{"data":[{"id":"building-daos-as-scalable-networks","contentType":"article","path":"docs/dao-primitives/articles/building-daos-as-scalable-networks.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Building DAOs as scalable networks","url":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/Gx_rXSPOyt2sydHwlStfbrgVqYt6P3k5huT3xyZAolo","author":["Rowan Yeoman"],"tags":["daos","governance"],"publish":true,"type":"article","banner":"![[attachments/bH7p-1_vNGvLV7-2SOx4S.png]]"},"content":"The article \"Building DAOs as Scalable Networks\" explores how decentralized autonomous organizations ([DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md)) can scale by structuring smaller autonomous units called \"Cells\" within a broader governance system. It proposes a two-house model of governance — [Community Governance](data/resources/patterns/community-governance.md) to safeguard the network's purpose and [Operational Governance](data/resources/patterns/operational-governance.md) to allow flexibility and innovation. This approach enhances collaboration and coordination while ensuring long-term [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) alignment, enabling DAOs to influence larger systems effectively.\n\nFor more details, read the full article [here](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/Gx_rXSPOyt2sydHwlStfbrgVqYt6P3k5huT3xyZAolo).\n\n_Rowan is a contributor to [SuperBenefitDAO](https://www.superbenefit.org/) and works on scalable models of coordination and fractal DAO governance. Much thanks goes to @Lewwwk & @Philcockfield who contributed important insights to this article. This is the fifth in our series exploring DAOs as networks and is grounded in practical work that SuperBenefit is doing on governance design in web3. Thank you to @rathermercurial and Ananth (@plaintextbread) for their partnership on the designs this article maps._\n\n---\n\n## Designing network economies for autonomous teams to operate in.\n\nRecently many in the web3 community have been refocusing the concept of DAOs. Going from the idea of DAOs being sprawling, unwieldy communities to DAOs ideally being smaller, more pragmatic units of creative innovation that can engage with communities in new and richer ways. This is an attempt to retain a lot of the power and potential of DAOs, but reduce much of the complexity that has been encountered as communities have scaled, and their ability to govern themselves has failed to [scale](data/concepts/scale.md) with them.\n\nThe problem with this refocusing however, is that we can't escape the fact that these smaller more functional DAOs still operate inside an existing economic and social context. And this larger context will continue to exert a profound influence on everything that occurs at smaller scales. I think that transforming this larger socio/economic context still remains the fundamental opportunity for web3.\n\nOver the past year at SuperBenefit we have been working on DAO governance design that is focused on redesigning both the small innovation units building in web3 and also the larger [networks](data/concepts/networks.md) that they operate inside. The goal is to create DAOs as coherent wholes that are made up of networked smaller nodes formed into complex systems that can scale.\n\nWe have been exploring [DAO primitives](data/concepts/primitives.md), and have found unique and valuable territory in applying them at network scales. These primitive building blocks can allow the growth of DAOs as autonomous teams of people - working groups, pods, sub-DAOs (we refer to them as [Cells](data/resources/patterns/cells.md) for the sake of the metaphor of evolving complex organisms), being coordinated as collectively intelligent purpose driven networks. This embraces the fact that small teams are the fundamental atomic unit of crypto/web3, but places them inside the larger context of purpose driven **network economies**. You can track this research through this series of articles:\n\n- **[DAOs aren't things they are flows](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/3-ESNDLcf44dZ6VteaqZSpQuTL0oouSxlLJwuAlcQ_s)**\n    \n- **[Scale and the levers that provide DAOs their power](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/unisNGUtHyRF7Zcp9CBbC-VhICOvVm0uzTFJUPX-Icg)**\n    \n- **[DAOs: From fractal primitives to network scale](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/zyP-6GZQz-DWcdbAa-4sqRiY58P1WvYvIs_2zNa9oYo)**\n    \n- **[Minimum viable permissionless-ness](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/SKKglrTiDUh5nuZX0cPOmI0a2fXr7uEw03Y1qNUAQ90)**\n    \n\n## DAOs as systems that can influence systems.\n\n**Why is it so important to coordinate at this higher level?**\n\nOne of the breakthrough concepts of DAOs as community driven networks is that they have the potential to influence **whole systems**. This is something that is incredibly difficult within our current paradigm of discrete entities (companies and non-profits) operating within the confines of our existing institutions and economic system.\n\nIt is becoming widely recognised that changing the big societal systems that drive the dynamics of our world requires multi-modal, multi-disciplinary, multi-scale, multi-national approaches that are intelligent, coordinated and responsive to the emergent nature of the systems they are working in. And these approaches have to be sustained and resourced over long time periods. For instance, think about finding solutions to climate change or income inequality.\n\nDAOs as purpose driven networks have the potential to coordinate vast numbers of smaller teams that can act on many different parts of a system in a way that is coherent, flexible and collectively intelligent, allocating resources in highly effective ways [ref](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/SKKglrTiDUh5nuZX0cPOmI0a2fXr7uEw03Y1qNUAQ90).\n\n_Hence using the biological term \"CELLS\" mentioned above. Nature has solved for this complexity problem before, we have design precedent to draw on._\n\nIn the design we have been experimenting with; the community holds the overarching purpose of the network and this informs and supports an operating context. Cells, as the operational units of the network, function inside this operating context. Cells can be both highly independent or highly integrated into the structure of the DAO as needed. The overarching community evolves the purpose of the network and tweaks its economics to ensure that the mixture of coordinating and autonomous Cells are incentivised to advance its purpose over a long time horizon [ref](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/unisNGUtHyRF7Zcp9CBbC-VhICOvVm0uzTFJUPX-Icg).\n\n## A template for designing purpose driven network economies.\n\nAt SuperBenefit we are actively implementing this design approach in several projects including [All in For Sport](https://twitter.com/AllInForSport) – designing a perpetual funding mechanism for community sports projects globally. We are also working with several large philanthropic funders, partnering to find more sophisticated ways of deploying capital across complex problem spaces at global scale. With all of these projects we are implementing aspects of the following designs for building community driven governance for scaling network economies.\n\nOur core design revolves around a two house governance system that splits governance across three different scales:\n\n1. **Governance at the community scale**, to safeguard the integrity of the network and keep it oriented towards its purpose.\n    \n2. **Governance at the operational scale**, to leverage many of the highly effective mechanisms that have driven business to be such an effective tool for creating breakthrough innovation and scaling it to the world.\n    \n3. **Governance at the team scale**, to ensure as many decisions as possible are made by autonomous teams operating closest to the reality of the system, and that these signals flow up to inform the larger network.\n    \n\nHere are the broad steps we are experimenting with to create these community driven network economies:\n\n## Stage one: Early Catalyst\n\nPeople come together around an inspired idea or purpose and an opportunity to make it a reality. Start by prioritising permissionless community driven activity to inform and shape the early network. Then build a minimum viable governance structure so that the community can shape and endorse the direction of the evolving network.\n\n1. Start with a catalytic idea and an open community of people who are inspired to rally around the idea and its purpose. Ideally a diverse group of stakeholders with complementary perspectives, including lived experience of the domains the purpose aims to address.\n    \n2. Permissionless testing of ideas that can be brought to a simple community proposal for community endorsement and support. Turning early conversations into experimental action.\n    \n3. Forming more structured working groups (based on the design of the CELL primitive) to undertake and resource more structured activities, via community proposals.\n    \n4. Recognising contributors with governance authority and resourcing their activities from community treasury if available.\n    \n5. Spinning up basic network governance infrastructure consisting of:\n    \n    1. **Shared governance state** - a shared description of what the network intends and how it will go about achieving its goals. Agreements around how to make proposals, change the structure of the network etc\n        \n    2. **Proposal voting and tools**\n        \n    3. **Treasury wallet management**\n        \n\n## Stage two: Establishing a two house structure\n\nEvolving past early decision-making to a scalable governance structure.\n\nAs more working groups (Cells) are created, Governance splits into two different houses – Community Governance & Operational Governance.\n\n1. **[Community Governance](data/resources/patterns/community-governance.md)** - safeguards the purpose of the network\n    \n2. **[Operational Governance](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/implementation/implementation-guide-operational-governance.md)** - gives flexibility, autonomy and modern incentive design to produce innovation and scale\n    \n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2Fe8XTKLhYwcB4nY9F6QxH4.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\n**Operational governance** forms out of Cells (working groups) coordinating in a [sociocratic structure](https://www.sociocracyforall.org/sociocracy/). Individual Cells have autonomy over their own actions, but then form coordinating structures with other Cells. These larger structures can derive strategy from feedback loops coming from the smallest scales of the network but also include direction from the network's larger context (including from \"Community Governance\").\n\nOperational governance is also built on an economic model that can incentivise both structured \"scaling hierarchies\" as well as reward small teams who take risks and innovate to move the network forward in new directions (for example using retroactive public goods funding) [ref](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/unisNGUtHyRF7Zcp9CBbC-VhICOvVm0uzTFJUPX-Icg).\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FwWxV0cHaLskCrU5TGscZX.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\n**Community governance** is made up of Cell contributors, founders, partners (sponsors, funders etc), as well as others that have a stake in the purpose of the network but may not be contributing directly to its operations, for example other mission aligned organisations and networks. This allows community governance to include a broader base of stakeholders, many of whom have no financial stake in the network but are aligned with the purpose that the network is advancing.\n\nGovernance participation for Community Governance is managed by non-transferrable tokens/badges ensuring that no one can buy voting rights. It is focused on safeguarding the purpose of the network and slowly evolving and steering it over time, using slower less dramatic governance methods such as conviction voting, optimistic governance, quadratic voting and other yet to be designed mechanisms. It optimistically approves the overall operational budget but doesn't partake in operational and technical decisions.\n\nCommunity Governance also forms the back-stop for Operational Governance. Because of its focus on efficiency and effectiveness, Operational Governance has the potential to fail - either through governance capture, concentration/centralisation of power, or in other ways become misaligned with the direction that Community Governance is evolving the network towards (such as its purpose, values and vision). When this happens, Community Governance has a mechanism to step in and require changes from Operational Governance. Its control of the treasury and operational budget approval underpins this authority and ultimately Community Governance can vote to dissolve the network.\n\nIn the early examples we are experimenting with, the design requires that if Community Governance votes to withdraw treasury funding from the network the funds in the treasury will automatically be transferred to a US 501c foundation.\n\n## Optimised across the three different scales of decentralised organising.\n\nThis system leverages mechanisms that derive collective intelligence from the three different scales that a DAO network operates across:\n\n1. **[Collaboration Scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md)** - Cells operating as high bandwidth small scale collaborative units that can think and move fast and are operating at the grassroots of the system.\n2. **[Coordination Scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/coordination-scale.md)** - structures of Cells operating together in coordinating systems using [sociocratic governance](https://www.sociocracyforall.org/sociocracy/) to allocate resources and effectively create and implement strategies for the Cells to execute on (Operational Governance).\n3. **[Constituency Scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/constituency-scale.md)** - participation of a broader constituency of stakeholders that safeguard and evolve the long-term purpose of the network (Community Governance).\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FLHhCO36Aq6bN48886TQQA.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\n## Legal Compliance.\n\nThe other important role that this mechanism plays is to create a legally compliant network structure that can allow individuals and organizations to participate in the evolving network without many of the risks that would prohibit most traditional organisations (corporations, non-profits and governments) from participating.\n\nThe separation of **community** and **operational** governance allows for Community Governance to be wrapped up in a [UNA](https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/what-an-unincorporated-nonprofit-association.html) (in the US), or other proto-non-profit structures in other countries. This limits liability for people participating as members of community governance – based on community badging being non-transferrable and carrying no financial ownership in the network.\n\nAs long as the requirements of the [operating agreement](https://de.una.ricardian.eth.limo/) that governs the UNA are met – such as decisions being made via cryptographic voting – this DAO network structure has a huge amount of flexibility to evolve as it experiments with many different approaches at many different leverage points in the systems within which it plays. In time it can then adopt a more formal legal structure as it settle to become a more stable network economy.\n\n_Note: jurisdictionally compliant structures will continue to be developed and evolved, but the fundamentals should be implementable within any framework. However, please note, we are early in experimenting with these models and none of this should be considered legal advice._\n\n## Fit for purpose governance across all scales.\n\nThe big leap here is that this version of a \"two house\" model can provide the above formal protections without condemning the whole network to becoming a bureaucratic and rigid non-profit structure. This is because Operational Governance has the flexibility to reward contributors in ways that leverage the best tools that capitalism and the business world have to offer – as well as emerging web3 tools. These can be used to provide flexible incentive mechanisms for Cells that align DAO activities with its overarching purpose.\n\nWe think that designing DAO governance and tooling around the three different group scales articulated above is the key to leveraging the most effective methods of governance across a network. Community Governance creates and protects the larger context so that Cells can create, innovate, perform and scale in ways that enhance the overall network and its purpose, but without outgrowing the limits of the system or co-opting governance power to capture it.\n\n_We are learning as these experiments evolve and are deeply appreciative of the collaborative ethos present in web3. So do reach out if you have feedback, ideas or want to compare notes._\n\n### Article Series\n\n- Previous: [Minimum Viable Permissionless-ness](docs/dao-primitives/articles/Minimum Viable Permissionless-ness.md)\n- Next: coming soon…\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations designed as scalable networks\n- [Networks](data/concepts/networks.md) - Coordination structure for DAOs\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Challenges and approaches to scaling\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Mechanisms enabling network scaling\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making at network scale","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:27.516Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"daos-are-like-planetary-systems","contentType":"article","path":"data/stories/articles/going-daonwind/daos-are-like-planetary-systems.md","metadata":{"title":"DAOs are like Planetary Systems","source":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/BRRdW4JuQYiBGupJdPGYH2rabSBS1j3Y_CB_MIB5hRA","author":["Ayusha Mahajan"],"publish":true,"date":"2022-09-20","tags":["daos"],"type":"article","banner":"![[attachments/planetary-cover.png]]","banner_y":0.5},"content":"The universe is an exponentially expanding spectacle with never-ending potential for organized chaos governed by the rules of physics. DAOs (decentralized autonomous organizations) are similar, except they’re governed by the rules of democracy.\n\nDAOs are more flexible in what they decide their purpose-emitting star to be, and with enough gravity, any of the ongoing projects within a DAO can become the center of orbit. We like to call space the final frontier for humanity, but we’ve got more in common with what lies beyond its mysterious edge, than we think.\n\n![video \"Going DAOnwind: DAOs are like Planetary Systems\"](https://youtu.be/Lqza-PvqIfg)\n\n*DAOs are like planetary systems. Our own Solar System functions around a center of gravity that creates an orbit for the eight planets circling it. It’s almost as if the Sun is an object of purpose, its gravitational pull creating tiers of engagement.*\n\n*DAOs are similar. Those planets closest to the Sun’s pull spin faster and complete more revolutions in the same time that planets farther away do – their engagement depends on how close they are to the pull of the DAO’s purpose. Members at the periphery of a DAO, similarly, are still a part of it; just less involved.*\n\n*DAOs come in all kinds of shapes and forms, and they collectively represent different purposes, just like the stars and heavenly bodies that create a galaxy. They both manage to exist on their own, authentic, yet with a powerful enough purpose to ensure a framework to allow freedom for experimentation. Just like space, there are so many more discoveries left for us to make with DAOs.*\n\nThis is the second video of a three part-series that compares DAOs to nature, because what better way to describe the straightforward spontaneity of a community, than to compare it to the physical phonomena that does it best?\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations with orbital dynamics\n- [Networks](data/concepts/networks.md) - Gravitational structures of coordination\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Different orbital scales of organization\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Forces binding organizational systems\n- [Metaphors](tags/metaphors.md) - Understanding DAOs through celestial systems","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:24.109Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"daos-are-like-starling-murmurations","contentType":"article","path":"data/stories/articles/going-daonwind/daos-are-like-starling-murmurations.md","metadata":{"title":"DAOs Are Like Starling Murmurations","source":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/js99AFi44mRpiF7qAKR3JV1JTaJvsu-9tZJ_WEw2xYY","author":"Ayusha Mahajan","publish":true,"date":"2022-09-13","type":"article","banner":"![[attachments/murmurations-cover.png]]","banner_y":0.492},"content":"No, they do not gracefully shapeshift into spontaneous arrangements in the sky. Yes, they are a group effort motivated by a single purpose.\n\nWhat happens when you incentivize synonymous purpose for collaboration?\n\nYou get a decentralized autonomous organization. And a starling murmuration. The sizes and shapes that the two fluid groups can exist in are infinite, and the ways in which they can twist and transform to suit a common goal are endless. Birds of a feather typically flock together, but the iridescent starlings and members of a nascent DAO are much more creative in the way they approach communication and collective purpose.\n\n![video of \"oing DAOnwind: DAOs Are Like Starling Murmurations\"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2Uz5utFSL0)\n\n*DAOs are like starling murmurations. A few handful, or millions of starlings organize themselves into complex shapes to improvise and adapt to their environment.*\n\n*Form follows function with these birds, where the shape of the murmuration depends on what kind of predator they’re escaping. Similarly, DAOs shift and transform, liquid-like, to fit their purpose. The only constant is change. Movement towards the goal is the only means of identification.*\n\n*Murmurations have no social hierarchy or leader – yet they move collectively in unison, gathering together to share information. The beautiful diversity shared between DAOs and starlings proves that their variations makes them stronger than their strongest members, and more unique in their collective individuality.*\n\nThis is the first video of a three part-series that compares DAOs to nature, because what better way to describe the straightforward spontaneity of a community, than to compare it to the physical phonomena that does it best?\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations with emergent coordination\n- [Emergence](data/concepts/emergence.md) - Self-organizing patterns without central control\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Distributed coordination mechanisms\n- [Networks](data/concepts/networks.md) - Swarm-like organizational structures\n- [Metaphors](tags/metaphors.md) - Understanding DAOs through natural phenomena","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:24.590Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"daos-are-like-water","contentType":"article","path":"data/stories/articles/going-daonwind/daos-are-like-water.md","metadata":{"type":"article","title":"DAOs are like Water","source":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/oIJltxjPCu2p01QzOP6OVd8KxYIcyXJJ1ByKKRRTVCM","author":["Ayusha Mahajan"],"date":"2022-09-27","tags":["daos"],"banner":"![[attachments/water-cover.png]]","publish":true},"content":"At its core, water is life. At their core, DAOs (decentralized autonomous organizations) are the essence of society. There is no “right” state for them both to be in, as they take the shape and form of whichever vessel best suits their conditions and purposes.\n\nDAOs are like water. They take various forms and fulfill several roles, yet are recognizable for their existence as society’s H2O. Adaptable, recognizable, and versatile enough to play a uniquely essential life-breathing role within society. They plan on making waves in the places that will benefit society without flooding it with power and force.\n\n![Video of \"Going DAOnwind: DAOs are like Water\"](https://youtu.be/1EXBGy0qazw)\n\nThis is the third video of a three part-series that compares DAOs to nature, because what better way to describe the straightforward spontaneity of a community than to compare it with the physical phonomena that does it best.\n\nGoing DAOnwind: DAOs are like Water — SuperBenefit\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations with fluid properties\n- [Networks](data/concepts/networks.md) - Flowing structures and dynamics\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Adaptive coordination mechanisms\n- [Emergence](data/concepts/emergence.md) - Properties arising from flow and adaptation\n- [Metaphors](tags/metaphors.md) - Understanding DAOs through natural systems","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:25.189Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"daos-arent-things-they-are-flows","contentType":"article","path":"docs/dao-primitives/articles/daos-arent-things-they-are-flows.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"DAOs aren't things... they are flows.","url":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/3-ESNDLcf44dZ6VteaqZSpQuTL0oouSxlLJwuAlcQ_s","author":["yeoro.eth","heenal.eth","ml_baldwin.eth","lewwwk.eth"],"tags":["daos","governance","networks"],"publish":true,"type":"article","banner":"![[attachments/CZkS0TIqq19IH8wIkdxbT.png]]"},"content":"_Rowan is a contributor to [SuperBenefitDAO](https://www.superbenefit.org/) and works on scalable models of coordination and fractal [governance](data/concepts/governance.md). Much thanks goes to Heenal Rajani, Michael Lewkowitz and Michelle Baldwin who contributed to this article. This comes out of work that SuperBenefit is doing to explore the evolving nature of governance in web3._\n\n[Web3](data/concepts/blockchain.md) is giving us the opportunity to rewrite how groups of people come together and do things in the world. But are we importing a core concept from our existing paradigm without realising it? A concept that if it does find its way into the fabric of web3 might see us recreating our traditional centralising structures - the very structures we are so fervently trying to shake off?\n\n### How entity thinking became our dominant model.\n\n400 years ago, the creation of the limited liability company (with the formation of the Dutch and English East India Companies) laid down the template for the modern company. \"Legal personhood, permanent capital, transferable shares, separation of ownership and management, and limited liability\" defined its status as an entity structurally separate from the people involved in it. Over the past 400 years this has become the basic template upon which all of our capitalist world has been built.\n\nIt can go by many names depending on where you are in the world. But whether it's called a Limited Company, an LLC, a Corporation or some other variation on the theme, it is all essentially the same structure that was laid down in the 1600s. The company has become the basic building block of modern commerce and almost all of the development of modern society has been driven by it.\n\nA company is, at its heart, a way of organising a [network](data/concepts/networks.md) of participants in a highly coordinated and profitable way. By putting different participants into well-defined categories (investors, employees, suppliers, customers etc) the company can create a role for each to play that will benefit each and benefit the company. If it works, the company wins. And the more [scale](data/concepts/scale.md) it can generate by doing this, like building giant factories and workforces, the more efficiencies it can create and the more it wins. This is the basic formula that is repeated across the globe.\n\nIn this system the company is the central entity: we invest in the company, we work for the company, we sell to the company we buy from the company. The company is always at the centre coordinating its network.\n\nBecause most of the modern world is built on the back of this model, \"entity thinking\" is an inescapable part of our context. Whether it's a company, a non-profit, social enterprise, university or a nation state, we can't help but orient around entities. This is programmed deep into us and our [systems](data/concepts/systems.md).\n\nEntity thinking is woven all the way through our legal system. As soon as we try to do anything practical, we need a formal entity. Anything to do with money, compliance with regulations, transacting with customers-everything requires us to centralise around some sort of structured entity to contain our activities.\n\nIt's also deep in our psychology, we feel it viscerally. We've all had that experience when our thing becomes a Thing. That feeling when our amorphous collection of intention, ideas and people gets instantiated as a company, a non-profit, a DAO... an entity. All of a sudden it seems more solid, more real, more possible and more valuable than just the sum of our collected thoughts and actions.\n\nThe entity becomes our psychological anchor and the lack of an entity to anchor our thinking makes us feel untethered and a bit lost.\n\n### DAOs are reproducing entity thinking.\n\nIncredible work is happening in [DAO](data/concepts/daos.md) governance amidst an explosion of innovation on how to coordinate collective activities. Entity thinking, however, is a continuous influence on DAO design and governance and it undermines the potential that has drawn us here.\n\nWe constantly talk about the network as being the important thing, but we can't help backsliding into focusing on the DAO as an entity and, as a result, ever more time, energy, cost and risk gets tied up in governing the entity.\n\nEntity thinking is bound up in the concepts of assets and their need to be owned by something. Orienting DAOs around the concept of [treasuries](data/concepts/treasury.md) and [protocols](data/concepts/protocols.md) (as assets) draws us into thinking of a DAO as an entity, with assets that need to be protected and managed.