Meeting 8 - October 21st 2021
Catalyst Circle Meeting 8, Thursday, 21st October 2021
Last updated
Catalyst Circle Meeting 8, Thursday, 21st October 2021
Last updated
Thursday, October 21st at 17.00 UTC
Topic template:
(Topic start time) Topic of discussion/Objective - Leader(s) - Duration in minutes
Lauris Steglics - Stakepool Operators (SPOs)
Dor Garbash - IOHK
Felix Weber - Tool Makers and Maintainers (T&M)
Victor Corcino - Community Advisors (CAs)
Dean Jayes - General Voters
David Taylor - Cardano Foundation (CF)
Juliane Montag - Funded Cohort (Co-ordinators)
Nadim Karam - Facilitator
Nori Nishigaya - Facilitator
**Stephen Whitenstall **- Secretary - Minutes
Peter Wolcott - Secretary - Trello
This meeting will be transcribed using Otter.ai
Organize a wrap up or handover procedure for the next CC members? - Victor
**Nori **: We have 7 nominations so far for CC V2 and have somebody for every position now.
**Dor **: How much time is left ?
**Nori **: We will announce again at the next Town Hall
**Felix **: We should hand over this meeting’s recording to an editor to showcase Circle.
Recording and transcript begins here
**Nadim **- How has the past two weeks been since we last ?
**Lauris **- It has been mostly informing people about the new Circle V2 elections coming in. So meetings, discussions and some paperwork. Writing down some ideas for the Circle representatives I will be mentoring at least for the first meeting. SPOs are facing a lot of challenges but that's another topic.
**Victor **- I've been working with the VCAs to try to come up with the reputation system. And also talking to other CAs to see who wants to be a candidate for Circle V2. It is my first week full time in Cardano and Catalyst..
**Dor **- Great. Lots of hardcore planning and coordination. Our team has really established the Voltaire group. There is now a Catalyst and a Voltaire group. Lots of new faces. New product managers that are doing an awesome job and really owning the transition. We have a plan in place. To basically “know that we don't know” and start some pilots to get the ball rolling. The last hurdle is getting all the stakeholders in a room to say yes. A lot of them are now in Africa meeting with world leaders and weren't able to make it this week. But hopefully early next week we'll manage to get the green light and then we can actually go ahead and and share a roadmap for Voltaire
In terms of the elections, I'm considering asking Harris, the new product manager for Catalyst to be in the Catalyst Circle because he's gonna be way more in the weeds than me and going forward, so it might be healthier to do that. And I also reached out to Charles to candidate himself for the voters delegate.
**Felix **- Amazingly good. Very busy. Fell sick last week. Signal from the body to calm down a little bit.
On the toolmakers side it's been extremely nice to see the community define new standards over the last week. Communication becomes the standard and collaboration becomes the standard.
And just what Victor did becomes the unnamed master KPI of Catalyst - “who is leaving their day job”. More and more people are jumping on the train, getting inspired by each other as well.
Because one part of the Catalyst Circle is to provide a heads up when red lines are crossed. I will address one thing directly to something Dor mentioned in respect of Charles running for the general ADA voters at general ADA voters. I didn't have any good feedback about this from the community, I think it's just important to let everybody know. It could directly lead in the wrong direction. Because having Charles in a body like this in such an early stage attracts also a lot of people just concerned with “ADA to the moon”.
**Nadim **- Felix, thank you very much for the updates. Charles as a candidate would definitely be very impactful.
**Felix **- Some people who want to run for the general Ada voters would not nominate themselves because they would know they will have no chance. There would be no choice for us.
(00:05) Revise agenda and align expectations - All - 5 min
Moving existing Items across the board -> Update Trello Board Accordingly
How do we avoid duplications of effort? How do we generate partnerships? - https://trello.com/c/I1qjAPRj
**Nadim **- We've heard that Dor, Felix and Victor have been working specifically on how IOHK is going to hand over more of their power to the community. So we'll discuss that and see if anyone else has anything to mention.
