VDP-148 Blueprint for Sustainable Growth: Operationalizing VitaDAO’s New Mandate

This proposal outlines the transition of VitaDAO to a new organizational structure, VitaDAO 2.0, which combines high-stake monitorship with decentralized autonomous execution, enhancing operational efficiency, maintaining strategic alignment, and promoting scalable growth.

Authors: @alexdobrin , @PaulHaas , @Alex

Summary

VitaDAO’s 2024-2025 mandate introduced the need for an new organizational design:

This proposal elaborates on this need and suggests a new operational framework that guards the mandate and improves execution capacity.

Here’s how this structure helps ensure VitaDAO’s future:

Specification

Guardians

Guardians uphold the mission and mandate of VitaDAO and play a crucial role in steering its direction. The group is comprised of key stakeholders with significant VITA holdings, and is limited to seven members ("pizza team"), though not all seats have to be taken at all times.

• Application criteria and requirements
  • Members who are at the top 1% of governance power (inclusively of delegated tokens) can apply to become Guardians. The exact threshold will be determined based on the analysis of top token holders provided by Etherscan or a similar source. Members are allowed to serve as delegatees to get to the minimum amount of tokens required for candidacy.
  • Where Guardians have the opportunity to be rewarded for performing their oversight responsibilities well, through the granting of additional governance power, there also is a need to establish commitment and a sense of urgency for Guardians. Therefore, Guardians must be prepared to risk a limited amount of their existing governance power should their performance not meet quantifiable performance metrics.
  • Guardians shall host internal meetings every two weeks and hold a semi-annual face-to-face gathering. These meetings are critical for setting the agenda and overseeing high-level mandates for Pods and Pod Leads. The agenda and main outcomes of these meetings should be openly communicated to Pod Leads & the broader VITA community.
  • While Pod Leads can serve as Guardians, this is not a hard a requirement.
• Detailed responsibilities
  1. Assigning/terminating Pod Leads: Guardians shall have the right and responsibility to assign and terminate Pod Leads autonomously and negotiate terms privately on a case-by-case basis. Guardians have the duty to communicate the assignment/termination of any Pod Lead openly to the community. Finally, any community member can push VDPs in appeal for any assignment/termination.
  2. Terminating fellow Guardians: Guardians shall have the right and responsibility to keep other Guardians accountable and terminate those that fail to meet expected standards of performance, commitment or work ethics. Any termination must be communicated to the community and any community member can push VDPs in appeal for that termination. Decisions to terminate a Guardian should follow the Modified Consensus framework.
  3. Budgetary framework: Guardians are responsible for setting a budgetary framework for each Pod. However, the detailed allocation and management of this budget falls under Pod Leads’ purview. Moreover, Guardians have the authority to veto budget decisions that diverge from the established mandate or mission of VitaDAO and potential attack vectors (See ENS DAO). This veto power is a critical aspect of their role, as it allows them to maintain strategic alignment and prevent deviations from the organization's core goals and values. Along with the veto, Guardians should provide a detailed explanation and constructive feedback to Pod Leads, outlining why the budget decision does not align with VitaDAO's mission or mandate.
  4. Strategic planning/direction: Guardians will be responsible for interfacing with Pod Leads and suggesting strategic directions.
  5. Performance review & reporting: Guardians will have the key responsibility of reviewing the performance of Pod Leads and auditing their progress. The main output of this effort should be in the form of a community-wide report to all token holders. This reporting shall be done through an open community call to be held on a quarterly basis.
  6. Guardians agree to adhere to the Modified Consensus Process for decision making.

Pods

This proposal establishes the creation of two Pods: the Longevity Pod and the Web3 Pod. Pods should be seen as executional units led by a Pod Lead and operating with significant autonomy. Each Pod will be responsible for executing a specific mandate under the constraint of having a budget approved by Guardians. Furthermore, Pods will outline an operational scope, have leadership responsibilities, manage the budget autonomously and report progress bi-weekly directly to Guardians. Pod Leads will be directly supported by Guardians and a nest of DAO contributors.

Budget and Compensation

A thorough compensation framework will be presented and vetted by the community in a separate proposal. This VDP outlines some of the high-level components upon which the new proposal shall be based:

• Elected Guardians shall be entitled to receive recognition from the DAO based on their oversight/governance performance in the form of additional governance power. The performance metrics and mechanisms used to establish the granting of further governance power will be proposed separately as part of an overarching compensation framework. The allocation will be determined based on aggregated responsibilities (e.g., if they’re also executing as Pod Leads) and an yearly performance evaluation. Moreover, a mechanism which, if a Guardian fails to meet expected standards of performance or work ethics, could result in a reduction in governance power is anticipated.
• Pod Leads receive competitive salaries that should be negotiated on a case-by-case basis.
• Contributors compensation will be project-specific within Pods’ budgets and should be based on the OBRA model.

Implementation

The new structure will be implemented through a phased approach, starting with Pod Formation and Guardians elections.

1. Establishment of Pods
   • If approved, this proposal greenlights the creation of the Longevity and the Web3 Pod. These Pods can be incorporated as limited companies in any jurisdiction deemed strategic for its operations.
   • Contributors currently working under the Working Group scheme can be relocated to one of the Pods according to its internal demands. Service provider contracts that are currently active between VitaDAO Global Services (VGS) and contributors or their legal entities will either be terminated or transferred in full to one of the Pods. In both cases, the affected party shall be notified immediately.
   • Ongoing initiatives like The Longevist, Ambassadors Program, etc, will also automatically fall under one of the new Pods and budgeting shall be reevaluated by the lead. For gap periods where there’s no assigned lead for a given Pod, all initiatives underneath that Pod shall be directly managed by Guardians or fully interrupted until a new lead takes over.
2. Guardians election
   • The election will be conducted through a single Snapshot vote, utilizing a weighted voting mechanism. This method allows tokenholders to express their support for multiple candidates (or none), distributing their vote proportionally according to their preferences and ensuring a democratic and representative selection process that reflects the collective decision of the VitaDAO community. Candidates that receive the highest aggregate support will be elected as Guardians. The initial election will nominate no more and no less than 5 people to serve as Genesis Guardians. Two seats will remain open so as to incentivize greater contribution from members that aspire to serve as Guardians. The election or nomination of new members shall be held at any time.
3. Appointment of Pod Leads
   • Once elected, Guardians will be responsible for hiring and onboarding top-tier talent to lead each one of the Pods. Though Guardians will be responsible for carrying out interviews, reference checks and negotiating terms, any community member can suggest candidates to serve as Guardians. A contributor that manages to source a candidate that ends up being hired as Pod Lead will be fairly compensated for the effort.
   • Guardians shall also serve as Pod Leads if deemed the right person to take over the role. There should be a hard limit of no more than 50% of Guardians serving as Pod Leads at any given time.