\n\nFor all our talk of \"stewardship\" as a deeper concept, we can't help but collapse into focusing way too much on who's in charge of the entity and its assets.\n\nEven as we [decentralise](data/concepts/decentralization.md) DAO decision-making via proposal voting, if we are just decentralising the governance of an inherently centralising concept we are repeating this historical pattern and missing the bigger web3 opportunity.\n\nIf anything, the success of DAOs has served to exacerbate the tendency towards entity thinking, due to the fact that many DAOs have treasuries that are out of all proportion with the current value that exists in their networks. This distortion makes it almost impossible for a DAO's treasury (as a centralised asset) not to have an outsized gravitational pull.\n\n![Photo by Martin Sanchez on Unsplash](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2F3ckOwALsBJOCbiOqkpgTp.jpg&w=3840&q=75)  \nPhoto by Martin Sanchez on Unsplash\n\n### The value exists in the DAO network, not in the DAO entity.\n\nIf we can stop collapsing into this subtle trap of entity thinking, we can see decentralised autonomous organisations in a much more profound way, as decentralised autonomous networks. As centerless networks that organise themselves. As coordinated flows of [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) across a network towards some animating goal.\n\nWe need design that recognises DAO networks as what they are: groups of actors (people and organisations) who are coordinating their collective resources towards some shared intent. Their value is represented in real-time as the resources in the network (time, skills, technology, capital etc) plus the way it is being coordinated toward their goals in high leverage ways.\n\nOur fixation on treasury assets and protocols as assets is leading us to miss that the incredible potential of web3 can only be realised when networks are set free.\n\nWhen they are not squeezed through a centralising entity frame, three critical properties become possible for DAO networks:\n\n**High-scale** - They are capable of generating the kind of high-leverage scale-economies that companies have used to power the last 400 years of progress.\n**Adaptive** - They can innovate. They can be adaptive and evolve, form and re-form in unique and powerful ways. Unlike companies, along with leveraging scale they can also be highly creative, experimental and responsive to change.\n**Sensing** - All of this scale and innovation can be driven by a broader and deeper sensing of what is needed beyond the narrow set of needs that a company is designed to serve (i.e., maximising shareholder value). DAO networks can genuinely serve the larger needs of the ecosystems they inhabit.\n\nThese three qualities hold the potential of what web3 can offer the world, but their actualisation is by no means guaranteed. If we continue to pass everything through an entity thinking filter as our underlying framing, we are more likely to get the heartbreak of more of the same… a world where high-leverage, high-scale things are dominated by centralising [power](data/concepts/power.md) and profit motives and where the work of moving the world to a better future is back as a low-leverage, low-scale side project for humanity.\n\n### Fractal DAO design can take us somewhere better.\n\nIf we lean into thinking about DAO networks as coordinated flows of resources towards a goal, and not as centralising entities, then the only real way for this to work is using fractal dynamics. Just as in biological systems, we need DAO networks that can:\n\n- Spin up versions of themselves out of themselves\n- Constantly form, reform and deform\n- Exercise radical freedom combined with powerful interdependence\n\nFractal DAO network design is leading us to ask questions like:\n\n- What is a minimum viable DAO network structure?\n- What [primitives](data/concepts/primitives.md) and tools would make it simple for networks to spin up useful fractals of themselves?\n- How can a treasury be a distributed function across a network and not a centralising force?\n- How can part of a network reform into a new structure that fully represents the value embodied by that part of the network?\n- How can tokens (meta-governance, treasury, reserve currencies) work across fractal networks to maintain powerful but flexible interdependence - governance, incentives and leverage?\n\nThere is a lot more to say about fractal design in DAOs and also a bunch of folks doing interesting work to answer some of these questions. Some promising examples include:\n\n- Modular Politics\n- Metagov\n- Gnosis Guild\n- Orca Protocol\n\n![Image Credit: BenRG, public domain](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FhQzZ6vBGxJxqo9zfckkFx.png&w=3840&q=75)  \nImage Credit: BenRG, public domain\n\n### \"DAO\" as a verb, not a thing.\n\nIt's also true that thinking about DAOs as complex networks is probably what we all think we are doing already. But entity thinking is deeply ingrained and subtle and will keep exerting its gravity on what we are designing and building. We need to be aware, moment by moment, of when we might be collapsing back into entity thinking, otherwise its centralising power will just keep sneaking back in again and again.\n\nMaybe part of this is a reorientation of our language. Maybe it's \"DAO\" as a verb. The \"organisation\" in DAO does not refer to an entity, but to the act of organising.\n\nTo DAO, or DAOing, is for a network to autonomously organise itself in a decentralised way. And what we call \"DAO\" is just the collection of coordinating functions that show up in a network/[community](data/concepts/community.md) so that it can achieve its goals.\n\nPerhaps this reframing will help keep us oriented towards coordinating value flows across networks and away from legacy ideas and entity thinking.\n\n### Article Series\n\n- Next: [Scale and the levers that provide DAOs their power](docs/dao-primitives/articles/Scale and the levers that provide DAOs their power.md)\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations explored as flows rather than entities\n- [Networks](data/concepts/networks.md) - Structure that DAOs operate within\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Coordination approaches for flowing networks\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Network dynamics across different scales\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Mechanisms for organizing network flows","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:28.155Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"daos-from-fractal-primitives-to-network-scale","contentType":"article","path":"docs/dao-primitives/articles/daos-from-fractal-primitives-to-network-scale.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"DAOs - From fractal primitives to network scale.","url":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/zyP-6GZQz-DWcdbAa-4sqRiY58P1WvYvIs_2zNa9oYo","author":["yeoro.eth","lewwwk.eth","heenal.eth"],"tags":["daos","permissions","governance"],"publish":true,"type":"article","banner":"![[attachments/FzK303B84CkXp5lxZT5Uq.png]]"},"content":"_Rowan is a contributor to [SuperBenefitDAO](https://www.superbenefit.org/) and works on scalable models of coordination and fractal DAO governance. Deep gratitude to Heenal Rajani and Michael Lewkowitz for contributing to this article. This article is the third in our series exploring the concept of DAOs as networks and their evolutionary nature._\n\n### [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) matters\n\nDAOs are extraordinary for their capacity to test experimental ideas. And the innovation DAOs are unlocking because of this, all across Web3, is astounding! But, in order to have a transformational impact on the world, we need DAOs to scale beyond experiments. There is a risk that if they can't successfully scale what they do, their potentially transformational innovations will just get co-opted by more centralised organisations (pseudo-DAOs and companies), who can more effectively scale and exploit them. Leaving us in much the same position we are in now.\n\nScale is not just about getting a lot of users onto a protocol with a bare bones interface that only early adopters will accept. In traditional startup speak, this would be considered _validation_ or _proof of concept_ only. Scale means delivering world class products to millions of people, with user experiences that are better than what Web2 is currently giving us.\n\nI know we like to criticise the Web2 progenitors to our world, but these companies are running massively scaled operations the likes of which DAOs have not come close to yet.\n\nIt is true that digital scaling ([network effects](https://www.nfx.com/post/network-effects-manual) + [scaling at near zero marginal cost](https://ckluis.com/the-marginal-cost-of-software-approaches-zero-7fda166f219f) + [Moore's Law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law)) means that digital business models scale in particularly powerful ways. But this does not mean that these models scale effortlessly without needing infrastructure. The likes of Google, Meta, Twitter et al still have to design and build significant infrastructure to generate scale advantages for their business models across; design, software development, sales, marketing etc – just like any other business does. And likewise, DAOs don't get to opt out of this dynamic just because they are digitally native.\n\nIt is also important to remember that DAOs are increasingly going to be building for real world applications. If Web3 is going to be a transformational force in the world, DAOs are going to need to operate across all of the domains that companies currently do. And for this to work, being able to harness scaling dynamics at least as well as companies currently do is going to be crucial.\n\nScale needs to be a clear part of DAO thinking going forward and we need to make sure that we aren't ignoring it – consciously or unconsciously – just because it reminds us of traditional business.\n\nIn the previous articles in this series – \"[DAOs aren't things… they are flows](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/3-ESNDLcf44dZ6VteaqZSpQuTL0oouSxlLJwuAlcQ_s)\" and \"[Scale and the levers that provide DAOs their power](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/unisNGUtHyRF7Zcp9CBbC-VhICOvVm0uzTFJUPX-Icg)\" – we looked at how a legacy mindset causes us to think of DAOs as 'entities', but they are much better understood as networks with coordinated flows of resources and value. We then unpacked how biological systems, companies and cities all function based on two fundamental scaling dynamics:\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FEaZ4ugicL63KmahezgeXp.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nWe saw that unlike companies that operate business models, DAOs are network economies. This makes them more like cities, giving them the remarkable ability to leverage both **Dynamic One** and **Dynamic Two** scaling systems.\n\nIn this article we will dig deeper into how DAOs can deliberately design themselves to utilise both of these dynamics.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FattCBAbVGBjsUHRAb7VQc.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\n### From simple to massively complex\n\nDAO structures need to start simply but then be able to grow into massive complexity. As DAOs try to scale, we cannot just apply arbitrary structure to them to solve the coordination issues that will naturally show up. If we do, we are just going to end up with broken systems. Ad hoc solutions that seem like good ideas at the time will end up causing problems like centralisation and fragility down the line in unexpected ways as they scale.\n\n[Galls Law](http://principles-wiki.net/principles:gall_s_law) reminds us that we need to start with simple systems that work:\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FD9iSIpJ_53qOslTItH0Vr.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nSuperBenefitDAO recently hosted a [conversation on metagovernance](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/yyY2khsoDSgCBaLSIJMeT6xNPJ0c9d2T83rYyt6UfX8) with Gabagool.eth, BPetes.eth and Justinehy.eth. As we explored the topic of metagovernance, one theme that came through strongly was the idea that we need to keep coming back to the magic that we all saw in DAOs in the first place. The magic of small groups of inspired people working together on something that matters to them – and the simple primitives that make this possible. From here we work our way up to complex governance and metagovernance, but we keep this simple starting point in focus. This is a great signpost for us to think about the simple primitives out of which complex DAO networks can emerge.\n\n### DAOs as fractal networks of connected [cells](data/resources/patterns/cells.md)\n\nWhen a core team of people come together to start a DAO, pretty quickly they feel the need to create sub-teams as a way of separating tasks and managing accountability. As soon as this happens, they have begun the complex and difficult journey of experimental org design.\n\nThe mental model that rescues us from this becoming a morass of incoherent and unscalable structure is that of **fractal design**. Rather than umbrellaing these teams inside an entity (like a company does), we can think of these smaller teams as being identical in type to the DAO that birthed them. Each starts as a **DAO primitive**; a version of the DAO created out of itself, in order to get things done. All of these **DAO cells** exist in relationship with one another in a complex and emerging network.\n\nCall them subDAOs, Pods, Fractals, Working Groups, Circles – I'll refer to them as [cells](data/resources/patterns/cells.md) in this article because that works nicely with a biological metaphor, but the naming of them is neither here nor there – the mental model is to understand them as their own independent DAO cells that are defined by their relationships with other cells in the DAO network.\n\nThis notion of DAO cells as the primitive starting point for DAO networks is the basis for DAOs being able to leverage both of the scaling dynamics laid out in the [previous article](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/unisNGUtHyRF7Zcp9CBbC-VhICOvVm0uzTFJUPX-Icg).\n\nIt is also the mechanism by which DAO networks collectively evolve.\n\nHere is how both of these mechanisms work.\n\n### Cells can become Scaling Hierarchies AND Creative Networks\n\nWhen a new DAO cell is spun up in a DAO network, depending on the purpose it has, it needs to be set up to be either part of a scaling hierarchy or a creative network.\n\n**D1 Scaling Hierarchy**: If it is to play a role in a scaling hierarchy – for example, as part of DAO operations or core DAO infrastructure – then it will have quite tightly defined accountabilities. It will be closely coupled to other cells in the scaling hierarchy because its outputs will be critical to the functioning of the system as a whole.\n\n**D2 Creative Network**: However, if the cell came into existence to explore things like novel ideas, partnership opportunities or new areas of research, then it will be much less constrained.\n\nWhere a cell needing to plug into a **scaling hierarchy** needs tight constraints to make sure that it is producing the outputs that the other cells in the hierarchy need, a **creative network** cell is set up to be maximally unconstrained.\n\nDAO cell primitives need to be easily configurable in order to dial up the right constraints to make them function as the DAO network needs. This requires clearly defining the accountabilities, roles and relationships with other cells in the network, and then setting up the corresponding governance structure and tooling to make this possible.\n\nOut of these single-celled starting points, DAOs then evolve into complex networks of cells.\n\nHats off to all the folks already experimenting in sophisticated ways with how these primitives can work – [Orca](https://www.orcaprotocol.org/), [Sobol](https://sobol.io/), [Colony](https://colony.io/), [Murmur](https://www.murmur.com/), [Juicebox](https://juicebox.money/#/), [Hypha](https://hypha.earth/) et al.\n\n![Photo: Matthew Ansley - Unsplash](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2Frwlv3BbwL-r9E5Q6MYGVe.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nPhoto: Matthew Ansley - Unsplash\n\n### Example: DAO Prison Network\n\nLet's make this more concrete by looking at a hypothetical example. Imagine a national prison system run as a DAO network. I'm choosing a difficult real-world problem here as an example to emphasise the challenges of scaling real-world systems.\n\nThe prison network is animated by its purpose of transforming how we approach crime as a social issue by searching for better solutions to these complex problems.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FmXAo2rYdixOWcPolxFX1r.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nBecause it is running existing infrastructure in an existing system, the DAO network would be made up in large part by **scaling hierarchies** consisting of networks of DAO cells that combine to deliver the well understood operational needs of the prison system. Things like buildings and facilities, security, health and welfare, education, staff/HR etc. These hierarchies of cells would be highly coordinated to deliver the right outputs, reliably and efficiently.\n\nEach DAO cell would be set up to perform a specific role in the system, be accountable to other cells that rely on it, and be governed to some extent by these interdependent cells. They would likely have ongoing streams of funding and would measure themselves by the effectiveness of their activities in delivering on the known outcomes they were created to produce. They would also have the ability to produce their own new DAO cells so that as their responsibilities grew they would be able to scale their activities via fractal hierarchical scaling.\n\n_An important caveat to add in case the word hierarchy is triggering. The term **scaling hierarchy** refers to the structure of a network that functions with this particular set of scale advantages. It doesn't need to mean \"dominator hierarchy\" or \"management hierarchy\". Companies traditionally use management hierarchies to implement a power structure, but DAOs don't have to do this. Much of the cutting edge work in organisational design ([The Ready](https://theready.com/) being a great example), concerns itself with how we can coordinate at scale without resorting to old school management hierarchies, aka \"command and control\". But make no mistake, DAOs do need to match their ability to innovate with a genuine ability to scale._\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FN-tqqsWqDOwtXg0yBvzHP.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nBut interspersed with these scaling hierarchies would be numerous loosely coupled **creative network** cells that are experimenting across the system in search of better solutions. Unlike the more highly coordinated scaling hierarchies which function with a well defined operating model and something that looks a lot like \"strategy\", these creative cells will bubble up from ideas and inspiration from the DAO's community.\n\nA member of the community can have a novel idea, refine it, get a proposal approved and then spin up a cell to start exploring it. For our prison example, things these cells might experiment on could look like:\n\n1. Ideas for better systems for staff - _Process innovation/Horizon-1_ (in traditional business speak)\n2. Novel ideas for working with prisoners, rehabilitation etc - _Product line expansion/Horizon-2_\n3. Radical ideas that would make prisons as we know them obsolete - _Disruptive innovation_/_Horizon-3_\n4. Ideas that bridge and extend the DAO network beyond prisons, perhaps into mental health or early social crime prevention. Possibilities to connect and integrate the prison DAO into larger aligned networks beyond prisons.\n\nThese creative cells would be funded and structured to give them maximum freedom/autonomy. And then as creative cells evolve their ideas beyond experimentation, they can grow and connect with other parts of the larger DAO network to develop their discoveries into scaling hierarchies that the whole network can benefit from.\n\n### DAO networks evolve organically\n\nWith traditional organisations and companies we are used to thinking about power structures. And so for an organisation to change, it requires the power structure to change at the highest level and then for this to cascade down through the hierarchy. However, because DAOs consist of networks of cells, they can evolve organically.\n\nFor example, if a creative cell in our national prison DAO had been exploring an idea for early social intervention which prevented crime and discovered an exciting solution that would meaningfully reduce crime. That cell could generate its own contributors, community, token value, capital etc and as it grew would exert its own gravity on the larger DAO network. As this new opportunity started to scale it would change the shape of the original DAO as the network collectively reorientated itself around this new and impactful opportunity. Perhaps as a result the prison population would fall, but this is good news as the DAO would already have been flowing resources towards the new activities and possible new paradigm of transformational social outcomes.\n\n**This is sense-making in action.** Rather than leaders in a power structure gathering up all the data and deciding on a new strategy for the DAO, the energy and resources flow with each individual member of the network as they gravitate towards the highest potential and most aligned opportunities. This is the DAO network reshaping itself organically using genuinely decentralised intelligence. Rather than trying to define and implement strategy for the DAO, strategy emerges **autonomously** from the DAO network itself.\n\nThis is in stark contrast to traditional organisations who can't produce this kind of flexibility and collective intelligence due to rigid scaling infrastructure (see [previous article](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/unisNGUtHyRF7Zcp9CBbC-VhICOvVm0uzTFJUPX-Icg)). This legacy model leads to incredibly crappy externalities. This is easy to see in current private prison systems, where prison operators will often lobby governments for stricter enforcement of laws to increase prisoner numbers, in an attempt to maintain occupancy rates and ensure their business models keep working.\n\n### Enough scale to pay for the innovation\n\nThese amazing network dynamics are great in theory but DAO networks need to generate enough scale to make them work in practice. Searching for novel solutions is resource intensive. If DAOs are going to be these combinations of scale and innovation that can sense and evolve, they need to be big enough to generate the scale efficiencies to afford to do it.\n\nScale is also needed to make sure that these valuable new ideas make it out into the world in a way that many people can benefit from them.\n\nIt is easy to see from our prisons example, that if the DAO network only included one prison, the system would likely not be able to sustain the kind of creative networks needed to actually find breakthrough solutions. And then if they did find a breakthrough solution, they would not have a network through which to scale it. In our previous article we talked about the city-like positive feedback mechanisms that DAOs can generate:\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FGMQJu7gVYAxZYUUZU2PO-.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nFor all of this to work the DAO network needs to be operating at the scale of the system that it is trying to transform.\n\n### DAOs as many interconnected networks working across vast scale\n\nBut all this talk of \"enough scale\", must not collapse back into entity thinking. It is not about any one particular DAO being any particular size. This is the exciting opportunity. If we can pull the design of DAOs back to their smallest starting primitive cells, and DAOs (as networks of cells) just build up from there, then getting bogged down in where one DAO finishes and another starts becomes unnecessary.\n\nIf one DAO cell can easily, and in a principled way, connect with any other DAO cell and form into a useful structure (scaling or creative), then in principle it should be just as easy for two cells in different DAO networks to connect as well. Given all the experimentation with things like token swaps and DAO-to-DAO tools, the technical and governance tooling to do this more and more easily is emerging.\n\nIn this way I don't think the future will consist of giant monolithic DAOs that rival the likes of Google, Meta and other giant traditional companies. DAO networks present us with a different way of thinking about scale. A company needs to contain its hierarchical scaling dynamics inside an entity, but the tools that Web3 gives us allow the coordination of resources across and between vast networks.\n\nSo a Web3 solution that replaces Google might be a whole web of DAO networks that is spread across all of Google's 4.3 billion users… some of whom are working in highly structured ways to deliver at-scale technical infrastructure and core functions, some who are working on thousands of smaller experimental projects that grow and evolve into new and valuable things, some who just use the products being created and contribute data to the network as a byproduct. Maybe there is one search product, maybe a hundred, maybe a million.\n\nI know developing a million products sounds implausible but there is no reason that the tools we are collectively evolving to coordinate shared ownership, governance and activity across interconnecting networks could not scale to coordinate a network of billions.\n\n### DAOs are \"network intelligence\" that flows\n\nDAO networks will find equilibrium as they scale and fill the needs/opportunities they are trying to fill. But they will constantly be evolving under the surface. Whether it is the culture of the network evolving within the larger cultures we inhabit; adapting to changing environments, developing new technical underpinnings or product/service offerings, harnessing emerging discoveries and innovation - they will be able to scale but also to evolve, grow and reorient towards what is needed.\n\nUnlike animals and companies who, because of their inflexibility, grow old and die, DAO networks will be like forests, dying and being reborn moment by moment as the energy and resources of the community flow, form, reform, connect and interconnect in ever more complex and useful ways.\n\nBut DAOs developing into these kinds of complex emergent intelligent systems can't happen in an ad hoc way, it has to be foundational. We need to focus on finding and refining the primitive starting points. We need to make sure that we are working towards simple systems that can evolve into vastly complex ones.\n\nThe limited liability company primitive was able to produce the vastly complex global systems we have today. Now we need DAO primitives that can similarly evolve into our next emerging paradigm.\n\n### Article Series\n\n- Previous: [Scale and the levers that provide DAOs their power](docs/dao-primitives/articles/Scale and the levers that provide DAOs their power.md)\n- Next: [Minimum Viable Permissionless-ness](docs/dao-primitives/articles/Minimum Viable Permissionless-ness.md)\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations built from fractal primitives\n- [Primitives](data/concepts/primitives.md) - Building blocks that compose at network scale\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Fractal patterns across organizational scales\n- [Networks](data/concepts/networks.md) - Structure emerging from primitive composition\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for composable coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:28.743Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"minimum-viable-permissionless-ness","contentType":"article","path":"docs/dao-primitives/articles/minimum-viable-permissionless-ness.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Minimum Viable Permissionless-ness","url":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/SKKglrTiDUh5nuZX0cPOmI0a2fXr7uEw03Y1qNUAQ90","author":["yeoro.eth","lewwwk.eth"],"tags":["daos","permissions","governance"],"publish":true,"type":"article","banner":"![[attachments/w8Fm_EQb7jhvrd51VtE61.png]]"},"content":"## How permissionless access in DAOs creates decentralized collective intelligence\n\n_Rowan is a contributor to [SuperBenefitDAO](https://www.superbenefit.org/) and works on scalable models of coordination and fractal DAO governance. Gratitude to Michael Lewkowitz for contributing to this article and for his deep insight and belief in the possibility of Web3. This article is the fourth in our series exploring the concept of DAOs as networks and their evolutionary nature._\n\nAs we wrote in our recent article [DAOs: From Fractal Primitives to Network Scale](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/zyP-6GZQz-DWcdbAa-4sqRiY58P1WvYvIs_2zNa9oYo), a DAO needs to be able to produce emergent collective intelligence; **\"DAOs are network intelligence that flows\"**\n\nThis is what sets DAOs apart from businesses and other organizations. Traditionally we work on the notion that the smartest people sit at the top of an organization. They filter all of the information from across the whole org and then come up with a strategy that is sent down the chain of command to be implemented by the \"little people\" at the coal face.\n\nBut DAOs **—** as fractal networks of [cells](data/resources/patterns/cells.md) **—** have the ability to self-organize around the best opportunities emerging across the system in real-time. This dynamic, occurring constantly across the whole network, causes the system to become \"intelligent\". It can prioritize opportunities, allocate [resources](data/concepts/resources.md), make strategic [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md), change its shape and change its direction. It can do all of this traditional \"strategy\" much more effectively than a traditional organization can. Furthermore it can do it organically and from the bottom up in a deeply decentralized way.\n\nCentral to harnessing this decentralized collective intelligence in DAOs is the concept of \"Permissionless-ness\". The concept of \"permissionless access\" gets thrown around a lot in DAO-land but mostly as an ideal or an aspiration, and usually not in a very principled way.