**Dor **- There are two different IOG problems and the one in the problem backlog is more about coordination between IOG and the Catalyst community.
We have slightly kind of pivoted on it, but I think it is a good pivot. Rather than dealing with the entirety of the coordination problem we have identified specific areas. Such as where the community wants to take part more at an early stage, where we can define incentives and mechanisms for Catalyst and where there is a need for a tighter collaboration with IOG and more inclusion.
So, we are addressing a subset of this problem in a pragmatic way for getting things done.
This is actually really useful because it has led to a pilot we have launched today. A solution that is already partly in place and starting to be experimented with is the auditing problem. The need for auditing in Catalyst and how to create a decentralized auditing layer.
We brought IOG product managers and researchers in a room together with the community. And the person talking and guiding the whole process was the community members Ron Hill (SPOCRA).
We had two takeaways.
One is the need to create a dedicated group, let's call it a circle of people that are shepherding the process, defining this auditing layer, and implementing it and following through all the steps. This is a multi-year process to get it fully implemented because it's very complicated.
Two. But in the short term we need a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) auditing solution. For Fund Seven, an $8 million fund we need a patch and that is in three and a half months from now. So, this needs to work at a different pace. And there needs to be a dedicated group just for the short-term solution that can be used as a pilot and instruct the long-term circle.
If there is a pilot in place then people can observe, iterate, and expand upon it. So, I would move this problem to the being picked up column because that is what is happening and let's see how it goes.
**Dor **: How to remove IOHK from every decision made in Catalyst?
So today I heard a new term coined, a new acronym and IOG likes acronyms. The new acronym is w.o. which is “without IO”. So, the litmus test is: “Is this being done with or without IO?”. And that is a good anchor.
Going through all the processes, decisions, maintenance, and core one by one. And realizing how to move it to “without IO”.
We have a strategy in place and a roadmap. We're just waiting for stakeholders’ approval to publish it to start to communicate it to the community.
It is not a waterfall plan. It's not like, this is how it's going to be 12345678.
It is more of a process that we're starting with the community, including discussions, retrospectives, and revisions of the plan as we move from iteration to iteration.
To get going, we are setting some useful expectations and metrics of success. From there on up it is about collective awareness mechanisms, the ability to look at every iteration, determine our success or failure, identify improvements and what needs to be let go of. That is what is going to determine the success of Voltaire.
What is important is having an awesome collective awareness function. And that will drive us towards a governance system that is better than anything a researcher or any one individual can state because it will evolve in an organic way.
So, the problem could move to “defined”. We have not publicly shared the definition. But I would now say it is a well-defined problem.
**Nadim **- That's extremely interesting. Is there any action plan or do you need any support from anyone within the circle on this in terms of next steps ?
**Dor **- As an IOG employee I can't just make up my own plans and announce them. I need approval from the executive layer. And I think they are supportive of it but it needs to go through that process.
**Felix **- The real value of Catalyst Circle is knowing what IOG is doing on their side we can organize in the community as well. So, the Toolmakers and Maintainers came together in regard to auditability.
Especially in the funded cohort, auditability comes down to standards and the community says, “what can we do already to support this?”.
So, today, we put all funded Catalyst proposals on a Google Sheet and sent them out to the community to define simple archetypes for proposals. These archetypes inform how common KPIs or OKIs can look.
And this directly addresses another Cohort problem which is still in the backlog:
Many Fund 6 proposals from groups such as Catalyst Swarm, Catalyst school and Eastern Town Hall. As we move into the cohort, we will start to define a common reporting approach using the same tools. These can be used by most Fund 6 proposals in Fund 6 when we provide valuable tool sets and workflows which can also help IOG.
It was amazing to see the custom spreadsheet set up. Lucio, from the community said he will mint a special NFT as reward for contribution. So, the laser cat NFT we've got now. And another community member said he will contribute 10 ADA.
