I’m affirming my commitment to the Index Coop’s Guiding Principles and Code of Conduct.
I am not a lead, nor part of any groups, but I will represent Set’s engineering and am focused on driving forward a sense of belonging within technical topics, growth and improvement of Index Coop’s capabilities, and empathy for the challenges we will face together.
One thing you will come to find about the Set team is that we are not a vocal group, on twitter or on any other medium, but we believe the best path forward is to invest time into sharing our current responsibilities and creating more awareness to empower the Coop to make its own decisions.
I affirm my commitment to our Guiding Principles and the Code of Conduct
After reviewing what @BigSky7 suggests for adding to the Code of Conduct I have mixed feelings. I like the vast majority of the suggestions, but think we risk being too prescriptive with further expansion. And think we’re wading into especially dangerous territory to suggest we want to “adjudicate and help correct behavior.” We can have important conversations about what’s acceptable and what’s not without codifying prohibited behavior beyond the existing Code of Conduct.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about empathy and positive-sum thinking. One thing I forget is that they’re both very hard work because they’re not our natural, default setting.
On empathy, I’m typically not operating at my best at all times or in all situations. Definitionally, no one is doing that. I expect to be able to RECEIVE empathy for an explanation like, “hey, I snapped a post that’s probably not particularly kind towards the FT contributors because I had 5 minutes before I wanted to pick up my kids and I knew if I said nothing then, I might forget to, and this point go underappreciated by the community and I probably didn’t take the time to say it in the right way or consider whether I should learn more privately before snapping off in a public forum.” It’s much harder work for me to GIVE empathy and think “Hm, feels like @jdcook is coming at me a bit. I guess he has his reasons, let’s go find out what those are.” Nobody naturally thinks that way in the middle of a disagreement. But that kind of empathy is something to aspire to (which makes it a good guiding principle but bad thing to codify) To me, a pillar of empathy is to extend the grace you expect. And one of the acknowledgements you have to make is that no one you communicate with is a monolith. But if you do the hard work to find shared goals and find ways to work on them together, then you’re getting more out of this than you put in. Which brings me to…
I’ve found that I (and a lot ofTradFi converts) are often thinking “who’s getting the better end of the deal?” whenever there’s any change/proposal/structure that comes about. It’s beaten into you to view the world as zero-sum. And I actually don’t think that’s wrong. Incentives and motivation should be evaluated thoroughly. But one of the hardest things to do is to say “this person might be getting a better deal, maybe even unfairly so proportionate to what I’m doing, but I should work with them anyway because we’re better off coordinating.” And I think we’re going to have to do a lot of this. To @verto0912’s point, we have to make decisions in a fast-paced environment. Fair compensation/governance allocation will likely be something to consider for the life of the protocol. Knowing that fact, means you also know we will never get it exactly right.
To tie this back to empathy, this means that literally every proposal for how we fairly distribute ownership or govern ourselves will get it “wrong” somehow. But we can only engage with each other on the topic if we carry empathy about that and we’re only ok with it if our collective orientation is towards positive-sum goals. In other words, I can disagree with the how if I trust that your why is positive-sum.
Affirming my commitment to these values here. If I am ever not abiding by these values, please call me out publicly or privately and I will update my behavior.
That said, I do want to drop Set’s values (what we believe we are and strive for) for some context on who we are and what we stand for:
Collaborate Empathetically: Be caring to customers / partners, understand people’s actions and what they’re going to need; We proactively understand where people are coming from and try to understand why they do what they do. We recognize that each entity we interact with are human beings. We’re not beneath doing anything, willing to do anything to help others and for us to succeed
Deliver Results: Deliver with the right quality and in a timely fashion; We apply judgment to ensure we focus on results vs. process; We think strategically and articulate what we are and are not trying to do
No Rugging: Express information in a clear and accurate way without disguising its unpleasantness. Be open, trustworthy, and truthful; Hide no secrets; Do not leave others abruptly in a problematic or difficult situation. If you say you are going to do something, it is assumed you will complete it unless you otherwise communicate.
Think Like a Scientist: Create hypothesis, try proving / disproving them, always willing to run experiments and change our minds, intellectual honesty, accepting the brutal truth, keeping an open mind, learn to unlearn / relearn
I am affirming my commitment to these values! Thank you @Thomas_Hepner for the thoughtful adds and call to contribute.
I’ll echo Thomas and @verto0912 's comments on the importance of “disagree and commit.” We’re in the midst of several hard and strategic conversations about the direction of the Coop. We will not end these conversations in a place where everyone is 100% in agreement or on board with those conclusions. However, if we are to move forward as a community, we need to disagree and commit to our decisions.
Thank you @Louisaraj for the call to empower more women + diverse thought at the Coop. YES!!! By practicing our principles of belonging, safety, and empathy, we can find a way to break through echo chambers and include more diverse people and thoughts in our community.
Thanks @setoshi for sharing Set’s values. I’d also like to share the five values that guide the way I work and who I choose to work with - excellence, service, integrity, collaboration and solutions. I set these in collaboration with co-founders back in 2009 and they have been a guiding light ever since.
It took some work to refine them to a single word and I am with @fallow8 on the risk of being too prescriptive. I feel we would be better served by simplifying as @0xModene shows than trying to further codify principles.
@Thomas_Hepner agree with objective criteria for evaluating performance and mechanisms for feedback and accountability. Would you agree that this is more policy (subject to change) than guiding principles?
@pujimak_in I aspire to servant leadership, love this call. [They] who would lead should serve, which I see happening here
@bradwmorris@Louisaraj with the new joiner onboarding process maybe we ask people to share their guiding values - which may be new to some people. A cooper owl task to express how they align their personal values with the coop guiding principles?
Thanks for this conversation @BigSky7
I think Guiding Principles deserves a General > Discord dedicated to topic, would anyone else support that idea?
I would love to hear from the broader community on this topic I feel it could help elevate and increase visisibility for this conversation and I would happily volunteer to encourage/facilitate/support/contribute via Discord.
It may also eventually serve as a ‘safe place’ for people to come and express concerns if they feel there is some breach?
I affirm my commitment to these values! I will also commit to bringing awareness to any breaches of these principles.
I would also suggest discord and forum suspensions and bans based on reviews by a committee. It is important that we uphold these principles and make sure there are consequences to actions.
Hi! I’m Jai from Rari Capital and I think that this is a great initiative to see coming from the community, it is really exciting to see. In our collaboration with the Index Coop, the Rari Team stands to commit to the community principles.
Far beyond money or power, the main point of what we’re trying to build here is establishing a new standard in human collaboration and organization - and this goes with sticking to core values.
Herewith affirming my commitment to these Guiding Principles and Code of Conduct (and writing them into iRobot’s ROM ).
I reaffirm my commitment to these Guiding Principles and Code of Conduct. The IC is a force in DeFi and its example will influence many. I know we can trip and stumble but as whole we help each other live these principles and values. Long may we build on them.
+1 to servant leadership and fostering an environment of ownership - this is usually the missing ingredient that drives the social scalability of how DAOs can coordinate.
I’m Peter from 1kx and we stand by committing to these community principals
).