\n\nIn this article I want to make the case for a very simple **\"primitive\"** from which we can build permissionless access into DAOs out of which effective collective intelligence can emerge.\n\n### Permissionless-ness\n\nThe term \"permissionless\" in crypto originates from the concept of a \"permissionless blockchain\". Starting with the Bitcoin whitepaper, \"permissionless access,\" as a property of the blockchain, meant that no third-party gatekeepers could prevent anyone from interacting with the ledger.\n\nFrom here, the concept has become an important part of Web3 with the notion that permissionless access breaks us out of the gatekeeping structures of old, where entrenched power controls access to platforms and resources in ways that serve their needs; and not necessarily the needs of the community.\n\nThe vision of Web3 as a new paradigm of decentralized community ownership, and collective governance, requires permissionless-ness as a key part of the design. But at this stage there is a real lack of clarity about what the concept actually means, and as a result it is being applied in DAO design in haphazard ways.\n\nWe need to tighten this up. Rather than thinking of permissionless-ness as a vague ideal to aspire to, we need to think of it more as a principle to design from. I.e. What dynamics are we hoping to produce through employing \"permissionless access\"? How can we balance permissionless access with the need for security, privacy, capture resistance etc?\n\nThese are the kinds of questions that should be keeping us up at night.\n\n### Permissionless access in DAOs\n\nWith permissionless blockchains, e.g. Bitcoin, there is an explicit notion that the blockchain is designed to be a \"non-excludable\", \"non-rivalrous\", public good. This means that anyone can access it, use it, and that this usage does not reduce the value that other people derive from using it as well. This permissionless access is the whole point of a system like Bitcoin and therefore is wound deeply into its architecture.\n\nBut what about DAOs? With DAOs that are organized around clean technical protocols that are very focused in their scope (e.g an [AMM](https://www.coindesk.com/learn/2021/08/20/what-is-an-automated-market-maker/)), it is relatively straight-forward to see how aspects of the protocol can be open in a way that allows permissionless access to everyone in a principled way.\n\nBut with more expansive DAOs, we are talking about coordinating groups of humans to bring insights and ideas, to contribute and collaborate, to create and build, to allocate capital…\n\nThis is an entirely different proposition. If we are going to leverage the power of collective intelligence, but not fall into the chaos of structurelessness, we need a more **\"social\"** understanding of the concept of permissionless access.\n\nWhile access to a blockchain or protocol might be a non-rivalrous good, a DAO's resources **are** rivalrous goods. That is, if one individual or project gets given resources then these limited resources are no longer available for someone else to use.\n\nDAOs can't just allow permissionless access to finite resources without running straight into a game theoretic tarpit. But if we restrict access to DAO resources, just like a company would, nothing of significance will change. This is the challenge that we are wrestling with in DAO governance.\n\nIn their insightful article [Go Fork Yourself](https://www.notboring.co/p/go-fork-yourself?utm_source=email); [Packy McCormick](https://twitter.com/packyM), [Luca Prosperi](https://twitter.com/LucaProsperi) & [David Phelps](https://twitter.com/divine_economy) make the case that the direction that current DAO governance is heading in, to address this challenge, has not led to meaningful decentralization in how DAOs operate:\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FEkfhRFDWSgiraQjR2xTaN.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nThe actual decision-making has become more \"democratic\" because more people are involved in the final decisions, but this often rests on a small group of people putting up proposals for sign-off by the larger community. While community voting is a step forward, it doesn't, on its own, produce more intelligent systems.\n\n### Permissionless access to the \"network\"\n\nThe key here is in recognising that DAOs aren't organizations in themselves, they are [networks](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/3-ESNDLcf44dZ6VteaqZSpQuTL0oouSxlLJwuAlcQ_s). What needs to be permissionless is not access to a DAO's **resources** (treasury and other assets) but **access to its network.**\n\nThe following three features are the basis for allowing permissionless access to a DAO network. If DAOs do these three simple things well they can produce _\"the ability for anyone anywhere to contribute creatively to a system\"_ and harness collective intelligence to grow it into more complex and powerful things.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2F4AzAe6G2LPHZsbGA7VLMF.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\n### 1. Work on something\n\nA person can see an opportunity to contribute to the DAO and can start working on that thing without needing permission from anyone else.\n\nThis doesn't give them any claim on the resources of the DAO and doesn't give them the ability to interfere with what anyone else is working on. But it recognises that a DAO network's openness should be fundamental. People should be able to take action to attempt to create value for the network without requiring permission.\n\nThe network can decide separately whether it values that contribution and whether it wants to engage with it.\n\n### 2. Attract others to work on this new \"thing\"\n\nA person can encourage others to join their project without asking permission.\n\nPeople (\"talent\") are the network's most valuable resource.\n\nA person working on their \"thing\" can't demand that anyone join them on their project, but they are free to ask. Talent freely decides whether to contribute to the person's project (or not), based on whether it represents a compelling opportunity.\n\n### 3. Put up a proposal to the network\n\nAnyone in the network can put up a proposal to the highest level of governance in the network without needing permission.\n\nThis ensures that if (1) a person can see a compelling opportunity and start working on it. And if (2) they successfully gather others to push the opportunity forward, (3) they are able to show this to the community to ask for the resources necessary to keep developing it.\n\n- _A crucial second function of this \"permissionless access to the proposal mechanism\" is that the network can reorient itself when needed. When anyone can call out when the DAO may be moving out of alignment with the purpose or values of the network that animates it; it gains the capacity for the DAO to avoid capture and remain alive and relevant._\n\nOf course all of this freedom of access needs to be designed into a DAO in a way that doesn't just plunge everything into chaos.\n\nA lot of current DAO design is wrestling with managing governance overwhelm and how to prevent issues like malicious proposals destroying the viability of the DAO. All of these kinds of issues and friction does need to be resolved. The key point though, is that if we view DAOs as networks, we realize that we shouldn't try to do this by restricting access to the network itself — don't treat the network like an organization.\n\n### Access to the network should be an inalienable right\n\nPeople can do \"things\" in the network in a permissionless way. The collective sense-making (and permissioning of rivalrous goods) is based on how the rest of the network **responds** to these contributions.\n\n- Is their contribution valuable?\n    \n- Is their behavior acceptable?\n    \n- Do others in the network want to engage with what they are doing?\n    \n\nCrucially, unlike with organizations, these decisions don't have to be centralized. Other players in the network can decide for themselves whether they want to engage with, support, or promote any given \"thing\" that someone is working on. And at a higher level, the community/network can collectively agree on allocating capital to the valuable \"things\".\n\nWe still need to wrap structure around this. DAO's might utilize a code of conduct for managing behavior on a communication platform (like Discord) and they will implement tools and methods to curate proposals so that governance doesn't become a hot mess. This is not about **everything** being radically unconstrained. Rather it is about making sure that these three inalienable rights of permissionless access are not compromised in the process. **They** are what fuel the collective intelligence at work in DAOs.\n\n### What does this gain us?\n\nEnshrining these three permissionless features deep into a DAO's structure and culture causes an important self organizing dynamic to emerge.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2F6emMwTjA9jdLPyHZUf16V.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nIndividuals (\"talent\") identify high potential opportunities.\n\n\"High potential\" means that they have the potential to deliver on personal goals as well as the DAO's purpose and values.\n\nAs the developing opportunity attracts more talent, this signals to capital via treasury proposals, or other newer and more decentralized mechanisms.\n\nThis is a big shift from the status quo, where capital tries to be the source of intelligence. Collective intelligence emerges when people have permissionless access to the network and can turn this access into valuable action.\n\nKnowledge and insights from many individuals working \"close to reality\" become the driver of strategy. Rather than governance being solely focused on democratic decision making by the members of the network at the highest level, most decision-making becomes a function of action happening across the network. This dynamic is nicely articulated by Spencer Graham [here](https://spengrah.mirror.xyz/tGT32p-lA__63rmTXq_OD_iTTDoK-vsUn3QVsnnWmvo).\n\n- _**NB:**_ _I am aware the term \"talent\" may feel a bit loaded, but I am using it in a deliberate way to mean not just \"people,\" but people who have specific skills and intentions that make them relevant to a particular context. Broadly \"talent\" is: individuals with skills, discernment and motivation._\n\nWhen \"talent\" is free to make choices and act based on motivation and discernment, it can flow toward opportunity and act on it. Then if \"capital\" is able to flow towards this \"talent taking action\", you have strategy and capital allocation done at [network scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/network-scale.md), in real-time from the ground up.\n\nYou have a system that can [scale](data/concepts/scale.md) collective intelligence in a way that: (1) evolves to closely match the environment the system is operating in; (2) remains in alignment with the purpose and values of the broader network; and (3) is far more resistant to governance capture and attack than centralized systems.\n\n### Article Series\n\n- Previous: [DAOs - From fractal primitives to network scale](docs/dao-primitives/articles/DAOs - From fractal primitives to network scale..md)\n- Next: [Building DAOs as scalable networks](docs/dao-primitives/articles/Building DAOs as scalable networks.md)\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations balancing permission and openness\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making about permissions\n- [Decentralization](data/concepts/decentralization.md) - Tension between openness and coordination\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Mechanisms requiring varying permission levels\n- [Power](data/concepts/power.md) - Distribution through permissionless structures","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:29.800Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"reimagining-power-how-web3-can-transform-impact","contentType":"article","path":"docs/rpp/Reimagining Power - How Web3 Can Transform Impact.md","metadata":{"group":"rpp","type":"article","title":"Reimagining Power - How Web3 Can Transform Impact","description":"Exploring how emerging web3 technologies can be leveraged to redistribute power, mobilize capital, and transform systems toward more equitable outcomes.","tags":["impact"],"publish":true,"banner":"![[attachments/rpp-article-cover.webp]]"},"content":"In the face of multiple crises, systemic inequities, and entrenched power imbalances, philanthropy stands at a pivotal moment. Achieving transformational change requires bold shifts in how we understand and exercise [power](data/concepts/power.md), mobilize [resources](data/concepts/resources.md), and distribute value. It is no longer enough to acknowledge the power and privilege inherent in philanthropy; we must fundamentally alter the structures and [systems](data/concepts/systems.md) that perpetuate these dynamics.\r\n\r\nHistorically, philanthropic efforts have been shaped by systems of oppression, including colonialism, capitalism, and patriarchy. These systems not only inform the distribution of resources but also the underlying philosophies that drive philanthropic decision-making. Western-centric and capitalistic approaches often lack cultural sensitivity and fail to engage underrepresented communities effectively, perpetuating power imbalances and undermining the agency of those they aim to help. As a result, the outcomes are frequently neither sustainable nor genuinely impactful.\r\n\r\nThe legacies of colonialism and capitalism continue to shape the distribution of resources, knowledge, and decision-making processes in philanthropy. Capitalism, with its focus on profit and efficiency, often prioritizes short-term gains over long-term community empowerment, reinforcing a cycle of dependency rather than fostering true resilience. Additionally, patriarchal structures within philanthropy frequently marginalize voices and leadership from women and gender-diverse individuals, limiting the scope and effectiveness of impact.\r\n\r\nTo create meaningful change, it is imperative to dismantle these intertwined systems of oppression and reimagine power dynamics within social impact efforts. However, despite growing recognition of the harm done alongside the good, the systems that perpetuate underinvestment in historically marginalized communities remain largely unchanged. This often results in the distribution of resources that are insufficient to drive long-term impact, keeping these communities in a cycle of dependency rather than empowerment.\r\n\r\nAddressing these deep-seated power dynamics is crucial. It is not enough to engage in discourse about change; there must be a genuine commitment to transferring and sharing power. Without confronting the inherent imbalances rooted in colonialism, capitalism, and patriarchy, both the conversation and its implementation will remain superficial and ineffective.\r\n\r\nWhile there have been positive steps—such as participatory grantmaking and the transfer of assets and endowments—these efforts are but a drop in the bucket. Philanthropy itself acknowledges the need for more significant action, yet continues to be trapped within the same systems that reproduce the very power imbalances it seeks to address. If the problem is systemic, the solution must be systemic as well.\r\n\r\nWeb3—a transformative approach that offers a new paradigm for addressing power imbalances in philanthropy and social impact, stands as a potential solution. By leveraging decentralized technologies, Web3 provides a transparent and equitable method of resource distribution. Blockchain technology, for instance, ensures accountability and minimizes power disparities by allowing community members direct involvement in funding decisions. This democratization of decision-making is essential to dismantling entrenched power structures and fostering sustainable, impactful outcomes for underrepresented communities.\r\n\r\nHowever, for [blockchain](data/concepts/blockchain.md) to truly revolutionize philanthropy and social impact, it must be paired with a fundamental reimagining of power. The adoption of these technologies should be driven by a commitment to power transfer and sharing. By prioritizing community-driven approaches and inclusive decision-making, philanthropy can harness Web3’s potential to empower marginalized communities and drive long-term, meaningful change.\r\n\r\nChallenges such as impact measurement, data quality, and resource constraints have long plagued philanthropy and social impact organizations. Traditional methods often fall short due to inconsistencies and a lack of robust, transparent systems for data sharing. Web3 technologies—such as [blockchain](data/concepts/blockchain.md) and [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md)—offer innovative solutions to these challenges. Blockchain provides a secure, immutable ledger for tracking transactions and outcomes, enhancing transparency and accountability. DAOs enable collective intelligence and more inclusive decision-making processes, while smart contracts allow for real-time tracking of resource distribution and impact metrics. These technologies foster collaboration across organizations, leading to more sustainable and impactful outcomes.\r\n\r\nPhilanthropy and Social Impact today find themselves in a paradox: they exist to create impact and address urgent global needs, yet the systems from which they operate often hinder its potential. By embracing community-driven approaches, inclusive decision-making, and long-term perspectives, philanthropy can better serve the needs of marginalized communities and create lasting, meaningful change. Integrating emerging technologies like Web3 can further amplify these efforts, building a more democratic and equitable future for all.\r\n\r\nThe time for incremental change has passed. The time for bold, systemic transformation is now. Philanthropy must step up, reimagine its approach to power, and embrace the opportunities that new approaches offer to create a more equitable and just system for all.\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n1\\. **Power Imbalances in Decision-Making**\r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: Traditional philanthropic models often centralize decision-making power within a small group of donors or foundations, leading to a top-down approach that can overlook the needs and voices of the communities they aim to serve. This can result in misaligned priorities and ineffective solutions that do not address the root causes of issues.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: Philanthropic foundations can dictate terms and conditions for funding, leaving little room for community input or participatory decision-making. This centralization of power can stifle innovation and perpetuate systemic inequities.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Participatory economics, facilitated through Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs), can democratize decision-making by enabling communities to have direct input in how funds are allocated. By utilizing token-based voting systems within DAOs, community members can actively participate in funding decisions, ensuring that resources are directed toward initiatives that genuinely reflect their needs and priorities. This approach shifts power imbalances in decision-making, giving more control to those directly impacted by the outcomes.\r\n\r\n2\\. **Lack of Transparency and Accountability**\r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: The philanthropic sector often lacks transparency in how funds are managed, distributed, and the impact measured.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: Donor-Advised Funds (DAFs) have been criticized for their lack of transparency and for allowing donors to claim tax benefits without ensuring timely or impactful disbursements. Funds can sit in DAFs for years without being distributed, delaying much-needed support for urgent causes.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Blockchain technology can enhance transparency by providing an immutable ledger of all transactions. Every contribution, allocation, and impact report can be publicly accessible and verifiable, ensuring accountability at every step. This transparency builds trust and can accelerate the deployment of resources to where they are needed most.\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n3\\. **Underinvestment in Marginalized Communities and Organizations**\r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: Philanthropic funding often fails to reach marginalized communities at the scale required to make a lasting impact. Funding tends to favor established organizations over smaller and/or grassroots movements, which are more closely aligned with community needs but lack the capacity to compete for traditional grants.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: Preference for funding large, well-known nonprofits can marginalize smaller, community-led initiatives that lack the resources to navigate complex grant application processes.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Web3 can lower the barriers to funding for grassroots initiatives through decentralized crowdfunding platforms and peer-to-peer funding mechanisms. Smart contracts can automate the distribution of funds based on pre-agreed milestones or outcomes, ensuring that smaller organizations receive the support they need to scale their impact effectively.\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n4\\. **Inequitable Resource Distribution**\r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: Philanthropic resources are often concentrated in specific geographies or among certain organizations, leading to inequitable distribution of resources. This can exacerbate existing inequalities and limit the reach and effectiveness of philanthropic efforts.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: Many philanthropic efforts are concentrated in urban centers, leaving rural and remote areas underserved.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Through tokenization and decentralized finance (DeFi), Web3 can enable more equitable distribution of resources. For example, impact tokens could be issued to represent and track the flow of resources to different regions or communities, ensuring a more balanced and fair distribution. These tokens can be designed to incentivize investment in underfunded areas.\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n5\\. **Data and Impact Measurement**\r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: Measuring impact in philanthropy can be inconsistent and fragmented, making it difficult to assess the effectiveness of initiatives and make data-driven decisions. This lack of standardization in impact metrics can lead to duplication of efforts, inefficiencies, and challenges in scaling successful programs.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: Many foundations and nonprofits use different metrics and methodologies to measure impact, leading to a lack of comparability and difficulties in aggregating data to assess overall progress in a given area.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Blockchain and smart contracts can standardize impact measurement by automating data collection and ensuring the accuracy and consistency of metrics across organizations. Decentralized data repositories can facilitate the sharing of data, fostering collaboration and enabling a more comprehensive understanding of impact across different initiatives.\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n6\\. **Limited Access to Capital for Early-Stage Social Enterprises**  \r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: Early-stage social enterprises, particularly those serving underrepresented communities, often struggle to access capital due to their perceived high risk. Traditional impact investors may be hesitant to fund these social enterprises, leading to a concentration of capital in more established or \"safer\" investments, which may not be as innovative or community-focused.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: A social enterprise focused on providing affordable housing in an underserved area might struggle to secure investment due to the perceived risks associated with operating in an underserved market, despite the potential for significant social impact.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Web3 can democratize access to capital for early-stage social enterprises through decentralized crowdfunding platforms and peer-to-peer lending systems. By tokenizing investments, Web3 allows for fractional ownership, enabling a broader base of investors, including those from the community being served, to participate in funding these ventures.\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n7\\. **Access and Participation Barriers in Social Impact Bonds**\r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: Community bonds and Social Impact Bonds (SIBs) often have high entry thresholds for participation, which can exclude smaller investors or members of underrepresented and equity-deserving communities. This limits the diversity of stakeholders involved and can lead to a concentration of ownership among wealthier individuals or institutions.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: A community bond issued to fund a local infrastructure project may require a minimum investment amount that is too high for many community members, thereby excluding them from participating and benefiting from the project.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Web3 can lower barriers to participation by using tokenization to fractionalize ownership of community bonds or SIBs. This allows individuals to invest small amounts, making these instruments more accessible to a broader range of participants. Decentralized finance ([DeFi](data/concepts/defi.md)) platforms could also enable peer-to-peer lending, where community members can pool smaller contributions to collectively purchase bonds.\r\n\r\n  \r\n\r\n8\\. **Centralized Governance and Decision-Making**  \r\n\r\n* **Challenge**: In many social finance and impact investing frameworks, decision-making power is highly centralized. This governance structure often concentrates authority within a small group of committee members, fund managers, or investors.    \r\n\r\n* **Example**: An impact investment fund may have an investment committee composed of a few individuals who make all major decisions about which projects to fund.    \r\n\r\n* **Web3 Solution**: Web3 offers a [decentralized governance](data/concepts/governance.md) model through the use of Decentralized Autonomous Organizations ([DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md)). In a DAO, decision-making power can be distributed among a broader group of stakeholders, including community members, social entrepreneurs, and smaller investors. This [community governance](/data/resources/patterns/community-governance.md) approach allows for more inclusive and equitable decision-making processes, ensuring that diverse voices are heard and that decisions better reflect the needs and priorities of [diverse stakeholders](/docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/implementation/implementation-guide-multi-stakeholder-governance.md). Token-based voting systems can be implemented to allow participants to vote on investment decisions, governance policies, and fund allocations, creating a more transparent and accountable decision-making process.\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Related Concepts\r\n\r\n- [Power](data/concepts/power.md) - Transformation and redistribution through Web3\r\n- [Impact](data/concepts/impact.md) - Social and environmental outcomes\r\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations reimagining power structures\r\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making that enables power shifts\r\n- [Reimagining Power Project](docs/rpp/index.md) - SuperBenefit's power transformation work","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:17.242Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"scale-and-the-levers-that-provide-daos-their-power","contentType":"article","path":"docs/dao-primitives/articles/scale-and-the-levers-that-provide-daos-their-power.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Scale and the levers that provide DAOs their power","url":"https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/unisNGUtHyRF7Zcp9CBbC-VhICOvVm0uzTFJUPX-Icg","author":["yeoro.eth","lewwwk.eth","heenal.eth"],"tags":["daos","governance"],"publish":true,"type":"article","banner":"![[attachments/qztS_khrW3sAN3MEOHtsz.png]]"},"content":"_Rowan is a contributor to [SuperBenefitDAO](https://www.superbenefit.org/) and works on scalable models of coordination and fractal DAO governance. Deep gratitude to Heenal Rajani and Michael Lewkowitz for contributing to this article. This article is the second in our series exploring the concept of DAOs as networks and the evolving nature of DAO design._\n\n### Goodbye \"business model\". Hello \"network economy\"\n\nAs we described in our recent article [DAOs aren't things... they are flows](docs/dao-primitives/articles/DAOs aren't things... they are flows..md), [blockchain](data/concepts/blockchain.md) presents the possibility of a new paradigm to replace the company-centric paradigm that has been evolving over the past 400 years.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FwzujkB3B59tUd80JEcLsV.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nIf we can shed this 'company as centralising entity' paradigm and instead see DAOs not as entities but as centerless [networks](data/concepts/networks.md) with coordinated flows of [resources](data/concepts/resources.md), then a whole new way of looking at business and economics becomes possible.\n\nDAOs and companies are fundamentally different [systems](data/concepts/systems.md). Companies operate **business models**. DAOs are **network economies**. And this distinction is at the heart of why DAOs have the potential to usher in a new paradigm.\n\nUnpacking what network economies are and how they are different and more powerful than business models will require some framing. The concept of [scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/index.md) will be our way into understanding this; and to explain scale, I will lean heavily on Geoffrey West's work on the dynamics of how systems scale.