**Dor **- Are you in close touch with Kriss? About reporting? He can help integrating
**Felix **- Not yet. We started this just Wednesday when we came together in the After Town Hall getting people on the train, to see who is willing to contribute. So I think the problem “Cohort: Almost non existing “collaborative layer” to welcome newcomers” can move from the backlog forward. I don't know, what do you think?
**Dor **- The question is, how well defined is it? Is there some kind of a document? If there was a short document that defines the problems and the goals. If your group can get working on it now, produce something, then you can come to the town hall and present it. This may inspire more people to join the group or to try more things in parallel because everybody has a shared understanding. So, it's kind of picked up, but it also needs to be well defined and shared with the community.
**Dor **: The schema we set up for the Trello board I can now see that when we act on stuff it doesn't necessarily neatly move in a linear fashion. So I would invite the facilitator team to reflect on this. I do think the structure really helps our work. But what about all these edge cases?
(00.40) (CC) Using the 5L’s method: Things we’ve Loved, Learned, Lacked, Longed for and List of things to note: https://app.teleretro.com/board/907ze52I8flf
**Nori **- Let me share the retrospective link. If everybody could go to this link. This is an app called tele retro, which we've been using for community retrospectives, and it's a pretty simple retrospective tool. I'll share my screen so we can talk through this.
The way to add a card which is a kind of an encapsulated thought of your own is to hit the plus at the top and a card will appear. And then you can type something. Then hit enter and it'll complete the card.
As a note, a helpful card would have some context so that you know what the person is thinking and whether someone else would like to talk about it. Something that is less helpful would be writing under the learned column “I learned a lot”. It'd be nice to have a little more context of what you learned and what impact that had and things like that.
There are two options here. We can work in a brainstorm mode where you can't see other people's cards, or we work in an open mode so you can see other people’s cards. I found in the past that an open style helps trigger things that other people want to contribute to. And it usually leads to better outcomes. But some people like to brainstorm on their own without that distraction. So, we can do that, or a hybrid of the two, what would you guys prefer?
There are no preferences, so we'll do it in an open style. I'll set a timer for 10 minutes, and then we can spend the next 10 minutes, just adding stuff.
To explain things. There are five columns here:
**Liked **- these are things that you really liked or found valuable.
**Learned **- things that you learned or are going to take away.
**Lacked **- things that you felt were lacking or could be better longed for was something you wish for, and that we can maybe introduce with circle V2.
And then if something doesn't fit in any of these categories, feel free to list them on the fifth column.
So I'm going to give each person eight votes. Please vote for two items in each column and then We'll pick the ones that get the most votes to talk about. These are the ones that you would like to recognize or call out for discussion. And put two per column and then we'll tally them up.
Each column was voted on for further discussion. Max - 5 minutes to vote.
Things you liked or found valuable
Resilience dealing with hard issues and ambiguity while being civil and supportive
**Nori **- Liked column - Resilience dealing with hard issues and ambiguity while being civil and supportive - got the most votes. Do you want to talk a little bit Dor about what you saw? And what prompted you to write that card?
**Dor **- I think we did incredibly well, we took on a really big bite out of something. And most of us haven't worked together before. And it's just incredible.
I think of the hard times and the only reason now we're here feeling good is by managing to deal with all this stuff that came our way. And while mistakes were made, miscommunications were had, this is very normal human activity. There was never blame. Never anger. Always constructive, always patience and giving people a chance to figure things out. And that's something that is not trivial. This is something that needs to be pursued and persist in the culture and values of Circle going forward.
**Nori **- Do people who voted for this one want to say anything about it, and why you voted for it?
**Victor **- I think this experience showed us that even when we are dealing with specific problems, whether they are simple or complex, it's impossible to not receive outputs from outside when we are dealing with them. It was the first iteration of Circle and I think we faced more challenges than we were expecting. And I think this is a kind of skill or characteristic that is required for this task. To be resilient, to know how to be flexible, to adapt and to meet the world in its different aspects.
