TE Stakeholder Research Group. The Reputation Systems group has experimented with ways to onboard new members into the group through weekly meetings and weekly twitter spaces that engages with the broader TE Community around topical areas. We are looking forward to capturing the momentum that these groups have already brought to this project. Learn more about this initiative here.
Season 1 Goals:
To ensure the TEC’s minimal but sustainable operation, we created a roles system initially including 22 distinct roles across six key areas: Strategic Planning & Organizational Development, Economic Development & Service Operations, Communications, Tech Support, and Finance & Accounting. This approach will provide us with clear guidance on the required tasks to keep the TEC running, while also allowing flexibility and certainty for when people enter or leave the team at any moment.
Recognizing accountability as a vital factor in fostering teamwork within a non-hierarchical structure, we have taken steps to design various tools and systems for measuring and evaluating accountability levels both at the individual and team levels.
Budgeting System
Developing an effective budgeting system has been one of our priorities as it was something that the TEC did not have in the past. Our goal was to improve our funding management and accounting practices. Thanks to these efforts, we have been successful in maintaining the TEC’s essential functions with a monthly budget of 10,000 xDAI, which is only a quarter of the previous average monthly operating costs of 39,000 xDAI.
Individual & Team Accountability Tools
We are also currently in the process of rolling out several measures, including a team agreement that outlines our principles and responsibilities, a sanctions system to foster accountability and prompt appropriate actions if required, tools like surveys and polls for peer and self-evaluations, and soliciting community feedback on our overall team performance. Additionally, we provide regular updates on our work, like this report, to ensure transparency and keep the community informed. It’s worth noting that these measures are still in the process of being implemented after receiving extensive feedback from the team,
We are also committed to introducing new and improving current mechanisms for continuous improvement in our role-based system and organizational processes.
Project Management Processes
Our team has been continuously working on defining the most suitable project management practices and methodologies that cater to the needs of our members, the TEC, and the evolving industry landscape, all while staying true to the principles of decentralization and DAO structures. Moving forward we plan on refining and adopting the AGILE approach that the TEC has used in the past while integrating it with enhanced accountability, budgeting and compensations practices.
Governance Processes
Funding TE public goods while protecting the CP
One of the big changes is the way that we fund token engineering public goods with the new “Token Engineering Grants Program ‘’ using Gitcoin’s Allo protocol for running our own quadratic funding rounds. This new program shifts our use of Common Pool funds to act as a matching funds catalyst to spur donations to token engineering public goods from others. We eventually hope to have significant portions of these matches covered by funding partners such as ENS and Ethereum Foundation. The result will be a much more robust and sustainable flow of public goods funding without it acting as a continual drain on our Common Pool.
Conviction Voting to TAO Voting
The move from Conviction Voting to TAO Voting marks a much needed shift in the way we govern spending decisions within the TEC. It has been a complex process due to the fact that we have been forced to do it while simultaneously allowing for the submission of several spending proposals; much like fixing a jet while flying. There have been hiccups along the way, but we are on schedule to complete the process on April 20th.
Paid Contributions
The team has also been dedicated to developing a compensation model that finds fairness through accountability in serving the mission of the TEC. While this has been a difficult and ongoing process, we have made significant progress in transitioning from a rigid hourly wage structure to a more dynamic approach that tries to offer economic security and predictability to team members, while also incorporating a more flexible component that allows for objective and project-based compensation. Though we continue to refine this model iteratively, our goal remains to ensure that all contributors are compensated fairly and equitably in coordinating the work of the commons in an effective and accountable way.
Open/Voluntary Contributions
Our progress on this matter has been limited by time constraints and changing priorities, preventing us from achieving as much as we had initially intended. However, we are optimistic that we are laying the groundwork for future progress through different initiatives, such as the SPI and its associated curation service, which are generating a lot of new possibilities to explore in the months to come. As we look for ways to integrate these kinds of community contributions into the AI focus in Season 2, we anticipate the creation of new opportunities for anyone to contribute to the commons in a simple, permissionless, and impactful manner really soon.
Advisory Network
We are in the early stages of creating a network of influential individuals with diverse backgrounds and expertise in the field of TE. This network will serve as a valuable resource for high-level consultation and advice on a regular basis, helping to guide important decisions for the TEC. The initial focus will be on supporting the token engineering AI Proof of Concept.
Contributors Definition
As part of the ongoing transformation of stewardship within the TEC, we have also begun the process of defining and categorizing the various types of contributors within our community. Our goal is to provide greater clarity for individuals interested in joining the TEC and to outline the different pathways available for personal and professional development.
TEC Coordination Team Performance Poll:
We want to hear from the community about how they feel we’ve been doing lately, so we set up a pol.is poll with 16 different statements for people to share their sentiment.
We highly encourage community members to spare just 10 minutes of their day to complete this poll. Your feedback will mean a lot to us and will go a long way in helping us figure out where we can improve and keep growing as a team. You can find the poll here!