\n\nA fuller explanation can be found [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxgHyPCCqaw&t=2s), but at a high level there are two fundamental dynamics to understand:\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FRLL22d1B8r-fONy7Cj_-N.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nI will start by outlining both of these dynamics and, if I do this well, hopefully it will become obvious that these two systems are the keys to unlocking the [power](data/concepts/power.md) that DAOs can embody in the world.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FbauTbkeITvUDgsK_5MJdW.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nWest's work starts with understanding that biological systems scale in a **sub-linear** way, meaning that as biological systems (mammals, insects, trees, etc) increase in size they become more efficient in a uniform and predictable way. For example, if you double the size of a mouse, it will only require 75% more food, oxygen, water and so forth; its heart will beat slower, and it will live longer. And the equations that predict this are accurate all the way up from a mouse to an elephant or a blue whale; each doubling in size produces a corresponding 25% increase in efficiency. The mechanisms that cause this phenomena have to do with the concept called **fractal scaling hierarchies**.\n\nBiological systems create fractal hierarchies with branching structures and every layer in the hierarchy creates an increase in efficiency. A good example is the cardiovascular system of a mammal. All of us mammals have a heart that pumps blood around our bodies in the same way; the heart pumps blood under pressure into an aorta which branches into two arteries. These then branch into more arteries and these then branch into still more. The physics that govern this system means that the more layers in the branching hierarchy, the more efficient the system becomes (the amount of work your heart has to do to get oxygenated blood to every cell in your body drops as you grow). This is why a 220 ton blue whale's heart only has to beat 11 times per minute to circulate blood to every cell in its body, while a mouse's heart needs to beat 500 times a minute to do the same thing. And every mammal in between these two exhibits the exact same heart rate to size ratio.\n\nAmazing as this is, what is more incredible is that this dynamic holds true for human-built systems too. This scaling effect is the fundamental dynamic that makes companies work. As a business grows, it is essentially building a set of branching hierarchies that generate economies of [scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/index.md) using the [same mathematics](https://arxiv.org/abs/2109.10379) that mammals, insects and trees use to grow. As the company increases its size and adds more layers to its hierarchy, efficiencies are gained across all the layers in the hierarchy. This causes the unit cost of the goods it produces to fall as its size increases. This is known as **sub-linear scaling**, where the use of resources becomes more and more efficient as the system grows in size.\n\n### Fractal hierarchies are finite\n\nSystems that rely on scaling via fractal hierarchies can become incredibly efficient as they scale. But the downside of this dynamic is that these systems decay and die in very predictable ways. The lifespans of all animals are almost perfectly predicted by their size (for mammals, from a mouse 1-1.5 years, to an elephant 60-70 years, to a blue whale 80-90 years). The bigger you are, the longer you live – but all do die eventually.\n\nThis is because fractal hierarchies are rigid. They gain advantage by creating infrastructures that can deliver scale, but over time this infrastructure decays. Over time the system inevitably pours more and more of its resources into maintaining its aging infrastructure and, with no ability to alter its fixed structure, it eventually becomes non-viable.\n\n_As a side note, humans are the only animals that buck this trend by living roughly twice as long as we should based on our size. But this has only happened in the past few hundred years because of breakthroughs in medicine, hygiene, nutrition etc. Up until the 19th century our lifespan averaged somewhere between 20-40 years, which is about right for our body size._\n\n### Companies are masters of fractal hierarchies\n\nThis dynamic is what underpins 400 years of success for the \"Company\". With the creation of the limited liability company we gained a highly effective system to make this dynamic work – allocating capital, to build infrastructure, to scale a business model… rinse and repeat.\n\nBut a consequence of this is that, like fractal hierarchies in biology, companies are finite. They scale their business models but then over time they fail to evolve, their infrastructure requires more and more resources to maintain itself, and eventually they die.\n\nThis death is often not obvious. Companies employ every trick they can to keep themselves alive, including anti-competitive practices, buying and incorporating other companies that are still on a scaling upswing, or they themselves might be acquired by another company (continuing a brand even though the company essentially disappears). But even with all of these strategies to cheat death, a broad analysis shows that almost all companies do predictably decline and die.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2F1yX1HzPX4hoF1MYTSlPKd.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nThe other powerful dynamic that West identifies is that of **social networks** and the way they produce social outputs in a **super-linear** way. The social networks we are referring to here are simply networks of humans interacting; this might be friend groups, business relationships, religious communities, membership clubs etc – any collection of social relationships.\n\nSocial networks scale in a super-linear way based on a set of predictable networks dynamics, including [Metcalfe's law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metcalfe%27s_law)\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2F2YK45VmGhEvW_deaU_N-9.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nThis is how things like markets work. The greater the number of participants in a market network, the greater the possibility that valuable exchanges of goods and services will occur (trade as a social output) and therefore the greater the value of the network.\n\nThis means that as social networks increase in size they produce social outputs at an increasing rate. So if you double the size of a social network, the research shows that you get a greater than double increase in social outputs; a 115% increase, to be exact.\n\nThis dynamic holds true across all social outputs, but what we are interested in for this analysis is the production of ideas and innovation. And the conclusion of West and his team is clear; if you increase the size of a social network, you get a mathematically predictable super-linear increase in ideas and innovation. This is a direct result of the greater surface area for the exchange of ideas, knowledge, capital and the possibility for creative collaboration.\n\nThe problem for companies is that once they are mature, it is nearly impossible for them to successfully leverage this social network driven dynamic. The necessity for them to commit to building scaling hierarchies in order to capture the benefits of economies of scale means that they need to have highly rigid infrastructure and organisational structures. This makes genuine creative innovation almost impossible. Try as they might, innovation is just not what they are designed for.\n\nSome do engage in R&D to drive product line expansion etc, but this seldom leads to genuinely novel innovation. So most resign themselves to purchasing innovation that is produced by others. As their hierarchies become more and more entrenched and inflexible, they do this more and more in an effort to stay relevant and ultimately to try to ward off their inevitable decline.\n\n### But cities don't die\n\nThis is where West's analysis gets really interesting. While animals, plants and companies all predictably die, throughout history there have been almost no cases of cities dying.\n\nIt turns out that cities survive (and thrive) because they are able to harness both of these dynamics - sub-linear hierarchical scaling **and** super-linear social network driven creativity and innovation.\n\nCities utilise scaling infrastructure for roading, electrical grids, water supply, hospitals, emergency services, communication networks, schools, and much more. This means that the bigger the city, the more efficient all of this infrastructure becomes, which allows for more amenities and better standards of living.\n\nBut, as cities grow, they also have ever larger social networks, which produce increasing amounts of creativity and innovation (along with all the other social outputs). If you double the size of a city it produces 115% more research papers, patents, startups etc.\n\nThis dynamic has the effect of creating a virtuous cycle of innovation and improvement to the city. The innovation producing function of the city creates a constant stream of innovative new businesses growing to replace those that die, bringing in new money; incomes go up, infrastructure is invested in and improved, the city is renewed. This in turn adds another virtuous cycle where the improvement in the lifestyles and prospects of the city's residents attracts new residents, which then improves the **Dynamic One** efficiency of the infrastructure and also improves the **Dynamic Two** ideas and innovation machine.\n\n### What about DAOs?\n\nYou can probably see where this is going. DAOs as network economies have the potential to leverage both **Dynamic One** and **Dynamic Two**. After all, cities are not _things_ either… They are networks!\n\nCompanies are fundamentally about building out fractal scaling infrastructure. That is what they do. Steve Blank, professor of entrepreneurship at Stanford and Berkeley Universities, differentiates between a startup and a business (company) in the following way:\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FzbrBXv4Ufzs3-CaoBP9PN.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nIn this framing, we can see that a startup is meant to operate like a social network – a group of founders, who are hopefully well connected, being highly creative and innovative as they connect, experiment, iterate, pivot... in the hope that they can discover a repeatable and scalable business model.\n\nThen when they have the repeatable and scalable business model, they become laser-focused on building the infrastructure to scale the business model. This commits them to the structure they have chosen. They orient their strategy and their business units towards delivering this structure and change, after this point, is extremely difficult.\n\nBut DAOs are network economies, not business models. And as network economies they can be more like cities and can escape the rigid and finite fate of companies. As economies, they can leverage both dynamics; they can be engines of experimentation and discovery, led by communities of individuals aligned around a shared purpose, but they can also bring these innovations to scale making them useful to the world.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2FcPvBMYwlW33bmfnoXV05D.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\nThis is possible because network economies can be coordinated in much more complex and useful ways than can companies. A DAO network can contain multitudes. Rather than being a single centralising, controlling entity, it can contain many autonomous self-organising groups – all working towards its overarching purpose inside a vastly more flexible structure; some building scaling hierarchies and others exploring and creating.\n\nLike cities, leveraging **Dynamics One & Two**, DAO networks can benefit from the same positive feedback loops as they grow. Increasing economies of scale make them powerful, while constant creativity, innovation and responsiveness keep them alive and relevant to a changing world. And as a result of this they attract more and more talented people looking for opportunities to do useful things, who grow and sustain the DAO network.\n\nThis is the promise of Web3! This is the promise of DAOs as networks of inspired individuals that can collectively overcome the inertia of our deeply entrenched economic system, multi trillion dollar incumbents and 400 years of habit.\n\nAnd to do this DAOs have to be able to leverage **both** Dynamic-One **and** Dynamic-Two.\n\n![](https://superbenefit.mirror.xyz/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimages.mirror-media.xyz%2Fpublication-images%2Fd1SkB3A0096bXkhc8GGln.png&w=3840&q=75)\n\n### Article Series\n\n- Previous: [DAOs aren't things... they are flows](docs/dao-primitives/articles/DAOs aren't things... they are flows..md)\n- Next: [DAOs - From fractal primitives to network scale](docs/dao-primitives/articles/DAOs - From fractal primitives to network scale..md)\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Core focus of DAO power dynamics\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations wielding power through scale\n- [Power](data/concepts/power.md) - Leverage points in scaled coordination\n- [Networks](data/concepts/networks.md) - Structure enabling scale and power\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making at different scales","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:30.335Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"collaboration-scale","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","type":"note","title":"Collaboration Scale","description":"Characteristics and considerations for groups operating at the Collaboration Scale.","tags":["dao-primitives","framework"],"aliases":null,"publish":true},"content":"Collaboration Scale represents the smallest and most fundamental level of group organization within decentralized [networks](data/concepts/networks.md). It's characterized by direct, high-bandwidth interaction among a small number of individuals working together toward shared goals. At this intimate scale, [groups](data/concepts/groups.md) benefit from rich communication channels, rapid feedback loops, and deep contextual understanding that enable emergent creativity and responsive adaptation.\r\n\r\nCollaboration Scale groups typically consist of 3-8 individuals—a size that allows for meaningful relationship development while maintaining operational agility. This scale creates the conditions for \"group flow,\" where collective intelligence emerges through synchronous interaction and mutual trust. Unlike larger organizational units that require more formalized [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) mechanisms, Collaboration Scale groups can maintain coherence through shared context and continuous communication.\r\n\r\nThe power of Collaboration Scale comes from its unique properties:\r\n\r\n1. **Communication Density**: With fewer communication pathways than larger groups, information flows rapidly and with minimal distortion, enabling quick sense-making and [decision](data/concepts/decisions.md) execution.\r\n2. **Context Richness**: Members develop shared mental models and tacit knowledge through ongoing presence and interaction, reducing the need for explicit documentation of all [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md) and rationales.\r\n3. **Trust Formation**: Direct relationships build psychological safety and mutual accountability, creating spaces where creative risk-taking becomes possible.\r\n4. **Adaptive Response**: Small groups can pivot quickly in response to new information or changing conditions without requiring extensive renegotiation of [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md).\r\n\r\nWhile the exact upper limit of group size varies depending on the complexity of the task and the individuals involved, it generally remains under 10 individuals. Beyond this threshold, the challenges of maintaining ongoing shared sense-making become significantly more pronounced, necessitating a transition to more structured approaches at Coordination Scale or to produce other collaboration scale groups to work in parallel.\r\n\r\n## When This Scale Applies\r\n\r\nThis scale is appropriate for your organization when you observe:\r\n\r\n**Size Indicators:**\r\n- Your group has 3-8 people working together on shared goals\r\n- Everyone can participate meaningfully in the same conversation\r\n- Direct relationships exist between all members\r\n\r\n**Coordination Needs:**\r\n- Work requires continuous collaboration and shared sense-making\r\n- Decisions benefit from everyone's input and perspective\r\n- Rapid adaptation and creative problem-solving are essential\r\n- High-context understanding enables efficient execution\r\n\r\n**Structural Implications:**\r\n- Minimal formal processes - trust and relationships provide coherence\r\n- Synchronous communication (regular calls, in-person work) is primary\r\n- Lightweight documentation captures essential [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) only\r\n- Simple tools support collaboration without creating overhead (shared docs, basic multisigs)\r\n\r\n**When to Transition:**\r\n- Group size exceeds 8-10 people and communication becomes strained\r\n- Work can be divided into parallel streams that don't require continuous shared context\r\n- The scope expands to require multiple small teams [coordinating](data/concepts/coordination.md) together\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Key Characteristics\r\n\r\n- **Direct Interaction:** Members interact directly with each other, fostering strong relationships and shared understanding.\r\n- **Shared Goal:** A clearly defined, shared goal unites the group and provides a focus for collaboration.\r\n- **Small Group Size:** The group size is typically small (generally under 10 individuals), allowing for high-bandwidth communication and [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md).\r\n- **Enabling Constraints:** The structure is typically flexible and adaptable, allowing for clarity and positive group dynamics, but avoiding bureaucracy and process-heavy operation. Using formal processes only for things that can generate significant risk, like financial management.\r\n- **High Trust:** High levels of trust and mutual respect are essential for effective collaboration.\r\n\r\n### Challenges at the Collaboration Scale\r\n\r\n- **Communication Breakdown:** Misunderstandings and communication breakdowns can easily occur in small groups, especially if there is a lack of clarity or trust.\r\n- **Insularity:** The tendency for groups to become overly separated and self-serving, no longer a genuine participant in the [network's](data/concepts/networks.md) goals.\r\n- **Unhealthy Group Dynamics:** Emergent power dynamics and other negative group patterns undo the benefits of creativity and flexibility in a small group.\r\n- **Traditional Group Thinking:** Collaboration scale requires group members to commit to and take responsibility for the group. Traditional \"work\" patterns can cause members to look to others for authority and avoid participating fully.\r\n- **Scalability:** Collaboration scale groups are not easily scalable; increasing group size often necessitates a transition to a different scale or for the group to produce one more additional collaboration scale group.\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Tools and Practices for Collaboration Scale\r\n\r\nCollaboration scale groups rely heavily on a combination of:\r\n\r\n1. **Enabling Constraints**: Group ways-of-working that emphasize self-management, shared [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md), and collective sense-making. Enabling constraints tend to take the form of group-level [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) about how the group will meet, work, and make decisions.\r\n2. **Formal Processes**: These are more structured processes often used to manage things that carry significant risk, such as [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) management [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md), or other major decisions like making changes to the core [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) of the group.\r\n\r\nCollaboration scale groups gain their power from having a group of high-context members who are empowered to move quickly and creatively towards achieving the group's goals. As a result, a Collaboration scale group will include the fewest number of formal processes that it can get away with.\r\n\r\nSee the [sense-making-facilitation-tools](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/guides/sense-making-facilitation-tools.md) document for examples of enabling constraints approaches appropriate for collaboration scale.\r\n\r\n### Collaboration Scale Patterns\r\n\r\n- [Cell State](data/resources/patterns/cell-state.md)\r\n- [Cells](data/resources/patterns/cells.md)\r\n- [Decider](data/resources/patterns/decider.md)\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Successful Collaboration Scale Outcomes\r\n\r\nA successful Collaboration Scale group exhibits:\r\n\r\n- High levels of trust and mutual respect among members.\r\n- Flexibility and creativity, the ability to respond to new information and alter course as needed.\r\n- Clear communication and shared understanding of goals and priorities.\r\n- Effective processes for [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) and conflict resolution.\r\n- A strong sense of shared [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and commitment to the group's goals.\r\n\r\nCollaboration Scale is the foundation for many larger organizational structures. Understanding its characteristics and challenges is crucial for building effective and sustainable decentralized [networks](data/concepts/networks.md).\r\n\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Related Concepts\r\n\r\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Organizational size and coordination approaches\r\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations operating at different scales\r\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Scale-appropriate coordination mechanisms\r\n- [Teams](data/concepts/teams.md) - Small-scale coordination units\r\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for scale-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:27.297Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"completion-phase","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/completion-phase.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Completion Phase","description":"The final phase of group development focused on thoughtfully concluding a group's work, preserving its knowledge and achievements, and ensuring appropriate transitions of resources and responsibilities","author":["yeoro.eth"],"tags":["dao-primitives","framework","group-phase"],"aliases":["completion-phase"],"publish":true,"type":"note"},"content":"The Completion Phase marks the final [group phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/index.md) of development, where a group that has fulfilled its purpose or reached a natural end point engages in a deliberate process of closure and transition. Following the active delivery work of the [iteration phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/iteration-phase.md), this phase focuses on preserving the group's legacy, ensuring its knowledge and resources transition appropriately, and celebrating its achievements. Just as beginning a group requires intentionality, so too does ending one—a thoughtful completion process honors the group's contributions while freeing resources for new opportunities within the network.\n\nEvery group consumes resources - whether that's team members' time, financial assets, or communication bandwidth. When a group's purpose is fulfilled, a clear process for winding down operations ensures these resources can be redirected where needed. Without such processes, organizations accumulate organizational debt, becoming rigid and inefficient. This directly undermines the flexible decision-making and resource allocation that these decentralized structures aim to achieve.\n\n## When Your Organization is in This Phase\n\nYour organization is likely in the Completion Phase if you observe:\n\n**Indicators:**\n- The group's core [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) has been fulfilled or is no longer relevant\n- Resources are being consumed without proportional impact or value\n- Team members' energy and commitment are declining\n- The [network](data/concepts/networks.md) context has changed such that the group's role is no longer needed\n- A deliberate decision has been made to wind down operations\n\n**Appropriate Structures:**\n- Clear closure timeline and plan communicated to the [network](data/concepts/networks.md)\n- Documentation processes for capturing knowledge and learnings\n- Asset transition plan for [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md), tools, and other [resources](data/concepts/resources.md)\n- Handover protocols for ongoing responsibilities\n- Celebration and recognition mechanisms for team contributions\n\n**What to Avoid:**\n- Letting groups fade away informally without proper closure\n- Hoarding [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) that could serve new purposes elsewhere in the [network](data/concepts/networks.md)\n- Losing valuable knowledge by not documenting learnings\n- Failing to communicate closure clearly to stakeholders\n- Rushing the process without honoring the group's contributions and relationships\n\n## Key Characteristics\n\n- **Decision to Close:** This could be made by the team itself or by a coordinating entity in the structure that has responsibility for the team.\n- **Documenting Group Closure**: Capturing key information about the activities, achievements and impact of the group and harvesting valuable knowledge it produced.\n- **Transference of Responsibilities:** Formal authorities and responsibilities that the group holds need to be transferred to other individuals and entities to ensure that the larger organization can continue to function effectively.\n- **Distribution of Assets** Any funds or other assets held in the group's [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) need to be distributed appropriately.\n- **Clear Communication** Communicating to the network that the group will be closing and how this will happen.\n- **Formal Closure** At the end of the completion phase the group will be formally closed.\n\n---\n\n## Functional Elements\n\n### Activities\n\n- **Closure Decision Process**: Determining whether and when to conclude the group through a thoughtful assessment process.\n- **Impact Evaluation**: Measuring and documenting the group's achievements against its original purpose and goals.\n- **Document Domain Learning**: It is crucial that knowledge and insights that have been generated by the group based on the work it has done are captured in line with the standards and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) of the larger network that the group has been operating in.\n\n- **Document Organizational Learning:** It is also important that any organizational insights are captured. Decentralized organizations must ensure that the wider network is learning and evolving based on experience and knowledge that bubbles up from the individual teams who are doing the work of the network.\n\n- **Asset Transition Plan**: Creating and following a plan for transferring financial [resources](data/concepts/resources.md), digital assets, and other property according to established protocols. Gaining approval for this plan as required by [governance](data/concepts/governance.md).\n- **Responsibility Handover**: Ensuring critical functions are either concluded or transferred to appropriate successors.\n\n- **Network Communication** Communicate the fact that the group is winding down to the [network](data/concepts/networks.md) within which the group sits. This will help the rest of the network understand how its structure is changing. It also creates the opportunity for others to suggest alternatives to closing the group.\n\n- **Celebration and Recognition**: Acknowledging contributions and achievements through ceremonies, artifacts, credentials etc.\n- **Technical Decommissioning**: Archiving group documents and communication channels in accordance with organizational practices. Closing down and canceling software subscriptions and other ongoing commitments etc.. Creating a final written completion document is recommended so that there is a clear articulation of the finished state of the group.\n\n### Challenges\n\n- **Failure to close**: Groups can fail to acknowledge or action the need to conclude a group that has outlived its purpose. Often group members can become overly invested in group identity, overly reliant on compensation from the group, or overly averse to the pain or conflict that closing down a group might cause themselves or others. These factors (and more) can cause groups to persist longer than they are effective, soaking up network resources and leading to a slowdown in overall progress towards a network's goals.\n- **Knowledge Loss:** Often crucial knowledge can be lost when a group finishes with key insights remaining only in the heads of departing team members. Decentralized organizations rely on the formal communication/archiving of this knowledge so that this knowledge loss does not occur.\n- **Orphaned Funds:** As group structures change in decentralized organizations, often funds can become trapped in treasury wallets. E.g., if several multisig signers disappear and the treasury can no longer be accessed.\n- **Loss of Access Credentials:** As groups change, specific authorities granted to groups or members of groups can become confused and potentially lost. E.g., login access to an organization's social accounts or software subscriptions can be lost. There needs to be a clear handover of these credentials to prevent this from happening.\n\n- **Ensuring Appropriate Recognition**: Creating fair acknowledgment of different contributions to the group's work is important. Consider creating onchain credentials that represent lasting recognition of group members' contributions and their impact.