Having a small consistent group learning to work together over time
**Felix **- I voted for because I think it's one of the most important parts of what actually is happening in the ecosystem, not only for Catalyst Circle. People coming together with totally different backgrounds, in small teams, and educating themselves. This is how collaboration can look like. We don't have any playbooks. We don't have any scripts. But it helps us a lot in this regard. We have to explore by ourselves.
Secretary and facilitation teams are awesome
**Lauris **- Facilitation and secretaries helped us a lot. I think it was a great idea to have them. And, it has been expanded to several people, which is helpful for us. And we have great people here. So, we feel blessed to have you guys here.
**Dor **- I think, I think you're the secret weapon. The magical butterflies of harmony of this Circle. And I really hope that the secretary and facilitation teams continue with version two. Because we really need you and you are adding lots of value.
I think you're putting up a model for all the governance, that is key. I don't see us succeeding either in the Circle or in decentralizing the governance of Cardano without the Secretary and Facilitation teams taking on additional responsibilities.
I think we need to figure out how to scale up the proposals for these teams, because I think we can all see how important it is and how much value it brings. And these people need to be compensated accordingly.
**Lauris **- This is a very important topic. We'll have to figure out how to manage that and get some stable support.
That the CC is a perfect micro-picture of the overall Project Catalyst and its functional groups
**Felix **- This is amazing when you look at it. Because cohorts really lack structure, communications and they have problems getting involved in Project catalyst. For the SPOs there are not really incentives. Nothing against the people who are representing but from a philosophic point of view It's extremely interesting. The SPOS are mostly not present in Project Catalyst. Emurgo was not even invited. Cardano Foundation has no presence in Project catalyst. Toolmakers and CAs are extremely engaged, taking a lot of initiative and responsibility. And given this situation, IOG must make the decisions. So, what we have in Project Catalyst is exactly what we have in Catalyst Circle. It's a very condensed microcosmic synthesis. I am really amazed by this thought to say, yeah, this experiment is successful. Because somehow it arrived naturally. There wasn't coordination behind the representatives to act and design it that way. Also, what we saw with the general Ada holders, extremely struggling to contribute into the process. It just fits perfectly. And so yeah, a successful experiment.
**Victor **- I voted for it because I was curious about who wrote it, but I agree with Felix. I also think that currently there is some overlap between toolmakers, CAs and proposers. This point of view could help us with solving all the problems outside Catalyst Circle as well.
How important it is to have the right facilitation and methods in place to get work done
**Nori **- Okay, the next one is “How important is it to have the right facilitation and methods in place to get work done?” Who put that card up? And can you add some more context?
**Dor **- I'm now in the perspective of transition planning and scaling up stuff. And I really think that the human processes that drive governance are a critical fundamental part. It is crazy how much of an afterthought it is. Even if you only think about a normal government like, a cabinet of the US. How are they making discussions, what kind of tools and methods do they use to determine the future of the planet? And if it's so lacking, so blah.
I think it's great to really think about it in a systematic way. I think we're going to see better decisions, superior decisions coming out of such structures as we build them simply because we're aware of these issues and pay attention to them. Better decisions come from awareness of how we facilitate.
**Victor **- I voted for this because for me it was very clear the increase in efficiency of these meetings. We had three different kinds of facilitators. And we were just improving over time. It is very clear that now we reached something very good, that could even be the standard. Moving forward.
More time for unofficial discussions/meetings with members to work on problem solving / defining the problems, etc.
**Lauris **- We are lacking additional meetings. And that was one of the issues when I messed up with budget things. All the members are super busy with different projects. So, it really was hard to get more than two people together. I think the next Catalyst Circle V2 members will have to calculate in additional time that is not only the official time. But you must have time for additional meetings with other members and with some additional groups. It is not only about being a Catalyst Circle member. It is Catalyst Circle plus experts in some kind of area who can really provide insights.
