Q1 Operations Guild Update

dxDAO
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The last few months have been exciting ones for DXdao and the Operations Guild. We have seen contributors come and go, and work continues on multiple products at the same time the DAO is trying to define a flagship purpose and product. We are dogfooding our own processes and trying to live the decentralized and open ethos that we aspire to and preach.

Treasury proposals by Karpatkey and Avantegarde were unexpected and led to some good discussion about treasury management. A potential deal to acquire mStable was pondered but ultimately shelved due to a lack of interest by the DAO. But the most influential component of Q1 has been the Redemption Balancer Process, which we hope will continue to evolve and shape the DAO and its contributors.

The Operations Guild budget for 1H2023 was $170k ($28.3k a month) and there was an additional $5.7k sent for 1H2023 contributor stipends.

Overall H2 2023 Guild Milestones and Goals

  • Steward DXdao through the new budgetary process and 1st 6-month cycle, including the rollout of Davi and the new guild system.
  • Coordinate on and push forward phase 3 of Restructuring and Refocus 1.
  • Formalize and communicate processes to the DXdao community more broadly
  • Build Operations Guild governance culture

Key for Status of KPI’s/Milestones

:green_circle: Healthy / On track

:orange_circle: Not started but planned for Q2

:red_circle: Falling behind - need to focus on in Q2

:white_check_mark: Complete

Governance Squad

Members: Caney Fork, Skymine Labs, Dave (Q1 only)

General Comments:

The Governance Squad has been leading the transition to the new Guild model and implementing phase 3 of Restructuring and Refocus 1. We have rolled out a new semi-annual budgeting process, established a priorities board, and pushed for transparency in governance actions and decisions.

The upcoming upgrades to DAO governance contracts are exciting. As details become finalized, we look forward to better understanding and providing feedback on them, as well as educating others about them and ultimately using them.

Key Milestones and Goals:

:white_check_mark: Launch the DXdao Priorities Board with established processes and a monthly meeting

  • The Priorities Board has been created using ESP and monthly meetings have been held to discuss those priorities.
  • There is work to be done to make the process smoother for contributors and easier to understand, as well as to include DXD holders in the process. Some of this is making the process better and some of it is developer work (out of scope).
  • Videos and notes on the calls are available here:

:red_circle: Create organizational structure around Guild Councils (aka Mission Wardens) and recruit candidates to sit on council

:orange_circle: Draft and publish a Governance Guidebook for best practices for participating in DXdao governance

  • This has not begun and should be considered in light of upcoming changes to governance processes. As governance changes, communicating how things work will become much more important.
  • This is also not even listed on the priorities board, so it is unclear how important the broader DAO thinks it is.

:green_circle: Establish multi-sig management system

  • DXdao multisigs and the signers can be seen here.
  • At the beginning of the quarter all the Guilds were set up with a multisig on mainnet, Gnosis Chain and Arbitrum
  • More recently, all of the signers of DXdao multisigs have been updated to only have current contributors.

:orange_circle: Come up with a new plan for DXdao reputation distribution with the goal to expand the stakeholder base of reputation holders

:green_circle: Establish DXD Monetary Policy Committee

  • The Monetary Policy Committee has not yet been formally established, but the Operations Guild holds monthly meetings where Caney Fork presents statistics and thoughts on the process. We believe that this process can be further opened up to allow for outside recommendations. We would like to hear more about how stakeholders see this committee evolving.
  • Videos and notes on the calls are available here:

Objectives and Responsibilities:

:green_circle: Facilitate review of 1H2023 budgets and preparation for 2H2023 Guild Budgets

  • The budgeting process for H12023 was completed successfully and all guilds participated, produced deliverables, and were funded.
  • Further organization and stewardship for the Q2 updates and H2 budget requests will be ongoing and we intent to apply lessons from the first round.

:green_circle: Participate actively in ENS Governance through delegation to Caney Fork

  • Caney Fork has actively participated in ENS governance, voted on governance proposals with the DAO’s ENS tokens and attended networking events at EthDenver.
  • “This Month in ENS DAO” newsletter is published monthly.

:orange_circle: Publish quarterly updates on DXdao’s expenses across Guilds and Squads

  • This is on pause until the Treasury position is filled

:green_circle: Host a weekly governance meeting to review and discuss live proposals as well as other major initiatives facing DXdao that need community discussion.

  • These are held every Wednesday at 16:00 UTC. A list of all the meetings, with video recaps can be seen here.

Treasury Squad

Members: Dave (Q1 only), TBD new treasury manager (Q2 only)

General Comments:

It was expected that the Treasury Squad would be in a transition period at the end of Q1, with Dave leaving and a new person or persons stepping in to fill his shoes. The Operations Guild has recommended MattyG as a qualified replacement who can step in and contribute immediately. A vote is up to approve this decision.

Proposals from both Karpatkey and AvanteGarde have been an unexpected twist this quarter and have added some intrigue and politics into what was expected to be a relatively simple hiring process. We look forward to further discussions with both these organizations about how they can help DXdao manage its treasury in the future.

Key Milestones and Goals:

:orange_circle: Upgrade DXD token contract and return funds to general treasury

  • This is planned for Q2 of 2023 and will require coordination with the Dev-Ops and Security Squad, as well as the DXgov Guild as the technical expertise to upgrade the contract does not exist within this squad.