\n\n### Signs of Effective Completion\n\nA completion phase is proceeding effectively when the activities listed above have been completed. With the group having been fully shut down, its knowledge harvested and archived, and all responsibilities and assets transferred and its contributors acknowledged.\n\n## Tools and Practices\n\n### State Documentation\n\nDuring the Completion Phase, the [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation evolves into its final form, serving as both a transition tool and a historical record:\n\n**Purpose Elements**:\n\n- Final assessment of goal achievement and impact\n- Documentation of how the [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) evolved over time\n- Evaluation of what worked and what didn't in pursuing the purpose\n- Recommendations for future work in this domain\n\n**Practice Elements**:\n\n- Documentation of methodologies and approaches\n- Inventory of tools, systems, and resources to be transitioned\n- List of key relationships and their status/transition plans\n- Final [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) decisions regarding the group's closure\n- Final financial and resource allocation records\n- Operational shutdown checklist and timeline\n\n**Progress Elements**:\n\n- Complete record of the group's key achievements\n- Documentation of unfinished work and recommendations\n- Archive of critical materials and artifacts\n- Contributor recognition and acknowledgment\n\n### Transition Mechanisms\n\nEffective completion phase groups should implement mechanisms for ensuring appropriate conclusions and transitions:\n\n- **Completion Decision Framework**: Clear processes for determining when and how to conclude a group's work\n- **Knowledge Repositories**: Accessible archives for preserving and sharing the group's intellectual capital as part of the broader network's knowledge infrastructure\n- **Asset Transfer Systems**: Secure methods for redistributing financial and other resources\n- **Responsibility Transition Systems**: Structured approaches to handling transfer of authorities and access credentials\n- **Recognition Approaches**: Appropriate ways to acknowledge contributions and achievements\n\n### Technical Implementation\n\nTechnical requirements for closing a group will depend on technical tools that the group has used to implement its governance and operations.\n\nIt is important to ensure that platforms are properly closed off. This should include:\n\n- Archiving data/records back into the wider network's knowledge infrastructure\n- Canceling any software subscriptions, especially any that are either paid-for, or contribute to \"user\" or \"usage\" numbers of a larger organizational subscription\n- Capturing onchain addresses and relevant context so that the group's onchain activities can be accessed and understood in the future\n- Ensuring signing authorities on group wallets and other onchain authorities are transferred before the group is closed\n- Ensuring that communication channels are archived and removed from active platforms\n\n---\n\n## Success Indicators\n\nA completion phase has been successful when:\n\n- **Knowledge Preservation** The group's key insights and learnings are effectively documented and accessible\n- **Resource Transition** Financial and other assets have been appropriately redistributed or repurposed\n- **Network Clarity** All relevant entities in the network/s understand the completion process and its implications\n- **Recognition of Value** The group's achievements and contributions are appropriately acknowledged\n- **Relationship Continuity** Valuable connections established by the group can persist in new contexts\n- **Operational Closure** All systems, tools, and processes have been properly shut down or transferred\n- **Historical Documentation** The group's story and impact are preserved for future reference\n- **Network Adaptation** The broader organization has adjusted successfully to the group's conclusion. The completion phase represents not just an ending but a transformation—converting a group's active work into lasting legacy and freed [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) that can fuel new initiatives.\n\nWhen handled thoughtfully, this phase honors what has been accomplished while creating space for what comes next.\n\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [Group Phases](tags/group-phases.md) - Developmental stages of group formation and work\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations moving through phases\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Phase-appropriate coordination mechanisms\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making suited to each phase\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for phase-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:24.103Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"constituency-scale","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/constituency-scale.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","type":"note","title":"Constituency Scale","description":"Characteristics and considerations for groups operating at the Constituency Scale.","tags":["dao-primitives","framework"],"aliases":null,"publish":true},"content":"Constituency Scale represents a broad-based level of group organization, encompassing a large and diverse group of stakeholders who share a common interest or benefit from the organization's activities.\r\n\r\nUnlike the [collaboration-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md) and [coordination-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/coordination-scale.md) scales, which focus on smaller, more tightly coupled [groups](data/concepts/groups.md) and sets of groups, Constituency Scale emphasizes participation, representation, and collective [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) across a wider [community](data/concepts/community.md). This can range into the millions for a democratic nation. But can also be relatively small numbers, for example a small DAO [network](data/concepts/networks.md).\r\n\r\nThis scale is often necessary when [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md) need to be made that affect a large and diverse population, requiring mechanisms for ensuring that the voices of all stakeholders are heard and considered.\r\n\r\nHowever, there is a necessary trade-off between scale and the complexity of decisions that it can handle. [Collaboration](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md) scale can handle complexity, nuance, tension, etc., [coordination-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/coordination-scale.md) scale is more constrained and only able to make more formal decisions (usually that have bubbled up as options from collaboration scale groups). Constituency scale is more constrained still. At large numbers, there is little scope for complex [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) and usually simple voting mechanisms are used.\r\n\r\n## When This Scale Applies\r\n\r\nThis scale is appropriate for your organization when you observe:\r\n\r\n**Size Indicators:**\r\n- Your organization has 100s+ members in the broader [community](data/concepts/community.md)\r\n- Stakeholders are diverse and geographically distributed\r\n- Not all members participate actively in operations, but should have voice in [governance](data/concepts/governance.md)\r\n\r\n**Coordination Needs:**\r\n- Decisions affect a broad [community](data/concepts/community.md) and require broad input\r\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) needs to safeguard [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and guide long-term direction\r\n- Operational structures (coordination and collaboration scale) need oversight and legitimacy\r\n- Resource allocation decisions benefit from constituency-wide participation\r\n\r\n**Structural Implications:**\r\n- Formal voting systems enable broad participation in key [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md)\r\n- Delegation and representation mechanisms (councils, representatives) improve efficiency\r\n- [Transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) mechanisms (onchain tools, public forums) build trust\r\n- [Community](data/concepts/community.md) management functions enable engagement and participation\r\n- Simplified [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) processes (yes/no votes rather than nuanced deliberation)\r\n\r\n**When to Transition:**\r\n- Scale grows to network level with multiple DAOs or organizations [coordinating](data/concepts/coordination.md)\r\n- Governance becomes primarily about inter-organizational relationships rather than internal [community](data/concepts/community.md) governance\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Key Characteristics\r\n\r\n- **Broad Participation:** A large and diverse group of stakeholders participates in the organization's activities.\r\n- **Shared Interest:** Stakeholders share a common interest or benefit from the organization's activities.\r\n- **Representation:** Mechanisms for representing the interests of diverse constituents through collective [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md), such as voting or delegating authority.\r\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Structures:** Formal governance structures are necessary to manage the complexity of a large and diverse group.\r\n- **[Community](data/concepts/community.md) Management:** Often a formal structure will play the role of enabling community engagement and participation in [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) activities.\r\n- **Wrapping Smaller Scales**: Usually constituency scale [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) will wrap smaller scale operational structures. For example, it will act as the [community](data/concepts/community.md) governance wrapper that will support [coordination-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/coordination-scale.md) and [collaboration-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md) scale operational groups.\r\n- **Operational Functions**: In order to function, a constituency scale system needs some operational functions. There needs to be mechanisms to operationalize the [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md) made by the constituency scale governance, at a minimum to provide for the smooth functioning of the governance system itself.\r\n\r\n### Challenges at the Constituency Scale\r\n\r\n- **Communication:** The [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) system must support multiple communication channels to effectively reach and engage members of the constituency.\r\n- **[Transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md)**: For constituency scale groups to function, it is important for the system to be transparent so that constituents can understand that the system is fair and the collective's will is in fact being represented.\r\n- **Conflict Management**: A constituency scale group needs clear guidelines, policies, and codes of conduct to manage conflict arising in the [community](data/concepts/community.md) around governance. There also needs to be smaller scale forums where issues can be discussed.\r\n- **Representation:** Ensuring that all stakeholders are adequately represented can be difficult.\r\n- **[Decision-Making](data/concepts/decisions.md):** Reaching consensus on decisions can be time-consuming and complex. Decisions usually need to be made simple and straightforward, e.g., voting-based decision-making.\r\n- **Tyranny of the Majority**: Having a voting system doesn't necessarily ensure that all groups in a constituency are treated fairly. The system needs to account for marginalized voices that may get shut out. These may carry valuable intelligence that the wider group needs to understand.\r\n- **Participation:** Maintaining high levels of participation from all stakeholders can be difficult, which risks failing [community](data/concepts/community.md) engagement and governance capture.\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Tools and Practices for Constituency Scale\r\n\r\n- **Voting Systems:** Formal voting systems allow stakeholders to express their preferences on [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md).\r\n- **Onchain Tooling**: The use of onchain tools can enable [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) and auditability of high-scale [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) systems.\r\n- **New [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Mechanisms**: New tools and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) are being created that allow for richer, more complex preference gathering and sense-making at constituency scale to become possible.\r\n- **Online Forums and Platforms:** Online platforms facilitate communication and participation from a geographically dispersed group.\r\n- **Delegation and Representation:** Delegating [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) authority to representatives can improve efficiency and solve for voter apathy problems.\r\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Frameworks:** Clear governance frameworks are essential for guiding decision-making and ensuring accountability. Having well-developed group state documentation that is trusted and accessible allows group members to understand how they can best participate in group governance.\r\n- **[Transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) and Communication:** Transparency and open communication are crucial for maintaining trust and engagement.\r\n\r\n### Constituency Scale Patterns\r\n\r\n- [dao-state](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/patterns/dao-patterns/dao-state.md)\r\n- [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md)\r\n- [Community Governance](data/resources/patterns/community-governance.md)\r\n- [docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/implementation/implementation-guide-community-governance](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/implementation/implementation-guide-community-governance.md)\r\n- [daos](data/concepts/daos.md)\r\n\r\n## Successful Constituency Scale Outcomes\r\n\r\nA successful Constituency Scale group exhibits:\r\n\r\n- High levels of stakeholder participation and engagement.\r\n- Effective mechanisms for representing the interests of diverse stakeholders.\r\n- Transparent and accountable onchain [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) processes.\r\n- A strong sense of [community](data/concepts/community.md) and shared [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md).\r\n- A mechanism to translate constituency scale [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) decisions into operational execution.\r\n\r\nEffective Constituency Scale design is essential for organizations that serve a broad-based [community](data/concepts/community.md). Understanding its characteristics and challenges is crucial for building effective and sustainable large-scale decentralized organizations that leverage different scales across their activities.\r\n\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Related Concepts\r\n\r\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Organizational size and coordination approaches\r\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations operating at different scales\r\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Scale-appropriate coordination mechanisms\r\n- [Teams](data/concepts/teams.md) - Small-scale coordination units\r\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for scale-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:27.759Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"conversation-phase","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/conversation-phase.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Conversation Phase","description":"The initial phase of group development characterized by open exploration, relationship building, and vision formation that establishes the foundation for emergent collective action.","author":null,"tags":["framework","group-phase"],"aliases":["conversation phase","ideation phase","exploration phase"],"publish":true,"type":"note"},"content":"The Conversation Phase represents the foundational [group phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/index.md) of development within decentralized [networks](data/concepts/networks.md), characterized by open exploration, idea generation, and relationship building. During this phase, potential collaborators gather around areas of shared interest to explore possibilities before formal structures or commitments are established. The primary goal is to establish shared context, build relationships, and develop a collective vision that can inspire and guide future collaboration.\n\nAt a high level, the activities of a Conversation phase group can be described as \"Discovery.\" This can often manifest as a formal discovery process resulting in a discovery report as an indicator that the group has completed the Conversation phase of its development.\n\nWhen the Conversation phase is complete, a group is ready to move on to the [Formation Phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/formation-phase.md).\n\n## When Your Organization is in This Phase\n\nYour organization is likely in the Conversation Phase if you observe:\n\n**Indicators:**\n- People are gathering around an idea or area of shared interest without formal structures\n- Conversations focus on \"what if\" possibilities rather than concrete execution plans\n- Participants are exploring whether they want to commit to working together\n- No formal roles, processes, or governance mechanisms have been established\n- Energy is focused on understanding the problem space and building relationships\n\n**Appropriate Structures:**\n- Informal discussion channels (Discord threads, regular calls, collaborative documents)\n- Lightweight documentation to capture emerging ideas and insights\n- Open invitation for anyone interested to participate in conversations\n- Minimal coordination overhead - flexibility over structure\n\n**What to Avoid:**\n- Creating formal governance structures before shared purpose is clear\n- Forcing premature [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md) about direction or commitments\n- Establishing rigid processes that constrain exploration and relationship building\n- Requiring significant resource commitments before trust and alignment are established\n\n## Key Characteristics\n\n- **Shared Vision Formation:** Conversations gradually crystallize around a common understanding of [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md), creating the foundation for purpose alignment that will guide the group's evolution through subsequent phases.\n- **Relationship Building:** This phase prioritizes building trust, understanding diverse perspectives, and establishing the social foundations upon which more structured collaboration can later emerge.\n- **Team Self-Selection:** This phase is an opportunity for people to self-select themselves as conversational participants. As the conversation phase progresses, people with interest, capabilities, and capacity can start to shape the group that will take an idea forward.\n- **Informal Processes:** Processes are typically informal and adaptable. The emphasis is on flexibility and responsiveness to emerging ideas and insights. The group may identify as a squad or some other informal group type.\n- **Emergent Direction:** Rather than following predetermined paths, [groups](data/concepts/groups.md) in this phase allow direction to emerge organically through dialogue, discovering areas of resonance and energy within the collective.\n- **Cognitive Diversity:** The conversation phase benefits from diverse perspectives, allowing for a richer exploration of possibilities and the identification of approaches that might not be visible from any single viewpoint.\n- **Permissionless Exploration:** Participants engage without requiring formal authority or approval, embodying the concept of minimum viable permissionless-ness where anyone can identify an opportunity and begin working on it.\n\n---\n\n## Functional Elements\n\n### Activities\n\n- **Collective Sense-making:** Participants work together to understand contexts, challenges, and opportunities from multiple perspectives, creating a richer understanding of the problem or opportunity space.\n- **Idea Generation:** Open brainstorming and divergent thinking generate a broad range of possibilities before convergence on specific directions.\n- **Lightweight Experimentation:** Small, low-commitment tests to explore the viability of ideas or approaches provide learning without requiring formal structure.\n- **Network Weaving:** Identifying and connecting relevant skills, experiences, and [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) that might contribute to the emerging [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md).\n\n### Navigating Challenges\n\n- **Maintaining Momentum:** Keeping engagement without formal structure requires intentional facilitation and regular touchpoints.\n- **Balancing Divergence and Convergence:** [Groups](data/concepts/groups.md) must navigate between exploring new possibilities and focusing enough to make [progress](data/concepts/progress.md).\n- **Addressing Power Dynamics:** Even in early, informal stages, power imbalances can shape who speaks, what ideas gain traction, and how the group orients.\n- **Overcoming [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) Barriers:** Cultural differences, geographic distribution, and varying levels of context can create friction in establishing shared understanding.\n- **Overcoming Legacy Organizational Thinking:** Members can often habitually defer to higher authority in the organizational structure.\n- **Challenging Conflict Avoidance:** As a conversation phase group starts to define its [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md), group members can avoid reconciling differences in perspective and approach in an effort to maintain group harmony. This leads to a failure to make [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md), poor strategy, and future (more harmful) conflict.\n- **Failure to Close Down Conversations That Are Not Progressing:** [Groups](data/concepts/groups.md) can have a tendency not to \"call it\" when an idea is not progressing. This leads to wasted time and energy that could be redirected to ideas that have more potential.\n\n### Signs of Readiness for Evolution\n\nA conversation phase group may be ready to evolve to a more structured [formation-phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/formation-phase.md) phase when:\n\n- Clear energy and commitment emerge around specific, well-defined directions or ideas.\n- Participants express readiness to make concrete contributions toward shared goals.\n- The need for more defined [roles](data/concepts/roles.md) and processes becomes apparent to enable effective [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md).\n- [Resources](data/concepts/resources.md) or other forms of coordination are required that entail making a proposal to the wider [community](data/concepts/community.md), which will require group formalization.\n- Often this phase will culminate in the completion of a formal discovery process and the preparation of a discovery report.\n\n## Tools and Practices\n\n### Communication Infrastructure\n\nNo specific communication infrastructure is necessary, but utilizing platforms that offer different modes of communication is recommended.\n\n- **Synchronous Dialogue Spaces:** Regular video calls or in-person gatherings create high-bandwidth connection points for relationship building and complex ideation.\n- **Asynchronous Discussion Forums:** Platforms that enable ongoing, time-shifted conversation allow for participation across time zones and schedules and also create an easy way for members of the [community](data/concepts/community.md) to discover conversation phase projects to contribute to.\n- **Collaborative Document Editing:** Shared workspaces where multiple participants can contribute to evolving ideas and maintain a collective memory.\n- **Visual Collaboration Tools:** Digital whiteboards and mapping software that help visualize relationships between ideas and identify patterns.\n\n### Group Facilitation Approaches\n\n- **Generative Facilitation:** Approaches that help draw out diverse perspectives and build upon each other's ideas rather than creating debate dynamics. Some potential approaches can be found in [Sense-Making Facilitation Tools](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/guides/sense-making-facilitation-tools.md).\n- **Check-in [Practices](data/concepts/practices.md):** Regular reflection points for participants to share their current thinking, energy, and capacity to engage.\n- **Documentation Rituals:** Lightweight [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) for capturing key insights, [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md), and open questions to maintain collective memory.\n- **Diverge-Converge Cycles:** Alternating between expansive thinking (generating options) and focusing (making sense of what's emerging).\n- **[Progress](data/concepts/progress.md) Sharing:** Using tools like AI meeting summary bots and then posting meeting notes in public channels help [community](data/concepts/community.md) members to see what progress is being made and where they might be able to contribute to a group's progress.\n- **Utilizing Formal Processes:** Facilitation frameworks can support a conversation phase team to move an idea forward from a broad starting point to something that can be formally proposed and moved forward.\n\n---\n\n## Success Indicators\n\nA conversation phase has been successful when:\n\n- **Shared [Purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md):** A clear, compelling articulation of shared purpose has emerged that resonates with participants.\n- **Trust Foundation:** Relationships characterized by trust and mutual understanding have been established.\n- **Collective Knowledge:** Diverse perspectives have been integrated into a richer understanding of the context and possibilities.\n- **Natural Next Steps:** Clear energy and direction for moving forward becomes apparent without forced consensus.\n- **Emerging [Agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md):** Initial lightweight agreements about how the group will work together start to form.\n- These aspects are wrapped together into a formal discovery report that makes the group's work transparent and shareable.\n\nThe conversation phase is not merely a preliminary step but a vital foundation for authentic, purpose-aligned collective action. When done well, it establishes the conditions for [groups](data/concepts/groups.md) to evolve organically into more structured forms while maintaining the alignment, relationships, and generative energy that gives decentralized [networks](data/concepts/networks.md) their unique advantages.\n\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [Group Phases](tags/group-phases.md) - Developmental stages of group formation and work\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations moving through phases\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Phase-appropriate coordination mechanisms\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making suited to each phase\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for phase-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:24.678Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"coordination-scale","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/coordination-scale.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","type":"note","title":"Coordination Scale","description":"Characteristics and considerations for groups operating at the Coordination Scale","tags":["dao-primitives","framework"],"aliases":null,"publish":true},"content":"Coordination Scale represents a larger level of group organization than [collaboration scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md). It involves larger [groups](data/concepts/groups.md) or multiple groups working together towards a shared goal, requiring more sophisticated [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) mechanisms and communication strategies.\r\n\r\nWhile the exact upper limit of group size is flexible, Coordination Scale groups typically range from 10 to 150 individuals.\r\n\r\nCoordination scale is too large to afford the nuanced sense-making, creativity, and conflict management that [Collaboration Scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md) groups are capable of, but are still small enough to be effective at delivering well-scoped and planned activities. Beyond its limits (roughly 150 members - see [Dunbar's number](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar%27s_number)), [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) becomes too costly and difficult and should be either broken into smaller coordination efforts or transitioned to a [Constituency Scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/constituency-scale.md) approach.\r\n\r\nWhile [collaboration-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md) scale outlines small, high-context, high-trust group formation, coordination scale can leverage groups of a similar size as part of its operational structure. The difference here is that these groups will be more purely functional, efficiently delivering on known processes to achieve predictable results. Whereas a collaboration scale group will exhibit properties like autonomy, sense-making, creativity, and adaptability as a result of its less constrained design.