**Nori **- Thanks, Lauris. As part of our nomination criteria, we added 10 plus hours a week to devote to Circle work as one of the criteria. I would be curious to hear from people how much time you think we should be asking people to commit to, to be effective in this role.
**Victor **- I estimate 6 to 8 hours a week
**Felix **- I would even go further, at least from the community side. I would envision having people who have this almost like a full time or half time job. So, 20 hours per week to really get things done. We can't expect this from the IOG side as they have their official roles and official commitments. But from the community side, when a frame like this is given, people can be rewarded and could live from this. Which could produce a huge value in control and outcomes.
In-person interaction
**Dor **- I think in person interaction could be brought to a completely new level. Imagine if we met in person and had a three-day workshop when we started Circle. It would have been such a different type of experience going forward. I would love even for v3 to include a travel budget for people when a new circle is formed. To get all the new members together in the same place. Just for a shared retreat. Because this is fundamental to building relationships. I think it can really help accelerate trust and better communication.
**Lauris **- On the next Cardano summit there should be an additional room for people to meet Catalyst Circle. Unfortunately, this year, it was not possible with the restrictions. In the London summit when I met with people and afterwards. It is on a more personal level and engagement is higher.
**Nori **- I can envision the future maybe having the circle gather for three days at Charles's ranch
The missing participation from CF
**Felix **- The missing participation from Cardano Foundation which normally plays a key role in the ecosystem. This lack, I would say,was almost 100 percent and impacted Circle.
**Lauris **- Maybe CF and IOG should have a full timer dedicated to this ?
**Nori **- From what I saw from the outside there definitely seemed to be a lack of participation from the Cardano Foundation. I don't know if anybody has communication channels with them. Perhaps David didn't have enough time to participate meaningfully and maybe somebody else within the organisation does, or maybe an ambassador could sit in and represent or something like that. But I agree that having participation from one of the key pillars of the community makes a lot of sense. And I think for V2 can we iterate and figure out a way to get greater participation?
**Dor **- It is a complex issue. There are a lot of things in play here. And how we're going to react to it is going to define also how things evolve. So, I think we need to be strategic. I think the next Circle needs to have a clear protocol of what to do if someone is not attending. So that a representative alerts people in advance, listens to the recording, and writes down their comments. And if they fail to do that then they're like out of the Circle and someone else comes to replace them.
We’ve had three individuals missing from meetings and not communicating with them. So, it's not just the Cardano Foundation, it's a general kind of governance issue. With the first Circle it's like an experiment with volunteers. I don't feel very attached to people coming or not coming.
But in Circle V2 it needs to be a bit tighter and an understanding that legitimacy is established by showing up. And if you don't show up you de-legitimize the structure and there needs to be repercussions. Anyone who takes on a role of representing has a duty to the group they are representing. There needs to be accountability.
I am happy we had it happen early. Because the whole thing about accountability is one of the things that happens in governance. Those who don't develop an immune system for lack of accountability are going to end up being stagnant and toothless. I feel very strongly about it as you can hear
Protocol to deal with elected members not showing up
**Nori **- This aligns with a card on the next column. protocols dealing with elected members not showing up so maybe we can move on to that one. Does anybody else have anything else to contribute there?
**Lauris **- maybe if person can’t come - he has his “representative”
it’s like a 2 person team - for each position
**Felix **- Maybe the admin team can draft a code of conduct for Catalyst Circle members which can evolve over iterations. But at a minimum you say if you present yourself to represent a group you are accountable to them as well. Catalyst Circle functions as a group and how you represent yourself and the actions you are doing falling back to the whole group as well. If people don't agree they don't have to sign up. But Circle is a commitment to something.