:orange_circle: Explore more deployment of the treasury into trustless treasury management tools, increase amount of treasury that is deployed by 25%

  • Treasury management has been at the front of our minds and the proposal to hire MattyG to take over for Dave in the Treasury Squad is a key first step in that process.
  • DXdao and the treasury guild have been in communication with both Karpatkey and AvanteGarde about providing treasury management services. One of the first tasks for the Treasury Guild is to help the DAO determine its needs and evaluate those proposals.

:green_circle: Enable DXD purchases as authorized by the passed signal proposal to Upgrade the DXD Token Model as well as NAV calculations

  • In coordination with the Governance Squad, numerous buybacks and “redemption balancers” have been issued over the last new months.
    • As of 2023.03.2021 there have been 16 Redemption Balancers that have been executed amounting to 9716.1 DXD bought back.
    • An additional 4403 DXD have been bought back via CowSwap orders since the beginning of the year.
  • Continued evolution and managment of these processes will be ongoing in coordination with the Monetary Policy Committee.
  • For additional information, check out the notes and video from the Monetary Policy Meetings:
  • Spreadsheet with relevant data is here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mS1sVmyP0Z3YiA1JiZpHgPHjSIh3da7MawpjQodE34Y/edit#gid=851060356

:orange_circle: Work with DXgov on creating a simple dashboard for DXdao’s treasury

  • This work has not begun and will be part of the Q2 scope for the new treasury manager.

Objectives and Responsibilities:

:green_circle: Ensure execution of DXdao’s treasury needs across its bases and guilds

:orange_circle: Publish quarterly updates on DXdao’s treasury makeup and performance

:green_circle: Communicate with partners on opportunities to leverage the treasury

:orange_circle: Participate in and provide support to the DXD Monetary Policy Committee

ContributorX Squad

Members: Melanie, AllyQ

General Comments:

Quarter has focused on 1. Shift to guilds and re-working different processes 2. Recruiting and onboarding of Swapr Dev, DXgov dev and Treasury manager

Key Milestones and Goals:

:green_circle: Successful recruitment and onboarding of four DXdao contributors, including a new treasury manager, a rockstar solidity dev for Davi/Swapr and a security researcher

:green_circle: Support for contributors on the transition to submitting individual proposals to guilds

:green_circle: In collaboration with DXgov, deliver a how-to guide for DAVI for guilds and contributors

:orange_circle: Produce (1) Contributor Feedback Review

:orange_circle: Provide at least one update to the Contributor Guidelines, involving the community in the process

:orange_circle: Investigate the viability of the current compensation system and frame a discussion in the forum on any potential changes.

:orange_circle: Create alternative compensation structure for high value/priority positions, including a senior solidity developer

Objectives and Responsibilities:

:green_circle: Manage contributor onboarding and offboarding process

:green_circle: Active/ongoing recruitment for new DXdao contributors

:green_circle: Manage and assist contributors through the current contributor proposal process

:orange_circle: Oversee and execute tracking and notification system for contributors

:green_circle: Oversee DXevents and distribution of contributor stipends in line with DXdao Contributor stipend and Event budget proposal

  • Stipends for contributor travel to Denver, Porto, Tokyo, and other Ethereum events were successfully distributed via Guilds and DAVI.

Devops & Security squad

Members: Augusto, Nelson, Fnanni

General Comments:

Q1 was was focused on transitioning, with Augusto leaving in Q2. Nelson and Fnanni will take over security aspects going forward, while the weekly developer call will be split between DXgov and Swapr

Key Milestones and Goals:

:orange_circle: Attract and onboard a new security researcher

Objectives and Responsibilities:

:green_circle: Monitor and maintain DXdao’s security posture

:green_circle: Run DXdao developer call and manage technical collaboration across products

:green_circle: Maintain DXdao’s Hats security committee

  • Updated multisig committee and went over process with new members

Legal Squad

Members: Jarek (Redhatross)

General Comments:

The legal squad is still getting established and has mostly been exploring ideas around contributor payments in Europe and exploring options for DevX.

Key Milestones and Goals:

:orange_circle: Ensure DXdao contributors have a way of getting paid legally in their jurisdiction

:orange_circle: Conduct regulatory review for DXdao stakeholders

Objectives and Responsibilities:

:orange_circle: Manage Devx as a convenient way to pay contributors in Europe

:orange_circle: Engage with the DAO legal community and keep the DXdao community informed of the most pressing developments

Unexpected things

There were quite a lot! Wow, USDC depegging? But in terms of the Ops Guild, the treasury search took longer than expected and was a huge chunk of time in February/March. This was because of the great candidates and the time it took to evaluate them. There was a lot of negativity in the DAO over these months and that takes its toll on morale, and also distracts from the daily work. Speaking for myself, it can be hard to stay focused on the Guild priorities with so many distractions.

Conclusion

Overall, I’d give the Operations Guild a B on its first quarter. It has executed on many of its most important tasks but there is clearly a lot of work to be done in the DAO. In Q2, it will need to lead the budget conversation and likely will need to do some belt-tightening of its own.

Quite a lot of updates in the above. Hopefully that gives the community an idea of where the Ops Guild is at. Please leave comments below if there are specific points that we could elaborate on. We will also be going over this on tomorrow’s governance discussion.

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