\r\n\r\n## When This Scale Applies\r\n\r\nThis scale is appropriate for your organization when you observe:\r\n\r\n**Size Indicators:**\r\n- Your organization has 10-150 people working toward shared goals\r\n- Multiple teams or working groups need to coordinate activities\r\n- Not everyone can maintain direct relationships with everyone else\r\n\r\n**Coordination Needs:**\r\n- Work requires multiple teams operating in parallel with interdependencies\r\n- Clear strategy and work breakdown allows delegation to smaller groups\r\n- More formal processes are needed to maintain alignment across teams\r\n- Resource allocation must be managed across multiple initiatives\r\n\r\n**Structural Implications:**\r\n- Formal [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) structures guide [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) and accountability\r\n- Multiple teams (often [Cells](data/resources/patterns/cells.md)) with defined [roles](data/concepts/roles.md) and [responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md)\r\n- [Group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation provides [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) across teams\r\n- Reporting mechanisms track [progress](data/concepts/progress.md) and enable resource allocation\r\n- Communication platforms support asynchronous coordination alongside synchronous meetings\r\n\r\n**When to Transition:**\r\n- Growth beyond ~150 people makes coordination overhead unsustainable\r\n- Broader [community](data/concepts/community.md) participation in [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) becomes necessary\r\n- The need shifts from operational coordination to constituency-level governance\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Key Characteristics\r\n\r\n- **Shared Goal:** A clearly defined, shared goal unites the various teams and provides a focus for [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md).\r\n- **Strategy**: Coordination scale groups need to be collectively working towards a clear strategy that breaks complex components into smaller chunks that can be managed at smaller scales.\r\n- **Governing Constraints:** A more formal structure and sets of processes are typically required to reduce complexity in coordination scale groups, where larger numbers of people are required to work as a collective. See the [Cynefin Framework](https://thecynefin.co/about-us/about-cynefin-framework/#:~:text=Cynefin%2C%20pronounced%20kuh%2Dnev%2D,we%20can%20never%20fully%20understand.) for description of governing constraints.\r\n- **Multiple Teams:** Coordination Scale groups often consist of multiple teams working together. This allows for nuanced (complex) [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) to be pushed to smaller groups.\r\n- **Delegation:** [Tasks](data/concepts/tasks.md) and [responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md) are delegated to different teams or individuals.\r\n- **Communication Channels:** Multiple communication channels are used to facilitate information sharing and [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md).\r\n- **Interdependence:** Teams are interdependent, requiring effective communication and coordination to achieve the shared goal.\r\n\r\n### Challenges at the Coordination Scale\r\n\r\n- **Communication Complexity:** Conflict, disagreement, and ambiguity are difficult to process and manage in coordination scale groups and need to be managed through clear processes and policies.\r\n- **Coordination Overwhelm:** Coordinating the activities of multiple teams can require significant overhead. This needs to be designed to be as simple as possible to not create a bureaucratic nightmare.\r\n- **Maintaining Alignment:** Different teams may develop conflicting priorities. Clear [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) between teams and [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) about what they are doing and how they are doing it (via group state) is needed to ensure the larger group coherence.\r\n- **[Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) Allocation:** Allocating [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) effectively across multiple teams can be challenging. Clear [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) and accountabilities governing resource allocation are important.\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Tools and Practices for Coordination Scale\r\n\r\n- **Communication Platforms:** Platforms for facilitating communication and collaboration among teams including gauging sentiment from across the wider group.\r\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Structures:** Formal governance tooling to guide [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) and ensure accountability.\r\n- **Onchain Tools:** Where practical, onchain tools allow for [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) without centralization of authority.\r\n- **Group State**: Using onchain trust mechanisms that connect back to [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation allow groups to participate in coordination scale structures without overwhelming the coordination overhead.\r\n- **Reporting Mechanisms:** Mechanisms for reporting [progress](data/concepts/progress.md) and impact allow for coordination scale structures to manage and allocate [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) effectively.\r\n- **Project Management Software:** Tools for managing [tasks](data/concepts/tasks.md), tracking progress, and coordinating activities across multiple teams.\r\n\r\n### Coordination Scale Patterns\r\n\r\nRelated patterns and resources for coordination scale organizations can be found in the [Pattern Library](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/patterns/index.md).\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Successful Coordination Scale Outcomes\r\n\r\nA successful Coordination Scale group exhibits:\r\n\r\n- Effective mechanisms to surface intelligence from across the group and feed it into group [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md).\r\n- Free flow of communication and [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) among teams.\r\n- Efficient allocation and utilization of [resources](data/concepts/resources.md).\r\n- Clear processes for [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) and conflict resolution.\r\n- Alignment with the shared goal and priorities.\r\n- Effective mechanisms for engaging with [constituency-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/constituency-scale.md) and [network](data/concepts/networks.md) scales.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Related Concepts\r\n\r\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Organizational size and coordination approaches\r\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations operating at different scales\r\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Scale-appropriate coordination mechanisms\r\n- [Teams](data/concepts/teams.md) - Small-scale coordination units\r\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for scale-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:28.260Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"formation-phase","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/formation-phase.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Formation Phase","description":"The developmental phase where groups begin to establish structure, initial agreements, and concrete initiatives after the exploratory Conversation phase.","author":["yeoro.eth"],"tags":["dao-primitives","group-phase"],"aliases":["#formation"],"publish":true,"type":"note"},"content":"The Formation Phase represents the critical transition from open exploration to structured commitment within decentralized networks. Following the ideation and relationship-building of the [Conversation Phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/conversation-phase.md), groups in Formation begin establishing clear boundaries, formalizing [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md), and designing the structure needed for coordinated action. This phase transforms emerging potential into concrete design, creating the foundation for functional structure to be implemented.\n\nThe formation phase usually culminates in a proposal or some other ask from the community or governance structure that the group is forming within. This is in order to gain funding/[resources](data/concepts/resources.md), partnerships, legitimacy, etc. to allow for the formal implementation of the group's structure in the Organization phase.\n\nWhen the formation phase is complete, a group is ready to move on to the [organization phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/organization-phase.md).\n\n## When Your Organization is in This Phase\n\nYour organization is likely in the Formation Phase if you observe:\n\n**Indicators:**\n- A core team has committed to working together on a specific shared [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md)\n- The group is designing formal structure but hasn't fully implemented it yet\n- Initial [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) about roles, responsibilities, and ways of working are being documented\n- The group is preparing a proposal for resources, funding, or formal recognition\n- Simple decision-making processes are being tested but remain flexible\n\n**Appropriate Structures:**\n- Basic role assignments (even if informal) to clarify who does what\n- Lightweight [cell state](data/resources/patterns/cell-state.md) or nucleus document capturing purpose, practice, and initial plans\n- Simple proposal processes for making group [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md)\n- Initial coordination tools (shared documents, regular meetings, communication channels)\n- Draft governance and operational designs ready for implementation\n\n**What to Avoid:**\n- Over-engineering governance before testing basic operations\n- Requiring perfection in documentation or processes before moving forward\n- Creating complex hierarchies or rigid structures too early\n- Making commitments for resources not yet secured\n- Implementing technical systems before understanding actual coordination needs\n\n---\n\n## Key Characteristics\n\n- **Purpose Definition:** The group works from the clear, specific purpose statement that emerged in the [conversation-phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/conversation-phase.md) phase. This defines its reason for existence and intended contribution to the broader network.\n- **Structured Decision-Making:** Simple but formal [decision](data/concepts/decisions.md) processes begin to replace purely informal consensus, enabling clearer accountability and execution.\n- **Initial Agreements:** Members make explicit commitments about participation, contributions, and shared expectations, establishing the basis for mutual accountability.\n- **Lightweight Documentation:** The group develops basic documentation of its purpose, practices, and progress through an initial [cell state](data/resources/patterns/cell-state.md) or nucleus document.\n- **Resource Planning:** Initial budgets, timelines, and [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) needs are identified and documented to support formal proposals for funding or support.\n- **Minimal Role Definition:** Core roles and responsibilities emerge and are assigned, though these remain somewhat fluid and may evolve substantially.\n- **Team Formation:** The self-selected group solidifies into an identifiable team with shared commitments, moving beyond loose association.\n\n---\n\n## Functional Elements\n\n### Activities\n\n- **Early Execution:** Beginning execution towards the goals of the group. Important to be able to experiment and learn to inform the design of the group's structure.\n- **Commitment Establishment:** Members explicitly commit to specific future contributions, roles, or responsibilities.\n- **Resource Mapping:** Identifying needed skills, knowledge, and [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) for successful execution.\n- **Boundary Definition:** Clarifying what is and isn't within the group's scope and authority.\n- **Integration Planning:** Establishing how the group will connect and [coordinate](data/concepts/coordination.md) with the broader [network](data/concepts/networks.md) or [community](data/concepts/community.md).\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) & Operational Design:** Designing the governance and operational structure that will be implemented in the [organization-phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/organization-phase.md) phase.\n- **Proposal Development:** Creating formal proposals to seek [community](data/concepts/community.md) endorsement, funding, or permission when needed to formally instantiate the group.\n- **Initial State Documentation:** Documenting the group's proposed purpose, practices, and plans in a [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) document. This outlines vision and practical implementation of the group.\n\n### Challenges\n\n- **Achieving Specificity:** Moving from broad aspirations to precise, actionable objectives without losing alignment with deeper purpose.\n- **Balancing Structure and Emergence:** Creating enough structure to enable effective action without prematurely constraining evolution and adaptation.\n- **Maintaining Momentum:** Keeping energy and engagement high while shifting from open exploration to more structured commitment.\n- **Formalizing Without Bureaucratizing:** Designing useful structures without creating unnecessary processes that hinder action.\n- **Establishing Credibility:** Demonstrating sufficient capability and seriousness to earn support from the broader community.\n\n### Signs of Readiness for Evolution\n\nA formation phase group may be ready to evolve to a more structured [organization phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/organization-phase.md) when:\n\n- A clear governance and operational structure has been defined and is ready to be implemented.\n- Key roles have been established and filled with committed individuals.\n- Basic [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) processes are being consistently followed.\n- The group has begun execution of initial activities and can demonstrate progress.\n- There is a need for more sophisticated coordination mechanisms to manage increasing complexity.\n- Initial community support and [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) have been secured via a proposal or similar.\n- The group's [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) document is sufficiently developed to outline the structure to be implemented in the organization phase.\n\n---\n\n## Tools and Practices\n\n### State Documentation\n\nCreating a lightweight but clear [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) document is a critical practice during the Formation Phase.\n\nThe development of the group state document helps the group to get clear and precise about the group's goals and how it is planning to achieve them. It also communicates this to others in the community or operational network, forming the basis for a proposal or other mechanism for community or operational endorsement, funding, partnership, etc.\n\n#### Essential Components for Formation Phase State Documents:\n\n**Purpose Elements:**\n\n- Clear purpose statement connecting to broad community goals\n- Specific problem or opportunity being addressed\n- Initial goals and success criteria\n\n**Practice Elements:**\n\n- Key team members and their roles\n- Basic decision-making protocols\n- Simple meeting structures and communication channels\n- Initial [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) needs and [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) management approach\n\n**Progress Elements:**\n\n- Initial roadmap or timeline\n- First planned deliverables\n- Basic tracking mechanisms for activities\n\n### Proposal Development\n\nFormation often requires creating one or more proposals to secure support, [resources](data/concepts/resources.md), or formal recognition from the broader [community](data/concepts/community.md) or governance system. Effective proposals typically include:\n\nProposal development can center around the group state document outlined above, combined with whatever specific asks that the group may have of the community or governance system. For example:\n\n- Establishment funding\n- Ongoing funding\n- Access to community assets\n- Formal recognition within the governance structure\n- Mandate to act on the community's behalf\n\n### Support Resources\n\n- **Governance Design Support:** Accessing specific guidance and [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) for [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) design can save a lot of time and result in better overall governance design. This knowledge garden has a wealth of resources to support this work including governance patterns, frameworks, guides, and case studies.\n- **Group Facilitation:** Accessing governance facilitation support can assist with helping the group to get to agreement on exactly how they want to define the group's [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) and which [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) [primitives](data/concepts/primitives.md) and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) the group wants to adopt.\n- **Technical Support:** Once the fundamentals of the group's governance design are established, sourcing specific support to select the right technical tools to implement it is hugely beneficial.\n\n## Success Indicators\n\n**A formation phase has been successful when:**\n\n- **Shared Commitments:** Team members have made explicit commitments to specific contributions.\n- **Operational Structure:** Basic operational structures and processes have been outlined ready for implementation.\n- **Resource Access:** Initial [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) needed for execution have been secured or identified.\n- **External Recognition:** The group has been acknowledged and endorsed by relevant stakeholders.\n- **Execution Progress:** The group has begun making progress towards its goals.\n- **Community Proposal:** A clear, compelling proposal to the [community](data/concepts/community.md) or existing governance structure has been created and is ready to present.\n- **Completed State Documentation:** An implementable governance and operational model has been designed and is outlined in the group's state documentation.\n\nThe formation phase establishes the foundation for effective collective action by translating inspiration into structured commitment. It bridges the gap between exploration and execution, creating the conditions for a group to be formally established in the community or network that it is participating in.\n\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [Group Phases](tags/group-phases.md) - Developmental stages of group formation and work\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations moving through phases\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Phase-appropriate coordination mechanisms\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making suited to each phase\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for phase-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:25.248Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"index","contentType":"file","path":"docs/ics/index.md","metadata":{"group":"ics","title":"Institute for Community Sustainability","description":"A grassroots organization based in London, Ontario that bridges local sustainability work with global regenerative finance and web3 technologies","author":null,"tags":["organizations","sustainability","web3","refi"],"aliases":["ICS","The ICS","Reimagine Institute","Reimagine Institute for Community Sustainability"],"publish":true,"type":"entity"},"content":"# Institute for Community Sustainability (ICS)\n\nThe Institute for Community Sustainability (ICS) is a federal not-for-profit organization based in London, Ontario in the Carolinian Canada bioregion. \n\n## History and Background\n\nFounded in 2018, ICS evolved from Reimagine Co, a package-free grocery store and community hub. The organization expanded beyond its origins to become a distinct entity with a broader mission focused on helping Londoners lead more sustainable and connected lives through community-driven initiatives that promote environmental stewardship, circular economies, and social cohesion.\n\n## Vision and Mission\n\nICS envisions resilient communities where sustainability practices are accessible to all and where local action connects meaningfully to global movements. The organization's mission is to foster community-based sustainability through practical initiatives, knowledge sharing, and innovative governance models that empower local residents while contributing to broader ecological regeneration.\n\n## Core Programs\n\n### Repair Café\nA community-based initiative that brings together skilled volunteers and community members to repair household items that would otherwise be discarded. Beyond waste reduction, the Repair Café creates a space for knowledge exchange, skill development, and community building. These events transform the act of repair from an individual chore into a collective, empowering experience.\n      - **[v0.2](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/v0.2.md)**\n        - **[A-Introduction](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/A-Introduction/A-Introduction.md)**\n        - **[B-Overview](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/B-Overview/B-Overview.md)**\n        - **[C-Implementation](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/C-Implementation/C-Implementation.md)**\n        - **[D-Examples](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/D-Examples/D-Examples.md)**\n        - **[E-Guides](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/E-Guides/E-Guides.md)**\n        - **[F-Activities](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/F-Activities/F-Activities.md)**\n        - **[G-Future](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/G-Future/G-Future.md)**\n        - **[H-Reference](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/H-Reference/H-Reference.md)**\n        - **[I-Fund](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.2/I-Fund/I-Fund.md)**\n      - **[v0.18](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.18/v0.18.md)**\n      - **[v0.19](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/v0.19.md)**\n        - **[A-Cover](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/A-Cover/A-Cover.md)**\n        - **[B-Overview](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/B-Overview/B-Overview.md)**\n        - **[C-Implementation](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/C-Implementation/C-Implementation.md)**\n        - **[D-Examples](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/D-Examples/D-Examples.md)**\n        - **[E-Guides](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/E-Guides/E-Guides.md)**\n        - **[F-Activities](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/F-Activities/F-Activities.md)**\n        - **[G-Future](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/G-Future/G-Future.md)**\n        - **[H-Reference](docs/ics/ccc/archive/v0.19/H-Reference/H-Reference.md)**\n    - **[docs](docs/ics/ccc/docs/docs.md)**\n      - **[A-Introduction](docs/ics/ccc/docs/A-Introduction/A-Introduction.md)**\n      - **[B-Overview](docs/ics/ccc/docs/B-Overview/B-Overview.md)**\n      - **[C-Implementation](docs/ics/ccc/docs/C-Implementation/C-Implementation.md)**\n      - **[D-Examples](docs/ics/ccc/docs/D-Examples/D-Examples.md)**\n      - **[E-Guides](docs/ics/ccc/docs/E-Guides/E-Guides.md)**\n      - **[F-Activities](docs/ics/ccc/docs/F-Activities/F-Activities.md)**\n      - **[G-Future](docs/ics/ccc/docs/G-Future/G-Future.md)**\n      - **[H-Reference](docs/ics/ccc/docs/H-Reference/H-Reference.md)**\n      - **[I-Fund](docs/ics/ccc/docs/I-Fund/I-Fund.md)**\n  - **city-grant-reporting**\n    - **[index](docs/ics/city-grant-reporting/2024-final/index.md)**\n    - **[index](docs/ics/city-grant-reporting/2025-mid/index.md)**\n  - **[gg23](docs/ics/gg23/gg23.md)**\n    - **[graphics](docs/ics/gg23/graphics/graphics.md)**\n    - **[newsletters](docs/ics/gg23/newsletters/newsletters.md)**\n    - **[outreach](docs/ics/gg23/outreach/outreach.md)**\n    - **[social-media](docs/ics/gg23/social-media/social-media.md)**\n    - **[tweets](docs/ics/gg23/tweets/tweets.md)**\n    - **[website](docs/ics/gg23/website/website.md)**\n  - **[rpp-reporting](docs/ics/rpp-reporting/rpp-reporting.md)**\n\n\n## History and Background\n\nFounded in 2018, ICS evolved from Reimagine Co, a package-free grocery store and community hub. The organization expanded beyond its origins to become a distinct entity with a broader mission focused on helping Londoners lead more sustainable and connected lives through community-driven initiatives that promote environmental stewardship, circular economies, and social cohesion.\n\n## Vision and Mission\n\nICS envisions resilient communities where sustainability practices are accessible to all and where local action connects meaningfully to global movements. The organization's mission is to foster community-based sustainability through practical initiatives, knowledge sharing, and innovative governance models that empower local residents while contributing to broader ecological regeneration.\n\n## Core Programs\n\n### Repair Café\nA community-based initiative that brings together skilled volunteers and community members to repair household items that would otherwise be discarded. Beyond waste reduction, the Repair Café creates a space for knowledge exchange, skill development, and community building. These events transform the act of repair from an individual chore into a collective, empowering experience.\n\n### Thing Library\nA lending library for tools, equipment, and household items that community members can borrow rather than purchase. This resource-sharing model reduces consumption, makes useful items accessible regardless of economic means, and demonstrates practical alternatives to ownership-based consumption. The Thing Library exemplifies how community resources can be managed as commons rather than private property.\n\n### Community Workshops\nEducational events covering a range of sustainability topics such as furniture repair, clothing mending, food preservation, and sustainable cooking. These workshops build practical skills while nurturing a culture of self-reliance, resource conservation, and community interdependence.\n\n## Role in the Reimagining Power Project (RPP)\n\nICS serves as a key implementation partner in the Reimagining Power Project, a two-year initiative exploring how web3 technologies can transform traditional power dynamics in philanthropy and social impact work. Within this collaboration:\n\n- ICS acts as a fiscal sponsor, facilitating the on-ramping of traditional funds into web3 ecosystems\n- The organization serves as a real-world testing ground for web3 governance frameworks\n- Local programs provide concrete contexts for implementing and evaluating decentralized coordination tools\n- Knowledge and insights from implementation are documented and shared through the SuperBenefit Knowledge Garden\n\n## Web3 and ReFi Initiatives\n\nICS is actively exploring the intersection of local sustainability work and decentralized technologies:\n\n- **DAO Formation**: Implementing decentralized governance models for community programs\n- **Impact Verification**: Developing hypercerts and other on-chain mechanisms for documenting outcomes\n- **Funding Experiments**: Testing quadratic funding and other participatory resource allocation mechanisms\n- **Bridge Building**: Connecting traditional philanthropic institutions with regenerative finance ecosystems\n\n## Connection to Ethereum Localism\n\nICS embodies principles of Ethereum Localism by:\n\n- Serving as a physical community hub where digital coordination meets place-based implementation\n- Implementing cosmolocal approaches (\"what is heavy is local, what is light is global\")\n- Developing as a bioregional node within global decentralized networks\n- Creating and sharing open-source documentation of local web3 implementations\n- Building connections between on-chain governance and community-scale decision making\n\nThe organization's work demonstrates how Ethereum and web3 tools can enhance local resilience while connecting community initiatives to global movements and resources.\n\n## Strategic Direction\n\nICS aims to evolve from a single local node into a bioregional hub that coordinates multiple stakeholders, mutualizes resources, and enables systemic, place-based solutions. This approach aligns with principles of coordi-nations – voluntary interwoven networks that emphasize mutualism, participatory governance, and sovereignty.\n\n## Resources and Links\n\n- Website: [communitysustainability.ca](https://communitysustainability.ca/)\n- Strategic Plan: [ICS 2025-2030 Plan](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xZ-Z4KtnaTsurHNjUhs-y8-2GzQSyrNO/view)\n- SuperBenefit Knowledge Garden: [knowledge.superbenefit.org](https://knowledge.superbenefit.org/)","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:16.656Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"iteration-phase","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/iteration-phase.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Iteration Phase","description":"The mature stage of group development where a fully established group executes effectively on its purpose, maximizing impact through coordinated action with others in the network.","author":"yeoro.eth","tags":["framework","group-phase"],"aliases":["#iteration"],"type":"note","publish":true},"content":"---\n\nThe Iteration Phase represents the mature [index](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/index.md) where [groups](data/concepts/groups.md) transition from establishing their structures and processes in the [organization phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/organization-phase.md) to focused execution on their [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and goals. In this phase, a group leverages its fully implemented operational capabilities and [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) systems to deliver maximum value and impact. The emphasis shifts from internal development to effective delivery, with [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) becoming a key mechanism for accessing necessary [resources](data/concepts/resources.md), capabilities, and support from the broader [network](data/concepts/networks.md) or ecosystem.\n\nThe iteration phase is where a group, as an autonomous (or semi-autonomous) entity, both leverages and contributes to the power and collective intelligence of the decentralized [network](data/concepts/networks.md) it inhabits (or in the case of a DAO, is creating).