**Dor **- Funded proposers have a public table that shows who is and is not submitting reports. This is very effective because it creates visibility and transparency about who is accountable. So just having attendance sheets making Circle participation visible is already a social tool to drive better behavior.
Action Item : CC Admin team to draft code of conduct for CC v2
Action Item : CC Admin team to include public attendance sheet for CC v2
An official platform for CC members for communication with their communities/voters
**Nori **- I'm using the list column to write any notable takeaway action items. Another card that got two votes was “An official platform for CC members for communication with the communities or voters.” Who wrote that card? Do you want to add some more context?
**Lauris **- So basically, build a platform for the next Catalyst Circle to communicate with other members of the community. Currently there is no official communication channel. Catalyst Circle version 2 should have an official way to communicate. Not just internally but also for the community to contact us. Somewhere we can put some emails and other content. Make it more official and prominent.
**Nori **- I think that's a really good idea. It even adds legitimacy to the group if there's an official way to contact and to reach out.
**Dor **- I propose for Circle V2, if we get funding, to get a corporate Google account, like Google Apps (Google Workspace). So, each representative can access a common email domain for Circle communications.
And in the longer term, as Circle matures, maybe even start to go down the path of starting a DAO in Wyoming? To mitigate liability risks. I do think this is going to happen in V2, only something to consider in the longer term.
**Nori **- OK, I've taken that as a note. I think a DAO would be amazing for a number of our groups longer term. And I really look forward to seeing people building out smart contracts and systems on top of Cardano. A lot of groups would benefit from tending that way longer term especially just on the liability issue and legal standing. Any other thoughts or ideas on that card?
Lauris, you mentioned that you felt this was a lack. And I'm sure the CA's and Toolmakers and Maintainers kind of had a natural platform. Is that a shortcoming of the SPO space that it is a fractured community? That you don't have a single place where all SPOs are gathered?
**Lauris **- I am not sure that Toolmakers and Maintainers reached all the people in their community. We have platforms, but none owned by Catalyst circle. It is up to me to leave and to give somebody this access. I think we need an official platform so we can reach all people.
**Nori **- Would you see that as a combined official channel for all the seats? Or would each one have their own kind of official?
**Lauris **- Definitely each representative should have their own channel. A common channel would be great too. But I think Catalyst Townhall is already a good choice for common communication. But for SPOs, ADA holders, or anybody else there definitely should be some kind of channel which is owned by Catalyst Circle.
**Dor **- I would say that the nice thing about Circle is that it allows a bird’s eye perspective to understand problems within groups I'm not naturally involved with. That is the essence of the circle, right? And innovation within all these groups can be siloed or not siloed. I would super advocate for having a Slack channel (https://slack.com) for all the groups. Each group has their own channel, but also a big chance to intermingle. Because I think that's where this kind of value comes from. I like the idea of using a good, fully featured, collaboration platform like Slack versus something like Discord which is more adapted for video gamers. Something more work oriented. Like slack or an open-source alternative. And having some sort of a mailing list that people can subscribe to and get updates directly from the Circle itself. All of these would be great to try out and see how it works.
**Lauris **- Another solution is Mighty Networks (https://www.mightynetworks.com/). A platform where people can join different groups, there is chat, whatever we need without having software in order to connect. This will be something that CCV2 has to figure out. To find a solution to this is crucial.
If I can ask Felix and Victor, do you feel that you are reaching all Toolmakers, all groups, or is there something that is still missing. And would you also prefer to have some kind of platform ?
**Felix **- It is hard to really define what are Toolmakers and Maintainers, especially when it comes to Maintainers, what exactly is a Maintainer? What is the definition of a Maintainer? I was really focusing on the problems of the people within these groups, not looking so much for a specific group. People who constantly add value in the community, who constantly work without even being in the cohort or being rewarded for this. And, to your point, no, I don't think that it was possible to include all of them. Because you never know, when new people come in, all the initiatives in the ecosystem. Especially as it's growing really fast, really rapid.
