Context

About 4 months have passed since the first iteration of our Organizational Design, during which we’ve experimented with an almost fully decentralized model, with little to no traditional paradigms guiding collaboration.

We have observed many interesting upsides to a decentralized work and coordination model, including:

1. providing opportunities for new members to demonstrate their abilities and become core contributors;
2. engaging our community and compensating those who make valuable contributions;
3. fostering a culture of openness and meritocracy;
4. improving integration of different areas of the DAO.

However, we also noticed many downsides to not having centralized, hierarchical leadership, such as:

1. lack of accountability when things go wrong;
2. unreliability and lack of continuity in the work being carried out;
3. unpredictable/highly variable compensation, making it harder to retain talent;
4. lack of focus and direction.

In light of these findings, we’ve come to the conclusion that a mix of centralized and decentralized contribution is the ideal model to be adopted, specially considering the early stage of our DAO. We believe this mix should be adjusted as the context of the DAO evolves.

The purpose of this proposal is to capitalize on these observations and update our organizational design accordingly, in an effort to increase our performance and the likelihood of achieving our vision for Fingerprints DAO.

Proposal

Organizational Structure

• Fingerprints’ updated organizational structure shall be the following:

  https://imgur.com/BIkbt1w

Centralized Contribution

1. A core team shall be formed to take responsibility for the performance of each area of the DAO;
2. A CEO-like position shall be elected by the community in a token-weighted snapshot referendum, with a term lasting until Jan 1st, 2023, whereupon a new election shall be held, along with a yearly financial budget;
   1. Fingerprints members will have the power to impeach the officer during his/her term with a snapshot token-weighted vote, in which the incumbent shall not participate.
3. Each organizational area will be led by a member in a fixed-position, to be appointed by Fingerprints’ CEO;
4. Core team members shall report to Fingerprints’ elected CEO, who will have the power to replace them as he/she wishes;
5. The specific details of each fixed role will be decided and negotiated by Fingerprints’ CEO and the chosen applicant for the position, including:
   1. role expectations and responsibilities;
   2. decision-making power, including the ability to hire staff;
   3. performance measures;
   4. compensation package, which might include a mix of fixed and performance-based compensation, to be paid either in cash (i.e. stablecoin or ETH), tokens ($PRINTS or others from the FP ecosystem), or a mix of both.
6. The total compensation expense shall be capped by a yearly budget, to be defined via a Snapshot-approved proposal;
7. Expense budgets might be assigned by the CEO to core contributors, with the sum capped at the yearly budget limits;
8. The core team must provide detailed reports of their progress to the DAO every quarter end;
9. The CEO must address and report to the DAO every 6 months;
10. The CEO and core team must strive to reduce centralization during their tenure, without detriment to the DAO’s performance.

Decentralized Contribution

1. All members of the DAO will be able to participate and engage with the open work being carried out in our token-gated channels;
2. Core team members shall decide on a budget and time period for compensation to be distributed via a decentralized Coordinape compensation vote to contributing community members, analogous to the current model;
   1. Core team members will be able to vote (but not receive votes or any compensation), and might exercise the right to distribute up to 3x the amount of votes of non-core team members;
   2. Core team members will be able to set bounties for specific one-off tasks, up to the limit imposed in the period’s decentralized compensation budget.
3. Core team members will be able to elaborate a system of contributor tiers, where the most active and valuable non-core members will have their status recognized within the community and earn better rewards.

Closing Remarks

We’re confident that these changes are crucial to Fingerprints’ ability to deliver on its vision, and remain excited about the potential of this hybrid model to allow for flexibility and openness within our community.

We’ll continue to iterate on this design in the future as we learn more about what works and doesn’t in our daily execution.

The community remains the final source of legitimacy and power, with the core team existing to serve and attend to the interests of the community.