\n\nWhen the Iteration phase is complete, a group may either evolve into a [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) or operational structure or enter a [completion phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/completion-phase.md) as its [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) is fulfilled.\n\n## When Your Organization is in This Phase\n\nYour organization is likely in the Iteration Phase if you observe:\n\n**Indicators:**\n- All governance and operational systems are fully implemented and functioning\n- The group is executing its strategy and delivering concrete outcomes\n- Focus has shifted from building infrastructure to maximizing impact\n- The group is actively [coordinating](data/concepts/coordination.md) with other entities in the [network](data/concepts/networks.md)\n- Regular cycles of planning, execution, feedback, and evolution are established\n\n**Appropriate Structures:**\n- Mature [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) processes that handle decisions efficiently\n- Well-maintained [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation that stays current\n- Established [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) mechanisms with other [network](data/concepts/networks.md) entities\n- Regular feedback and evolution cycles to improve systems and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md)\n- Impact measurement and reporting mechanisms that demonstrate value\n\n**What to Avoid:**\n- Becoming rigid - continue evolving governance and operations as context changes\n- Neglecting [network](data/concepts/networks.md) relationships in favor of internal focus\n- Allowing documentation and [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) to degrade over time\n- Losing sight of core [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) as operations become routine\n- Failing to recognize when the group's [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) has been fulfilled and [completion phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/completion-phase.md) is appropriate\n\n## Key Characteristics\n\n- **Purpose-Driven Execution:** The group's activities are tightly aligned with its core [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md), with clear prioritization of high-impact initiatives that advance its goals.\n- **[Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) Sharing:** The group optimizes the use of its internal [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) while accessing and/or contributing resources externally through [network](data/concepts/networks.md) relationships.\n- **Decentralized [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md):** The group fully implements the onchain tooling and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) that allow its [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational structure to leverage decentralization in effective ways.\n- **Operational Excellence:** Internal systems and processes function smoothly, allowing focus to shift from setup and maintenance to optimization and results.\n- **Evolution:** The group evolves its [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational structure and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) over time in response to its evolving context.\n- **Measurable Impact:** The group consistently delivers and documents concrete outcomes that advance its [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and provide value to the broader [network](data/concepts/networks.md).\n\n## Functional Elements\n\n### Activities\n\nThe activities of an Iteration phase group are outlined in their [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation. Broadly these include:\n\n- **Internal [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md):** Execution of the group's ongoing governance structure and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md). Including keeping group state documentation up to date and accessible to participants in the [network](data/concepts/networks.md).\n- **Network [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md):** Participating in external decentralized governance processes within coordinating [networks](data/concepts/networks.md).\n- **Strategic Execution:** Implementing the group's strategy through coordinated action that delivers on key objectives and milestones.\n- **Operational [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md):** Strategic planning, [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) allocation, contributor and partner coordination, etc.\n- **External Partnerships:** Establishing and executing on partnerships with other autonomous entities in the decentralized [network](data/concepts/networks.md) or other stakeholders from outside the network.\n- **Impact Measurement:** Tracking and communicating the outcomes and value created by the group's activities.\n- **Feedback Integration:** Systematically gathering and responding to feedback from users, stakeholders, and [network](data/concepts/networks.md) participants.\n- **Knowledge Sharing:** Documenting and sharing learnings, tools, and approaches that could benefit others in the [network](data/concepts/networks.md). Including consistently updating and sharing its [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation.\n\n### Navigating Challenges\n\n- **Maintaining Momentum:** Sustaining energy and [progress](data/concepts/progress.md) toward goals despite obstacles and competing priorities.\n- **Balancing Flexibility and Focus:** Adapting to changing circumstances without losing sight of core objectives and priorities.\n- **Principled Evolution:** Ensuring that as the group evolves, it grows in principled ways, avoiding centralization, governance capture, bureaucratic bloat, etc. Leveraging decentralized tooling and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) to ensure [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operations stay true to design.\n- **Maintaining Alignment with Coordinating Entities:** Ensuring that new opportunities and partnerships remain aligned with the group's fundamental [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and with the purpose of the [network](data/concepts/networks.md) that the group is participating in.\n- **Consistently Communicating [Progress](data/concepts/progress.md):** Ensuring that the [network](data/concepts/networks.md) that the group is coordinating with can see and understand the progress it is making and trust that it is a good [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) partner.\n\n### Signs of Readiness for Evolution\n\nAn iteration phase group may be ready to evolve to a new form or enter completion when:\n\n- The group's [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) has been substantially fulfilled or has evolved significantly\n- The operational context has changed in ways that require fundamental restructuring\n- New capabilities or approaches have emerged that would better serve the purpose\n- The group's work has been effectively systematized or automated\n- The group can no longer maintain the energy and commitment of team members and contributors in order to do its work\n\n---\n\n## Tools and Practices\n\n### State Documentation\n\nDuring the Iteration Phase, the group's [group state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation is the critical interface between the group and the [network](data/concepts/networks.md) it inhabits. It contains the [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) between the group and other coordinating entities, as well as references to web3 tooling and onchain information that allows for effective decentralized [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) between the group and its network.\n\nAt iteration phase, if a group fails to maintain their state documentation, or to communicate it clearly and transparently, this should be a red flag for any entity or [network](data/concepts/networks.md) coordinating with the group.\n\n**[Purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) Elements:**\n\n- Evolution of the group's strategy and goals in line with its purpose\n- Evolution of its relationship with/to other entities in its [network](data/concepts/networks.md) and the network itself\n\n**[Practice](data/concepts/practices.md) Elements:**\n\n- Updated [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) practices that evolve as the group grows and changes\n- Maintaining [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) and internal and external [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) processes\n- Evolving contributor engagement and coordination mechanisms\n- Maintaining [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) and [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) allocation practices\n- Ongoing retrospectives and feedback processes and ongoing governance and operational evolution\n- Records of major group [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md) and transactions\n\n**[Progress](data/concepts/progress.md) Elements:**\n\n- Implementation of onchain tools where practical\n- Collaborative project management tools tracking group activities and deliverables\n- Communication platforms - meetings, group channels, broadcast channels\n- Shared workspaces, documentation, and data platforms\n- Documentation of learnings and group evolution\n- Impact metrics that track progress toward key objectives - clear articulation of how activities connect to broader [network](data/concepts/networks.md) goals\n\n### Technical Implementation\n\nIteration Phase groups typically employ various technical tools to support execution and [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md). At this phase these should, where practical, be onchain tools. This promotes the decentralized properties that are designed into the group's [governance](data/concepts/governance.md). Using onchain tools is especially important for:\n\n- Governing the group's [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) and allocation of [resources](data/concepts/resources.md).\n- Managing changes in the overall [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) structure of the group, i.e., who has [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) authorities.\n- Information for external stakeholders. [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) partners need to have trust in the group's processes at a glance.\n\nThere is always a balance to be struck between the flexibility of a lightweight minimal organizational structure, and the need for solid tools, [practices](data/concepts/practices.md), processes, and policies to support a group to function successfully. At iteration phase, the group should have its structure fully implemented with technical tooling, in line with what it needs to deliver on its stated [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational design.\n\n## Success Indicators\n\nAn iteration phase has been successful when:\n\n- **[Purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) Advancement:** The group consistently delivers outcomes that meaningfully advance its purpose\n- **[Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) Effectiveness:** Available resources are deployed efficiently to create maximum impact\n- **[Network](data/concepts/networks.md) Support:** The group maintains ongoing support from the networks that it inhabits\n- **Contributor Engagement:** The group successfully attracts and retains contributors with aligned skills and interests to deliver on its strategy\n- **Clear [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md):** The group executes on its governance practices in an effective and [transparent](data/concepts/transparency.md) way\n- **Operational Fluidity:** The group's ability to create and manage operations via tools like [roles](data/concepts/roles.md) and [tasks](data/concepts/tasks.md) can scale coherently to meet the operational needs of the group\n- **Adaptive Capacity:** The group effectively executes on retrospectives and other feedback processes, and translates insights generated through these processes into changes in the governance and operational structure of the group\n- **Documented Impact:** Clear evidence demonstrates the value and outcomes created by the group's activities\n\nThe iteration phase represents the period when a group's full potential is realized through effective execution on its [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md). To do this, it effectively coordinates with the decentralized [networks](data/concepts/networks.md) it inhabits.\n\nWhen successful, the group creates tangible value for itself and for the broader [networks](data/concepts/networks.md) while building a foundation for sustainable impact and evolution.\n\n\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [Group Phases](tags/group-phases.md) - Developmental stages of group formation and work\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations moving through phases\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Phase-appropriate coordination mechanisms\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making suited to each phase\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for phase-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:26.247Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"network-scale","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/network-scale.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","type":"note","title":"Network Scale","description":"Characteristics and considerations for groups operating at the Network Scale.","tags":["dao-primitives","framework"],"aliases":null,"publish":true},"content":"Network Scale represents the highest level of group organization within the DAO [primitives](data/concepts/primitives.md) framework. It encompasses the relationships and connections between decentralized organizations, [communities](data/concepts/community.md) as well as traditional organizations, as they coordinate to achieve impact using decentralized organizing patterns.\r\n\r\nNetwork scale spans and leverages the three other group scales ([collaboration-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/collaboration-scale.md), [coordination-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/coordination-scale.md), and [constituency-scale](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/constituency-scale.md) scales).\r\n\r\nThis scale is characterized by high levels of interdependence, complex communication flows, and the need for robust mechanisms for [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) and [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) across multiple entities.\r\n\r\n## When This Scale Applies\r\n\r\nThis scale is appropriate for your organization when you observe:\r\n\r\n**Size Indicators:**\r\n- Multiple independent organizations or DAOs need to coordinate\r\n- Partnerships span across different [communities](data/concepts/community.md), networks, or ecosystems\r\n- No single entity can achieve goals alone - collaboration across organizations is essential\r\n\r\n**Coordination Needs:**\r\n- Shared or complementary goals require inter-organizational collaboration\r\n- [Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) flows and [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) must operate across organizational boundaries\r\n- Complex problems require coordinated action at multiple levels (collaboration, coordination, constituency scales)\r\n- Interoperability between different organizational systems and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) is necessary\r\n\r\n**Structural Implications:**\r\n- Shared platforms and infrastructure enable communication and collaboration\r\n- Network-level [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) mechanisms coordinate [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) across organizations\r\n- Onchain protocols provide [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) and trust for inter-organizational relationships\r\n- Clear [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation from all entities enables alignment and trust\r\n- Conflict resolution processes handle disagreements between autonomous organizations\r\n\r\n**Examples:**\r\n- Multi-stakeholder partnerships between DAOs and traditional organizations\r\n- Networks of DAOs coordinating around shared ecosystems or domains\r\n- Decentralized protocols with multiple governance entities\r\n- Cross-organization initiatives requiring federated coordination\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Key Characteristics\r\n\r\n- **Interconnected Organizations:** The Network Scale involves multiple organizations or [groups](data/concepts/groups.md) working together, often with varying degrees of autonomy.\r\n- **Decentralized Organizing**: Seeks to create effective mechanisms for partnership by leveraging decentralized patterns of organizing.\r\n- **Shared or Complementary Goals:** Organizations within the [network](data/concepts/networks.md) may share common goals or have complementary goals that contribute to a larger ecosystem.\r\n- **Multi-Scale:** The network is operationalized through interdependent entities that operate at different [group-scales](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-scale/index.md), in order to most effectively deliver on the goals of the network.\r\n- **Complex Communication:** Communication flows are complex, requiring robust mechanisms for information sharing and [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md).\r\n- **Decentralized [Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) Allocation:** [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) at multiple levels in the network allocates [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) based on local knowledge and context.\r\n- **Adaptability:** The network must be adaptable to changing circumstances and the evolving needs of its constituent organizations.\r\n\r\n### Challenges at Network Scale\r\n\r\n- **Communication and [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md):** Maintaining effective communication and coordination across a large and diverse network can be extremely challenging.\r\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md):** Establishing and maintaining effective governance mechanisms across multiple organizations is complex.\r\n- **Interoperability:** Ensuring that the systems and processes of different organizations are interoperable is crucial.\r\n- **Conflict Resolution:** Resolving conflicts between organizations within the network requires robust mechanisms.\r\n- **Maintaining Alignment:** Keeping all organizations aligned with the overall goals of the network is essential.\r\n- **Scalability:** The network must be designed to scale effectively as new organizations join and the network grows.\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Tools and Practices for Network Scale\r\n\r\n- **Shared Platforms and Infrastructure:** Shared platforms and infrastructure for communication, collaboration, and [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) sharing.\r\n- **Network [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Mechanisms:** Mechanisms for coordinating [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) and ensuring accountability across the network.\r\n- **Onchain Protocols**: Tools that allow for stakeholders across the networks to understand and participate in network scale [governance](data/concepts/governance.md), as well as to have visibility of and trust in the [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) occurring at lower levels of scale in the network.\r\n- **Conflict Resolution Processes:** Processes for resolving conflicts between organizations.\r\n- **Communication Protocols:** Clear communication protocols and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) for effective information sharing.\r\n- **Monitoring and Evaluation:** Mechanisms for monitoring the performance of the network and evaluating its effectiveness.\r\n- **Group State**: Clear and transparent group state documentation to allow for partnership alignment and trust across the network.\r\n\r\n### Network Scale Patterns\r\n\r\nRelated patterns and resources for network scale organizations:\r\n\r\n- [Bioregional Finance](docs/rpp/rpp-working-docs/biofi.md)\r\n- [Privacy-Preserving Crypto Payments](docs/rpp/rpp-working-docs/privacy-payments.md)\r\n- [Decentralized Social Finance](docs/rpp/rpp-working-docs/social-finance.md)\r\n- Additional patterns in the [Pattern Library](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/patterns/index.md)\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Successful Network Scale Outcomes\r\n\r\nA successful Network Scale system exhibits:\r\n\r\n- Effective decentralization of authority across the network.\r\n- Mechanisms to surface collective intelligence from across the different nodes in the network.\r\n- Effective communication and [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) across all organizations.\r\n- Robust [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) mechanisms that ensure accountability and [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md).\r\n- Interoperable systems and processes that facilitate collaboration.\r\n- Mechanisms for resolving conflicts and maintaining alignment.\r\n- Adaptability to changing circumstances and the evolving needs of its constituent organizations.\r\n\r\nThe Network Scale represents the highest level of organizational complexity within this framework. Understanding its characteristics and challenges is crucial for building effective and sustainable large-scale [networks](data/concepts/networks.md).\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n---\r\n\r\n## Related Concepts\r\n\r\n- [Scale](data/concepts/scale.md) - Organizational size and coordination approaches\r\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations operating at different scales\r\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Scale-appropriate coordination mechanisms\r\n- [Teams](data/concepts/teams.md) - Small-scale coordination units\r\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for scale-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:29.377Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"organization-phase","contentType":"file","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/organization-phase.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Organization Phase","description":"The developmental phase where groups establish formalized structures, processes, and governance mechanisms to enable sustainable operations and effective coordination within the network.","author":["yeoro.eth"],"tags":["framework","group-phase"],"aliases":["organization phase","#organization"],"publish":true,"type":"note"},"content":"The Organization Phase builds upon the [formation phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/formation-phase.md), transitioning from a basic framework to a fully established, formal structure with defined processes and [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) mechanisms. This phase is characterized by the implementation of the systems, procedures, and [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) frameworks that were designed in the Formation phase. Getting these up and running enables the group to operate efficiently, effectively, and with the necessary [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) needed for the decentralized [network](data/concepts/networks.md) that it is either establishing or operating inside.\n\nThe organization phase often follows a [community](data/concepts/community.md) proposal at the culmination of the Formation phase, and much of its activities will be implementing the design that was laid out in this previous phase.\n\nThe Organization phase is complete when the structure outlined in the group's [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation has been fully implemented, [roles](data/concepts/roles.md) have been filled, and the group is executing on its goals.\n\n## When Your Organization is in This Phase\n\nYour organization is likely in the Organization Phase if you observe:\n\n**Indicators:**\n- The group has secured resources and approval to implement its designed structure\n- Formal [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) systems are being put in place (voting, proposal processes, decision frameworks)\n- Technical infrastructure is being deployed (multisigs, tokens, coordination tools)\n- [Roles](data/concepts/roles.md) are being filled and formalized with clear responsibilities\n- The group is transitioning from design to full operational execution\n\n**Appropriate Structures:**\n- Complete [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation covering purpose, [practices](data/concepts/practices.md), and [progress](data/concepts/progress.md)\n- Formal [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) processes for different types of decisions\n- [Treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) management systems with clear authorization and accountability\n- Technical governance and coordination tools (Safe multisigs, Snapshot voting, token systems)\n- Regular communication cadences and reporting mechanisms\n\n**What to Avoid:**\n- Treating implemented structures as permanent - maintain flexibility for evolution\n- Creating governance complexity beyond what the group's scale requires\n- Neglecting to document systems and processes as they're implemented\n- Moving too quickly without testing and learning from each new system\n- Over-relying on technical solutions before social [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) are solid\n\n## Key Characteristics\n\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Implementation:** Detailed [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) frameworks and processes that enable efficient handling of different decision types and appropriate stakeholder involvement.\n- **Robust State Documentation:** Fully developed [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) document that provides [transparency](data/concepts/transparency.md) about [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md), [practices](data/concepts/practices.md), and [progress](data/concepts/progress.md).\n- **Defined [Roles](data/concepts/roles.md) and [Responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md):** Clear delineation of roles with specific accountabilities, authorities, and success criteria for each position.\n- **Formalized [Treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) Management:** Structured systems for [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) allocation, spending authorization, and financial accountability.\n- **Established Communication Patterns:** Regular meeting cadences, documentation standards, and information-sharing protocols.\n- **Operational Infrastructure:** Technical systems and tools supporting the group's specific functions and [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) needs.\n- **Process Maturity:** Well-defined workflows for core activities that balance consistency with appropriate flexibility.\n- **External Interface Mechanisms:** Clear protocols for how the group interacts with other groups, [community](data/concepts/community.md) [governance](data/concepts/governance.md), and external stakeholders.\n\n---\n\n## Functional Elements\n\n### Activities\n\nActivities revolve around implementing the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational design proposed in the group's [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation and approved by the [community](data/concepts/community.md) or governance system proposal process used.\n\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Implementation:** Establishing and refining governance systems in line with the design outlined in the group's state documentation.\n- **Operational Implementation:** Setting up operational patterns, [practices](data/concepts/practices.md), and systems.\n- **Technical Implementation:** Setting up technical tooling to implement the above.\n- **Strategy Execution:** Alongside the setting up of governance and operational infrastructure and processes, in the organization phase, the group will begin execution of the strategy defined in its group state.\n\n### Navigating Challenges\n\n- **Balancing Structure and Adaptability:** Creating sufficient structure without sacrificing the ability to adapt to changing conditions.\n- **Managing Bureaucratic Tendencies:** Avoiding unnecessary process complexity while ensuring adequate [governance](data/concepts/governance.md).\n- **Maintaining [Purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) Alignment:** Ensuring operational details remain connected to fundamental purpose.\n- **Scaling Operations in a Decentralized Way:** Avoiding recreating centralizing tendencies as operations scale.\n- **Integrating New Members:** Effectively onboarding new contributors while maintaining cultural continuity.\n- **Managing Inter-group Dependencies:** Navigating relationships and commitments with other groups in the [network](data/concepts/networks.md).\n- **Resolving Role Conflicts:** Addressing tensions or overlaps in [responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md) and authorities.\n\n### Signs of Readiness for Evolution\n\nAn organization phase group may be ready to evolve to the ongoing [iteration phase](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/iteration-phase.md) when:\n\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational systems, designed in the Formation phase, are implemented and functioning effectively with minimal friction\n- [Roles](data/concepts/roles.md) are clearly defined and resourced\n- [Treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) and [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) management processes are in place and operate smoothly\n- External [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) mechanisms with other cells and [network](data/concepts/networks.md) entities are established\n- The group's [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation is comprehensive and regularly maintained\n- The group has demonstrated capability to execute effectively on its [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md)\n\n---\n\n## Tools and Practices\n\n### State Documentation\n\nDuring the Organization Phase, the [group-state](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-state.md) documentation evolves from the initial version proposed in the Formation phase to a comprehensive representation of the group's structure and current operations. This mature state documentation serves as both an internal [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) tool that ensures alignment and coherence within the group, and an external interface with the broader [network](data/concepts/networks.md).