**Victor **- For the CAs, I think it's easier to define who is a CA, and who is not. Most of them are in the CA Telegram or Discord group, but not all of them. At the beginning of Circle V1 during the second, or first week, I asked Dany to send an email to all the CAs who were subscribed to Ideascale, inviting them to participate in the problem sensing phase and subsequent phases as well. So, I think we reached out to every CA. But the participation of the CAs in the Circle itself was not that high. We have hundreds of active CAs assessing proposals, but a maximum of 40 to 50 actively participating in Catalyst circle initiatives. Which is good. But it's a small percentage of the whole population.
**Dor **- Felix pointed to an interesting problem about the defining toolmakers and maintainers. As there is some overlap between them and funded proposers. But they also have a unique perspective.
If I am building some random DEX versus building a component in the governance. Being a facilitator. For me, this is a tool, just like technology, that has a different perspective and needs.
It's important to acknowledge that this identity needs to be formed along with recognising that the people doing it are critical. Because it's such a fundamental part of the system.
Maybe a lot of people don't realize that being a facilitator or running a workshop means you are a tool maker and maintainer. People often associate it only with technology.
Maybe a new name, new label, maybe even a more formal definition or listing is required. I'm guessing there are around 25 different groups doing different things, probably half of them are Swarm related. Within that there's like lots of subgroups. Making that explicit and having a Toolmakers and Maintainers registry could really help.
I want to open it for like a short discussion to hear what you guys think? How do we continue to help the Toolmakers and Maintainers evolve their strong identity, strong support, stronger presentation?
**Nori **- Felix any thoughts ?
**Felix **- I would like to hear from others first. When we are close to something we make the worst observations sometimes.
**Victor **- I think T&M are defined almost by exclusion. If you are in the community, but not a CA or SPO, then you are a Toolmaker. Not even hosting a workshop, but just participating, giving ideas, and contributing to a discussion also helps build the ecosystem. It's difficult to define. But we need to improve the identification of people with this role. I would say just try to list but not limit the different roles that people can take within Catalyst that makes them a Toolmaker or Maintainer.
**Dor **- It's nice to use the lens of function. There are different functions, and one person can fill multiple functions. If the functions are in harmony, then it doesn't even matter who the people are, then the whole organism is in harmony. Toolmakers have very specific functions, right. Their function is to expose all the tools, methodologies and processes that will deliver better governance and like it's a huge task.
One thing we can do is put out a survey and ask everyone what tools they are currently maintaining, what is the methodology and what processes are they building.
**Nori **- Those are really good points. circling back to Felix, what are your thoughts on that topic?
**Felix **- My thoughts are constantly evolving. In my experience, I had a high focus on Gimbalabs for the specific case of Toolmakers and Maintainers. Because Gimbalabs is a group, a collective, a community which are building tools, which also educate and onboard people everything mapped into one project. This helped me a lot in the problem sensing to also look at which problems is this Gimbalabs group facing? Because this group represents in quite an effective way Toolmakers and Maintainers in general.
**Dor **- I can have different functions, hats, and intentions. I guess the question is where does it break down? Maybe a bit more analysis is required to identify concrete problems, issues, missed opportunities that are created with the current categorization. Then we can talk about the changes that can be made. So, an internal retrospective for the Toolmakers and Maintainers.
**Nori **- I think there is an opportunity to better define the T&M category. It seems like there is overlap. A lot of people in the community wear a lot of hats. I am an SPO, a CA, a proposer, I identify as a toolmaker and maintainer, and I am a general ADA voter. So, I fit all five categories of the electable positions. Maybe that is why I am on the admin team because I can contribute across the board.
Many people are in the same situation because everything we do involves a community, it's not like we were hired into a job with one function. A lot of us do a lot of little things and contribute where we can.