\n\nIt is critical that the group's state documentation is accessible, [transparent](data/concepts/transparency.md), trustworthy, and comprehensive, in order for others to safely choose to coordinate with the group in useful ways.\n\nAt organization phase, a group's state documentation should cover:\n\n**[Purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) Elements:**\n\n- Refined purpose statement with clear connection to the broader network's mission\n- Detailed scope definition with explicit boundaries\n- Strategic objectives with measurable success criteria\n- Theory of change or impact model if applicable\n\n**[Practice](data/concepts/practices.md) Elements:**\n\n- Comprehensive team structure with detailed [roles](data/concepts/roles.md)/[tasks](data/concepts/tasks.md) and [responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md)\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) processes for different decision types\n- [Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) management protocols including [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) operations\n- Meeting structures and communication frameworks\n- Dispute resolution mechanisms\n- External [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) mechanisms\n\n**[Progress](data/concepts/progress.md) Elements:**\n\n- Detailed roadmap with milestones and dependencies\n- Project and task management systems\n- Performance metrics and reporting mechanisms\n- Documentation of achievements and learning\n\n### Technical Implementation\n\nOrganization Phase groups need to implement appropriate technical infrastructure to support their operations:\n\n- **Collaboration Tools:** Platforms for asynchronous and synchronous collaboration.\n- **Knowledge Management Systems:** Tools for documenting and sharing information.\n- **Project Management Infrastructure:** Systems for tracking tasks, deadlines, and dependencies.\n- **[Treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) Management:** Multi-signature wallets, expenditure tracking, and accounting systems.\n- **Decision Records:** Systems for documenting and tracking [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md).\n- **State Visibility:** Tools that make group state [transparent](data/concepts/transparency.md) to relevant stakeholders.\n- **Communication Protocols:** Clearly defined communication channels and protocols to ensure effective communication.\n\n## Success Indicators\n\nAn organization phase has been successful when:\n\n- **Operational Effectiveness:** The group has operational tools and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) set up and running effectively\n- **Role Clarity:** [Roles](data/concepts/roles.md) are understood and can be utilized effectively\n- **[Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) Functionality:** [Decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) processes operate smoothly with appropriate participation\n- **External [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md):** The group can interface effectively with other [network](data/concepts/networks.md) entities\n- **[Purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) Alignment:** All activities and processes remain clearly connected to the group's fundamental purpose\n\nThe organization phase establishes the operational infrastructure that enables a group to function effectively as an autonomous cell within a decentralized [network](data/concepts/networks.md). It creates the conditions for sustainable effectiveness while maintaining alignment with network [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md).\n\n\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [Group Phases](tags/group-phases.md) - Developmental stages of group formation and work\n- [DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md) - Organizations moving through phases\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Phase-appropriate coordination mechanisms\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making suited to each phase\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework for phase-based coordination","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:26.773Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"},{"id":"group-facilitation","contentType":"guide","path":"docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/implementation/group-facilitation.md","metadata":{"group":"dao-primitives","title":"Primitives Framework Group Facilitation Guide","description":"A guide for facilitators to navigate the Primitives Framework and work with groups to define purpose, design and implement governance and operational structures","type":"guide","author":["yeoro.eth"],"tags":["dao-primitives","facilitation","governance","framework","guide"],"publish":true},"content":"## Purpose of this Guide\n\nThis guide helps facilitators navigate and use the Primitives Framework to support a group to develop a decentralized [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational structure. It follows steps to assess group context, design appropriate governance and operational structures, and then implement and operationalize these systems. It serves as a roadmap to navigate through the existing framework resources, showing facilitators how to sequence and apply the tools developed here.\n\n> **Quick Navigation**: **First time facilitating?** Start with Discovery (Section II) · **Have discovery report already?** Jump to Design (Section III) · **Design approved, need to implement?** Implementation (Section IV)\n\n---\n\n## I. Introduction: Facilitating Using the Primitives Framework\n\nThis guide draws from the Primitives Framework and utilizes many of the documents and tools in the framework. It works through 3 basic steps in the facilitation flow: Discover, Design & Implement:\n\n1. **Discover** - Learn about the group and understand the starting context - produce a discovery report/proposal\n2. **Design** - [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational structure using organizational patterns and tools - produce a governance design/proposal\n3. **Implement** - The design using the structured processes from implementation guides\n\nThis process will vary in its depth and rigor based on the scale and phase of the group that is being facilitated.\n\nFor example, setting up a single cell within an existing operational structure could be a relatively fast process because you are dealing with a small collaboration scale team making mostly internal [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md) about how it will structure and govern itself.\n\nAt the other end of the spectrum, however, if you're dealing with a large group looking to establish a DAO, this group facilitation process will be much more involved. The larger group of stakeholders needing to be engaged across multiple different scales will be more complex and time-consuming, and the resulting [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational structure will likewise be more complex.\n\nThe facilitation process follows these key steps:\n\n1. **Assessing Context**: Understanding the group's current phase, scale, and state\n2. **Identifying Needs**: Determining the most pressing challenges and opportunities\n3. **Selecting Patterns**: Choosing appropriate organizational patterns from the [Pattern Library](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/patterns/index.md)\n4. **Implementing Solutions**: Adapting and applying these patterns to the specific context\n5. **Evolving & Iterating**: Continuously refining the approach based on feedback\n\n---\n\n## II. Discovery\n\n### Group Sense Making: The Foundation of Discovery\n\nThe discovery process begins with a fundamental recognition: most [groups](data/concepts/groups.md), whether they're nascent DAOs, established teams, or emerging [networks](data/concepts/networks.md), operate with surprisingly little shared understanding of their own context. While groups often form around compelling high-level ideas or shared visions, the actual alignment around concrete intentions, operational realities, and stakeholder needs frequently remains unexplored territory.\n\nGroup sense making serves as the cornerstone of effective [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) design because it transforms individual perspectives into collective intelligence. This process is particularly crucial for decentralized organizations where traditional hierarchical structures cannot rely on top-down clarity to resolve ambiguity. Instead, the group itself must become the primary mechanism for developing shared understanding and surfacing areas of misalignment that could undermine future governance structures.\n\nThe sense making process serves two interconnected purposes:\n\n- **Collective Discovery**: Enables the group to discover its own context collaboratively, which is essential because governance systems built on assumed consensus often fail to meet stakeholder needs\n- **Ongoing Coherence**: Provides an artifact that group members can use to build on the group's organizational development, such as evolving the governance structure and developing their impact model\n\nFor larger groups and those encompassing multiple stakeholder contexts, the sense making process becomes even more involved. These environments contain diverse perspectives, competing incentives, and varying definitions of success that must be surfaced and integrated before effective [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) can be designed.\n\n### Mapping Organizational Context and Stakeholder Landscapes\n\nThe heart of group sense making involves systematically mapping the current organizational context, beginning with stakeholder perspectives on vision, [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md), and impact goals. This mapping process reveals not just what stakeholders want the group to achieve, but how they understand the group's role within larger systems and what success looks like from their vantage point.\n\n#### Process Steps by Group Scale:\n\n**For Single Teams/Small Groups:**\n\n1. Conduct intensive workshop sessions with structured dialogue\n2. Surface individual mental models and assumptions\n3. Identify areas of alignment and divergence collaboratively\n4. Document shared understanding and remaining tensions\n\n**For [Community](data/concepts/community.md) Networks/Multi-Stakeholder Groups:**\n\n1. Gather insights from different stakeholder groups separately\n2. Synthesize and share insights back to the wider [community](data/concepts/community.md)\n3. Iterate through multiple rounds of sense making\n4. Continue until authentic shared understanding emerges (not just superficial agreement)\n\nThe sense making process often reveals early patterns that become crucial for design:\n\n- **Stakeholder Relationships**: Who needs to coordinate with whom and how\n- **Value Flows**: How value creation and exchange naturally occurs within the [network](data/concepts/networks.md)\n- **Power Dynamics**: Where influence and [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) authority currently reside\n- **Resource Dependencies**: What the group needs to function and where those [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) come from\n\nUnderstanding these emergent patterns provides crucial input for the design phase, as [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) structures must align with and support the natural dynamics of the network rather than imposing artificial constraints.\n\nThroughout this process, facilitators can draw upon various sense making tools and methodologies available in the [sense-making-facilitation-tools](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/guides/sense-making-facilitation-tools.md) for specific facilitation needs.\n\n### Producing Discovery Outputs: Reports and Proposals\n\nThe discovery phase culminates in concrete outputs that capture insights and provide clear direction for next steps. These outputs serve as both culmination and foundation—capturing the collective intelligence generated through sense making while establishing the legitimacy and direction needed for [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) design.\n\n#### 1. Discovery Report\n\nThe discovery report comprehensively documents the sense making process and should include:\n\n- **Shared Understanding**: Clear articulation of agreed-upon [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and high-level goals\n- **Divergent Perspectives**: Honest acknowledgment of areas where different viewpoints persist\n- **Stakeholder Mapping**: Overview of key participants, their interests, and relationship patterns\n- **Value Flow Insights**: Early understanding of how value creation and exchange occurs\n- **Areas for Further Exploration**: Recognition of questions that require continued attention\n\nThis report functions as more than documentation—it becomes a foundational artifact that establishes legitimacy for the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) design process and provides accountability for how stakeholder input shaped the emerging direction.\n\n#### 2. Proposal\n\nThe nature of the proposal depends significantly on the group's scale and autonomy:\n\n**Small Teams with Internal Autonomy:**\n\n- Initial [group-state-template](docs/dao-primitives/resources/templates/group-state-template.md) capturing [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and high-level goals\n- Internal decision to proceed to design phase\n- [Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) allocation for design activities\n\n**Larger Groups Requiring External Authorization:**\n\n- Communication of discovery insights to broader stakeholders\n- Compelling case for moving to design phase\n- Resource requirements and anticipated outcomes\n- Designation of design team with clear accountability mechanisms\n\nWhen working with larger, more complex groups, the proposal often involves designating a smaller design team that will work in consultation with the broader [community](data/concepts/community.md). This approach balances the need for focused design work with ongoing stakeholder engagement, but requires clear [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) about how the design team will maintain connection with and accountability to the wider group throughout the design process.\n\n---\n\n## III. Design\n\n**Design [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) & Operational Structures**\n\nThe design phase translates the insights and shared understanding from discovery into concrete governance and operational structures. This process moves from broad stakeholder alignment to specific organizational architecture, requiring careful attention to both the technical requirements of governance systems and the human dynamics that will animate them.\n\n### 1. Define Purpose and High-Level Goals\n\n_If they have not already been defined and agreed upon in the discovery step_\n\n#### Activity: Purpose Statement Development\n\n- Gather key stakeholders to define essential [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md)\n- Identify values that [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) must uphold\n- Document high-level goals for governance structure\n- Create impact model if needed\n\n### 2. Defining the Requirements of the Governance System\n\n#### Activity: Requirements Mapping\n\nBased on the discovery report, the design team needs to define the overarching parameters of the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational system. These requirements emerge from the articulated [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and high-level goals, as well as the needs and desires of different stakeholders, the activities they want to engage in, and the constraints they operate within.\n\nThis requirements mapping process serves as a bridge between the broad insights from discovery and the specific design choices that follow. Without clear requirements, design teams often default to familiar patterns that may not serve the group's actual needs, or they become paralyzed by the overwhelming array of governance options available.\n\n#### Governance Requirements\n\nThe [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) system must be designed to handle the specific [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md) needs and stakeholder dynamics that emerged during discovery:\n\n- **Decision Scope**: What types of decisions need formal governance processes versus informal [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md)\n- **Stakeholder Inclusion**: Who needs representation in governance and at what level of engagement\n- **Scale Considerations**: What different group scales need to be included and how they interface\n- **Time Horizons**: What timeframes governance must address (immediate operations vs. long-term strategy)\n- **Resource Management**: What [resources](data/concepts/resources.md) governance will oversee and how allocation decisions get made\n- **Technical Constraints**: What factors shape implementation possibilities (existing systems, technical capacity, budget limitations)\n\n#### Operational Requirements\n\nThe operational structure must support the group's ability to execute on its [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) while maintaining the autonomy and [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) patterns that stakeholders value:\n\n- **Core Activities**: How the group will operationalize its purpose to achieve stated goals\n- **Autonomy Levels**: The degree of decentralization of authority and [responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md) needed for operations to succeed\n- **Information Systems**: How information needs to flow through the operational structure for effective [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md)\n\nFor small teams with a clear mandate, this requirements mapping can often be completed in focused working sessions. However, for more complex groups involving multiple stakeholder types or scales, this process may require additional engagement and insights gathering from across the [network](data/concepts/networks.md) to ensure all perspectives are captured and integrated.\n\n### 3. Design the Governance & Operational Model\n\n#### 1. Choose a Governance Approach\n\nBased on the articulated [purpose](data/concepts/purpose.md) and mapped requirements, the design team must narrow in on a particular [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) approach from the many available options for decentralized governance. The [Community Governance](data/resources/patterns/community-governance.md) pattern outlines several approaches worth considering, but the choice will depend on multiple factors including the specific needs of the group, the nature of their work, and the structure and culture of existing [networks](data/concepts/networks.md) they coordinate with.\n\nThe discovery phase should have surfaced key insights into what qualities the group wants from its governance approach—whether they prioritize maximally decentralized [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md), trust and capture resistance, technical sophistication, or other values. These insights become crucial selection criteria when evaluating governance options.\n\nReview the [dao-primitives framework](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/index.md) along with [index](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/patterns/index.md) and [index](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/case-studies/index.md) to guide the group toward settling on a governance approach that matches their outlined requirements rather than defaulting to popular or familiar options that may not fit their context.\n\n#### 2. Entities and Agreements\n\nThe Primitives Framework provides four basic organizational patterns that offer a flexible system for [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) design. These building blocks are designed so governance and operational patterns can be applied to them to compose bespoke yet coherent governance structures that deliver the governance qualities a group desires.\n\n##### Core Organizational Patterns\n\nUsing organizational patterns as building blocks:\n\n- **[DAOs](data/concepts/daos.md)**: Entity structure for purpose-aligned [networks](data/concepts/networks.md)\n- **[Cells](data/resources/patterns/cells.md)**: Entity structure for small autonomous teams\n- **[Roles](data/concepts/roles.md)**: Agreement pattern for ongoing [responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md) and permissions\n- **[Tasks](data/concepts/tasks.md)**: Agreement pattern for specific work deliverables\n\n> **Note**: These are organizational patterns (structural building blocks), distinct from technical primitives (implementation tools like smart contracts, tokens, governance protocols) that you'll select during implementation.\n\nThe design process involves determining which combination of these patterns will best serve the group's requirements, then identifying specific approaches for how to compose them into functional structures. Examples of using these patterns to compose governance and operational models can be found in [index](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/case-studies/index.md), including case studies like [docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/studies/rpp-governance-case-study](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/studies/rpp-governance-case-study.md).\n\n#### 3. Pattern Selection\n\nBased on the chosen [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) approach, the design team builds out a complete governance and operational model by selecting patterns best suited to delivering the desired functionality. This selection process requires balancing multiple considerations: the group's current capacity, their growth projections, the complexity they can manage, and the specific [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) challenges they face.\n\nGovernance and operational patterns can be found in [index](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/patterns/index.md). Facilitators should help the group select patterns that work effectively in conjunction with the chosen organizational building blocks (DAOs, Cells, Roles & Tasks) to create a governance and operational system that functions as intended rather than creating elegant structures that fail in practice.\n\n#### 4. Feedback and Approval\n\nMeaningful participation from all group stakeholders in deciding on [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational design is essential for both quality outcomes and system legitimacy. For large, complex groups, this participation must be orchestrated across multiple scales to balance broad input with design coherence:\n\n1. **Collaboration Scale**: The team tasked with governance design needs internal processes for evaluating ideas and making design [decisions](data/concepts/decisions.md)\n2. **Coordination Scale**: Larger groups of highly engaged individuals can participate through feedback processes, workshops, and other [coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) mechanisms\n3. **Constituency Scale**: Wider [communities](data/concepts/community.md) of stakeholders can engage through preference signaling and voting mechanisms\n\nManaging engagement across different scales ensures the design process benefits from broad [community](data/concepts/community.md) intelligence while preventing the tyranny of structurelessness from derailing effective [decision-making](data/concepts/decisions.md). The goal is to harness collective wisdom without allowing the design process to devolve into protracted politics.\n\n#### 5. Design Proposal\n\nThe design phase should conclude with a clear proposal that confirms the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational model. For small groups, this might take the form of an internal decision recorded in the group's state document. For larger, more complex groups, this typically requires a formal [community](data/concepts/community.md) proposal process.\n\nIt's crucial that any proposal clearly describes the governance design in sufficient detail that stakeholders understand exactly what they're approving. Vague or overly abstract proposals often lead to implementation conflicts when different participants discover they had different interpretations of what was agreed upon.\n\n---\n\n## IV. Implementation\n\n### 1. Design Implementation Steps\n\nThe final component of the design phase involves creating a clear roadmap for implementing the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) system. This implementation plan must account for the dynamic nature of group development and the reality that complex governance systems evolve rather than launching fully formed.\n\n#### Group-Phase Considerations\n\nFollow the [index](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/group-phase/index.md) model to ensure implementation steps are appropriate for each phase of the group's evolution:\n\n- **Conversation Phase**: Informal gathering of ideas and intentions\n- **Formation Phase**: Basic [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md) and initial structures\n- **Organization Phase**: Formalized systems and processes\n- **Iteration Phase**: Ongoing operations and evolution\n- **Completion Phase**: Winding down unneeded groups\n\nFor larger, more complex groups, different parts of the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational structure may exist at different phases simultaneously as the system evolves. Single groups typically exist within one phase at a time, allowing for more straightforward implementation sequencing.\n\n#### Group-Scale Integration\n\nSimilarly, follow the group-scale model to ensure the implementation plan addresses governance entities, [agreements](data/concepts/agreements.md), tools, and [practices](data/concepts/practices.md) appropriate to current and projected group scales. Complex groups will have multiple scales represented across their governance structure, with smaller scale groups nested within larger structures. The implementation plan must account for scale evolution as groups grow and change over time.\n\n#### Group-State Anchoring\n\nAnchor the development of the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) system to the evolution of group-state documentation for each entity in the system. For DAO development, begin with sketching a high-level version of the DAO state appropriate to the formation phase. This can provide essential infrastructure like proposal processes and [treasury](data/concepts/treasury.md) management that enable [community](data/concepts/community.md) stakeholders to provide mandates for ongoing governance development and [resource](data/concepts/resources.md) allocation.\n\nFor single teams, implementing governance can proceed much more rapidly. If requirements are clear, a completed group-state can be produced quickly, allowing teams to move from formation through organization to iteration phase in short timeframes.\n\n#### Implementation Guides\n\nSeveral implementation guides provide documented processes for specific [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) systems. If the chosen governance approach and pattern set maps to available guides, they can be followed for detailed implementation guidance:\n\n- **Community Governance**: For constituency-scale governance\n- **Operational Governance**: For coordination-scale operations\n- **Multi-Stakeholder Governance**: For inter-network partnerships\n\n### 2. Implementation Plan Development\n\nProduce a comprehensive plan for implementing the [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) and operational system, including:\n\n- **Implementation Phases**: Sequenced stages of system development\n- **Timelines**: Realistic schedules for each phase and milestone\n- **Budget Requirements**: [Resource](data/concepts/resources.md) needs for implementation activities\n- **Implementation Team**: Who will execute the work and their [responsibilities](data/concepts/responsibilities.md)\n\n### 3. Implementation Proposal\n\nThe implementation plan itself requires approval through appropriate [governance](data/concepts/governance.md) mechanisms. For small groups with dedicated [resources](data/concepts/resources.md), this can be an internal decision reflected in group state documentation. For larger groups with [community](data/concepts/community.md) membership, this should follow established or new community proposal processes to ensure proper authorization and resource allocation.\n\n---\n\n## V. Resources for Ongoing Support\n\n### A. Framework Documentation\n\n- [Complete Framework Overview](docs/dao-primitives/primitives-framework/concepts/index.md)\n- [Implementation Resources](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/index.md)\n- [Case Studies](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/case-studies/index.md) for real-world examples\n\n### B. Specific Implementation Support\n\n- Detailed implementation [docs/dao-primitives/implementation/guides/index](docs/dao-primitives/implementation/guides/index.md) for each governance type\n- Pattern Library for specific solutions -  [index](data/resources/patterns/index.md)\n- Templates and tools within the implementation guides\n- - Facilitation support through SuperBenefit network\n\n### C. Community Resources\n\n- SuperBenefit Knowledge Garden for broader context as well as specific Patterns, Guides and Tools\n\n\n---\n\n## Related Concepts\n\n- [Facilitation](tags/facilitation.md) - Processes for guiding group work\n- [Coordination](data/concepts/coordination.md) - Mechanisms enabled by facilitation\n- [Teams](data/concepts/teams.md) - Groups benefiting from facilitation\n- [Governance](data/concepts/governance.md) - Decision-making supported by facilitation\n- [DAO Primitives Framework](docs/dao-primitives/index.md) - Framework using facilitation practices","syncedAt":"2026-03-24T19:07:27.178Z","commitSha":"314e405d3f1d0160604776980aa098c5e6715141"}],"total":249,"offset":0,"limit":20}