I've always wondered how to define T&M because it seems very rigid. When I hear it, I think about coding and tools and stuff. So, I appreciate Dor’s clarification, also including systems, mechanisms, and facilitation. And being able to communicate that would be a useful thing. Because that expands the category to make more of our community feel welcome and represented.
**Felix **- We have IOG, CF, ADA holders and CAs, then we have one group Toolmakers and Maintainers that includes two groups. From my perspective, this was often difficult. So, in a further state, it makes better sense to split them off. Also, to have better text, criteria for both, that are easier to map. Rather than put it all into one bucket.
**Dor **- “Technology is the sum of any techniques, skills, methods, and processes used in the production of goods or services or in the accomplishment of objectives, such as scientific investigation”
So facilitation is a technology. Retrospectives is a technology
**Lauris **- I think also that is a good idea, to better define the toolmakers and to split in smaller chunks. It's the same with SPOs, if you're doing something else, then you're in other groups. And most probably you are in the toolmaker group because there is nothing else. Should we have more people from more specific groups joining the Catalyst Circle?
**Felix **- For CAs, Funded Cohort and SPOS we have guidelines.
**Dor **- I think toolmakers should have guidelines as well. There definitely needs to be formalization of privacy, user rights etc. Right now, it's a group of early adopters. But what happens when someone creates a voting tool that is then used to extort or dox people? These things are going to happen. We are building an open API and driving towards an open ecosystem. And now is the time to put some principles in place that can help us evolve in the right direction.
**Nori **- OK, thank you. Let's wrap this up. Thanks for all of your input and conversation. I think a lot of us will be super useful for Circle v2. And I'm sure the admin team will have a lot of takeaways as well. Any final comments or reflections from Circle members ?
**Lauris **- A lot of things happened during these three months, and I think we learned a lot. And the community learned a lot about this as well. it's nice to see that we started something great, it will evolve and become more important. Also in decision power, etc. I hope this will be successful and provide a template that other people can copy into other areas. And, yeah, I'm happy to be part of that.
**Victor **- So, for me as well I am very happy to be part of the first Catalyst Circle, and I think it was a quite long journey. It was only three to four months, but it was very satisfying. At least for me, to help build the foundations for the future of governance. And I think that it's good that it's a short mandate because we can have different people working here with different perspectives. And at the same time, we can evaluate different approaches to similar problems. And I think this is very valuable.
**Dor **- Yeah, I think we were the lemmings crashing into all the crazy traps and challenges at the start and we have the scars to show it. But we did a phenomenal job. And I think we're leaving Circle V2 a good foundation for them to tackle weird new traps, going further than us. We led some important first things and showed that it can be done.
I think that there are very few people tracking all these conversations and noticing the progress. But the few who do can see the potential, they can see the progress made. What we accomplish with a bunch of volunteers working with not a lot of resources and support.
When we do get support and become incentivized then I think the sky's the limit. We have planted that seed. To show it's possible. And for that we are awesome, and we should feel good about ourselves.
**Felix **- I agree with what everybody said, and I have a huge respect for what everybody did.
In the beginning, it was said it's about leadership and I have a natural antipathy to authoritarianism and leadership. And I am really surprised seeing what leadership can look like. A group of people taking initiative and responsibility in a direction where nobody knows where to go leads to. So, I think we made some amazing, good steps in this direction on the right matters. We did not abuse our leadership roles. We stuck to the ground. We never described our code of conduct, but there was a natural code of conduct of respecting and listening to each other. Even when we disagreed, we somehow found a common ground. And in this regard, I think it was a total success, and I feel very honoured to be part of it.
And the last mark, Dor it's hard to catch up with you. You have really high levels of acting. And I know that I speak also for other people in the Catalyst Circle. You set the bar so high that you have an atmosphere of expectation around you. I think you are aware of this, which pushes people which pushes them extremely sometimes to that limit.
**Dor **- Thank you. I will process this. We need everybody to be well. I take it as a complement and something to work on.
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